''M 


ilia! 

Wim 


V 


ESSAYS, 


CRITICAL    AND    MISCELLANEOUS. 


BY 


T.  BABINGTON/MACAULAY 


BOSTON: 
PHILLIPS,    SAMPSON,    AND    COMPANY. 

1856. 


Al/7 


PUBLISHERS'  NOTICE. 


THE  very  general  and  high  commendation,  bestowed  by  the  press 
and  the  community  upon  the  American  edition  of  Macaulay's  Miscellaneous 
Writings,  has  induced  the  publishers  to  issue  a  new  afcd  cheap  edition 
embracing  the  remainder  of  the  articles  in  the  Edinburgh  Review,  and 
several  articles  written  and  published  while  the  author  was  at  college. 


M27SO45 


CONTENTS 


MlLTON   --«----•------.-.•.....         | 

Edinburgh  Review.    1825. 

MACHIAVELLI    .....................     19 

Edinburgh  Review.     1827. 

DRYDEN  -----.••-••............35 

Edinburgh  Review.     1828. 

--HISTORY '............51 

Edinburgh  Review.    1828. 

^  HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY     --.......-...67 

Edinburgh  Review.     1828. 

SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY      .............99 

Edinburgh  Review.     1830. 

VlooRE's  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON  ----.-...-...-    -116 

Edinburgh  Review.     1831. 

SOUTHEY'S  EDITION  OF  THE  PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS 128 

Edinburgh  Review.     1831. 

CROKER'S  EDITION  OF  BOSWELL'S  LIFE  OF  JOHNSON 135 

Edinburgh  Review.     1831, 

LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN «-..».-  151 

Edinburgh  Review.     1831. 

NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD  BURGHLEY      ...-.-....-        171 

Edinburgh  Review.     1832. 

DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS  OF  MIRABEAU  -.,.....-.-        182 

Edinburgh  Review.     1832. 

LORD  MAIION'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION       ...........  192 

Edinburgh  Review.     1333. 

WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN 211 

Edinburgh  Review.     1833. 

THACKERAY'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM     ........  2*20 

Edinburgh  Review.     1834. 

LORD  BACON 343 

Edinburgh  Review.     1837. 

^MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  REVOLUTION  IN  ENGLAND,  IN  1688    -    -    -  289 

Edinburgh  Review.     1835. 


Iv  CONTENTS. 

SIR  JOHN  MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  CLIVE 315 

Edinburgh  Review.     1840. 

LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE  -----.----  345 

Edinburgh  Review.    1838. 

CHURCH  AND  STATE  --          -----.----.-....  379 

Edinburgh  Review.     1839. 

RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  POPES 401 

Edinburgh  Review.     1840. 

Co\VLEY    AND    MlLTON     ----------.  ......    410 

ON  MITFORD'S  HISTORY  OF  GREECE     --.---.-----_  424 
ON  THE  ATHENIAN  ORATORS  -----•--.------.  433 

COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE  RESTORATION       ...........  439 

Edinburgh  Review.     1841. 

THE  LATE  LORD  HOLLAND 455 

Edinburgh  Review.     1841. 

WARREN  HASTINGS 460 

Edinburgh  Renew.     184!. 

FREDERIC  THE  GREAT   -----•----.-------  502 

Edinburgh  Review.     1842. 

LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME  .---•--•----«----  531 

Preface 533 

Horatius 540 

The  Battle  of  the  Lake  Regillus 547 

Virginia ..-..--•--.-.-_  550 

The  Prophecy  of  Capys 563 

APPENDIX .---..--.......  569 

MADAME  D'ARBLAY 573 

Edinburgh  Review.    January,  1843. 

LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON  -----.---------  594 

Edinburgh  Review.    July,  1843. 

EARERE'S  MEMOIRS      -------.-----•-----  624 

Edinburgh  Review.    April,  1844. 

MR.  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS  --------------  657 

Edinburgh  Review.    April,  1830. 

CIVIL  DISABILITIES  OF  THE  JEWS    ---------------  665 

MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT  ----------------  670 

Edinburgh  Review.    March,  1829. 

BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL  ----------------  684 

Edinburgh  Review.    June,  1829. 

UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT 696 

Edinburgh  Review.     October,  1829. 
THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM 709 

Edinburgh  Review.     October,  1844. 

SPEECH  ON  INSTALLATION  AS  LORD  RECTOR  OF  GLASGOW  UNIVERSITY  -     -     -  740 
SPEECH  ON  RETIRING  FROM  POLITICAL  LIFE 743 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANIES, 


MILTON.' 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1825.] 


TOWARDS  the  close  of  the  year  1823,  Mr.  Le 
mon,  Deputy  Keeper  of  the  State  Papers,  in  the 
course  of  his  researches  among  the  presses  of 
his  office,  met  with  a  large  Latin  manuscript. 
With  it  were  found  corrected  copies  of  the 
foreign  despatches  written  by  Milton,  while  he 
filled  the  office  of  Secretary,  and  several  papers 
relating  to  the  Popish  Trials  and  the  Rye-house 
Plot.  The  whole  was  wrapped  up  in  an  enve 
lope,  superscribed  "  To  Mr.  Skinner,  Merchant." 
On  examination,  the  large  manuscript  proved 
to  be  the  long  lost  Essay  on  the  Doctrines  of 
Christianity,  which,  according  to  Wood  and 
Toland,  Milton  finished  after  the  Restoration, 
and  deposited  with  Cyriac  Skinner.  Skinner, 
it  is  well  known,  held  the  same  political  opi 
nions  with  his  illustrious  friend.  It  is  therefore 
probable,  as  Mr.  Lemon  conjectures,  that  he 
may  have  fallen  under  the  suspicions  of  the 
government  during  that  persecution  of  the 
Whigs  which  followed  the  dissolution  of  the 
Oxford  Parliament,  and  that,  in  consequence 
of  a  general  seizure  of  his  papers,  this  work 
may  have  been  brought  to  the  office  in  which 
it  had  been  found.  But  whatever  the  adven 
tures  of  the  manuscript  may  have  been,  no 
doubt  can  exist,  that  it  is  a  genuine  relic  of  the 
great  poet. 

Mr.  Sumner,  who  was  commanded  by  his 
majesty  to  edit  and  translate  the  treatise,  has 
acquitted  himself  of  this  task  in  a  manner 
honourable  to  his  talents  and  to  his  character. 
His  version  is  not  indeed  very  easy  or  elegant ; 
but  it  is  entitled  to  the  praise  of  clearness  and 
fidelity.  His  notes  abound  with  interesting 
quotations,  and  have  the  rare  merit  of  really 
eJucidating  the  text.  The  preface  is  evidently 
the  work  of  a  sensible  and  candid  ma,n,  firm  in 
fcis  own  religious  opinions,  and  tolerant  to 
wards  those  of  others. 

The  book  itself  will  not  add  much  to  the 
fame  of  Milton.  It  is,  like  all  his  Latin  works, 
well  written — though  not  exactly  in  the  style 
of  the  Prize  Essays  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge. 
There  is  no  elaborate  imitation  of  classical 


*Juannis  Miltoni,  Angli^de  Dnc.irina  Christiana  libri 
dun  pfini.hii.ini.  A  Treatise  on  Christian  Doctrine,  com 
piled  from  th?  Holy  Scriptures  alone.  By  JOHN  MILTON, 
transliitud  from  the  original  by  Charles  R.  Sumner, 
M.  A..&C.  &c.  1825. 
VOL.  I.— I 


antiquity,  no  scrupulous  purity,  none  of  the 
ceremonial  cleanness  which  characterizes  the 
diction  of  our  academical  Pharisees.  He  does 
not  attempt  to  polish  and  brighten  his  composi 
tion  into  the  Ciceronian  gloss  and  brilliancy. 
He  does  not,. in  short,  sacrifice  sense  and  spirit 
to  pedantic  refinements.  The  nature  of  his 
subject  compelled  him  to  use  many  words 

•*  That  would  have  made  Quintiiian  stare  and  gasp." 

But  he  writes  with  as  much  ease  and  freedom 
as  if  Latin  were  his  mother  tongue ;  and 
where  he  is  least  happy,  his  failure  seems  to 
arise  from  the  carelessness  of  a  native,  not 
from  the  ignorance  of  a  foreigner.  What  Den- 
ham  with  great  felicity  says  of  Cowley,  may  be 
applied  to  him.  He  wears  the  garb,  but  not 
the  clothes,  of  the  ancients. 

Throughout  the  volume  are  discernible  the 
traces  of  a  powerful  and  independent  mind, 
emancipated  from  the  influence  of  authority, 
and  devoted  to  the  search  of  truth.  He  pro 
fesses  to  form  his  system  from  the  Bible  alone; 
and  his  digest  of  Scriptural  texts  is  certainly 
among  the  best  that  have  appeared.  But  he  is 
not  always  so  happy  in  his  inferences  as  in  his 
citations. 

Some  of  the  heterodox  opinions  which  he 
avows  seem  to  have  excited  considerable 
amazement:  particularly  his  Arianism,  and 
his  notions  on  the  subject  of  polygamy.  Yet 
we  can  scarcely  conceive  that  any  person 
could  have  read  the  Paradise  Lost  without 
suspecting  him  of  the  former,  nor  do  we  thfok 
that  any  reader,  acquainted  with  the  history  cf 
his  life,  ought  to  be  much  startled  at  the  latter. 
The  opinions  which  he  has  expressed  respect 
ing  the  nature  of  the  Deity,  the  eternity  ot  mat 
ter,  and  the  observation  of  the  Sabbath,  might, 
we  think,  have  caused  more  just  surprise. 

But  we  will  not  go  into  the  discussion  of 
these  points.  The  book,  were  it  far  more  or 
thodox,  or  far  more  heretical  than  it  is,  would 
not  much  edify  or  corrupt  the  present  genera 
tion.  The  men  of  our  time  are  not  to  be  coil 
verted  or  perverted  by  quartos.  A  few  more 
days,  and  this  Essay  will  follow  the  Defense 
Popidl  to  the  dust  and  silence  of  the  upper 
shelf.  The  name  of  its  author,  and  the  re 
markable  circumstances  attending  it? 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


don,  will  secure  to  it  a  certain  degree  of  atten 
tion.  For  a  month  or  two  it  will  occupy  a  few 
minutes  of  chat  in  every  drawing-room,  and  a 
few  columns  in  every  magazine ;  and  it  will 
then,  to  borrow  the  elegant  language  of  the 
play-bills,  be  withdrawn,  to  make  room  for  the 
forthcoming  novelties. 

We  wish,  however,  to  avail  ourselves  of  the 
interest,  transient  as  it  may  be,  which  this 
work  has  excited.  The  dexterous  Capuchins 
never  choose  to  preach  on  the  life  and  mira 
cles  of  a  saint,  till  they  have  awakened  the 
devotional  feelings  of  their  auditors,  by  exhi 
biting  some  relic  of  him — a  thread  of  his  gar 
ment,  a  lock  of  his  hair,  or  a  drop  of  his  blood. 
On  the  same  principle,  we  intend  to  take  ad 
vantage  of  the  late  interesting  discovery,  and, 
while  this  memorial  of  a  great  and  good  man 
is  still  in  the  hands  of  all,  to  say  something  of 
his  moral  and  intellectual  qualities.  Nor,  we 
are  convinced,  will  the  severest  of  our  readers 
blame  us  if,  on  an  occasion  like  the  present, 
we  turn  for  a  short  time  from  the  topics  of  the 
day  to  commemorate,  in  all  love  and  reve 
rence,  the  genius  and  virtues  of  John  Milton, 
the  poet,  the  statesman,  the  philosopher,  the 
glory  of  English  literature,  the  champion  and 
the  martyr  of  English  liberty. 

It  is  by  his  poetry  that  Milton  is  best  known; 
and  it  is  of  his  poetry  that  we  wish  first  to 
speak.  By  the  general  suffrage  of  the  civilized 
world,  his  place  has  been  assigned  among  the 
greatest  masters  of  the  art.  His  detractors, 
however,  though  out-voted,  have  not  been 
silenced.  There  are  many  critics,  and  some 
oi  great  name,  who  contrive,  in  the  same 
breath,  to  extol  the  poems  and  to  decry  the  poet. 
The  works,  they  acknowledge,  considered  in 
themselves,  may  be  classed  among  the  noblest 
productions  of  the  human  mind.  But  they  will 
not  allow  the  author  to  rank  with  those  great 
men  who,  born  in  the  infancy  of  civilization, 
supplied,  by  their  own  powers,  the  want  of  in 
struction,  and,  though  destitute  of  models  them 
selves,  bequeathed  to  posterity  models  which 
defy  imitation.  Milton,  it  is  said,  inherited 
what  his  predecessors  created ;  he  lived  in  an 
enlightened  age;  he  received  a  finished  edu 
cation  ;  and  we  must  therefore,  if  we  would 
form,  a  just  estimate  of  his  powers,  make  large 
deductions  for  these  advantages. 

We  venture  to  say,  on  the  contrary,  para 
doxical  as  the  remark  may  appear,  that  no 
poet  has  ever  had  to  struggle  with  more  un 
favourable  circumstances  than  Milton.  He 
doubted,  as  he  has  himself  owned,  whether 
he  had  not  been  born  "  an  age  too  late."  For 
this  notion  Johnson  has  thought  fit  to  make 
him  the  butt  of  his  clumsy  ridicule.  The  poet, 
we  believe,  understood  the  nature  of  his  art 
better  than  the  crilic.  He  knew  that  his  poeti 
cal  genius  derived  no  advantage  from  the 
civili/ation  which  surrounded  him,  or  from 
the  learning  which  he  had  acquired :  and  he 
looked  back  with  something  like  regret  to  the 
juder  age  of  simple  words  and  vivid  impres 
sions. 

We  think  that,  as  civilization  advances,  po 
etry  almost  necessarily  declines.  Therefore, 
though  we  admire  those  great  works  of  imagi 
nation  which  have  appeared  in  dark  ages,  we 


do  not  admire  them  the  more  because  thej 
have  appeared  in  dark  ages.  On  the  contrary 
we  hold  that  the  most  wonderful  and  splendid 
proof  of  genius  is  a  great  poem  produced  in  a 
civilized  age.  We  cannot  understand  why 
those  \vho  believe  in  that  most  orthodox  article 
of  literary  faith,  that  the  earliest  poets  are 
generally  the  best,  should  wonder  at  the  rule 
as  if  it  were  the  exception.  Surely  the  uni 
formity  of  the  phenomenon  indicates  a  corres 
ponding  uniformity  in  the  cause. 

The  fact  is,  that  common  observers  reason 
from  the  progress  of  the  experimental  sciences 
to  that  of  the  imitative  arts.  The  improve 
ment  of  the  former  is  gradual  and  slow.  Ages 
are  spent  in  collecting  materials,  ages  more  in 
separating  and  combining  them.  Even  when 
a  system  has  been  formed,  there  is  still  some 
thing  to  add,  to  alter,  or  to  reject.  Every  gene 
ration  enjoys  the  use  of  a  vast  hoard  be 
queathed  to  it  by  antiquity,  and  transmits  it, 
augmented  by  fresh  acquisitions,  to  future 
ages.  In  these  pursuits,  therefore,  the  firs* 
speculators  lie  under  great  disadvantages,  and, 
even  when  they  fail,  are  entitled  i.o  praise. 
Their  pupils,  with  far  inferior  intellectual 
powers,  speedily  surpass  them  in  actual  attain 
ments.  Every  girl,  who  has  read  Mrs.  Maicet's 
little  Dialogues  on  Political  Economy,  could 
teach  Montague  or  Walpole  many  lessons  in 
finance.  Any  intelligent  man  may  now,  by 
resolutely  applying  himself  for  a  few  years  to 
mathematics,  learn  more  than  the  great  New 
ton  knew  after  half  a  century  of  study  and 
meditation. 

But  it  is  not  thus  with  music,  with  painting, 
or  with  sculpture.  Still  less  is  it  thus  with  po 
etry.  The  progress  of  refinement  rarely  sup 
plies  these  arts  with  better  objects  of  imitation. 
It  may,  indeed,  improve  the  instruments  which 
are  necessary  to  the  mechanical  operations  of 
the  musician,  the  sculptor,  and  the  painter. 
But  language,  the  machine  of  the  poet,  is  best 
fitted  for  his  purpose  in  its  rudest  state.  Na 
tions,  like  individuals,  first  perceive,  and  then 
abstract.  They  advance  from  particular  im 
ages  to  general  terms.  Hence,  the  vocabulary 
of  an  enlightened  society  is  philosophical,  that 
of  a  half-civilized  people  is  poetical. 

This  change  in  the  language  of  men  is  part 
ly  the  cause,  and  partly  the  effect  of  a  corres 
ponding  change  in  the  nature  of  their  intellec 
tual  operations,  a  change  by  which  science 
gains,  and  poetry  loses.  Generalization  is  ne 
cessary  to  the  advancement  of  knowledge,  but 
particularly  in  the  creations  of  the  imagination. 
In  proportion  as  men  know  more,  and  think 
more,  they  look  less  at  individuals  and  more 
at  classes.  They  therefore  make  better  theo 
ries  and  worse  poems.  They  give  us  vague 
phrases  instead  of  images,  and  personified 
qualities  instead  of  men.  They  may  be  better 
able  to  analyze  human  nature  than  their  pre 
decessors.  But  analysis  is  not  the  business 
of  the  poet.  His  office  is  to  portray,  not  to  dis 
sect.  He  may  believe  in  a  morai  ser  se,  like 
Shaftesbury.  He  may  refer  all  human  actions 
to  self-interest,  like  Helvetius,  or  he  may  never 
think  about  the  matter  at  all.  His  creed  on 
such  subjects  will  no  more  influence  his 
poetry,  properly  so  called,  than  the  notions 


MILTON. 


which  a  painter  may  have  conceived  respecting  |  good  ones — but  little  poetry.  Men  will  judge 
the  lachrymal  glands,  or  the  circulation  of  the  |  and  compare ;  but  they  will  not  create.  They 
blood  will  affect  the  tears  of  his  Niobe,  or  the  j  will  talk  about  the  old  poets,  and  comment  on 
"blushes  of  his  Aurora.  If  Shakspeare  had  I  them,  and  to  a  certain  degree  enjoy  them, 
written  a  book  on  the  motives  of  human  ac-  \  But  they  will  scarcely  be  able  to  conceive  the 
tions,  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  it  would  effect  which  poetry  produced  on  their  ruder 


have  been  a  good  one.  It  is  extremely  impro 
bable  that  it  would  have  contained  half  so 
much  able  reasoning  on  the  subject  as  is  to  be 
found  in  the  "  Fable  of  the  Bees."  But  could 
Maude ville  have  created  an  lago  1 
knew  how  to  resolve  characters  into  their  ele 
ments,  would  he  have  been  able  to  combine 
those  elements  in  such  a  manner  as  to  make 
up  a  man — a  real,  living,  individual  man  1 

Perhaps  no  man  can  be  a  poet,  or  can  even 
enjoy  poetry,  without  a  certain  unsoundness 
of  mind,  if  any  thing  which  gives  so  much 
pleasure  ought  to  be  called  unsoundness.  By 
poetry  we  mean,  not  of  course  all  writing  in 
verse,  nor  even  all  good  writing  in  verse. 
Our  definition  excludes  many  metrical  compo 
sitions  which,  on  other  grounds,  deserve  the 
highest  praise.  By  poetry  we  mean,  the  art  of 
employing  words  in  such  a  mariner  as  to  pro 
duce  an  illusion  on  the  imagination :  the  art  of 
doing  by  means  of  words  what  the  painter  does 
by  means  of  colours.  Thus  the  greatest  of 
poets  has  described  it,  in  lines  universally  ad 
mired  for  the  vigour  and  felicity  of  their  dic 
tion,  and  still  more  valuable  on  account  of  the 
just  notion  which  they  convey  of  the  art  in 
which  he  excelled. 

"  As  imagination  bodies  forth 
The  forms  of  things  unknown,  the  poet's  pen 
Turns  them  to  shapes,  and  gives  to  airy  nothing 
A  local  habitation  and  a  name." 

These  are  the  fruits  of  the  "  fine  frenzy"  which 
he  ascribes  to  the  poet — a  fine  frenzy  doubtless, 
but  still  a  frenzy.  Truth,  indeed,  is  essential 
to  poetry;  but  it  is  the  truth  of  madness.  The 
reasonings  are  just;  but  the  premises  are  false. 
After  the  first  suppositions  have  been  made, 
everything  ought  to  be  consistent;  but  those 
first  suppositions  require  a  degree  of  credulity 
•which  almost  amounts  to  a  partial  and  tempo 
rary  derangement  of  the  intellect.  Hence,  of 
all  people,  children  are  the  most  imaginative. 
They  abandon  themselves  without  reserve  to 
every  illusion.  Every  image  which  is  strongly 
presented  to  their  mental  eye  produces  on 
them  the  effect  of  reality.  No  man,  whatever 
his  sensibility  may  be,  is  ever  affected  by 
Hamlet  or  Lear,  as  a  little  girl  is  affected  by 
the  story  of  poor  Red  Riding-hood.  She  knows 
that  it  is  all  false,  that  wolves  cannot  speak, 
that  there  are  no  wolves  in  England.  Yet  in 
spite  of  her  knowledge  she  Relieves ;  she 
weeps,  she  trembles  ;  she  dares  not  go  into  a 
dark  room  lest  she  should  feel  the  teeth  of  the 
monster  at  her  throat.  Such  is  the  despotism 
of  the  imagination  over  uncultivated  minds. 


In  a  rude  state  of  society,  men  are  children 
with  a  greater  variety  of  ideas.  It  is  there 
fore  in  such  a  state  of  society  that  we  may 
expect  to  find  the  poetical  temperament  in  its 
highest  perfection.  In  an  enlightened  age 
there  will  be  much  intelligence,  much  science, 
much  philosophy,  abundance  of  just  classifica 
tion  and  subtle  analysis,  abundance  of  wit  and  ' 
eloquence,  abundance  of  verses,  and  even  of 


ancestors,  the  agony,  the  ecstasy,  the  plenitude 
of  belief.  The  Greek  Rhapsodists,  according  to 
Plato,  could  not  recite  Homer  without  almost 
falling  into  convulsions.*  The  Mohawk  hardly 
Well  as  he  feels  the  scalping-knife  while  he  shouts  his 
death-song.  The  power  which  the  ancient 
bards  of  Wales  and  Germany  exercised  over 
their  auditors  seems  to  modern  readers  almost 
miraculous.  Such  feelings  are  very  rare  in  a 
civilized  community,  and  most  rare  among 
those  who  participate  most  in  its  improve 
ments.  They  linger  longest  .among  the  pea 
santry. 

Poetry  produces  an  illusion  on  the  eye  of  the 
mind,  as  a  magic  lantern  produces  an  illusion 
on  the  eye  of  the  body.  And,  as  the  magic 
lantern  acts  best  in  a  dark  room,  poetry  effect^ 
its  purpose  most  completely  in  a  dark  age. 
As  the  light  of  knowledge  breaks  in  upon  its 
exhibitions,  as  the  outlines  of  certainty  be 
come  more  and  more  definite,  and  the  shades 
of  probability  more  and  more  distinct,  the 
hues  and  lineaments  of  the  phantoms  which  it 
calls  up  grow  fainter  and  fainter.  We  cannot 
unite  the  incompatible  advantages  of  reality 
and  deception,  the  clear  discernment  of  tru^i 
and  the  exquisite  enjoyment  of  fiction. 

He  who,  in  an  enlightened  and  literary 
society,  aspires  to  be  a  great  poet,  must  first 
become  a  little  child.  He  must  take  to  pieces 
the  whole  web  of  his  mind.  He  must  unlearn 
much  of  that  knowledge  which  has  perhaps 
constituted  hitherto  his  chief  title  of  supe 
riority.  His  very  talents  will  be  a  hinderance 
to  him.  His  difficulties  will  be  proportioned 
to  his  proficiency  in  the  pursuits  which  are 
fashionable  among  his  contemporaries ;  and 
that  proficiency  will  in  general  be  proportioned 
to  the  vigour  and  activity  of  his  mind.  And 
it  is  well,  if,  after  all  his  sacrifices  and  exer 
tions,  his  works  do  not  resemble  a  lisping 
man,  or  a  modern  ruin.  We  have  seen  in  our 
own  time,  great  talents,  intense  labour,  and 
long  meditation,  employed  in  this  struggle 
against  the  spirit  of  the  age,  and  employed, 
we  will  not  say,  absolutely  in  vain,  but  with 
dubious  success  and  feeble  applause. 

If  these  reasonings  be  just,  no  poet  has 
ever  triumphed  over  greater  difficulties  than 
Milton.  He  received  a  learned  education. 
He  was  a  profound  and  elegant  classical 
scholar:  he  had  studied  all  the  mysteries  of 
Rabbinical  literature :  he  was  intimately  ac 
quainted  with  every  language  of  modern  Eu 
rope,  from  which  either  pleasure  or  information 
was  then  to  be  derived.  He  was  perhaps  the 
only  great  poet  of  later  times  who  has  been 
distinguished  by  the  excellence  of  his  Latin 
verse.  The  genius  of  Petrarch  was  scarcely 
of  the  first  order;  and  his  poems  in  the  ancient 
language,  though  much  praised  by  those  who 
have  never  read  them,  are  wretched  com 
positions.  Cowley,  with  all  his  admirable  wit 


*  See  the  Dialogue  between  Socrates  and  !o 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  ingenul.y,  had  little  imagination ;  nor 
indeed  do  we  think  his  classical  diction  com 
parable  to  that  of  Milton.  The  authority  of 
Johnson  is  against  us  on  this  point.  But 
Johnson  had  studied  the  bad  writers  of  the 
middle  ages  till  he  had  become  utterly  insen 
sible  to  the  Augustan  elegance,  and  was  as  ill 
qualiiied  to  judge  between  two  Latin  styles 
as  an  habitual  drunkard  to  set  up  for  a  wine- 
taster. 

Versification  in  a  dead  language  is  an  exotic, 
a  far-fetched,  costly,  sickly  imitation  of  that 
which  elsewhere  may  be  found  in  healthful 
and  spontaneous  perfection.  The  soils  on 
which  this  rarity  flourishes  are  in  general  as 
ill  suited  to  the  production  of  vigorous  native 
poetry,  as  the  flower-pots  of  a  hot-house  to  the 
growth  of  oaks.  That  the  author  of  the  Para 
dise  Lost  should  have  written  the  Epistle  to 
Manso,  was  truly  wonderful.  Never  before 
were  such  marked  originality  and  such  ex 
quisite  mimicry  found  together.  Indeed,  in  all 
the  Latin  poems  of  Milton,  the  artificial  manner 
indispensable  to  such  works  is  admirably  pre 
served,  while,  at  the  same  time,  the  richness 
of  his  fancy  and  the  elevation  of  his  senti 
ments  give  to  them  a  peculiar  charm,  an  air 
of  nobleness  and  freedom,  which  distinguishes 
them  from  all  other  writings  of  the  same  class. 
They  remind  us  of  the  amusements  of  those 
angelic  warriors  who  composed  the  cohort  of 
Gabriel: 

"About  him  exercised  heroic  games 
The  unarmed  youth  of  heaven.    Hut  o'er  their  heads 
Celestial  armory,  shield,  helm,  and  spear, 
Hung  bright,  with  diamond  flaming  and  with  gold." 

We  cannot  look  upon  the  sportive  exercises 
for  which  the  genius  of  Milton  ungirds  itself, 
without  catching  a  glimpse  of  the  gorgeous 
and  terrible  panoply  which  it  is  accustomed 
to  wear.  The  strength  of  his  imagination 
triumphed  over  every  obstacle.  So  intense 
and  ardent  was  the  fire  of  his  mind,  that  it  not 
only  was  not  suffocated  beneath  the  weight 
of  its  fuel,  but  penetrated  the  whole  super 
incumbent  mass  with  its  own  heat  and  ra 
diance. 

It  is  not  our  intention  to  attempt  any  thing 
like  a  complete  examination  of  the  poetry  of 
Miiton.  The  public  has  long  been  agreed  as 
to  the  merit  of  the  most  remarkable  passages 
the  incomparable  harmony  of  the  numbers 
and  the  excellence  of  that  style  which  no  rival 
has  been  able  to  equal,  and  no  parodist  to 
degrade,  which  displays  in  their  highest  per 
fection  the  idiomatic  powers  of  the  English 
tongue,  and  to  which  every  ancient  and  every 
modern  language  has  contributed  something 
of  grace,  of  energy,  or  of  music.  In  the  vasl 
field  of  criticism  in  which  we  are  entering 
innumerable  reapers  have  already  put  their 
'  sickles.  Yet  the  harvest  is  so  abundant  that 
the  negligent  search  of  a  straggling  gleaner 
may  be  rewarded  with  a  sheaf. 

The  most  striking  characteristic  of  the  poetry 
of  Milton   is  the  extreme   remoteness  of  th 
associations,  by  means  of  which  it  acts  on  th 
reader.     Its  effect   is  produced,  not  so  much 
by  what  it.  expresses,  as  by  what  ii  suggests 
imi  so  much   by  the   ideas  which  it  directl) 
conveys,  a*    by  other  ideas  which   are   con 


nected  with  them.  He  electrifies  the  mind 
hrough  conductors.  The  most  unimaginative 
nan  must  understand  the  Iliad.  Homer  gives 
im  no  choice,  and  requires  from  him  no  txer- 
ion ;  but  takes  the  whole  upon  himself,  and 
ets  his  images  in  so  clear  a  light  that  it  is 
mpossible  to  be  blind  to  them.  The  works 
f  Milton  cannot  be  comprehended  or  enjoyed, 
unless  the  mind  of  the  reader  co-operate  with 
hat  of  the  writer.  He  does  not  paint  a  finished 
icture,  or  play  for  a  mere  passive  listener. 
le  sketches,  and  leaves  others  to  fill  up  the 
utline.  He  strikes  the  key-note,  and  expects 
lis  hearer  to  make  out  the  melody. 

We  often  hear  of  the  magical  influence 
f  poetry.  The  expression  in  general  means 
nothing;  but,  applied  to  the  writings  of  Milton, 
t  is  most  appropriate.  His  poetry  acts  like 
an  incantation.  Its  merit  lies  less  in  its 
jbvious  meaning  than  in  its  occult  power. 
There  would  seem,  at  first  sight,  to  be  no  more 
n  his  words  than  in  other  words.  But  they 
are  words  of  enchantment;  no  sooner  are  they 
•(renounced  than  the  past  is  present,  and.  the 
distant  near.  New  forms  of  beauty  start  at 
once  into  existence,  and  all  the  burial  places 
of  the  memory  give  up  their  dead.  Change 
he  structure  of  the  sentence,  substitute  one 
synonyme  for  another,  and  the  whole  effect  is 
destroyed.  The  spell  loses  its  power:  and  he 
who  should  then  hope  to  conjure  with  it,  would 
find  himself  as  much  mistaken  as  Cassim  in 
the  Arabian  tale,  when  he  stood  crying,  "  Open 
Wheat,"  "  Open  Barley,"  to  the  door  which 
obeyed  no  sound  but  "  Open  Sesame  !"  The 
miserable  failure  of  Dryden,  in  his  attempt  to 
rewrite  some  parts  of  the  Paradise  Lost,  is  a 
remarkable  instance  of  this. 

In  support  of  these  observations  we  may 
remark,  that  scarcely  any  passages  in  the 
poems  of  Milton  are  more  generally  known, 
or  more  frequently  repeated,  than  those  which 
are  little  more  than  muster  rolls  of  names. 
They  are  not  always  more  appropriate  or 
more  melodious  than  other  names.  But  they 
are  charmed  names.  Every  one  :f  them  is 
the  first  link  in  a  long  chain  of  associated 
ideas.  Like  the  dwelling-place  of  our  infancy 
revisited  in  manhood,  like  the  song  of  our 
country  heard  in  a  strange  land,  they  produce 
upon  us  an  effect  wholly  independent  of  their 
intrinsic  value.  One  transports  us  back  to  a 
remote  period  of  history.  Another  places  us 
among  the  moral  scenery  and  manners  of  a 
distant  country.  A  third  evokes  all  the  dear 
classical  recollections  of  childhood,  the  school 
room,  the  dog-eared  Virgil,  the  holiday,  and 
the  prize.  A  fourth  brings  before  us  the 
splendid  phantoms  of  chivalrous  romance, 
the  trophied  lists,  the  embroidered  housings, 
the  quaint  devices,  the  haunted  forests,  the 
enchanted  gardens,  the  achievements  of  ena 
moured  knights,  and  the  smiles  of  rescued 
princesses. 

In  none  of  the  works  of  Milton  is  his  pecu 
liar  manner  more  happily  displayed  than  in 
the  Allegro  and  the  Penseroso.  It  is  impossi 
ble  to  conceive  that  the  mechanism  of  language 
can  be  brought  to  a  more  exquisite  degree  of 
perfection.  These  poems  differ  from  others 
as  ottar  of  roses  differs  from  ordinary  rose. 


MILTON. 


water,  the  close  packed  essence  from  the  thin 
diluted  mixture.     They  are  indeed  not  so  much 


poem 


collections  of  hints,  from  each  of 


-which  the  reader  is  to  make  out  a  poem  for 
himself.  Every  epithet  is  a  text  for  a  canto. 

The  Comus  and  the  Samson  Agonistes  are 
works,  which,  though  of  very  different  merit, 
offer  some  marked  points  of  resemblance. 
They  are  both  Lyric  poems  in  the  form  of 
Plays.  There  are  perhaps  no  two  kinds  of 
composition  so  essentially  dissimilar  as  the 
drama  and  the  ode.  The  business  of  the  dra 
matist  is  to  keep  himself  out  of  sight,  and  to 
let  nothing  appear  but  his  characters.  As 
soon  as  he  attracts  notice  to  his  personal  feel 
ings,  the  illusion  is  broken.  The  effect  is  as 
unpleasa-nt  as  that  which  is  produced  on  the 
stage  by  the  voice  of  a  prompter,  or  the  en 
trance  of  a  scene-shifter.  Hence  it  was  that 
the  tragedies  of  Byron  were  his  least  success 
ful  performances.  They  resemble  those  paste 
board  pictures  invented  by  the  friend  of  child 
ren,  Mr.  Newberry,  in  which  a  single  movable 
head  goes  around  twenty  different  bodies ;  so 
that  the  same  face  looks  out  upon  us  succes 
sively,  from  the  uniform  of  a  hussar,  the  furs 
of  a  judge,  and  the  rags  of  a  beggar.  In  all 
the  characters,  patriots  and  tyrants,  haters  and 
lovers,  the  frown  and  sneer  of  Harold  were 
discernible  in  an  instant.  But  this  species  of 
egotism,  though  fatal  to  the  drama,  is  the  inspi 
ration  of  the  ode.  It  is  the  part  of  the  lyric 
poet  to  abandon  himself,  without  reserve,  to  his 
own  emotions. 

Between  these  hostile  elements  many  great 
men  have  endeavoured  to  effect  an  amalgama 
tion,  but  never  with  complete  success.  The 
Greek  drama,  on  the  model  of  which  the  Sam 
son  was  written,  sprung  from  the  Ode.  The 
dialogue  was  ingrafted  on  the  chorus,  and 
naturally  partook  of  its  character.  The  genius 
of  the  greatest  of  the  Athenian  dramatists  co 
operated  with  the  circumstances  under  which 
tragedy  made  its  first  appearance.  ^Eschylus 
was,  head  and  heart,  a  lyric  poet.  In  his  time, 
the  Greeks  had  far  more  intercourse  with  the 
East  than  in  the  days  of  Homer ;  and  they  had 
not  yet  acquired  that  immense  superiority  in 
war,  in  science,  and  in  the  arts,  which,  in  the 
following  generation,  led  them  to  treat  the 
Asiatics  with  contempt.  From  the  narrative 
of  Herodotus,  it  should  seem  that  they  still 
looked  up.  with  the  veneration  of  disciples,  to 
Egypt  and  Assyria.  At  this  period,  accord 
ingly,  it  was  natural  that  the  literature  of 
Greece  should  be  tinctured  with  the  Oriental 
style.  And  that  style,  we  think,  is  clearly 
discernible  in  the  works  of  Pindar  and  /Eschy- 
lus.  The  latter  often  reminds  us  of  the  He 
brew  writers.  The  book  of  Job,  indeed,  in 
conduct  and  diction,  bears  a  considerable  re 
semblance  to  some  of  his  dramas.  Considered 
as  plays,  his  works  are  absurd :  considered  as 
choruses,  they  are  above  all  praise.  If,  for 
instance,  we  examine  the  address  of  Clytem- 
nestra  to  Agamemnon  on  his  return,  or  the  de 
scription  of  the  seven  Argive  chiefs,  by  the 
principles  of  dramatic  writing,  we  shall  in 
stantly  condemn  them  as  monstrous.  But,  if 
we  forget  the  characters,  and  think  only  of  the 
poetry,  we  shall  admit  that  it  has  never  been 


surpassed  in  energy  and  magnificc  ice.  So 
phocles  made  the  Greek  drama  as  dramatic  as 
was  consistent  with  its  original  form.  His 
portraits  of  men  have  a  sort  of  similarity ;  but 
it  is  the  similarity  not  of  a  painting,  but  of  a 
bas-relief.  It  suggests  a  resemblance ;  but  it 
does  not  produce  an  illusion.  Euripides  at 
tempted  to  carry  the  reform  further.  But  it 
was  a  task  far  beyond  his  powers,  perhaps  l:e- 
yond  any  powers.  Instead  of  correcting  what 
was  bad,  he  destroyed  what  war,  excellent.  He 
substituted  crutches  for  stilts,  bad  sermons  for 
good  odes. 

Milton,  it  is  well  known,  admired  Euripi  Jes 
highly;  much  more  highly  than,  in  our  opinion, 
he  deserved.  Indeed,  the  caresses,  which  this 
partiality  leads  him  to  bestow  on  "  sad  Elec- 
tra's  poet/'  sometimes  reminds  us  of  the  beau 
tiful  Queen  of  Fairy-land  kissing  the  long  ears 
of  Bottom.  At  all  events,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  this  veneration  for  the  Athenian, 
Avhether  just  or  not,  was  injurious  to  the  Sam 
son  Agonistes.  Had  he  taken  yEschylus  for 
his  model,  he  would  have  given  himself  up  to 
the  lyric  inspiration,  and  poured  out  profusely 
all  the  treasures  of  his  mind,  without  bestow 
ing  a  thought  on  those  dramatic  proprieties 
which  the  nature  of  the  work  rendered  it  im 
possible  to  preserve.  In  the  attempt  to  recon 
cile  things  in  their  own  nature  inconsistent,  he 
has  failed,  as  every  one  must  have  failed.  We 
cannot  identify  ourselves  with  the  characters, 
as  in  a  good  play.  We  cannot  identify  our 
selves  with  the  poet,  as  in  a  good  ode.  The 
conflicting  ingredients,  like  an  acid  and  an 
alkali  mixed,  neutralize  each  other.  We  are 
by  no  means  insensible  to  the  merits  of  this 
celebrated  piece,  to  the  severe  dignity  of  the 
style,  the  graceful  and  pathetic  solemnity  of 
the  opening  speech,  or  the  wild  and  barbaric 
melody  which  gives  so  striking  an  effect  to  the 
choral  passages.  But  we  think  it,  we  confess, 
the  least  successful  effort  of  the  genius  of 
Milton. 

The  Comus  is  framed  on  the  model  of  the 
Italian  Masque,  as  the  Samson  is  framed  on 
the  model  of  the  Greek  Tragedy.  It  is,  cer 
tainly,  the  noblest  performance  of  the  kind 
which  exists  in  any  language.  It  is  as  far  su 
perior  to  the  Faithful  Shepherdess,  as  the 
Faithful  Shepherdess  is  to  the  Aminta,  or  the 
Aminta  to  the  Pastor  Fido.  It  was.  well  for 
Milton  that  he  had  here  no  Euripides  to  mis 
lead  him.  He  understood  and  loved  the  litera 
ture  of  modern  Italy.  But  he  did  not  feel  for 
it  the  same  veneration  which  he  entertained 
for  the  remains  of  Athenian  and  Roman  poetry, 
consecrated  by  so  many  lofty  and  endearing 
recollections.  The  faults,  moreover,  of  his 
Italian  predecessors  were  of  a  kind  to  which 
his  mind  had  a  deadly  antipathy.  He  could 
stoop  to  a  plain  style,  sometimes  even  to  a  bald 
style;  but  false  brilliancy  was  his  utter  aver 
sion.  His  Muse  had  no  objection  to  a  russet 
attire;  but  she  turned  with  disgust  from  the 
finery  of  Guarini,  as  tawdry,  and  as  paltry  as 
the  rags  of  a  chimney-sweeper  on  May-day. 
Whatever  ornaments  she  wears  are  of  massive 
gold,  not  only  dazzling  to  the  sight,  but  capable 
of  standing  the  severest  test  of  the  crucible. 

Milton  attended  in  the  Comus  to  the  distinc 

AS 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


t?on  which  he  neglected  in  the  Samson.  He 
made  it  what  it  ought  to  be,  essentially  lyrical, 
and  dramatic  only  in  semblance.  He  has  not 
attempted  a  fruitless  struggle  against  a  defect 
inherent  in  the  nature  of  that  species  of  com 
position  ;  and  he  has,  therefore,  succeeded, 
wherever  success  was  not  impossible.  The 
speeches  must  be  read  as  majestic  soliloquies; 
and  he  who  so  reads  them  will  be  enraptured 
with  their  eloquence,  their  sublimity,  and  their 
music.  The  interruptions  of  the  dialogue, 
however,  impose  a  constraint  upon  the  writer, 
and  break  the  illusion  of  the  reader.  The 
finest  passages  are  those  which  are  lyric  in 
form  as  well  as  in  spirit.  "I  should  much 
commend,"  says  the  excellent  Sir  Henry  Wot- 
ton,  in  a  letter  to  Milton,  "  the  tragical  part,  if 
the  lyrical  did  not  ravish  me  with  a  certain 
dorique  delicacy  in  your  songs  and  odes,  where- 
unto,  I  most  plainly  confess  to  you,  I  have  seen 
yet  nothing  parallel  in  our  language."  The 
criticism  was  just.  It  is  when  Milton  escapes 
from  the  shackles  of  the  dialogue,  when  he  is 
discharged  from  the  labour  of  uniting  two  in 
congruous  styles,  when  he  is  at  liberty  to  in 
dulge  his  choral  raptures  without  reserve,  that 
he  rises  even  above  himself.  Then,  like  his 
own  Good  Genius,  bursting  from  the  earthly 
form  and  weeds  of  Thyrsis,  he  stands  forth  in 
celestial  freedom  and  beauty ;  he  seems  to  cry 
exultingly, 

"  Now  my  task  is  smoothly  done, 
I  can  fly,  or  I  can  run," 

to  skim  the  earth,  to  soar  above  the  clouds,  to 
bathe  in  the  Elysian  dew  of  the  rainbow,  and 
to  inhale  the  balmy  smells  of  nard  and  cassia, 
which  the  musky  winds  of  the  zephyr  scatter 
through  the  cedared  alleys  of  the  Hesperides.* 

There  are  several  of  the  minor  poems  of 
Milton  on  which  we  would  willingly  make  a 
few  remarks.  Still  more  willingly  would  we 
enter  into  a  detailed  examination  of  that  ad 
mirable  poem,  the  Paradise  Regained,  which, 
strangely  enough,  is  scarcely  ever  mentioned, 
except  as  an  instance  of  the  blindness  of  that 
parental  affection  which  men  of  letters  bear 
towards  the  offspring  of  their  intellects.  That 
Milton  was  mistaken  in  preferring  this  work, 
excellent  as  it  is,  to  the  Paradise  Lost,  we 
must  readily  admit.  But  we  are  sure  that  the 
superiority  of  the  Paradise  Lost  to  the  Para 
dise  Reg-ained  is  riot  more  decided  than  the 
superiority  of  the  Paradise  Regained  to  every 
poem  which  has  since  made  its  appearance. 
But  our  limits  prevent  us  from  discussing  the 
point  at  length.  We  hasten  on  to  that  extraor 
dinary  production,  which  the  general  suffrage 
of  critics  has  placed  in  the  highest  class  of 
human  compositions. 

The  only  poern  of  modern  times  which  can 


There  eternal  summer  dwells, 
And  west  winds  with  musky  wing, 
About  the  cedared  alleys  fling 
Nard  and  cassia's  halrny  smells: 
Irb  there  with  humid  how 
Wi'.ers  the  odorous  hanks,  that  blow 
Flowers  of  more  initialed  hue 
Than  her  puriled  scarf  can  show, 
Arid  dienches  with  Elysian  dew, 
(List,  mortals,  if  your  ears  be  true,) 
Beds  of  hyacinths  and  roses, 
Where  young  Adonis  oft  reposes, 
"Waxing  well  of  his  deep  wound." 


be  compared  with  the  Paradise  Lost,  is  the 
Divine  Comedy.  The  subject  of  Milton,  in 
some  points,  resembled  that  of  Dante ;  but  he 
has  treated  it  in  a  widely  different  manner. 
We  cannot,  we  think,  better  illustrate  our 
opinion  respecting  our  own  great  poet,  than 
by  contrasting  him  with  the  father  of  Tuscan 
literature. 

The  poetry  of  Milton  differs  from  that  of 
Dante,  as  the  hieroglyphics  of  Egypt  differed 
from  the  picture-writing  of  Mexico.  The 
images  which  Dante  employs  speak  for  them- 
selves : — they  stand  simply  for  what  the)'-  are. 
Those  of  Milton  have  a  signification  which  is 
often  discernible  only  to  the  initiated.  Their 
value  depends  less  on  what  they  directly  re 
present,  than  on  what  they  remotely  suggest 
However  strange,  however  grotesque,  may  be 
the  appearance  which  Dante  undertakes  to  de 
scribe,  he  never  shrinks  from  describing  it. 
He  gives  us  the  shape,  the  colour,  the  sound, 
the  smell,  the  taste;  he  counts  the  numbers; 
he  measures  the  size.  His  similes  are  the  il 
lustrations  of  a  traveller.  Unlike  those  of  other 
poets,  and  especially  of  Milton,  they  are  intro 
duced  in  a  plain,  business-like  manner;  not 
for  the  sake  of  any  beauty  in  the  objects  from 
which  they  are  drawn,  not  for  the  sake  of  any 
ornament,  which  they  may  impart  to  the  poem, 
but  simply  in  order  to  make  the  meaning  of  the 
writer  as  clear  to  the  reader  as  it  is  to  himself. 
The  ruins  of  the  precipice  which  led  from  the 
sixth  to  the  seventh  circle  of  hell,  were  like 
those  of  the  rock  which  fell  into  the  Adige  on 
the  south  of  Trent.  The  cataract  of  Phlege 
thon  was  like  that  of  Aqua  Cheta  at  the  mo 
nastery  of  St.  Benedict.  The  place  where  the 
heretics  were  confined  in  burning  tombs  re« 
sembled  the  vast  cemetery  of  Aries  ! 

Now,  let  us  compare  with  the  exact  details 
of  Dante  the  dim  intimations  of  Milton.  We 
will  cite  a  few  examples.  The  English  poet 
has  never  thought  of  taking  the  measure  of 
Satan.  He  gives  us  merely  a  vague  idea  of 
vast  bulk.  In  one  passage  the  fiend  lies 
stretched  out,  huge  in  length,  floating  many  a 
rood,  equal  in  size  to  the  earth-born  enemies 
of  Jove,  or  to  the  sea-monster  whuTh  the  mari 
ner  mistakes  for  an  island.  When  he  ad 
dresses  himself  to  battle  against  the  guardian 
angels,  he  stands  like  Teneriffe  or  Atlas  ;  his 
stature  reaches  the  sky.  Contrast  with  these 
descriptions  the  lines  in  which  Dante  has  de 
scribed  the  gigantic  spectre  of  Nimrod.  "His 
face  seemed  to  me  as  long  and  as  broad  as  the 
ball  of  St.  Peter's  at  Rome;  and  his  other  limbs 
were  in  proportion;  so  that  the  bank,  which 
concealed  him  from  the  waist  downwards, 
nevertheless  showed  so  much  of  him,  that 
three  tall  Germans  would  in  vain  have  at 
tempted  to  reach  his  hair."  We  are  sensible 
that  we  do  no  justice  to  the  admirable  style  of 
the  Florentine  poet.  But  Mr.  Cary's  transla 
tion  is  not  at  hand,  and  our  version,  however 
rude,  is  sufficient  to  illu'  trate  our  meaning. 

Once  more,  compare  the  lazar-house,  in  the 
eleventh  book  of  the  Paradise  Lost,  with  the 
last  ward  of  Malebolge  in  Dante.  Milton  avoids 
the  loathsome  details,  and  takes  refuge  in  in 
distinct,  but  solemn  and  tremendous  imagery — 
Despair  hurrying  from  couch  to  couch,  to  mock 


MILTON. 


the  wretches  with  his  attendance :  Death  shak 
ing  his  dart  over  them,  but  in  spite  of  suppli 
cations,  delaying  to  strike.  What  says  Dante? 
"There  was  such  a  moan  there  as  there  would 
be  if  all  the  sick,  who,  between  July  and  Sep 
tember,  are  in  the  hospitals  of  Valdichiana, 
and  of  the  Tuscan  swamps,  and  of  Sardinia, 
were  in  one  pit  together;  and  such  a  stench 
was  issuing  forth  as  is  wont  to  issue  from  de 
cayed  limbs." 

We  will  not  take  upon  ourselves  the  invi 
dious  office  of  settling  precedency  between  two 
such  writers.  Each  in  his  own  department  is 
incomparable;  and  each,  we  may  remark,  has, 
wisely  or  fortunately,  taken  a  subject  adapted 
to  exhibit  his  peculiar  talent  to  the  greatest 
advantage.  The  Divine  Comedy  is  a  personal 
narrative.  Dante  is  the  eye-witness  and  ear- 
witness  of  that  which  he  relates.  He  is  the 
very  man  who  has  heard  the  tormented  spirits 
crying  out  for  the  second  death;  \vho  has  read 
the  dusky  characters  on  the  portal,  within 
which  there  is  no  hope ;  who  has  hidden  his 
face  from  the  terrors  of  the  Gorgon ;  who  has 
fled  from  the  hooks  and  the  seething  pitch  of 
Barbaricciaand  Diaghignazzo.  His  own  hands 
have  grasped  the  shaggy  sides  of  Lucifer.  His 
own  feet  have  climbed  the  mountain  of  expia 
tion.  His  own  brow  has  been  marked  by  the 
purifying  angel.  The  reader  would  throw  aside 
such  a  tale  in  incredulous  disgust,  unless  it 
were  told  with  the  strongest  air  of  veracity, 
with  a  sobriety  even  in  its  horrors,  with  the 
greatest  precision  and  multiplicity  in  its  de 
tails.  The  narrative  of  Milton  in  this  respect 
differs  from  that  of  Dante,  as  the  adventures 
of  Amidas  differ  from  those  of  Gulliver.  The 
author  of  Amidas  would  have  made  his  book 
ridiculous  if  he  had  introduced  those  minute 
particulars  which  give  such  a  charm  to  the 
work  of  Swift,  the  nautical  observations,  the 
affected  delicacy  about  names,  the  official  do 
cuments  transcribed  at  full  length,  and  all  the 
unmeaning  gossip  and  scandal  of  the  court, 
springing  out  of  nothing,  and  tending  to  no 
thing.  We  are  not  shocked  at  being  told  that 
a  man  who  lived,  nobody  knows  when,  saw 
many  very  strange  sights,  and  we  can  easily 
abandon  ourselves  to  the  illusion  of  the  ro 
mance.  But  when  Lemuel  Gulliver,  surgeon, 
now  actually  resident  at  Rotherhithe,  tells  us 
of  pigmies  and  giants,  flying  islands  and  phi 
losophizing  horses,  nothing  but  such  circum 
stantial  touches  could  produce,  for  a  single 
moment,  a  deception  on  the  imagination. 

Of  all  the  poets  who  have  introduced  into 
their  works  the  agency  of  supernatural  beings, 
Milton  has  succeeded  best.  Here  Dante  de 
cidedly  yields  to  him.  And  as  this  is  a  point 
on  which  many  rash  and  ill-considered  judg 
ments  have  been  pronounced,  we  feel  inclined 
to  dwell  on  it  a  little  longer.  The  most  fatal 
error  which  a  poet  can  possibly  commit  in  the 
management  of  his  machinery,  is  that  of  attempt 
ing  to  philosophize  too  much.  Milton  has  been 
often  censured  for  ascribing  to  spirits  many 
functions  of  which  spirits  must  be  incapable. 
But  these  objections,  though  sanctioned  by 
eminent  names,  originate,  we  venture  to  say, 
in  profound  ignorance  of  the  art  of  poetry. 

What  is  spiri  tl  What  are  our  own  minds,  the 


portion  of  spirit  with  which  we  are  best  ac 
quainted?  We  observe  certain  phenomena.; 
We  cannot  explain  them  into  material  causes, 
We  therefore  infer  that  there  exists  something 
which  is  not  material.  But  of  this  something 
we  have  no  idea.  We  can  define  it  only  by 
negatives.  We  can  reason  about  it  only  by 
symbols.  We  use  the  word,  but  we  have  no 
image  cf  the  thing  :  and  the  business  of  pcetry 
is  with  images,  and  not  with  words.  The  poet 
uses  words  indeed;  but  they  are  merely  the 
instruments  of  his  art,  not  its  objects.  They 
are  the  materials  which  he  is  to  dispose  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  present  a  picture  to  the 
mental  eye.  And,  if  they  are  not  so  disposed, 
they  are  no  more  entitled  to  be  called  poetry, 
than  a  bale  of  canvass  and  a  box  of  colours 
are  to  be  called  a  painting. 

Logicians  may  reason  about  abstractions , 
but  the  great  mass  of  mankind  can  never  feel 
an  interest  in  them.  They  must  have  images. 
The  strong  tendency  of  the  multitude  in  all 
ages  and  nations  to  idolatry  can  be  explained 
on  no  other  principle.  The  first  inhabitants 
of  Greece,  there  is  every  reason  to  believe, 
worshipped  one  invisible  Deity.  But  the  ne 
cessity  of  having  something  more  definite  to 
adore  produced,  in  a  few  centuries,  the  innu 
merable  crowd  of  gods  and  goddesses.  In  like 
manner  the  ancient  Persians  thought  it  im 
pious  to  exhibit  the  Creator  under  a  human 
form.  Yet  even  these  transferred  to  the  sun 
the  worship  which,  speculatively,  they  consi 
dered  due  only  to  the  Supreme  mind.  The 
history  of  the  Jews  is  the  record  of  a  continual 
struggle  between  pure  Theism,  supported  by 
the  most  terrible  sanctions,  and  the  strangely 
fascinating  desire  of  having  some  visible  and 
tangible  object  of  adoration.  Perhaps  none 
of  the  secondary  causes  which  Gibbon  has  as 
signed  for  the  rapidity  with  which  Christianity 
spread  over  the  world,  while  Judaism  scarcely 
ever  acquired  a  proselyte,  operated  more  power 
fully  than  this  feeling,  God,  the  uncreated, 
the  incomprehensible,  the  invisible,  attracted 
few  worshippers.  A  philosopher  might  admire 
so  noble  a  conception;  but  the  crowd  turned 
away  in  disgust  from  words  which  presented 
»no  image  to  their  minds.  It  was  before  Deity, 
embodied  in  a  human  form,  walking  among 
men,  partaking  of  their  infirmities,  leaning  on 
their  bosoms,  weeping  over  their  graves,  slum 
bering  in  the  manger,  bleeding  on  the  cross, 
that  the  prejudices  of  the  Synagogue,  and  th.3 
doubts  of  the  Academy,  and  the  pride  of  th;; 
Portico,  and  the  fasces  of  the  lictor,  and  the 
swords  of  thirty  legions,  were  humbled  in  the 
dust !  Soon  after  Christianity  had  achieved  its 
triumph,  the  principle  which  had  assisted  it 
began  to  corrupt.  It  became  a  new  paganism 
Patron  saints  assumed  the  offices  of  household 
gods.  St.  George  took  the  place  of  Mars.  St, 
Elmo  consoled  the  mariner  for  the  loss  of  Cas 
tor  and  Pollux,  The  Virgin  Mother  and  Cicilia 
succeeded  to  Venus  and  the  Muses.  The  fas 
cination  of  sex  and  loveliness  was  again  joined 
to  that  of  celestial  dignity;  and  the  homage  of 
chivalry  was  blended  with  that  of  religion. 
Reformers  have  often  made  a  stand  against 
these  feelings  ;  but  never  with  more  than  ap 
parent  and  partial  success.  The  men  who  cir- 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


molishei  the  images  in  cathedrals  have  not 
thvays  been  able  to  demolish  those  which  were 
enshrined  in  their  minds.  It  would  not  be  diffi 
cult  to  show,  that  in  politics  the  same  rule 
holds  good.  Doctrines,  we  are  afraid,  must 
generally  be  embodied  before  they  can  excite 
strong  public  feeling.  The  multitude  is  more 
easily  interested  for  the  most  unmeaning  badge, 
or  the  most  insignificant  name,  than  for  the 
most  important  principle. 

From  these  considerations,  we  infer,  that  no 
poet  who  should  affect  that  metaphysical  accu 
racy  for  the  want  of  which  Milton  has  been 
blamed,  would  escape  a  disgraceful  failure. 
Still,  however,  there  was  another  extreme, 
which,  though  far  less  dangerous,  was  also  to 
be  avoided.  The  imaginations  of  men  are  in 
a  great  measure  under  the  control  of  their 
opinions.  The  most  exquisite  art  of  a  poetical 
colouring  can  produce  no  illusion  when  it  is 
employed  to  represent  that  which  is  at  once 
perceived  to  be  incongruous  and  absurd.  Mil 
ton  wrote  in  an  age  of  philosophers  and  theo 
logians.  It  was  necessary  therefore  for  him  to 
abstain  from  giving  such  a  shock  to  their  un 
derstandings,  as  might  break  the  charm  which 
it  was  his  object  to  throw  over  their  imagina 
tions.  This  is  the  real  explanation  of  the 
indistinctness  and  inconsistency  with  which 
he  has  often  been  reproached.  Dr.  Johnson 
acknowledges,  that  it  was  absolutely  neces 
sary  for  him  to  clothe  his  spirits  with  ma 
terial  forms.  "But,"  says  he,  "he  should 
have  secured  the  consistency  of  his  system, 
by  keeping  immateriality  out  of  sight,  and  se 
ducing  the  reader  to  drop  it  from  his  thoughts." 
This  is  easily  said  ;  but  what  if  he  could  not 
seduce  the  reader  to  drop  it  from  his  thoughts  1 
What  if  the  contrary  opinion  had  taken  so  full 
a  posses  on  of  the  minds  of  men,  as  to  leave 
no  room  even  for  the  quasi-belief  which  poetry 
requires  1  Such  we  suspect  to  have  been  the 
case.  It  was  impossible  for  the  poet  to  adopt 
altogether  the  material  or  the  immaterial  sys 
tem.  He  therefore  took  his  stand  on  the 
debatable  ground.  He  left  the  whole  in  am 
biguity.  He  has  doubtless  by  so  doing  laid 
himself  open  to  the  charge  of  inconsistency. 
But,  though  philosophically  in  the  wrong,  we 
cannot  but  believe  that  he  was  poetically  in 
the  right.  This  task,  which  almost  any  other 
writer  would  have  found  impracticable,  was 
easy  to  him.  The  peculiar  art  which  he  pos 
sessed  of  communicating  his  meaning  circuit- 
ously,  through  a  long  succession  of  associated 
ideas,  and  of  intimating  more  than  he  ex 
pressed,  enabled  him  to  disguise  those  incon 
gruities  which  he  could  not  avoid. 

Poetry,  which  relates  to  the  beings  of  another 
world,  ought  to  be  at  once  mysterious  and 
picturesque.  That  of  Milton  is  so.  That  of 
Dante  is  picturesque,  indeed,  beyond  any  that 
was  ever  written.  Its  effect  approaches  to  that 
produced  by  the  pencil  or  the  chisel.  But  it  is 
picturesque  to  the  exclusion  of  all  mystery. 
This  is  a  fault  indeed  on  the  right  side,  a  fault 
inseparable  from  the  plan  of  his  poem,  which, 
as  we  have  already  observed,  rendered  the  ut 
most  accuracy  of  description  necessary.  Stil] 
it  i?  a  fault.  His  supernatural  agents  excite 
an  interest;  but  it  is  not  the  interest  which  is 


proper  to  supernatural  agents.  We  feel  that 
we  could  talk  with  his  ghosts  and  demons, 
without  any  emotions  of  unearthly  awe.  We 
could,  like  Don  Juan,  ask  them  to  supper,  and 
at  heartily  in  their  company  His  angels  are 
good  men  with  wings.  His  devils  are  spiteful, 
ugly  executioners.  His  dead  men  are  merely 
iving  men  in  strange  situations.  The  scene 
which  passes  between  the  poet  and  Facinata 
is  justly  celebrated.  Still,  Facinata  in  the 
burning  tomb  is  exactly  what  Facinata  would 
have  been  at  an  auto  da  fe.  Nothing  can  be 
more  touching  than  the  first  interview  of  Dante 
and  Beatrice.  Yet  what  is  it,  but  a  lovely  wo 
man  chiding,  with  sweet  austere  composure, 
the  lover  for  whcse  affections  she  is  grateful, 
but  whose  vices  she  reprobates  1  The  feelings 
which  give  the  passage  its  charm  would  suit 
the  streets  of  Florence,  as  well  as  the  summit 
of  the  Mount  of  Purgatory. 

The  Spirits  of  Milton  are  unlike  those  of 
almost  all  other  writers.  His  fiends,  in  parti 
cular,  are  wonderful  creations.  They  are  not 
metaphysical  abstractions.  They  are  not 
wicked  men.  They  are  not  ugly  beasts.  They 
have  no  horns,  no  tails,  none  of  the  fee-faw- 
fum  of  Tasso  and  Klopstock.  They  have  just 
nough  in  common  with  human  nature  to  be 
intelligible  to  human  beings.  Their  characters 
are,  like  their  forms,  marked  by  a  certain  dim 
resemblance  to  those  of  men,  but  exaggerated 
to  gigantic  dimensions  and  veiled  in  myste 
rious  gloom. 

Perhaps  the  gods  and  demons  of  ^Eschylus 
may  best  bear  a  comparison  with  the  angels 
and  devils  of  Milton.  The  style  of  the  Athe 
nian  had,  as  we  have  remarked,  something  of 
the  vagueness  and  tenor  of  the  Oriental  cha 
racter  ;  and  the  same  peculiarity  may  be  traced 
in  his  mythology.  It  has  nothing  of  the  ame 
nity  and  elegance  which  we  generally  find  in 
the  superstitions  of  Greece.  All  is  rugged, 
barbaric,  and  colossal.  His  legends  seem  to 
harmonize  less  with  the  fragrant  groves  and 
graceful  porticos,  in  which  his  countrymen 
paid  their  vows  to  the  God  of  Light  and  God 
dess  of  Desire,  than  with  those  huge  and  gro 
tesque  labyrinths  of  eternal  granite,  in  which 
Egypt  enshrined  her  mystic  Osiris,  or  in  which 
Hindostan  still  bows  down  to  her  seven-headed 
idols.  His  favourite  gods  are  those  of  the 
elder  generations, — the  sons  of  heaven  and 
earth,  compared  with  whom  Jupiter  himself 
was  a  stripling  and  an  upstart, — the  gigantic 
Titans  and  the  inexorable  Furies.  Foremost 
among  his  creations  of  this  class  stands  Pro 
metheus,  half  fiend,  half  redeemer,  the  friend 
of  man,  the  sullen  and  implacable  enemy  of 
heaven.  He  bears  undoubtedly  a  considerable 
resemblance  to  the  Satan  of  Milton.  In  both 
we  find  the  same  v  -patience  of  control,  the 
same  ferocity,  the  same  unconquerable  pride. 
In  both  characters  also  are  mingled,  though  in 
very  different  proportions,  some  kind  and 
generous  feelings.  Prometheus,  however,  is 
hardly  superhuman  enough.  He  talks  too 
much  of  his  chains  and  his  uneasy  posture 
He  is  rather  too  much  depressed  and  agitated. 
His  resolution  seems  to  depend  on  the  know 
ledge  which  he  possesses,  that  he  holds  the  fate 
of  his  torturer  in  his  hands,  and  that  the  hour 


MILTON 


of  his  release  will  surely  come.  But  Satan  is 
a  creature  of  another  sphere.  The  might  of 
his  intellectual  nature  is  victorious  over  the  ex 
tremity  of  pain.  Amidst  agonies  which  cannot 
be  conceived  without  horror,  he  deliberates, 
resolves,  and  even  exults.  Against  the  sword 
of  Michael,  against  the  thunder  of  Jehovah, 
against  the  flaming  lake  and  the  marl  burning 
with  solid  fire,  against  the  prospect  of  an  eter 
nity  of  anintermittent  misery,  his  spirit  bears 
up  unbroken,  resting  on  its  own  innate  ener 
gies,  requiring  no  support  from  any  thing  ex 
ternal,  nor  even  from  hope  itself! 

To  return  for  a  moment  to  the  parallel  which 
we  have  been  attempting  to  draw  between  Mil 
ton  and  Dante,  we  would  add,  that  the  poetry 
of  these  great  men  has  in  a  considerable  degree 
taken  its  character  from  their  moral  qualities. 
They  are  not  egotists.  They  rarely  obtrude 
their  idiosyncrasies  on  their  readers.  They 
have  nothing  in  common  with  those  modern 
beggars  for  fame,  who  extort  a  pittance  from 
the  compassion  of  the  inexperienced,  by  ex 
posing  the  nakedness  and  sores  of  their  minds. 
Yet  it  would  be  difficult  to  name  two  writers 
whose  works  have  been  more  completely, 
though  undesignedly,  coloured  by  their  per 
sonal  feelings. 

The  character  of  Milton  was  peculiarly  dis 
tinguished  by  loftiness  of  thought;  that  of 
Dante  by  intensity  of  feeling.  In  every  line 
of  the  Divine  Comedy  we  discern  the  asperity 
which  is  produced  by  pride  struggling  with 
misery.  There  is  perhaps  no  work  in  the 
world  so  deeply  and  uniformly  sorrowful.  The 
melancholy  of  Dante  was  no  fantastic  caprice. 
It  was  not,  as  far  as  at  this  distance  of  time 
flan  be  judged,  the  effect  of  external  circum 
stances.  It  was  from  within.  Neither  love 
nor  glory,  neither  the  conflicts  of  the  earth  nor 
the  hope  of  heaven  could  dispel  it.  It  twined 
every  consolation  and  every  pleasure  into  its 
own  nature.  It  resembled  that  noxious  Sardi 
nian  soil  of  which  the  intense  bitterness  is  said 
to  have  been  perceptible  even  in  its  honey. 
His  mind  was,  in  the  noble  language  of  the  He 
brew  poet,  "a  land  of  darkness,  as  darkness 
itself,  and  where  the  light  was  as  darkness  !" 
The  gloom  of  his  character  discolours  all  the 
passions  of  men  and  all  the  face  of  nature, 
and  tinges  with  its  own  livid  hue  the  flowers 
of  Paradise  and  the  glories  of  the  Eternal 
Throne!  All  the  portraits  of  him  are  singu 
larly  characteristic.  No  person  can  look  on 
the  features,  noble  even  to  ruggedness,  the 
dark  furrows  of  the  cheek,  the  haggard  and 
woful  stare  of  the  eye,  the  sullen  and  contemp 
tuous  curve  of  the  lip,  and  doubt  that  they  be 
longed  to  a  man  too  proud  and  too  sensitive  to 
be  happy. 

Milton  was,  like  Dante,  a  statesman  and  a 
lover ;  and,  like  Dante,  he  had  been  unfortu 
nate  in  ambition  and  in  love.  He  had  sur 
vived  his  health  and  his  sight,  the  comforts  of 
his  home  and  the  prosperity  of  his  party.  Of 
the  great  men,  by  whom  he  had  been  distin 
guished  at  his  entrance  into  life,  some  had 
been  taken  away  from  the  evil  to  come ;  some 
had  carried  into  foreign  climates  their  un 
conquerable  hatred  of  oppression;  some  were 
pining  in  dungeons;  and  some  had  poured 

Vol.  I.— 2 


forth  their  blood  on  scaffolds.  That  hateful 
proscription,  facetiously  termed  the  Act  of  In- 
demnity  and  Oblivion,  had  set  a  mark  on  the 
poor,  blind,  deserted  poet,  and  held  him  up  by 
name  to  the  hatred  of  a  profligate  court  and 
an  inconstant  people !  Venal  and  licentious 
scribblers,  with  just  sufficient  talent  to  clothe 
the  thoughts  of  a  pander  in  the  style  of  a  bell 
man,  were  now  the  favourite  writers  of  the 
sovereign  and  the  public.  It  was  a  loathsome 
herd — which  could  be  compared  to  nothing  so 
fitly  as  to  the  rabble  of  Comus,  grotesque  mon 
sters,  half  bestial,  half  human,  dropping  with 
wine,  bloated  with  gluttony,  and  reeling  in  ob 
scene  dances.  Amidst  these  his  Muse  was 
placed,  like  the  chaste  lady  of  the  Masque, 
lofty,  spotless,  and  serene — to  be  chatted  at, 
and  pointed  at,  and  grinned  at,  by  the  whole 
rabble  of  Satyrs  and  Goblins.  If  ever  despond 
ency  and  asperity  could  be  excused  in  any 
man,  it  might  have  been  excused  in  Milton. 
But  the  strength  of  his  mind  overcame  every 
calamity.  Neither  blindness,  nor  gout,  nor 
age,  nor  penury,  nor  domestic  afflictions,  nor 
political  disappointments,  nor  abuse,  nor  pro 
scription,  nor  neglect,  had  power  to  disturu 
his  sedate  and  majestic  patience.  His  spirits 
do  not  seem  to  have  been  high,  but  they  were 
singularly  equable.  His  temper  was  serious, 
perhaps  stern  ;  but  it  was  a  temper  which  no 
sufferings  could  render  sullen  or  fretful.  Such 
as  it  was,  when,  on  the  eve  of  great  events,  he 
returned  from  his  travels,  in  the  prime  of  health 
and  manly  beauty,  loaded  with  literary  distinc 
tions  and  glowing  with  patriotic  hopes,  such 
it  continued  to  be — when,  after  having  experi 
enced  every  calamity  which  is  incident  to  our 
nature,  old,  poor,  sightless,  and  disgraced,  he 
retired  to  his  hovel  to  die  ! 

Hence  it  was,  that  though  he  wrote  the 
Paradise  Lost  at  a  time  of  life  when  images 
of  beauty  and  tenderness  are  in  general  be 
ginning  to  fade,  even  from  those  minds  in 
which  they  have  not  been  effaced  by  anxiety 
and  disappointment,  he  adorned  it  with  all 
that  is  most  lovely  and  delightful  in  the  phy 
sical  and  in  the  moral  world.  Neither  Theo 
critus  nor  Ariosto  had  a  finer  or  a  more  health 
ful  sense  of  the  pleasantness  of  external 
objects,  or  loved  better  to  luxuriate  amidst 
sunbeams  and  flowers,  the  songs  of  nightin 
gales,  the  juice  of  summer  fruits,  and  the 
coolness  of  shady  fountains.  His  conception 
of  love  unites  all  the  voluptuousness  of  the 
Oriental  harem,  and  all  the  gallantry  of  the 
chivalric  tournament,  with  all  the  pure  and 
quiet  affection  of  an  English  fireside.  His 
poetry  reminds  us  of  the  miracles  of  Alpine 
scenery.  Nooks  and  dells,  beautiful  as  fairy 
land,  are  embosomed  in  its  most  rugged  and 
gigantic  elevations.  The  roses  and  myrtles 
bloom  unchilled  on  the  verge  of  the  avalanche. 

Traces,  indeed,  of  the  peculiar  character  of 
Milton  may  be  found  in  all  his  works ;  but  it 
is  most  strongly  displayed  in  the  Sonnets. 
Those  remarkable  poems  have  been  under* 
valued  by  critics,  who  have  not  understood 
their  nature.  They  have  no  epigrammatic 
point.  There  is  none  of  the  ingenuity  of  Fili 
caji  in  the  thought,  none  of  the  hard  and  bril. 
liant  enamel  ofTetrarch  in  the  style  They 


10 


MACAULAY  S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


(ire  simple  but  majestic  records  of  the  feelings 
of  the  poet ;  as  little  tricked  out  for  the  public 
eye  as  his  diary  would  have  been.  A  victory, 
an  expected  attack  upon  the  city,  a  momentary 
lit  of  depression  or  exultation,  a  jest  thrown 
out  against  one  of  his  books,  a  dream,  which 
for  a  short  time  restored  to  him  that  beautiful 
face  over  which  the  grave  had  closed  forever, 
led  him  to  musings  which,  without  effort, 
shaped  themselves  into  verse.  The  unity  of 
sentiment  and  severity  of  style,  which  charac 
terize  these  little  pieces,  remind  us  of  the 
Greek  Anthology;  or  perhaps  still  more  of  the 
Collects  of  the  English  Liturgy — the  noble 
poem  on  the  Massacres  of  Piedmont  is  strictly 
a  collect  in  verse. 

The  Sonnets  are  more  or  less  striking,  ac 
cording  as  the  occasions  which  gave  birth  to 
them  are  more  or  less  interesting.  But  they 
are,  almost  without  exception,  dignified  by  a 
sobriety  and  greatness  of  mind  to  which  we 
know  not  where  to  look  for  a  parallel.  It  would 
indeed  be  scarcely  safe  to  draw  any  decided 
inferences,  as  to  the  character  of  a  writer, 
from  passages  directly  egotistical.  But  the 
qualities  which  we  have  ascribed  to  Milton, 
though  perhaps  most  strongly  marked  in  those 
parts  of  his  works  which  treat  of  his  personal 
feelings,  are  distinguishable  in  every  page,  and 
impart  to  all  his  writings,  prose  and  poetry, 
English,  Latin,  and  Italian,  a  strong  family 
likeness. 

His  public  conduct  was  such  as  was  to  be 
expected  from  a  man  of  a  spirit  so  high,  and 
an  intellect  so  powerful.  He  lived  at  one  of 
Jie  most  memorable  eras  in  the  history  of  man- 
*an<l ;  at  the  very  crisis  of  the  great  conflict 
Between  Oromasdes  and  Arimanes — liberty 
«nd  despotism,  reason  and  prejudice.  That 
great  battle  was  fought  for  no  single  genera 
tion,  for  no  single  land.  The  destinies  of  the 
human  race  were  staked  on  the  same  cast 
with  the  freedom  of  the  English  people.  Then 
were  first  proclaimed  those  mighty  principles, 
which  have  since  worked  their  way  into  the 
depths  of  the  American  forests,  which  have 
roused  Greece  from  the  slavery  and  degrada 
tion  of  two  thousand  years,  and  which,  from 
one  end  of  Europe  to  the  other,  have  kindled 
an  unquenchable  fire  in  the  hearts  of  the  op 
pressed,  and  loosed  the  knees  of  the  oppressors 
with  a  strange  and  unwonted  fear ! 

Of  those  principles,  then  struggling  for  their 
infant  existence,  Milton  was  the  most  devoted 
and  eloquent  literary  champion.  We  need 
not  say  how  much  we  admire  his  public  con 
duct.  But  AVC  cannot  disguise  from  ourselves, 
that  a  large  portion  of  his  countrymen  still 
think  it  unjustifiable.  The  civil  war,  indeed, 
has  been  more  discussed,  and  is  less  under 
stood,  than  any  event  in  English  history.  The 
Roundheads  laboured  under  the  disadvantage 
of  which  the  lion  in  the  fable  complained  so 
bitterly.  Though  they  were  the  conquerors, 
their  enemies  were  the  painters.  As  a  body, 
ihey  had  dune  their  utmost  to  decry  and  rum 
literature  ;  and  literature  was  even  with  them, 
as,  in  the  long  run,  it  always  is  with  its  ene 
mies.  The  best  book,  on  their  side  of  the 
question,  is  the  charming  memoir  of  Mrs. 
Uuchinson.  May's  History  of  the  Parliament 


is  good ;  but  it  breaks  off  at  the  most  interest* 
ing  crisis  of  the  struggle.  The  performance 
of  Ludlow  is  very  foolish  and  violent;  and 
most  of  the  later  writers  who  have  espoused 
the  same  cause,  Oldmixon,  for  instance,  and 
Catherine  Macaulay,  have,  to  say  the  least, 
been  more  distinguished  by  zeal  than  either 
by  candour  or  by  skill.  On  the  other  side  are 
the  most  authoritative  and  the  most  popular 
historical  works  in  our  language,  that  of  Cla 
rendon,  and  that  of  Hume.  The  former  is  not 
only  ably  written  and  full  of  valuable  informa 
tion,  but  has  also  an  air  of  dignity  and  sin 
cerity  which  makes  even  the  prejudices  and 
errors  with  which  it  abounds  respectable. 
Hume,  from  whose  fascinating  narrative  the 
great  mass  of  the  reading  public  are  still  con 
tented  to  take  their  opinions,  hated  religion  so 
much,  that  he  hated  liberty  for  having  been 
allied  with  religion — and  has  pleaded  the  cause 
of  tyranny  with  the  dexterity  of  an  advocate, 
while  affecting  the  impartiality  of  a  judge. 

The  public  conduct  of  Milton  must  be  ap 
proved  or  condemned,  according  as  the  resist 
ance  of  the  people  to  Charles  I.  shall  appear 
to  be  justifiable  or  criminal.  We  shall  there 
fore  make  no  apology  for  dedicating  a  few 
pages  to  the  discussion  of  that  interesting 
and  most  important  question.  We  shall  not 
argue  it  on  general  grounds,  we  shall  not  recur 
to  those  primary  principles  from  which  the 
claim  of  any  government  to  the  obedience  of 
its  subjects  is  to  be  deduced ;  it  is  a  vantage- 
ground  to  which  we  are  entitled ;  but  we  will 
relinquish  it.  We  are,  on  this  point,  so  confi 
dent  of  superiority,  that  we  have  no  objection 
to  imitate  the  ostentatious  generosity  of  those 
ancient  knights,  who  vowed  to  joust  without 
helmet  or  shield  against  all  enemies,  and  to 
give  their  antagonist  the  advantage  of  sun  and 
wind.  We  will  take  the  naked,  constitutional 
question.  We  confidently  aflirm,  that  every 
reason,  which  can  be  urged  in  favour  of  the 
Revolution  of  1688,  may  be  urged  with  at  least 
equal  force  in  favour  of  what  is  called  the 
great  rebellion. 

In  one  respect  only,  we  think,  can  the 
warmest  admirers  of  Charles  venture  to  say 
that  he  was  a  better  sovereign  than  his  son. 
He  was  not,  in  name  and  profession,  a  papist ; 
we  say  in  name  and  profession,  because  both 
Charles  himself  and  his  miserable  creature, 
Laud,  while  they  abjured  the  innocent  badges 
of  popery,  retained  all  its  worst  vices,  a  com 
plete  subjection  of  reason  to  authority,  a  weak 
preference  of  form  to  substance,  a  childish 
passion  for  mummeries,  an  idolatrous  venera 
tion  for  the  priestly  character,  and,  above  all,  a 
stupid  and  ferocious  intolerance.  This,  how 
ever,  we  waive.  We  will  concede  that  Charles 
was  a  good  protestant ;  but  we  say  that  his 
protestantism  does  not  make  the  slightest  dis 
tinction  between  his  case  and  that  of  James. 

The  principles  of  the  Revolution  have  often 
been  grossly  misrepresented,  and  never  more 
than  in  the  course  of  the  present  year.  There 
is  a  certain  class  of  men,  who,  while  they 
profess  to  hold  in  reverence  the  great  names 
and  great  actions  of  former  times,  never  look 
at  them  for  any  other  purpose  than  in  order  to 
find  in  them  some  excuse  for  existing  a'l/usec. 


MILTON. 


In  every  venerable  precedent,  tt  ey  pass 
what  is  essential,  and  take  only  vhat  is  acci 
dental:  they  keep  out  of  sight  what  is  benefi 
cial,  and  hold  up  to  public  imitation  all  that  i: 
defective.  If,  in  any  part  of  any  great  exam 
pie,  there  be  any  thing  unsound,  these  flesh-flies 
detect  it  with  an  unerring  instinct,  and  dar 
upon  it  with  a  ravenous  delight.  They  canno 
always  prevent  the  advocates  of  a  good  mea 
sure  from  compassing  their  end ;  but  they  feel 
with  their  prototype,  that 

"Their  labours  must  be  to  pervert  that  end, 
And  out  of  good  still  to  find  means  of  evil." 

To  the  blessings'  which  England  has  de 
rived  from  the  Revolution  these  people  are 
utterly  insensible.  The  expulsion  of  a  tyrant 
the  solemn  recognition  of  popular  rights 
liberty,  security,  toleration,  all  go  for  nothing 
with  them.  One  sect  there  was,  which,  from 
unfortunate  temporary  causes,  it  was  thought 
necessary  to  keep  under  close  restraint.  One 
part  of  the  empire  there  was  so  unhappily  cir 
cumstanced,  that  at  that  time  its  misery  was 
necessary  to  our  happiness,  and  its  slavery  to 
our  freedom  !  These  are  the  parts  of  the  Re 
volution  which  the  politicians  of  whom  we 
speak  love  to  contemplate,  and  which  seem  to 
them,  not  indeed  to  vindicate,  but  in  some  de 
gree  to  palliate  the  good  which  it  has  produced. 
Talk  to  them  of  Naples,  of  Spain,  or  of  South 
America.  They  stand  forth,  zealots  for  the 
doctrine  of  Divine  Right,  which  has  now  come 
back  to  us,  like  a  thief  from  transportation, 
under  the  alias  of  Legitimacy.  But  mention 
the  miseries  of  Ireland !  Then  William  is  a 
hero.  Then  Somers  and  Shrewsbury  are  great 
men.  Then  the  Revolution  is  a  glorious  era! 
The  very  same  persons,  who,  in  this  country, 
never  omit  an  opportunity  of  reviving  every 
wretched  Jacobite  slander  respecting  the  whigs 
of  that  period,  have  no  sooner  crossed  St. 
George's  channel,  than  they  begin  to  fill  their 
bumpers  to  the  glorious  and  immortal  memory. 
They  may  truly  boast  that  they  look  not  at  men 
but  measures.  So  that  evil  be  done,  they  care 
not  who  does  it — the  arbitrary  Charles  or  the 
liberal  William,  Ferdinand  the  catholic  or 
Frederick  the  protestant !  On  such  occasions 
their  deadliest  opponents  may  reckon  upon 
their  candid  construction.  The  bold  assertions 
of  these  people  have  of  late  impressed  a  large 
portion  of  the  public  with  an  opinion  that 
James  II.  was  expelled  simply  because  he  was 
a  catholic,  and  that  the  Revolution  was  essen 
tially  a  protestant  revolution. 

Bat  this  certainly  was  not  the  case.  Nor 
can  any  person,  who  has  acquired  more  know 
ledge  of  the  history  of  those  times  than  is  to  be 
found  in  Goldsmith's  Abridgment,  believe  that, 
if  James  had  held  his  own  religious  opinions 
without  wishing  to  make  proselytes ;  or  if, 
wishing  even  to  make  proselytes,  he  had  con 
tented  himself  with  exerting  only  his  cons>...t  j- 
tional  influence  for  that  purpose,  the  Prince  of 
Orange  would  ever  have  been  invited  over. 
Our  ancestors,  we  suppose,  knew  their  own 
meaning.  And,  if  we  may  believe  them,  their 
hostility  was  primarily  not  to  popery,  but  to 
tyranny.  They  did  not  drive  out  a  tyrant  be 
cause  he  was  a  catholic;  but  they  excluded 


catholics  from  the  crown,  because  they  thought 
them  likely  to  be  tyrants.  The  ground  on 
which  they,  in  their  famous  resolution,  de 
clared  the  throne  vacant,  was  this,  "that 
James  had  broken  the  fundamental  laws  of  the 
kingdom."  Every  man,  therefore,  who  ap 
proves  of  the  Revolution  of  1688,  must  hold 
that  the  breach  of  fundamental  laivs  on  the  part  of 
the  sovereign  justifies  resistance.  The  question 
then  is  this  :  Had  Charles  I.  broken  the  funda 
mental  laws  of  England  1 

No  person  can  answer  in  the  negative,  un 
less  he  refuses  credit,  not  merely  to  all  th« 
accusations  brought  against  Charles  by  his 
opponents,  but  to  the  narratives  of  the  warmest 
royalists,  and  to  the  confessions  of  the  king 
himself.  If  there  be  any  historian  of  any  party 
who  has  related  the  events  of  that  reign,  the 
conduct  of  Charles,  from  his  accession  to  the 
meeting  of  the  Long  Parliament,  had  been  a 
continued  course  of  oppression  and  treachery. 
Let  those  who  applaud  the  Revolution  and  con 
demn  the  rebellion,  mention  one  act  of  James 
[I.,  to  which  a  parallel  is  not  to  be  found  in  the 
history  of  his  father.  Let  them  lay  their  fin 
gers  on  a  single  article  in  the  Declaration  of 
Right,  presented  by  the  two  Houses  to  WilJiam 
and  Mary,  which  Charles  is  not  acknowledged 
to  have  violated.  He  had,  according  to  the 
testimony  of  his  own  friends,  usurped  the 
functions  of  the  legislature,  raised  taxes  without 
the  consent  of  parliament,  and  quartered 
roops  on  the  people  in  the  most  illegal  and 
vexatious  manner.  Not  a  single  session  of 
parliament  had  passed  without  some  unconsti- 
ional  attack  on  the  freedom  of  debate.  The 
right  of  petition  was  grossly  violated.  Arbi- 
rary  judgments,  exorbitant  fines,  and  unwar 
ranted  imprisonments,  were  grievances  of  daily 
and  hourly  occurrence.  If  these  things  do  not 
"ustify  resistance,  the  Revolution  was  treason ; 
f  they  do,  the  Great  Rebellion  was  laudable. 

But,  it  is   said,  why  not  adopt  milder  mec» 
;ures  1     Why,  after  the  king  had  consented  to 
so  many  reforms,  and  renounced  so  many  op- 
>ressive  prerogatives,  did  the  parliament  con- 
inue  to  rise  in  their  demands,  at  the  risk  of 
^revoking  a  civil  war?     The  ship-money  had 
jeen  given  up.     The  star-chamber  had  beea 
ibolished.     Provision  had  been  made  for  the 
'requent  convocation  and  secure  deliberation 
>f  parliaments.     Why  not  pursue  an  end  con- 
essedly  good,  by  peaceable  and  regular  means! 
We  recur  again  to  the  analogy  of  the  Revolu- 
ion.  Why  was  James  driven  from  the  throne  ! 
Why  was  he  not  retained  upon  conditions  * 
He  too  had  offered  to  call  a  free  parliament, 
nd  to  submit  to  its  decision  all  the  matters  in 
ispute.     Yet  we  praise  our  forefathers,  who 
referred  a  revolution,  a  disputed  succession, 
a  dynasty  of  strangers,  twenty  years  of  foreign 
ind  intestine  war,  a  standing  army,  and  a  na- 
ional  debt,  to  the  rule,  however  restricted,  of  a 
ried  and  proved  tyrant.    The  Long  Parlia 
ment  acted  on  the  same  principle,  and  is  enti- 
"ed  to  the  same  praise.     They  could  not  trust 
le  king.  He  had  no  doubt  passed  salutary  laws, 
kit  what  assurance  had  they  that  he  would 
ot  break  them  ?     He  had  renounced  oppres 
ive  prerogatives.    But  where  was  the  security 
hat  he  would  not  resume  them?     Thev  had  t« 


MACAULAY  P,  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


deal  \vith  a  man  whom  DO  tie  couM  ivnd,  a  man 
who  made  and  broke  promises  vrith  equal  faci 
lity,  a  man  whose  honour  had  boen  a  hundred 
limes  pawned — and  never  redeemed. 

Here,  indeed,  the  Long  Parliament  stands 
on  still  stronger  ground  than  the  Convention 
of  1688.  No  action  of  James  can  be  compared 
for  wickedness  and  impudence  to  the  conduct 
of  Cnarles  with  respect  to  the  Petition  of  Right. 
The  lords  and  commons  present  him  with  a 
bill  in  which  the  constitutional  limits  of  his 
power  are  marked  out.  He  hesicates ;  he  evades  ; 
at  last  he  bargains  to  give  h5s  assent,  for  five 
subsidies.  The  bill  receives  hh  solemn  assent. 
The  subsidies  are  voted.  But  no  sooner  is  the 
tyrant  relieved,  than  he  returns  at  once  to  all 
the  arbitrary  measures  which  he  had  bound 
himself  to  abandon,  and  violates  all  the 
clauses  of  the  very  act  which  he  had  been 
paid  to  pass. 

For  more  than  ten  years,  the  people  had 
seen  the  rights,  which  were  theirs  by  a  double 
claim,  by  immemorial  inheritance  and  by  re 
cent  purchase,  infringed  by  the  perfidious  king 
who  had  recognised  them.  At  length  circum 
stances  compelled  Charles  to  summon  another 
parliament ;  another  chance  was  given  them 
for  liberty.  Were  they  to  throw  it  away  as 
they  had  thrown  away  the  former?  Were 
they  again  to  be  cozened  by  le  Roi  le  veut? 
Were  they  again  to  advance  their  money  on 
pledges,  which  had  been  forfeited  over  and 
over  again  1  Were  they  to  lay  a  second  Peti 
tion  of  Right  at  the  foot  of  the  throne,  to  grant 
another  lavish  aid  in  exchange  for  another  un 
meaning  ceremony,  and  then  take  their  de 
parture,  till,  after  ten  years'  more  of  fraud  and 
oppression,  their  prince  should  again  require 
a  supply,  and  again  repay  it  with  a  perjury  1 
They  were  compelled  to  choose  whether  they 
would  trust  a  tyrant  or  conquer  him.  We  think 
that  they  chose  wisely  and  nobly. 

The  advocates  of  Charles,  like  the  advocates 
of  other  malefactors  against  whom  overwhelm 
ing  evidence  is  produced,  generally  decline  all 
controversy  about  the  facts,  and  content  them 
selves  with  calling  testimony  to  character.  He 
had  so  many  private  virtues  !  And  had  James 
II.  no  private  virtues'?  Was  even  Oliver 
Cromwell,  his  bitterest  enemies  themselves 
being  judges,  destitute  of  private  virtues? 
And  what,  after  all,  are  the  virtues  ascribed  to 
Charles  ?  A  religious  zeal,  not  more  sincere 
than  that  of  his  son,  and  fully  as  weak  and 
narrow-minded,  and  a  few  of  the  ordinary 
household  decencies,  which  half  the  tomb 
stones  in  England  claim  for  those  who  lie  be 
neath  them.  A  good  father!  A  good  husband! 
— Ample  apologies  indeed  for  fifteen  years  of 
persecution,  tyranny,  and  falsehood. 

We  charge  him  with  having  broken  his  co 
ronation  oath — and  we  are  told  that  he  kept 
his  marriage-vow!  We  accuse  him  of  having 
given  up  his  people  to  the  merciless  inflictions 
of  the  most  hot-headed  and  hard-hearted  of 
prelate^ — and  the  defence  is,  that  he  took  his 
little  son  on  his  knee  and  kissed  him !  We 
censure  him  for  having  violated  the  articles 
of  the  Petition  of  Right,  after  having,  for  good 
an<\  valuable  consideration,  promised  to  ob- 
*£»•»«'  them — and  we  are  informed  that  he  was 


accustomed  to  hear  prayers  at  six  o'clock  in 
the  morning!  It  is  to  such  considerations  as 
these,  together  with  his  Vandyke  dress,  his 
handsome  face,  and  his  peaked  beard,  that  he 
owes,  we  verily  believe,  most  of  his  popularity 
with  the  present  generation. 

For  ourselves,  we  own  that  we  do  not  under 
stand  the  common  phrase — a  good  man.  but  a 
bad  king.  We  can  as  easily  conceive  a  good 
man  and  an  unnatural  father,  or  a  good  man 
and  a  treacherous  friend.  We  cannot,  in  esti 
mating  the  character  of  an  individual,  leave 
out  of  our  consideration  his  conduct  in  the 
most  important  of  all  human  relations.  And 
if  in  that  relation  we  find  him  to  have  been 
selfish,  cruel,  and  deceitful,  we  shall  take  the 
liberty  to  call  him  a  bad  man.  in  spite  of  all 
his  temperance  at  table,  and  all  his  regularity 
at  chapel. 

We  cannot  refrain  from  adding  a  few  words 
respecting  a  topic  on  which  the  defenders  of 
Charles  are  fond  of  dwelling.  If,  they  say,  he 
governed  his  people  ill,  he  at  least  governed 
them  after  the  example  of  his  predecessors.  If 
he  violated  their  privileges,  it  was  because  those 
privileges  had  not  been  accurately  defined.  No 
act  of  oppression  has  ever  been  imputed  to 
him  which  has  not  a  parallel  in  the  annals  of 
the  Tudors.  This  point  Hume  has  laboured 
with  an  art  which  is  as  discreditable  in  an  his 
torical  work  as  it  would  be  admirable  in  a 
forensic  address.  The  answer  is  short,  clear, 
and  decisive.  Charles  had  assented  to  the 
Petition  of  Right.  He  had  renounced  the  op 
pressive  powers  said  to  have  been  exercised 
by  his  predecessors,  and  he  had  renounced 
them  for  money.  He  was  not  entitled  to  set 
up  his  antiquated  claims  against  his  own  re 
cent  release. 

These  arguments  are  so  obvious  that  it  may 
seem  superfluous  to  dwell  upon  them.  But 
those  who  have  observed  hoAv  much  the  events 
of  that  time  are  misrepresented  and  misunder 
stood,  will  not  blame  us  for  staling  the  case 
simply.  It  is  a  case  of  which  the  simplest 
statement  is  the  strongest. 

The  enemies  of  the  parliament,  indeed,  rare 
ly  choose  to  take  issue  on  the  great  points  of 
the  question.  They  content  themselves  with 
exposing  some  of  the  crimes  and  follies  of 
which  public  commotions  necessarily  gave 
birth.  They  bewail  the  unmerited  fate  of 
Strafford.  They  execrate  the  lawless  violence 
of  the  army.  They  laugh  at  the  scriptural 
names  of  the  preachers.  Major-generals  fleec 
ing  their  districts ;  soldiers  revelling  on  the 
spoils  of  a  ruined  peasantry;  upstarts,  enrich 
ed  by  the  public  plunder,  taking  possession  of 
the  hospitable  firesides  and  hereditary  trees 
of  the  old  gentry;  boys  smashing  the  beautiful 
windows  of  cathedrals ;  Quakers  riding  naked 
through  the  market-place ;  Fifth-monarchy- 
men  shouting  for  King  Jesus ;  agitators  lec 
turing  from  the  tops  of  tubs  on  the  fate  of 
Agag; — all  these,  they  tell  us,  were  the  off 
spring  of  the  Great  Rebellion. 

Be  it  so.  We  are  not  careful  to  answer  in 
this  matter.  These  charges,  were  they  infinite 
ly  more  important,  would  not  alter  our  opinion 
of  an  event,  which  alone  has  made  us  to  differ 
from  the  slaves  who  crouch  beneath  the  seep- 


MILTON. 


13 


tres  of  Brandenburg  and  Braganza.  Many 
evils,  no  doubt,  were  produced  by  the  civil  war. 
They  were  the  price  of  our  liberty.  Has  the 
acquisition  been  worth  the  sacrifice]  It  is  the 
nature  of  the  devil  of  tyranny  to  tear  and  rend 
the  body  which  he  leaves.  Are  the  miseries 
of  continued  possession  less  horrible  than  the 
struggles  of  the  tremendous  exorcism] 

If  it  were  possible  that  a  people,  brought  up 
under  an  intolerant  and  arbitrary  system,  could 
subvert  that  system  without  acts  of  cruelty  and 
folly,  half  the  objections  to  despotic  power 
would  be  removed.  We  should,  in  that  case, 
be  compelled  to  acknowledge  that  it  at  least 
produces  no  pernicious  effects  on  the  intellec 
tual  and  moral  character  of  a  people.  We  de 
plore  the  outrages  which  accompany  revolu 
tions.  But  the  more  violent  the  outrages,  the 
more  assured  we  feel  that  a  revolution  was  ne 
cessary.  The  violence  of  those  outrages  will 
always  be  proportioned  to  the  ferocity  and  ig 
norance  of  the  people :  and  the  ferocity  and 
ignorance  of  the  people  will  be  proportioned 
to  the  oppression  and  degradation  under  which 
they  have  been  accustomed  to  live.  Thus  it 
was  in  our  civil  war.  The  rulers  in  the  church 
and  state  reaped  only  that  which  they  had 
sown.  They  had  prohibited  free  discussion — 
they  had  done  their  best  to  keep  the  people  un 
acquainted  with  their  duties  and  their  rights. 
The  retribution  was  just  and  natural.  If  they 
suffered  from  popular  ignorance,  it  was  be 
cause  they  had  themselves  taken  away  the  key 
of  knowledge.  If  they  were  assailed  with  blind 
fury,  it  was  because  they  had  exacted  an 
equally  blind  submission. 

It  is  the  character  of  such  revolutions  that 
we  always  see  the  worst  of  them  at  first.  Till 
men  have  been  for  some  time  free,  they  know 
not  how  to  use  their  freedom.  The  natives  of 
wine  countries  are  always  sober.  In  climates 
where  wine  is  a  rarity,  intemperance  abounds. 
A  newly  liberated  people  may  be  compared  to 
a  northern  army  encamped  on  the  Rhine  or 
the  Xeres.  It  is  said  that,  when  soldiers  in 
such  a  situation  first  find  themselves  able  to 
indulge  without  restraint  in  such  a  rare  and 
expensive  luxury,  nothing  is  to  be  seen  but  in 
toxication.  Soon,  however,  plenty  teaches  dis 
cretion  ;  and  after  wine  has  been  for  a  few 
months  their  daily  fare,  they  become  more 
temperate  than  they  had  ever  been  in  their 
own  country.  In  the  same  manner  the  final 
and  permanent  fruits  of  liberty  are  wisdom, 
moderation,  and  mercy.  Its  immediate  effects 
are  often  atrocious  crimes,  conflicting  errors, 
scepticism  on  points  the  most  clear,  dogma 
tism  on  points  the  most  mysterious.  It  is  just 
at  this  crisis  t'hat  its  enemies  love  to  exhibit 
it.  They  pull  down  the  scaffolding  from  the 
half-finished  edifice;  they  point  to  the  flying 
dust,  the  falling  bricks,  the  comfortless  rooms, 
the  frightful  irregularity  of  the  whole  appear 
ance  ;  and  then  ask  in  scorn  where  the  pro 
mised  splendour  and  comfort  are  to  be  found  ? 
If  such  miserable  sophisms  were  to  prevail, 
there  would  never  be  a  good  house  or  a  good 
government  in  the  world. 

Ariosto  tells  a  pretty  story  of  a  fairy,  who, 
by  some  mysterious  law  of  her  nature,  was 
condemned  to  appear  at  certain  seasons  in  the 


form  of  a  foul  and  poisonous  snake.  Those 
who  injured  her  during  the  period  of  her  dis 
guise,  were  forever  excluded  from  participa 
tion  in  the  blessings  which  she  bestowed.  But 
to  those  who,  in  spite  of  her  loathsome  aspect, 
pitied  and  protected  her,  she  afterwards  re 
vealed  herself  in  the  beautiful  and  celestial 
form  which  was  natural  to  her,  accompanied 
their  steps,  granted  all  their  wishes,  filled  their 
houses  with  wealth,  made  them  happy  in  love, 
and  victorious  in  war.*  Such  a  spirit  is 
Liberty.  At  timer;  she  takes  the  form  of  a 
hateful  reptile.  She  grovels,  she  hisses,  she 
stings.  But  wo  to  those  who  in  disgust  shall 
venture  to  crush  her!  And  happy  are  those 
who,  having  dared  to  receive  her  in  her  de 
graded  and  frightful  shape,  shall  at  length  be 
rewarded  by  her  in  the  time  of  her  beauty  and 
her  glory. 

There  is  only  one  cure  for  the  evils  which 
newly  acquired  freedo7n  produces — and  that 
cure  is  freedom!  When  a  prisoner  leaves  his 
cell,  he  cannot  be?,r  the  light  of  day; — he  is 
unable  to  discriminate  colours,  or  recognise 
faces.  But  tte  remedy  is  not  to  remand  him 
into  his  dungeon,  but  to  accustom  him  to  the 
rays  of  tha  sun.  The  blaze  of  truth  and  liberty 
may  ?.i  first  dazzle  and  bewilder  nations  which 
have  become  half  blind  in  the  house  of  bondage 
But  let  them  gaze  on,  and  they  will  soon  be  able 
to  bear  it.  In  a  few  years  men  learn  to  reason. 
The  extreme  violence  of  opinion  subsides. 
Hostile  theories  correct  each  other.  The  scat 
tered  elements  of  truth  cease  to  conflict,  and 
begin  to  coalesce.  And  at  length  a  system  of 
justice  and  order  is  educed  out  of  the  chaos. 

Many  politicians  of  our  time  are  in  the  habit 
of  laying  it  down  as  a  self-evident  proposition, 
that  no  people  ought  to  be  free  till  they  are  fi; 
to  use  their  freedom.  The  maxim  is  worthy 
of  the  fool  in  the  old  story,  who  resolved  not  to 
go  into  the  water  till  he  had  learnt  to  swim ! 
If  men  are  to  wait  for  liberty  till  they  become 
wise  and  good  in  slavery,  they  may  indeed 
wait  forever. 

Therefore  it  is  that  we  decidedly  approve 
of  the  conduct  of  Milton  and  the  other  wise 
and  good  men  who,  in  spite  of  much  that  was 
ridiculous  and  hateful  in  the  conduct  of  their 
associates,  stood  firmly  by  the  cause  of  public 
liberty.  We  are  not  aware  that  the  poet  has 
been  charged  with  personal  participation  in. 
any  of  the  blamable  excesses;  of  that  time. 
The  favourite  topic  of  his  enemies  is  the  line 
of  conduct  which  he  pursued  with  regard  to 
the  execution  of  the  king.  Of  that  celebrated 
proceeding  we  by  no  means  approve.  Still 
we  must  say,  in  justice  to  the  many  eminent 
persons  who  concurred  in  it,  and  in  justice 
more  particularly  to  the  eminent  person  who 
defended  it,  that  nothing  can  be  more  absurd 
than  the  imputations  which,  for  the  last  hun 
dred  and  sixty  years,  it  has  been  the  fashion  to 
cast  upon  the  regicides.  We  have  throughout 
abstained  from  appealing  to  first  principles — 
we  will  not  appeal  to  them  now.  We  recur 
acrain  to  the  parallel  case  uf  the  Revolution. 
What  essential  distinction  can  be  drawn  be 
tween  the  execution  of  the  father  an«l  thP 


*  Orlando  Furioso,  Canto  43 

i 


14 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


deposition  of  the  son  1  What  constitutional  : 
maxim  is  there,  \vhich  applies  to  the  former  : 
and  not  to  the  latter  1  The  king  can  do  no  | 
wrong.  If  so,  James  was  as  innocent  as  ; 
Charles  could  have  been.  The  minister  only 
ought  to  be  responsible  for  the  acts  of  the 
sovereign.  If  so,  why  not  impeach  Jeffries 
and  retain  James  1  The  person  of  a  king  is 
sacred.  Was  the  person  of  James  considered 
sacred  at  the  Boyne  ?  To  discharge  cannon 
against  an  army  in  which  a  king  is  known  to 
be  posted,  is  to  approach  pretty  near  to  regi 
cide.  Charles  too,  it  should  always  be  re 
membered,  was  put  to  death  by  men  who  had 
been  exasperated  by  the  hostilities  of  several 
ye&rs,  and  who  had  never  been  bound  to  him 
by  any  other  tie  than  that  which  was  common 
to  them  with  all  their  fellow-citizens.  Those 
who  drove  James  from  his  throne,  who  seduced 
his  army,  who  alienated  his  friends,  who  first 
imprisoned  him  in  his  palace,  and  then  turned 
him  out  of  it,  who  broke  in  upon  his  very 
slumbers  by  imperious  messages,  who  pursued 
him  with  fire  and  sword  from  one  part  of  the 
empire  to  another,  who  hanged,  drew,  and 
quartered  his  adherents,  and  attainted  his 
innocent  heir,  were  his  nephew  and  his  two 
daughters !  When  we  reflect  on  all  these 
things,  we  are  at  a  loss  to  conceive  how  the 
same  persons  who,  on  the  fifth  of  November, 
thank  God  for  wonderfully  conducting  his  ser 
vant  King  William,  and  for  making  all  opposi 
tion  fall  before  him  until  he  became  our  King 
and  Governor,  can,  on  the  thirtieth  of  January, 
contrive  to  be  afraid  that  the  blood  of  the  Royal 
Martyr  may  be  visited  on  themselves  and  their 
ehildren. 

We  do  not,  we  repeat,  approve  of  the  execu 
tion  of  Charles ;  not  because  the  constitution 
exempts  the  king  from  responsibility,  for  we 
know  that  all  such  maxims,  however  excellent, 
have  their  exceptions ;  nor  because  we  feel 
any  peculiar  interest  in  his  character,  for  we 
think  that  his  sentence  describes  him  with 
perfect  justice  as  a  "  tyrant,  a  traitor,  a  mur 
derer,  and  a  public  enemy;"  but  because  we 
are  convinced  that  the  measure  was  most  in 
jurious  to  the  cause  of  freedom.  He  whom  it 
removed  was  a  captive  and  a  hostage.  His 
heir,  to  whom  the  allegiance  of  every  royalist 
was  instantly  transferred,  was  at  large.  The 
Presbyterians  could  never  have  been  perfectly 
reconciled  to  the  father.  They  had  no  such  root 
ed  enmity  to  the  son.  The  great  body  of  the 
people,  also,  contemplated  that  proceeding  with 
feelings  which,  however  unreasonable,  no  go 
vernment  could  safely  venture  to  outrage. 

But,  though  we  think  the  conduct  of  the 
regicides  blamable,  that  of  Milton  appears  to 
us  in  a  very  different  light.  The  deed  was 
done.  It  could  not  be  undone.  The  evil  was 
incurred;  and  the  object  was  to  render  it  as 
small  as  possible.  We  censure  the  chiefs 
of  the  army  for  not  yielding  to  the  popular 
opinion:  but  we  cannot  censure  Milton  for 
wishing  to  change  that  opinion.  The  very 
feeling,  which  would  have  restrained  us  from 
committing  the  act,  would  have  led  us,  after  it 
had  been  committed,  to  defend  it  against  the 
ravings  of  servility  and  superstition.  For  the 
iak",  of  public  liberty,  we  wish  that  the  thing 


had  not  been  done,  while  the  people  dis 
approved  of  it.  But,  for  the  sake  of  public 
liberty,  we  should  also  have  wished  the  people 
to  approve  of  it  when  it  was  done.  If  any 
thing  more  were  wanting  to  the  justification 
of  Milton,  the  book  of  Salinasius  would  furnish 
it.  That  miserable  performance  is  now  with 
justice  considered  only  as  a  beacon  to  word- 
catchers  who  wish  to  become  statesmen.  The 
celebrity  of  the  man  who  refuted  it,  the  "  JEncss 
magni  dextra,"  gives  it  all  its  fame  with  the 
present  generation.  In  that  age  the  state  of 
things  was  different.  It  was  not  then  fully 
understood  how  vast  an  interval  separates  the 
mere  classical  scholar  from  the  political  philo 
sopher.  Nor  can  it  be  doubted,  that  a  treatise 
which,  bearing  the  name  of  so  eminent  a 
critic,  attacked  the  fundamental  principles  of 
all  free  governments,  must,  if  suffered  to  re 
main  unanswered,  have  produced  a  most  per 
nicious  effect  on  the  public  mind. 

We  wish  to  add  a  few  words  relative  to 
another  subject  on  which  the  enemies  of 
Milton  delight  to  dwell — his  conduct  during 
the  administration  of  the  Protector.  That  an 
enthusiastic  votary  of  liberty  should  accept 
office  under  a  military  usurper,  seems,  no 
doubt,  at  first  sight,  extraordinary.  But  all  the 
circumstances  in  which  the  country  was  then 
placed  were  extraordinary.  The  ambition  of 
Oliver  was  of  no  vulgar  kind.  He  never  seems 
to  have  coveted  despotic  power.  He  at  first 
fought  sincerely  and  manfully  for  the  parlia 
ment,  and  never  deserted  it,  till  it  had  deserted 
its  duty.  If  he  dissolved  it  by  force,  it  was 
not  till  he  found  that  the  few  members,  Who 
remained  after  so  many  deaths,  secessions, 
and  expulsions,  were  desirous  to  appropriate 
to  themselves  a  power  which  they  held  only 
in  trust,  and  to  inflict  upon  England  the 
curse  of  a  Venetian  oligarchy.  But  even 
when  thus  placed  by  violence  at  the  head 
of  affairs,  he  did  not  assume  unlimited  power. 
He  gave  the  country  a  constitution  far  more 
perfect  than  any  which  had  at  that  time  been 
known  in  the  world.  He  reformed  the  repre 
sentative  system  in  a  manner  which  has  ex 
torted  praise  even  from  Lord  Clarendon.  For 
himself,  he  demanded  indeed  the  first  place  in 
the  commonwealth ;  but  with  powers  scarcely 
so  great  as  those  of  a  Dutch  stadtholder,  or  an 
American  president.  He  gave  the  parliament 
a  voice  in  the  appointment  of  ministers,  and 
left  to  it  the  whole  legislative  authority — not 
even  reserving  to  himself  a  veto  on  its  enact 
ments.  And  he  did  not  require  that  the  chief 
magistracy  should  be  hereditary  in  his  family. 
Thus  far,  we  think,  if  the  circumstances  of  the 
time,  and  the  opportunities  which  he  had  of 
aggrandizing  himself,  be  fairly  considered,  he 
will  not  lose  by  comparison  with  Washington 
or  Bolivar.  Had  his  moderation  been  met  by 
corresponding  moderation,  there  is  no  reason 
to  think  that  he  would  have  overstepped  the 
line  which  he  had  traced  for  himself.  But 
when  he  found  that  his  parliaments  questioned 
the  authority  under  which  they  met,  and  that  he 
was  in  danger  of  being  deprived  of  the  restrict 
ed  power  which  was  absolutely  necessary  to  his 
personal  safety,  then,  it  must  be  acknowledged, 
i  he  adopted  a  more  arbitrary  policy. 


MILTON. 


15 


Yet,  though  we  believe  that  the  intentions  ! 
of  Cromwell  were  at  first  honest,  though  we 
believe  that  he  was  driven  from  the  noble 
course  which  he  had  marked  out  for  himself 
by  the  almost  irresistible  force  of  circum 
stances,  though  we  admire,  in  common  with 
all  men  of  all  parties,  the  ability  and  energy 
of  his  splendid  administration,  we  are  not 
pleading  for  arbitrary  and  lawless  power,  even 
in  his  hands.  We  know  that  a  good  constitu 
tion  is  infinitely  better  than  the  best  despot. 
But  we  suspect,  that,  at  the  time  of  which  we 
speak,  the  violence  of  religious  and  political 
enmities  rendered  a  stable  and  happy  settle 
ment  next  to  impossible.  The  choice  lay,  not 
between  Cromwell  and  liberty,  but  between 
Cromwell  and  the  Stuarts.  That  Milton  chose 
well,  no  man  can  doubt,  who  fairly  compares 
the  events  of  the  protectorate  with  those  of  the 
thirty  years  which  succeeded  it — the  darkest 
and  most  disgraceful  in  the  English  annals. 
Cromwell  was  evidently  laying,  though  in  an 
irregular  manner,  the  foundations  of  an  ad 
mirable  system.  Never  before  had  religious 
liberty  and  the  freedom  of  discussion  been 
enjoyed  in  a  greater  degree.  Never  had  the 
national  honour  been  better  upheld  abroad,  or 
the  seat  of  justice  better  filled  at  home.  And 
it  was  rarely  that  any  opposition,  which  stopped 
short  of  open  rebellion,  provoked  the  resent 
ment  of  the  liberal  and  magnanimous  usurper. 
The  institutions  which  he  had  established,  as 
set  down  in  the  Instrument  of  Government, 
and  the  Humble  Petition  and  Advice,  were 
excellent.  His  practice,  it  is  true,  too  often 
departed  from  the  theory  of  these  institutions. 
But,  had  he  lived  a  few  years  longer,  it  is 
probable  that  his  institutions  would  have  sur 
vived  him,  and  that  his  arbitrary  practice 
would  have  died  with  him.  His  power  had 
not  been  consecrated  by  any  ancient  preju 
dices.  It  was  upheld  only  by  his  great  per 
sonal  qualities.  Little,  therefore,  was  to  be 
dreaded  from  a  second  Protector,  unless  he 
were  also  a  second  Oliver  Cromwell.  The 
events  which  followed  his  decease  are  the 
most  complete  vindication  of  those  who  exert 
ed  themselves  to  uphold  his  authority.  For 
his  death  dissolved  the  whole  frame  of  society. 
The  army  rose  against  the  Parliament,  the 
different  corps  of  the  army  against  each  other. 
Sect  raved  against  sect.  Party  plotted  against 
party.  The  Presbyterians,  in  their  eagerness 
to  be  revenged  on  the  Independents,  sacrificed 
their  own  liberty,  and  deserted  all  their  old 
principles.  Without  casting  one  glance  on  the 
past,  or  requiring  one  stipulation  for  the  future, 
they  threw  down  their  freedom  at  the  feet  of 
the  most  frivolous  and  heartless  of  tyrants. 

Then  came  those  days,  never  to  be  recalled 
without  a  blush — the  days  of  servitude  without 
loyalty,  and  sensuality  without  love,  of  dwarf 
ish  talents  and  gigantic  vices,  the  paradise  of 
cold  hearts  and  narrow  minds,  the  golden  age 
of  the  coward,  the  bigot,  and  the  slave.    The 
king  cringed  to  his  rival  that  he  might  trample  j 
on  his  people,  sunk  into  a  viceroy  of  France,  j 
and   pocketed,  with   complacent  infamy,  her  < 
degrading    insults   and    her  more   degrading  j 
gold.     The  caresses  of  harlots  and  the  jests  I 
of  buffoons  regulated  the  measures  of  a  go- 1 


vernment,  which  had  just  ability  enough  to 
deceive,  and  just  religion  enough  to  persecute. 
The  principles  of  liberty  were  the  scoff  of  every 
grinning  courtier,  and  the  Anathema  Marana- 
tha  of  every  fawning  dean.  In  every  high 
place,  worship  was  paid  to  Charles  and  James 
— Belial  and  Moloch  ;  and  England  propitiated 
those  obscene  and  cruel  idols  with  the  blood 
of  her  best  and  bravest  children.  Crime  suc 
ceeded  to  crime,  and  disgrace  to  disgrace,  till 
the  race,  accursed  of  God  and  man,  was  a 
second  time  driven  forth,  to  wander  on  the 
face  of  the  earth,  and  to  be  a  by- word  and  a 
shaking  of  the  head  to  the  nations. 

Most  of  the  remarks  which  we  have  hitherto 
made  on  the  public  character  of  Milton,  apply 
to  him  only  as  one  of  a  large  body.  We  shall 
proceed  to  notice  some  of  the  peculiarities 
which  distinguished  him  from  his  contempo 
raries.  And,  for  that  purpose,  it  is  necessary 
to  take  a  short  survey  of  the  parties  into  which 
the  political  world  was  at  that  time  divided. 
We  must  premise,  that  our  observations  are 
intended  to  apply  only  to  those  who  adhered, 
from  a  sincere  preference,  to  one  or  to  the 
other  side.  At  a  period  of  public  commotion, 
ever}-  faction,  like  an  Oriental  army,  is  attended 
by  a  crowd  of  camp  followers,  a  useless  and 
heartless  rabble,  who  prowl  round  its  line  of 
march  in  the  hope  of  picking  up  something 
under  its  protection,  but  desert  it  in  the  day  of 
battle,  and  often  join  to  exterminate  it  after  a 
defeat.  England,  at  the  time  of  which  we  are 
treating,  abounded  with  such  fickle  and  selfish 
politicians,  who  transferred  their  support  to 
every  government  as  it  rose, — who  kissed  the 
hand  of  the  king  in  1 640,  and  spit  in  his  face 
in  1649, — who  shouted  with  equal  glee  when 
Cromwell  was  inauguiated  in  Westminster 
Hall,  and  when  he  was  dug  up  to  be  hanged  at 
Tyburn — who  dined  on  calves'  heads  or  on 
broiled  rumps,  and  cut  doAvn  oak  branches  or 
stuck  them  up  as  circumstances  altered,  with 
out  the  slightest  shame  or  repugnance.  These 
we  leave  out  of  the  account.  We  take  our 
estimate  of  parties  from  those  who  really 
deserved  to  be  called  partisans. 

We  would  speak  first  of  the  Puritans,  the 
most  remarkable  body  of  men,  perhaps,  which 
the  world  has  ever  produced.  The  odious  and 
ridiculous  parts  of  their  character  lie  on  the 
surface.  He  that  runs  may  read  them ;  nor 
have  there  been  wanting  attentive  and  mali 
cious  observers  to  point  them  out.  For  many 
years  after  the  Restoration,  they  were  the  theme 
of  unmeasured  invective  and  derision.  They 
were  exposed  to  the  utmost  licentiousness  of 
the  press  and  of  the  stage,  at  the  time  when 
the  press  and  the  stage  were  most  licentious. 
They  were  not  men  of  letters ;  they  were,  as  a 
body,  unpopular ;  they  could  not  defend  them 
selves  ;  and  the  public  would  not  take  them 
under  its  protection.  They  were  therefore 
abandoned,  without  reserve,  to  the  tender  mer 
cies  of  the  satirists  and  dramatists.  The 
ostentatious  simplicity  of  their  dress,  their 
sour  aspect,  their  nasal  twang,  their  stiff  pos« 
ture,  their  long  graces,  their  Hebrew  names 
the  Scriptural  phrases  which  they  introduced 
on  every  occasion,  their  contempt  of  human 
learning,  their  detestation  of  polite  arnusr 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


16 

ments,  were  indeed  fair  game  for  the  laughers. 
But  it  is  not  from  the  laughers  alone  that  the 
philosophy  of  history  is  to  be  learnt.  And  he 
who  approaches  this  subject  should  carefully 
guard  against  the  influence  of  that  potent  ridi 
cule,  which  has  already  misled  so  many  excel 
lent  writers. 

"  Ecco  il  fonte  del  riso,  ed  ecco  il  rio 
Che  mortal!  perigli  in  se  contiene: 
Horqui  tener  a  fren  nostro  a  dcsio, 
Ed  esser  cauti  molto  a  noi  conviene   '« 
Those  who  roused  the  people  to  resistance — 
who  directed  their  measures  through  a  long- 
series  of  eventful  years — who  formed,  out  of 
the 'most    unpromising  materials,  the   finest 
army  that  Europe  had  ever  seen — who  tram 
pled  down  King,  Church,  and  Aristocracy— 
who,  in  the  short  intervals  of  domestic  sedition 
and  rebellion,  made  the  name  of  England  ter 
rible  to  every  nation  on  the  face  of  the  earth, 
were  no  vulgar  fanatics.     Most  of  their  ab 
surdities  were  mere  external  badges,  like  the 
signs  of  freemasonry  or  the  dresses  of  friars. 
We  regret  that  these  badges  were  not  more 
attractive.    We  regret  that  a  body,  to  whose 
courage  and  talents  mankind  has  owed  inesti 
mable  obligations,  had  not  the  lofty  elegance 
which  distinguished  some  of  the  adherents  of 
Charles  I.,  or  the  easy  good  breeding  for  which 
the  court  of  Charles  II.  was  celebrated.     But, 
if  we  must  make  our  choice,  we  shall,  like 
Bassanio  in  the  play,  turn  from  the  specious 
caskets  which  contain  only  the  Death's  .head 
arid  the  Fool's  head,  and  fix  our  choice  on  the 
plain  leaden  chest  which  conceals  the  treasure. 
The  Puritans  were  men  whose  minds  had 
derived  a  peculiar  character  from  the  daily 
contemplation  of  superior  beings  and  external 
interests.    Not  consent  with  acknowledging,  in 
general  terms,  an  overruling  Providence,  they 
habitually  ascribed  every  event  to  the  will  of 
the  Great  Being,  for  whose  power  nothing  was 
too  vai  t,  for  whose  inspection  nothing  was  too 
minute      To  know  him,  to  serve  him,  to  enjoy 
him,  was  with  them  the  great  end  of  existence. 
They  rejected  with  contempt  the  ceremonious 
homage  which  other  sects  substituted  for  the 
pure  worship  of  the  soul.    Instead  of  catching 
occasional  glimpses  of  the  Deity  through  an 
obscuring  veil,  they  aspired  to  gaze  full  on  the 
intolerable  brightness,  and  to  commune  with 
him  face  to  face.    Hence  originated  their  con. 
tempt  for  terrestrial  distinctions.    The  differ 
ence  between  the  greatest  and  meanest  of  man 
kind  seemed  to  vanish,  when  compared  with 
the   boundless   interval  which  separated  the 
whole  race  from  him  on  whom  their  own  eyes 
were  constantly  fixed.    They  recognised  nr 
title  to  superiority  but  his  favour;  and,  confi 
dent  of  that  favour,  they  despised  all  the  ac 
complishments  and  all   the  dignities  of   the 
world.    If  they  were  unacquainted  with  th 
works  of  philosophers  and  poets,  they  wer 
deeply  read  in  the  oracles  of  God.    If  thei 
names  were  not  found  in  the  registers  of  he 
raids,  they  felt  assured  that  they  were  recorde 
in  the  Book  of  Life.    If  their  steps  were  no 
accompanied  by  a  splendid  train  of  menials 
legions  of  ministering  angels  had  charge  ove 
dxein     Their  palaces  were  houses  not  mad 


*  Gcrusalemme  Liberata,  xv.  57. 


with  hands:  their  diadems  crowns  of  glory 

which  should  never  fade  away !     On  the  rich 

and  the  eloquent,  on  nobles  and  pries  is,  they 

looked  down  with  contempt :  for  they  esteemed 

themselves  rich  in  a  moie  precious  treasure, 

and   eloquent  in   a  more   sublime   language, 

nobles  by  the  right  of  an  earlier  creation,  and 

priests  by  the  imposition  of  a  mightier  hand. 

The  very  meanest  of  them  was   a  being   to 

whose  fate  a  mysterious  and  terrible  import- 

ance  belonged — on  whose  slightest  actions  the 

spirits   of   light    and    darkness    looked   with 

anxious  interest — who  had  been  destined,  be- 

ore  heaven  and  earth  were  created,  to  enjoy 

felicity  which  should  continue  when  heaven 

nd  earth  should  have  passed  away.     Events 

rhich   short-sighted    politicians    ascribed    to 

arthly  causes  had  been  ordained  on  his  ac- 

ount.    For  his  sake  empires  had  risen,  and 

ourished,   and  decayed.     For  his   sake  the 

Vlmighty  had  proclaimed  his  will  by  the  pen 

f  the  evangelist  and  the  harp  of  the  prophet. 

He  had  been  rescued  by  no  common  deliverer 

rom  the  grasp  of  no  common  foe.     He  had 

een  ransomed  by  the   sweat  of  no   vulgar 

gony,  by  the  blood  of  no   earthly  sacrifice. 

t  was  for  him  that  the  sun  had  been  darkened, 

hat  the  rocks  had  been  rent,  that  the  dead  had 

.risen,  that  all  nature  had  shuddered  at  the  suf- 

erings  of  her  expiring  God ! 

Thus  the  Puritan  was  made  up  of  two  differ 
ent  men,  the  one  all  self-abasement,  penitence, 
gratitude,  passion;  the  other  proud,  calm,  in 
flexible,  sagacious.    He  prostrated  himself  in 
he  dust  before  his  Maker;  but  he  set  his  foot 
m  the  neck  of  his  king.    In  his  devotional  re- 
irement,   he  prayed   with    convulsions,   and 
groans,  and  tears.     He  was  half  maddened  by 
glorious  or  terrible  illusions.    He   heard  the 
jtes  of  angels  or  the  tempting  whispers  of 
iends.    He   caught  a  gleam   of  the   Beatific 
Vision,  or  woke  screaming  from  dreams  of 
everlasting  fire.    Like  Vane,  he  thought  him 
self  intrusted  with  the  sceptre  of  the  millennial 
year.     Like  Fleetwood,  he  cried  in  the  bitter 
ness  of  his  soul  that  God  had  hid  his  face  from 
him.    But  when  he  took  his  seat  in  the  coun 
cil,  or  girt  on  his  sword  for  war,  these  tem 
pestuous    workings    of   the    soul  had  left  no 
perceptible  trace  behind  them.     People  who 
saw  nothing  of  the  godly  but  their  uncouth 
visages,  and  heard  nothing  from  them  but  their 
groans  and  their  whining  hymns,  might  laugh 
at  them.     But  those  had  little  reason  to  laugh, 
who  encountered  them  in  the  hall  of  debate  or 
in  the  field  of  battle.    These  fanatics  brought 
to  civil  and  military  affairs  a  coolness  of  judg 
ment  and  an  immutability  of  purpose  which 
some  writers  have  thought  inconsistent  with 
their  religious  zeal,  but  which  were  in  fact  the 
necessary  effects  of  it.    The  intensity  of  their 
feelings  on  one  subject  made  them  tranquil  on 
every  other.   One  overpowering  sentiment  had 
subjected  to  itself  pity  and  hatred,  ambition 
and  fear.     Death  had  lost  its  terrors  and  plea 
sure  its  charms.    They  had  their  smiles  and 
their  tears,  their  raptures  and  their  sorrows, 
but  not  for  the  things  of  this  world.  Enthusiasm 
had  made  them  stoics,  had  cleared  their  minds 
from  every  vulgar  passion  and  prejudice,  ao4 
raised  them  above  the  influence  of  danger  and 


MILTON. 


17 


of  corruption.  It  sometimes  might  lead  them 
to  pursue  unwise  ends,  but  never  to  choose  un 
wise  means.  They  went  through  the  world 
like  Sir  Artegale's  iron  man  Talus  with  his 
flail,  crushing  and  trampling  down  oppressors, 
mingling  with  human  beings,  but  having  nei 
ther  part  nor  lot  in  human  infirmities ;  insensi 
ble  to  fatigue,  to  pleasure,  and  to  pain ;  not  to 
be  pierced  by  any  weapon,  not  to  be  withstood 
by  any  barrier. 

Such  we  believe  to  have  been  the  character 
of  the  Puritans.  We  perceive  the  absurdity  of 
their  manners.  We  dislike  the  sullen  gloom 
of  their  domestic  habits.  We  acknowledge 
that  the  tone  of  their  minds  was  often  injured 
by  straining  after  things  too  high  for  mortal 
reach.  And  we  know  that,  in  spite  of  their 
hatred  of  Popery,  they  too  often  fell  into  the 
worst  vices  of  that  bad  system,  intolerance  and 
extravagant  austerity — that  they  had  their  an 
chorites  and  their  crusades,  their  Dunstans  and 
their  De  Montforts,  their  Dominies  and  their 
Escobars.  Yet  when  all  circumstances  are 
taken  into  consideration,  we  do  not  hesitate  to 
pronounce  them  a  brave,  a  wise,  an  honest,  and 
a  useful  body. 

The  Puritans  espoused  the  cause  of  civil 
liberty,  mainly  because  it  was  the  cause  of  re- 
*igion.  There  was  another  party,  by  no  means 
ftumerous,  but  distinguished  by  learning  and 
ability,  which  co-operated  with  them  on  very 
different  principles.  We  speak  of  those  whom 
Cromwell  was  accustomed  to  call  the  Heathens, 
men  who  were,  in  the  phraseology  of  that  time, 
doubting  Thomases  or  careless  Gallios  with 
regard  to  religious  subjects,  but  passionate 
worshippers  of  freedom.  Heated  by  the  study 
of  ancient  literature,  they  set  up  their  country 
as  their  idol,  and  proposed  to  themselves  the 
heroes  of  Pkitarch  as  their  examples.  They 
seem  to  have  borne  some  resemblance  to  the 
Brissotines  of  the  French  Revolution.  But  it 
is  not  very  easy  to  draw  the  line  of  distinction 
between  them  and  their  devout  associates, 
whose  tone  and  manner  they  sometimes  found 
it  convenient  to  affect,  and  sometimes,  it  is 
probable,  imperceptibly  adopted. 

We  now  come  to  the  Royalists.  We  shall 
attempt  to  speak  of  them,  as  we  have  spoken 
of  their  antagonists,  with  perfect  candour.  We 
shall  not  charge  upon  a  whole  party  the  profli 
gacy  and  baseness  of  the  horseboys,  gamblers, 
and  bravoes,  whom  the  hope  of  license  and 
plunder  attracted  from  all  the  dens  of  White- 
friars  to  the  standard  of  Charles,  and  who  dis 
graced  their  associates  by  excesses  which, 
under  the  stricter  discipline  of  the  Parliament 
ary  armies,  were  never  tolerated.  We  will 
select  a  more  favourable  specimen.  Thinking, 
as  we  do,  that  the  cause  of  the  king  was  the 
cause  of  bigotry  and  tyranny,  we  yet  cannot 
refrain  from  looking  with  complacency  on  the 
character  of  the  honest  old  Cavaliers.  We  feel 
a  national  pride  in  comparing  them  with  the 
instruments  which  the  despots  of  other  coun 
tries  are  compelled  to  employ,  with  the  mutes 
who  throng  their  antechambers,  and  the  Janis 
saries  who  mount  guard  at  their  gates.  Our 
royalist  countrymen  were  not  heartless,  dan 
gling  courtiers,  bowing  at  every  step,  and  sim 
pering  at  everv  word.  Thev  were  not  mere 

Vox..  I.— 3 


machines  for  destruction  dressed  up  in  uni 
forms,  caned  into  skill,  intoxicated  into  valour, 
defending  without  love,  destroying  without 
hatred.  There  was  a  freedom  in  their  subser 
viency,  a  nobleness  in  their  very  degradation. 
The  sentiment  of  individual-independence  was 
strong  within  them.  They  were  indeed  mis 
led,  but  by  no  base  or  selfish  motive.  Com 
passion  and  romantic  honour,  the  prejudices 
of  childhood,  and  the  venerable  names  of  his 
tory,  threw  over  them  a  spell  potent  as  that  of 
Duessa;  and,  like  the  Red-Cross  Knight,  they 
thought  that  they  were  doing  battle  for  an  in 
jured  beauty,  while  they  defended  a  false  and 
loathsome  sorceress.  In  truth,  they  scarcely 
entered  at  all  into  the  merits  of  the  political 
question.  It  was  not  for  a  treacherous  king 
or  an  intolerant  church  that  they  fought ;  but 
for  the  old  banner  which  had  waved  in  so 
many  battles  over  the  heads  of  their  fathers, 
and  for  the  altars  at  which  they  had  received 
the  hands  of  their  brides.  Though  nothing 
could  be  more  erroneous  than  their  political 
opinions,  they  possessed,  in  a  far  greater  de 
gree  than  their,  adversaries,  those  qualities 
which  are  the  grace  of  private  life.  With 
many  of  the  vices  of  the  Round  Table,  they 
had  also  many  of  its  virtues,  courtesy,  genp- 
rosity,  veracity,  tenderness,  and  respect  for  wo 
man.  They  had  far  more  both  of  profound  and 
of  polite  learning  than  the  Puritans.  Their 
manners  were  more  engaging,  their  tempers 
more  amiable,  their  tastes  more  elegant,  and 
their  households  more  cheerful. 

Milton  did  not  strictly  belong  to  any  of  the 
classes  which  we  have  described.  He  was  not 
a  Puritan.  He  was  not  a  Freeininker.  He 
was  not  a  Cavalier.  In  his  character  the  no 
blest  qualities  of  every  party  were  combined 
in  harmonious  union.  From  the  parliament 
and  from  the  court,  from  the  conventicle  and 
from  the  Gothic  cloister,  from  the  gloomy  and 
sepulchral  circles  of  the  Roundheads  and  from 
the  Christmas  revel  of  the  hospitable  Cavalier, 
his  nature  selected  and  drew  to  itself  whatever 
was  great  and  good,  while  it  rejected  all  iho 
base  and  pernicious  ingredients  by  which  those 
fine  elements  were  defiled.  Like  the  Puritans, 
he  lived 

"  As  ever  in  his  great  Taskmaster's  eye." 

Like  them,  he  kept  his  mind  continually  fixed 
on  an  Almighty  Judge  and  an  eternal  reward. 
And  hence  he  acquired  their  contempt  of  ex 
ternal  circumstances,  their  .fortitude,  their 
tranquillity,  their  inflexible  resolution.  But 
not  the  coolest  sceptic  or  the  most  profane 
scoffer  was  more  perfectly  free  from  the  con 
tagion  of  their  frantic  delusions,  their  savage 
manners,  their  ludicrous  jargon,  their  scorn  of 
science,  and  their  aversion  to  pleasure.  Hating 
tyranny  with  a  perfect  hatred,  he  had  never 
theless  all  the  estimable  and  ornamental  quali 
ties,  which  were  almost  entirely  monopolized 
by  the  party  of  the  tyrant.  There  was  non§ 
who  had  a  stronger  sense  of  the  value  of  lite-> 
rature,  a  finer  relish  for  every  elegant  amuse* 
ment,  or  a  more  chivalrous  delicacy  of  honour 
and  love.  Though  his  opinions  were  demo- 
cratic,  his  tastes  and  his  associates  were  such 
as  harmonize  best  with  monarchy  and  ansio 


:s 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


cracy.  He  was  under  the  influence  of  all  the 
feelings  by  which  the  gallant,  cavaliers  were 
misled.  But  of  those  feelings  he  was  the  mas 
ter  and  not  the  slave.  Like  the  hero  of  Homer, 
he  enjoyed  all  the,  pleasures  of  fascination ; 
but  he  was  not  fascinated.  He  listened  to  the 
song  of  the  Sirens ;  yet  he  glided  by  without 
being  seduced  to  their  fatal  shore.  He  tasted 
the  cup  of  Circe ;  but  he  bore  about  him  a  sure 
antidote  against  the  effects  of  its  bewitching 
sweetness.  The  illusions  which  captivated 
his  imagination  never  impaired  his  reasoning 
powers.  The  statesman  was  a  proof  against 
the  splendour,  the  solemnity,  and  the  romance 
which  enchanted  the  poet.  Any  person  who 
will  contrast  the  sentiments  expressed  in  his 
Treatises  on  Prelacy,  with  the  exquisite  lines 
on  ecclesiastical  architecture  and  music  in  the 
Penseroso,  which  were  published  about  the 
same  time,  will  understand  our  meaning. 
This  is  an  inconsistency  which,  more  than  any 
thing  else,  raises  his  character  in  our  estima 
tion  ;  because  it  shows  how  many  private 
tastes  and  feelings  he  sacrificed,  in  order  to  do 
what  he  considered  his  duty  to  mankind.  It  is 
the  very  struggle  of  the  noble  Othello.  His 
heart  relents  ;  but  his  hand  is  firm.  He  does 
naught  in  hate,  but  all  in  honour.  He  kisses 
the  beautiful  deceiver  before  he  destroys  her. 

That  from  which  the  public  character  of 
Milton  derives  its  great  and  peculiar  splendour 
still  remains  to  be  mentioned.  If  he  exerted 
himself  to  overthrow  a  foresworn  king  and  a 
persecuting  hierarchy,  he  exerted  himself  in 
conjunction  with  others.  But  the  glory  of  the 
battle,  which  he  fought  for  that  species  of  free 
dom  which  is  the  most  valuable,  and  which 
was  then  the  least  understood,  the  freedom  of 
the  human  mind,  is  all  his  own.  Thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands  among  his  contempora 
ries  raised  their  voices  against  ship-money 
and  the  star-chamber.  But  there  were  few  in 
deed  who  discerned  the  more  fearful  evils  of 
moral  and  intellectual  slavery,  and  the  bene 
fits  which  would  result  from  the  liberty  of  the 
press  and  the  unfettered  exercise  of  private 
judgment.  These  were  the  objects  which  Mil 
ton  justly  conceived  to  be  the  most  important. 
He  was  desirous  that  the  people  should  think 
for  tnemselves  as  well  as  tax  themselves,  and 
be  emancipated  from  the  dominion  of  preju 
dice  as  well  as  from  that  of  Charles.  He 
knew  that  those  who,  with  the  best  intentions, 
overlooked  these  schemes  of  reform,  and  con 
tented  themselves  with  pulling  down  the  king 
and  imprisoning  the  malignants,  acted  like  the 
heedless  brothers  in  his  own  poem,  who,  in 
their  eagerness  to  disperse  the  train  of  the  sor 
cerer,  neglected  the  means  of  liberating  the 
captive.  They  thought  only  of  conquering 
when  they  should  have  thought  of  disenchant 
ing. 

"Oh,  yc  mistook!  You  should  have  snatched  the  wand! 
Without  the  rod  reversed, 

And  backward  mutters  of  dissevering  power, 

We  cannot  free  the  lady  that  sits  here 

Bound  in  strong  fetters  fixed  and  motionless." 

To  reverse  the  rod,  to  spell  the  charm  back 
ward,  to  break  the  ties  w'hich  bound  a  stupe- 
fed  people  to  the  seat  of  enchantment,  was  the 
noble  aim  of  Milton.  To  this  all  his  public 
conduct  was  directed.  For  this  he  joined  the 


Presbyterians — for  this  he  forsook  them.  He 
fought  their  perilous  battle ;  but  he  turned 
away  wit.h  disdain  from  their  insolent  triumph. 
He  saw  that  they,  like  those  whom  they  had 
vanquished,  were  hostile  to  the  liberty  of 
thought.  He  therefore  joined  the  Independents, 
and  called  upon  Cromwell  to  break  the  secular 
chain,  and  to  save  free  conscience  from  the 
paw  of  the  Presbyterian  wolf.*  With  a  view 
to  the  same  great  object,  he  attacked  the 
licensing  system  in  that  sublime  treatise  which 
every  statesman  should  wear  as  a  sign  upon 
his  hand,  and  as  frontlets  between  his  eyes. 
His  attacks  were,  in  general,  directed  less 
against  particular  abuses  than  against  those 
deeply-seated  errors  on  which  almost  all  abuses 
are  founded,  the  servile  worship  of  eminenf 
men  and  the  irrational  dread  of  innovation. 

That  he  might  shake  the  foundations  of 
these  debasing  sentiments  more  effectually,  he 
always  selected  for  himself  the  boldest  literary 
services.  He  never  came  up  to  the  rear  when 
the  outworks  had  been  carried  and  the  breach 
entered.  He  pressed  into  the  forlorn  hope. 
At  the  beginning  of  the  changes,  he  wrote  with 
incomparable  energy  and  eloquence  against 
the  bishops.  But,  when  his  opinion  seemed 
likely  to  prevail,  he  passed  on  to  other  sub 
jects,  and  abandoned  prelacy  to  the  crowd  of 
writers  who  now  hastened  to  insult  a  falling 
party.  There  is  no  more  hazardous  enterprise 
than  that  of  bearing  the  torch  of  truth  into 
those  dark  and  infected  recesses  in  which  no 
light  has  ever  shone.  But  it  was  the  choice 
and  the  pleasure  of  Milton  to  penetrate  the 
noisome  vapours  and  to  brave  the  terrible  ex 
plosion.  Those  who  most  disapprove  of  his 
opinions  must  respect  the  hardihood  with 
which  he  maintained  them.  He,  in  general, 
left  to  others  the  credit  of  expounding  and  de 
fending  the  popular  parts  of  his  religious  and 
political  creed.  He  took  his  own  stand  upon 
those  which  the  great  body  of  his  countrymen 
reprobated  as  criminal,  or  derided  as  para 
doxical.  He  stood  up  for  divorce  and  regicide. 
He  ridiculed  the  Eikon.  He  attacked  the  pre 
vailing  systems  of  education.  His  radiant  and 
beneficent  career  resembled  that  of  the  god  of 
light  and  fertility, 

"  Nitor  in  adversum  ;  nee  me,  qui  csetera,  vincit 
Impetus,  et  rapido  contrarius  evehor  orbi." 

It  is  to  be  regretted  that  the  prose  writings 
of  Milton  should,  in  our  time,  be  so  little  read. 
As  compositions,  they  deserve  the  attention  of 
every  man  who  wishes  to  become  acquainted 
with  the  full  power  of  the  English  language. 
They  abound  with  passages  compared  with 
which  the  finest  declamations  of  B  urke  sink  into 
insignificance.  They  are  a  perfect  field  of  cloth 
of  gold.  The  style  is  stiff,  with  gorgeous  em 
broidery.  Not  even  in  the  earlier  books  of  the 
Paradise  Lost  has  he  ever  risen  higher  than  in 
those  parts  of  his  controversial  works  in  which 
his  feelings,  excited  by  conflict,  find  a  vent  in 
bursts  of  devotional  and  lyric  rapture.  It  is,- 
to  borrow  his  own  majestic  language,  "a 
sevenfold  chorus  of  hallelujahs  and  harping 
symphonies."! 

*  Sonnet  to  Cromwell. 

f  The  Reason  of  Church  Government  urged  again* 
Prelacy,  Book  II. 


MACHIAVELLI. 


We  had  intended  to  look  more  closely  a 
their  performances,  to  analyze  the  peculiari 
ties  of  their  diction,  to  dwell  at  some  length 
on  the  sublime  wisdom  of  the  Areopagitica 
and  the  nervous  rhetoric  of  the  Iconoclast,  and 
to  point  out  some  of  those  magnificent  pas 
sages  which  occur  in  the  Treatise  of  Reforma 
tion  and  the  Animadversions  on  the  Remon 
strant.     But  the  length  to  which  our  remarks 
have  already  extended  renders  this  impossible. 
We  must  conclude.  And  yet  we  can  scarce 
ly  tear  ourselves  away  from  the  subject.     The 
da3's  immediately  following  the  publication  of 
this  relic  of  Milton  appear  to  be  peculiarly  set 
apart  and  consecrated  to  his  memory.     And 
we  shall  scarcely  be  censured  if,  on  this  his 
festival,  we  be  found  lingering  near  his  shrine, 
how  worthless   soever   may  be   the   offering 
which  we  bring  to  it.     While  this  book  lies 
on  our  table,  we  seem  to  be  contemporaries 
of  the  great  poet.     We  are  transported  a  hun 
dred  and  fifty  years  back.     We  can  almost 
fancy  that  we  are  visiting  him  in  his  small 
lodging ;  that  we  see  him  sitting  at  the  old  or 
gan  beneath  the  faded  green  hangings ;  that 
we  can  catch  the  quick  twinkle  of  his  eyes, 
rolling  in  vain  to  find  the  day ;   that  we  are 
reading  in  the  lines  of  his  noble  countenance 
the  proud  and  mournful  history  of  his  glory 
and  his  affliction!    We  image  to  ourselves  the 
breathless  silence  in  which  we  should  listen 
to  his  slightest  word ;   the  passionate  venera 
tion  with  which  we  should  kneel  to  kiss  his 
hand  and  weep  upon  it ;  the  earnestness  with 
which  we  should  endeavour  to  console  him,  if 
indeed  such  a  spirit  could  need  consolation,  for 
the  neglect  of  an  age  unworthy  of  his  talents 
and  his  virtues  ;  the  eagerness  with  which  we 
should  contest  with  his  daughters,  or  with  his 
Quaker  friend,  Elwood,  the  privilege  of  read 
ing  Homer  to  him,  or  of  taking  down  the  im 
mortal  accents  which  flowed  from  his  lips. 


These  are  perhaps  foolish  feelings.  Yet  we 
cannot  be  ashamed  of  them ;  nor  shall  we  be 
sorry  if  what  we  have  written  shall  in  any  de 
gree  excite  them  in  other  minds.  We  are  not 
much  in  the  habit  of  idolizing  either  the  living 
or  the  dead.  And  we  think  that  there  is  no 
more  certain  indication  of  a  weak  and  ill-regu 
lated  intellect  than  that  propensity  which,  for 
want  of  a  better  name,  we  will  venture  to 
christen  Bosivellism.  But  there  are  a  few  cha 
racters  which  have  stood  the  closest  scrutiny 
and  the  severest  tests,  which  have  been  tried 
in  the  furnace  and  have  proved  pure,  which 
have  been  weighed  in  the  balance  and  have 
not  been  found  wanting,  which  have  been  de 
clared  sterling  by  the  general  consent  of  man 
kind,  and  which  are  visibly  stamped  with  the 
image  and  superscription  of  the  Most  High. 
These  great  men  we  trust  that  we  know  how 
to  prize ;  and  of  these  was  Milton.  The  sight 
of  his  books,  the  sound  of  his  name,  are  re 
freshing  to  us.  His  thoughts  resemble  those 
celestial  fruits  and  flowers  which  the  Virgin 
Martyr  of  Massinger  sent  down  from  the  gar 
dens  of  Paradise  to  the  earth,  distinguished 
from  the  productions  of  other  soils,  not  only 
by  their  superior  bloom  and  sweetness,  but  by 
their  miraculous  efficacy  to  invigorate  and  to 
ical.  They  are  powerful,  not  only  to  delight, 
but  to  elevate  and  purify.  Nor  do  we  envy 
the  man  who  can  study  either  the  life  or  the 
writings  of  the  great  Poet  and  Patriot  without 
aspiring  to  emulate,  not  indeed  the  sublime 
works  with  which  his  genius  has  enriched  our 
iterature,  but  the  zeal  with  which  he  laboured 
"or  the  public  good,  the  fortitude  with  which 
he  endured  every  private  calamity,  the  lofty 
disdain  with  which  he  looked  down  on  tempta- 
ion  and  dangers,  the  deadly  hatred  which  he 
)ore  to  bigots  and  tyrants,  and  the  faith  which 

so  sternly  kept  with  his  country  and  with 
his  fame. 


MACHIAVELLI.1 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1827.] 


THOSE  who  have  attended  to  the  practice  of 
our  literary  tribunal  are  well  aware  that,  by 
means  of  certain  legal  fictions  similar  to  those 
of  Westminster  Hall,  we  are  frequently  en 
abled  to  take  cognisance  of  cases  lying  beyond 
the  sphere  of  our  original  jurisdiction.  We 
need  hardly  say,  therefore,  that,  in  the  present 
instance,  M.  Perier  is  merely  a  Richard  Roe — 
that  his  name  is  used  for  the  sole  purpose  of 
bringing  Machiavelli  into  court — and  that  he 
will  not  be  mentioned  in  any  subsequent  stage 
of  the  proceedings. 

We  doubt  whether  any  name  in  literary  his 
tory  be  so  generally  odious  as  that  of  the  man 
whose  character  and  writings  we  now  propose 
to  consider.  The  terms  in  which  he  is  com- 


*  (F.uvres  completes  de  MachiaveL  traduites  par  J.  V. 
PEHIKU.    Paris,  1825. 


monly  described  would  seem  to  import  that  he 
was  the  Tempter,  the  Evil  Principle,  the  dis 
coverer  of  ambition  and  revenge,  the  original 
inventor  of  perjury;  that,  before  the  publica 
tion  of  his  fatal  Prince,  there  had  never  been  a 
hypocrite,  a  tyrant,  or  a  traitor,  a  simulated 
virtue  or  a  convenient  crime.  One  writer 
gravely  assures  us,  that  Maurice  of  Saxony 
learned  all  his  fraudulent  policy  from  that  ex 
ecrable  volume.  Another  remarks,  that  since 
it  was  translated  into  Turkish,  the  Sultans 
have  been  more  addicted  than  formerly  to  the 
custom  of  strangling  their  brothers.  Our  own 
foolish  Lord  Lyttleton  charges  the  poor  Floren 
tine  with  the  manifold  treasons  of  the  House 
of  Guise,  and  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew 
Several  authors  have  hinted  that  the  Gunpov* 
der  Plot  is  to  be  primarily  attributed  to  his 
doctrines,  and  seem  to  think  that  his  effigy 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ought  to  be  substituted  for  that  of  Guy  Fawkes, 
in  those  processions  by  which  the  ingenuous 
youth  of  England  annually  commemorate  the 
preservation  of  the  Three  Estates.  The  Church 
of  Rome  has  pronounced  his  works  accursed 
things.  Nor  have  our  own  countrymen  been 
backward  in  testifying  their  opinion  of  his 
merits.  Out  of  his  surname  they  have  coined 
an  epithet  for  a  knave — and  out  of  his  Chris 
tian  name  a  synonyme  for  the  Devil.* 

It  is  indeed  scarcely  possible  for  any  person, 
not  well  acquainted  with  the  history  and  litera 
ture  of  Italy,  to  read,  without  horror  and 
amazement,  the  celebrated  treatise  which  has 
brought  so  much  obloquy  on  the  name  of  Ma- 
chiavelli.  Such  a  display  of  wickedness,  naked, 
yet  not  ashamed,  such  cool,  judicious,  scientific 
atrocity,  seem  rather  to  belong  to  a  fiend  than 
to  the  most  depraved  of  men.  Principles 
which  the  most  hardened  ruffian  would 
scarcely  hint  to  his  most  trusted  accomplice, 
or  avow,  without  the  disguise  of  some  palliat 
ing  sophism,  even  to  his  own  mind,  are  pro 
fessed  without  the  slightest  circumlocution, 
and  assumed  as  the  fundamental  axioms  of  all 
political  science. 

It  is  not  strange  that  ordinary  readers  should 
regard  the  author  of  such  a  book  as  the  most 
depraved  and  shameless  of  human  beings. 
Wise  men,  however,  have  always  been  in 
clined  to  look  with  great  suspicion  on  the  an 
gels  and  demons  of  the  multitude  ;  and  in  the 
present  instance,  several  circumstances  have 
led  even  superficial  observers  to  question  the 
justice  of  the  vulgar  decision.  It  is  notorious 
that  Machiavelli  was,  through  life,  a  zealous 
republican.  In  the  same  year  in  which  he 
composed  his  manual  of  Kingcraft,  he  suffered 
imprisonment  and  torture  in  the  cause  of 
public  liberty.  It  seems  inconceivable  that 
the  martyr  of  freedom  should  have  design 
edly  acted  as  the  apostle  of  tyranny.  Several 
eminent  writers  have,  therefore,  endeavoured 
to  detect,  in  this  unfortunate  performance, 
some  concealed  meaning  more  consistent  with 
the  character  and  conduct  of  the  author  than 
that  which  appears  at  the  first  glance. 

One  hypothesis  is,  that  Machiavelli  intended 
to  practice  on  the  young  Lorenzo  de  Medici  a 
fraud,  similar  to  that  which  Sunderland  is  said 
to  have  employed  against  our  James  the 
Second, — that  he  urged  his  pupil  to  violent  and 
perfidious  measures,  as  the  surest  means  of 
accelerating  the  moment  of  deliverance  and 
revenge.  Another  supposition,  which  Lord 
Bacon  seems  to  countenance,  is,  that  the  trea 
tise  was  merely  a  piece  of  grave  irony,  in 
tended  to  warn  nations  against  the  arts  of 
ambitious  men.  It  would  be  easy  to  show  that 
neither  of  these  solutions  is  consistent  with 
many  passages  in.  the  Prince  itself.  But  the 
most  decisive  refutation  is  that  which  is  fur 
nished  by  the  other  works  of  Machiavelli.  In 
all  the  writings  which  he  gave  to  the  public, 
and  in  all  those  which  the  research  of  editors 
has,  in  the  course  of  three  centuries,  dis- 


*  Nick  Machiavel  had  ne'er  a  trick, 
Tho'  he  gave  his  name  to  our  Old  Nick. 

Hudibras,  Part  III.  Canto  I. 

Hut,  we  believe,  there  is  a  schism  on  this  subject  among 
!'»»*>  antinuaries. 


:  covered — in  his  Comedies,  designed  for  the 
entertainment  of  the  multitude — in  his  Com- 
|  ments  on  Livy,  intended  for  the  perusal  of  the 
|  most  enthusiastic  patriots  of  Florence — in  his 
History,  inscribed  to  one  of  the  most  amiable 
and  estimable  of  the  Popes — in  his  Public 
Despatches — in  his  private  Memoranda,  the 
same  obliquity  of  moral  principle  for  which 
the  Prince  is  so  severely  censured  is  more  or 
less  discernible.  We  doubt  whether  it  would 
be  possible  to  find,  in  all  the  many  volumes 
of  his  compositions,  a  single  expression  indi 
cating  that  dissimulation  and  treachery  had 
ever  struck  him  as  discreditable. 

After  this  it  may  seem  ridiculous  to  say,  that 
we  are  acquainted  with  few  writings  which 
exhibit  so  much  elevation  of  sentiment,  so 
pure  and  warm  a  zeal  for  the  public  good,  or 
so  just  a  view  of  the  duties  and  rights  of  citi 
zens,  as  those  of  Machiavelli.  Yet  so  it  is. 
And  even  from  the  Prince  itself  we  could  select 
many  passages  in  support  of  this  remark.  To 
a  reader  of  our  age  and  country  this  incon 
sistency  is.  at  first,  perfectly  bewildering.  The 
whole  man  seems  to  be  an  enigma — a  gro 
tesque  assemblage  of  incongruous  qualities — 
selfishness  and  generosity,  cruelty  and  benevo 
lence,  craft  and  simplicity,  abject  villany  and 
romantic  heroism.  One  sentence  is  such  as  a 
veteran  diplomatist  would  scarcely  write  in 
cipher  for  the  direction  of  his  most  confiden 
tial  spy:  the  next  seems  to  be  extracted  from 
a  theme  composed  by  an  ardent  schoolboy  on 
the  death  of  Leonidas.  An  act  of  dexterous 
perfidy,  and  an  act  of  patriotic  self-devotion, 
call  forth  the  same  kind  and  the  same  degree 
of  respectful  admiration.  The  moral  sensi 
bility  of  the  writer  seems  at  cnce  to  be 
morbidly  obtuse  and  morbidly  acute.  Two 
characters  altogether  dissimilar  are  united  in 
him.  They  are  not  merely  joined,  but  inter 
woven.  They  are  the  warp  and  the  woof  of 
his  mind;  and  their  combination,  like  that  of 
the  variegated  threads  in  shot  silk,  gives  to  the 
whole  texture  a  glancing  and  ever-changing 
appearance.  The  explanation  might  have 
been  easy,  if  he  had  been  a  very  weak  or  a 
very  affected  man.  But  he  was  evidently  nei 
ther  the  one  nor  the  other.  His  works  prove 
beyond  all  contradiction,  that  his  understand 
ing  was  strong,  his  taste  pure,  and  his  sense 
of  the  ridiculous  exquisitely  keen. 

This  is  strange — and  yet  the  strangest  is  be 
hind.  There  is  no  reason  whatever  to  think, 
that  those  amongst  whom  he  lived  saw  any 
thing  shocking  or  incongruous  in  his  writings. 
Abundant  proofs  remain  of  the  high  estimation 
in  which  both  his  works  and  his  person  were 
held  by  the  most  respectable  among  his  con 
temporaries.  Clement  the  Seventh  patronised 
the  publication  of  those  very  books  which  the 
council  of  Trent,  in  the  following  generation, 
pronounced  unfit  for  the  perusal  of  Christians. 
Some  members  of  the  democratical  party  cen 
sured  the  secretary  for  dedicating  the  Prince  to  a 
patron  who  bore  the  unpopular  name  of  Medici. 
But  to  those  immoral  doctrines,  which  have 
since  called  forth  such  severe  reprehensions, 
no  exception  appears  to  have  been  taken.  The 
cry  against  them  was  first  raised  beyond  the 
Alps — and  seems  to  have  been  heard  with 


MACHIAVELLI. 


amazement  in  Italy.  The  earliest  assailant,  as 
far  as  we  are  aware,  was  a  countryman  of  our 
own,  Cardinal  Pole.  The  author  of  the  Anti- 
Machiavelli  was  a  French  Protestant. 

It  is,  therefore,  in  the  state  of  moral  feeling 
among  the  Italians  of  those  times,  that  we 
must  «eek  for  the  real  explanation  of  what 
seems  most  mysterious  in  the  life  and  writings 
of  this  remarkable  man.  As  this  is  a  subject 
which  suggests  many  interesting  considera 
tions,  both  political  and  metaphysical,  we  shall 
make  no  apology  for  discussing  it  at  some 
length. 

During  the  gloomy  and  disastrous  centuries 
which  followed  the  downfall  of  the  Roman  Em 
pire,  Italy  had  preserved,  in  a  far  greater  de 
gree  than  any  other  part  of  Western  Europe, 
the  traces  of  ancient  civilization.  The  night 
which  descended  upon  her  was  the  night  of  an 
arctic  summer: — the  dawn  began  to  reappear 
before  the  last  reflection  of  the  preceding  sun 
set  had  faded  from  the  horizon.  It  was  in  the 
time  of  the  French  Merovingians,  and  of  the 
Saxon  Heptarchy,  that  ignorance  and  ferocity 
seemed  to  have  done  their  worst.  Yet  even 
then  the  Neapolitan  provinces,  recognising  the 
authority  of  the  Eastern  Empire,  preserved 
something  of  Eastern  knowledge  and  refine 
ment.  Rome,  protected  by  the  sacred  charac 
ter  of  its  Pontiffs,  enjoyed  at  least  comparative 
security  and  repose.  Even  in  those  regions 
where  the  sanguinary  Lombards  had  fixed 
their  monarchy,  there  was  incomparably  more 
of  wealth,  of  information,  of  physical  comfort, 
and  of  social  order,  than  could  be  found  in 
Gaul,  Britain,  or  Germany. 

That  which  most  distinguished  Italy  from 
the  neighbouring  countries  was  the  importance 
w*hieh  the  population  of  the  towns,  from  a  very 
early  period,  began  to  acquire.  Some  cities 
founded  in  wild  and  remote  situations,  by  fu 
gitives  who  had  escaped  from  the  rage  of  the 
barbarians,  preserved  their  freedom  by  their 
obscurity,  till  they  became  able  to  preserve  it 
by  their  power.  Others  seemed  to  have  re 
tained,  under  all  the  changing  dynasties  of 
invaders,  under  Odoacer  and  Theodoric,Narses 
and  Alboin,  the  municipal  institutions  which 
had  been  conferred  on  them  by  the  liberal 
policy  of  the  Great  Republic.  In  provinces 
which  the  central  government  was  too  feeble 
either  to  protect  or  to  oppress,  these  institu 
tions  first  acquired  stability  and  vigour.  The 
citizens,  defended  by  their  walls  and  governed 
by  their  own  magistrates  and  their  own  by 
laws,  enjoyed  a  considerable  share  of  republi 
can  independence.  Thus  a  strong  democratic 
spirit  was  called  into  action.  The  Carlovingian 
sovereigns  Avere  too  imbecile  to  subdue  it. 
The  generous  policy  of  Otho  encouraged  it. 
It  might  perhaps  have  been  suppressed  by  a 
close  coalition  between  the  Church  and  the 
.Empire.  It  was  fostered  and  invigorated  by 
their  disputes.  In  the  twelfth  century  it 
attained  its  full  vigour,  and,  after  a  long  and 
doubtful  conflict,  it  triumphed  over  the  abili 
ties  and  courage  of  the  Swabian  Princes. 

The  assistance  of  the  ecclesiastical  power 
had  greatly  contributed  to  the  success  of  the  ! 
Gueh's.     That  success  would,  however,  have  : 
a  doubtful  good,  if  its  only  effect  had 


been  to  substitute  a  moral  for  a  political  servi 
tude,  to  exalt  the  Popes  at  the  expense  of  the 
Coesars.  Happily  the  public  mind  of  Italy  had 
long  contained  the  seeds  of  free  opinions, 
which  were  now  rapidly  developed  by  the  ge 
nial  influence  of  free  institutions.  The  people 
of  that  country  had  observed  the  whole  ma 
chinery  of  the  church,  its  saints  and  its  mira 
cles,  its  lofty  pretensions  and  its  splendid  cere 
monial,  its  worthless  blessings  and  its  harmless 
curses,  too  long  and  too  closely  to  be  duped. 
They  stood  behind  the  scenes  on  which  others 
were  gazing  with  childish  awe  and  interest 
They  witnessed  the  arrangement  of  the  pul 
leys,  and  the  manufacture  of  the  thunders. 
They  saw  the  natural  faces  and  heard  the  na 
tural  voices  of  the  actors.  Distant  nations 
looked  on  the  Pope  as  the  vicegerent  of  the 
Almighty,  the  oracle  of  the  All-wise,  the  um 
pire  from  whose  decisions,  in  the  disputes 
either  of  theologians  or  of  kings,  no  Christian 
ought  to  appeal.  The  Italians  were  acquaint 
ed  with  all  the  follies  of  his  youth,  and  with 
all  the  dishonest  arts  by  which  he  had  attained 
power.  They  knew  how  often  he  had  em 
ployed  the  keys  of  the  church  to  release  him 
self  from  the  most  sacred  engagements,  and  its 
wealth  to  pamper  his  mistresses  and  nephews. 
The  doctrines  and  rites  of  the  established  re 
ligion  they  treated  with  decent  reverence.  But 
though  they  still  called  themselves  Catholics, 
they  had  ceased  to  be  Papists.  Those  spiritual 
arms  which  carried  terror  into  the  palaces  and 
camps  of  the  proudest  sovereigns  excited  only 
their  contempt.  When  Alexander  commanded 
our  Henry  the  Second  to  submit  to  the  lash 
before  the  tomb  of  a  rebellious  subject,  he  was 
himself  an  exile.  The  Romans,  apprehending 
that  he  entertained  designs  against  their  liber 
ties,  had  driven  him  from  their  city;  and, 
though  he  solemnly  promised  to  confine  him 
self  for  the  future  to  his  spiritual  functions, 
they  still  refused  to  re-admit  him. 

In  every  other  part  of  Europe,  a  large  and 
powerful  privileged  class  trampled  on  the  peo 
ple  and  defied  the  government.  But  in  the 
most  flourishing  parts  of  Italy  the  feudal  no 
bles  were  reduced  to  comparative  insignifi 
cance.  In  some  districts  they  took  shelter 
under  the  protection  of  the  powerful  common 
wealths  which  they  were  unable  to  oppose, 
and  gradually  sunk  into  the  mass  of  burghers. 
In  others  they  possessed  great  influence ;  but 
it  was  an  influence  widely  different  from  that 
which  was  exercised  by  the  chieftains  of  the 
Transalpine  kingdoms.  They  were  uot  pet 
ty  princes,  but  eminent  citizens.  Instead 
of  strengthening  their  fastnesses  among  the 
mountains,  they  embellished  their  places  in 
the  market-place.  The  state  of  society  in  the 
Neapolitan  dominions,  and  in  some  parts  of 
the  Ecclesiastical  State,  more  nearly  resembled 
that  which  existed  in  the  great  monarchies  of 
Europe.  But  the  governments  of  Lombardy 
and  Tuscany,  through  all  their  revolutions, 
preserved  a  different  character.  A  people, 
when  assembled  in  a  town,  is  far  more  formi 
dable  to  its  rulers  than  when  dispersed  over  a 
wide  extent  of  country.  The  most  arbitrary 
of  the  Coesars  found  it  necessary  to  feed  and 
divert  the  inhabitants  of  their  unwieldy  capi- 


22 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tal  at  the  expense  of  the  provinces.  The  citi 
zens  of  Madrid  have  more  than  once  besieged 
their  sovereign  in  his  own  palace,  and  extorted 
from  him  the  most  humiliating  concessions. 
The  sultans  have  often  been  compelled  to  pro 
pitiate  the  furious  rabble  of  Constantinople 
with  the  head  of  an  unpopular  vizier.  From 
the  same  cause  there  was  a  certain  tinge  of 
democracy  in  the  monarchies  and  aristocracies 
of  Northern  Italy. 

Thus  liberty,  partially,  indeed,  and  transient 
ly,  revisited  Italy ;  and  with  liberty  came  com 
merce  and  empire,  science  and  taste,  all  the 
comforts  and  all  the  ornaments  of  life.  The 
crusades,  from  which  the  inhabitants  of  other 
countries  gained  nothing  but  relics  and 
wounds,  brought  the  rising  commonwealths 
of  the  Adriatic  and  Tyrrhene  seas  a  large  in 
crease  of  wealth,  dominion,  and  knowledge. 
Their  moral  and  their  geographical  position 
enabled  them  to  profit  alike  by  the  barbarism 
of  the  West  and  the  civilization  of  the  East. 
Their  ships  covered  every  sea.  Their  fac 
tories  rose  on  every  shore.  Their  money 
changers  set  their  tables  in  every  city.  Manu 
factures  flourished.  Banks  were  established. 
The  operations  of  the  commercial  machine 
were  facilitated  by  many  useful  and  beautiful 
inventions.  We  doubt  whether  any  country 
of  Europe,  our  own  perhaps  excepted,  have  at 
the  present  time  reached  so  high  a  point  of 
wealth  and  civilization  as  some  parts  of  Italy 
had  attained  four  hundred  years  ago.  Histo 
rians  rarely  descend  to  those  details  from 
which  alone  the  real  state  of  a  community 
can  be  collected.  Hence  posterity  is  too  often 
deceived  by  the  vague  hyperboles  of  poets  and 
rhetoricians,  vho  mistake  the  splendour  of  a 
court  for  the  happiness  of  a  people.  Fortu 
nately  John  Villani  has  given  us  an  ample  and 
precise  account  of  the  state  of  Florence  in  the 
earlier  part  of  the  fourteenth  century.  The 
revenue  of  the  republic  amounted  to  three 
hundred  thousand  florins,  a  sum  which,  allow 
ing  for  the  depreciation  of  the  precious  metals, 
was  at  least  equivalent  to  six  hundred  thou 
sand  pounds  sterling;  a  larger  sum  than  Eng 
land  and  Ireland,  two  centuries  ago,  yielded  an 
nually  to  Elizabeth — a  larger  sum  than,  accord 
ing  to  any  computation  which  we  have  seen,  the 
Grand-duke  of  Tuscany  now  derives  from  a 
territory  of  much  greater  extent.  The  manu 
facture  of  wool  alone  employed  two  hundred 
factories  and  thirty  thousand  workmen.  The 
cloth  annually  produced  sold,  at  an  average, 
for  twelve  hundred  thousand  florins ;  a  sum 
fairly  equal,  in  exchangeable  value,  to  two 
millions  and  a  half  of  our  money.  Four  hun 
dred  thousand  florins  were  annually  coined. 
Eighty  banks  conducted  the  commercial  ope- 
ra* ions,  not  of  Florence  only,  but  of  all  Europe. 
The  transactions  of  these  establishments  were 
sometimes  of  a  magnitude  which  may  surprise 
even  the  contemporaries  of  the  Barings  and 
the  Rothschilds.  Two  houses  advanced  to 
Edward  the  Third  of  England  upwards  of 
three  hundred  thousand  marks,  at  a  time  when 
the  mark  contained  more  silver  than  fifty  shil- 
ling.s  of  the  present  day,  and  when  the  value 
of  silver  was  more  than  quadruple  of  what  it 
rn/w  is.  The  city  and  its  environs  contained 


a  hundred  and  seventy  thousand  inhabitants, 
In  the  various  schools  about  ten  thousand 
children  were  taught  to  read;  twelve  hundred 
|  studied  arithmetic ;  six  hundred  received  a 
i  learned  education.  The  progress  of  elegant 
;  literature  and  of  the  fine  arts  was  proportioned 
|  to  that  of  the  public  prosperity.  Under  the 
despotic  successors  of  Augustus,  all  the  fields 
of  the  intellect  had  been  turned  into  arid 
wastes,  still  marked  out  by  formal  boundaries, 
still  retaining  the  traces  of  old  cultivation,  but 
yielding  neither  flowers  nor  fruit.  The  deluge 
of  barbarism  came.  It  swept  away  all  the 
landmarks.  It  obliterated  all  the  signs  of  for 
mer  tillage.  But  it  fertilized  while  it  devas 
tated.  When  it  receded,  the  wilderness  was 
as  the  garden  of  God,  rejoicing  on  every  side, 
laughing,  clapping  its  hands,  pouring  forth  in 
spontaneous  abundance  every  thing  brilliant, 
or  fragrant,  or  nourishing.  A  new  language, 
characterized  by  simple  sweetness  and  simple 
energy,  had  attained  its  perfection.  No  tongue 
ever  furnished  more  gorgeous  and  vivid  tints 
to  poetry;  nor  was  it  long  before  a  poet  ap 
peared  who  knew  how  to  employ  them.  Early 
in  the  fourteenth  century  came  forth  the  Di 
vine  Comedy,  beyond  comparison  the  greatest 
work  of  imagination  which  had  appeared  since 
the  poems  of  Homer.  The  following  genera 
tion  produced,  indeed,  no  second  Dante;  but 
it  was  eminently  distinguished  by  general  in 
tellectual  activity.  The  study  of  the  Latin 
writers  had  never  been  wholly  neglected  in 
Italy.  But  Petrarch  introduced  a  more  pro 
found,  liberal,  and  elegant  scholarship ;  and 
communicated  to  his  countrymen  that  enthu 
siasm  for  the  literature,  the  history,  and  the 
antiquities  of  Rome,  which  divided  his  own 
heart  with  a  frigid  mistress  and  a  more  frigid 
muse.  Boccaccio  turned  their  attention  to  the 
more  sublime  and  graceful  models  of  Greece. 

From  this  time  the  admiration  of  learning 
and  genius  became  almost  an  idolatry  among 
the  people  of  Italy.  Kings  and  republics,  car 
dinals  and  doges,  vied  with  each  other  in  ho 
nouring  and  flattering  Petrarch.  Embassies 
from  rival  states  solicited  the  honour  of  his  in 
structions.  His  coronation  agitated  the  court 
of  Naples  and  the  people  of  Rome  as  much  as 
the  most  important  political  transactions  could 
have  done.  To  collect  books  and  antiques,  to 
found  professorships,  to  patronise  men  of 
learning,  became  almost  universal  fashions 
among  the  great.  The  spirit  of  literary  re 
search  allied  itself  to  that  of  commercial  en 
terprise.  Every  place  to  which  the  merchant- 
princes  of  Florence  extended  their  gigantic 
traffic,  from  the  bazaars  of  the  Tigris  to  the 
monasteries  of  the  Clyde,  was  ransacked  for 
medals  and  manuscripts.  Architecture,  paint 
ing,  and  sculpture  were  munificently  encou 
raged.  Indeed  it  would  be  difficult  to  name  an 
Italian  of  eminence  during  the  period  of  which 
we  speak,  who,  whatever  may  have  been  his 
I  general  character,  did  not  at  least  affect  a  love 
I  of  letters  and  of  the  arts. 

Knowledge  and  public  prosperity  continued 

to  advance  together.    Both  attained  their  men- 

!  dian  in  the  age  of  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent. 

We  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  the  splendid 

passage,  in  which  the  Tuscan  ThucydHes  de 


MACHIAVELLI. 


scribes  the  state  of  Italy  at  that  period : — Ri- 
dotta  tutta  in  somma  pace  e  tranquillita,  colti- 
vata  non  meno  ne'  luoghi  piu  montuosi  e  piii 
sterili  che  nelle  pianure  e  region!  piu  fertili, 
ne  sottoposta  ad  altro  imperio  che  de  'suoi  me- 
desimi,  non  solo  era  abbondantissima  d'abita- 
tori  e  di  ricchezze ;  ma  illustrata  sommamente 
dalla  magnificenza  di  molti  principi,  dallo 
splendore  di  molte  nobilissime  e  bellissime 
citta,  dalla  sedia  e  maesta  delle  religione,  fiori- 
va  d'uomini  prestantissimi  nell'  amministra- 
zione  delle  cose  pubbliche,  e  d'ingegni  molto 
nobili  in  tutte  le  scienze,  ed  in  qualunque  arte 
preclara  ed  industriosa."*  When  we  peruse 
this  just  and  splendid  description,  we  can 
scarcely  persuade  ourselves  that  we  are  read 
ing  of  times,  in  which  the  annals  of  England 
and  France  present  us  only  with  a  frightful 
spectacle  of  poverty,  barbarity,  and  ignorance. 
From  the  oppressions  of  illiterate  masters,  and 
the  sufferings  of  a  brutalized  peasantry, it  is 
delightful  to  turn  to  the  opulent  and  enlighten 
ed  States  of  Italy— to  the  vast  and  magnificent 
cities,  the  ports,  the  arsenals,  the  villas,  the 
museums,  the  libraries,  the  marts  filled  with 
every  article  of  comfort  and  luxury,  the  manu 
factories  swarming  with  artisans,  the  Apen 
nines  covered  with  rich  cultivation  up  to  their 
very  summits,  the  Po  wafting  the  harvests  of 
Lombardy  to  the  granaries  of  Venice,  and  car 
rying  back  the  silks  of  Bengal  and  the  firs  of 
Siberia  to  the  palaces  of  Milan.  With  pecu 
liar  pleasure,  every  cultivated  mind  must  re 
pose  on  the  fair,  the  happy,  the  glorious  Flo 
rence — on  the  halls  which  rung  with  the  mirth 
of  Pulci— the  cell  where  twinkled  the  midnight 
lamp  of  Politian— the  statues  on  which  the 
young  eye  of  Michel  Angelo  glared  with  the 
frenzy  of  a  kindred  inspiration — the  gardens 
in  which  Lorenzo  meditated  some  sparkling 
song  for  the  May-day  dance  of  the  Etrurian 
virgins.  Alas,  for  the  beautiful  city  !  Alas, 
for  the  wit  and  the  learning,  the  genius  and 
the  love  ! 

"Le  donne,  e  cavalier,  gli  affanni,  gli  agi, 
Che  ne'nvogliav'  ainore  ecortesia, 
La  dove  i  cuor'  son  fatti  ei  malvagi."f 

A  time  was  at  hand,  when  all  the  seven  vials 
of  the  Apocalypse  were  to  be  poured  forth  and 
shaken  out  over  those  pleasant  countries — a 
time  for  slaughter,  famine,  beggary,  infamy, 
slavery,  despair. 

In  the  Italian  States,  as  in  many  natural  bo 
dies,  untimely  decrepitude  was  the  penalty  of 
precocious  maturity.  Their  early  greatness, 
and  their  early  decline,  are  principally  to  be  at 
tributed  to  the  same  cause — the  preponderance 
which  the  towns  acquired  in  the  political  sys 
tem. 

In  a  community  of  hunters  or  of  shepherds, 
every  man  easily  and  necessarily  becomes  a 
soldier.  His  ordinary  avocations  are  perfectly 
compatible  with  all  the  duties  of  military  ser 
vice.  However  remote  may  be  the  expedition 
on  which  he  is  bound,  he  finds  it  easy  to  trans 
port  with  him  the  stock  from  which  he  derives 
his  subsistence.  The  whole  people  is  an  army ; 
the  whole  year  a  march.  Such  was  the  state 


*  Guicciardini,  lib.  i.  -J-  Dante  Purgatorio,  xiv. 


of  society  which  facilitated  the  gigantic  con 
quests  of  Attila  and  Timour. 

But  a  people  which  subsists  by  the  c  ultiva- 
tion  of  the  earth  is  in  a  very  different  situation. 
The  husbandman  is  bound  to  the  soil  on  which 
he  labours.  A  long  campaign  would  be  ruin 
ous  to  him.  Still  his  pursuits  are  such  as  give 
to  his  frame  both  the  active  and  the  passive 
strength  necessary  to  a  soldier.  Nor  do  they, 
at  least  in  the  infancy  of  agricultural  science, 
demand  his  uninterrupted  attention.  At  par 
ticular  times  of  the  year  he  i*  almost  wholly 
unemployed  and  can,  without  jnjury  to  him 
self,  afford  the  time  necessary  for  a  short  expe 
dition.  Thus,  the  legions  of  Rome  were  sup- ' 
plied  during  its  earlier  wars.  The  season, 
during  which  the  farms  did  not  require  the 
presence  of  the  cultivators,  sufficed  for  a  short 
inroad  and  a  battle.  These  operations,  too 
frequently  interrupted  to  produce  decisive  re 
sults,  yet  served  to  keep  up  among  the  people  a 
degree  of  discipline  and  courage  which  render 
ed  them,  not  only  secure,  but  formidable.  The 
archers  and  billmen  of  the  middle  ages,  who, 
with  provisions  for  forty  days  at  their  backs, 
left  the  fields  for  the  camp,  were  troops  of  the 
same  description. 

But,  when  commerce  and  manufactures 
begin  to  flourish,  a  great  change  takes  place. 
The  sedentary  habits  of  the  desk  and  the  loom 
render  the  exertions  and  hardships  of  war  in 
supportable.  The  occupations  of  traders  and 
artisans  require  their  constant  presence  and 
attention.  In  such  a  community,  there  is  little 
superfluous  time;  but  there  is  generally  much 
superfluous  money.  Some  members  of  the  so 
ciety  are,  therefore,  hired  to  relieve  the  rest 
from  a  task  inconsistent  with  their  habits  and 
engagements. 

The  history  of  Greece  is,  in  this,  as  in  many 
other  respects,  the  best  commentary  on  the 
history  of  Italy.  Five  hundred  years  before 
the  Christian  era,  the  citizens  of  the  republics 
round  the  ^gean  Sea  formed  perhaps  the  finest 
militia  that  ever  existed.  As  wealth  and  re 
finement  advanced,  the  system  underwent  a 
gradual  alteration.  The  Ionian  States  were 
the  first  in  which  commerce  and  the  arts  were 
cultivated, — and  the  first  in  which  the  ancient 
discipline  decayed.  Within  eighty  years  after 
the  battle  of  Platcea,  mercenary  troops  were 
everywhere  plying  for  battles  and  sieges.  In 
the  time  of  Demosthenes,  it  was  scarcely  pos 
sible  to  persuade  or  compel  the  Athenians  to 
enlist  for  foreign  service.  The  laws  of  Lycur- 
gus  prohibited  trade  and  manufactures.  The 
Spartans, therefore,  continued  to  form  a  national 
force,  long  after  their  neighbouis  had  begun  tc 
hire  soldiers.  But  their  military  spirit  declined 
with  their  singular  institutions.  In  the  second 
century,  Greece  contained  only  one  nation  of 
warriors,  the  savage  highlanders  of  ^tolia, 
who  were  at  least  ten  generations  behind  their 
countrymen  in  civilization  and  intelligence. 

All  the  causes  which  produced  these  effects 
among  the  Greeks  acted  still  more  strongly  on 
the  modern  Italians.  Instead  of  a  power  "like 
Sparta,  in  its  nature  warlike,  they  had  amongst 
them  an  ecclesiastical  state,  in  its  nature  pa 
cific.  Where  there  are  numerous  slaves,  every 
freeman  is  induced  by  the  strongest  motives  to 


24 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


familiarize  himself  with  the  use  of  arms.  The 
commonwealths  of  Italy  did  not,  like  those  of 
Greece,  swarm  with  thousands  of  these  house 
hold  enemies.  Lastly,  the  mode  in  which  mi 
litary  operations  were  conducted,  during  the 
prosperous  times  of  Italy,  was  peculiarly  un 
favourable  to  the  formation  of  an  efficient  mili 
tia.  Men  covered  with  iron  from  head  to  foot, 
armed  with  ponderous  lances,  and  mounted  on 
horses  of  the  largest  breed,  were  considered  as 
composing  the  strength  of  an  army.  The  in 
fantry  was  regarded  as  comparatively  worth 
less,  and  was  neglected  till  it  became  really  so. 
These  tactics  maintained  their  ground  for  cen 
turies  in  most  parts  of  Europe.  That  foot  sol 
diers  could  withstand  the  charge  of  heavy  ca 
valry  was  thought  utterly  impossible,  till,  to 
wards  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the 
rude  mountaineers  of  Switzerland  dissolved 
the  spell,  and  astounded  the  most  experienced 
generals,  by  receiving  the  dreaded  shock  on 
an  impenetrable  forest  of  pikes. 

The  use  of  the  Grecian  spear,  the  Roman 
sword,  or  the  modern  bayonet,  might  be  acquir 
ed  with  comparative  ease.  But  nothing  short 
of  the  daily  exercise  of  years  could  train  the 
man  at  arms  to  support  his  ponderous  panoply 
and  manage  his  unwieldy  weapon.  Through 
out  Europe,  this  most  important  branch  of  war 
became  a  separate  profession.  Beyond  the 
Alps,  indeed,  though  a  profession,  it  was  not 
generally  a  trade.  It  was  the  duty  and  the 
amusement  of  a  large  class  of  country  gentle 
men.  It  was  the  service  by  which  they  held 
their  lands,  and  the  diversion  by  which,  in  the 
absence  of  mental  resources,  they  beguiled 
their  leisure.  But,  in  the  Northern  States  of 
Italy,  as  we  have  already  remarked,  the  grow 
ing  power  of  the  cities,  where  it  had  not  exter 
minated  this  order  of  men,  had  completely 
changed  their  habits.  Here,  therefore,  the  prac 
tice  of  employing  mercenaries  became  univer 
sal,  at  a  time  when  it  was  almost  unknown  in 
other  countries. 

When  war  becomes  the  trade  of  a  separate 
^slass,  the  least  dangerous  course  left  to  a 
government  is  to  form  that  class  into  a  stand 
ing  army.  It  is  scarcely  possible,  that  men 
can  pass  their  lives  in  the  service  of  a  single 
state,  without  feeling  some  interest  in  its 
greatness.  Its  victories  are  their  victories. 
Its  defeats  are  their  defeats.  The  contract 
loses  something  of  its  mercantile  character. 
The  services  of  the  soldier  are  considered  as 
the  effects  of  patriotic  zeal,  his  pay  as  the  tri 
bute  of  national  gratitude.  To  betray  the  power 
which  employs  him,  to  be  even  remiss  in  its 
service,  are  in  his  eyes  the  most  atrocious  and 
degrading  of  crimes. 

When  the  princes  and  commonwealths  of 
Italy  began  to  use  hired  troops,  their  wisest 
course  would  have  been  to  form  separate  mili 
tary  establishments.  Unhappily  this  was  not 
done.  The  mercenary  warriors  of  the  Penin 
sula,  instead  of  being  attached  to  the  service 
of  different  powers,  were  regarded  as  the  com 
mon  propery  of  all.  The  connection  between 
the  state  and  its  defenders  was  reduced  to  the 
most  simple  naked  traffic.  The  adventurer 
brought  his  horse,  his  weapons,  his  strength, 
and  his  experience  into  the  market.  Whether 


the  King  of  Naples  or  the  Duke  of  Milan,  the 
Pope  or  the  Signory  of  Florence,  struck  the 
bargain,  was  to  him  a  matter  of  perfect  indif 
ference.  He  was  for  the  highest  wages  and 
the  longest  term.  When  the  campaign  for 
which  he  had  contracted  was  finished,  there 
was  neither  law  nor  punctilio  to  prevent  him 
from  instantly  turning  his  arms  against  his 
late  masters.  The  soldier  was  altogether  dis 
joined  from  the  citizen  and  from  the  subject. 

The  natural  consequences  followed.  Left  to 
the  conduct  of  men  who  neither  loved  those 
whom  they  defended,  nor  hated  those  whom 
they  opposed — who  were  often  bound  by 
stronger  ties  to  the  army  against  which  they 
fought  than  the  state  which  they  served — who 
lost  by  the  termination  of  the  conflict,  and 
gained  by  its  prolongation,  war  completely 
changed  its  character.  Every  man  came  into 
the  field  of  battle  impressed  with  the  know 
ledge*  that,  in  a  few  days,  he  might  be  taking 
the  pay  of  the  power  against  which  he  -was 
then  employed,  and  fighting  by  the  side  of  his 
enemies  against  his  associates.  The  strongest 
interest  and  the  strongest  feelings  concurred  to 
mitigate  the  hostility  of  those  who  had  lately 
been  brethren  in  arms,  and  who  might  soon  be 
brethren  in  arms  once  more.  Their  common 
profession  was  a  bond  of  union  not  to  be  for 
gotten,  even  when  they  were  engaged  in  the 
service  of  contending  parties.  Hence  it  was 
that  operations,  languid  and  indecisive  beyond 
any  recorded  in  history,  marches  and  counter 
marches,  pillaging  expeditions  and  blockades, 
bloodless  capitulations  and  equally  bloodless 
combats,  make  up  the  military  history  of  Italy 
during  the  course  of  nearly  two  centuries. 
Mighty  armies  fight  from  sunrise  to  sunset.  A 
great  victory  is  won.  Thousands  of  prisoners 
are  taken ;  and  hardly  a  life  is  lost !  A  pitched 
battle  seems  to  have  been  really  less  dangerous 
than  an  ordinary  civil  tumult. 

Courage  was  now  no  longer  necessary  even 
to  the  military  character.  Men  grew  old  in 
camps,  and  acquired  the  highest  renown  by 
their  warlike  achievements,  without  being 
once  required  to  face  serious  danger.  The 
political  consequences  are  too  .well  known. 
The  richest  and  most  enlightened  part  of  the 
world  was  left  undefended,  to  the  assaults  of 
every  barbarous  invader — to  the  brutality  of 
Switzerland,  the  insolence  of  France,  and  the 
fierce  rapacity  of  Arragon.  The  moral  effects 
which  followed  from  this  state  of  things  were 
still  more  remarkable. 

Among  the  rude  nations  which  lay  beyond 
the  Alps,  valour  was  absolutely  indispensable 
Without  it,  none  could  be  eminent ;  few  could 
be  secure.  Cowardice  was,  therefore,  naturally 
considered  as  the  foulest  reproach.  Among 
the  polished  Italians,  enriched  by  commerce, 
governed  by  law,  and  passionately  attached  to 
literature,  every  thing  was  done  by  superiority 
of  intelligence.  Their  very  wars,  more  pacific 
than  the  peace  of  their  neighbours,  required 
rather  civil  than  military  qualifications.  Hence, 
while  courage  was  the  point  of  honour  in 
other  countries,  ingenuity  became  the  point  of 
honour  in  Italy. 

From  these  principles  were  deduced,  by  pro 
cesses  strictly  analogous,  two  opposite  sys- 


MACHIAVELLI. 


ferns  of  fashionable  morality. — Through  the 
greater  part  of  Europe,  the  vices  which  pecu 
liarly  belong  to  timid  dispositions,  and  which 
are  the  natural  defence  of  weakness,  fraud, 
and  hypocrisy,  have  always  been  most  disre 
putable.  On  the  other  hand,  the  excesses  of 
haughty  and  daring  spirits  have  been  treated 
with  indulgence,  and  even  with  respect.  The 
Italians  regarded  with  corresponding  lenity 
those  crimes  which  require  self-command, 
address,  quick  observation,  fertile  invention, 
and  profound  knowledge  of  human  nature. 

Such  a  prince  as  our  Henry  the  Fifth  would 
have  been  the  idol  of  the  North.  The  follies 
of  his  youth,  the  selfish  and  desolating  ambi 
tion  of  his  manhood,  the  Lollards  roasted  at 
slow  fires,  the  prisoners  massacred  on  the  field 
of  battle,  the  expiring  lease  of  priestcraft  re 
newed  for  another  century,  the  dreadful  legacy 
of  a  causeless  and  hopeless  war,  bequeathed  to 
a  people  who  had  no  interest  in  its  event, 
every  thing  is  forgotten,  but  the  victory  of 
Agincourt !  Francis  Sforza,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  the  model  of  the  Italian  hero.  He  made 
his  employers  and  his  rivals  alike  his  tools. 
He  first  overpowered  his  open  enemies  by  the 
help  of  faithle-ss  allies  ;  he  then  armed  himself 
against  his  allies  with  the  spoils  taken  from 
his  enemies.  By  his  incomparable  dexterity, 
he  raised  himself  from  the  precarious  and  de 
pendent  situation  of  a  military  adventurer  to 
the  first  throne  of  Italy.  To  such  a  man  much 
was  forgiven — hollow  friendship,  ungenerous 
enmity,  violated  faith.  Such  are  the  opposite 
errors  which  men  commit,  when  their  morality 
is  not  a  science,  but  a  taste ;  when  they  abandon 
eternal  principles  for  accidental  associations. 

We  have  illustrated  our  meaning  by  an  in 
stance  taken  from  history.  We  will  select 
another  from  fiction.  Othello  murders  his 
wife ;  he  gives  orders  for  the  murder  of  his 
lieutenant ;  he  ends  by  murdering  himself. 
Yet  he  never  loses  the  esteem  and  affection  of 
a  Northern  reader — his  intrepid  and  ardent 
spirit  redeeming  every  thing.  The  unsuspect 
ing  confidence  with  which  he  listens  to  his 
adviser,  the  agony  with  which  he  shrinks  from 
the  thought  of  shame,  the  tempest  of  passion 
with  which  he  commits  his  crimes,  and  the 
haughty  fearlessness  with  which  he  avows 
them,  give  an  extraordinary  interest  to  his 
character.  lago,  on  the  contrary,  is  the  object 
of  universal  loathing.  Many  are  inclined  to 
suspect  that  Shakspeare  has  been  seduced  into 
an  exaggeration  unusual  with  him,  and  has 
drawn  a  monster  who  has  no  archetype  in 
human  nature.  Now  we  suspect,  that  an 
Italian  audience,  in  the  fifteenth  century,  would 
have  felt  very  differently.  Othello  would  have 
inspired  nothing  but  detestation  and  contempt. 
The  folly  with  which  he  trusts  to  the  friendly 
professions  of  a  man  whose  promotion  he  had 
obstructed — the  credulity  with  which  he  takes 
unsupported  assertions,  and  trivial  circum 
stances,  for  unanswerable  proofs — the  violence 
with  which  he  silences  the  exculpation  till  the 
exculpation  can  only  aggravate  his  misery, 
would  have  excited  the  abhorrence  and  disgust 
of  the  spectators.  The  conduct  of  lago  they 
would  assuredly  have  condemned;  but  they 
would  have  condemned  it  as  we  condemn  that , 


of  his  victim.  Something  of  interest  and  re 
spect  would  have  mingled  with  their  disap 
probation.  The  readiness  of  his  wit,  the 
clearness  of  his  judgment,  the  skill  with  which 
he  penetrates  the  dispositions  of  others  and 
conceals  his  own,  would  have  insured  to  him 
a  certain  portion  of  their  esteem. 

So  wide  was  the  difference  between  the 
Italians  and  their  neighbour:;.  A  similar  dif 
ference  existed  between  the  Greeks  of  the  se 
cond  century  before  Christ,  and  their  masters 
the  Romans.  The  conquerors,  brave  and 
resolute,  faithful  to  their  engagements,  and 
strongly  influenced  by  religious  feelings,  \vere, 
at  the  same  time,  ignorant,  arbitrary,  and 
cruel.  With  the  vanquished  people  were  de 
posited  all  the  art,  the  science,  and  the  litera 
ture  of  the  Western  world.  In  poetry,  in, 
philosophy,  in  painting,  in  architecture,  in 
sculpture,  they  had  no  rivals.  Their  manners 
were  polished,  their  perceptions  acute,  their 
invention  ready ;  they  were  tolerant,  affable, 
humane.  But  of  courage  and  sincerity  they 
were  almost  utterly  destitute.  The  rude  war 
riors  who  had  subdued  them  consoled  them 
selves  for  their  intellectual  inferiority,  by 
remarking  that  knowledge  and  taste  seemed 
only  to  make  men  atheists,  cowards,  and 
slaves.  The  distinction  long  continued  to  be 
strongly  marked,  an^furnished  an  admirable 
subject  for  the  fierce  sarcasm  of  Juvenal. 

The  citizen  of  an  Italian  commonwealth  was 
the  Greek  of  the  time  of  Juvenal,  and  the  Greek 
of  the  time  of  Pericles,  joined  in  one.  Like 
the  former,  he  was  timid  and  pliable,  artful  an<£ 
unscrupulous.  But,  like  the  latter,  he  had  a 
country.  Its  independence  and  prosperity 
were  dear  to  him.  If  his  character  were  de 
graded  by  some  mean  crimes,  it  was,  on  the 
other  hand,  ennobled  by  public  spirit  and  by  an 
honourable  ambition. 

A  vice  sanctioned  by  the  general  opinion  is 
merely  a  vice.  The  evil  terminates  in  itself. 
A  vice  condemned  by  the  general  opinion  pro 
duces  a  pernicious  effect  on  the  whole  charac 
ter.  The  former  is  a  local  malady,  the  latter  a 
constitutional  taint.  When  the  reputation  of 
the  offender  is  lost,  he  too  often  flings  the  re 
mains  of  his  virtue  after  it  in  despair.  The 
Highland  gentleman,  who,  a  century  ago,  lived 
by  taking  black  mail  from  his  neighbours, 
committed  the  same  crime  for  which  Wild 
was  accompanied.to  Tyburn  by  the  huzzas  cf 
two  hundred  thousand  people.  But  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  he  was  a  much  less  depraved 
man  than  Wild.  The  deed  for  which  Mrs. 
Brownrigg  was  hanged  sinks  into  nothing, 
when  compared  with  the  conduct  of  the  Roman 
who  treated  the  public  to  a  hundred  pair  of 
ladiators.  Yet  we  should  probably  wrong 
such  a  Roman  if  we  supposed  that  his  disposi 
tion  was  so  cruel  as  that  of  Mrs.  Brownrigg. 
In  our  own  country,  a  woman  forfeits  her 
place  in  society,  by  what,  in  a  man,  is  too 
commonly  considered  as  an  honourable  dis 
tinction,  and,  at  worst,  as  a  venial  error.  The 
consequence  is  notorious.  The  moral  prin 
ciple  of  a  woman  is  frequently  more  impaired 
by  a  single  lapse  from  virtue,  than  that  of  a 
man  by  twenty  years  of  intiigue.  Classical 
antiquity  would  furnish  us  with  instances 
C 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


stronger,  if  possible,  than  those  to  which  we 
have  referred. 

We  must  apply  this  principle  to  the  case  be 
fore  us.  Habits  of  dissimulation  and  falsehood, 
no  doubt,  mark  a  man  of  our  age  and  country 
as  utterly  worthless  and  abandoned.  But  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  a  similar  judgment 
would  be  just  in  the  case  of  an  Italian  of  the 
middle  ages.  On  the  contrary,  we  frequently 
find  those  faults,  which  we  are  accustomed  to 
consider  as  certain  indications  of  a  mind  alto 
gether  depraved,  in  company  with  great  and 
good  qualities,  with  generosity,  with  benevo 
lence,  with  disinterestedness.  From  such  a 
state  of  society,  Palamedes,  in  the  admirable 
dialogue  of  Hume,  might  have  drawn  illustra 
tions  of  his  theory  as  striking  as  any  of  those 
with  which  Fourli  furnished  him.  These  are 
not,  we  well  know,  the  lessons  which  historians 
are  generally  most  careful  to  teach,  or  readers 
most  willing  to  learn.  But  they  are  not  there 
fore  useless.  How  Philip  disposed  his  troops 
at  Chyeronea,  where  Hannibal  crossed  the  Alps, 
whether  Mary  blew  up  Darnley,  or  Siquicr  shot 
Charles  the  Twelfth,  and  ten  thousand  other 
questions  of  the  same  description,  are  in  them 
selves  unimportant.  The  inquiry  may  amuse 
us,  but  the  decision  leaves  us  no  wiser.  He 
alone  reads  history  aright,  who,  observing  how 
powerfully  circumstance^  influence  the  feel 
ings  and  opinions  of  men,  how  often  vices  pass 
into  virtues,  and  paradoxes  into  axioms,  learns 
to  distinguish  what  is  accidental  and  transitory 
ui  human  nature,  from  what  is  essential  and 
mimutable. 

In  this  respect  no  history  suggests  more  im 
portant  reflections  than  that  of  the  Tuscan  and 
Lombard  commonwealths.  The  character  of 
the  Italian  statesman  seems,  at  first  sight,  a 
collection  of  contradictions,  a  phantom,  as 
monstrous  as  the  portress  of  hell  in  Milton,  half 
divinity,  half  snake,  majestic  and  beautiful 
above,  grovelling  and  poisonous  below.  We 
see  a  man,  whose  thoughts  and  words  have  no 
connection  with  each  other;  who  never  hesi 
tates  at  an  oath  when  he  wishes  to  seduce,  who 
never  wants  a  pretext  when  he  is  inclined  to 
betray.  His  cruelties  spring,  not  from  the  heat 
of  blood,  or  the  insanity  of  uncontrolled  power, 
but  from  deep  and  cool  meditation.  His  pas 
sions,  like  well-trained  troops,  are  impetuous 
by  rule,  and  in  their  most  headstrong  fury 
never  forget  the  discipline  to  which  they  have 
been  accustomed.  His  whole  soul  is  occupied 
with  vast  and  complicated  schemes  of  ambi 
tion.  Yet  his  aspect  and  language  exhibit  no 
thing  but  philosophic  moderation.  Hatred  and 
revenge  eat  into  his  heart :  yet  every  look  is  a 
cordial  smile,  every  gesture  a  familiar  caress. 
He  never  excites  the  suspicion  of  his  adver 
sary  by  petty  provocations.  His  purpose  is 
disclosed  only  when  it  is  accomplished.  His 
face  is  unruffled,  his  speech  is  courteous,  till 
vigilance  is  laid  asieep,  till  a  vital  point  is  ex 
posed,  till  a  sure  aim  is  taken;  and  then  he 
strikes — for  the  first  and  last  time.  Military 
courage,  the  boast  of  the  sottish  German,  the 
frivolous  and  prating  Frenchman,  the  roman 
tic  and  arrogant  Spaniard,  he  neither  possesses 
nor  values.  He  shuns  danger,  not  because  he 


is  insensible  to  shame,  but  because,  in  the  so 
ciety  in  which  he  lives,  timidity  has  ceased  to 
be  shameful.  To  do  an  injury  openly  is,  in  his 
estimation,  as  wicked  as  to  do  it  secretly,  and 
far  less  profitable.  With  him  the  most  honour 
able  means  are — the  surest,  the  speediest,  and 
the  darkest.  He  cannot  comprehend  how  a 
man  should  scruple  to  deceive  him  whom  he 
does  not  scruple  to  destroy.  He  would  think 
it  madness  to  declare  open  hostilities  against 
a  rival  whom  he  might  stab  in  a  friendly  em 
brace,  or  poison  in  a  consecrated  wafer. 

Yet  this  man,  black  with  the  vices  which  we 
consider  as  most  loathsome — traitor,  hypocrite, 
coward,  assassin — was  by  no  means  destitute 
even  of  those  virtues  which  we  generally  con 
sider  as  indicating  superior  elevation  of  charac 
ter.  In  civil  courage,  in  perseverance,  in  pre 
sence  of  mind,  those  barbarous  warriors  who 
were  foremost  in  the  battle  or  the  breach,  were 
far  his  inferiors.  Even  the  dangers  which  he 
avoided,  with  a  caution  almost  pusillanimous, 
never  confused  his  perceptions,  never  para 
lyzed  his  inventive  faculties,  never  wrung  out 
one  secret  from  his  ready  tongue  and  his  in 
scrutable  brow.  Though  a  dangerous  enemy, 
and  a  still  more  dangerous  accomplice,  he -was 
a  just  and  beneficent  ruler.  With  so  much  un 
fairness  in  his  policy,  there  was  an  extraordi 
nary  degree  of  fairness  in  his  intellect.  Indif 
ferent  to  truth  in  the  transactions  of  life,  he 
was  honestly  devoted  to  the  pursuit  of  truth  in 
the  researches  of  speculation.  Wanton  cru 
elty  was  not  in  his  nature.  On  the  contrary, 
where  no  political  object  was  at  stake,  his  dis 
position  was  soft  and  humane.  The  suscepti 
bility  of  his  nerves,  and  the  activity  of  his 
imagination,  inclined  him  to  sympathize  with 
the  feelings  of  others,  and  to  delight  in  the  cha 
rities  and  courtesies  of  social  life.  Perpetually 
descending  to  actions  which  might  seem  to 
mark  a  mind  diseased  through  all  its  faculties, 
he  had  nevertheless  an  exquisite  sensibility  both 
for  the  natural  and  the  moral  sublime,  for 
every  graceful  and  every  lofty  conception. 
Habits  of  petty  intrigue  and  dissimulation 
might  have  rendered  him  incapable  of  great 
general  views ;  but  that  the  expanding  effect 
of  his  philosophical  studies  counteracted  the 
narrowing  tendency.  He  had  the  keenest  en 
joyment  of  wit,  eloquence,  and  poetry.  The 
fine  arts  profited  alike  by  the  severity  of  his 
judgment,  and  the  liberality  of  his  patronage. 
The  portraits  of  seme  of  the  remarkable 
Italians  of  those  times  are  perfectly  in  harmo 
ny  with  this  description.  Ample  and  majestic 
foreheads ;  brows  strong  and  dark,  but  not 
frowning;  eyes  of  which  the  calm  full  gaze, 
while  it  expresses  nothing,  seems  to  discern 
every  thing ;  cheeks  pale  with  thought  and  se 
dentary  habits  ;  lips  formed  with  feminine  deli 
cacy,  but  compressed  with  more  than  mascu 
line  decision,  mark  out  men  at  once  enterpris 
ing  and  apprehensive;  men  equally  skilled  in 
detecting  the  purposes  of  others,  and  in  con 
cealing  their  own;  men  who  must  have  been 
formidable  enemies  and  unsafe  allies ;  but  men, 
at  the  same  time,  whose  tempers  were  mild  and 
equable,  and  who  possessed  an  amplitude  and 
subtlety  of  mind,  which  would  have  rendered 


MACHIAVELLI. 


27 


them  eminent  either  in  active  or  in  contempla 
tive  life,  arid  fitted  them  either  to  govern  or  to 
instruct  mankind. 

Every  age  and  every  nation  has  certain 
characteristic  vices,  which  prevail  almost  uni 
versally,  which  scarcely  any  person  scruples 
to  avow,  and  which  even  rigid  moralists  but 
faintly  censure.  Succeeding  generations 
change  the  fashion  of  their  morals,  with  their 
hats  and  their  coaches  ;  take  some  other  kind 
of  wickedness  under  their  patronage,  and  won 
der  at  the  depravity  of  their  ancestors.  Nor  is 
this  all.  Posterity,  that  high  court  of  appeal 
which  is  never  tired  of  eulogizing  its  own  jus 
tice  and  discernment,  acts,  on  such  occasions, 
like  a  Roman  dictator  after  a  general  mutiny. 
Finding  the  delinquents  too  numerous  to  be  all 
punished,  it  selects  some  of  them  at  hazard  to 
bear  the  whole  penalty  of  an  offence  in  which 
they  are  not  more  deeply  implicated  than  those 
who  escape.  Whether  decimation  be  a  con 
venient  mode  of  military  execution,  we  know 
not :  but  we  solemnly  protest  against  the  intro 
duction  of  such  a  principle  into  the  philoso 
phy  of  history. 

In  the  present  instance,  the  lot  has  fallen  on 
Machiavelli :  a  man  whose  public  conduct  was 
upright  and  honourable,  whose  views  of  mo 
rality,  where  they  differed  from  those  of  the 
persons  around  him,  seem  to  have  differed  for 
the  better,  and  whose  only  fault  was,  that,  hav 
ing  adopted  some  of  the  maxims  then  generally 
received,  he  arranged  them  more  luminously, 
and  expressed  them  more  forcibly  than  any 
other  writer. 

Having  now,  we  hope,  in  some  degree 
cleared  the  personal  character  of  Machiavelli, 
we  come  to  the  consideration  of  his  works. 
As  a  poet,  he  is  not  entitled  to  a  very  high 
place.  The  Decennali  are  merely  abstracts  of 
the  history  of  his  own  times  in  rhyme.  The 
style  and  versification  are  sedulously  modelled 
on  those  ef  Dante.  But  the  manner  of  Dante, 
like  that  of  every  other  great  original  poet,  was 
suited  only  to  his  own  genius,  and  to  his  own 
subject.  The  distorted  and  rugged  diction 
which  gives  to  his  unearthly  imagery  a  yet 
more  unearthly  character,  and  seems  to  pro 
ceed  from  a  man  labouring  to  express  that 
which  is  inexpressible,  is  at  once  mean  and 
extravagant  when  misemployed  by  an  imitator. 
The  moral  poems  are  in  every  point  superior. 
That  on  Fortune,  in  particular,  and  that  on  Op 
portunity  exhibit  both  justness  of  thought  and 
fertility  of  fancy.  The  Golden  Ass  has  no 
thing  but  the  name  in  common  with  the  Ro 
mance  of  Apuleius,  a  book  which,  in  spite  of 
its  irregular  plan  and  its  detestable  style,  is 
among  the  most  fascinating  in  the  Latin  lan 
guage,  and  in  which  the  merits  of  Le  Sage  and 
Radcliffe,  Banyan  and  Crebillon,  are  singularly 
united.  The  Poem  of  Machiavelli,  which  is 
evidently  unfinished,  is  carefully  copied  from 
the  earlier  Cantos  of  the  Inferno.  The  writer 
loses  himself  in  a  wood.  He  is  terrified  by 
monsters,  and  relieved  by  a  beautiful  damsel. 
His  protectress  conducts  him  to  a.  large  mena 
gerie  of  emblematical  beasts,  whose  peculiari 
ties  are  described  at  length.  The  manner  as 
well  as  the  plan  of  the  Divine  Comedy  is  care 
fully  imitated.  Whole  lines  are  transferred 


from  it.  But  they  no  longer  proJuce  their 
wonted  effect.  Virgil  advises  the  husbandmen 
who  removes  a  plant  from  one  spot  to  another 
to  mark  its  bearings  on  the  cork,  and  to  place 
it  in  the  same  position  with  regard  to  the  dif 
ferent  points  of  the  heaven  in  which  it  for 
merly  stood.  A  similar  care  is  necessary  in 
poetical  transplantation.  Where  it  is  neglect 
ed,  we  perpetually  see  the  flowers  of  language, 
which  have  bloomed  on  one  soil,  wither  on 
another.  Yet  the  Golden  Ass  is  not  altogethei 
destitute  of  merit.  There  is  considerable  in 
genuity  in  the  allegory,  and  some  vivid  colour 
ing  in  the  descriptions. 

The  Comedies  deserve  more  attention.  The 
Mandragola,  in  particular,  is  superior  to  the 
best  of  Goldoni,  and  inferior  only  to  the  best 
of  Moliere.  It  is  the  work  of  a  man  who,  if 
he  had  devoted  himself  to  the  drama,  would 
probably  have  attained  the  highest  eminence, 
and  produced  a  permanent  and  salutary  effect 
on  the  national  taste.  This  we  infer,  not  so 
much  from  the  degree,  as  from  the  kind  of  its 
excellence.  There  are  compositions  which 
indicate  still  greater  talent,  and  which  are 
perused  with  still  greater  delight,  from  which 
we  should  have  drawn  very  different  conclu 
sions.  Books  quite  worthless  are  quite  harm 
less.  The  sure  sign  of  the  general  decline  of 
an  art  is  the  frequent  occurrence,  not  of  de 
formity,  but  of  misplaced  beauty.  In  general, 
tragedy  is  corrupted  by  eloquence,  and  comedy 
by  wit. 

The  real  object  of  the  drama  is  the  exhibi 
tion  of  the  human  character.  This,  we  con* 
ceive,  is  no  arbitrary  canon,  originating  in 
local  and  temporary  associations,  like  those 
which  regulate  the  number  of  acts  in  a  play, 
or  syllables  in  a  line.  It  is  the  very  essence 
of  a  species  of  composition,  in  which  every 
idea  is  coloured  by  passing  through  the  me 
dium  of  an  imagined  mind.  To  this  funda 
mental  law  every  other  regulation  is  subor 
dinate.  The  situations  which  most  signally 
develope  character  form  the  best  plot.  The 
mother  tongue  of  the  passions  is  the  best  style 

The  principle,  rightly  understood,  does  not 
debar  the  poet  from  any  grace  of  composition. 
There  is  no  style  in  which  some  man  may  not, 
under  some  circumstances,  express  himself. 
There  is  therefore  no  style  which  the  drama 
rejects,  none  which  it  does  not  occasionally 
require.  It  is  in  the  discernment  of  place,  of 
time, .and  of  person,  that  the  inferior  artists 
fail.  The  brilliant  rodomontade  of  Mercutio, 
the  elaborate  declamation  of  Antony,  are, 
where  Shakspcare  has  placed  them,  natural 
jjid  pleasing.  But  Dry  den  would  have  made 
^Mercutio  challenge  Tybalt,  in  hyperboles  as 
fanciful  as  those  in  which  he  describes  the 
chariot  of  Mab. — Corneille  would  have  repre 
sented  Antony  as  scolding  and  coaxing  Cleo« 
patra  with  all  the  measured  rhetoric  of  a  fune 
ral  oration.  # 

No  writers  have  injured  the  Comedy  of  Eng 
land   so  deeply  as   Congreve  and  Sheridan. 
Both  were  men  of  splendid  wit  and  polished 
taste.     Unhappily  they  made  all  their  charac 
ters  in  their  own  likeness.     Their  works  bear 
j  the   same   relation   to   the    legitimate    drama 
I  which  a  transparency  bears  to  a  painnrg    no 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS 


delicate  touches;  no  hues  imperceptibly  fad-  j  Nicias  is,  as  Thersites  says  of  Patroclus,  a 


ing  into  each  other;  the  whole  is  lighted  up 
with  an  universal  glare.  Outlines  and  tints 
are  forgotten,  in  the  common  blaze  which 
illuminates  all.  The  flowers  and  fruits  of  the 
intellect  abound;  but  it  is  the  abundance  of  a 
jungle,  not  of  a  garden — unwholesome,  be 
wildering,  unprofitable  from  its  very  plenty, 
rank  from  its  very  fragrance.  Every  fop, 
every  boor,  every  valet,  is  a  man  of  wit.  The 
very  butts  and  dupes,  Tattie,  Urkwould,  PufF, 
Acres,  outshine  the  whole  Hotel  de  Rambouil- 
let.  To  prove  the  whole  system  of  this  school 
absurd,  it  is  only  necessary  to  apply  the  test 
which  dissolved  the  enchanted  Florimel — to 
place  the  true  by  the  false  Thalia,  to  contrast 
the  most  celebrated  characters  which  have 
been  drawn  by  the  writers  of  whom  we  speak, 
with  the  Bastard  in  King  John,  or  the  Nurse  in 
Romeo  and  Juliet.  It  was  not  surely  from 
want  of  wit  that  Shakspeare  adopted  so  differ 
ent  a  manner.  Benedick  and  Beatrice  throw 
Mirabel  and  Millamant  into  the  shade.  All 
the  good  sayings  of  the  facetious  hours  of  Ab 
solute  and  Surface  might  have  been  clipped 
from  the  single  character  of  Falstaff  without 
being  missed.  It  would  have  been  easy  for 
that  fertile  mind  to  have  given  Bardolph  and 
Shallow  as  much  wit  as  Prince  Hal,  and  to 
have  made  Dogberry  and  Verges  retort  on 
each  other  in  sparkling  epigrams.  But  he 
knew,  to  use  his  own  admirable  language,  that 
such  indiscriminate  prodigality  was  "from  the 
purpose  of  playing,  whose  end,  both  at  the  first 
and  now,  was,  and  is,  to  hold,  as  it  were,  the 
mirror  up  to  Nature." 

This  digression  will  enable  our  readers  to 
understand  what  we  mean  when  we  say  that, 
in  the  Mandragola,  Machiavelli  has  proved 
that  he  completely  understood  the  nature  of 
the  dramatic  art,  and  possessed  talents  which 
would  have  enabled  him  to  excel  in  it.  By  the 
correct  and  vigorous  delineation  of  human  na 
ture,  it  produces  interest  without  a  pleasing  or 
skilful  plot,  and  laughter  without  the  least  am 
bition  of  wit.  The  lover,  not  a  very  delicate 
or  generous  lover,  and  his  adviser  the  parasite, 
are  drawn  with  spirit.  The  hypocritical  con 
fessor  is  an  admirable  portrait.  He  is,  if  we 
mistake  not,  the  original  of  Father  Dominic, 
the  best  comic  character  of  Dryden.  But  old 
Nicias  is  the  glory  of  the  piece.  We  cannot 
call  to  mind  any  thing  that  resembles  him.  The 
follies  which  Moiiere  ridicules  are  those  of 
affectation,  not  those  of  fatuity.  Coxcombs 
and  pedants,  not  simpletons,  are  his  game. 
Shakspeare  has  indeed  a  vast  assortment  of 
fools ;  but  the  precise  species  of  which  waj 
speak  is  not,  if  we  remember  right,  to  be  founa 
there.  Shallow  is  a  fool.  But  his  animal  spi 
rits  supply,  to  a  certain  degree,  the  place  of 
cleverness.  His  talk  is  to  that  of  Sir  John 
what  soda-water  is  to  champagne.  It  has  the 
effervescence,  thoujh  not  the  body  or  the  fla 
vour.  Slender  and  Sir  Andrew  Aguecheek 
are  fools,  troubled  with  an  uneasy  conscious 
ness  of  their  folly,  which,  in  the  latter,  pro 
duce-  a  most  edifying  meekness  and  docility, 
an3  in  the  former,  awkwardness,  obstinacy, 
and  confusion.  Cloten  it  an  arrogant  fool, 
Osric  a  foppish  fool,  Ajax  a  savage  fool;  but 


fool  positive.  His  mind  is  .occupied  by  no 
strong  feeling;  it  takes  every  character,  and 
retains  none;  its  aspect  is  diversified,  not  by 
passions,  but  by  faint  and  transitory  semblances 
of  passion,  a  mock  joy,  a  mock  fear,  a  mock 
a  mock  pride,  which  chase  each  other 
like  shadows  over  its  surface,  and  vanish  as 
soon  as  they  appear.  He  is  just  idiot  enough 
to  be  an  object,  not  of  pity  or  horror,  but  of 
ridicule.  He  bears  some  resemblance  to  poor 
Calandrino,  whose  mishaps,  as  recounted  by 
Boccaccio,  have  made  all  Europe  merry  for 
more  than  four  centuries.  He  perhaps  resem 
bles  still  more  closely  Simon  de  Villa,  to  whom 
Bruno  and  Buffulmacco  promised  the  love  of 
the  Countess  Civilian.*  Nicias  is,  like  Simon, 
of  a  learned  profession  ;  and  the  dignity  with 
which  he  wears  the  doctoral  fur  renders  his 
absurdities  infinitely  more  grotesque.  The 
old  Tuscan  is  the  very  language  for  such  a 
being.  Its  peculiar  simplicity  gives  even  to 
the  most  forcible  reasoning  and  the  most  bril 
liant  wit  an  infantine  air,  generally  delightful, 
but  to  a  foreign  reader  sometimes  a  little  ludi 
crous.  Heroes  and  statesmen  seem  to  lisp 
when  they  use  it.  It  becomes  Nicias  incom 
parably,  and  renders  all  his  silliness  infinitely 
more  silly. 

We  may  add,  that  the  verses,  wiih  which 
the  Mandragola  is  interspersed,  appear  to  us 
to  be  the  most  spirited  and  correct  of  all  that 
Machiavelli  has  written  in  metre.  He  seems 
to  have  entertained  the  same  opinion;  for  he 
has  introduced  some  of  them  in  other  places* 
The  contemporaries  of  the  author  were  not 
blind  to  the  merits  of  this  striking  piece.  It 
was  acted  at  Florence  with  the  greatest  suc 
cess.  Leo  the  Tenth  was  among  its  admirers, 
and  by  his  order  it  was  represented  at  Rome.f 

The  Clizia  is  an  imitation  of  the  Casina  of 
Plautus,  which  is  itself  an  imitation  of  the  lost 
of  Dihilus.  Plautus  was,  unques 


tionably,  one  of  the  best  Latin  writers.  His 
works  are  copies  ;  but  they  have  in  an  extra 
ordinary  degree,  the  air  of  originals.  We  in 
finitely  prefer  the  slovenly  exuberance  of  his 
fancy,  and  the  clumsy  vigour  of  his  diction,  to 
the  artfully  disguised  poverty  and  elegant  lan 
guor  of  Terence.  But  the  Casina  is  by  no 
means  one  of  his  best  plays  ;  nor  is  it  one 
which  offers  great  facilities  to  an  imitator. 
The  story  is  as  alien  from  modern  habits  of 
life,  as  the  manner  in  which  it  is  developed 
from  the  modern  fashion  of  composition.  The 
lover  remains  in  the  country,  and  the  heroine 
is  locked  up  in  her  chamber  during  the  whole 
.action,  leaving  their  fate  to  be  decided  by  a 
foolish  father,  a  cunning  mother,  and  two  kna 
vish  servants.  Machiavelli  has  executed  his 
task  with  judgment  and  taste.  He  has  accom 
modated  the  plot  to  a  different  state  of  society, 
and  has  very  dexterously  connected  it  with 
the  history  of  his  own  times.  The  relation 
of  the  trick  put  on  the  doating  old  lover  is  ex 


*  Decameron,  Giorn.  viii.     Nov.  9. 

•f-  Nothing  can  be  more  evident  than  that  Paultis  Jo- 
vins  designates  the  Mandragola  under  the  name  of  the 
Niciaa.  We  should  not  have  noticed  what  is  so  per 
fectly  obvious,  were  it  not  that  this  natural  and  palpable 
misnomer  has  led  the  sagacious  and  industrious  IJayLe 
into  a  gross  error. 


MACHIAVELLI. 


quisitely  humorous.  It  is  far  superior  to  the 
corresponding  passage  in  the  Latin  comedy, 
and  scarcely  yields  to  the  account  which  Fal- 
staff  gives  of  his  ducking. 

Two  other  comedies  without  titles,  the  one 
in  prose,  the  other  in  verse,  appear  among  the 
works  of  Machiavelli.  The  former  is  very 
short,  lively  enough,  but  of  no  great  value. 
The  latter  .we  can  scarcely  believe  to  be 
g«nuine.  Neither  its  merits  nor  its  defects  re 
mind  us  of  the  reputed  author.  It  was  first 
printed  in  1796,  from  a  manuscript  discovered 
in  the  celebrated  library  of  the  Strozzi.  Its 
genuineness,  if  we  have  been  rightly  informed, 
is  established  solely  by  the  comparison  of 
hands.  Our  suspicions  are  strengthened  by  the 
circumstance,  that  the  same  manuscript  con 
tained  a  description  of  the  plague  of  1527, 
which  has  also,  in  consequence,  been  added  to 
the  works  of  Machiavelli.  Of  this  last  compo 
sition  the  strongest  external  evidence  would 
scarcely  induce  us  to  believe  him  guilty.  No 
thing  was  ever  written  more  detestable,  in  mat 
ter  and  manner.  The  narrations,  the  reflec 
tions,  the  jokes,  the  lamentations,  are  all  the 
very  worst  of  iheir  respective  kinds,  at  once 
trite  and  affected — threadbare  tinsel  from  the 
Ragfairs  and  Monmouth-streets  of  literature. 
A  foolish  school-boy  might  perhaps  write  it, 
and,  after  he  had  written  it,  think  it  much  finer 
than  the  incomparable  introduction  of  the  De 
cameron.  But  that  a  shrewd  statesman,  whose 
earliest  works  are  characterized  by  manliness 
of  thought  and  language,  should  at  nearly  sixty 
years  of  age,  descend  to  such  puerility,  is  ut 
terly  inconceivable. 

The  little  Novel  of  Belphegor  is  pleasantly 
conceived  and  pleasantly  told.  But  the  extra 
vagance  of  the  satire  in  some  measure  injures 
its  effect.  Machiavelli  was  unhappily  married  ; 
and  his  wish  to  avenge  his  own  cause  and  that 
of  his  brethren  in  misfortune,  carried  him  be 
yond  even  the  license  of  fiction.  Jonson  seems 
to  have  combined  some  hints  taking  from  this 
taie  with  others  from  Boccaccio,  in  the  plot  of 
The  Devil  is  an  Jlss — a  play  which,  though  not 
the  most  highly  finished  of  his  compositions, 
is  perhaps  that  which  exhibits  the  strongest 
proofs  of  geniu.s. 

The  political  correspondence  of  Machiavelli, 
first  published  in  1767,  is  unquestionably 
genuine  and  highly  valuable.  The  unhappy 
circumstances  in  which  his  country  was  placed, 
during  the  greater  part  of  his  public  life,  gave 
extraordinary  encouragement  to  diplomatic 
talents.  From  the  moment  that  Charles  the 
Eighth  descended  from  the  Alps,  the  whole 
character  of  Italian  politics  was  changed.  The 
governments  of  the  Peninsula  cease  to  form  an 
independent  system.  Drawn  from  their  old 
orbit  by  the  attraction  of  the  larger  bodies 
which  now  approached  them,  they  became 
mere  satellites  of  France  and  Spain.  All  their 
disputes,  internal  and  external,  were  decided 
by  foreign  influence.  The  contests  of  oppo 
site  factions  were  carried  on,  not  as  formerly 
in  the  Senate-house,  or  in  the  market-place, 
but  in  the  antechambers  of  Louis  and  Ferdi 
nand.  Under  these  circumstances,  the  pros 
perity  of  the  Italian  States  depended  far  more  on 
Uie  ability  of  their  foreign  agents  than  on  the  i 


'  conduct  of  those  who  were  intrusted  with  lh» 
j  domestic  administration.  The  ambassador  had 
|  to  discharge  functions  far  more  delicate  than 
transmitting  orders  of  knighthood,  introducing 
tourists,  or  presenting  his  brethren  with  the 
homage  of  his  high  consideration.  He  was  an 
advocate,  to  whose  management  the  dearest  in 
terests  of  his  clients  were  intrusted ;  a  spy,  cloth 
ed  with  an  inviolable  character.  Instead  of 
consulting  the  dignity  of  those  whom  he  repre 
sented  by  a  reserved  manner  and  an  ambigu 
ous  style,  he  was  to  plunge  into  all  ihe  in 
trigues  of  the  court  at  which  he  resided,  to  dis 
cover  and  flatter  every  weakness  of  the  prince 
who  governed  his  employers,  of  the  favourite 
who  governed  the  prince,  and  of  the  lacquey 
who  governed  the  favourite.  He  was  to  com 
pliment  the  mistress  and  bribe  the  confessor, 
to  panegyrize  or  supplicate,  to  laugh  or  weep, 
to  accommodate  himself  to  every  caprice,  to 
lull  every  suspicion,  to  treasure  every  hint,  to 
be  every  thing,  to  observe  every  thing, to  endure 
every  thing.  High  as  the  art  of  political  in 
trigue  had  been  carried  in  Italy,  these  were 
times  which  required  it  all. 

On  these  arduous  errands  Machiavelli  was 
frequently  employed.  He  was  sent  to  treat 
with  the  King  of  the  Romans  and  with  the 
Duke  of  Valentinois.  He  was  twice  ambassa 
dor  at  the  court  of  Romi.-,  and  thrice  at  that  of 
France.  In  these  missions,  and  in  several 
others  of  inferior  importance,  he  acquitted  him 
self  with  great  dexterity.  His  despatches  form 
one  of  the  most  amusing  and  instructive  col 
lections  extant.  We  meet  with  none  of  the 
mysterious  jargon  so  common  in  modern  state 
papers,  the  flash-language  of  political  robbers 
and  sharpers.  The  narratives  are  clear  and 
agreeably  written ;  the  remarks  on  men  and 
things  clever  and  judicious.  The  conversa 
tions  are  reported  in  a  spirited  and  character 
istic  manner.  We  find  ourselves  introduced 
into  the  presence  of  the  men  who,  during 
twenty  eventful  years,  swayed  the  destinies  of 
Europe.  Their  wit  and  their  folly,  their  fret- 
fulness  and  their  merriment  are  exposed  to  us. 
We  are  admitted  to  overhear  their  chat,  and  to 
watch  their  familiar  gestures.  It  is  interesting 
and  curious  to  recognise,  in  circumstances 
which  elude  the  notice  of  historians,  the  feeble 
violence  and  shallow  cunning  of  Louis  the 
Twelfth ;  the  bustling  insignificance  of  Maxi 
milian,  cursed  with  an  impotent  pruriency  for 
renown,  rash  yet  timid,  obstinate  yet  fickle,  al 
ways  in  a  hurry,  yet  always  too  late; — the 
fierce  and  haughty  energy  which  gave  dignity 
to  the  eccentricities  of  Julius; — the  soft  and 
graceful  manners  which  masked  the  insatiable 
ambition  and  the  implacable  hatred  of  Borgia. 

We  have  mentioned  Borgia.  It  is  impossi 
ble  not  to  pause  for  a  moment  on  the  name  of 
a  man  in  whom  the  political  morality  of  Italy 
was  so  strongly  personified,  partially  blended 
with  the  sterner  lineaments  of  the  Spanish 
character.  On  IAVO  important  occasions  Ma 
chiavelli  was  admitted  to  his  society:  once,  at 
the  moment  Avhen  his  splendid  villany  achiev 
ed  its  most  signal  triumph,  when  he  caught  in 
one  snare  and  crushed  at  ono  blow  all  his  most 
formidable  rivals,  and  again  when,  exhausted 
by  disease  and  ovenvhelmed  bv 
c  2 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


which  no  human  prudence  could  have  averted, 
he  was  the  prisoner  of  the  deadliest  enemy  of 
his  house.  These  interviews,  between  the 
greatest  speculative  and  the  greatest  practical 
statesmen  of  the  age,  are  fully  described  in  the 
correspondence,  and  form  perhaps  the  most  in 
teresting  part  of  it.  From  some  passages  in  the 
Prince,  and  perhaps  also  from  some  indistinct 
traditions,  several  writers  have  supposed  a  con 
nection  between  those  remarkable  men  much 
closer  than  ever  existed.  The  Envoy  has  even 
been  accused  of  promoting  the  crimes  of  the  art 
ful  and  merciless  tyrant.  But  from  the  official 
documents  it  is  clear  that  their  intercourse, 
though  ostensibly  amicable,  was  in  reality  hos 
tile.  It  cannot  be  doubted,  however,  that  the 
imagination  of  Machiavelli  was  strongly  im 
pressed  and  his  speculations  on  government 
coloured,  by  the  observations  which  he  made 
on  the  singular  character,  and  equally  singular 
fortunes,  of  a  man  who,  under  such  disadvan 
tages,  had  achieved  such  exploits ;  who,  when 
sensuality,  varied  through  innumerable  forms, 
could  no  longer  stimulate  his  sated  mind, 
found  a  more  powerful  and  durable  excitement 
in  the  intense  thirst  of  empire  and  revenge  ; — 
who  emerged  from  the  sloth  and  luxury  of  the 
Roman  purple,  the  first  prince  and  general  of 
the  age  ; — who,  trained  in  an  unwarlike  profes 
sion,  formed  a  gallant  army  out  of  the  dregs  of 
an  unwarlike  people : — who,  after  acquiring 
sovereignty  by  destroying  his  enemies,  ac 
quired  popularity  by  destroying  his  tools; — 
who  had  begun  to  employ  for  the  most  saluta 
ry  ends  the  power  which  he  had  attained  by  the 
most  atrocious  means ;  who  tolerated  within 
the  sphere  of  his  iron  despotism  no  plunderer 
or  oppressor  but  himself; — and  who  fell  at  last 
amidst  the  mingled  curses  and  regrets  of  a 
people,  of  whom  his  genius  had  been  the  won 
der,  and  might  have  been  the  salvation.  Some  of 
those  crimes  of  Borgia,  wrhich  to  us  appear  the 
most  odious,  would  not,  from  causes  which  we 
have  already  considered,  have  struck  an  Italian 
of  the  fifteenth  century  with  equal  horror.  Pa 
triotic  feeling  also  might  induce  Machiavelli 
to  look,  with  some  indulgence  and  regret,  on 
the  memory  of  the  only  leader  who  could  have 
defended  the  independence  of  Italy  against  the 
confederate  spoilers  of  Cambray. 

On  this  subject  Machiavelli  felt  most 
strongly.  Indeed  the  expulsion  of  the  foreign 
tyrants,  and  the  restoration  of  that  golden  age 
which  had  preceded  the  irruption  of  Charles 
the  Eighth,  were  projects  which,  at  that  time, 
fascir.ated  all  the  master-spirits  of  Italy.  The 
magnificent  vision  delighted  the  great  but  ill- 
regulated  mind  of  Julius.  It  divided  with 
manuscripts  and  sauces,  painters  and  falcons, 
the  attention  of  the  frivolous  Leo.  It  prompted 
the  generous  treason  of  Morone.  It  imparted 
a  transient  energy  to  the  feeble  mind  and  body 
of  the  last  Sforza.  It  excited  for  one  moment 
an  honest  ambition  in  the  false  heart  of  Pes- 
cara.  Ferocity  and  insolence  were  not  among 
the  vices  of  the  national  character.  To  the 
discriminating  cruelties  of  politicians,  com 
mitted  for  great  ends  on  select  victims,  the 
moral  code  of  the  Italians  was  too  indulgent. 
But  though  they  might  have  recourse  to  bar 
barity  as  an  expedient,  they  did  not  require  it 


as  a  stimulant.  They  turned  with  loathing 
from  the  atrocity  of  the  strangers  whc  seemed 
to  love  blood  for  its  own  sake,  who,  not  con 
tent  with  subjugating,  were  impatient  to  de 
stroy;  who  found  a  fiendish  pleasure  in  razing 
magnificent  cities,  cutting  the  throats  of  ene 
mies  who  cried  for  quarter,  or  suffocating  an 
unarmed  people  by  thousands  in  the  caverns 
to  which  they  had  fled  for  safety.  Such  were 
the  scenes  which  daily  excited  the  terror  and 
disgust  of  a  people,  amongst  whom,  till  lately, 
the  worst  that  a  soldier  had  to  fear  in  a  pitched 
battle  was  the  loss  of  his  horse,  and  the  ex 
pense  of  his  ransom.  The  swinish  intemper 
ance  of  Switzerland,  the  wolfish  avarice  of 
Spain,  the  gross  licentiousness  of  the  French, 
indulged  in  violation  of  hospitality,  of  decency, 
of  love  itself,  the  wanton  inhumanity  which 
was  common  to  all  the  invaders,  had  rendered 
them  subjects  of  deadly  hatred  to  the  inhabi 
tants  of  the  Peninsula.*  The  wealth  which 
had  been  accumulated  during  centuries  of 
prosperity  and  repose  was  rapidly  melting 
away.  The  intellectual  superiority  of  the  op 
pressed  people  only  rendered  them  more 
keenly  sensible  of  their  political  degradation. 
Literature  and  taste,  indeed,  still  disguised, 
with  a  flush  of  hectic  loveliness  and  brilliancy, 
the  ravages  of  an  incurable  decay.  The  iron 
had  not  yet  entered  into  the  soul.  The  time 
was  not  yet  come  when  eloquence  was  to  be 
gagged  and  reason  to  be  hood\vinked— when 
the  harp  of  the  poet  was  to  be  hung  on  the 
willows  of  Arno,  and  the  right  hand  of  the 
painter  to  forget  its  cunning.  Yet  a  discerning 
eye  might  even  then  have  seen  that  genius 
and  learning  would  not  long  survive  the  state 
of  things  from  which  they  had  sprung ; — that 
the  great  men  whose  talents  gave  lustre  to  that 
melancholy  period  had  been  formed  under  the 
influence  of  happier  days,  and  would  leave  no 
successors  behind  them.  The  times  which 
shine  with  the  greatest  splendour  in  Mterary 
history  are  not  always  those  to  which  the 
human  mind  is  most  indebted.  Of  this  we  may 
be  convinced,  by  comparing  the  generation 
which  follows  them  with  that  which  preceded 
them.  The  first  fruits  which  are  reaped  under 
a  bad  system  often  spring  from  seed  sown 
under  a  good  one.  Thus  it  was,  in  some  mea 
sure,  with  the  Augustan  age.  Thus  it  was 
with  the  age  of  Raphael  and  Ariosto,  of  Aldus 
and  Vida. 

Machiavelli  deeply  regretted  the  misfortune* 
of  his  country,  and  clearly  discerned  the  cause 
and  the  remedy.  It  was  the  military  system 
of  the  Italian  people  which  had  extinguished 
their  valour  and  discipline,  and  rendered  their 
wealth  an  easy  prey  to  every  foreign  plun 
derer.  The  Secretary  projected  a  scheme  alike 
honourable  to  his  heart  and  to  his  intellect,  for 
abolishing  the  use  of  mercenary  troops,  and 
organizing  a  national  militia. 

The  exertions  which  he  made  to  effect  this 
great  object  ought  alone  to  rescue  his  name 
from  obloquy.  Though  his  situation  and  his 


I 


*  The  opening  stanzas  of  the  Fourteenth  Canto  of  the 
Orlando  Furioso  give  a  frightful  picture  of  the  state  of 
Italy  in  those  times.  Yet,  strange  to  say.  Ariofto  is 
speaking  of  the  conduct  of  those  who  called  themselves 
\llies. 


MACHIAVELLI. 


habits  were  pacific,  he  studied  with  intense 
assiduity  the  theory  of  war.  He  made  himself 
master  of  all  its  details.  The  Florentine  go 
vernment  entered  into  his  views.  A  council 
of  war  was  appointed.  Levies  were  decreed.  | 
The  indefatigable  minister  flew  from  place  to 
place  in  order  to  superintend  the  execution  of  ' 
his  design.  The  times  were,  in  some  respects, 
favourable  to  the  experiment.  The  system  of 
military  tactics  had  undergone  a  great  revolu 
tion.  The  cavalry  was  no  longer  considered 
as  forming  the  strength  of  an  army.  The  hours 
which  a  citizen  could  spare  from  his  ordinary 
employments,  though  by  no  means  sufficient  to 
familiarize  him  with  the  exercise  of  a  man-at- 
arms,  might  render  him  a  useful  foot-soldier. 
The  dread  of  a  foreign  yoke,  of  plunder,  mas 
sacre,  and  conflagration,  might  have  conquered 
that  repugnance  to  military  pursuits,  which 
both  the  industry  and  the  idleness  of  great 
towns  commonly  generate.  For  a  time  the 
scheme  promised  well.  The  new  troops  ac 
quitted  themselves  respectably  in  the  field. 
Machiavelli  looked  with  parental  rapture  on 
the  success  of  his  plan ;  and  began  to  hope 
Shat  the  arms  of  Italy  might  once  more  be  for 
midable  to  the  barbarians  of  the  Tagus  and  the 
Rhine.  But  the  tide  of  misfortune  came  on 
before  the  barriers  which  should  have  with 
stood  it  were  prepared.  For  a  time,  indeed, 
Florence  might  be  considered  as  peculiarly 
fortunate.  Famine  and  sword  and  pestilence 
had  devastated  the  fertile  plains  and  stately 
cities  of  the  Po.  All  the  curses  denounced  of 
old  against  Tyre  seemed  to  have  fallen  on 
Venice.  Her  merchants  already  stood  afar 
off,  lamenting  for  their  great  city.  The  time 
seemed  near  when  the  sea-weed  should  over 
grow  her  silent  Rialto,  and  the  fisherman  wash 
his  nets  in  her  deserted  arsenal.  Naples  had 
been  four  times  conquered  and  reconquered, 
by  tyrants  equally  indifferent  to  its  welfare, 
and  equally  greedy  for  its  spoils.  Florence, 
as  yet,  had  only  to  endure  degradation  and  ex 
tortion,  to  submit  to  the  mandate  of  foreign 
powers,  to  buy  over  and  over  again,  at  an 
enormous  price,  what  was  already  justly  her 
own,  to  return  thanks  for  being  wronged,  and 
to  ask  pardon  for  being  in  the  right.  She  was 
at  length  deprived  of  the  blessings  even  of  this 
infamous  and  servile  repose.  Her  military 
and  political  institutions  were  swept  away 
together.  The  Medici  returned,  in  the  train 
of  foreign  invaders,  from  their  long  exile. 
The  policy  of  Machiavelli  was  abandoned; 
and  his  public  services  were  requited  with 
poverty,  imprisonment,  and  torture. 

The  fallen  statesman  still  clung  to  his  pro 
ject  with  unabated  ardour.  With  the  view  of 
vindicating  it  from  some  popular  objections, 
and  of  refuting  some  prevailing  errors  on  the 
subject  of  military  science,  he  wrote  his  seven 
books  on  the  Art  of  War.  This  excellent  work 
is  in  the  form  of  a  dialogue.  The  opinions  of 
the  writer  are  put  into  the  mouth  of  Fabrizio 
Colonna,  a  powerful  nobleman  of  the  Ecclesi 
astical  State,  and  an  officer  of  distinguished 
merit  in  the  service  of  the  King  of  Spain.  He 
visits  Florence  on  his  way  from  Lombardy  to 
his  own  domains.  He  is  invited  to  meet  some 
friends  at  the  house  of  Cosimo  Rucellui,  an 


amiable  and  accomplished  young  man,  whose 
early  death  Machiavelli  feelingly  ceplores. 
After  partaking  of  an  elegant  entertainment, 
they  retire  from  the  heat  into  the  most  shady 
recesses  of  the  garden.  Fabrizio  is  struck  by 
the  sight  of  some  uncommon  plants.  His  host 
informs  him  that,  though  rare  in  modern  days, 
they  are  frequently  mentioned  by  the  classical 
authors,  and  that  his  grandfather,  like  many 
other  Italians,  amused  himself  with  practising 
the  ancient  methods  of  gardening.  Fabrizio 
expresses  his  regret  that  those  who,  in  later 
times,  affected  the  manners  of  the  okl  Romans, 
should  select  for  imitation  their  most  trifling 
pursuits.  This  leads  to  a  conversation  on  the 
decline  of  military  discipline,  and  on  the  best 
means  of  restoring  it.  The  institution  of  the 
Florentine  militia  is  ably  defended ;  and  se 
veral  improvements  are  suggested  in  the 
details. 

The  Swiss  and  the  Spaniards  were,  at  that 
time,  regarded  as  the  best  soldiers  in  Europe. 
The  Swiss  battalion  consisted  of  pikemen,  and 
bore  a  close  resemblance  to  the  Greek  phalanx. 
The  Spaniards,  like  the  soldiers  of  Rome,  were 
armed  with  the  sword  aflti.  the  shield.  The 
victories  of  Flaminius  and  ^milius  over  the 
Macedonian  kings  seem  to  prove  the  superi 
ority  of  the  weapons  used  by  the  legions. 

The  same  experiments  had  been  recently 
tried  with  the  same  result  at  the  battle  of 
Ravenna,  one  of  those  tremendous  days  into 
which  human  folly  and  wickedness  compress 
the  whole  devastation  of  a  famine  or  a  plague. 
In  that  memorable  conflict,  the  infantry  of 
Arragon,  the  old  companions  of  Gonsalvo, 
deserted  by  all  their  allies,  hewed  a  passage 
through  the  thickest  of  the  imperial  pikes,  and 
effected  an  unbroken  retreat,  in  the  face  of  the 
gendarmerie  of  De  Foix,  and  the  renowned 
artillery  of  Este.  Fabrizio,  or  rather  Machia 
velli,  proposes  to  combine  the  two  systems,  to 
arm  the  foremost  lines  with  the  pike,  for  the 
purpose  of  repulsing  cavalry,  and  those  in  the 
rear  with  the  sword,  as  being  a  weapon  better 
adapted  for  every  purpose.  Throughout  the 
work,  the  author  expresses  the  highest  admira 
tion  of  the  military  science  of  the  ancient 
Romans,  and  the  greatest  contempt  for  the 
maxims  which  had  been  in  vogue  amongst  the 
Italian  commanders  of  the  preceding  genera 
tion.  He  prefers  infantry  to  cavalry;  and  for 
tified  camps  to  fortified  towns.  He  is  inclined 
to  substitute  rapid  movements,  and  decisive 
engagements,  for  the  languid  and  dilatory 
operations  of  his  countrymen.  He  attaches 
very  little  importance  to  the  invention  of  gun 
powder.  Indeed  he  seems  to  think  that  it 
ought  scarcely  to  produce  any  change  in  the 
mode  of  arming  or  of  disposing  troops.  The 
general  testimony  of  historians,  it  must  be 
allowed,  seems  to  prove,  that  the  ill-construct 
ed  and  ill-served  artillery  of  those  times, 
though  useful  in  a  siege,  was  of  little  value  on 
the  field  of  battle. 

Of  the  tactics  of  Machiavelli  we  will  not 
venture  to  give  an  opinion;  but  we  are  cer 
tain  that  his  book  is  most  able  and  interesting, 
As  a  commentary  on  the  history  of  his  times, 
it  is  invaluable.  The  ingenuity,  the  grace,  ami 
the  perspicuity  of  the  stvle,  and  the  eloquence 


32 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  animation  of  particular  passages,  must  j 
give  pleasure  even  to  readers  who  take  no  in 
terest  in  the  subject. 

The  Prince  and  the  Discourses  on  Livy  were 
written  after  the  fall  of  the  republican  govern 
ment.  The  former  was  dedicated  to  the  young 
Lorenzo  de  Medici.  This  circumstance  seems 
to  have  disgusted  the  contemporaries  of  the 
writer  far  more  than  the  doctrines  which  have 
rendered  the  name  of  the  work  odious  in  later 
times.  It  was  considered  as  an  indication  of 
political  apostasy.  The  fact,  however,  seems 
to  have  been,  that  Machiavelli,  despairing  of 
the  liberty  of  Florence,  was  inclined  to  support 
any  government  which  might  preserve  her 
independence.  The  interval  which  separated  a 
democracy  and  a  despotism,  Soderini  and  Lo 
renzo,  seemed  to  vanish  when  compared  with 
the  difference  between  the  former  and  the  pre 
sent  state  of  Italy ;  between  the  security,  the 
opulence,  and  the  repose  which  it  had  enjoyed 
under  its  native  rulers,  and  the  misery  in  which 
it  had  been  plunged  since  the  fatal  year  in 
which  the  first  foreign  tyrant  had  descended 
from  the  Alps.  The  noble  and  pathetic  ex 
hortation  with  winch  the  Prince  concludes, 
shows  how  strongly  the  writer  felt  upon  this 
subject. 

The  Prince  traces  the  progress  of  an  ambi 
tious  man,  the  Discourses  the  progress  of  an 
ambitious  people.  The  same  principles  on 
which  in  the  former  work  the  elevation  of  an 
individual  are  explained,  are  applied  in  the 
latter  to  the  longer  duration  and  more  complex 
interests  of  society.  To  a  modern  statesman 
the  form  of  the  Discourses  may  appear  to  be 
puerile.  In.  truth,  Livy  is  not  a  historian  on 
whom  much  reliance  can  be  placed,  even  in 
cases  where  he  must  have  possessed  consider 
able  means  of  information.  And  his  first  De 
cade,  to  which  Machiavelli  has  confined  him 
self,  is  scarcely  entitled  to  more  credit  than 
our  chronicle  of  British  kings  who  reigned  be 
fore  the  Roman  invasion.  But  his  commenta 
tor  is  indebted  to  him  for  little  more  than  a 
few  texts,  which  he  might  as  easily  have  ex 
tracted  from  the  Vulgate  or  the  "Decameron. 
The  whole  train  of  thought  is  original. 

On  the  peculiar  immorality  which  has  ren 
dered  the  Prince  unpopular,  and  which  is  al 
most  equally  discernible  in  the  Discourses,  we 
have  already  given  our  opinion  at  length.  We 
have  attempted  to  show  that  it  belonged  rather 
to  the  age  than  to  the  man  ;  that  it  was  a  par 
tial  taint,  and  by  no  means  implied  general 
depravity.  We  cannot,  however,  deny  that  it 
is  a  great  blemish,  and  that  it  considerably 
diminishes  the  pleasure  which,  in  other  re 
spects,  those  works  must  afford  to  every  in 
telligent  mind. 

It  is,  indeed,  impossible  to  conceive  a  more 
healthful  and  vigorous  constitution  of  the  un 
derstanding  than  that  which  these  works  indi 
cate.  The  qualities  of  the  active  and  the  con 
templative  statesman  appear  to  have  been 
blended,  in  the  mind  of  the  writer,  into  a  ran 
and  exquisite  harmony.  His  skill  in  the  de 
taiis  of  business  had  not  been  acquired  at  the 
expense  of  his  general  powers.  It  had  no 
rendered  his  mind  less  comprehensive,  but  i 
had  served  to  correct  his  speculations,  and  to 


impart  to  them  that  vivid  and  practical  cha 
racter  which  so  widely  distinguishes  them  from 
the  vague  theories  of  most  political  philoso 
phers. 

Every  man  who  has  seen  the  world  knows 

that  nothing  is  so  useless  as  a  general  maxim. 

If  it  be  very  moral  and  very  true,  it  may  serve 

for  a  copy  to  a  charity-boy.    If,  like  those  of 

Rochefoucauld,  it  be  sparkling  and  whimsi- 

al,  it  may  make  an  excellent  motto  for  an. 

ssay.      But   few,  indeed,  of  the   many  wise 

apophthegms  which  have  been  uttered,  from 

he  time  of  the  Seven  Sages  of  Greece  to  thai! 

of  Poor  Richard,  have  prevented  a  single  fool 

sh  action.     We  give  the  highest  and  the  most 

peculiar  praise  to  the  precepts  of  Machiavelli, 

when  we  say  that  they  may  frequently  be  of 

real  use  in  regulating  the  conduct,  not  so  much 

jecause  they  are  more  just  or  more  profound 

han  those  which  might  be  culled  from  other 

authors,  as  because  they  can  be  more  readily 

applied  to  the  problems  of  real  life. 

There  are  errors  in  these  works.  But  they 
are  errors  which  a  writer  situated  like  Machia 
velli  could  scarcely  avoid.  They  arise,  for  the 
most  part,  from  a  single  defect  which  appears 
:o  us  to  pervade  his  whole  system.  In  his  po 
litical  scheme  the  means  had  been  more  deep 
ly  considered  than  the  ends.  The  great  prin 
ciple,  that  societies  and  laws  exist  only  for  the 
purpose  of  increasing  the  sum  of  private  hap 
piness,  is  not  recognised  with  sufficient  clear 
ness.  The  good  of  the  body,  distinct  from  the 
good  of  the  members,  and  sometimes  hardly 
compatible  with  it,  seems  to  be  the  object 
which  he  proposes  to  himself.  Of  all  politi 
cal  fallacies,  this  has  had  the  widest  and  the 
most  mischievous  operation.  The  state  of  so 
ciety  in  the  little  commonwealths  of  Greece, 
the  close  connection  and  mutual  dependence 
of  the  citizens,  and  the  severity  of  the  laws  of 
war,  tended  to  encourage  an  opinion  which, 
under  such  circumstances,  could  hardly  be 
called  erroneous.  The  interests  of  every  in 
dividual  were  inseparably  bound  up  with  those 
of  the  state.  An  invasion  destroyed  his  corn 
fields  and  vineyards,  drove  him  from  his  home, 
and  compelled  him  to  encounter  all  the  hard 
ships  of  a  military  life.  A  peace  restored  him 
to  security  and  comfort.  A  victory  doubled 
the  number  of  his  slaves.  A  defeat  perhaps 
made  him  a  slave  himself.  When  Pericles,  in 
the  Peloponnesian  war,  told  the  Athenians  that 
if  their  country  triumphed  their  private  losses 
would  speedily  be  repaired,  but  that  if  their 
arms  failed  of  success,  every  individual 
amongst  them  would  probably  be  ruined,*  h«s 
spoke  no  more  than  the  truth.  He  spoke  to 
men  whom  the  tribute  of  vanquished  cities 
supplied  with  food  and  clothing,  with  the  luxu 
ry  of  the  bath  and  the  amusements  of  the 
theatre,  on  whom  the  greatness  of  their  coun 
try  conferred  rank,  and  before  whom  the  mem 
bers  of  less  prosperous  communities  trembled ; 
and  to  men  who,  in  case  of  a  change  in  the 
public  fortunes,  would  at  least  be  deprived  of 
every  comfort  and  every  distinction  which  they 
enjoyed.  To  be  butchered  on  the  smoking 
ruins  of  their  city,  to  be  dragged  in  chains  to 

*  Thucydides,  ii.  62 


MACHIAVELLI. 


33 


a  slave-market,  to  see  one  child  torn  from  them 
to  dig  in  the  quarries  of  Sicily,  and  another  to 
guard  the  harems  of  Persepolis ;  those  were 
the  frequent  and  probable  consequences  of  na 
tional  calamities.  Hence,  among  the  Greeks, 
patriotism  became  a  governing  principle,  or 
rather  an  ungovernable  passion.  Both  their 
legislators  and  their  philosophers  took  it  for 
granted  that,  in  providing  for  the  strength  and 
greatness  of  the  state,  they  sufficiently  provid 
ed  for  the  happiness  of  the  people.  The  writ 
ers  of  the  Roman  empire  lived  under  despots 
into  whose  dominion  a  hundred  nations  were 
melted  down,  and  whose  gardens  would  have 
covered  the  little  commonwealths  of  Phlius 
and  Plataea.  Yet  they  continued  to  employ  the 
same  language,  and  to  cant  about  the  duty  of 
sacrificing  every  thing  to  a  country  to  which 
they  owed  nothing. 

Causes  similar  to  those  which  had  influ 
enced  the  disposition  of  the  Greeks,  operated 
powerfully  on  the  less  vigorous  and  daring 
character  of  the  Italians.  They,  too,  were 
members  of  small  communities.  Every  man 
was  deeply  interested  in  the  welfare  of  the  so 
ciety  to  which  he  belonged — a  partaker  in  its 
wealth  and  its  poverty,  in  its  glory  and  its 
shame.  In  the  age  of  Machiavelli  this  was  pe 
culiarly  the  case.  Public  events  had  produced 
an  immense  sum  of  money  to  private  citizens. 
The  northern  invaders  had  brought  want  to 
their  boards,  infamy  to  their  beds,  fire  to  their 
roofs,  and  the  knife  to  their  throats.  It  was 
natural  that  a  man  who  lived  in  times  like 
the36  should  overrate  the  importance  of  those 
measures  by  which  a  nation  is  rendered  formi 
dable  to  its  neighbours,  and  undervalue  those 
which  make  it  prosperous  within  itself. 

Nothing  is  more  remarkable  in  the  political 
treatises  of  Machiavelli  than  the  fairness  of 
mind  which  they  indicate.  It  appears  where 
the  author  is  in  the  wrong  almost  as  strongly 
as  where  he  is  in  the  right.  He  never  ad 
vances  a  false  opinion  because  it  is  new  or 
splendid,  because  he  can  clothe  it  in  a  happy 
phrase  or  defend  it  by  an  ingenious  sophism. 
His  errors  are  at  once  explained  by  a  reference 
to  the  circumstances  in  which  he  was  placed. 
They  evidently  were  not  sought  out ;  they  lay 
in  his  way  and  could  scarcely  be  avoided. 
Such  mistakes  must  necessarily  be  committed 
by  early  speculators  in  every  science. 

In  this  respect  it  is  amusing  to  compare  the 
Prince  and  the  Discourses  with  the  Spirit  of 
Laws.  Montesquieu  enjoys,  perhaps,  a  wider 
celebrity  than  any  political  writer  of  modern 
Europe.  Something  he  doubtless  owes  to  his 
merit,  but  much  more  to  his  fortune.  He  had 
the  good  luck  of  a  valentine.  He  caught  the 
eye  of  the  French  nation  at  the  moment  when 
it  was  waking  from  the  long  sleep  of  political 
and  religious  bigotry,  and  in  consequence  he 
became  a  favourite.  The  English  at  that  time 
considered  a  Frenchman  who  talked  about 
constitutional  checks  and  fundamental  laws, 
as  a  prodigy  not  less  astonishing  than  the 
learned  pig  or  the  musical  infant.  Specious 
but  shallow,  studious  of  effect,  indifferent  to 
truth,  eager  to  build  a  system,  but  careless  of 
collecting  those  materials  out  of  which  alone 
a  sound  and  durable  system  can  be  built,  he 

VOL.  I.— 5 


I  constructed  theories  as  rapidly  aid  as  sbghtly 
1  as  card-houses — no  sooner  projected  than  com 
pleted — no  sooner  completed  than  blown  away 
— no  sooner  blown  away  than  forgotten.  Ma 
chiavelli  errs  only  because  his  experience,  ac 
quired  in  a  very  peculiar  state  of  society,  could 
not  always  enable  him  to  calculate  the  effect 
of  institutions  differing  from  those  of  which  he 
had  observed  the  operation.  Montesquieu  errs 
because  he  has  a  fine  thing  to  say  and  is  re 
solved  to  say  it.  If  the  phenomena  which  lie 
before  him  will  not  suit  his  purpose,  all  history 
must  be  ransacked.  If  nothing  established  by 
authentic  testimony  can  be  raked  or  chipped 
to  suit  his  Procrustean  hypothesis,  he  puts  up 
with  some  monstrous  fable  about  Siam,  or 
Bantam,  or  Japan,  told  by  writers  compared 
with  whom  Lucian  and  Gulliver  were  vera 
cious — liars  by  a  double  right,  as  travellers 
and  as  Jesuits. 

Propriety  of  thought  and  propriety  of  diction 
are  commonly  found  together.  Obscurity  and 
affectation  are  the  two  greatest  faults  of  style. 
Obscurity  of  expression  generally  spring:,  from 
confusion  of  ideas  ;  and  the  same  wish  to  daz 
zle,  at  any  cost,  which  produces  affectation  in 
the  manner  of  a  writer,  is  likely  to  produce 
sophistry  in  his  reasonings.  The  judicious 
and  candid  mind  of  Machiavelli  shows  itself 
in  his  luminous,  manly,  and  polished  language. 
The  style  of  Montesquieu,  on  the  other  hand, 
indicates  in  every  page  a  lively  and  ingenious, 
but  an  unsound  mind.  Every  trick  of  expres 
sion,  from  the  mysterious  conciseness  of  an 
oracle  to  the  flippancy  of  a  Parisian  coxcomb, 
is  employed  to  disguise  the  fallacj  of  some 
positions,  and  the  triteness  of  others.  Absurdi 
ties  are  brightened  into  epigrams  ;  truisms  are 
darkened  into  enigmas.  It  is  with  difficulty 
that  the  strongest  eye  can  sustain  the  glare 
with  which  some  parts  are  illuminated,  or 
penetrate  the  shade  in  which  others  are  con 
cealed. 

The  political  works  of  Machiavelli  derive  & 
peculiar  interest  from  the  mournful  earnestness 
which  he  manifests,  whenever  he  touches  oa 
topics  connected  with  the  calamities  of  his  na 
tive  land.  It  is  difficult  to  conceive  any  situa 
tion  more  painful  than  that  of  a  great  man,  con 
demned  to  watch  the  lingering  agony  of  an  ex 
hausted  country,  to  tend  it  during  the  alternate 
fits  of  stupefaction  and  raving  which  precede 
its  dissolution,  to  see  the  symptoms  of  vitality 
dissappear  one  by  one,  till  nothing  is  left  but 
coldness,  darkness,  and  corruption.  To  this 
joyless  and  thankless  duty  was  Machiavelli 
called.  In  the  energetic  language  of  the  pro 
phet,  he  was  "  mad  for  the  sight  of  his  eyes 
which  he  saw,"—  disunion  in  the  council,  effe 
minacy  in  the  camp,  liberty  extinguished,  com 
merce  decaying,  national  honour  sullied,  an 
enlightened  and  flourishing  people  given  ever 
to  the  ferocity  of  ignorant  savages.  Though 
his  opinions  had  not  escaped  the  contagion  of 
that  political  immorality  which  was  comm  ui 
among  his  countrymen,  his  natural  disposition 
seems  to  have  been  rather  stern  and  impetu 
ous  than  pliant  and  artful.  When  the  misery 
and  degradation  of  Florence,  and  the  foul  out 
rage  which  he  had  himself  sustained  roused 
his  mind,  the  smooth  craft  of  his  profession  an** 


34 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


his  nation  is  exchanged  for  the  honest  bitter 
ness  of  scorn  and  anger.  He  speaks  like  one 
sick  of  the  calamitous  times  and  abject  people 
among  whom  his  lot  is  cast.  He  pines  for  the 
strength  and  glory  of  ancient  Rome,  for  the 
fasces  of  Brutus  and  the  sword  of  Scipio,  the 
gravity  of  the  curule  chair,  and  the  bloody  pomp 
of  the  triumphal  sacrifice.  He  seems  to  be 
transported  back  to  the  days,  when  eight  hun 
dred  thousand  Italian  warriors  sprung  to  arms 
at  the  rumour  of  a  Gallic  invasion.  He  breathes 
all  the  spirit  of  those  intrepid  and  haughty  pa 
tricians,  who  forgot  the  dearest  ties  of  nature 
in  the  claims  of  public  duty,  who  looked  with 
disdain  on  the  elephants  and  on  the  gold  of 
Pyrrhus,  and  listened  with  unaltered  compo 
sure  to  the  tremendous  tidings  of  Cannae.  Like 
an  ancient  temple  deformed  by  the  barbarous 
architecture  of  a  later  age,  his  character  ac 
quires  an  interest  from  the  very  circumstances 
which  debase  it.  The  original  proportions  are 
rendered  more  striking,  by  the  contrast  which 
they  present  to  the  mean  and  incongruous  addi 
tions. 

The  influence  of  the  sentiments  which  we 
have  described  was  not  apparent  in  his  writ 
ings  alone.  His  enthusiasm,  barred  from  the 
career  which  it  would  have  selected  for  itself, 
seems  to  have  found  a  vent  in  desperate  levity. 
He  enjoyed  a  vindictive  pleasure  in  outraging 
the  opinions  of  a  society  which  he  despised. 
He  became  careless  of  those  decencies  which 
were  expected  from  a  man  so  highly  distin 
guished  in  the  literary  and  political  world.  The 
sarcastic  bitterness  of  his  conversation  disgust 
ed  those  who  were  more  inclined  to  accuse  his 
licentiousness  than  their  own  degeneracy,  and 
who  were  unable  to  conceive  the  strength  of 
those  emotions  which  are  concealed  by  the 
jests  of  the  wretched,  and  by  the  follies  of  the 
wise. 

The  historical  works  of  Machiavelli  still  re 
main  to  be  considered.  The  life  of  Castruccio 
Castracani  will  occupy  us  for  a  very  short 
time,  and  would  scarcely  have  demanded  our 
notice,  had  it  not  attracted  a  much  greater 
share  of  public  attention  than  it  deserves.  Few 
books,  indeed,  could  be  more  interesting  than 
a  careful  and  judicious  account,  from  such  a 
pen,  of  the  illustrious  Prince  of  Lucca,  the  most 
eminent  of  those  Italian  chiefs,  who,  like  Pisis- 
tratus  and  Gelon,  acquired  a  power  felt  rather 
than  seen,  and  resting,  not  on  law  or  on  pre 
scription,  but  on  the  public  favour  and  on  their 
great  personal  qualities.  Such  a  work  would 
exhibit  to  us  the  real  nature  of  that  species  of 
sovereignty,  so  singular  and  so  often  misunder 
stood,  which  the  Greeks  denominated  tyranny, 
and  which  modified  in  some  degree  by  the  feu 
dal  system,  re-appeared  in  the  commonwealths 
of  Lombard1'  and  Tuscany*.  But  this  little 
composition  ol  Machiavelli  is  in  no  sense  a 
history.  It  has  no  pretensions  to  fidelity.  It  is 
a  trifle,  and  not  a  very  successful  trifle.  It  is 
scarcely  more  authentic  than  the  novel  of  Bel- 
phegor,  and  is  very  much  duller. 

The  last  great  work  of  this  illustrious  man 
was  the  history  of  his  native  city.  It  was  writ 
ten  by  the  command  of  the  Pope,  who,  as  chief 
of  the  house  of  Medici,  was  at  that  time  sove 
reign  of  Florence.  The  characters  of  Cosmo, 


of  Piero,  and  of  Lorenzo,  are,  however,  treatet. 
with  a  freedom  and  impartiality  equally  honour 
able  to  the  writer  and  to  the  patron.  The  mise 
ries  and  humiliations  of  dependence,  the  bread 
which  is  more  bitter  than  every  other  food,  the 
stairs  which  are  more  painful  than  every  other 
assent,*  had  not  broken  the  spirit  of  Machi 
avelli.  The  most  corrupting  post  in  a  corrupt 
ing  profession  had  not  depraved  the  generous 
heart  of  Clement. 

The  history  does  not  appear  to  be  the  fruii 
of  much  industry  or  research.  It  is  unques 
tionably  inaccurate.  But  it  is  elegant,  lively, 
and  picturesque,  beyond  any  other  in  the  Ita 
lian  language.  The'reader,  we  believe,  carries 
away  from  it  a  more  vivid  and  a  more  faithful 
impression  of  the  national  character  and  man 
ners,  than  from  more  correct  accounts.  The 
truth  is,  that  the  book  belongs  rather  to  ancient 
than  to  modern  literature.  It  is  in  the  style, 
not  of  Davila  and  Clarendon,  but  of  Herodotus 
and  Tacitus;  and  the  classical  histories  may 
almost  be  called  romances  founded  in  fact. 
The  relation  is,  no  doubt,  in  all  its  principal 
points,  strictly  true.  But  the  numerous  little 
incidents  which  heighten  the  interest,  the  words, 
the  gestures,  the  looks,  are  evidently  furnish 
ed  by  the  imagination  of  the  author.  The  fash 
ion  of  later  times  is  different.  A  more  exact 
narrative  is  given  by  the  writer.  It  may  be 
doubted  whether  more  exact  notions  are  con 
veyed  to  the  reader.  The  best  portraits  are 
those  in  which  there  is  a  slight  mixture  of  cari 
cature  ;  and  we  are  not  aware,  that  the  best 
histories  are  not  those  in  which  a  little  of  the 
exaggeration  of  fictitious  narrative  is  judicious 
ly  employed.  Something  is  lost  in  accuracy ; 
but  much  is  gained  in  effect.  The  fainter  lines 
are  neglected ;  but  the  great  characteristic 
features  are  imprinted  on  the  mind  forever. 

The  history  terminates  with  the  death  of  Lo 
renzo  de  Medici.  Machiavelli  had,  it  seems, 
intended  to  continue  it  to  a  later  period.  But 
his  death  prevented  the  execution  of  his  de 
sign;  and  the  melancholy  task  of  recording 
the  desolation  and  shame  of  Italy  devolved  on 
Guicciardini. 

Machiavelli  lived  long  enough  to  see  the  com 
mencement  of  the  last  struggle  for  Florentine 
liberty.  Soon  after  his  death,  monarchy  was 
finally  established — not  such  a  monarchy  as 
that  of  which  Cosmo  had  laid  the  foundations 
deep  in  the  constitution  and  feelings  of  his 
countrymen,  and  which  Lorenzo  had  embel 
lished  with  the  trophies  of  every  science  and 
every  art;  but  a  loathsome  tyranny,  proud 
and  mean,  cruel  and  feeble,  bigoteJ  and  lasci 
vious.  The  character  of  Machiavelli  was  hate 
ful  to  the  new  masters  of  Italy ;  and  those  parts 
of  his  theory,  which  were  in  strict  accordance 
with  their  own  daily  practice,  afforded  a  pre 
text  for  blackening  his  memory.  His  works 
were  misrepresented  by  the  learned,  miscon 
strued  by  the  ignorant,  censured  by  the 
church,  abused,  with  all  the  rancour  of  simu 
lated  virtue,  by  the  minions  of  a  base  despot 
ism,  and  the  priests  of  a  baser  superstition. 
The  name  of  the  man  whose  genius  had  illu 
minated  all  the  dark  places  of  policy,  and  to 


*  Dante  Paradise  0'anto  xvii 


BRYDEN. 


35 


whose  patriotic,  wisdom  an  oppressed  people 
had  owed  their  last  chance  of  emancipation 
and  revenge,  passed  into  a  proverb  of  in 
famy 

For  more  than  two  hundred  years  his  bones 
lay  undistinguished.  At  length,  an  English 
nobleman  paid  the  last  honours  to  the  greatest 
statesman  of  Florence.  In  the  Church  of 
Santa  Croce,  a  monument  was  erected  to  his 
memory,  which  is  contemplated  with  reve 
rence  by  all  who  can  distinguish  the  virtues 


of  a  great  mind  through  the  corruptions  of  a 
degenerate  age ;  and  which  will  be  approached 
Mrith  still  deeper  homage,  when  the  object  to 
which  his  public  life  was  devoted  shall  be 
attained,  when  the  foreign  yoke  shall  be  bro 
ken,  when  a  second  Proccita  shall  avenge  the 
wrongs  of  Naples,  when  a  happier  Rienzi  shall 
restore  the  good  estate  of  Rome,  when  the 
streets  of  Florence  and  Bologna  shall  again 
resound  with  their  ancient-war  cry — Popolo  ; 
popolo  ;  muoiano  i  tiranni  ! 


DRYDEN.* 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1828.] 


THE  public  voice  has  assigned  to  Dryden 
the  first  place  in  the  second  rank  of  our  poets 
— no  mean  station  in  a  table  of  intellectual 
precedency  so  rich  in  illustrious  names.  It  is 
allowed  that,  even  of  the  few  who  were  his 
superiors  in  genius,  none  has  exercised  a 
more  extensive  or  permanent  influence  on  the 
national  habits  of  thought  and  expression. 
His  life  was  commensurate  with  the  period 
during  which  a  great  revolution  in  the  public 
taste  was  effected ;  and  in  that  revolution  he 
played  the  part  of  Cromwell.  By  unscrupu 
lously  taking  the  lead  in  its  wildest  excesses, 
he  obtained  the  absolute  guidance  of  it.  By 
trampling  on  laws,  he  acquired  the  authority 
of  a  legislator.  By  signalizing  himself  as  the 
most  daring  and  irreverent  of  rebels,  he  raised 
himself  to  the  dignity  of  a  recognised  prince. 
He  commenced  his  career  by  the  most  frantic 
outrages.  He  terminated  it  in  the  repose  of 
established  sovereignty — the  author  of  a  new 
code,  the  root  of  a  new  dynasty. 

Of  Dryden,  however,  as  of  almost  every 
man  who  has  been  distinguished  either  in  the 
literary  or  in  the  political  world,  it  may  be 
said  that  the  course  which  he  pursued,  and  the 
effect  which  he  produced,  depended  less  on  his 
personal  qualities  than  on  the  circumstances 
in  which  he  was  placed.  Those  who  have 
read  history  with  discrimination  know  the  fal 
lacy  of  those  panegyrics  and  invectives,  which 
represent  individuals  as  effecting  great  moral 
and  intellectual  revolutions,  subverting  esta 
blished  systems,  and  imprinting  a  new  cha 
racter  on  their  age.  The  difference  between 
one  man  and  another  is  by  no  means  so  great 
as  the  superstitious  crowd  supposes.  But  the 
same  feelings  which,  in  ancient  Rome,  pro 
duced  the  apotheosis  of  a  popular  emperor, 
and,  in  modern  Rome,  the  canonization  of  a 
devout  prelate,  lead  men  to  cherish  an  illusion 
which  furnishes  them  with  something  to  adore. 
By  a  law  of  association,  from  the  operation  of 
which  even  minds  the  most  strictly  regulated 
by  reason  are  not  wholly  exempt,  misery  dis 
poses  us  to  hatred,  and  happiness  to  love,  al- 


*  The  Paetical  Works  of  JOHN  DRYDEN.    In  two  vo-  i 
lumea.     University  Edition,    London,  1826. 


though  there  may  be  no  person  to  whom  our 
misery  or  our  happiness  can  be  ascribed. 
The  peevishness  of  an  invalid  vents  itself 
even  on  those  who  alleviate  his  pain.  The 
good-humour  of  a  man  elated  by  success  often 
displays  itself  towards  enemies.  In  the  same 
manner,  the  feelings  of  pleasure  and  admira 
tion,  to  which  the  contemplation  of  great  events 
gives  birth,  make  an  object  where  they  do  not 
find  it.  Thus,  nations  descend  to  the  absurdi 
ties  of  Egyptian  idolatry,  and  worship  stocks 
and  reptiles  —  Sacheverells  and  Wilkeses. 
They  even  fall  prostrate  before  a  deity  to 
which  they  have  themselves  given  the  form 
which  commands  their  veneration,  and  which, 
unless  fashioned  by  them,  would  have  remained 
a  shapeless  block.  They  persuade  themselves 
that  they  are  the  creatures  of  what  they  hav« 
themselves  created.  For,  in  fact,  it  is  the  age 
that  forms  the  man,  not  the  man  that  forms 
the  age.  Great  minds  do  indeed  react  on  the 
society  which  has  made  them  what  they  are ; 
but  they  only  pay  with  interest  what  they  have 
received.  We  extol  Bacon,  and  sneer  at  Aqui 
nas.  But  if  their  situations  had  been  changed, 
Bacon  might  have  been  the  Angelical  Doctor, 
the  most  subtle  Aristotelian  of  the  schools; 
the  Dominican  might  have  led  forth  the  sci 
ences  from  their  house  of  bondage.  If  Luther 
had  been  born  in  the  tenth  century,  he  wauld 
have  effected  no  reformation.  If  he  had  never 
been  born  at  all,  it  is  evident  that  the  sixteenth 
century  could  not  have  elapsed  without  a  great 
schism  in  the  church.  Voltaire,  in  the  days 
of  Lewis  the  Fourteenth,  would  probably  have 
been,  like  most  of  the  literary  men  of  that 
time,  a  zealous  Jansenist,  eminent  among  th« 
defenders  of  efficacious  grace,  a  bitter  assail 
ant  of  the  lax  morality  of  the  Jesuits  and  the 
unreasonable  decisions  of  the  Sorbonne.  If 
Pascal  had  entered  on  his  literary  career, 
when  intelligence  was  more  general,  and 
abuses  at  the  same  time  more  flagrant,  when 
the  church  was  polluted  by  the  Iscariot  Dubois, 
the  court  disgraced  by  the  orgies  of  Canillac, 
and  the  nation  sacrificed  to  the  juggles  of 
Law ;  if  he  had  lived  to  see  a  dynasty  of  har 
lots,  an  empty  treasury  and  a  crowded  harem, 
an  army  formidable  only  to  those  wnum  it 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


should  have  protected,  a  priesthood  just  reli 
gious  enough  to  be  intolerant,  he  might  possi 
bly,  like  every  man  of  genius  in  France,  have 
imbibed  extravagant  prejudices  against  mo 
narchy  and  Christianity.  The  wit  which 
blasted  the  sophisms  of  Escobar,  the  impas 
sioned  eloquence  which  defended  the  sisters 
of  Port  Royal,  the  intellectual  hardihood  which 
was  not  beaten  down  even  by  Papal  autho 
rity,  might  have  raised  him  to  the  Patriarchate 
of  the  Philosophical  Church.  It  was  long  dis 
puted  whether  the  honour  of  inventing  the 
method  of  Fluxions  belonged  to  Newton  or  to 
Leibnitz.  It  is  now  generally  allowed  that 
these  great  men  made  the  same  discovery  at 
the  same  time.  Mathematical  science,  indeed, 
had  then  reached  such  a  point,  that  if  neither 
of  them  had  ever  existed,  the  principle  must 
inevitably  have  occurred  to  some  person  within 
a  few  years.  So  in  our  own  time  the  doctrine 
of  rent  now  universally  received  by  political 
economists,  was  propounded  almost  at  the 
same  moment,  by  two  writers  unconnected 
with  each  other.  Preceding  speculators  had 
long  been  blundering  round  about  it;  and  it 
could  not  possibly  have  been  missed  much 
longer  by  the  most  heedless  inquirer.  We 
are  inclined  to  think  that,  with  respect  to  every 
great  addition  which  has  been  made  to  the 
stock  of  human  knowledge,  the  case  has  been 
similar;  that  without  Copernicus  we  should 
have  been  Copernicans,  that  without  Colum 
bus  America  would  have  been  discovered, 
that  without  Locke  we  should  have  possessed 
a  just  theory  of  the  origin  of  human  ideas. 
Society  indeed  has  its  great  men  and  its 
little  men,  as  the  earth  has  its  mountains 
and  its  valleys.  But  the  inequalities  of  in 
tellect,  like  the  inequalities  of  the  surface 
of  our  globe,  bear  so  small  a  proportion  to 
the  mass,  that,  in  calculating  its  great  revo 
lutions,  they  may  safely  be  neglected.  The 
tun  illuminates  the  hills,  while  it  is  still  below 
the  horizon ;  and  truth  is  discovered  by  the 
highest  minds  a  little  before  it  becomes  mani 
fest  to  the  multitude.  This  is  the  extent  of 
their  superiority.  They  are  the  first  to  catch 
and  reflect  a  light,  which,  without  their  assist 
ance,  must,  in  a  short  time,  be  visible  to  those 
who  lie  far  beneath  them. 

The  same  remark  will  apply  equally  to  the 
i ne  arts.  The  laws  on  which  depend  the  pro 
gress  and  decline  of  poetry,  painting,  and 
sculpture,  operate  with  little  less  certainty  than 
those  which  regulate  the  periodical  returns  of 
heat  and  cold,  of  fertility  and  barrenness. 
Those  who  seem  to  lead  the  public  taste,  are, 
in  general,  merely  outrunning  it  in  the  direc 
tion  which  it  is  spontaneously  pursuing.  With 
out  a  just  apprehension  of  the  laws  to  which 
we  have  alluded,  the  merits  and  defects  of 
Dryden  can  be  but  imperfectly  understood. 
We  will,  therefore,  state  what  we  conceive 
them  to  be 

The  ages  in  which  the  masterpieces  of  ima 
gination  have  been  produced,  have  by  no 
means  been  those  in  which  taste  has  been 
most  correct.  It  seems  that  the  creative  fa 
culty  and  the  critical  faculty  cannot  exist  toge 
ther  in  their  highest  perfection.  The  causes 
of  this  phenomenon  it  is  not  difficult  to  assign. 


It  is  true  that  the  man  -w  ho  is  best  able  tt 
take  a  machine  to  pieces,  and  who  most  clear 
ly  comprehends  the  manner  in  which  all  its 
wheels  and  springs  conduce  to  its  general  ef 
fect,  will  be  the  man  most  competent  to  form 
another  machine  of  similar  power.  In  all  the 
branches  of  physical  and  moral  science  which 
admit  of  perfect  analysis,  he  who  can  resolve 
will  be  able  to  combine.  But  the  analysis 
which  criticism  can  effect  of  poetry  is  neces 
sarily  imperfect.  One  element  must  forever 
elude  its  researches ;  and  that  is  the  very  ele 
ment  by  which  poetry  is  poetry.  In  the  de 
scription  of  nature,  for  example,  a  judicious 
reader  will  easily  detect  an  incongruous  im 
age.  But  he  will  find  it  impossible  to  explain 
in  what  consists  the  art  of  a  writer  who,  in  a 
few  words,  brings  some  spot  before  him  so 
vividly  that  he  shall  know  it  as  if  he  had  lived 
there  from  childhood ;  while  another,  employ 
ing  the  same  materials,  the  same  verdure,  the 
same  water,  and  the  same  flowers,  committing 
no  inaccuracy,  introducing  nothing  which  can 
be  positively  pronounced  superfluous,  omitting 
nothing  which  can  be  positively  pronounced 
necessary,  shall  produce  no  more  effect  than 
an  advertisement  of  a  capital  residence  and  a 
desirable  pleasure-ground.  To  take  another 
example,  the  great  features  of  the  character  of 
Hotspur  are  obvious  to  the  most  superficial 
reader.  We  at  once  perceive  that  his  courage 
is  splendid,  his  thirst  of  glory  intense,  his  ani 
mal  spirits  high,  his  temper  careless,  arbitrary, 
and  petulant ;  that  he  indulges  his  own  humour 
without  caring  whose  feelings  he  may  wound- 
or  whose  enmity  he  may  provoke,  by  his  levi 
ty.  Thus  far  criticism  will  go.  But  soem- 
thing  is  still  wanting.  A  man  might  have  all 
those  qualities,  and  every  other  quality  which 
the  most  minute  examiner  can  introduce  into 
his  catalogue  of  the  virtues  and  faults  of  Hot 
spur,  and  yet  he  would  not  be  Bocspur.  Al 
most  every  thing  that  we  have  said  of  him  ap 
plies  equally  to  Falconbridge.  Yet  in  the 
mouth  of  Falconbridge,  moA  of  his  speeches 
would  seem  out  of  place.  Li  real  life,  this  per 
petually  occurs.  We  art.  sensible  of  wide  dif 
ferences  between  men  whom,  if  we  are  required 
to  describe  them,  we  should  describe  in  almost 
the  same  terms.  If  we  vcre  attempting  to  draw 
elaborate  characters  of  vhem,  we  should  scarce 
ly  be  able  to  point  out  an  y  strong  distinction ;  yet 
we  approach  them  with  feelings  altogether  dis 
similar.  We  cannot  conceive  of  them  as  using 
the  expressions  or  gestures  of  each  other.  Let 
us  suppose  that  a  zoologist  should  attempt  to 
give  an  account  of  some  animal,  a  porcupine 
for  instance,  to  people  who  had  never  seen  it. 
The  porcupine,  he  might  say,  is  of  the  genus 
mammalia,  and  the  order  gliris.  There  are 
whiskers  on  its  face  ;  it  is  two  feet  long ;  it 
has  four  toes  before,  five  behind,  two  foreteeth, 
and  eight  grinders.  Its  body  is  covered  with 
hair  and  quills.  And  when  all  this  had  been 
said,  would  any  one  of  the  auditors  have 
formed  a  just  idea  of  a  porcupine?  Would 
any  two  of  them  have  formed  the  same  idea  * 
There  might  exist  innumerable  races  of  ani 
mals,  possessing  all  the  characteristics  which 
have  been  mentioned,  yet  altogether  unlike  to 
each  other.  What  the  description  of  our  nam- 


DRYDEN. 


37 


ralist  is  to  a  real  porcupine,  the  remarks  of 
criticism  are  to  the  images  of  poetry.  What 
it  so  imperfectly  decomposes,  it  cannot  per 
fectly  reconstruct.  It  is  evidently  as  impossi 
ble  to  produce  an  Othello  or  a  Macbeth  by  re 
versing;  an  analytical  process  so  defective  as 
it  would  be  for  an  anatomist  to  form  a  living 
man  out  of  the  fragments  of  his  dissecting 
room.  In  both  cases,  the  vital  principle  eludes 
the  finest  instruments,  and  vanishes  in  the 
very  instant  in  which  its  seat  is  touched. 
Hence  those  who,  trusting  to  their  critical 
skill,  attempt  to  write  poems,  give  us  not  im 
ages  of  things,  but  catalogues  of  qualities. 
Their  characters  are  allegories  ;  not  good  men 
and  bad  men,  but  cardinal  virtues  and  deadly 
sins.  We  seem  to  have  fallen  among  the  ac 
quaintances  of  our  old  friend  Christian :  some 
times  we  meet  Mistrust  and  Timorous  :  some 
times  Mr.  Hate-good  and  Mr.  Love-lust;  and 
then  again  Prudence,  Piety,  and  Charity. 

That  critical  discernment  is  not  sufficient  to 
make  men  poets  is  generally  allowed.  Why 
it  should  keep  them  from  becoming  poets,  is 
not  perhaps  equally  evident.  But  the  fact  is, 
that  poetry  requires  not  an  examining,  but  a 
believing  frame  of  mind.  Those  feel  it  most, 
and  write  it  best,  who  forget  that  it  is  a  work 
of  art ;  to  whom  its  imitations,  like  the  reali 
ties  from  which  they  arc  taken,  are  subjects 
not  for  connoisseurship,  but  for  tears  and 
laughter,  resentment  and  affection,  who  are  too 
much  under  the  influence  of  the  illusion  to  ad 
mire  the  genius  which  has  produced  it ;  who 
are  too  much  frightened  for  Ulysses  in  the 
cave  of  Polyphemus,  to  care  whether  the  pun 
about  Outis  be  good  or  bad ;  who  forget  that 
such  a  person  as  Shakspeare  ever  existed, 
while  they  weep  and  curse  with  Lear.  It  is 
by  giving  faith  to  the  creations  of  the  imagina 
tion  that  a  man  becomes  a  poet.  It  is  by  treat 
ing  those  creations  as  deceptions,  and  by  re 
solving  them,  as  nearly  as  possible,  into  their 
elements,  that  he  becomes  a  critic.  In  the 
moment  in  which  the  skill  of  the  artist  is  per 
ceived,  the  spell  of  the  art  is  broken. 

These  considerations  account  for  the  absurd 
ities  into  which  the  greatest  writers  have  fal 
len,  when  they  have  attempted  to  give  general 
rules  for  composition,  or  to  pronounce  judg 
ment  on  the  works  of  others.  They  are  unac 
customed  to  analyze  what  they  feel ;  they, 
therefore,  perpetually  refer  their  emotions  to 
causes  which  have  not  in  the  slightest  degree 
tended  to  produce  them.  They  feel  pleasure 
m  reading  a  book.  They  never  consider  that 
this  pleasure  may  be  the  effect  of  ideas,  which 
some  unmeaning  expression,  striking  on  the 
first  link  or  a  chain  of  associations,  may  have 
called  up  in  their  own  minds — that  they  have 
themselves  furnished  to  the  author  the  beauties 
which  they  admire. 

Cervantes  is  the  delight  of  all  classes  of 
readers.  Every  schoolboy  thumbs  to  pieces 
the  most  wretched  translations  of  his  romance, 
and  knows  the  lantern  jaws  of  the  Knight- 
errant,  and  the  broad  cheeks  of  the  Squire, 
as  well  as  the  faces  of  his  own  playfellows. 
The  most  experienced  and  fastidious  judges 
are  amazed  at  the  perfection  of  that  art  which 
extracts  inextinguishable  laughter  from  the 


greatest  of  human  calamities,  without  once  vio 
lating  the  reverence  due  to  it ;  at  that  discrimi 
nating  delicacy  of  touch  which  makes  a  charac 
ter  exquisitely  ridiculous  without  impairing  its 
worth,  its  grace,  or  its  dignity.  In  Don  Quixote 
are  several  dissertations  on  the  principles  of 
poetic  and  dramatic  writing.  No  passages  in 
the  whole  work  exhibit  stronger  marks  of  labour 
and  attention ;  and  no  passages  in  any  work 
with  which  we  are  acquainted  are  more  worth 
less  and  puerile.  In  our  time  they  would  scarcely 
obtain  admittance  into  the  literary  department 
of  the  Morning  Post.  Every  reader  of  the  Di 
vine  Comedy  must  be  struck  by  the  veneration 
which  Dante  expresses  for  writers  far  inferior 
to  himself.  He  will  not  lift  up  his  eyes  from 
the  ground  in  the  presence  of  Brunetto,  all 
whose  works  are  not  worth  the  worst  of  his 
own  hundred  cantos.  He  does  not  venture  to 
walk  in  the  same  line  with  the  bombastic  Sta- 
tius.  His  admiration  of  Virgil  is  absolute 
idolatry.  If  indeed  it  had  been  excited  by  the 
elegant,  splendid  and  harmonious  diction  of 
the  Roman  poet,  it  would  not  have  been  alto 
gether  unreasonable ;  but  it  is  rather  as  an  au 
thority  on  all  points  of  philosophy,  than  as  a 
work  of  imagination,  that  he  values  the  ^Eneid. 
The  most  trivial  passages  he  regards  as  ora 
cles  of  the  highest  authority,  and  of  the  most 
recondite  meaning.  He  describes  his  con 
ductor  as  the  sea  of  all  wisdom,  the  sun  which 
heals  every  disordered  sight.  As  he  judged  of 
Virgil,  the  Italians  of  the  fourteenth  century 
judged  of  him  ;  they  were  proud  of  him  ;  they 
praised  him;  they  struck  medals  bearing  his 
head ;  they  quarrelled  for  the  honour  of  pos 
sessing  his  remains  ;  they  maintained  profes 
sors  to  expound  his  writings.  But  what  they 
admired  was  not  that  mighty  imagination 
which  called  a  new  world  into  existence,  and 
made  all  its  sights  and  sounds  familiar  to  the 
eye  and  ear  of  the  mind.  They  said  little  of 
those  awful  and  lovely  creations  on  which  la 
ter  critics  delight  to  dwell — Farinata  lifting 
his  haughty  and  tranquil  brow  from  his  couch 
of  everlasting  fire — the  lion-like  repose  of  Sor- 
dello — or  the  light  which  shone  from  the  celes 
tial  smile  of  Beatrice.  They  extolled  their 
great  poet  for  his  smattering  of  ancient  litera 
ture  and  history ;  for  his  logic  and  his  divinity ; 
for  his  absurd  physics,  and  his  more  absurd 
metaphysics ;  for  every  thing  but  that  in  which 
he  pre-eminently  excelled.  Like  the  fool  in 
the  story,  who  ruined  his  dwelling  by  digging 
for  gold,  which,  as  he  had  dreamed,  was  con 
cealed  under  its  foundations,  they  laid  waste 
one  of  the  noblest  works  of  human  genius,  by 
seeking  in  it  for  buried  treasures  of  wisdom, 
which  existed  only  in  their  own  wild  reveries. 
The  finest  passages  were  little  valued  till  they 
had  been  debased  into  some  monstrous  alle 
gory.  Louder  applause  was  given  to  the  lec 
ture  on  fate  and  free-will,  or  to  the  ridiculous 
astronomical  theories,  than  to  those  tremen 
dous  lines  which  disclose  the  secrets  of  th« 
tower  of  hunger;  or  to  that  half-told  tale  cf 
guilty  love,  so  passionate  and  so  full  of  tears. 
We  do  not  mean  to  say  that  the  contempo 
raries  of  Dante  read,  with  less  emotion  than 
their  descendants,  of  Ugolino  groping  among 
the  wasted  corpses  of  his  children,  or  of  Fran 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


cesca  starting  at  the  tremulous  kiss,  and  drop- 1  "Little  more  worth  remembering  occurred 
ping  the  fatal  volume.  Far  from  it.  We  be-  during  the  play,  at  the  end  of  which  Jones  asked 
iieve  that  they  admired  these  things  less  than  '  him  which  of  the  players  he  liked  best.  To 
ourselves,  but  that  they  felt  them  more.  We  !  this  he  answered,  with  some  appearance  of  in- 
should  perhaps  say,  that  they  felt  them  too  much  dignation  at  the  question,  'the  King,  without 
»«  orir^;^  *K<»™  T-V,*,  «™CT,-OCO  «f  a  «oti^r,  f™™  doubt.' — ' Indeed,  Mr.  Partridge,'  says  Mrs.  Mil- 

Jer,  'you  are  not  of  the  same  opinion  with  the 
town ;  for  they  are  all  agreed  that  Hamlet  is 
acted  by  the  best  player  who  was  ever  on  the 
stage.' — '  He  the  best  player !'  cries  Partridge, 
with  a  contemptuous  sneer;  'why  I  could  acl 
as  well  as  he  myself.  I  am  sure,  if  I  had  seen 
a  ghost,  I  should  have  looked  in  the  very  same 
manner,  and  done  just  as  he  did.  And  then, 
to  be  sure,  in  that  scene,  as  you  called  it,  be 
tween  him  and  his  mother,  where  you  told  me 
he  acted  so  fine,  why,  any  man,  that  is  any 
good  man,  that  had  such  a  mother,  would  have 
done  exactly  the  same.  I  know  you  are  only 
joking  with  me ;  but  indeed,  madam,  though  I 
never  was  at  a  play  in  London,  yet  I  have  seen 
acting  before  in  the  country,  and  the  King  for 
my  money ;  he  speaks  all  his  words  distinctly, 
and  half  as  loud  again  as  the  other.  Anybody 
may  see  he  is  an  actor.' " 

In  this  excellent  passage  Partridge  is  repre 
sented  as  a  very  bad  theatrical  critic.  But 
none  of  those  who  laugh  at  him  possess  the> 
tithe  of  his  sensibility  to  theatrical  excellence. 
He  admires  in  the  wrong  place  ;  but  he  trem. 
bles  in  the  right  place.  It  is  indeed  because  h« 
is  so  much  excited  by  the  acting  of  Garrick, 
that  he  ranks  him  below  the  strutting,  mouth 
ing  performer,  who  personates  the  King.  So, 
we  have  heard  it  said,  that  in  some  parts  of 
Spain  and  Portugal,  an  actor  who  should  re 
present  a  depraved  character  finely,  instead  of 
calling  down  the  applauses  of  the  audience,  is 
hissed  and  pelted  without  mercy.  It  would  be 
the  same  in  England,  if  we,  for  one  moment, 
thought  that  Shylock  or  lago  was  standing  be 
fore  us.  While  the  dramatic  art  was  in  its 
infancy  at  Athens,  it  produced  similar  effects 


to  admire  them.  The  progress  of  a  nation  from 
barbarism  to  civilization  produces  a  change 
similar  to  that  which  takes  place  during  the 
progress  of  an  individual  from  infancy  to  ma 
ture  age.  What  man  does  not  remember  with 
regret  the  first  time  that  he  read  Robinson  Cru 
soe  '!  Then,  indeed,  he  was  unable  to  appreci 
ate  the  powers  of  the  writer ;  or  rather,  he  nei 
ther  knew  nor  cared  whether  the  book  had  a 
writer  at  all.  He  probably  thought  it  not  half 
so  fine  as  some  rant  of  Macpherson  about  dark- 
browed  Foldath,  and  white-bosomed  Strina- 
dona.  He  now  values  Fingal  and  Temora 
only  as  showing  with  how  little  evidence  a 
story  may  be  believed,  and  with  how  little  merit 
a  book  may  be  popular.  Of  the  romance  of 
Defoe  he  entertains  the  highest  opinion.  He 
perceives  the  hand  of  a  master  in  ten  thousand 
touches,  which  formerly  he  passed  by  without 
notioe.  But  though  he  understands  the  merits 
of  the  narrative  better  than  formerly,  he  is  far 
less  interested  by  it.  Xury,  and  Friday,  and 
pretty  Poll,  the  boat  with  the  shoulder-of-mut- 
ton  sail,  and  the  canoe  which  could  not  be 
brought  down  to  the  water's  edge,  the  tent  with 
its  hedge  and  ladders,  the  preserve  of  kids,  and 
the  den  where  the  old  goat  died,  can  never 
again  be  to  him  the  realities  which  they  were. 
The  days  when  his  favourite  volume  set  him 
upon  making  wheel-barrows  and  chairs,  upon 
digging  caves  and  fencing  huts  in  the  garden, 
can  never  return.  Such  is  the  law  of  our  na 
ture.  Our  judgment  ripens,  our  imagination 
decays.  We  cannot  at  once  enjoy  the  flowers 
of  the  spring  of  life  and  the  fruits  of  its  autumn, 
the  pleasures  of  close  investigation  and  those 
of  agreeable  error.  We  cannot  sit  at  once  in 
the  front  of  the  stage  and  behind  the  scenes. 


We  cannot  be  under  the  illusion  of  the  specta-  on  the  ardent  and  imaginative  spectators.  It  is 
cle,  while  we  are  watching  the  movements  of  said  that  they  blamed  ^Eschylus  for  frightening 
the  ropes  and  pulleys  which  dispose  it.  them  into  fits  with  his  Furies.  Herodotus  tells 


The  chapter  in  which  Fielding  describes  the 
behaviour  of  Partridge  at  the  theatre,  affords  so 
complete  an  illustration  of  our  proposition,  that 
we  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  some  parts  of  it. 

"  Partridge  gave  that  credit  to  Mr.  Garrick 
which  he  had  denied  to  Jones,  and  fell  into  so 
violent  a  tremblisg  that  his  knees  knocked 
against  each  other.  Jones  asked  him  what 
was  the  matter,  and  whether  he  was  afraid  of 
the  warrior  upon  the  stage  1 — '  0,  la,  sir,'  said 
ne,  '  I  perceive  now  it  is  what  you  told  me.  I 
am  not  afraid  of  any  thing,  for  I  know  it  is  but 
a  play ;  and  if  it  was  really  a  ghost,  it  could  do 
one  no  harm  at  such  a  distance  and  in  so  much 
company ;  and  yet  if  I  was  frightened,  I  am  not 
the  only  person.' — '  Why,  who,'  cries  Jones, 
'dost  thou  take  to  be  such  a  coward  here  besides 
thyself]' — '  Nay,  you  may  call  me  a  coward  if 
you  will;  but  if  that  little  man  there  upon  the 
stage  is  not  frightened,  I  never  saw  any  man 
frightened  in  my  life.'  . . .  He  sat  with  his  eyes 
Jixed  partly  on  the  Ghost  and  partly  on  Hamlet, 
nnti  with  his  mouth  open ;  the  same  passions 
which  succeeded  each  other  in  Hamlet,  suc 
ceeded  likewise  in  him. 


us,  that  when  Phrynichus  produced  his  trage 
dy  on  the  fall  of  Miletus,  they  fined  him  in  a 
penalty  of  a  thousand  drachmas,  for  torturing 
their  feelings  by  so  pathetic  an  exhibition. 
They  did  not  regard  him  as  a  great  artist,  but 
merely  as  a  man  who  had  given  them  pain. 
When  they  woke  from  the  distressing  illusion, 
they  treated  the  author  of  it  as  they  would 
have  treated  a  messenger  who  should  have 
brought  them  fatal  and  alarming  tidings,  which 
turned  out  to  be  false.  In  the  same  manner,  a 
child  screams  with  terror  at  the  sight  of  a  per 
son  in  an  ugly  mask.  He  has  perhaps  seen  the 
mask  put  on.  But  his  imagination  is  too  strong 
for  his  reason,  and  he  entreats  that  it  may  be 
taken  off. 

We  should  act  in  the  same  manner,  if  the 
grief  and  horror  produced  in  us  by  wcrks  of 
the  imagination  amounted  to  real  torture. 
But  in  us  these  emotions  are  comparatively 
languid.  They  rarely  affect  our  appetite  or  our 
sleep.  They  leave  us  sufficiently  at  ease  to 
trace  them  to  their  causes,  and  to  estimate  the 
powers  which  produce  them.  Our  attention  ia 
speedily  diverted  from  the  images  which  call 


DRYDEN. 


39 


forth  our  tears,  to  the  art  by  which  those  images 
have  been  selected  and  combined.  We  applaud 
the  genius  of  the  writer.  We  applaud  our  own  , 
sagacity  and  sensibility,  and  we  are  comforted. 

Yet,  though  we  think  that,  in  the  progress  of  | 
nations  towards  refinement,  the  reasoning ; 
powers  are  improved  at  the  expense  of  the  ima-  j 
gination,  we  acknowledge,  that  to  this  rule  j 
there  are  many  apparent  exceptions.  We  are  j 
not,  however,  quite  satisfied  that  they  are  more 
than  apparent.  Men  reasoned  better,  for  ex- 
amp*,  in  the  time  of  Elizabeth  than  in  the 
time  of  Egbert ;  and  they  also  wrote  better 
poetry.  But  we  must  distinguish  between  poetry 
and  a  mental  act,  and  poetry  as  a  species  of 
composition.  If  we  take  it  in  the  latter  sense, 
its  excellence  depends,  not  solely  on  the  vigour 
of  the  imagination,  but  partly  also  on  the  in 
struments  which  the  imagination  employs. 
Within  certain  limits,  therefore,  poetry  may  be 
improving,  while  the  poetical  faculty  is  decay 
ing.  The  vividness  of  the  picture  presented 
to  the  reader  is  not  necessarily  proportioned  to 
the  vividness  of  the  prototype  which  exists  in 
the  mind  of  the  writer.  In  the  other  arts  we 
see  this  clearly.  Should  a  man,  gifted  by  na 
ture  with  all  the  genius  of  Canova,  attempt  to 
carve  a  statue  without  instruction  as  to  the 
management  of  his  chisel,  or  attention  to  the 
anatomy  of  the  human  body,  he  would  produce 
something  compared  with  which  the  High 
lander  at  the  door  of  the  snuff-shop  would  de 
serve  admiration.  If  an  uninitiated  Raphael 
were  to  attempt  a  painting,  it  would  be  a  mere 
daub ;  indeed,  the  connoisseurs  say,  that  the 
early  works  of  Raphael  are  little  better.  Yet, 
who  can  attribute  this  to  want  of  imagination  ? 
Who  can  doubt  that  the  youth  of  that  great  ar 
tist  was  passed  amidst  an  ideal  world  of  beauti 
ful  and  majestic  forms  1  Or,  who  will  attribute 
the  difference  which  appears  between  his  first 
rude  essays,  and  his  magnificent  Transfigura 
tion,  to  a  change  in  the  constitution  of  his 
mind!  In  poetry,  as  in  painting  and  sculpture, 
it  is  necessary  that  the  imitator  should  be  well 
acquainted  with  that  which  he  undertakes  to 
imitate,  and  expert  in  the  mechanical  part  of 
his  art.  Genius  will  not  furnish  him  with  a 
vocabulary  :  it  will  not  teach  him  what  word 
most  exactly  corresponds  to  his  idea,  and  will 
most  fully  convey  it  to  others :  it  will  not  make 
him  a  great  descriptive  poet,  till  he  has  looked 
with  attention  on  the  face  of  nature  ;  or  a  great 
dramatist,  till  he  has  felt  and  witnessed  much 
of  the  influence  of  the  passions.  Information 
and  experience  are,  therefore,  necessary ;  not 
for  the  purpose  of  strengthening  the  imagina 
tion,  which  is  never  so  strong  as  in  people  in 
capable  of  reasoning — savages,  children,  mad 
men,  and  dreamers  ;  but  for  the  purpose  of  en 
abling  the  artist  to  communicate  his  concep 
tions  to  others. 

In  a  barbarous  age  the  imagination  exercises 
a  despotic  power.  So  strong  is  the  perception 
of  what  is  unreal,  that  it  often  overpowers  all 
the  passions  of  the  mind,  and  all  the  sensations 
of  the  body.  At  first,  indeed,  the  phantasm  re 
mains  undivulged,  a  hidden  treasure,  a  word 
less  poetry,  an  invisible  painting,  .a  silent  mu 
sic,  a  dream  of  which  the  pains  and  pleasures 
wrist  to  the  dreamer  alone,  a  bitterness  which 


the  heart  only  knoweth,  a  joy  with  which  a 
stranger  intermeddleth  not.  The  machinery, 
by  which  ideas  are  to  be  conveyed  from  one 
person  to  another,  is  as  yet  rude  and  defective. 
Between  mind  and  mind  there  is  a  great  gulf. 
The  imitative  arts  do  not  exist,  or  are  in  their 
lowest  state.  But  the  actions  of  men  amply 
prove  that  the  faculty  which  gives  birth  to 
those  arts  is  morbidly  active.  It  is  not  yet  the 
inspiration  of  poets  and  sculptors ;  but  it  is  the 
amusement  of  the  day,  the  terror  of  the  night 
the  fertile  source  of  wild  superstitions.  It 
turns  the  clouds  into  gigantic  shapes,  and  the 
winds  into  doleful  voices.  The  belief  M'hich 
springs  from  it  is  more  absolute  and  undoubt- 
ing  than  any  which  can  be  derived  from  evi 
dence.  It  resembles  the  faith  which  we  re 
pose  in  our  own  sensations.  Thus,  the  Arab, 
when  covered  with  wounds,  saw  nothing  but 
the  dark  eyes  and  the  green  kerchief  of  a  beck 
oning  Houri.  The  Northern  warrior  laughed 
in  the  pangs  of  death,  when  he  thought  of  the 
mead  of  Valhalla. 

The  first  works  of  the  imagination  are,  as 
we  have  said,  poor  and  rude,  not  from  the  want 
of  genius,  but  from  the  want  of  materials. 
Phidias  could  have  done  nothing  with  an  old 
tree  and  a  fish-bone,  or  Homer  with  the  lan 
guage  of  New  Holland. 

Yet  the  effect  of  these  early  performances, 
imperfect  as  they  must  necessarily  be,  is  im 
mense.  All  deficiencies  are  to  be  supplied 
by  the  susceptibility  of  those  to  whom  they  are 
addressed.  We  all  know  what  pleasure  a 
wooden  doll,  which  may  be  bought  for  six 
pence,  will  afford  to  a  little  girl.  She  will  re 
quire  no  other  company.  She  will  nurse  it, 
dress  it,  and  talk  to  it  all  day.  No  grown-up 
man  takes  half  so  much  delight  in  one  of  the 
incomparable  babies  of  Chantrey.  In  the  same 
manner,  savages  are  more  affected  by  the  rude 
compositions  of  their  bards  than  nations  more 
advanced  in  civilization  by  the  greatest  mas 
terpieces  of  poetry. 

In  process  of  time,  the  instruments  by  which 
the  imagination  works  are  brought  to  perfec 
tion.  Men  have  not  more  imagination  than 
their  rude  ancestors.  We  strongly  suspect 
that  they  have  much  less.  But  they  produce 
better  works  of  imagination.  Thus,  up  to  a 
certain  period,  the  diminution  of  the  poetical 
powers  is  far  more  than  compensated  by  the 
improvement  of  all  the  appliances  and  means 
of  which  those  powers  stand  in  need.  Then 
comes  the  short  period  of  splendid  and  con 
summate  excellence.  And  then,  from  causes 
against  which  it  is  vain  to  struggle,  poetry  be 
gins  to  decline.  The  progress  of  language, 
which  was  at  first  favourable,  becomes  fatal  to 
it,  and,  instead  of  compensating  for  the  decay 
of  the  imagination,  accelerates  that  decay,  and 
renders  it  more  obvious.  When  the  adven 
turer  in  the  Arabian  tale  anointed  one  of  his 
eyes  with  the  contents  of  the  magical  box,  all 
the  riches  of  the  earth,  however  widely  dis 
persed,  however  sacredly  concealed,  became 
visible  to  him.  But  when  he  tried  the  experi 
ment  on  both  eyes,  he  was  struck  with  blind 
ness.  What  the  enchanted  elixir  was  to  the 
sight  of  the  body,  language  is  to  the  sight  of 
the  imagination.  At  first  it  calls  up  a  world 


40 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  glorious  illusions,  but  when  it  becomes  too  ! 
copious,  it  altogether  destroys  the  visual  power. ! 

As  the  development  of  the  mind  proceeds, 
symbols,  instead  of  being  employed  to  convey 
images,  are  substituted  for  them.  Civilized 
men  think  as  they  trade,  not  in  kind,  but  by 
means  of  a  circulating  medium.  In  these  cir 
cumstances  the  sciences  improve  rapidly,  and 
criticism  among  the  rest ;  but  poetry,  in  the 
highest  sense  of  the  word,  disappears.  Then 
comes  the  dotage  of  the  fine  arts,  a  second 
childhood,  as  feeble  as  the  former,  and  far 
more  hopeless.  This  is  the  age  of  critical 
poetry,  of  poetry  by  courtesy,  of  poetry  to 
which  the  memory,  the  judgment,  and  the  wit 
contribute  far  more  than  the  imagination.  We 
readily  allow  that  many  works  of  this  descrip 
tion  are  excellent;  we  will  not  contend  with 
those  who  think  them  more  valuable  than  the 
great  poems  of  an  earlier  period.  We  only 
maintain  that  they  belong  to  a  different  species 
of  composition,  and  are  produced  by  a  differ 
ent  faculty. 

It  is  some  consolation  to  reflect  that  this 
critical  school  of  poetry  improves  as  the  sci 
ence  of  criticism  improves ;  and  that  the  science 
of  criticism,  like  every  other  science,  is  con 
stantly  tending  towards  perfection.  As  experi 
ments  are  multiplied,  principles  are  better  un 
derstood. 

In  some  countries,  in  our  own,  for  example, 
there  has  been  an  interval  between  the  down 
fall  of  the  creative  school  and  the  rise  of  the 
critical,  a  period  during  which  imagination  has 
been  in  its  decrepitude,  and  taste  in  its  infancy. 
Such  a  revolutionary  interregnum  as  this  will 
be  deformed  by  every  species  of  extravagance. 

The  first  victory  of  good  taste  is  over  the 
bombast  and  conceits  which  deform  such  times 
as  these.  But  criticism  is  still  in  a  very  im 
perfect  state.  What  is  accidental  is  for  a  long 
time  confounded  with  what  is  essential.  Ge- 
Jieral  theories  are  drawn  from  detached  facts. 
How  many  hours  the  action  of  a  play  may  be 
allowed  to  occupy — how  many  similes  an  epic 
poet  may  introduce  into  his  first  book — whe 
ther  a  piece  which  is  acknowledged  to  have  a 
beginning  and  end  may  not  be  without  a  mid 
dle,  and  other  questions  as  puerile  as  these, 
formerly  occupied  the  attention  of  men  of  let 
ters  in  France,  and  even  in  this  country 
Poets,  in  such  circumstances  as  these,  exhibit 
all  the  narrowness  and  feebleness  of  the  criti 
cism  by  which  their  manner  has  been  fashion 
ed.  From  outrageous  absurdity  they  are  pre 
served  indeed  by  their  timidity.  But  they 
perpetually  sacrifice  nature  and  reason  to  ar 
bitrary  canons  of  taste.  In  their  eagerness  to 
avoid  the  mala  prohibita  of  a  foolish  code,  they 
are  perpetually  rushing  on  the  mala  in  sc. 
Their  great  predecessors,  it  is  true,  were  as 
bad  critics  as  themselves,  or  perhaps  worse ; 
tut  those  predecessors,  as  we  have  attempted 
to  show,  were  inspired  by  a  faculty  indepen 
dent  of  criticism,  and  therefore  wrote  well 
while  they  judged  ill. 

In  time  men  begin  to  take  more  rational  and 
comprehensive  views  of  literature.  The  ana- 
Ivsis  of  poetry,  which,  as  we  have  remarked 
must  at  best  be  imperfect,  approaches  nearer 
and  nearer  to  exactness.  The  merits  of  the 


wonderful  models  of  former  times  are  justly 
appreciated.  The  frigid  productions  of  a  later 
age  are  rated  at  no  more  than  their  proper 
value.  Pleasing  and  ingenious  imitations  of 
the  manner  of  the  great  masters  appear.  Poet 
ry  has  a  partial  revival,  a  St.  Martin's  Sum 
mer,  which,  after  a  period  of  dreariness  and 
decay,  agreeably  reminds  us  of  the  splendour 
of  its  June.  A  second  harvest  is  gathered  in; 
though,  growing  on  a  spent  soil,  it  has  not  the 
leart  of  the  former.  Thus,  in  the  present  age, 
Monti  has  successfully  imitated  the  style  of 
Dante ;  and  something  of  the  Elizabethan  in 
spiration  has  been  caught  by  several  eminent 
countrymen  of  our  own.  But  never  will  Italy 
produce  another  Inferno,  or  England  another 
Hamlet.  We  look  on  the  beauties  of  the  mo 
dern  imitations  with  feelings  similar  to  those 
with  which  we  see  flowers  disposed  in  vases 
to  ornament  the  drawing-rooms  of  a  capital. 
We  doubtless  regard  them  with  pleasure,  with 
greater  pleasure,  perhaps,  because,  in  the  midst 
of  a  place  ungenial  to  them,  they  remind  us 
of  the  distant  spots  on  which  they  flourish  in 
spontaneous  exuberance.  But  we  miss  the 
sap,  the  freshness,  and  the  bloom.  Or,  if  we 
may  borrow  another  illustration  from  Queen 
Scheherezade,  we  would  compare  the  writers 
of  this  school  to  the  jewellers  who  were  em 
ployed  to  complete  the  unfinished  window  of 
the  palace  of  Aladdin.  Whatever  skill  or  cost 
could  do  was  done.  Palace  and  bazaar  were 
ransacked  for  precious  stones.  Yet  the  artists, 
with  all  their  dexterity,  with  all  their  assiduity, 
and  with  all  their  vast  means,  were  unable  to 
produce  any  thing  comparable  to  the  wonders 
which  a  spirit  of  a  higher  order  had  wrought 
in  a  single  night. 

The  history  of  every  literature  with  which 
we  are  acquainted  confirms,  we  think,  the 
principles  which  we  have  laid  down.  In 
Greece  we  see  the  imaginative  school  of  poet 
ry  gradually  fading  into  the  critical.  ^Eschy- 
lus  and  Pindar  were  succeeded  by  Sophocles ; 
Sophocles  by  Euripides ;  Euripides  by  the 
Alexandrian  versifiers.  Of  these  last,  Theo 
critus  alone  has  left  compositions  which  de 
serve  to  be  read.  The  splendid  and  grotesque 
fairy-land  of  the  Old  Comedy,  rich  with  such 
gorgeous  hues,  peopled  with  such  fantastic 
shapes,  and  vocal  alternately  with  the  sweet 
est  peals  of  music  and  the  loudest  bursts  of 
elvish  laughter,  disappeared  forever.  The 
masterpieces  of  the  New  Comedy  are  known 
to  us  by  Latin  translations  of  extraordinary 
merit.  From  these  translations,  and  from  the 
expressions  of  the  ancient  critics,  it  is  clear 
that  the  original  compositions  were  distin 
guished  by  grace  and  sweetness,  that  they 
sparkled  with  wit  and  abounded  with  pleasing 
sentiments,  but  that  the  creative  power  was 
gone.  Julius  Caesar  called  Terence  a  half 
Menander — a  sure  proof  that  Menandsr  was 
not  a  quarter  Aristophanes. 

The  literature  of  the  Romans  wa?  merely  a 
continuation  of  the  literature  of  the  Greeks. 
The  pupils  started  from  the  point  at  which 
their  masters  had  in  the  course  of  many  gene 
rations  arrived.  They  thus  almost  wholly 
missed  the  period  of  original  invention.  The 
only  Latin  poets  whose  writings  exhibit  much 


DRYDEN 


4i 


vigour  of  imagination  are  Lucretius  and  Ca 
tullus.  The  Augustan  age  produced  nothing 
equa*'.  to  their  finer  passages. 

In  France,  that  licensed  jester,  whose  jin 
gling  cap  and  motley  coat  concealed  more  ge 
nius  than  ever  mustered  in  the  saloon  of  Ninon 
or  of  Madame  Geoffrin,  was  succeeded  by  writ 
ers  as  decorous  and  as  tiresome  as  gentlemen- 
ushers. 

The  poetry  of  Italy  and  of  Spain  has  under 
gone  the  same  change.  But  nowhere  has  the 
revolution  been  more  complete  and  violent 
than  in  England.  The  same  person  who,  when 
a  boy,  had  clapped  his  thrilling  hands  at  the 
first  representation  of  the  Tempest,  might,  with 
out  attaining  to  a  marvellous  longevity,  have 
lived  to  read  the  earlier  works  of  Prior  and  Ad- 
dison.  The  change,  we  believe,  must,  sooner 
or  later,  have  taken  place.  But  its  progress 
was  accelerated  and  its  character  modified  by 
the  political  occurrences  of  the  times,  and  par 
ticularly  by  two  events,  the  closing  of  the  thea 
tres  under  the  Commonwealth,  and  the  resto 
ration  of  the  house  of  Stuart. 

We  have  said  that  the  critical  and  poetical 
faculties  are  not  only  distinct,  but  almost  in 
compatible.  The  state  of  our  literature  during 
the  reigns  of  Elizabeth  and  James  the  First  is 
a  strong  confirmation  of  this  remark.  The 
greatest  works  of  imagination  that  the  world 
has  ever  seen  were  produced  at  that  period, 
The  national  taste,  in  the  mean  time,  was  to 
the  last  degree  detestable.  Alliterations,  puns, 
antithetical  forms  of  expression  lavishly  em 
ployed  where  no  corresponding  opposition 
existed  between  the  thoughts  expressed,  strain 
ed  allegories,  pedantic  allusions,  every  thing, 
in  short,  quaint  and  affected  in  matter  and 
manner,  made  up  what  was  then  considered  as 
fine  writing.  The  eloquence  of  the  bar,  the 
pulpit,  and  the  council-board  was  deformed  by 
conceits  which  would  have  disgraced  the  rhym 
ing  shepherds  of  an  Italian  academy.  The 
king  quibbled  on  the  throne.  We  might,  in 
deed,  console  ourselves  by  reflecting  that  his 
majesty  was  a  fool.  But  the  chancellor  quib 
bled  in  concert  from  the  woolsack,  and  the 
chancellor  was  Francis  Bacon.  It  is  needless 
to  mention  Sidney  and  the  whole  tribe  of  Eu- 
phuists.  For  Shakspeare  himself,  the  greatest 
poet  that  ever  lived,  falls  into  the  same  fault 
whenever  he  means  to  be  particularly  fine. 
While  he  abandons  himself  to  the  impulse  of 
his  imagination,  his  compositions  are  not  only 
the  sweetest  and  the  most  sublime,  but  also 
the  most  faultless  that  the  world  has  ever  seen. 
But  as  soon  as  his  critical  powers  come  into 
play,  be  sinks  to  the  level  of  Cowley,  or  rather 
he  does  ill  what  Cowley  did  well.  All  that  is 
bad  in  his  works  is  bad  elaborately,  and  of 
malice  aforethought.  The  only  thing  wanting 
to  make  them  perfect  was,  that  he  should 
never  have  troubled  himself  with  thinking 
whether  they  were  good  or  not.  Like  the  an 
gels  in  Milton,  he  sinks  "with  compulsion  and  \ 
laborious  flight."  His  natural  tendency  is  up-  I 
wards.  That  he  may  soar  it  is  only  necessary  j 
that  he  should  not  struggle  to  fall.  He  resem- ! 
bled  the  American  cacique  who,  possessing  in  j 
unmeasured  abundance  the  metals  which  in  j 
polished  societies  are  esteemed  the  most  pre-  ] 

VOL.  I.— 6 


cious,  was  utterly  unconscious  of  their  value, 
and  gave  up  treasures  more  valuable  than  the 
imperial  crowns  of  other  countries,  to  secure 
some  gaudy  and  far-fetched  but  worthless  bau 
ble,  a  plated  button,  or  a  necklace  of  coloured 
glass. 

We  have  attempted  to  show  that,  as  know 
ledge  is  extended,  and  as  the  reason  developes 
itself,  the  imitative  arts  decay.  We  should, 
therefore,  expect  that  the  corruption  of  poetry 
would  commence  in  the  educated  classes  of 
society.  And  this,  in  fact,  is  almost  constantly 
the  case.  The  few  great  works  of  imagination 
which  appear  in  a  critical  age  are,  almost 
without  exception,  the  works  of  uneducated 
men.  Thus,  at  a  time  when  persons  of  quality 
translated  French  romances,  and  when  the 
Universities  celebrated  royal  deaths  in  verses 
about  Tritons  and  Fauns,  a  preaching  tinker 
produced  the  Pilgrim's  Progress.  And  thus  a 
ploughman  startl^  a  generation,  which  had 
thought  Hayley  and  Seattle  great  poets,  with 
the  adventures  of  Tarn  O'Shanter.  Even  in 
the  latter  part  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  the 
fashionable  poetry  had  degenerated.  It  re 
tained  few  vestiges  of  the  imagination  of 
earlier  times.  It  had  not  yet  been  subjected 
to  the  rules  of  good  taste.  Affectation  had 
completely  tainted  madrigals  and  sonnets. 
The  grotesque  conceits  and  the  tuneless  num 
bers  of  Donne  were,  in  the  time  of  James,  the 
favourite  models  of  composition  at  Whitehall 
and  at  the  Temple.  But  though  the  literature 
of  the  Court  was  in  its  decay,  the  literature  ol 
the  people  was  in  its  perfection.  The  Muses 
had  taken  sanctuary  in  the  theatres,  the  haunts 
of  a  class  whose  taste  was  not  better  than  that 
of  the  Right  Honourables  and  singular  good 
Lords  who  admired  metaphysical  love-verses, 
but  whose  imagination  retained  all  its  fresh 
ness  and  vigour;  whose  censure  and  approba 
tion  might  be  erroneously  bestowed,  but  whose 
tears  and  laughter  were  never  in  the  wrong. 
The  infection  which  had  tainted  lyric  and 
didactic  poetry  had  but  slightly  and  partially 
touched  the  drama.  While  the  noble  and  the 
learned  were  comparing  eyes  to  burning- 
glasses,  and  tears  to  terrestrial  globes,  coyness 
to  an  enthymeme,  absence  to  a  pair  of  com 
passes,  and  an  unrequited  passion  to  the  for 
tieth  remainderman  in  an  entail,  Juliet  leaning 
from  the  balcony,  and  Miranda  smiling  over 
the  chess-board,  sent  home  many  spectators, 
as  kind  and  simple-hearted  as  the  master  an<i 
mistress  of  Fletcher's  Ralpho,  to  cry  them 
selves  to  sleep. 

No  species  of  fiction  is  so  delightful  to  us  as 
the  old  English  drama.  Even  its  inferior  pro 
ductions  possess  a  charm  not  to  be  found  in 
any  other  kind  of  poetry.  It  is  the  most  lucid 
mirror  that  ever  was  held  up  to  nature.  The 
creations  of  the  great  dramatists  of  Athens 
produce  the  effect  of  magnificent  sculptures, 
conceived  by  a  mighty  imagination,  polished 
with  the  utmost  delicacy,  imbodying  ideas  of 
ineffable  majesty  and  beauty,  but  cold,  pale, 
and  rigid,  with  no  bloom  on  the  cheek,  and  no 
speculation  in  the  eye.  In  all  the  draperies, 
the  figures,  and  the  faces,  in  the  lovers  am- 
the  tyrants,  the  Bacchanals  and  the  Furie* 
there  is  the  same  marble  dullness  and  <VaA 

Ti  2 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ness.  Most  of  the  characters  of  the  French  terval  between  the  age  of  sublime  invention 
stage  resemble  the  waxen  gentlemen  and  ladies  and  that  of  agreeable  imitation.  The  works 
in  the  window  of  a  perfumer,  rouged,  curled, ;  of  Shakspeare,  which  were  not  appreciated 
and  bedizened,  but  fixed  in  such  stiff  attitudes, !  with  any  degree  of  justice  before  the  middle 
and  staring  with  eyes  expressive  of  such  utter  |  of  the  eighteenth  century,  might  then  have 
unmeaningness,  that  they  cannot  produce  an  I  been  the  recognised  standards  of  excellence 
illusion  for  a  single  moment.  In  the  English  j  during  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeenth  ;  and 

he  and  the  great  Elizabethan  writers  might 
have  been  almost  immediately  succeeded  by  a 
generation  of  poets,  similar  to  those  who  adorn 
our  own  times. 

But  the  Puritans  drove  imagination  from  its 
last  asylum.  They  prohibited  theatrical  repre 
sentations,  and  stigmatized  the  whole  race  of 
dramatists,  as  enemies  of  morality  and  reli 
gion.  Much  that  is  objectionable  may  be  found 
in  the  writers  whom  they  reprobated  ;  but 
whether  they  took  the  best  measures  for  stop 
ping  the  evil,  appears  to  us  very  doubtful,  and 
must,  we  think,  have  appeared  doubtful  to 
themselves,  when,  after  the  lapse  of  a  few 
years,  they  saw  the  unclean  spirit  whom  they 
had  cast  out,  return  to  his  old  haunts,  with 
seven  others  fouler  than  himself. 

By  the  extinction  of  the  drama,  the  fashion 
able  school  of  poetry — a  school  without  truth 
of  sentiment  or  harmony  of  versification — 
without  the  powers  of  an  earlier  or  the  cor 
rectness  of  a  later  age — was  left  to  enjoy  un 
disputed  ascendency.  A  vicious  ingenuity,  a 
morbid  quickness  .  to  perceive  resemblances 
and  analogies  between  things  apparently  hete 
rogeneous,  constituted  almost  its  only  claim  to 
admiration.  Suckling  was  dead.  Milton  was 
absorbed  in  political  and  theological  contro 
versy.  If  Waller  differed  from  the  Cowleian 
sect  of  writers,  he  differed  for  the  worse.  He 
had  as  little  poetry  as  they,  and  much  less  wit: 
nor  is  the  languor  of  his  verses  less  offensive 
than  the  ruggedness  of  theirs.  In  Denham 
alone  the  faint  dawn  of  a  better  manner  was 
discernible. 

But,  low  as  was  the  state  of  our  poetry 
during  the  civil  war  and  the  Protectorate,  a 
still  deeper  fall  was  at  hand.  Hitherto  our 
literature  had  been  idiomatic.  In  mind  as  in 
situation,  we  had  been  islanders.  The  revolu 
tions  in  our  taste,  like  the  revolutions  in  our 
government,  had  been  settled  without  the  in 
terference  of  strangers.  Had  this  state  of  things 
continued,  the  same  just  principles  of  reason 
ing,  which,  about  this  time,  were  applied  with 
unprecedented  success  to  every  part  of  phi 
losophy,  would  soon  have  conducted  our 
ancestors  to  a  sounder  code  of  criticism. 
There  were  already  strong  signs  of  improve 
ment.  Our  prose  had  at  length  worked  itself 
clear  from  those  quaint  conceits  which  still 
deformed  almost  every  metrical  composition. 
The  parliamentary  debates  and  the  diplomatic 
correspondence  of  that  eventful  period  had 
contributed  much  to  this  reform.  In  such 
bustling  times,  it  was  absolutely  necessary  to 
speak  and  write  to  the  purpose.  The  absurdi 
ties  of  Puritanism  had,  perhaps,  done  more. 
At  the  time  when  that  odious  style,  which 
deforms  the  writings  of  Hall  and  of  Lord  Ba 
con,  was  almost  universal,  had  appeared  that 
stupendous  work,  the  English  Bible — a  book 
which,  if  every  thing  else  in  our  language 
should  perish,  would  alone  suffice  to  show  the 


plays  alone  is  to  be  found  the  warmth,  the 
mellowness,  and  the  reality  of  painting.  We 
know  the  minds  of  the  men  and  women,  as  we 
know  the  faces  of  the  men  and  women  of  Van 
dyke. 

The  excellence  of  these  works  is  in  a  great 
measure  the  result  of  two  peculiarities,  which 
the  critics  of  the  French  school  consider  as 
defects — from  the  mixture  of  tragedy  and  co 
medy,  and  from  the  length  and  extent  of  the 
action.  The  former  is  necessary  to  render  the 
drama  a  just  representation  of  a  world,  in 
which  the  laughers  and  the  weepers  are  per 
petually  jostling  each  othfr — in  whicn  every 
event  has  its  serious  and  its  ludicrous  side. 
The  latter  enables  us  to  form  an  intimate  ac 
quaintance  with  characters,  with  which  we 
could  not  possibly  become  familiar  during  the 
few  hours  to  which  the  unities  restrict  the 
poet.  In  this  respect  the  works  of  Shakspeare, 
in  particular,  are  miracles  of  art.  In  a  piece, 
which  may  be  read  aloud  in  three  hours,  we 
aee  a  character  gradually  unfold  all  its  re 
cesses  to  us.  We  see  it  change  with  the 
change  of  circumstances.  The  petulant  youth 
rises  into  the  politic  and  warlike  sovereign. 
The  profuse  and.  courteous  philanthropist 
sours  into  a  hater  and  scorner  of  his  kind. 
The  tyrant  is  altered,  by  the  chastening  of  af 
fliction,  into  a  pensive  moralist.  The  veteran 
general,  distinguished  by  coolness,  sagacity, 
and  self-command,  sinks  under  a  conflict  be 
tween  love,  strong  as  death,  and  jealousy,  cruel 
as  the  grave.  The  brave  and  loyal  subject 
passes,  step  by  step,  to  the  extremities  of  hu 
man  depravity.  We  trace  his  progress  from 
the  first  dawnings  of  unlawful  ambition,  to  the 
cynical  melancholy  of  his  impenitent  remorse. 
Yet,  in  these  pieces,  there  are  no  unnatural 
transitions.  Nothing  is  omitted:  nothing  is 
crowded.  Great  as  are  the  changes,  narrow 
as  is  the  compass  within  which  they  are  exhi 
bited,  they  shock  us  as  little  as  the  gradual 
alterations  of  those  familiar  faces  which  we 
see  every  evening  and  every  morning.  The 
magical  skill  of  the  poet  resembles  that  of  the 
Dervise  in  the  Spectator,  who  condensed  all 
the  events  of  seven  years  into  the  single  mo 
ment  during  which  the  king  held  his  head 
under  the  water. 

It  is  deserving  of  remark,  that  at  the  time  of 
which  we  speak,  the  plays  even  of  men  not 
eminently  distinguished  by  genius — such,  for 
example,  as  Jonson — were  far  superior  to  the 
best  works  of  imagination  in  other  depart- 
menis.  Therefore,  though  we  conceive  that, 
from  causes  which  we  have  already  investi 
gated,  our  poetry  must  necessarily  have  de 
clined,  we  think  that,  unless  its  fate  had  been 
accelerated  by  external  attacks,  it  might  have 
enjoyed  an  euthanasia — that  genius  might  have 
been  kepi  alive  by  the  drama  till  its  place 
could,  in  .some  degree,  be  supplied  by  taste — 
tnat  there  would  have  been  scarcely  any  in- 


DRYDEN. 


whole  extent  of  its  beauty  and  power.  The 
respect  which  the  translators  felt  for  the  origi 
nal  prevented  them  from  adding  any  of  the 
hideous  decorations  then  in  fashion.  The 
groundwork  of  the  version,  indeed,  was  of  an 
earlier  age.  The  familiarity  with  which  the 
Puritans,  on  almost  every  occasion,  used  the 
scriptural  phrases,  was  no  doubt  very  ridicu 
lous  ;  but  it  produced  good  effects.  It  was  a 
cant ;  but  it  drove  out  a  cant  far  more  offen 
sive. 

The  highest  kind  of  poetry  is,  in  a  great 
measure,  independent  of  those  circumstances 
which  regulate  the  style  of  composition  in 
prose.  But  with  that  inferior  species  of  poe 
try  which  succeeds  to  it,  the  case  is  widely 
different.  In  a  few  years,  the  good  sense  and 
good  taste  which  had  weeded  out  affectation 
from  moral  and  political  treatises  would,  in 
the  natural  course  of  things,  have  effected  a 
simila'  reform  in  the  sonnet  and  the  ode.  The 
rigour  of  the  victorious  sectaries  had  relaxed. 
A  dominant  religion  is  never  ascetic.  The 
government  connived  at  theatrical  representa 
tions.  The  influence  of  Shakspeare  was  once 
more  felt.  But  darker  days  were  approaching. 
A  foreign  yoke  was  to  be  imposed  on  our  lite 
rature.  Charles,  surrounded  by  the  compa 
nions  of  his  long  exile,  returned  to  govern  a 
nation  which  ought  never  to  have  cast  him  out, 
or  never  to  have  received  him  back.  Every 
year  which  he  had  passed  among  strangers 
bad  rendered  him  more  unfit  to  rule  his  coun 
trymen.  In  France  he  had  seen  the  refractory 
magistracy  humbled,  and  royal  prerogative 
though  exercised  by  a  foreign  priest  in  the 
name  of  a  child,  victorious  over  all  opposition. 
This  spectacle  naturally  gratified  a  prince  to 
whose  family  the  opposition  of  parliaments 
had  been  so  fatal.  Politeness  was  his  solitary 
good  quality.  The  insults  which  he  had  suf 
fered  in  Scotland  had  taught  him  to  prize  it. 
The  effeminacy  and  apathy  of  his  disposition 
fitted  him  to  excel  in  it.  The  elegance  and 
vivacity  of  the  French  manners  fascinated 
him.  With  the  political  maxims  and  the  so 
cial  habits  of  his  favourite  people,  he  adopted 
their  taste  in  composition;  and,  when  seated 
on  the  throne,  soon  rendered  it  fashionable, 
partly  by  direct  patronage,  but  still  more  by 
that  contemptible  policy  which,  for  a  time, 
made  England  the  last  of  the  nations,  and 
raised  Louis  the  Fourteenth  to  a  height  of 
power  and  fame,  such  as  no  French  sovereign 
had  ever  before  attained. 

It  was  to  please  Charles  that  rhyme  was 
first  introduced  into  our  plays.  Thus,  a  rising 
blow,  which  would  at  any  time  have  been 
mortal,  was  dealt  to  the  English  drama,  then 
just  recovering  from  its  languishing  condition. 
Two  detestable  manners,  the  indigenous  and 
the  imported,  were  now  in  a  state  of  alternate 
conflict  and  amalgamation.  The  bombastic 
meanness  of  the  new  style  was  blended  with  the 
ingenious  absurdity  of  the  old ;  and  the  mix 
ture  produced  something  which  the  world  had 
never  before  seen,  and  which,  we  hope,  it  will 
never  see  again — something,  by  the  side  of 
which  the  worst  nonsense  of  all  other  ages 
appears  to  advantage — something,  which  those 
•who  have  attempted  to  caricature  it,  have, 


against  their  will,  been  forced  tc  flatter — of 
which  the  tragedy  of  Bayes  is  a  very  favour* 
able  specimen.  What  Lord  Dorset  observed 
to  Edward  Howard,  might  have  been  address 
ed  to  almost  all  his  contemporaries  : — 

"As  skilful  divers  to  the  bottom  fall, 
Swifter  than  those  who  cannot  swim  at  all ; 
So,  in  this  way  of  writing  without  thinking, 
Thou  hast  a  strange  alacrity  in  sinking." 

From  this  reproach  some  clever  men  of  the 
world  must  be  expected,  and  among  them 
Dorset  himself.  Though  by  no  means  great 
poets,  or  even  good  versifiers,  they  always 
wrote  with  meaning,  and  sometimes  with  wit. 
Nothing  indeed  more  strongly  shows  to  what 
a  miserable  state  literature  had  fallen,  than 
the  immense  superiority  which  the  occasional 
rhymes,  carelessly  thrown  on  paper  by  men 
of  this  class,  possess  over  the  elaborate  pro 
ductions  of  almost  all  the  professed  authors. 
The  reigning  taste  was  so  bad,  that  the  success 
of  a  writer  was  in  inverse  proportion  to  his 
labour,  and  to  his  desire  of  excellence.  An 
exception  must  be  made  for  Butler,  who  had  as 
much  wit  and  learning  as  Cowley,  and  who 
knew,  what  Cowley  never  knew,  how  to  use 
them.  A  great  command  of  good  homely 
English  distinguishes  him  still  more  from  the 
other  writers  of  the  time.  As  for  Gondibert. 
those  may  criticise  it  who  can  read  it.  Ima 
gination  was  extinct.  Taste  was  depraved. 
Poetry,  driven  from  palaces,  colleges,  and  the 
atres,  had  found  an  asylum  in  the  obscure 
dwelling,  where  a  great  man,  born  out  of  due 
season,  in  disgrace,  penury,  pain,  and  blind 
ness,  still  kept  uncontaminated  a  character 
and  a  genius  worthy  of  a  better  age. 

Every  thing  about  Milton  is  wonderful ;  bu* 
nothing  is  so  wonderful  as  that,  in  an  age  sa 
unfavourable  to  poetry,  he  should  have  pro 
duced  the  greatest  of  modern  epic  poems 
We  are  not  sure  that  this  is  not  in  some  de 
gree  to  be  attributed  to  his  want  of  sight.  Thn 
imagination  is  notoriously  most  active  when 
the  external  world  is  shut  out.  In  sleep  its 
illusions  are  perfect.  They  produce  all  the 
effect  of  realities.  In  darkness  its  visions  are 
always  more  distinct  than  in  the  light.  Every 
person  who  amuses  himself  with  \vhat  is  called 
building  castles  in  the  air,  must  have  expe 
rienced  this.  We  know  artists,  who,  before 
they  attempt  to  draw  a  face  from  memory, 
close  their  eyes,  that,  they  may  recall  a  more 
perfect  image  of  the  features  and  the  expres 
sion.  We  are  therefore  inclined  to  ne'ieve, 
that  the  genius  of  Milton  may  have  been  pre 
served  from  the  influence  of  times  sc  unfa 
vourable  to  it,  by  his  infirmity.  Be  this  as  it 
may,  his  works  at  first  enjoyed  a  very  small 
share  of  popularity.  To  be  neglected  by  his 
contemporaries  was  the  penalty  which  he  paid 
for  surpassing  them.  His  great  poem  was 
not  generally  studied  or  admired,  till  writers 
far  inferior  to  him  had,  by  rbsequiously  cring 
ing  to  the  public  taste,  acquired  sufficient  fa 
vour  to  reform  it. 

Of  these  Dryden  was  the  mcst  eminent. 
Amidst  the  crowd  of  authors,  who,  during  the 
earlier  years  of  Charles  the  Second,  courted! 
notoriety  by  every  species  of  absurdity  am1 
affectation,  he  speedily  became  conspicuous 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS    WRITINGS. 


No  man  exercised  so  much  influence  on  the 
age.  The  reason  is  obvious.  On  no  man  did 
the  age  exercise  so  much  influence.  He  was 
perhaps  the  greatest  of  those  whom  we  have 
designated  as  the  critical  poets ;  and  his  lite 
rary  career  exhibited,  on  a  reduced  scale,  the 
whole  history  of  the  school  to  which  he  be 
longed,  the  rudeness  and  extravagance  of  its 
infancy,  the  propriety,  the  grace,  the  dignified 
good  sense,  the  temperate  splendour  of  its 
maturity.  His  imagination  was  torpid,  till  it 
was  awakened  by  his  judgment.  He  began 
with  quaint  parallels  and  empty  mouthing. 
He  gradually  acquired  the  energy  of  the  sa 
tirist,  the  gravity  of  the  moralist,  the  rapture 
of  the  lyric  poet.  The  revolution  through 
which  English  literature  has  been  passing, 
from  the  time  of  Cowley  to  that  of  Scott,  may 
be  seen  in  miniature  within  the  compass  of 
his  volumes. 

His  life  divides  itself  into  two  parts.  There 
is  some  debatable  ground  on  the  common 
frontier ;  but  the  line  may  be  drawn  with  tole 
rable  accuracy.  The  year  1678  is  that  on 
which  we  should  be  inclined  to  fix  as  the  date 
of  a  great  change  in  his  manner.  During  the 
preceding  period  appeared  some  of  his  courtly 
panegyrics — his  Annus  Mirabilis,  and  most  of 
his  plays;  indeed,  all  his  rhyming  tragedies. 
To  the  subsequent  period  belong  his  best  dra 
mas — All  for  Love,  The  Spanish  Friar,  and 
Sebastian — his  satires,  his  translations,  his 
didactic  poems,  his  fables,  and  his  odes. 

Of  the  small  pieces  which  were  presented 
to  chancellors  and  princes,  it  would  scarcely 
be  fair  to  speak.  The  greatest  advantage 
which  the  fine  arts  derive  from  the  extension 
of  knowledge  is,  that  the  patronage  of  indivi 
duals  becomes  unnecessary.  Some  writers 
still  affect  to  regret  the  age  of  patronage. 
None  but  bad  writers  have  reason  to  regret  it. 
It  is  always  an  age  of  general  ignorance. 
Where  ten  thousand  readers  are  eager  for  the 
appearance  of  a  book,  a  small  contribution 
from  each  makes  up  a  splendid  remuneration 
for  the  author.  Where  literature  is  a  luxury, 
confined  to  few,  each  of  them  must  pay  high. 
If  the  Empress  Catherine,  for  example,  wanted 
an  epic  poem,  she  must  have  wholly  supported 
the  poet ; — just  as,  in  a  remote  country  village. 
a  man  who  wants  a  mutton-chop  is  sometimes 
forced  to  take  the  whole  sheep  ; — a  thing  which 
never  happens  where  the  demand  is  large. 
But  men  who  pay  largely  for  the  gratification 
of  their  taste,  will  expect  to  have  it  united 
with  some  gratification  to  their  vanity.  Flat 
tery  is  carried  to  a  shameless  extent;  and  the 
habit  of  flattery  almost  inevitably  introduces 
a  false  taste  into  composition.  Its  language 
is  made  up  of  hyperbolical  commonplaces — 
offensive  from  their  triteness — and  still  more 
offensive  from  their  extravagance.  In  no 
school  is  the  trick  of  overstepping  the  modesty 
of  nature  so  speedily  acquired.  The  writer, 
accustomed  to  find  exaggeration  acceptable 
and  necessary  on  one  subject,  uses  it  on  all. 
It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  the  early  pane 
gyrical  verses  of  Dryden  should  be  made  up 
of  meanness  and  bombast.  They  abound  with 
the  conceits  which  his  immediate  predecessors 
bad  brought  into  fashion.  But  his  language 


and  his  versification  were  already  far  supe* 
rior  to  theirs. 

The  Annus  Mirabilis  shows  great  command 
of  expression  and  a  fine  ear  for  heroic  rhyme. 
Here  its  merits  end.  Not  only  has  it  no  claim 
to  be  called  poetry ;  but  it  seems  to  be  the  work 
of  a  man  who  could  never,  by  any  possibility, 
write  poetry.  Its  affected  similes  are  the  best 
part  of  it.  Gaudy  weeds  present  a  more  en 
couraging  spectacle  than  utter  barrenness. 
There  is  scarcely  a  single  stanza  in  this  long 
work,  to  which  the  imagination  seems  to  have 
contributed  any  thing.  It  is  produced,  not  by 
creation,  but  by  construction.  It  is  made  up, 
not  of  pictures,  but  of  inferences.  We  will 
give  a  single  instance,  and  certainly  a  favour 
able  instance — a  quatrain  which  Johnson  has 
praised.  Dryden  is  describing  the  sea-fight 
with  the  Dutch. 

"  Amidst  whole  heaps  of  spices  lights  a  hall  ; 
And  now  their  odours  armed  against  them  fly 
Some  preciously  by  shattered  porcelain  fall, 
And  some  by  aromatic  splinters  die." 

The  poet  should  place  his  readers,  as  nearly  as 
possible,  in  the  situation  of  the  sufferers  or  the 
spectators.  His  narration  ought  to  produce 
feelings  similar  to  those  which  would  be  excited 
by  the  event  itself.  Is  this  the  case  here  1 
Who,  in  a  sea-fight,  ever  thought  of  the  price 
of  the  china  which  beats  out  the  brains  of  a 
sailor ;  or  of  the  odour  of  the  splinter  which 
shatters  his  leg?  It  is  not  by  an  act  of  the 
imagination,  at  once  calling  up  the  scene  be 
fore  the  interior  eye,  but  by  painful  meditation 
— by  turning  the  subject  round  and  round — by 
tracing  out  facts  into  remote  consequences, 
that  these  incongruous  topics  are  introduced 
into  the  description.  Homer,  it  is  true,  per 
petually  uses  epithets  which  are  not  peculiarly 
appropriate.  Achilles  is  the  swift-footed,  when 
he  is  sitting  still.  Ulysses  is  the  much-endur 
ing,  when  he  has  nothing  to  endure.  Every 
spear  casts  a  long  shadow;  every  ox  has 
crooked  horns ;  and  every  woman  a  high  bosom, 
though  these  particulars  may  be  quite  beside 
the  purpose.  In  our  old  ballads  a  similar 
practice  prevails.  The  gold  is  always  red,  and 
the  ladies  always  gay,  though  nothing  whatever 
may  depend  on  the  hue  of  gold,  or  the  temper 
of  the  ladies.  But  these  adjectives  are  mere 
customary  additions.  They  merge  in  the  sub 
stantives  to  which  they  are  attached.  If  the* 
at  all  colour  the  idea,  it  is  with  a  tinge  so  sligh 
as  in  no  respect  to  alter  the  general  effect.  In 
the  passage  which  we  have  quoted  from  Dry 
den,  the  case  is  very  different.  Predously  and 
aromatic  divert  our  whole  attention  to  them 
selves,  and  dissolve  the  image  of  the  battle  in 
a  moment.  The  whole  poem  reminds  us  of 
Lucan,  and  of  the  worst  parts  of  Lucan,  the 
sea-fight  in  the  bay  of  Marseilles,  for  example. 
The  description  of  the  two  fleets  during  the 
night  is  perhaps  the  only  passage  which  ought 
to  be  exempted  from  this  censure.  If  it  was 
from  the  Annus  Mirabilis  that  Milton  formed 
his  opinion,  when  he  pronounced  Dryden  a 
good  rhymer,  but  no  poet,  he  certainly  judged 
correctly.  But  Dryden  was,  as  we  have  said, 
one  of  those  writers,  in  whom  the  period  of 
imagination  does  not  precede,  but  follow,  th§ 
period  of  observation  and  reflection. 


DRYDEN. 


45 


His  plays,  his  rhyming  plays  in  particular, 
are  admirable  subjects  for  those  who  wish  to 
study  the  morbid  anatomy  of  the  drama.  He 
was  utterly  destitute  of  the  power  of  exhibiting 
real  human  beings.  Even  in  the  far  inferior 
talent  of  composing  characters  out  of  those  ele 
ments  into  which  the  imperfect  process  of  our 
reason  can  resolve  them,  he  was  very  deficient. 
His  men  are  not  even  good  personifications; 
they  are  not  well-assorted  assemblages  of  quali 
ties.  Now  and  then,  indeed,  he  seizes  a  very 
coarse  and  marked  distinction ;  and  gives  up, 
not  a  likeness,  but  a  strong  caricature,  in  which 
a  single  peculiarity  is  protruded,  and  every 
thing  else  neglected ;  like  the  Marquis  of  Gran- 
by  at  an  inndoor,  whom  we  know  by  nothing  but 
his  baldness ;  or  Wilkes,  who  is  Wilkes  only 
in  his  squint.  These  are  the  best  specimens 
of  his  skill.  For  most  of  his  pictures  seem, 
like  Turkey  carpets,  to  have  been  expressly 
designed  not  to  resemble  any  thing  in  the  hea 
vens  above,  in  the  earth  beneath,  or  in  the  wa 
ters  under  the  earth. 

The  latter  manner  he  practises  most  fre 
quently  in  his  tragedies,  the  former  in  his 
comedies.  The  comic  characters  are,  without 
mixture,  loathsome  and  despicable.  The  men 
of  Etherege  and  Vanbrugh  are  bad  enough. 
Those  of  Smollet  are  perhaps  worse.  Bat  they 
do  not  approach  to  the  Celadons,  the  Wild- 
bloods,  the  Woodalls,  and  the  Rhodophils  of 
Dryden.  The  vices  of  these  last  are  set  off  by 
a  certain  fierce,  hard  impudence,  to  which  we 
know  nothing  comparable.  Their  love  is  the 
appetite  of  beasts;  their  friendship  the  con 
federacy  of  knaves.  The  ladies  seem  to  have 
been  expressly  created  to  form  helps  meet  for 
such  gentlemen.  In  deceiving  and  insulting 
their  old  fathers,  they  do  not  perhaps  exceed 
the  license  which,  by  immemorial  prescription, 
has  been  allowed  to  heroines.  But  they  also 
cheat  at  cards,  rob  strong  boxes,  put  up  their 
favours  to  auction,  betray  their  friends,  abuse 
their  rivals  in  a  style  of  Billingsgate,  and  invite 
their  lovers  in  the  language  of  the  Piazza. 
These,  it  must  be  remembered,  are  not  the 
valets  and  waiting-women,  the  Mascarilles  and 
Nerines,  but  the  recognised  heroes  and  hero 
ines,  who  appear  as  the  representatives  of  good 
society,  and  who,  at  the  end  of  the  fifth  act, 
marry  and  live  very  happily  ever  after.  The 
sensuality,  baseness,  and  malice  of  their  na 
tures  are  unredeemed  by  any  quality  of  a  differ 
ent  description,  by  any  touch  of  kindness,  or 
oven  by  an  honest  burst  of  hearty  hatred  and 
revenge.  We  are  in  a  world  where  there  is 
ao  humanity,  no  veracity,  no  sense  of  shame 
— a  world  for  which  any  good-natured  man 
would  gladly  take  in  exchange  the  society  of 
Milton's  devils.  But  as  soon  as  we  enter  the 
regions  of  Tragedy,  we  find  a  great  change. 
Then  is  no  lack  of  the  fine  sentiment  there. 
Metastasio  is  surpassed  in  his  own  department. 
8cuderi  is  out-scuderied.  We  are  introduced 
to  people  whose  proceedings  we  can  trace  to 
no  motive — of  whose  feelings  we  can  form  no 
more  idea  than  of  a  sixth  sense.  We  have 
«ft  a  race  of  creatures,  whose  love  is  as  deli 
cate  and  affectionate  as  the  passion  which  an 
alderman  feels  for  a  turtle.  We  find  ourselves 
wnong  beings,  whose  love  is  purely  disinte 


rested  emotion — a  loyalty  extending  to  passive 
obedience — a  religion  like  that  of  the  Quictists, 
unsupported  by  any  sanction  of  hope  or  fear. 
We  see  nothing  but  despotism  without  power, 
and  sacrifices  without  compensation. 

We  will  give  a  few  instances : — In  Aureng- 
zebe,  Arimant,  governor  of  Agra,  falls  in  love 
with  his  prisoner  Indamora.  She  rejects  his  suif 
with  scorn;  but  assures  him  that  she  shall  make 
great  use  of  her  power  over  him.  He  threatens 
to  be  angry.  She  answers,  very  coolly  : 

"  Do  not :  your  anger,  like  your  love,  is  vain  : 
Whene'er  I  please,  you  must  be  pleased  atrain. 
Knowing  what  power  I  have  your  will  to  bend, 
I'll  use  it ;  for  I  need  just  such  a  friend." 

This  is  no  idle  menace.  She  soon  brings  a 
letter,  addressed  to  his  rival,  orders  him  to  read 
it,  asks  him  whether  he  thinks  it  sufficiently 
tender,  and  finally  commands  him  to  carry  it 
himself.  Such  tyranny  as  this,  it  may  be 
thought,  would  justify  resistance.  Arimant 
does  indeed  venture  to  remonstrate  : 

"This  fatal  paper  rather  let  me  tear, 
Than,  like  Bellerophon,  my  sentence  bear." 

The  answer  of  the  lady  is  incomparable : 

"You  may;  but  'twill  not  be  your  best  advice; 
'Twill  only  give  rne  pains  of  writing  twice. 
You  know  you  must  obey  me,  soon  or  late. 
Why  should  you  vainly  struggle  with  your  fate?" 

Poor  Arimant  seems  to  be  of  the  sam« 
opinion.  He  mutters  something  about  fate  and 
freewill,  and  walks  off  with  the  billet-doux. 

In  the  Indian  Emperor,  Montezuraa  presents 
Almeria  with  a  garland  as  a  token  of  his  love, 
and  offers  to  make  her  his  queen.  She  replies : 

"  I  take  this  garland,  not  as  given  by  you  ; 
But  as  my  merit's  and  my  beauty's  due 
As  for  the  crown  which  you,  my  slave,  possess, 
To  share  it  with  you  would  but  make  me  less." 

In  return  for  such  proofs  of  tenderness  as 
these,  her  admirer  consents  to  murder  his  two 
sons,  and  a  benefactor,  to  whom  he  feels  the 
warmest  gratitude.  Lyndaraxa,  in  the  Con 
quest  of  Granada,  assumes  the  same  lofty  tone 
with  Abdelmelech.  He  complains  that  she 
smiles  upon  his  rival. 

"Lynd.    And  when  did  I  my  power  so  far  resign, 

That  you  should  regulate  each  look  of  mine? 
Jlbdel.    Then,  when  you  gave  your  love,  you  gave  that 

power. 

Lynd.    'Tvvas  during  pleasure — 'tis  revoked  this  hour 
Abdel.    I'll  hate  you,  and  this  visit  is  my  last. 
Lynd.     Do,  if  you  can  ;  you  know  I  hold  you  fast." 

That  these  passages  violate  all  historica. 
propriety;  that  sentiments,  to  which  nothing 
similar  was  ever  even  affected  except  by  the 
cavaliers  of  Europe,  are  transferred  to  Mexico 
and  Agra,  is  a  light  accusation.  We  have  no 
objection  to  a  conventional  world,  an  Illyrian 
puritan,  or  a  Bohemian  seaport.  While  the 
faces  are  good,  we  care  little  about  the  back 
ground.  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  says,  that  the 
curtains  and  hangings  in  an  historical  painting 
ought  to  be,  not  velvet  or  cotton,  but  merely 
drapery.  The  same  principle  should  be  ap 
plied  to  poetry  and  romance.  The  truth  of 
character  is  the  first  object ;  the  truth  of  place 
and  time  is  to  be  considered  only  in  the  second 
place.  Puff  himself  c«uM  tell  the  actor  to  tun: 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


out  his  toes,  and  remind  him  that  Keeper  Hat- 
ton  was  a  great  dancer.  We  wish  that,  in  our 
own  time,  a  writer  of  a  very  different  order 
from  Puff  had  not  too  often  forgotten  human 
nature  in  the  niceties  of  upholstery,  millinery, 
and  cookery. 

We  blame  Dryden,  not  because  the  persons 
of  his  dramas  are  not  Moors  or  Americans, 
but  because  they  are  not  men  and  women; 
not  because  love,  such  as  he  represents  it, 
could  not  exist  in  a  harem  or  in  a  wigwam, 
but  because  it  could  not  exist  anywhere.  As 
is  the  love  of  his  heroes,  such  are  all  their 
other  emotions.  All  their  qualities,  their  cou 
rage,  their  generosity,  their  pride,  are  on  the 
same  colossal  scale.  Justice  and  prudence 
are  virtues  which  can  exist  only  in  a  moderate 
degree,  and  which  change  their  nature  and 
their  name  if  pushed  to  excess.  Of  justice  and 
prudence,  therefore,  Dryden  leaves  his  favour 
ites  destitute.  He  did  not  care  to  give  them 
what  he  could  not  give  without  measure.  The 
tyrants  and  ruffians  are  merely  the  heroes  al 
tered  by  a  few  touches,  similar  to  those  which 
transformed  the  honest  face  of  Sir  Roger  de 
Coverley  into  the  Saracen's  head.  Through 
the  grin  and  frown,  the  original  features  are 
still  perceptible. 

It  is  in  the  tragicomedies  that  these  absurdi 
ties  strike  us  most.  The  two  races  of  men,  or 
rather  the  angels  and  the  baboons,  are  there 
presented  to  us  together.  We  meet  in  one 
scene  with  nothing  but  gross,  selfish,  unblush 
ing,  lying  libertines  of  both  sexes,  who,  as  a 
punishment,  we  suppose,  for  their  depravity, 
are  condemned  to  talk  nothing  but  prose.  But 
as  soon  as  we  meet  with  people  who  speak  in 
verse,  we  know  that  we  are  in  society  which 
would  have  enraptured  the  Cathos  and  Made- 
Ion  of  Moliere,  in  society  for  which  Oroon- 
dates  would  have  too  little  of  the  lover,  Clelia 
too  much  of  the  coquette. 

As  Dryden  was  unable  to  render  his  plays 
interesting  by  means  of  that  which  is  the  pecu 
liar  and  appropriate  excellence  of  the  drama, 
it  was  necessary  that  he  should  find  some 
substitute  for  it.  In  his  comedies  he  supplied 
its  place,  sometimes  by  wit,  but  more  fre 
quently  by  intrigue,  by  disguises,  mistakes  of 
persons,  dialogues  at  cross  purposes,  hair 
breadth  escapes,  perplexing  concealments,  and 
rurprising  disclosures.  He  thus  succeeded  at 
least  in  making  these  pieces  very  amusing. 

In  his  tragedies  he  trusted,  and  not  alto 
gether  without  reason,  to  his  diction  and  his 
versification.  It  was  on  this  account,  in  all 
probability,  that  he  so  eagerly  adopted,  and  so 
reluctantly  abandoned,  the  practice  of  rhym 
ing  in  his  plays.  What  is  unnatural  appears 
less  unnatural  in  that  species  of  verse,  than  in 
lines  which  approach  more  nearly  to  common 
conversation  ;  and  in  the  management  of  the 
heroic  couplet,  Dryden  has  never  been  equalled. 
It  is  unnecessary  to  urge  any  arguments  against 
a  fashion  now  universally  condemned.  But 
ir  is  worthy  of  observation,  that  though  Dry 
den  was  deficient  in  that  talent  which  blank 
verse  exhibits  to  the  greatest  advantage,  and 
was  certainly  the  best  writer  of  heroic  rhyme 
in  our  language,  yet  the  plays  which  have, 
from  the  time  of  their  first  appearance,  been 


considered  as  his  best,  are  in  blank  verse.  Ni 
experiment  can  be  more  decisive. 

It  must  be  allowed,  that  the  worst  even  of 
the  rhyming  tragedies  contains  good  descrip 
tion  and  magnificent  rhetoric.  But,  even  when 
we  forget  that  they  are  plays,  and,  passing  by 
their  dramatic  improprieties,  consider  them 
with  reference  to  the  language,  we  are  perpe 
tually  disgusted  by  passages  which  it  is  diffd- 
cult  to  conceive  how  any  author  could  have 
written,  or  any  audience  have  tolerated ;  rants 
in  which  the  raving  violence  of  the  manner 
forms  a  strange  contrast  with  the  abject  tame- 
ness  of  the  thought.  The  author  laid  the  whole 
fault  on  the  audience,  and  declared,  that  when, 
he  wrote  them,  he  considered  them  bad  enough 
to  please.  This  defence  is  unworthy  of  a  man 
of  genius,  and,  after  all,  is  no  defence.  Ot- 
way  pleased  without  rant;  and  so  might  Dry 
den  have  done,  if  he  had  possessed  the  powers 
of  Otway.  The  fact  is,  that  he  had  a  tendency 
to  bombast,  which,  though  subsequently  cor 
rected  by  .time  and  thought,  was  never  wholly 
removed,  and  which  showed  itself  in  perform 
ances  not  designed  to  please  the  rude  mob  of 
the  theatre. 

Some  indulgent  critics  have  represented  thif 
failing  as  an  indication  of  genius,  as  the  pro 
fusion  of  unlimited  wealth,  the  wantonness  of 
exuberant  vigour.  To  us  it  seems  to  bear  a 
nearer  affinity  to  the  tawdriness  of  poverty,  or 
the  spasms  and  convulsions  of  weakness.  Dry 
den  surely  had  not  more  imagination  than 
Homer,  Dante,  or  Milton,  who  never  fall  into 
this  vice.  The  swelling  diction  of  ^Eschylus 
and  Isaiah  resembles  that  of  Almanzor  and 
Maximin  no  more  than  the  tumidity  of  a  mus 
cle  resembles  the  tumidity  of  a  boil.  The 
former  is  symptomatic  of  health  and  strength, 
the  latter  of  debility  and  disease.  If  ever 
Shakspeare  rants,  it  is  not  when  his  imagina 
tion  is  hurrying  him  along,  but  when  he  is  hur 
rying  his  imagination  along — when  his  mind 
is  for  a  moment  jaded — when,  as  was  said  of 
Euripides,  he  resembles  a  lion,  who  excites 
his  own  fury  by  lashing  himself  with  his  tail. 
What  happened  to  Shakspeare  from  the  occa 
sional  suspension  of  his  powers,  happened  to 
Dryden  from  constant  impotence.  He,  lik» 
his  confederate  Lee,  had  judgment  enough  to 
appreciate  the  great  poets  of  the  preceding 
age,  but  not  judgment  enough  to  shun  compe 
tition  with  them.  He  felt  and  admired  their 
wild  and  daring  sublimity.  That  it  belonged 
to  another  age  than  that  in  which  he  lived,  and 
required  other  talents  than  those  which  he 
possessed ;  that,  in  aspiring  to  emulate  it,  he 
was  wasting,  in  a  hopeless  attempt,  powers 
which  might  render  him  pre-eminent  in  a  dif 
ferent  career,  was  a  lesson  which  he  did  not 
learn  till  late.  As  those  knavish  enthusiasts, 
the  French  prophets,  courted  inspiration,  by 
mimicking  the  writhings,  swoonings,  and  gasp- 
ings,  which  they  considered  as  its  symptoms, 
he  attempted,  by  affected  fits  of  poetical  fury, 
to  bring  on  a  real  paroxysm ;  and,  like  them, 
he  got  nothing  but  his  distortions  for  his  pains. 

Horace  very  happily  compares  those  who, 
in  his  time,  imitated  Pindar,  to  the  youth  wko 
attempted  to  fly  to  heaven  on  waxen  wings,, 
and  who  experienced  so  fatal  and  ignominioy* 


DRYDEN. 


47 


a  fall.  His  own  admirable  good  sense  pre 
served  him  from  this  error,  and  taught  him  to 
cultivate  a  style  in  which  excellence  was 
within  his  reach.  Dryden  had  not  the  same 
self-knowledge.  He  saw  that  the  greatest 
poets  were  never  so  successful  as  when  they 
rushed  beyond  the  ordinary  bounds,  and  that 
some  inexplicable  good  fortune  preserved 
them  from  tripping  even  when  they  staggered 
on  the  brink  of  nonsense.  He  did  not  per 
ceive  that  they  were  guided  and  sustained  by 
a  power  denied  to  himself.  They  wrote  from 
the  dictation  of  the  imagination,  and  they 
found  a  response  in  the  imaginations  of  others. 
He,  on  the  contrary,  sat  down  to  work  him 
self,  by  reflection  and  argument,  into  a  deli 
berate  wildness,  a  rational  frenzy. 

In  looking  over  the  admirable  designs  which 
accompany  the  Faust,  we  have  always  been 
much  struck  by  one  which  represents  the  wi 
zard  and  the  tempter  riding  at  full  speed.  The 
demon  sits  on  his  furious  horse  as  heedlessly 
as  if  he  were  reposing  on  a  chair.  That  he 
should  keep  his  saddle  in  such  a  posture, 
would  seem  impossible  to  any  who  did  not 
know  that  he  was  secure  in  the  privileges  of 
a  superhuman  nature.  The  attitude  of  Faust, 
on  the  contrary,  is  the  perfection  of  horseman 
ship.  Poets  of  the  first  order  might  safely 
write  as  desperately  as  Mephistopheles  rode. 
But  Dryden,  though  admitted  to  communion 
with  higher  spirits,  though  armed  with  a  por 
tion  of  their  power,  and  intrusted  with  some 
of  their  secrets,  was  of  another  race.  What 
they  might  securely  venture  to  do,  it  was  mad 
ness  in  him  to  attempt.  It  was  necessary  that 
taste  and  critical  science  should  supply  its 
deficiencies. 

We  will  give  a  few  examples.  Nothing  can 
be  finer  than  the  description  of  Hector  at  the 
Grecian  wall. 


o  3'  ap'  eaSopf  0 
i  Sot)  araAajTo?  viruiria 

a),  TOV  ecffTO  ircpi  xpof  <5°t° 


E*rejp, 


Nocr</>i  $£wf,  or'  eaa\ro  nv\af  rtvpi  J*  oae 
Avrtica  <J"  01  fjiev  reixos  vwepfiaaav,  ot  Se  KUT'  auraj 
rag  etr£\vvTa  iruAaj.     Aavaot  S1  c<(>o@r)$£v 
ava  yhaQvpas'  o//ajoj  6'  aAtaor 


What  daring  expressions!  Yet  how  signi 
ficant  !  How  picturesque  !  Hector  seems  to 
rise  up  in  his  strength  and  fury.  The  gloom 
of  night  in  his  frown  —  the  fire  burning  in  his 
eyes  —  the  javelins  and  the  blazing  armour  — 
the  mighty  rush  through  the  gates  and  down 
the  battlements  —  the  trampling  and  the  infinite 
roar  of  the  multitude  —  every  thing  is  with  us; 
every  thing  is  real. 

Dryden  has  described  a  very  similar  event 
in  Maximin  ;  and  has  done  his  best  to  be  sub 
lime,  as  follows  : 

"  Thero  with  a  forest  of  their  darts  he  strove, 
And  stood  like  Capaneus  defying  Jove  ; 
With  his  broad  sword  the  boldest  beating  down, 
Till  Fate  grew  pale,  lest  he  should  win  the  town, 
And  turned  the  iron  leaves  of  its  dark  book 
To  make  new  dooms,  or  mend  what  it  mistook." 

How  exquisite  is  the  imagery  of  the  fairy- 
songs  in  the  Tempest  and  the  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream;  Ariel  riding  through  the  twi 
light  on  the  bat,  or  sucking  in  the  bells  of 


flowers  with  the  bee ;  or  the  little  bower-women 
of  Titania,  driving  the  spiders  from  the  couch 
of  the  Queen !  Dryden  truly  said,  that 

"  Shakspeare's  magic  could  riot  copied  be; 
Within  the  circle  none  durst  walk  but  he." 

It  would  have  been  well  if  he  had  not  himself 
dared  to  step  within  the  enchanted  line,  and 
drawn  on  himself  a  fate  similar  to  that  which, 
according  to  the  old  superstition,  punished 
such  presumptuous  interferences.  The  follow 
ing  lines  are  parts  of  the  song  of  his  fairies  : 

"Merry,  merry,  merry,  we  sail  from  the  East, 
Half-tippled  at  a  rainbow  feast. 
In  the  bright  moonshine,  while  winds  whistle  loud, 
Tivy,  tivy,  tivy,  we  mount  and  we  fly, 
All  racking  along  in  a  downy  white  cloud ; 
And  lest  our  leap  from  the  sky  prove  too  far, 
We  slide  on  the  back  of  a  new  falling  star, 
And  drop  from  above 
In  a  jelly  of  love." 

These  are  very  favourable  instances.  Those 
who  wish  for  a  bad  one  may  read  the  dying 
speeches  of  Maximin,  and  may  compare  them 
with  the  last  scenes  of  Othello  and  Lear. 

If  Dryden  had  died  before  the  expiration  of 
the  first  of  the  periods  into  which  we  have  di 
vided  his  literary  life,  he  would  have  left  a  re 
putation,  at  best,  little  higher  than  that  of  Lee 
or  Davenant.  He  would  have  been  known  only 
to  men  of  letters ;  and  by  them,  he  would  have 
been  mentioned  as  a  writer  who  threw  away, 
on  subjects  which  he  was  incompetent  to  treat, 
powers  which,  judiciously  employed,  might 
have  raised  him  to  eminence;  whose  diction 
and  whose  numbers  had  sometimes  very  high 
merit,  but  all  whose  works  were  blemished  by 
a  false  taste  and  by  errors  of  gross  negligence. 
A  few  of  his  prologues  and  epilogues  might  per 
haps  still  have  been  remembered  and  quoted. 
In  these  little  pieces,  he  early  showed  all  the 
powers  which  afterwards  rendered  him  the 
greatest  of  modern  satirists.  But  during  the 
latter  part  of  his  life,  he  gradually  abandoned 
the  drama.  His  plays  appeared  at  longer  in 
tervals.  He  renounced  rhyme  in  tragedy.  His 
language  became  less  turgid,  his  characters 
less  exaggerated.  He  did  not  indeed  produce 
correct  representations  of  human  nature  ;  but 
he  ceased  to  daub  such  monstrous  chimeras  as 
those  which  abound  in  his  earlier  pieces.  Here 
and  there  passages  occur  worthy  of  the  best 
ages  of  the  British  stage.  The  style  which  the 
drama  requires  changes  with  every  change  of 
character  and  situation.  He  who  can  vary  his 
manner  to  suit  the  variation  is  the  great  drama 
tist  ;  but  he  who  excels  in  one  manner  only, 
will,  when  that  manner  happens  to  be  appro 
priate,  appear  to  be  a  great  dramatist ;  as  the 
hands  of  a  watch,  which  does  not  go,  point 
right  once  in  the  twelve  hours.  Sometimes 
there  is  a  scene  of  solemn  debate.  This  a  mere 
rhetorician  may  write  as  well  as  the  greatest 
tragedian  that  ever  lived.  We  confess  that  to 
us  the  speech  of  Sempronius  in  Gato  seems 
very  nearly  as  good  as  Shakspeare  could  have 
made  it.  But  when  the  senate  breaks  up,  and 
we  find  that  the  lovers  and  their  mistresses,  the 
hero,  the  villain,  and  the  deputy  villain,  all 
ontinue  to  harangue  in  the  same  style, 
we  perceive  the  difference  between  a  man 
who  can  write  a  play  and  a  man  who  can 


48 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


write  a  speech.  In  the  same  manner,  wit,  a 
talent  for  description,  or  a  talent  for  narration, 
may,  for  a  time,  pass  for  dramatic  genius. 
Dryden  was  an  incomparable  reasoner-in  verse. 
He  was  conscious  of  his  power ;  he  was  proud 
of  it ;  and  the  authors  of  the  Rehearsal  justly 
charged  him  with  abusing  it.  His  warriors  and 
princesses  are  fond  of  discussing  points  of 
amorous  casuistry,  such  as  would  have  de 
lighted  a  Parliament  of  Love.  They  frequently 
go  still  deeper,  and  speculate  on  philosophical 
necessity  and  the  origin  of  evil. 

There  were,  however,  some  occasions  which 
absolutely  required  this  peculiar  talent.  Then 
Dryden  was  indeed  at  home.  All  his  best 
scenes  are  of  this  description.  They  are  all 
between  men ;  for  the  heroes  of  Dryden,  like 
many  other  gentlemen,  can  never  talk  sense 
when  ladies  are  in  company.  They  are  all 
intended  to  exhibit  the  empire  of  reason  over 
violent  passion.  We  have  two  interlocutors, 
the  one  eager  and  impassioned,  the  other  high, 
cool,  and  judicious.  The  composed  and  ra 
tional  character  gradually  acquires  the  ascend 
ency.  His  fierce  companion  is  first  inflamed 
to  rage  by  his  reproaches,  then  overawed  by 
his  equanimity,  convinced  by  his  arguments, 
and  soothed  by  his  persuasions.  This  is  the 
case  in  the  scene  between  Hector  and  Troilus, 
in  that  between  Antony  and  Ventidius,  and  in 
that  between  Sebastian  and  Dorax.  Nothing 
of  the  same  kind  in  Shakspeare  is  equal  to 
them,  except  the  quarrel  between  Brutus  and 
Cassius,  which  is  worth  them  all  three. 

Some  years  before  his  death,  Dryden  alto 
gether  ceased  to  write  for  the  stage.  He  had 
turned  his  powers  in  a  new  direction,  with 
success  the  most  splendid  and  decisive.  His 
taste  had  gradually  awakened  his  creative  fa 
culties.  The  first  rank  in  poetry  was  beyond 
his  reach,  but  he  challenged  and  secured  the 
most  honourable  place  in  the  second.  His 
imagination  resembled  the  wings  of  an  ostrich. 
It  enabled  him  to  run,  though  not  to  soar. 
When  he  attempted  the  highest  flights,  he  be 
came  ridiculous  ;  but  while  he  remained  in  a 
lower  region,  he  outstripped  all  competitors. 

All  his  natural  and  all  his  acquired  powers 
fitted  him  to  found  a  good  critical  school  of 
poetry.  Indeed,  he  carried  his  reforms  too  far 
for  his  age.  After  his  death,  our  literature  re 
trograded  ;  and  a  century  was  necessary  to  bring 
it  back  to  the  point  at  which  he  left  it.  The 
general  soundness  and  healthfulness  of  his 
mental  constitution ;  his  information,  of  vast 
superficies,  though  of  small  volume  ;  his  wit, 
scarcely  inferior  to  that  of  the  most  distinguish 
ed  followers  of  Donne  ;  his  eloquence,  grave, 
deliberate,  and  commanding,  could  not  save 
him  from  disgraceful  failure  as  a  rival  of 
Shakspeare,  but  raised  him  far  above  the  level 
of  Boileau.  His  command  of  language  was 
immense.  With  him  died  the  secret  of  the  old 
poetical  diction  of  England — the  art  of  pro 
ducing  rich  effects  by  familiar  words.  In  the 
following  century,  it  was  as  completely  lost  as 
rne  Gothic  method  of  painting  glass,  and  was 
imt  poony  supplied  by  the  laborious  and  tesse- 
laied  imitations  of  Mason  and  Gray.  On  the 
other  hand,  he  was  the  first  writer  under  whose 
•kilful  management  the  scientific  vocabulary 


fell  into  natural  and  pleasing  verse.  In  this 
department,  he  succeeded  as  completely  as  his 
contemporary  Gibbons  succeeded  in  the  similar 
enterprise  of  carving  the  most  delicate  flowers 
from  heart  of  oak.  The  toughest  and  most 
knotty  parts  of  language  became  ductile  at  his 
touch.  His  versification  in  the  same  manner, 
while  it  gave  the  first  model  of  that  neatness 
and  precision  which  the  following  generation 
esteemed  so  highly,  exhibited,  at  the  same 
time,  the  last  examples  of  nobleness,  freedom, 
variety  of  pause  and  cadence.  His  tragedies 
in  rhyme,  however  worthless  in  themselves, 
had  at  least  served  the  purpose  of  nonsense- 
verses  :  they  had  taught  him  all  the  arts  of  me 
lody  which  the  heroic  couplet  admits.  For 
bombast,  his  prevailing  vice,  his  new  subjects 
gave  little  opportunity;  his  better  taste  gra 
dually  discarded  it. 

He  possessed,  as  we  have  said,  in  a  pre- 
eminent  degree,  the  power  of  reasoning  in 
verse ;  and  this  power  was  now  peculiarly  use 
ful  to  him.  His  logic  is  by  no  means  uni 
formly  sound.  On  poiats  of  criticism,  he  al 
ways  reasons  ingeniously;  and,  when  he  is 
disposed  to  be  honest,  correctly.  But  the  theo 
logical  and  political  questions,  which  he  under 
took  to  treat  ia  verse,  were  precisely  those 
which  he  uuderstood  least.  His  arguments, 
therefore,  are  often  worthless.  But  the  man 
ner  in  which  they  are  stated  is  beyond  all 
praise.  The  style  is  transparent.  The  topics 
follow  each  other  in  the  happiest  order.  The 
objections  are  drawn  up  in  such  a  manner, 
that  the  whole  fire  of  the  reply  may  be  brought 
to  bear  on  them.  The  circumlocutions  which 
are  substituted  for  technical  phrases,  are  clear, 
neat,  and  exact.  The  illustrations  at  once 
adorn  and  elucidate  the  reasoning.  The  spark 
ling  epigrams  of  Cowley,  and  the  simple  garru 
lity  of  the  burlesque  poets  of  Italy,  are  alter 
nately  employed,  in  the  happiest  manner,  to 
give  effect  to  what  is  obvious  ;  or  clearness  to 
what  is  obscure. 

His  literary  creed  was  catholic,  even  to  lati- 
tudinarianism ;  not  from  any  want  of  acute- 
ness,  but  from  a  disposition  to  be  easily  satis 
fied.  He  was  quick  to  discern  the  smallest 
glimpse  of  merit;  he  was  indulgent  even  to 
gross  improprieties,  when  accompanied  by  any 
redeeming  talent.  When  he  said  a  severe 
thing,  it  was  to  serve  a  temporary  purpose, — 
to  support  an  argument,  or  to  tease  a  rival. 
Never  was  so  able  a  critic  so  free  from  fastidi 
ousness.  He  loved  the  old  poets,  especially 
Shakspeare.  He  admired  the  ingenuity  which 
Donne  and  Cowley  had  so  wildly  abused.  He 
did  justice,  amidst  the  general  silence,  to  the 
memory  of  Milton.  He  praised  to  the  skies 
the  schoolboy  lines  of  Addison.  Always  look 
ing  on  the  fair  side  of  every  object,  he  admired 
extravagance  on  account  of  the  invention 
which  he  supposed  it  to  indicate  ;  he  excused 
affectation  in  favour  of  wit;  he  tolerated  even 
lameness  for  the  sake  of  the  correctness  which 
was  its  concomitant. 

It  was  probably  to  this  turn  of  mind,  rather 
than  to  the  more  disgraceful  causes  which 
Johnson  has  assigned,  that  we  are  to  attribute 
the  exaggeration  which  disfigures  the  pane 
gyrics  of  Dryden.  No  writer,  it  must  b* 


DRYDEN. 


49 


owned,  lias  carried  the  flattery  of  dedication  to 
a  greater  length.  But  this  was  not,  we  sus 
pect,  merely  interested  servility ;  it  was  me 
overflowing  of  a  mind  singularly  disposed  to 
admiration, — of  a  mind  which  diminished 
vices,  and  magnified  virtues  and  obligations. 
The  most  adulatory  of  his  addresses  is  that  in 
which  he  dedicates  the  State  of  Innocence  to 
Mary  of  Modena.  Johnson  thinks  it  strange 
that  any  man  should  use  such  language  with 
out  self-detestation.  But  he  has  not  re 
marked  that  to  the  very  same  work  is  pre 
fixed  an  eulogium  on  Milton,  which  certainly 
could  not  have  been  acceptable  at  the  court 
of  Charles  the  Second.  Many  years  later, 
when  Whig  principles  were  in  a  great  mea 
sure  triumphant,  Sprat  refused  to  admit  a  mo 
nument  of  John  Philips  into  Westminster  Ab 
bey,  because,  in  the  epitaph,  the  name  of  Mil 
ton  incidentally  occurred.  The  walls  of  his 
church,  he  declared,  should  not  be  polluted  by 
the  name  of  a  republican  !  Dryden  was  at 
tached,  both  by  principle  and  interest  to  the 
court.  But  nothing  could  deaden  his  sensibi 
lity  to  excellence.  We  are  unwilling  to  accuse 
him  severely,  because  the  same  disposition, 
which  prompted  him  to  pay  so  generous  a 
tribute  to  the  memory  of  a  poet  whom  his  pa 
trons  detested,  hurried  him  into  extravagance 
when  he  described  a  princess,  distinguished  by 
the  splendour  of  her  beauty,  and  the  gracious- 
ness  of  her  manners. 

This  is  an  amiable  temper;  but  it  is  not  the 
temper  of  great  men.  Where  there  is  eleva 
tion  of  character,  there  will  be  fastidiousness. 
It  is  only  in  novels,  and  on  tombstones,  that 
we  meet  with  people  who  are  indulgent  to  the 
faults  of  others,  and  unmerciful  to  their  own; 
and  Dryden,  at  all  events,  was  not  one  of 
these  paragons.  His  charity  was  extended 
most  liberally  to  others,  but  it  certainly  began 
at  home.  In  taste  he  was  by  no  means  defi 
cient.  His  critical  works  are,  beyond  all  com 
parison,  superior  to  any  which  had,  till  then, 
appeared  in  England.  They  were  generally 
intended  as  apologies  for  his  own  poems,  ra 
ther  than  as  expositions  of  general  principles; 
he,  therefore,  often  attempts  to  deceive  the 
reader  by  sophistry,  which  could  scarcely  have 
deceived  himself.  His  dicta  are  the  dicta,  not 
of  a  judge,  but  of  an  advocate ;  often  of  an 
advocate  in  an  unsound  cause.  Yet,  in  the 
very  act  of  misrepresenting  the  laws  of  com 
position,  he  shows  how  well  he  understands 
them.  But  he  was  perpetually  acting  against 
his  better  knowledge.  His  sins  were  sins  against 
light.  He  trusted,  that  what  was  bad  would 
be  pardoned  for  the  sake  of  what  was  good. 
What  was  good,  he  took  no  pains  to  make  bet 
ter.  He  was  not,  like  most  persons  who  rise 
to  eminence,  dissatisfied  even  with  his  best 
productions.  He  had  set  up  no  unattainable 
standard  of  perfection,  the  contemplation  of 
which  might  at  once  improve  and  mortify  him. 
His  path  was  not  attended  by  an  unapproach 
able  mirage  of  excellence,  forever  receding 
and  forever  pursued.  He  was  not  disgusted 
bv  the  negligence  of  others,  and  he  extended 
the  same  toleration  to  himself.  His  mind  was 
of  a  slovenly  character — fond  of  splendour, 
but  indifferent  to  neatness.  Hence  most  of 

VOL.  I-  7 


his  writings  exhibit  the  sluggish  magni^cencc 
of  a  Russian  noble,  all  vermin  and  diamond'', 
dirty  linen  and  inestimable  sables.  Those 
faults  which  spring  from  affectation,  t  me  and 
thought  in  a  great  measure  removed  1/om  his 
poems.  But  his  carelessness  he  retained  to 
the  last.  If  towards  the  close  of  his  life  h 
less  frequently  went  wrong  from  negligence, 
it  was  only  because  long  habits  of  composition 
rendered  it  more  easy  to  go  right.  In  his  best 
pieces,  we  find  false  rhymes — triplets,  in  which 
the  third  line  appears  to  be  a  mere  intruder, 
and,  while  it  breaks  the  music,  adds  nothing  to 
the  meaning — gigantic  Alexandrines  of  four 
teen  and  sixteen  syllables,  and  truncated  verses 
for  which  he  never  troubled  himself  to  find  a 
termination  or  a  partner. 

Such  are  the  beauties  and  the  faults  which 
may  be  found  in  profusion  throughout  the  later 
works  of  Dryden.  A  more  just  and  complete 
estimate  of  his  natural  and  acquired  powers, 
of  the  merits  of  his  style  and  of  its  blemishes, 
may  be  formed  from  the  Hind  and  Panther, 
than  from  any  of  his  other  writings.  As  a 
didactic  poem,  it  is  far  superior  to  the  Religio 
Laici.  The  satirical  parts,  particularly  the 
character  of  Burnet,  are  scarcely  inferior  to 
the  best  passages  in  Absalom  and  Achitophcl. 
There  are,  moreover,  occasional  touches  of  a 
tenderness  which  affects  us  more,  because  it 
is  decent,  rational,  and  manly,  and  reminds  us 
of  the  best  scenes  in  his  tragedies.  His  versi 
fication  sinks  and  swells  in  happy  unison  with 
the  subject ;  and  his  wealth  of  language  seems 
to  be  unlimited.  Yet  the  carelessness  with 
which  he  has  constructed  his  plot,  and  the  in 
numerable  inconsistencies  into  which  he  is 
every  moment  falling,  detract  much  from  the 
pleasure  which  such  varied  excellence  affords. 

In  Absalom  and  Achitophel  he  hit  upon  a  new 
and  rich  vein,  which  he  worked  with  signal 
success.  The  ancient  satirists  were  the  sub 
jects  of  a  despotic  government.  They  were 
compelled  to  abstain  from  political  topics,  and 
to  confine  their  attention  to  the  frailties  of  pri 
vate  life.  They  might,  indeed,  sometimes  ven 
ture  to  take  liberties  with  public  men, 

"  Quorum  Flaminia  tegitur  cinis  at<iue  Latina." 

Thus  Juvenal  immortalized  the  obsequious 
senators,  who  met  to  decide  the  fate  of  the 
memorable  turbot.  His  fourth  satire  frequently 
reminds  us  of  the  great  political  poem  of  Dry 
den  ;  but  it  was  not  written  till  Domilian  had 
fallen,  and  it  wants  something  of  the  peculiar 
flavour  which  belongs  to  contemporary  invec 
tive  alone.  His  anger  has  stood  so  lon<r,  thai, 
though  the  body  is  not  impaired,  the  efferves 
cence,  the  first  cream,  is  gone.  Boileau  lay 
under  similar  restraints ;  and,  if  he  had  been 
free  from  all  restraint,  would  have  been  no 
match  for  our  countryman. 

The  advantages  which  Dryden  derived  from 
the  nature  of  his  subject  he  improved  to  the 
very  utmost.  His  manner  is  almost  perfect. 
The  style  of  Horace  and  Boileau  is  fit  only  for 
light  subjects.  The  Frenchman  did  indeed 
attempt  to  turn  the  theological  reasonings  of 
the  Provincial  Letters  into  verse,  but  with 
very  indifferent  success.  The  slitter  of  Pope 
is  cold.  The  ardour  of  Persms  is  without 


50 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


brilliancy.  Magnificent  versification  and  in 
genious  combinations  rarely  harmonize  with 
the  expression  of  deep  feeling.  In  Juvenal  and 
Dryden  alone  we  have  the  sparkle  and  the  heat 
together.  Those  great  satirists  succeeded  in 
communicating  the  fervour  of  their  feelings 
to  materials  the  most  incombustible,  and  kin 
dled  the  whole  mass  into  a  blaze  at  once 
dazzling  and  destructive.  We  cannot,  indeed, 
think,  without  regret,  of  the  part  which  so  emi 
nent  a  writer  as  Dryden  took  in  the  disputes 
of  that  period.  There  was,  no  doubt,  madness 
and  wickedness  on  both  sides.  But  there  was 
liberty  on  the  one,  and  despotism  on  the  other. 
On  this  point,  however,  we  will  not  dwell.  At 
Talavera  the  English  and  French  troops  for  a 
moment  suspended  their  conflict,  to  drink  of  a 
stream  which  flowed  between  them.  The 
shells  were  passed  across  from  enemy  to  ene 
my  without  apprehension  or  molestation.  We, 
in  the  same  manner,  would  rather  assist  our 
political  adversaries  to  drink  with  us  of  that 
fountain  of  intellectual  pleasure  which  should 
be  the  common  refreshment  of  both  parties, 
than  disturb  and  pollute  it  with  the  havoc  of 
unseasonable  hostilities. 

Macflecnoe  is  inferior  to  Absalom  and 
Achitophel,  only  in  the  subject.  In  the  execu 
tion  it  is  even  superior.  But  the  greatest  work 
of  Dryden  was  the  last,  the  Ode  on  Saint  Ce 
cilia's  day.  It  is  the  masterpiece  of  the  second 
class  of  poetry,  and  ranks  but  just  below  the 
great  models  of  the  first.  It  reminds  us  of  the 
Pedasus  of  Achilles, 


Jj  Kfll  S 


CtlV,  £!!£$'  ITTTOJf 


By  comparing  it  with  the  impotent  ravings 
of  the  heroic  tragedies,  we  may  measure  the 
progress  which  the  mind  of  Dryden  had  made. 
He  had  learned  to  avoid  a  too  audacious  com 
petition  with  higher  natures,  to  keep  at  a  dis 
tance  from  the  verge  of  bombast  or  nonsense, 
to  venture  on  no  expression  which  did  not 
convey  a  distinct  idea  to  his  own  mind. 
There  is  none  of  that  "  darkness  visible"  of 
style  which  he  had  formerly  affected,  and  in 
which  the  greatest  poets  only  can  succeed. 
Every  thing  is  definite,  significant,  and  pic 
turesque.  His  early  writings  resembled  the 
gigantic  works  of  those  Chinese  gardeners 
who  attempt  to  rival  nature  herself,  to  form 
cataracts  of  terrific  height  and  sound,  to  raise 
precipitous  ridges  of  mountains,  and  to  imi 
tate  in  artificial  plantations  the  vastness  and 
trie  gloom  of  some  primeval  forest.  This  man 
ner  he  abandoned;  nor  did  he  ever  adopt  the 
Dutch  taste  which  Pope  affected,  the  trim 


parterres  and  the  rectangular  walks.  He 
rather  resembled  our  Kents  and  Browns, 
who,  imitating  the  great  features  of  land 
scape  without  emulating  them,  consulting  the 
genius  of  the  place,  assisting  nature  and  care 
fully  disguising  their  art,  produced,  not  a 
Chamouni  nor  a  Niagara,  but  a  Stowe  or  a 
Hagley. 

We  are,  on  the  whole,  inclined  to  regret  that 
Dryden  did  not  accomplish  his  purpose  of 
writing  an  epic  poem.  It  certainly  would  not 
have  been  a  work  of  the  highest  rank.  It 
would  not  have  rivalled  the  Iliad,  the  Odyssey, 
or  the  Paradise  Lost;  but  it  would  have  been 
superior  to  the  productions  of  Apollonius, 
Lucan,  or  Statius,  and  not  inferior  to  the  Jeru 
salem  Delivered.  It  would  probably  have  been 
a  vigorous  narrative,  animated  with  something 
of  the  spirit  of  the  old  romances,  enriched  with 
much  splendid  description,  and  interspersed 
with  fine  declamations  and  disquisitions.  The 
danger  of  Dryden  would  have  been  from  aim 
ing  too  high ;  from  dwelling  too  much,  for  ex 
ample,  on  his  angels  of  kingdoms,  and  attempt 
ing  a  competition  with  that  great  writer,  Avho 
in  his  own  time  had  so  incomparably  succeed 
ed  in  representing  to  us  the  sights  and  sounds 
of  another  world.  To  Milton,  and  to  Milton 
alone,  belonged  the  secrets  of  the  great  deep, 
the  beach  of  sulphur,  the  ocean  of  fire ;  the 
palaces  of  the  fallen  dominations,  glimmer 
ing  through  the  everlasting  shade,  the  silent 
wilderness  of  verdure  and  fragrance  where 
armed  angels  kept  watch  over  the  sleep  of  the 
first  lovers,  the  portico  of  diamond,  the  sea  of 
jasper,  the  sapphire  pavement  empurpled  v^ith 
celestial  roses,  and  the  infinite  ranks  of  the 
Cherubim,  blazing  with  adamant  and  gold. 
The  council,  the  tournament,  the  procession, 
the  crowded  cathedral,  the  camp,  the  guard 
room,  the  chase,  were  the  proper  scenes  for 
Dryden. 

But  we  have  not  space  to  pass  in  review  all 
the  works  which  Dryden  wrote.  We,  there 
fore,  will  not  speculate  longer  on  those  which 
he  might  possibly  have  written.  He  may,  on 
the  whole,  be  pronounced  to  have  been  a  man 
possessed  of  splendid  talents,  which  he  often 
abused,  and  of  a  sound  judgment,  the  admoni 
tions  of  which  he  often  neglected  ;  a  man  who 
succeeded  only  in  an  inferior  department  of 
his  art,  but  who,  in  that  department,  succeeded 
pre-eminently;  and  who,  with  a  mo»  3  inde 
pendent  spirit,  a  more  anxious  desire  >M:xcel 
lence,  and  more  respect  for  hims'ijf,  v  or  Id,  in 
his  own  walkt  have  attained  to  *,'so.  ji*  c«r 
fection 


HISTORY. 


51 


HISTOEY.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1828.] 


To  wr'te  history  respectably — that  is,  to  ab 
breviate  despatches,  and  make  extracts  from 
speeches,  to  intersperse  in  due  proportion 
epithets  of  praise  and  abhorrence,  to  draw  up 
antithetical  characters  of  great  men,  setting 
forth  how  many  contradictory  virtues  and 
vices  they  united,  and  abounding  in  withs  and 
wit/touts,-  all  this  is  very  easy.  But  to  be  a 
really  great  historian  is  perhaps  the  rarest  of 
intellectual  distinctions.  Many  Scientific  works 
are,  in  their  kind,  absolutely  perfect.  There 
are  Poems  which  we  should  be  inclined  to 
designate  as  faultless,  or  as  disfigured  only  by 
blemishes  which  pass  unnoticed  in  the  general 
blaze  of  excellence.  There  are  Speeches, 
some  speeches  of  Demosthenes  particularly, 
in  which  it  would  be  impossible  to  alter  a 
word,  without  altering  it  for  the  worse.  But 
we  are  acquainted  with  no  History  which  ap 
proaches  to  our  notion  of  what  a  history  ought 
to  be ;  with  no  history  which  does  not  widely 
depart,  either  on  the  right  hand  or  on  the  left, 
from  the  exact  line. 

The  cause  may  easily  be  assigned.  This 
province  of  literature  is  a  debatable  land.  It 
lies  on  the  confines  of  two  distinct  territories. 
It  is  under  the  jurisdiction  of  two  hostile 
powers  ;  and,  like  other  districts  similarly 
situated,  it  is  ill  defined,  ill  cultivated,  and  ill 
regulated.  Instead  of  being  equally  shared 
between  its  two  rulers,  the  Reason  and  the 
Imagination,  it  falls  alternately  under  the  sole 
and  absolute  dominion  of  each.  It  is  some 
times  fiction.  It  is  sometimes  theory. 

History,  it  has  been  said,  is  philosophy 
teaching  by  examples.  Unhappily  what  the 
philosophy  gains  in  soundness  and  depth,  the 
examples  generally  lose  in  vividness.  A  per 
fect  historian  must  possess  an  imagination 
sufficiently  powerful  to  make  his  narrative 
affecting  and  picturesque.  Yet  he  must  con 
trol  it  so  absolutely  as  to  content  himself  with 
the  materials  which  he  finds,  and  to  refrain 
from  supplying  deficiencies  by  additions  of  his 
own.  He  must  be  a  profound  and  ingenious 
reasoner.  Yet  he  must  possess  sufficient  self- 
command  to  abstain  from  casting  his  facts  in 
the  mould  of  his  hypothesis.  Those  who  can 
justly  estimate  these  almost  insuperable  diffi 
culties  will  not  think  it  strange  that  every 
writer  should  have  failed,  either  in  the  narra 
tive  or  in  the  speculative  department  of  his 
tory. 

It  may  be  laid  down  as  a  general  rule,  though 
subject  to  considerab'e  qualifications  and  ex 
ceptions,  that  history  oegins  in  Novel  and  ends 
in  Essay.  Of  the  romantic  historians  Herodo 
tus  is  the  earliest  and  the  best.  His  animation, 
his  simple-hearted  tenderness,  his  wonderful 


*  Tke  Romance  of  History.      England.      By  HENRY 
NKELE.  London,  1828. 


talent  for  description  and  dialogue,  and  the 
pure  sweet  flow  of  his  language,  place  him  at 
the  head  of  narrators.  He  reminds  us  of  a 
delightful  child.  There  is  a  grace  beyond  the 
reach  of  affectation  in  his  awkwardness,  a 
malice  in  his  innocence,  an  intelligence  in  his 
nonsense,  an  insinuating  eloquence  in  his  lisp. 
We  know  of  no  writer  who  makes  such  in 
terest  for  himself  and  his  book  in  the  heart  of 
the  reader.  At  the  distance  of  three-and-twenty 
centuries,  we  feel  for  him  the  same  sort  of 
pitying  fondness  which  Fontaine  and  Gay  are 
said  to  have  inspired  in  society.  He  has 
written  an  incomparable  book.  He  has  writ 
ten  something  better  perhaps  than  the  best 
history;  but  he  has  not  written  a  good  history; 
he  is,  from  the  first  to  the  last  chapter,  an  in 
ventor.  We  do  not  here  refer  merely  to  those 
gross  fictions  with  which  he  has  been  reproach 
ed  by  the  critics  of  later  times.  We  speak  of 
that  colouring  which  is  equally  diffused  over 
his  whole  narrative,  and  which  perpetually 
leaves  the  most  sagacious  reader  in  doubt 
what  to  reject  and  what  to  receive.  The  most 
authentic  parts  of  his  work  bear  the  same  re 
lation  to  his  wildest  legends,  which  Henry  the 
Fifth  bears  to  the  Tempest.  There  was  an 
expedition  undertaken  by  Xerxes  against 
Greece ;  and  there  was  an  invasion  of  France. 
There  was  a  battle  at  Platoea;  and  there  was 
a  battle  at  Agincourt.  Cambridge  and  Exeter, 
the  Constable  and  the  Dauphin,  were  persons 
as  real  as  Demaratus  and  Pausanias.  The 
harangue  of  the  Archbishop  on  the  Salic  Law 
and  the  Book  of  Numbers  differs  much  less 
from  the  orations  which  have  in  all  ages  pro 
ceeded  from  the  Right  Reverend  bench,  than 
the  speeches  of  Mardonius  and  Artabanus, 
from  those  which  were  delivered  at  the  Coun 
cil-board  of  Susa.  Shakspeare  gives  us  enu 
merations  of  armies,  and  returns  of  killed  and 
wounded,  which  are  not,  we  suspect,  much, 
less  accurate  than  those  of  Herodotus.  There 
are  passages  in  Herodotus  nearly  as  long  as 
acts  of  Shakspeare,  in  which  every  thing  is 
told  dramatically,  and  in  which  the  narrative 
serves  only  the  purpose  of  stage-directions.  It 
is  possible,  no  doubt,  that  the  substance  of  some 
real  conversations  may  have  been  reported 
to  the  historian.  But  events  which,  if  they 
ever  happened,  happened  in  ages  and  nations 
so  remote  that  the  particulars  could  never 
have  been  known  to  him,  are  related  with  the 
greatest  minuteness  of  detail.  We  have  all 
that  Candaules  said  to  Gyges,  and  all  that 
passed  between  Astyages  and  Harpagus.  Wo 
are,  therefore,  unable  to  judge  whether,  in  the 
account  which  he  gives  of  transactions,  re 
specting  which  he  might  possibly  have  been 
well  informed,  we  can  trust  to  any  thing  be 
yond  the  naked  outline ;  whether,  for  example, 
the  answer  of  Gelon  to  the  ambassadors  of  ,*hr 


k.9 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Grecian  confederacy,  or  the  expressions  which 
passed  between  Aristides  and  Themistocles  at 
their  famous  interview,  have  been  correctly 
transmitted  to  us.  The  great  events  are,  no 
doubt,  faithfully  related.  So,  probably,  are 
many  of  the  slighter  circumstances ;  but  which 
of  them  it  is  impossible  to  ascertain.  The  fic 
tions  are  so  much  like  the  facts,  and  the  facts 
so  much  like  the  fictions,  that,  with  respect  to 
many  most  interesting  particulars,  our  belief 
is  neither  given  nor  withheld,  but  remains  in 
an  uneasy  and  interminable  state  of  abeyance. 
We  know  that  there  is  truth,  but  we  cannot 
exactly  decide  where  it  lies. 

Tne  faults  of  Herodotus  are  the  faults  of  a 
simple  and  imaginative  mind.  Children  and 
servants  are  remarkably  Herodotean  in  their 
style  of  narration.  They  tell  every  thing  dra 
matically.  Their  says  ties  and  says  shes  are 
proverbial.  Every  person  who  has  had  to 
settle  their  disputes  knows  that,  even  when 
they  have  no  intention  to  deceive,  their  reports 
ef  conversation  always  require  to  be  carefully 
sifted.  If  an  educated  man  were  giving  an 
account  of  the  late  change  of  administration, 
he  would  say,  "Lord  Goderich  resigned;  and 
the  king  in  consequence  sent  for  the  Duke  of 
Wellington."  A  porter  tells  the  story  as  if  he 
had  been  hid  behind  the  curtains  of  the  royal 
bed  at  Windsor.  "  So  Lord  Goderich  says,  '  I 
cannot  manage  this  business  ;  I  must  go  out.' 
So  the  king  says,  says  he,  '  Well,  then,  I  must 
send  for  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  that's  all.' " 
This  is  the  very  manner  of  the  father  of  his 
tory. 

Herodotus  wrote  as  it  was  natural  that  he 
should  write.  He  wrote  for  a  nation  suscepti 
ble,  curious,  lively,  insatiably  desirous  of  no 
velty  and  excitement ;  for  a  nation  in  which 
the  fine  arts  had  attained  their  highest  excel 
lence,  but  in  which  philosophy  was  still  in  its 
infancy.  His  countrymen  had  but  recently 
begun  to  cultivate  prose  composition.  Public 
transactions  had  generally  been  recorded  in 
verse.  The  first  historians  might  therefore  in 
dulge,  without  fear  of  censure,  in  the  license 
allowed  to  their  predecessors  the  bards.  Books 
were  few.  The  events  of  former  times  were 
learned  from  tradition  and  from  popular  bal 
lads  ;  the  manners  of  foreign  countries  from 
the  reports  of  travellers.  It  is  well  known  that 
the  mystery  which  overhangs  what  is  distant, 
either  in  space  or  time,  frequently  prevents  us 
from  censuring  as  unnatural  what  we  perceive 
to  be  impossible.  We  stare  at  a  dragoon  who 
has  killed  three  French  cuirassiers  as  a  pro 
digy;  yet  we  read,  without  the  least  disgust, 
how  Godfrey  slew  his  thousands,  and  Rinaldo 
his  ten  thousands.  Within  the  last  hundred 
years  stories  about  China  and  Bantam,  which 
ough,  not  to  have  imposed  on  an  old  nurse, 
were  gravely  laid  down  as  foundations  of  po 
litical  theories  by  eminent  philosophers.  What 
the  time  of  the  Crusades  is  to  us,  the  genera 
tion  of  Croesus  and  Solon  was  to  the  Greeks 
of  the  time  of  Herodotus.  Babylon  was  to 
ihem.  what  Pekin  was  to  the  French  academi 
cians  of  the  last  century. 

For  such  a  people  was  the  book  of  Herodo- 
nis  composed  ;  and  if  we  may  trust  to  a  report, 
not  sanctioned,  indeed,  by  writers  of  high  au 


thority,  but  in  itself  not  improbat  «,  it  was 
composed  not  to  be  read,  but  to  be  .leard.  It 
was  not  to  the  slow  circulation  of  a  few  copies, 
which  the  rich  only  could  possess,  that  the  as 
piring  author  looked  for  his  reward.  The 
great  Olympian  festival — the  solemnity  which 
collected  multitudes,  proud  of  the  Grecian 
name,  from  the  wildest  mountains  of  Doris 
and  the  remotest  colonies  of  Italy  and  Lybia — 
was  to  witness  his  triumph.  The  interest  of 
the  narrative  and  the  beauty  of  the  style  were 
aided  by  the  imposing  effect  of  recitation — by 
the  splendour  of  the  spectacle — by  the  powerful 
influence  of  sympathy.  A  critic  who  could  have 
asked  for  authorities  in  the  midst  of  such  a  scene 
must  have  been  of  a  cold  and  sceptical  nature, 
and  few  such  critics  were  there.  As  was  the 
historian,  such  were  the  auditors — inquisitive, 
credulous,  easily  moved  by  religious  awe  or 
patriotic  enthusiasm.  They  were  the  very  men 
to  hear  with  delight  of  strange  beasts,  and 
birds,  and  trees  ;  of  dwarfs,  and  giants,  and 
cannibals ;  of  gods  whose  very  names  it  WLS 
impiety  to  utter;  of  ancient  dynasties  which 
had  left  behind  them  monuments  surpassing 
all  the  works  of  later  times ;  of  towns  like  pro 
vinces  ;  of  rivers  like  seas ;  of  stupendous 
walls,  and  temples,  and  pyramids;  of  the  rites 
which  the  Magi  performed  at  daybreak  on  the 
tops  of  the  mountains  ;  of  the  secrets  inscribed 
on  the  eternal  obelisks  of  Memphis.  With 
equal  delight  they  would  have  listened  to  the 
graceful  romances  of  their  own  country.  They 
now  heard  of  the  exact  accomplishment  of  ob 
scure  predictions ;  of  the  punishment  of  crimes 
over  which  the  justice  of  Heaven  had  seemed 
to  slpmber;  of  dream?,  omens,  warnings  from 
the  dead  ;  of  princesses  for  whom  noble  suit 
ors  contended  in  every  generous  exercise  oi* 
strength  and  skill ;  of  infante  strangely  pre 
served  from  the  dagger  of  the  assassin  to  fulfil 
high  destinies. 

As  the  narrative  approached  their  own  times 
the  interest  became  still  more  absorbing.  The 
chronicler  had  now  to  tell  the  story  of  that 
great  conflict  from  which  Europe  dates  its  in 
tellectual  and  political  supremacy — a  story 
which,  even  at  this  distance  of  time,  is  the 
most  marvellous  and  the  most  touching  in  the 
annals  of  the  human  race — a  story  abounding 
with  all  that  is  wild  and  wonderful,  with  all 
that  is  pathetic  and  animating;  with  the  gigan 
tic  caprices  of  infinite  wealth  and  despotic 
power;  with  the  mightier  miracles  of  wisdom, 
of  virtue,  and  of  courage.  He  told  them  of 
rivers  dried  up  in  a  day,  of  provinces  famished 
for  a  meal;  of  a  passage  for  ships  hewn  through 
the  mountains;  of  a  road  for  armies  spread  upon 
the  waves;  of  monarchies  and  commonwealths 
swept  away;  of  anxiety,  of  terror,  of  confusion, 
of  despair! — and  then  of  proud  and  stubborn 
hearts  tried  in  that  extremity  of  evil  and  not 
found  wanting;  of  resistance  long  maintained 
against  desperate  odds;  of  lives  dearly  sold 
when  resistance  could  be  maintained  no  more; 
of  signal  deliverance,  and  of  unsparing  re 
venge.  Whatever  gave  a  stronger  air  of  reality 
to  a  narrative  so  well  calculated  to  inflame  the 
passions  and  to  flatter  national  pride  was  cer« 
tain  to  be  favourably  received. 

Between  the  time  at  which  Herndotns  is  said 


HISTORY. 


53 


to  have  composed  his  history  and  the  close 
of  the  Peloponnesian  war  about  forty  years 
elapsed — forty  years  crowded  with  great  mili 
tary  and  political  events.  The  circumstances 
of  that  period  produced  a  great  effect  on  the 
Grecian  character;  and  nowhere  was  this  effect 
so  remarkable  as  in  the  illustrious  democracy 
of  Athens.  An  Athenian,  indeed,  even  in  the 
time  of  Herodotus,  would  scarcely  have  writ 
ten  a  book  so  romantic  and  garrulous  as  that  of 
Herodotus.  As  civilization  advanced,  the  citi 
zens  of  that  famous  republic  became  still  less 
visionary  and  still  less  simple-hearted.  They 
aspired  to  know  where  their  ancestors  had 
been  content  to  doubt;  they  began  to  doubt 
where  their  ancestors  had  thought  it  their  duty 
to  believe.  Aristophanes  is  fond  of  alluding 
to  this  change  in  the  temper  of  his  country 
men.  The  father  and  son,  in  the  Clouds,  are 
evidently  representatives  of  the  generations  to 
which  they  respectively  belonged.  Nothing 
more  clearly  illustrates  the  nature  of  this  mo 
ral  revolution  than  the  change  which  passed 
upon  tragedy.  The  wild  sublimity  of  jEschy- 
lus  became  the  scoff  of  every  young  Phidippi- 
des.  Lectures  on  abstruse  points  of  philoso 
phy,  the  fine  distinctions  of  casuistry,  and  the 
dazzling  fence  of  rhetoric,  were  substituted  for 
poetry.  The  language  lost  something  of  that 
infantine  sweetness  which  had  characterized 
it.  It  became  less  like  the  ancient  Tuscan,  and 
more  like  the  modern  French. 

The  fashionable  logic  of  the  Greeks  was, 
indeed,  far  from  strict.  Logic  never  can  be 
strict  where  books  are  scarce,  and  where  in 
formation  is  conveyed  orally.  We  are  all 
aware  how  frequently  fallacies  which,  when 
set  down  on  paper,  are  at  once  detected,  pass 
for  unanswerable  arguments  when  dexterously 
and  volubly  urged  in  parliament,  at  the  bar,  or 
in  private  conversation.  The  reason  is  evi 
dent.  We  cannot  inspect  them  closely  enough 
to  perceive  their  inaccuracy.  We  cannot  rea 
dily  compare  them  with  each  other.  We  lose 
sight  of  one  part  of  the  subject  before  another, 
which  ought  to  be  received  in  connection  with 
it,  comes  before  us;  and  as  there  is.no  im 
mutable  record  of  what  has  been  admitted  and 
of  what  has  been  denied,  direct  contradictions 
pass  muster  with  little  difficulty.  Almost  all 
the  education  of  a  Greek  consisted  in  talking 
and  listening.  His  opinions  on  governments 
Were  picked  up  in  the  debates  of  the  assembly. 
If  he  wished  to  study  metaphysics,  instead  of 
shutting  himself  up  with  a  book,  he  walked 
down  to  the  market-place  to  look  for  a  sophist. 
So  completely  were  men  formed  to  these  ha 
bits,  that  even  writing  acquired  a  conversa 
tional  air.  The  philosophers  adopted  the  form 
of  dialogue  as  the  most  natural  mode  of  com 
municating  knowledge.  Their  reasonings  have 
the  merits  and  the  defects  which  belong  to  that 
species  of  composition;  and  are  characterized 
rather  by  quickness  and  subtilty  than  by  depth 
and  precision.  Truth  is  exhibited  in  parts  and 
by  glimpses.  Innumerable  clever  hints  are 
given  ;  but  n  •  sound  and  durable  system  is 
erected.  The  argumentum  ad  hominem,  a  kind 
of  argument  most  efficacious  in  debate,  but 
int^rly  useless  for  the  investigation  of  general 
jumciples,  is  among  their  favourite  resources. 


Hence,  though  nothing  can  be  more  admirable 
;  than  the  skill  which  Socrates  displays  in  the 
!  conversations  which  Plato  has  reported  or  in 
vented,  his  victories  for  the  most  part  seem  to 
!  us  unprofitable.     A  trophy  is  set  up,  but  no 
j  new  province  is  added  to  the  dominions  of  the 
human  mind. 

Still,  where  thousands  of  keen  and  ready 
intellects  were  constantly  employed  in  specu 
lating  on  the  qualities  of  actions  and  on  the 
principles  of  government,  it  was  impossible 
that  history  should  retain  its  old  character.  It 
became  less  gossipping  and  less  picturesque ; 
but  much  more  accurate,  and  somewhat  more 
scientific. 

The  history  of  Thucydides  differs  from  that 
of  Herodotus  as  a  portrait  differs  from  the  re 
presentation  of  an  imaginary  scene;  as  the 
Burke  or  Fox  of  Reynolds  differs  from  his 
Ugolino  or  his  Beaufort.  In  the  former  case, 
the  archetype  is  given :  in  the  latter  it  is  cre 
ated.  The  faculties  which  are  required  for  the 
latter  purpose  are  of  a  higher  and  rarer  order 
than  those  which  suffice  for  the  former,  and 
indeed  necessarily  comprise  them.  He  who 
is  able  to  paint  what  he  sees  with  the  eye  of 
the  mind,  will  surely  be  able  to  paint  what  he 
sees  with  the  eye  of  the  body.  He  who  can 
invent  a  story  and  tell  it  well,  will  also  be  able 
to  tell,  in  an  interesting  manner,  a  story  which 
he  has  not  invented.  If,  in  practice,  some  of 
the  best  writers  of  fiction  have  been  among 
the  worst  writers  of  history,  it  has  been  be 
cause  one  of  their  talents  had  merged  in 
another  so  completely,  that  it  could  not  be 
severed;  because,  having  long  been  habituated 
to  invent  and  narrate  at  the  same  time,  they 
found  it  impossible  to  narrate  without  inventing. 
Some  capricious  and  discontented  artists 
have  affected  to  consider  portrait-painting  as 
unworthy  of  a  man  of  genius.  Some  critics 
have  spoken  in  the  same  contemptuous  man 
ner  of  history.  Johnson  puts  the  case  thus: 
The  historian  tells  either  what  is  false  or  what 
is  true.  In  the  former  case  he  is  no  historian. 
In  the  latter,  he  has  no  opportunity  for  display 
ing  his  abilities.  For  truth  is  one:  and  all 
who  tell  the  truth  must  tell  it  alike. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  elude  both  the  norns  of 
this  dilemma.  We  will  recur  to  the  analo 
gous  art  of  portrait-painting.  Any  man  with 
eyes  and  hands  may  be  taught  to  take  a  like 
ness.  The  process,  up  to  a  certain  point,  is 
merely  mechanical.  If  this  were  all,  a  man 
of  talents  might  justly  despise  the  occupation. 
But  we  could  mention  portraits  which  are  re 
semblances,  but  not  mere  resemblances ;  faith 
ful,  but  much  more  than  faithful ;  portraits 
which  condense  into  one  point  of  time,  and 
exhibit,  at  a  single  glance,  the  whole  history 
of  turbid  and  eventful  lives — in  whi^h  the  eye 
seems  to  scrutinize  us,  and  the  mourn  to  com 
mand  us — in  which  the  brow  menaces,  and  tht 
lip  almost  quivers  with  scorn — in  which  every 
wrinkle  is  a  comment  on  some  important 
transaction.  The  account  which  Thucvdides 
has  given  of  the  retreat  from  Syracuse  is, 
among  narratives,  what  Vandyck's  Lc  "d  Straf- 
ford  is  among  paintings. 

Diversity,  it  is  said,  implies  error;  truth  & 
one,  and  admits  of  no  degree.  We  answer, 


64 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


that  this  principle  holds  good  only  in  abstract 
reasonings.  When  we  talk  of  the  truth  of 
imitation  in  the  fine  arts,  we  mean  an  imper 
fect  and  a  graduated  truth.  No  picture  is  ex 
actly  like  the  original:  nor  is  a  picture  good 
in  proportion  as  it  is  like  the  original.  When 
Sir  Thomas  Lawrence  paints  a  handsome 
peeress,  he  does  not  contemplate  her  through 
a  powerful  microscope,  and  transfer  to  the 
canvass  the  pores  of  the  skin,  the  blood-vessels 
of  the  eye,  and  all  the  other  beauties  which 
Gulliver  discovered  in  the  Brobdignaggian 
maids  of  honour.  If  he  were  to  do  this,  the 
effect  would  not  merely  be  unpleasant,  but 
unless  the  scale  of  the  picture  were  propor- 
tionably  enlarged,  would  be  absolutely  false. 
And,  after  all,  a  microscope  of  greater  power 
than  that  which  he  had  employed  would  con 
vict  him  of  innumerable  omissions.  The  same 
may  be  said  of  history.  Perfectly  and  abso 
lutely  true,  it  cannot  be ;  for,  to  be  perfectly 
and  absolutely  true,  it  ought  to  record  all  the 
slightest  particulars  of  the  slightest  transac 
tions — all  the  things  done,  and  all  the  words 
uttered,  during  the  time  of  which  it  treats. 
The  omission  of  any  circumstance,  how 
ever  insignificant,  would  be  a  defect.  If  his 
tory  were  written  thus,  the  Bodleian  library 
would  not  contain  the  occurrences  of  a  week. 
What  is  told  in  the  fullest  and  most  accurate 
annafe  bears  an  infinitely  small  proportion  to 
what  is  suppressed.  The  difference  between 
the  copious  work  of  Clarendon,  and  the  ac 
count  of  the  civil  wars  in  the  abridgment  of 
Goldsmith,  vanishes,  when  compared  with  the 
immense  mass  of  facts  respecting  which  both 
are  equally  silent. 

No  picture,  then,  and  no  history,  can  present 
us  with  the  whole  truth  :  but  those  are  the  best 
pictures  and  the  best  histories  which  exhibit 
such  parts  of  the  truth  as  most  nearly  produce 
the  effect  of  the  whole.  He  who  is  deficient 
in  the  art  of  selection  may,  by  showing  no 
thing  but  the  truth,  produce  all  the  effect  of  the 
grossest  falsehood.  It  perpetually  happens 
that  one  writer  tells  less  truth  than  another, 
merely  because  he  tells  more  truths.  In  the 
imitative  arts  we  constantly  see  this.  There 
are  lines  in  the  human  face,  and  objects  in 
landscape,  which  stand  in  such  relations  to 
each  other,  that  they  ought  either  to  be  all  in 
troduced  into  a  painting  together,  or  all  omitted 
together.  A  sketch  into  which  none  of  them 
enters  may  be  excellent;  but  if  some  are  given 
and  others  left  out,  though  there  are  more 
points  of  likeness,  there  is  less  likeness.  An 
outline  scrawled  with  a  pen,  which  seizes  the 
marked  features  of  a  countenance,  will  give 
a  much  stronger  idea  of  it  than  a  bad  painting 
in  oils.  Yet  the  worst  painting  in  oils  that 
ever  hung  in  Somerset  House  resembles  the  \ 
original  in  many  more  particulars.  A  bust 
of  white  marble  may  give  an  excellent  idea 
of  a  blooming  face.  Colour  the  lips  and 
cheeks  of  the  bust,  leaving  the  hair  and  eyes 
unaltered,  and  the  similarity,  instead  of  being 
inork  striking,  will  be  less  so. 

History  has  its  foreground  and  its  back 
ground,  ^nd  it  is  principally  in  the  manage 
ment  of  its  perspective,  that  one  artist  differs 
from  another.  Some  events  must  be  repre-  ; 


sented  on  a  large   scale,  others   diminishpj 
the  great  majority  will  be  lost  in  the  dimness 
of  the  horizon ;  and  a  general   ic  ea  of  their 
joint  effect  will  be    given  by   a  few  slight 
touches. 

In  this  respect  no  writer  has  ever  equalled 
Thucydides.  He  was  a  perfect  master  of  the 
art  of  gradual  diminution.  His  history  is  some 
times  as  concise  as  a  chronological  chart;  yet 
it  is  always  perspicuous.  It  is  sometimes  as 
minute  as  one  of  Lovelace's  letters ;  yet  it  is 
never  prolix.  He  never  fails  to  contract  and 
to  expand  it  in  the  right  place. 

Thucydides  borrowed  from  Herodotus  the 
practice  of  putting  speeches  of  his  own  into 
the  mouths  of  his  characters.  In  Herodotus 
this  usage  is  scarcely  censurable.  It  is  of  a 
piece  with  his  whole  manner.  But  it  is  al 
together  incongruous  in  the  work  of  his  suc 
cessor  ;  and  violates,  not  only  the  accuracy  of 
history,  but  the  decencies  of  fiction.  When 
once  we  enter  into  the  spirit  of  Herodotus,  we 
find  no  inconsistency.  The  conventional  pro 
bability  of  his  drama  is  preserved  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end.  The  deliberate  orations 
and  the  familiar  dialogues  are  in  strict  keeping 
with  each  other.  But  the  speeches  of  Thucy 
dides  are  neither  preceded  nor  followed  by 
any  thing  with  which  they  harmonize.  They 
give  to  the  whole  book  something  of  the  gro 
tesque  character  of  those  Chinese  pleasure- 
grounds,  in  which  perpendicular  rocks  of 
granite  start  up  in  the  midst  of  a  soft  green 
plain.  Invention  is  shocking,  where  truth  is 
in  such  close  juxtaposition  with  it. 

Thucydides  honestly  tells  us  that  some  of 
these  discourses  are  purely  fictitious.  He 
may  have  reported  the  substance  of  others 
correctly.  But  it  is  clear  from  the  internal 
evidence  that  he  has  preserved  no  more  than 
the  substance.  His  own  peculiar  habits  of 
thought  and  expression  are  everywhere  dis 
cernible.  Individual  and  national  peculiarities 
are  seldom  to  be  traced  in  the  sentiments,  and 
never  in  the  diction.  The  oratory  of  the  Co 
rinthians  and  Thebans  is  not  less  Attic,  either 
in  matter  or  in  manner,  than  that  of  the 
Athenians.  The  style  of  Cleon  is  as  pure,  as 
austere,  as  terse,  and  as  significant,  as  that 
of  Pericles. 

In  spite  of  this  great  fault,  it  must  be  allow 
ed  that  Thucydides  has  surpassed  all  his  rivals 
in  the  art  of  historical  narration,  in  the  art  of 
producing  an  effect  on  the  imagination,  by 
skilful  selection  and  disposition,  without  in 
dulging  in  the  license  of  invention.  But  nar 
ration,  though  an  important  part  of  the  busi 
ness  of  an  historian,  is  not  the  whole.  To 
append  a  moral  to  a  work  of  fiction,  is  either 
useless  or  superfluous.  A  fiction  may  give  a 
more  impressive  effect  to  what  is  already 
known,  but  it  can  teach  nothing  new.  If  it 
presents  to  us  characters  and  trains  of  events 
to  which  our  experience  furnishes  us  with  no 
thing  similar,  instead  of  deriving  instruction 
from  it,  we  pronounce  it  unnatural.  We  do 
not  form  our  opinions  from  it;  but  we  try  it 
by  our  preconceived  opinions.  Fiction,  there 
fore,  is  essentially  imitative.  Its  merit  con 
sists  in  its  resemblance  to  a  model  with  which 
we  are  already  familiar,  or  to  which  at  least 


HISTORY. 


55 


we  can  instantly  refer.  Hence  it  is  that  the 
anecdotes,  which  interest  us  most  strongly  in 
authentic  narrative,  are  offensive  when  intro 
duced  into  novels  ;  that  what  is  called  the  ro 
mantic  part  of  history  is  in  fact  the  least 
romantic.  It  is  delightful  as  history,  because 
it  contradicts  our  previous  notions  of  human 
nature,  and  of  the  connection  of  causes  and 
effects.  It  is,  on  that  very  account,  shocking 
and  incongruous  in  fiction.  In  fiction,  the 
principles  are  given  to  find  the  facts ;  in  his 
tory,  the  facts  are  given  to  find  the  principles ; 
and  the  writer  who  does  not  explain  the  phe 
nomena  as  well  as  state  them,  performs  only 
one-half  of  his  office.  Facts  are  the  mere  dross 
of  history.  It  is  from  the  abstract  truth  which 
interpenetrates  them,  and  lies  latent  among 
them,  like  gold  in  the  ore,  that  the  mass  de 
rives  its  whole  value  ;  and  the  precious  parti 
cles  are  generally  combined  with  the  baser  in 
such  a  manner  that  the  separation  is  a  task  of 
the  utmost  difficulty. 

Here  Thucydides  is  deficient.  The  defi 
ciency,  indeed,  is  not  discreditable  to  him.  It 
was  the  inevitable  effect  of  ci^fcimstances.  It 
was  in  the  nature  of  things  nroessary  that,  in 
some  part  of  its  progress  through  political 
science,  the  human  mind  should"  reach  that 
point  which  it  attained  in  his  time.  Know 
ledge  advances  by  steps,  and  not  by  leaps. 
The  axioms  of  an  English  debating  club  would 
I  /have  been  startling  and  mysterious  paradoxes 
M'ilii^p  the  most  enlightened  statesman  of  Athens. 
n.  But  it  would  be  as  absurb  to  speak  contempt- 
2*  I  uously  of  the  Athenian  on  this  account,  as  to 
ridicule  Strabo  for  not  having  given  us  an  ac 
count  of  Chili,  or  to  talk  of  Ptolemy  as  we 
talk  of  Sir  Richard  Phillips.  Still,  when  we 
wish  for  solid  geographical  information,  we 
must  prefer  the  solemn  coxcombry  of  Pinker- 
ton  to  the  noble  work  of  Strabo.  If  we  wanted 
instruction  respecting  the  solar  system,  we 
should  consult  the  silliest  girl  from  a  board 
ing-school  rather  than  Ptolemy. 

Thucydides  was  undoubtedly  a  sagacious 
and  reflecting  man.  This  clearly  appears 
from  the  ability  with  which  he  discusses  prac 
tical  questions.  But  the  talent  of  deciding  on 
the  circumstances  of  a  particular  case  is  often 
possessed  in  the  highest  perfection  by  persons 
destitute  of  the  power  of  generalization.  Men, 
skilled  in  the  military  tactics  of  civilized  na 
tions,  have  been  amazed  at  the  far-sightedness 
and  penetration  which  a  Mohawk  displays  in 
concerting  his  stratagems,  or  in  discerning 
those  of  his  enemies.  In  England,  no  class 
possesses  so  much  of  that  peculiar  ability 
which  is  required  for  constructing  ingenious 
schemes,  and  for  obviating  remote  difficulties, 
as  the  thieves  and  the  thief-takers.  Women 
have  more  of  this  dexterity  than  men.  Law 
yers  have  more  of  it  than  statesmen  states 
men  have  more  of  it  than  philosophers.  Monk 
had  more  of  it  than  Harrington  and  all  his 
club.  Walpole  had  more  of  it  than  Adam 
Smith  or  Beccaria.  Indeed,  the  species  of 
discipline  by  which  this  dexterity  is  acquired 
tends  to  contract  the  mind,  and  to  render  it  in 
capable  of  abstract  reasoning. 

The  Grecian  statesmen  of  the  age  of  Thu 
cydides  were  distinguished  by  their  practical 


sagacity,  their  insight  into  motives,  their  skill 
in  devising  means  for  the  attainment  of  their 
ends.  A  state  of  society  in  which  the  rich 
were  constantly  planning  the  oppression  of 
the  poor,  and  the  poor  the  spoliation  of  the 
rich,  in  which  the  ties  of  party  had  superseded 
those  of  country,  in  which  revolutions  and 
counter-revolutions  were  events  of  daily  oc 
currence,  was  naturally  prolific  in  desperate 
and  crafty  political  adventurers.  This  was 
the  very  school  in  which  men  were  likely  to 
acquire  the  dissimulation  of  Mazarine,  the  judi 
cious  temerity  of  Richelieu,  the  penetration, 
the  exquisite  tact,  the  almost  instinctive  pre 
sentiment  of  approaching  events,  which  gave 
so  much  authority  to  the  counsel  of  Shaftes- 
bury,  that  "  it  was  as  if  a  man  had  inquired  of 
the  oracle  of  God."  In  this  school  Thucydides 
studied;  and  his  wisdom  is  that  which  such  a 
school  would  naturally  afford.  He  judges  bet 
ter  of  circumstances  than  of  principles.  The 
more  a  question  is  narrowed,  the  better  he  rea 
sons  upon  it.  His  work  suggests  many  most 
important  considerations  respecting  the  first 
principles  of  government  and  morals,  the 
growth  of  factions,  the  organization  of  armies, 
and  the  mutual  relations  of  communities.  Yet 
all  his  general  observations  on  these  subjects 
are  very  superficial.  His  most  judicious  re 
marks  differ  from  the  remarks  of  a  really  phi 
losophical  historian,  as  a  sum  correctly  cast  up 
by  a  book-keeper,  from  a  general  expression 
discovered  by  an  algebraist.  The  former  is 
useful  only  in  a  single  transaction  ;  the  latter 
may  be  applied  to  an  infinite  number  of 
cases. 

This  opinion  will,  we  fear,  be  considered  as 
heterodox.  For,  not  to  speak  of  the  illusion 
which  the  sight  of  a  Greek  type,  or  the  sound 
a  Greek  diphthong,  often  produces,  there  are 
some  peculiarities  in  the  manner  of  Thuyci- 
dides,  which  in  no  small  degree  have  tended 
to  secure  to  him  the  reputation  of  profundity. 
His  book  is  evidently  the  book  of  a  man  and"  a 
statesman;  and  in  this  respect  presents  a  re 
markable  contrast  to  the  delightful  childish 
ness  of  Herodotus.  Throughout  it  there  is  an 
air  of  matured  power,  of  grave  and  melan 
choly  reflection,  of  impartiality  and  habitual 
self-command.  His  feelings  are  rarely  in 
dulged,  and  speedily  repressed.  Vulgar  pre 
judices  of  every  kind,  and  particularly  vulgar 
superstitions,  he  treats  with  a  cold  and  sober 
disdain  peculiar  to  himself.  His  style  is 
weighty,  condensed,  antithetical,  and  not  un- 
frequently  obscure.  But  when  we  look  at  his 
political  philosophy.  Wiithout  regard  to  these 
circumstances,  we  find  him  to  have  been,  what 
indeed  it  would  have  been  a  miracle  if  he  had 
not  been,  simply  an  Athenian  of  the  fifth  cen 
tury  before  Christ. 

Xenophon  is  commonly  placed,  out  we  think 
without  much  reason,  in  the  same  rank  with 
Herodotus  and  Thucydides.  He  resembles 
them,  indeed,  in  the  purity  and  sweetness  of 
his  style  ;  but  in  spirit,  he  rather  resembles 
that  later  school  of  historians,  whose  works 
seem  to  be  fables,  composed  for  a  moral,  and 
who,  in  their  eagerness  to  give  us  \varnings 
and  example,  forget  to  give  us  men  and  wo 
men.  The  life  of  Cyrus,  whether  we  look  upon 


56 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


it  as  a  history  or  as  a  romance,  seems  to  us  a 
very  wretched  performance.  The  Expedition 
of  the  Ten  Thousand,  and  the  History  of  Gre 
cian  Affairs,  are  certainly  pleasant  reading; 
but  they  indicate  no  great  power  of  mind.  In 
truth,  Xenophon,  though  his  taste  was  elegant, 
his  dispositions  amiable,  and  his  intercourse 
with  the  world  extensive,  had,  we  suspect,  ra 
ther  a  weak  head.  Such  was  evidently  the 
opinion  of  that  extraordinary  man  to  whom  he 
early  attached  himself,  and  for  whose  memory 
he  entertained  an  idolatrous  veneration.  He 
came  in  only  for  the  milk  with  which  Socrates 
nourished  his  babes  in  philosophy.  A  few 
saws  of  morality,  and  a  few  of  the  simplest 
doctrines  of  natural  religion,  were  enough  for 
the  good  young  man.  The  strong  meat,  the 
bold  speculations  on  physical  and  metaphysi 
cal  science,  were  reserved  for  auditors  of  a 
different  description.  Even  the  lawless  habits 
of  a  captain  of  mercenary  troops,  could  not 
change  the  tendency  which  the  character  of 
Xenophon  early  acquired.  To  the  last,  he 
seems  to  have  retained  a  sort  of  heathen  Pu 
ritanism.  The  sentiments  of  piety  and  virtue, 
which  abound  in  his  works,  are  those  of  a 
well-meaning  man,  somewhat  timid  and  nar 
row-minded,  devout  from  constitution  rather 
than  from  rational  conviction.  He  was  as 
superstitious  as  Herodotus,  but  in  a  way  far 
more  offensive.  The  very  peculiarities  which 
charm  us  in  an  infant,  the  toothless  mumbling, 
the  stammering,  the  tottering,  the  helplessness, 
the  causeless  tears  and  laughter,  are  disgust 
ing  in  old  age.  In  the  same  manner,  the  ab 
surdity  which  precedes  a  period  of  general 
intelligence,  is  often  pleasing ;  that  which  fol 
lows  it  is  contemptible.  The  nonsense  of 
Herodotus  is  that  of  a  baby.  The  nonsense 
of  Xenophon  is  that  of  a  dotard.  His  stories 
about  dreams,  omens,  and  prophecies,  present 
a  strange  contrast  to  the  passages  in  which 
Che  shrewd  and  incredulous  Thucydides  men 
tions  the  popular  superstitions.  It  is  not  quite 
clear  that  Xenophon  was  honest  in  his  credu 
lity  ;  his  fanaticism  was  in  some  degree  politic. 
He  would  have  made  an  excellent  member  of 
the  Apostolic  Comarilla.  An  alarmist  by  na 
ture,  ar  aristocrat  by  party,  he  carried  to  an 
unreasonable  excess  his  horror  of  popular 
turbulence.  The  quiet  atrocity  of  Sparta  did 
not  shock  him  in  the  same  manner;  for  he 
hated  tumult  more  tha.\  crimes.  He  was  de 
sirous  to  find  restraints  which  might  curb  the 
passions  of  the  multitude ;  and  he  absurdly 
fancied  that  he  had  found  them  in  a  religion 
without  evidences  or  sanction,  precepts  or 
example,  in  a  frigid  system  of  Theophilan- 
thropy,  supported  by  nursery  tales. 

Polybius  and  Arrian  have  given  us  authen 
tic  accounts  of  facts,  and  here  their  merit  ends. 
They  were  not  men  of  comprehensive  minds  ; 
they  had  not  the  art  of  telling  a  story  in  an  in 
teresting  manner.  They  have  in  consequence 
been  thrown  into  the  shade  by  writers,  who, 
though  less  studious  of  truth  than  themselves, 
understood  far  better  the  art  of  producing  ef 
fect,  by  Livy  and  Quintus  Curtius. 

Yet  Polybius  and  Arrian  deserve  high  praise, 
•rhen  compared  with  the  writers  of  that  school 
*•{'  which  Plutarch  may  be  considered  as  the 


head.  For  the  historians  of  this  class  we  must 
confess  that  we  entertain  a  peculiar  aversion. 
They  seem  to  have  been  pedants,  who,  though 
destitute  of  those  valuable  qualities  which  are 
frequently  found  in  conjunction  with  pedantry, 
thought  themselves  great  philosophers  and  great 
politicians.  They  not  only  mislead  their  read 
ers  in  every  page,  as  to  particular  facts,  but 
they  appear  to  have  altogether  misconceived 
the  whole  character  of  the  times  of  which  they 
write.  They  were  inhabitants  of  an  empire 
bounded  by  the  Atlantic  Ocean  and  the  Euphra 
tes,  by  the  ice  of  Scythia  and  the  sands  of  Mau 
ritania  ;  composed  of  nations  whose  manners, 
whose  languages,  whose  religion,  whose  coun 
tenances  and  complexions,  were  widely  differ 
ent,  governed  by  one  mighty  despotism,  which 
had  risen  on  the  ruins  of  a  thousand  common 
wealths  and  kingdoms.  Of  liberty,  such  as  it 
is  in  small  democracies,  of  patriotism,  such  as 
it  is  in  small  independent  communities  of  any 
kind,  they  had,  and  they  could  have,  no  experi 
mental  knowledge.  But  they  had  read  of  men, 
who  exerted  UMinselves  in  the  cause  of  their 
country,  withflKi  energy  unknown  in  later 
times,  who  had  violated  the  dearest  of  domestic 
charities,  or  voluntarily  devoted  themselves  to 
death  for  the  public  good;  and  they  wondered 
at  the  degeneracy  of  their  contemporaries.  It 
never  occurred  to  them,  that  the  feelings  which 
they  so  greatly  admired  sprung  from  local  and 
occasional  causes ;  that  they  will  always  grow 
up  spontaneously  in  small  societies;  and  that, 
in  large  empires,  though  they  may  be  forced 
into  existence  for  a  short  time  by  peculiar  cir 
cumstances,  they  cannot  be  general  or  perma 
nent.  It  is  impossible  that  any  man  should  feel 
for  a  fortress  on  a  remote  frontier,  as  he  feels 
for  his  own  house ;  that  he  should  grieve  for  a 
defeat  in  which  ten  thousand  people  whom  he 
never  saw  have  fallen,  as  he  grieves  for  a  de 
feat  which  has  half  unpeopled  the  street  in 
which  he  lives;  that  he  should  leave  his  home 
for  a  military  expedition,  in  order  to  preserve 
the  balance  of  power,  as  cheerfully  as  he  would 
leave  it  to  repel  invaders  who  had  begun  to 
burn  ail  the  cornfields  in  his  neighbourhood. 

The  writers  of  whom  we  speak  should  have 
considered  this.  They  should  have  considered 
that,  in  patriotism,  such  as  it  existed  amongst 
the  Greeks,  there  was  nothing  essentially  and 
eternally  good ;  that  an  exclusive  attachment  to 
a  particular  society, though  a  natural,  an  d,  under 
certain  restrictions,  a  most  useful  sentiment, 
implies  no  extraordinary  attainments  in  wis 
dom  or  virtue  ;  that  where  it  has  existed  in  an 
intense  degree,  it  has  turned  states  into  gangs 
of  robbers,  whom  their  mutual  fidelity  has  ren 
dered  more  dangerous,  has  given  a  character 
of  peculiar  atrocity  to  war,  and  has  generated 
that  worst  of  all  political  evils,  the  tyranny  of 
nations  over  nations. 

Enthusiastically  attached  to  the  name  of  li 
berty,  these  historians  troubled  themselves  lit 
tle  about  its  definition.  The  Spartans,  tor 
mented  by  ten  thousand  absurd  restraints,  un 
able  to  please  themselves  in  the  choice  of  their 
wives,  their  suppers,  or  their  company,  com 
pelled  to  assume  a  peculiar  manner,  and  to 
talk  in  a  peculiar  style,  gloried  in  their  liberty 
The  aristocracy  of  Rome  repeatedly  made  li- 


HISTORY. 


57 


bert/  a  plea  for  cutting  off  the  favourites  of  the  | 
people.  In  almost  all  the  little  commonwealths 
of  antiquity,  liberty  was  used  as  a  pretext  for 
measures  directed  against  every  thing  which 
makes  liberty  valuable,  for  measures  which 
stifled  discussion,  corrupted  the  administration 
of  justice,  and  discouraged  the  accumulation 
of  property.  The  writers,  whose  works  we 
are  considering,  confounded  the  sound  with  the 
subs  lance,  and  the  means  with  the  end.  Their 
imaginations  were  inflamed  by  mystery.  They 
conceived  of  liberty  as  monks  conceive  of  love, 
as  Cockneys  conceive  of  the  happiness  and  in 
nocence  of  rural  life,  as  novel-reading  semp 
stresses  conceive  of  Ahnack's  and  Grosvenor 
Square,  accomplished  Marquesses  and  hand 
some  Colonels  of  the  Guards.  In  the  relation 
of  events,  and  the  delineation  of  characters, 
they  have  paid  little  attention  to  facts,  to  the 
costume  of  the  times  of  which  they  pretend  to 
treat,  or  to  the  general  principles  of  human  na 
ture.  They  have  been  faithful  only  to  their 
own  puerile  and  extravagant  doctrines.  Gene 
rals  and  Statesmen  are  metamorphosed  into 
magnanimous  coxcombs,  from  whose  fulsome 
virtues  we  turn  away  with  disgust.  The  fine 
sayings  and  exploits  of  their  heroes  reminds 
us  of  the  insufferable  perfections  of  Sir  Charles 
Gratidison,  and  affect  us  with  a  nausea  similar 
to  that  which  we  feel  when  an  actor,  in  one  of 
Morton's  or  Kotzebue's  plays,  lays  his  hand  on 
his  heart,  advances  to  the  ground-lights,  and 
mouths  a  moral  sentence  for  the  edification  of 
the  gods. 

These  writers,  men  who  knew  not  what  it 
was  to  have  a  country,  men  who  had  never  en 
joyed  political  rights,  brought  into  fashion  an 
offensive  cant  about  patriotism  and  zeal  for 
freedom.  What  the  English  Puritans  did  for 
the  language  of  Christianity,  what  Scuderi  did 
for  the  language  of  love,  they  did  for  the  lan 
guage  of  public  spirit.  By  habitual  exaggera 
tion  they  made  it  mean.  By  monotonous  em 
phasis  they  made  it  feeble.  They  abused  it 
till  it  became  scarcely  possible  to  use  it  with 
effect. 

Their  ordinary  rules  of  morality  are  deduced 
from  extreme  cases.    The  common  regimen 
which  they  prescribe  for  society  is  made  up  of 
those  desperate  remedies,  which  only  its  most 
desperate  distempers  require.    They  look  with 
peculiar  complacency  on  actions,  which  even 
those  who  approve  them  consider  as  excep 
tions  to  laws  of  almost  universal  application — 
which  bear  so  close  an  affinity  to  the  most  atro 
cious  crimes,  that  even  where  it  may  be  unjust 
to  censure  them,  it  is  unsafe  to  praise  them.  It 
is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  some  flagitious 
instances  of  perfidy  and  cruelty  should  have 
been  pas,sed  unchallenged  in  such  company, 
that  grave  moralists,  with  no  personal  interest 
at  stake,  should  have  extolled,  in   the  highest 
terms,   deeds  of  which  the   atrocity  appalled  | 
even   the  infuriated  factions  in  whose  cause  ! 
they  were  perpetrated.     The  part  which  Timo-  | 
Icon  took  in  the  assassination  of  his  brother  j 
shocked  many  of  his  own  partisans.     The  re-  j 
collection  of  it  preyed  long  on  his  own  mind.  ! 
But  it  was  reserved  for  historians  who  lived 
F^me  centuries  later  to  discover  that  his  con 
duct  was  a  glorious  display  of  virtue,  and  to 

V<a    I.— 8 


lament  that,  from  the  frailty  of  human  nature, 
a  man  who  could  perform  so  great  an  exploit 
could  repent  of  it. 

The  writings  of  these  men,  and  of  their  mo 
dern  imitators,  have  produced  effects  which 
deserve  some  notice.  The  English  have  been 
so  long  accustomed  to  political  speculation, 
and  have  enjoyed  so  large  a  measure  of  prac 
tical  liberty,  that  such  works  have  produced 
little  effect  on  their  minds.  We  have  classical 
associations  and  great  names  of  our  own, 
which  we  can  confidently  oppose  to  the  most 
splendid  of  ancient  times.  Senate  has  not  to 
our  ears  a  sound  so  venerable  as  Parliament. 
We  respect  the  Great  Charter  more  than  the 
laws  of  Solon.  The  Capitol  and  the  Forum 
impress  us  with  less  awe  than  our  own  West 
minster  Hall  and  Westminster  Abbey,  the 
place  where  the  great  men  of  twenty  genera 
tions  have  contended,  ihe  place  where  they 
sleep  together!  The  list  of  warriors  and 
statesmen  by  whom  our  constitution  was  found 
ed  or  preserved,  from  De  Morifort  down  to  Fox, 
may  well  stand  a  comparison  with  the  Fasti 
of  Rome.  The  dying  thanksgiving  of  Sidney 
is  as  noble  as  ithe  libation  which  Thrasea 
poured  to  Liberating  Jove:  and  we  think  with 
far  less  pleasure  of  Cato  tearing  out  his  entrails, 
than  of  Russel  saying,  as  he  turned  away  from 
his  wife,  that  the  bitterness  of  death  was  past. 
— Even  those  parts  of  our  history,  over  which, 
on  some  accounts,  we  would  gladly  throw  a 
veil,  may  be  proudly  opposed  to  those  on  which 
the  moralists  of  antiquity  loved  most  to  dwell. 
The  enemy  of  English  liberty  was  not  mur 
dered  by  men  whom  he  had  pardoned  and 
loaded  \vith  benefits.  He  was  not  stab;  ed  in. 
the  back  by  those  who  smiled  and  cringed 
before  his  face.  He  was  vanquished  on  fields 
of  stricken  battle ;  he  was  arraigned,  sen 
tenced,  and  executed  in  the  face  of  heaven 
and  earth.  Our  liberty  is  neither  Greek  nor 
Roman ;  but  essentially  English.  It  has  a 
character  of  its  own — a  character  which  has 
taken  a  tinge  from  the  sentiments  of  the  chi 
valrous  ages,  and  which  accords  with  the 
peculiarities  of  our  manners  and  of  our  insu 
lar  situation.  It  has  a  language,  too,  of  its 
own,  and  a  language  singularly  idiomatic,  full 
of  meaning  to  ourselves,  scarcely  intelligible 
to  strangers. 

Here,  therefore,  the  effect  of  books,  sucli  as 
those  which  we  have  been  considering,  has 
been  harmless.  They  have,  indeed,  given  cur 
rency  to  many  very  erroneous  opinions  with 
respect  to  ancient  history.  They  have  heated 
the  imagination  of  boys.  They  have  misled 
the  judgment,  and  corrupted  the  taste  of  some 
men  of  letters,  such  as  Akenside  and  Sir  Wil 
liam  Jones.  But  on  persons  engaged  in  pub 
lie  affairs  they  have  had  very  little  influence. 
The  foundations  of  our  constitution  were  laid 
by  men  who  knew  nothing  of  the  Greeks,  but 
that  they  denied  the  orthodox  procession,  and 
cheated  the  Crusaders;  and  nothing  of  Rome, 
but  that  the  Pope  lived  there.  Those  who  fol 
lowed,  contented  themseHres  with  improving 
on  the  original  plan.  They  found  n.xlels  at 
home ;  and  therefore  they  did  not  look  for  them 
abroad.  But  when  enlightened  men  on  the, 
continent  began  to  think  about  nolitical  re 


68 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


formation,  having  no  patterns  before  their 
eyes  in  their  domestic  history,  they  naturally 
had  recourse  to  those  remains  of  antiquity, 
the  study  of  which  is  considered  throughout 
Europe'  as  an  important  part  of  education. 
The  historians  of  whom  we  have  been  speak-  \ 
ing  had  been  members  of  large  communities,  \ 
and  subjects  of  absolute  sovereigns.  Hence 
i:  is,  as  we  have  already  said,  that  they  com-  ' 
mit  such  gross  errors  in  speaking  of  the  Little  ! 
republics  of  antiquity.  Their  works  were  now 
read  in  the  spirit  in  which  they  had  been  writ 
ten.  They  were  read  by  men  placed  in  cir 
cumstances  closely  resembling  their  own,  un 
acquainted  with  the  real  nature  of  liberty,  but 
inclined  to  believe  every  thing  good  which 
could  be  told  respecting  it.  How  powerfully 
these  books  impressed  these  spe»ulative  re 
formers,  is  well  known  to  all  who  have  paid 
any  attention  to  the  French  literature  of  the 
last  century.  But,  perhaps,  the  writer  on 
whom  they  produced  the  greatest  effect,  was 
Vittorio  Alfieri.  In  some  of  his  plays,  particu 
larly  in  Virginia,  Timoleon,  and  Brutus  the 
Younger,  he  has  even  caricatured  the  extrava 
gance  of  his  masters. 

It  was  not  strange  that  th*e  blind,  thus  led 
by  the  blind,  should  stumble.  The  transactions 
of  the  French  Revolution,  in  some  measure, 
took  their  character  from  these  works.  With 
out  the  assistance  of  these  works,  indeed,  a 
revolution  would  have  taken  place — a  revolu 
tion  productive  of  much  good  and  much  evil, 
tremendous,  but  short-lived  evil,  dearly  pur 
chased,  but  durable  good.  But  it  would  not 
have  been  exactly  such  a  revolution.  The 
style,  the  accessories,  would  have  been  in  ma 
ny  respects  different.  There  would  have  been 
less  of  bombast  in  language,  less  of  affectation 
in  manner,  less  of  solemn  trifling  and  ostenta 
tious  simplicity.  The  acts  of  legislative  as 
semblies,  and  the  correspondence  of  diploma 
tists,  would  not  have  been  disgraced  by  rants 
worthy  only  of  a  college  of  declamation.  The 
government  of  a  great  and  polished  nation 
would  not  have  rendered  itself  ridiculous  by 
attempting  to  revive  the  usages  of  a  world 
which  had  long  passed  away,  or  rather  of  a 
world  which  had  never  existed  except  in  the 
description  of  a  fantastic  school  of  writers. 
These  second-hand  imitations  resembled  the 
originals  about  as  much  as  the  classical  feasts 
with  which  the  Doctor  in  Peregrine  Pickle 
turned  the  stomachs  of  all  his  guests,  resem 
bled  one  of  the  suppers  of  Lucullus  in  the 
Hall  of  Apollo. 

These  were  mere  follies.  But  the  spirit  ex 
cited  by  these  writers  produced  more  serious 
effects.  The  greater  part  of  the  crimes  which 
disgraced  the  revolution,  sprung  indeed  from 
the  relaxation  of  law,  from  popular  ignorance, 
from  the  remembrance  of  past  oppression, 
from  the  fear  of  foreign  conquest,  from  rapa 
city,  from  ambition,  from  party  spirit.  But 
many  atrocious  proceedings  must,  doubtless, 
oe  ascribed  to  heated  imagination,  to  perverted 
principle,  to  a  distaste  for  what  was  vulgar  in 
morals,  and  a  passion  for  what  was  startling 
and  dubious.  Mr.  Burke  has  touched  on  this 
mbject  with  great  felicity  of  expression : 
*  The  gradation  of  their  republic,"  says  he, 


"is  laid  in  moral  paradoxes.  All  those  in 
stances  to  be  found  in  history,  whether  real  or 
fabulous,  of  a  doubtful  public  spirit,  at  which 
morality  is  perplexed,  reason  is  staggered,  and 
from  which  affrighted  nature  recoils,  are  their 
chosen  and  almost  sole  examples  for  the  in 
struction  of  their  youth."  This  evil,  we  be 
lieve,  is  to  be  directly  ascribed  to  the  influence 
of  the  historians  whom  we  have  mentioned, 
and  their  modern  imitators. 

Livy  had  some  faults  in  common  with  these 
writers.  But  on  the  whole  he  must  be  consi 
dered  as  forming  a  class  by  himself.  No  his 
torian  with  whom  we  are  acquainted  has 
shown  so  complete  an  indifference  to  truth. 
He  seems  to  have  cared  only  about  the  pictu 
resque  effect  of  his  book  and  the  honour  of  his 
country.  On  the  other  hand,  we  do  not  know, 
in  the  whole  range  of  literature,  an  instance 
of  a  bad  thing  so  well  done.  The  painting  of 
the  narrative  is  beyond  description  vivid  and 
graceful.  The  abundance  of  interesting  senti 
ments  and  splendid  imagery  in  the  speeches  is 
almost  miraculous.  His  mind  is  a  soil  which 
is  never  overteemed,  a  fountain  which  never 
seems  to  trickle.  It  pours  forth  profusely;  yet 
it  gives  no  sign  of  exhaustion.  It  M'as  proba 
bly  to  this  exhaberance  of  thought  and  lan« 
uage,  always  fresh,  always  sweet,  always 
pure,  no  sooner  yielded  than  repaired,  that  the 
critics  applied  that  expression  which  has  been 
so  much  discussed,  lactea  ubcrtas. 

All  the  merits  and  all  the  defects  of  Livy 
take  a  colouring  from  the  character  of  his  na 
tion.  He  was  a  writer  peculiarly  Roman  ;  the 
proud  citizen  of  a  commonwealth  which  had 
indeed  lost  the  reality  of  liberty,  but  which 
still  sacredly  preserved  its  forms — in  fact  the 
subject  of  an  arbitrary  prince,  but  in  his  own 
estimation  one  of  the  masters  of  the  world, 
with  a  hundred  kings  below  him,  and  only  the 
gods  above  him.  He,  therefore,  looked  back 
on  former  times  with  feelings  far  different  from 
those  which  were  naturally  entertained  by  his 
Greek  contemporaries,  and  which  at  a  later 
period  became  general  among  men  of  letters 
throughout  the  Roman  Empire.  He  contem 
plated  the  past  with  interest  and  delight,  not 
because  it  furnished  a  contrast  to  the  present, 
but  because  it  had  led  to  the  present.  He  re 
curred  to  it,  not  to  lose  in  proud  recollections 
the  sense  of  national  degradation,  but  to  trace 
the  progress  of  national  glory.  It  is  true  that 
his  veneration  for  antiquity  produced  on  him 
some  of  the  effects  which  it  produced  on  those 
who  arrived  at  it  by  a  very  different  road.  He 
has  something  of  their  exaggeration,  some 
thing  of  their  cant,  something  of  their  fondness 
for  anomalies  and  lusus  iia.iura>  in  morality. 
Yet  even  here  we  perceive  a  difference.  They 
talk  rapturously  of  patriotism  and  liberty  in 
the  abstract.  He  does  not  seem  to  think  any 
country  but  Rome  deserving  of  love;  nor  is  it 
for  liberty,  as  liberty,  but  for  liberty  as  a  par} 
of  the  Roman  institutions,  tliiJ  he  is  zealous. 

Of  the  concise  and  elegant  accounts  of  the 
campaigns  of  Cnssar  little  can  be  said.     They 
'  are    incomparable    models    for    military  de 
spatches.     But  histories  the)   are  not,  and  dc 
not  pretend  to  be. 

The  ancient  critics  placed   Sallust  in  tht 


HISTORY 


59 


same  rank  with  Livy ;  and  unquestionably  the 
small  portion  of  his  works  which  has  come 
down  to  us,  is  calculated  to  give  a  high  opi 
nion  of  his  talents.  But  his  style  is  not  very 
pleasant ;  and  his  most  powerful  work,  the  ac 
count  of  the  Conspiracy  of  Catiline,  has  ra 
ther  the  air  of  a  clever'  party  pamphlet  than 
that  of  a  history.  It  abounds  with  strange  in 
consistencies,  which,  unexplained  as  they  are, 
necessarily  excite  doubts  as  to  the  fairness  of 
Ihe  narrative.  It  is  true,  that  many  circum 
stances  now  forgotten  may  have  been  familiar 
to  his  contemporaries,  and  may  have  rendered 
passages  clear  to  them  which  to  us  appear  du 
bious  and  perplexing.  But  a  great  historian 
should  remember  that  he  writes  for  distant 
generations,  for  men  who  will  perceive  the  ap 
parent  contradictions,  and  will  possess  no 
means  of  reconciling  them.  We  can  only  vin 
dicate  the  fidelity  of  Sallust  at  the  expense  of 
his  skill.  But  in  fact  all  the  information 
which  we  have  from  contemporaries  respect 
ing  this  famous  plot  is  liable  to  the  same  ob 
jection,  and  is  read  by  discerning  men  with 
the  same  incredulity.  It  is  all  on  one  side. 
No  answer  has  reached  our  times.  Yet,  on  the 
showing  of  the  accusers,  the  accused  seem  en 
titled  to  acquittal.  Catiline,  we  are  told,  in 
trigued  with  a  Vestal  virgin,  and  murdered  his 
own  son.  His  house  was  a  den  of  gamblers 
and  debauchees.  No  young  man  could  cross 
his  threshold  without  danger  to  his  fortune  and 
reputation.  Yet  this  is  the  man  with  whom 
Cicero  was  willing  to  coalesce  in  a  contest 
for  the  first  magistracy  of  the  republic ;  and 
whom  he  described,  long  after  the.  fatal  termi 
nation  of  the  conspiracy,  as  an  accomplished 
hypocrite,  by  whom  he  had  himself  been  de 
ceived,  and  who  had  acted  with  consummate 
skill  the  character  of  a  good  citizen  and  a  good 
friend.  We  are  told  that  the  plot  was  the  most 
wicked  and  desperate  ever  known,  and  almost 
in  the  same  breath,  that  the  great  body  of  the 
people,  and  many  of  the  nobles  favoured  it : 
that  the  richest  citizens  of  Rome  were  eager 
for  the  spoliation  of  all  property,  and  its  high 
est  functionaries  for  the  destruction  of  all  or 
der;  that  Crassus,  Cresar,  the  praetor  Lentulus, 
one  of  the  consuls  of  the  year,  one  of  the  con 
suls  elect,  were  proved  or  suspected  to  be  en 
gaged  in  a  scheme  for  subverting  institutions 
to  which  they  owed  the  highest  honours,  and 
introducing  universal  anarchy.  We  are  told, 
that  a  government  which  knew  all  this  suffered 
the  conspirator,  whose  rank,  talents,  and  cou 
rage  rendered  him  most  dangerous,  to  quit  Rome 
without  molestation.  We  are  told,  that  bond 
men  and  gladiators  were  to  be  armed  against 
«he  citizens.  Yet  we  find  that  Catiline  rejected 
the  slaves  who  crowded  to  enlist  in  his  army, 
*est,  as  Sallust  himself  expresses  it, "  he  should 
seem  to  identify  their  cause  with  that  of  the 
citizens."  Finally,  we  are  told  that  the  magis 
trate,  who  was  universally  allowed  to  have 
saved  all  classes  of  his  countrymen  from  con 
flagration  and  massacre,  rendered  himself  so  j 
unpopular  by  his  conduct,  that  a  marked  in- 
suit  was  offered  to  him  at  the  expiration  of  his  j 
office,  and  a  severe  punishment  inflicted  on  i 
him  shortly  after. 

Sallust  tells  us,  what,  indeed,  the  letters  and. 


speeches  of  Cicero  sufficiently  prove,  that  some 
persons  considered  the  shocking  and  atrocious 
parts  of  the  plot  as  mere  inventions  of  the  go 
vernment,  designed  to  excuse  its  unconstitu 
tional  measures.  We  oaust  confess  ourselves 
to  be  of  that  opinion.  1  here  was,  undoubtedly, 
a  strong  parly  desirous  to  change  the  adminis 
tration.  While  Pompey  held  the  command  of 
an  army,  they  could  not  effect  their  purpose 
without  preparing  means  for  repelling  force, 
if  necessary,  by  force.  In  all  this  there  is  no 
thing  different  from  the  ordinary  practice  of 
Roman  factions.  The  other  charges  brought 
against  the  conspirators  are  so  inconsistent 
and  improbable,  that  we  give  no  credit  what 
ever  to  them.  If  our  readers  think  this  skep 
ticism  unreasonable,  let  them  turn  to  the  con 
temporary  account  of  the  Popish  plot.  Let 
them  look  over  the  votes  of  Parliament,  and 
the  speeches  of  the  king;  the  charges  of 
Scroggs,  and  the  harangues  of  the  managers 
employed  against  Strafibrd.  A  person,  who 
should  form  his  judgment  from  these  pieces 
alone,  would  believe  that  London  was  set  on 
fire  by  the  Papists,  and  that  Sir  Edmondbury 
Godfrey  was  murdered  for  his  religion.  Yet 
these  stories  are  now  altogether  exploded. 
They  have  been  abandoned  by  statesmen  to 
aldermen,  by  aldermen  to  clergymen,  by  cler 
gymen  to  old  women,  and  by  old  women  to 
Sir  Harcourt  Lees. 

Of  the  Latin  historians,  Tacitus  was  cer 
tainly  the  greatest.  His  style  indeed  is  not 
only  faulty  in  itself,  but  is,  in  some  respects, 
peculiarly  unfit  for  historical  composition.  He 
carries  his  love  of  effect  far  beyond  the  limits 
of  moderation.  He  tells  a  fine  story  finely: 
but  he  cannot  tell  a  plain  story  plainly.  He 
stimulates  till  all  stimulants  lose  their  power. 
Thucydides,  as  we  have  already  observed,  re 
lates  ordinary  transactions  Avith  the  unpre 
tending-  clearness  and  succinctness  of  the 
gazette.  His  great  powers  of  painting  he 
reserves  for  events,  of  which  the  slightest 
details  are  interesting.  The  simplicity  of  the 
setting  gives  additional  lustre  to  the  brilliants. 
There  are  passages  in  the  narrative  of  Tacitus 
superior  to  the  best  which  can  be  quoted  from 
Thucydides.  But  they  are  not  enchased  and 
relieved  with  the  same  skill.  They  are  far 
more  striking  when  extracted  from  the  body 
of  the  work  to  which  they  belong,  than  when 
they  occur  in  their  place,  and  are  read  in  con 
nection  with  what  precedes  and  follows. 

In  the  delineation  of  character,  Tacitus  is 
unrivalled  among  historians,  and  has  very  few 
superiors  among  dramatists  and  novelists.  By 
the  delineation  of  character,  \ve  do  not  mean 
the  practice  of  drawing  up  epigrammatic  cata 
logues  of  good  and  bad  qualities,  and  append 
ing  them  to  the  names  of  eminent  men.  No 
writer,  indeed,  has  done  this  more  skilfully 
than  Tacitus  ;  but  this  is  not  his  peculiar 
glory.  All  the  persons  who  occupy  a  large 
space  in  his  works  have  an  individuality  of 
character  which  seems  to  pervade  an  tneir 
words  and  actions.  We  know  them  as  if  wo 
had  lived  with  them.  Claudius,  Nero,  Otho, 
both  the  Agrippinas,  are  masterpieces.  Bui 
Tiberius  is  a  still  higher  miracle  of  art.  The 
historian  undertook  to  make  us  intimately  ac- 


GO 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


quainted   with   a  man   singularly   dark    and ! 
inscrutable — with  a  man  whose  real  disposi-  j 
tion   long  remained  swathed  up  in  intricate  | 
folds  of  factitious  virtues ;    and  over  whose  j 
actions  the  hypocrisy  of  his  youth  and  the  se- 
clusion  of  his  old  age  threw  a  singular  mys 
tery.     He  was  to  exhibit  the  specious  qualities 
of  the  tyrant  in  a  light  which  might  render 
them  transparent,  and  enable  us   at  once  to 
perceive  the  covering  and  the  vices  which  it 
concealed.     He  was  to  trace  the  gradations  by 
which   the   first  magistrate  of  a   republic,  a 
senator  mingling  freely  in  debate,  a  noble  as 
sociating  with  his  brother  nobles,  was  trans 
formed   into   an   Asiatic   sultan ;    he   was   to 
exhibit  a  character  distinguished  by  courage, 
self-command,  and  profound  policy,  yet  denied 
by  all 

"th'  extravagancy 
And  crazy  ribaldry  of  fancy." 

He  was  to  mark  the  gradual  effect  of  advanc 
ing  age  and  approaching  death  on  this  strange 
compound  of  strength  and  weakness ;  to  exhi 
bit  the  old  sovereign  of  the  world  sinking  into 
a  dotage  which,  though  it  rendered  his  appe 
tites  eccentric  and  his  temper  savage,  never 
impaired  the  powers  of  his  stern  and  penetrat 
ing  mind,  conscious  of  failing  strength,  raging 
•with  capricious  sensuality,  yet  to  the  last  the 
keenest  of  observers,  the  most  artful  of  dis 
semblers,  and  the  most  terrible  of  masters. 
The  task  was  one  of  extreme  difficulty.  The 
execution  is  almost  perfect. 

The  talent  which  is  required  to  write  history 
thus,  bears  a  considerable  affinity  to  the  talent 
of  a  great  dramatist.  There  is  one  obvious 
distinction.  The  dramatist  creates,  the  histo 
rian  only  disposes.  The  difference  is  not  in 
the  mode  of  execution,  but  in  the  mode  of  con 
ception.  Shakspeare  is  guided  by  a  model 
•which  exists  in  his  imagination;  Tacitus,  by  a 
model  furnished  from  without.  Hamlet  is  to 
Tiberius  irhat  the  Laocoon  is  to  the  Newton 
of  Roubilliac. 

In  this  part  of  his  art  Tacitus  certainly  had 
neither  equal  nor  second  among  the  ancient 
historians.  Herodotus,  though  he  wrote  in  a 
dramatic  form,  had  little  of  dramatic  genius. 
The  frequent  dialogues  which  he  introduces 
give  vivacity  and  movement  to  the  narrative  ; 
but  are  not  strikingly  characteristic.  Xenophon 
is  fond  of  telling  his  readers,  at  considerable 
length,  what  he  thought  of  the  persons  whose  ad 
ventures  he  relates.  But  he  does  not  show 
them  the  men,  and  enable  them  to  judge  for 
themselves.  The  heroes  of  Livy  are  the  most 
insipid  of  all  beings,  real  or  imaginary,  the 
heroes  of  Plutarch  always  excepted.  Indeed, 
the  manner  of  Plutarch  in  this  respect  reminds 
us  of  the  cookery  of  those  continental  inns,  the 
horror  of  English  travellers,  in  which  a  certain 
nondescript  broth  is  kept  constantly  boiling, 
and  copiously  poured,  without  distinction,  over 
every  dish  as  it  comes  up  to  table.  Thucy- 
dides,  though  at  a  wide  interval,  comes  next  to 
Tacitus.  His  Pericles,  hio  Nicias,  his  Cleon, 
his  Brasidas,  are  happily  discriminated.  The 
lines  are  few,  the  colouring  faint;  but  the  ge- 
woral  air  and  expression  is  caught. 

\Ve  Degin,  like  the  priest  in  Don  Quixote's 


library,  to  be  tired  with  taking  down  books  one 
after  another  for  separate  judgment,  and  feel 
inclined  to  pass  sentence  on  them  in  masses. 
We  shall,  therefore,  instead  of  pointing  out  the 
defects  and  merits  of  the  different  modern  his 
torians,  state  generally  in  what  particulars  they 
have  surpassed  their  predecessors,  and  in  what 
we  conceive  them  to  have  failed. 

They  have  certainly  been,  in  one  sense,  far 
more  strict  in  their  adherence  to  truth  than 
most  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  writers.  They 
do  not  think  themselves  entitled  to  render  their 
narrative  interesting  by  introducing  descrip 
tions,  conversations,  and  harangues,  which 
have  no  existence  but  in  their  own  imagina 
tion.  This  improvement  was  gradually  intro 
duced.  History  commenced  among  the  modern 
nations  of  Europe,  as  it  had  commenced  among 
the  Greeks,  in  romance.  Froissart  was  our 
Herodotus.  Italy  was  to  Europe  what  Athens 
was  to  Greece.  In  Italy,  therefore,  a  more  ac 
curate  and  manly  mode  of  narration  was  early 
introduced.  Machiavelli  and  Guicciardini,  in 
imitation  of  Livy  and  Thucydid.es,  composed 
speeches  for  their  historical  personages.  But 
as  the  classical  enthusiasm  which  distinguish 
ed  the  age  of  Lorenzo  and  Leo  gradually  sub 
sided,  this  absurd  practice  was  abandoned.  In 
France,  we  fear,  it  still,  in  some  degree,  keeps 
its  ground.  In  our  own  country,  a  writer  who 
should  venture  on  it  would  be  laughed  to 
scorn.  Whether  the  historians  of  the  last  two 
centuries  tell  more  truth  than  those  of  anti> 
quity,  may  perhaps  be  doubted.  But  it  is  quite 
certain  that  they  tell  fewer  falsehoods. 

In  the  philosophy  of  history,  the  moderns 
have  very  far  surpassed  the  ancients.  It  is 
not,  indeed,  strange  that  the  Greeks  and  Ro 
mans  should  not  have  carried  the  science  of 
government,  or  any  other  experimental  science, 
so  far  as  it  has  been  carried  in  our  time;  for 
the  experimental  sciences  are  generally  in  a 
state  of  progression.  They  were  better  under 
stood  in  the  seventeenth  century  than  in  the 
sixteenth,  and  in  the  eighteenth  century  than 
in  the  seventeenth.  But  this  constant  improve? 
ment,  this  natural  growth  of  knowledge,  will 
not  altogether  account  for  the  immense  superi 
ority  of  the  modern  writers.  The  difference  is 
a  difference,  not  in  degree,  but  of  kind.  It  is 
not  merely  that  new  principles  have  been  dis 
covered,  but  that  new  faculties  seem  to  be  ex-, 
erted.  It  is  not  that  at  one  time  the  human  in 
tellect  should  have  made  but  small  progress, 
and  at  another  time  have  advanced  far;  but 
that  at  one  time  it  should  have  been  station 
ary,  and  at  another  time  constantly  proceeding. 
In  taste  and  imagination,  in  the  graces  of  style, 
in  the  arts  of  persuasion,  in  the  magnificence 
of  public  works,  the  ancients  were  at  least  our 
equals.  They  reasoned  as  justly  as  ourselves 
on  subjects  which  required  pure  demonstra 
tion.  But  in  the  moral  sciences  they  made 
scarcely  any  advance.  During  the  long  period 
which  elapsed  between  the  fifth  century  before 
the  Christian  era  and  the  fifth  century  after  it, 
little  perceptible  progress  was  made.  All  the 
metaphysical  discoveries  of  all  the  philoso 
phers,  from  the  time  of  Socrates  to  the  northern 
invasion,  are  not  to  be  compared  in  importance 
with  those  which  have  been  made  in  England 


HISTORY. 


erery  fifty  years  since  the  time  of  Elizabeth. 
There  is  not  the  least  reason  to  believe  that  the 
principles  of  government,  legislation,  and  po 
litical  economy,  were  better  understood  in  the 
time  of  Augustus  Ccesar  than  in  the  time  of 
Pericles.  In  our  own  country,  the  sound  doc 
trines  of  trade  and  jurisprudence  have  been, 
within  the  lifetime  of  a  single  generation,  dimly 
hinted,  boldly  propounded,  defended,  systema 
tized,  adopted  by  all  reflecting  men  of  all 
parties,  quoted  in  legislative  assemblies,  incor 
porated  into  laws  and  treaties. 

To  what  is  this  change  to  be  attributed] 
Partly,  no  doubt,  to  the  discovery  of  printing, 
-a  discovery  which  has  not  only  diffused 
knowledge  widely,  but,  as  we  have  already  ob 
served,  has  also  introduced  into  reasoning  a 
precision  unknown  in  those  ancient  communi 
ties,  in  which  information  was,  for  the  most 
part,  conveyed  orally.  There  was,  we  suspect, 
another  cause  less  obvious,  but  still  more  pow 
erful. 

The  spirit  of  the  two  most  famous  nations 
of  antiquity  was  remarkably  exclusive.  In  the 
time  of  Homer,  the  Greeks  had  not  begun  to 
consider  themselves  as  a  distinct  race.  They 
still  looked  with  something  of  childish  wonder 
and  awe  on  the  riches  and  wisdom  of  Sidon 
and  Egypt.  From  what  causes,  and  by  what 
gradations,  their  feelings  underwent  a  change, 
it  is  not  easy  to  determine.  Their  history,  from 
the  Trojan  to  the  Persian  war,  is  covered  with 
an  obscurity  broken  only  by  dim  and  scattered 
gleams  of  truth.  But  it  is  certain  that  a  great 
alteration  took  place.  They  regarded  them 
selves  as  a  separate  people.  They  had  com 
mon  religious  rites,  and  common  principles  of 
public  law,  in  which  foreigners  had  no  part. 
In  all  their  political  systems,  monarchical,  aris- 
tocratical,  anddemocratical,  there  was  a  strong 
family  likeness.  After  the  retreat  of  Xerxes 
and  the  fall  of  Mardonius,  national  pride  ren 
dered  the  separation  between  the  Greeks  and 
the  Barbarians  complete.  The  conquerors  con 
sidered  themselves  men  of  a  superior  breed, 
men  who,  in  their  intercourse  with  neighbour 
ing  nations,  were  to  teach,  and  not  to  learn. 
They  looked  for  nothing  out  of  themselves. 
They  borrowed  nothing.  They  translated  no 
thing.  We  cannot  call  to  mind  a  single  ex 
pression  of  any  Greek  writer  earlier  than  the 
age  of  Augustus,  indicating  an  opinion  that 
any  thing  worth  reading  could  be  written  in 
any  language  except  his  own.  The  feelings 
which  sprung  from  national  glory  were  not 
altogether  extinguished  by  national  degrada 
tion.  They  were  fondly  cherished  through 
ages  of  slavery  and  shame.  The  literature  of 
Rome  herself  was  regarded  with  contempt  by 
those  who  had  fled  before  her  arms,  and  who 
bowed  beneath  her  fasces.  Voltaire  says,  in 
one  of  his  six  thousand  pamphlets,  that  he  was 
the  first  person  who  told  the  French  that  Eng 
land  had  produced  eminent  men  besides  the 
Duke  of  Marlborough.  Down  to  a  very  late 
period,  the  Greeks  seem  to  have  stood  in  need 
of  similar  information  with  respect  to  their 
masters.  With  Paulus  ^Emilius,  Syila,  and 
Ccesar,  they  were  well  acquainted.  But  the 
notions  which  they  entertained  respecting  Ci 
cero  a.nd  Virgil  were,  probably,  not  unlike 


those  which  Boileau  may  have  formed  al^out 
Shakspeare.  Dionysius  lived  in  the  most 
splendid  age  of  Latin  poetry  and  eloquence. 
He  was  a  critic,  and,  after  the  manner  of  his 
age,  an  able  critic.  He  studied  the  language 
of  Rome,  associated  with  its  learned  men,  and 
compiled  its  history.  Yet  he  seems  to  have 
thought  its  literature  valuable  only  for  the  pur 
pose  of  illustrating  its  antiquities.  His  read 
ing  appears  to  have  been  confined  to  its  public 
records,  and  to  a  few  old  annalists.  Once,  and 
but  once,  if  we  remember  rightly,  he  quotes 
Ennius,  to  solve  a  question  of  etymology.  He 
has  written  much  on  the  art  of  oratory  ;' yet  he 
has  not  mentioned  the  name  of  Cicero. 

The  Romans  submitted  to  the  pretensions  of 
a  race  which  they  despised.  Their  epic  poet, 
while  he  claimed  for  them  pre-eminence  in  the 
arts  of  government  and  war,  acknowledged 
their  inferiority  in  taste,  eloquence,  and  science. 
Men  of  letters  affected  to  understand  the  Greek 
language  better  than  their  own.  Pomponius 
preferred  the  honour  of  becoming  an  Athenian, 
by  intellectual  naturalization,  to  all  the  distinc 
tions  which  were  to  be  acquired  in  the  politi 
cal  contests  of  Rome.  His  great  friend  com 
posed  Greek  poems  and  memoirs.  It  is  well 
known  that  Petrarch  considered  that  beautiful 
language  in  which  his  sonnets  are  written,  as 
a  barbarous  jargon,  and  intrusted  his  fame  to- 
those  wretched  Latin  hexameters,  which,  dur 
ing  the  last  four  centuries,  have  scarcely  found 
four  readers.  Many  eminent  Romans  appear 
to  have  felt  the  same  contempt  for  their  native 
tongue  as  compared  Avith  the  Greek.  The  pre 
judice  continued  to  a  very  late  period.  Julian 
was  as  partial  to  the  Greek  language  as  Fre 
derick  the  Great  to  the  French ;  and  it  seems 
that  he  could  not  express  himself  with  ele 
gance  in  the  dialect  of  the  state  which  he  ruled. 

Even  those  Latin  writers,  who  did  not  carry 
this  affectation  so  far,  looked  on  Greece  as  the 
only  fount  of  knowledge.  From  Greece  they 
derive  the  measures  of  their  poetry,  and  indeed, 
all  of  poetry  that  can  be  imported.  From 
Greece  they  borrowed  the  principles  and  the 
vocabulary  of  their  philosophy.  To  the  litera 
ture  of  other  nations  they  do  not  seem  to  have 
paid  the  slightest  attention.  The  sacred  books 
of  the  Hebrews,  for  example,  books  which,  con 
sidered  merely  as  human  compositions,  are  in 
valuable  to  the  critic,  the  antiquary,  and  the 
philosopher,  seem  to  have  been  utterly  unno 
ticed  by  them.  The  peculiarities  of  Judaism, 
and  the  rapid  growth  of  Christianity,  attracted 
their  notice.  They  made  war  against  the  Jews. 
They  made  laws  against  the  Christians.  But 
they  never  opened  the  books  of  Moses.  Juve 
nal  quotes  the  Pentateuch  with  censure.  The 
author  of  the  treatise  on  the  "  Sublime"  quotes 
it  with  praise:  but  both  of  them  quote  it  erro 
neously.  When  we  consider  what  sublime 
poetry,  what  curious  history,  what  striking  and 
peculiar  views  of  the  divine  nature,  and  of  the 
social  duties  of  men,  are  to  be  found  in  the 
Jewish  Scriptures;  when  we  consider  the  two 
sects  on  which  the  attention  of  the  government 
was  constantly  fixed,  appealed  to  those  Scrip 
tures  as  the  rule  of  their  faith  and  practice, 
this  indifference  is  astonishing.  The  fact 
seems  to  be,  that  the  Greeks  admired  only  ihcin- 


62 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


selves,  and  that  the  Romans  admired  only  them- : 
selves  and  the  Greeks.     Literary  men  turned 
away  with  disgust  from  modes  of  thought  and 
expression  so  widely  different  from  all  that  I 
they  had  beei  accustomed  to  admire.     The  ef- , 
feet  was  narrowness  and  sameness  of  thought,  j 
Their  minds,  if  we  may  so  express  ourselves,  i 
bred  in  and  in,  and  were  accordingly  cursed  j 
with  barrenness,  and  degeneracy.    No  extra- ! 
neous  beauty  or  vigour  was  engrafted  on  the  ' 
decaying  stock.     By  an  exclusive  attention  to 
one  class  of  phenomena,  by  an  exclusive  taste 
for  one  species  of  excellence,  the  human  intel 
lect  was  stunted.       Occasional  coincidences 
were  turned  into  general  rules.      Prejudices 
were  confounded  with  instincts.     On  man,  as 
he  was  found  in  a  particular  state  of  society, 
on  government,  as  it  had  existed  in  a  particu 
lar  corner  of  the  world,  many  just  observations 
were  made  ;  but  of  man  as  man,  or  government 
as  government,  little  was  known.    Philosophy 
remained  stationary.      Slight  changes,  some 
times  for  the  worse  and  sometimes  for  the  bet 
ter,  were  made  in  the  superstructure.     But  no 
body  thought  of  examining  the  foundations. 

The  vast  despotism  of  the  Coesars,  gradually 
effacing  all  national  peculiarities,  and  assimu- 
lating  the  remotest  provinces  of  the  Empire  to 
each  other,  augmented  the  evil.  At  the  close 
of  the  third  century  after  Christ,  the  prospects 
of  mankind  were  fearfully  dreary.  A  system 
of  etiquette,  as  pompously  frivolous  as  that  of 
the  Escurial,  had  been  established.  A  sove 
reign  almost  invisible;  a  crowd  of  dignitaries 
minutely  distinguished  by  badges  and  titles ; 
rhetoricians  who  said  nothing  but  what  had 
been  said  ten  thousand  times ;  schools  in  which 
nothing  was  taught  but  what  had  been  known 
for  ages — such  was  the  machinery  provided 
for  '.he  government  and  instruction  of  the  most 
enlightened  part  of  the  human  race.  That  great 
community  was  then  in  danger  of  experienc 
ing  a  calamity  far  more  terrible  than  any  of 
the  quick,  inflammatory,  destroying  maladies,  to 
which  nations  are  liable — a  tottering,  drivelling, 
paralytic  longevity,  the  immortality  of  the  Struld- 
brugs,  a  Chinese  civilization.  It  would  be 
easy  to  indicate  many  points  of  resemblance 
between  the  subjects  of  Diocletian  and  the 
people  of  that  Celestial  Empire,  where,  during 
many  centuries,  nothing  has  been  learned  or 
unlearned;  where  government,  where  educa 
tion,  \vhere  the  whole  system  of  life  is  a  cere 
mony;  where  knowledge  forgets  to  increase 
and  multiply,  and,  like  the  talent  buried  in  the 
earth,  or  the  pound  wrapped  up  in  the  napkin, 
experiences  neither  waste  nor  augmentation. 

The  torpor  was  broken  by  two  great  revolu 
tions,  the  one  moral,  the  other  political;  the 
one  from  within,  the  other  from  without.  The 
victory  of  Christianity  over  Paganism,  consi 
dered  with  relation  to  this  subject  only,  was 
of  great  importance.  It  overthrew  the  old 
system  of  morals,  and  with  it  much  of  the  old 
system  of  metaphysics.  It  furnished  the  ora 
tor  with  new  topics  of  declamation,  and  the  lo 
gician  with  new  points  of  controversy.  Above 
all,  it  introduced  a  new  principle,  of  which  the 
operation  was  constantly  felt  in  every  part  of 
society.  It  stirred  the  stagnant  mass  from  the 
inmost  depths.  It  excited  all  the  passions  of 


a  stormy  democracy  in  the  quiet  and  listless 
population  of  an  overgrown  empire.  The  fear 
of  heresy  did  what  the  sense  of  oppression 
could  not  do  ;  it  changed  men,  accustomed  to 
be  turned  over  like  sheep  from  tyrant  to  tyrant, 
into  devoted  partisans  and  obstinate  rebels. 
The  tones  of  an  eloquence  which  had  been 
silent  for  ages  resounded  from  the  pulpit  of 
Gregory.  A  spirit  which  had  been  extinguished 
on  the  plains  of  Philippi  revived  in  Athanasius 
and  Ambrose. 

Yet  even  this  remedy  was  not  sufficiently 
violent  for  the  disease.  It  did  not  prevent  the 
empire  of  Constantinople  from  relapsing,  after 
a  short  paroxysm  of  excitement,  into  a  state  of 
stupefaction  to  which  history  furnishes  scarce 
ly  any  parallel.  We  there  find  that  a  polished 
society,  a  society  in  which  a  most  intricate 
and  elaborate  system  of  jurisprudence  was  es 
tablished,  in  which  the  arts  of  luxury  were 
well  understood,  in  which  the  works  of  the  great 
ancient  writers  were  preserved  and  studied, 
existed  for  nearly  a  thousand  years  without 
making  one  great  discovery  in  science,  or  pro 
ducing  one  book  which  is  read  by  any  but 
curious  inquirers.  There  were  tumults,  too, 
and  controversies,  and  wars  in  abundance; 
and  these  things,  bad  as  they  are  in  th  m 
selves,  have  generally  been  favourable  to  -he 
progress  of  the  intellect.  But  here  they  ti  r 
mented  without  stimulating.  The  waters  were 
troubled,  but  no  healing  influence  descended. 
The  agitations  resembled  the  grinnings  and 
writhings  of  a  galvanized  corpse,  not  the 
struggles  of  an  athletic  man. 

From  this  miserable  state  the  Western  Em 
pire  was  saved  by  the  fiercest  and  most  de 
stroying  visitation  with  which  God  has  ever 
chastened  his  creatures — the  invasion  of  the 
northern  nations.  Such  a  cure  was  required 
for  such  a  distemper.  The  Fire  of  London,  it 
has  been  observed,  was  a  blessing.  It  burned 
down  the  city,  but  it  burned  out  the  plague. 
The  same  may  be  said  of  the  tremendous  de 
vastation  of  the  Roman  dominions.  It  anni 
hilated  the  noisome  recesses  in  which  lurked 
the  seeds  of  great  moral  maladies;  it  clearer 
an  atmosphere  fatal  to  the  health  and  vigour 
of  the  human  mind.  It  cost  Europe  a  thou 
sand  years  of  barbarism  to  escape  the  fate  of 
China. 

At  length  the  terrible  purification  was  ac 
complished;  and  the  second  civilization  of 
mankind  commenced,  under  circumstances 
which  afforded  a  strong  security  that  it  would 
never  retrograde  and  never  pause.  Europe 
was  now  a  great  federal  community.  Her 
numerous  states  were  united  by  the  easy  ties 
of  international  law  and  a  common  religion. 
Their  institutions,  their  languages,  their  man 
ners,  their  tastes  in  literature,  their  modes  of 
education,  were  widely  different.  Their  con 
nection  was  close  enough  to  allow  of  mutual 
observation  and  improvement,  yet  not  so  close 
as  to  destroy  the  idioms  of  natural  opinion  and 
feeling. 

The  balance  of  moral  and  intellectual  influ 
ence,  thus  established  between  the  nations  of 
Europe,  is  far  more  important  than  the  balance 
of  political  power.  Indeed,  we  are  inclined  to 
think  that  the  latter  is  valuable  principally  be- 


HISTORY. 


63 


cause  it  tends  to  maintain  the  former.  The 
civilized  world  has  thus  been  preserved  from 
a  uniformity  of  character  fatal  to  all  improve 
ment.  Every  part  of  it  has  been  illuminated 
with  light  reflected  from  every  other.  Compe 
tition  has  produced  activity  where  monopoly 
would  have  produced  sluggishness.  The  num 
ber  of  experiments  in  moral  science  which  the 
speculator  has  an  opportunity  of  witnessing 
has  been  increased  beyond  all  calculation. 
Society  and  human  nature,  instead  of  being 
seen  in  a  single  point  of  view,  are  presented 
to  him  under  ten  thousand  different  aspects. 
By  observing  the  manners  of  surrounding  na 
tions,  by  studying  their  literature,  by  compar 
ing  it  with  that  of  his  own  country  and  of  the 
ancient  republics,  he  is  enabled  to  correct 
those  errors  into  which  the  most  acute  men  must 
fall  when  they  reason  from  a  single  species  to 
a  genus.  He  learns  to  distinguish  what  is 
local  from  what  is  universal ;  what  is  transi 
tory  from  what  is  eternal;  to  discriminate  be 
tween  exceptions  and  rules ;  to  trace  the  ope 
ration  of  disturbing  causes  ;  to  separate  those 
general  principles  which  are  always  true  and 
everywhere  applicable,  from  the  accidental 
circumstances  with  which  in  every  community 
they  are  blended,  and  with  which,  in  an  iso 
lated  community,  they  are  confounded  by  the 
most  philosophical  mind. 

Hence  it  is  that,  in  generalization,  the  writ 
ers  of  modern  times  have  far  surpassed  those 
of  antiquity.  The  historians  of  our  own  coun 
try  are  unequalled  in  depth  and  precision  of 
reason  ;  and  even  in  the  works  of  our  mere 
compilers  we  often  meet  with  speculations  be 
yond  the  reach  of  Thucydides  or  Tacitus. 

But  it  must  at  the  same  time  be  admitted 
that  they  have  characteristic  faults,  so  closely 
connected  with  their  characteristic  merits  and 
of  such  magnitude  that  it  may  well  be  doubted 
whether,  on  the  whole,  this  department  of  lite 
rature  has  gained  or  lost  during  the  last  two- 
aml-twenty  centuries. 

The  best  nistorians  of  later  times  have  been 
seduced  from  truth,  not  by  their  imagination, 
but  by  their  reason.  They  far  excel  their  pre 
decessors  in  the  art  of  deducing  general  prin 
ciples  from  facts.  But  unhappily  tney  have 
fallen  into  the  error  of  distorting  facts  to  suit 
general  principles.  They  arrive  at  a  theory 
from  looking  at  some  of  the  phenomena,  and 
the  remaining  phenomena  they  strain  or  cur 
tail  to  suit  the  theory.  For  this  purpose  it  is 
not  necessary  that  they  should  assert  what  is 
absolutely  false,  for  all  questions  in  morals 
and  politics  are  questions  of  comparison  and 
degree.  Any  proposition  which  does  not  in- 
voive  a  contradiction  in  terms  may,  by  possi 
bility,  be  true;  and  if  all  the  circumstances 
which  raise  a  probability  in  its  favour  be  stated 
and  enforced,  and  those  which  lead  to  an  op 
posite  conclusion  be  omitted  or  lightly  passed 
over,  it  may  appear  to  be  demonstrated.  In 
every  human  character  and  transaction  there 
is  a  mixture  of  good  and  evil; — a  little  exagge 
ration,  a  little  suppression,  a  judicious  use  of 
epithets,  a  watchful  and  searching  skepticism 
with  respect  to  the  evidence  on  one  side,  a  con 
venient  credulity  with  respect  to  every  report  j 
or  tradition  on  the  other,  may  easily  make  a  | 


saint   of  Laud,    or  a   tyrant  of  Henry  the 
Fourth. 

This  species  of  misrepresentation  abounds 
in  the  most  valuable  works  of  modern  histo 
rians.  Herodotus  tells  his  story  like  a  slovenly 
witness,  who,  heated  by  partialities  and  preju 
dices,  unacquainted  with  the  established  rules 
of  evidence,  and  uninstructed  as  to  the  obliga 
tions  of  his  oath,  confounds  what  he  imagines 
with  what  he  has  seen  and  heard,  and  brings 
out  facts,  reports,  conjectures,  and  fancies,  in 
one  mass.  Hume  is  an  accomplished  advo 
cate.  Without  positively  asserting  much  more 
than  he  can  prove,  he  gives  prominence  to  all 
the  circumstances  which  support  his  case  ;  he 
glides  lightly  over  those  which  are  unfavour 
able  to  it;  his  own  witnesses  are  applauded 
and  encouraged;  the  statements  which  seem 
to  throw  discredit  on  them  are  controverted; 
the  contradictions  into  which  they  fall  are  ex 
plained  away;  a  clear  and  connected  abstract 
of  their  evidence  is  given.  Every  thing  that 
is  offered  on  the  other  side  is  scrutinized  with 
the  utmost  severity;  every  suspicious  circum 
stance  is  a  ground  for  comment  and  invective; 
what  cannot  be  denied  is  extenuated  or  passed 
by  without  notice;  concessions  even  are  some 
times  made;  but  this  insidious  candour  only  in 
creases  the  effect  of  the  vast  mass  of  sophistry. 

We  have  mentioned  Hume  as  the  ablest  and 
most  popular  writer  of  his  class;  but  the  charge 
which  we  have  brought  against  him  is  one  to 
which  all  our  most  distinguished  historians  are 
in  some  degree  obnoxious.  Gibbon,  in  particu 
lar,  deserves  very  severe  censure.  Of  all  the  nu 
merous  culprits,  however,  none  is  more  deeply 
guilty  than  Mr.  Mitford.  We  willingly  acknow 
ledge  the  obligations  which  are  due  to  his  ta 
lents  and  industry.  The  modern  historians  of 
Greece  had  been  in  the  habit  of  writing  as  if 
the  world  had  learned  nothing  new  during  the. 
last  sixteen  hundred  years.  Instead  of  illus 
trating  the  events  which  they  narrated  by  the 
philosophy  of  a  more  enlightened  age,  they 
judged  of  antiquity  by  itself  alone.  They 
seemed  to  think  that  notions,  long  driven  from 
every  other  corner  of  literature,  had  a  pre 
scriptive  right  to  occupy  this  last  fastness. 
They  considered  all  the  ancient  historians  a> 
equally  authentic.  They  scarcely  made  any 
distinction  between  him  who  related  events  at 
which  he  had  himself  been  present,  and  him 
who  five  hundred  years  after  composed  a  phi 
losophical  romance,  for  a  society  which  had 
in  the  interval  undergone  a  complete  change. 
It  was  all  Greek,  and  all  true  !  The  centuries 
which  separated  Plutarch  from  Thucydides 
seemed  as  nothing  to  men  who  lived  in  an  age 
so  remote.  The  distance  of  time  produced  aa 
error  similar  to  that  which  is  sometimes  pro 
duced  by  distance  of  place.  There  are  many 
good  ladies  who  think  that,  afl  the  people  in 
India  live  together,  and  who  charge  a  friend 
setting  out  for  Calcutta  with  kind  messages  to 
Bombay.  To  Rollin  and  Barthelemi,  in  the 
same  manner,  all  the  classics  were  contem 
poraries. 

Mr.  Mitforrl  ceitainly  introduced  great  im 
provements  ;  he  showed  us  that  men  who 
wrote  in  Greek  and  Latin  sometimes  told  lies; 
he  showed  us  that  ancient  history  might  be 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


relate  i  in  such  a  manner  as  to  furni.sk  not 
only  allusions  to  schoolboys,  but  important 
lessons  to  statesmen.  From  that  love  of  the 
atrical  effect  and  high  flown  sentiment  which 
had  poisoned  almost  every  other  work  on  the 
same  subject,  his  book  is  perfectly  free.  But 
his  passion  for  a  theory  as  false,  and  far  more 
ungenerous,  led  him  substantially  to  violate 
truth  in  every  page.  Statements  unfavour 
able  to  democracy  are  made  with  unhesitating 
confidence,  and  with  the  utmost  bitterness  of 
language.  Every  charge  brought  against  a 
monarch,  or  an  aristocracy,  is  sifted  with  the 
utmost  care.  If  it  cannot  be  denied,  some 
palliating  supposition  is  suggested,  or  we  are 
at  least  reminded  that  some  circumstances 
now  unknown  may  have  justified  what  at  pre 
sent  appears  unjustifiable.  Two  events  are 
reported  by  the  same  author  in  the  same  sen 
tence  ;  their  truth  rests  on  the  same  testimony ; 
but  the  one  supports  the  darling  hypothesis, 
and  the  other  seems  inconsistent  with  it.  The 
one  is  taken  and  the  other  is  left. 

The  practice  of  distorting  narrative  into  a 
conformity  with  theory,  is  a  vice  not  so  unfa 
vourable,  as  at  first  sight  it  may  appear,  to 
the  interest  of  political  science.  We  have 
compared  the  writers  who  indulge  in  it  to 
advocates ;  and  we  may  add,  that  their  con 
flicting  fallacies,  like  those  of  advocates,  cor 
rect  each  other.  It  has  always  been  held,  in 
the  most  enlightened  nations,  that  a  tribunal 
will  decide  a  judicial  question  most  fairly, 
when  it  has  heard  two  able  men  argue,  as  un 
fairly  as  possible,  on  the  two  opposite  sides  of 
it;  and  we  are  inclined  to  think  that  this  opi 
nion  is  just.  Sometimes,  it  is  true,  superior 
eloquence  and  dexterity  will  make  the  worse 
appear  the  better  reason;  but  it  is  at  least 
certain  that  the  judge  will  be  compelled  to 
contemplate  the  case  under  two  different 
aspects.  It  is  certain  that  no  important  con 
sideration  will  altogether  escape  notice. 

This  is  at  present  the  state  of  history.  The 
poet  laureate  appears  for  the  Church  of  Eng 
land,  Lingard  for  the  Church  of  Rome.  Brodie 
has  moved  to  set  aside  the  verdicts  obtained 
by  Hume;  and  the  cause  in  which  Mitford 
succeeded  is,  we  understand,  about  to  be  re 
heard.  In  the  midst  of  these  disputes,  how 
ever,  history  proper,  if  we  may  use  the  term, 
is  disappearing.  The  high,  grave,  impartial 
summing  up  of  Thucydides  is  nowhere  to  be 
found. 

While  our  historians  are  practising  all  the 
arts  of  controversy,  they  miserably  neglect  the 
art  of  narration,  the  art  of  interesting  the  affec 
tions,  and  presenting  pictures  to  the  imagina 
tion.  That  a  writer  may  produce  these  effects 
without  violating  truth  is  sufficiently  proved 
by  many  excellent  biographical  works.  The 
immense  popularity  which  well-written  books 
of  this  kind  have  acquired,  deserves  the  serious 
consideration  of  historians.  Voltaire's  Charles 
the  Twelfth,  Marmontd's  Memoirs,  Bwsweli' 
Lile.  of  Johnson,  Southey's  account  of  Nelson, 
ure  perused  with  delight  by  the  most  frivolous 
and  indolent.  Whenever  any  tolerable  book 
of  the  same  description  mnites  its  appearance, 
the  circulating  libraries  are  mobbed;  the  book 
societies  are  in  commotion  the  new  novel  lies 


uncut;  the  magazines  and  newspapers  fill  their 
columns  with  extracts.  In  the  mean  time  his 
tories  of  great  empires,  written  by  men  of 
eminent  ability,  lie  unread  on  the  shelves  of 
ostentatious  libraries. 

The  writers  of  history  seem  to  entertain  an 
aristocratical  contempt  for  the  writers  of  me 
moirs.  They  think  it  benrath  the  dignity  of 
men  who  describe  the  revolutions  of  nations, 
to  dwell  on  the  details  which  constitute  the 
charm  of  biography.  They  ha^e  imposed  on 
themselves  a  code  of  conventional  decencies 
as  absurd  as  that  which  has  been  the  bane  of 
the  French  drama.  The  most  characteristic 
and  interesting  circumstances  are  omitted  or 
softened  down,  because,  as  we  are  told,  they 
are  too  trivial  for  the  majesty  of  history.  The 
majesty  of  history  seems  to  resemble  the  ma 
jesty  of  the  poor  King  of  Spain,  who  died  a 
martyr  to  ceremony,  because  the  proper  digni 
taries  were  not  at  hand  to  render  him  assist 
ance. 

That  history  would  be  more  amusing  if  this 
etiquette  were  relaxed,  will,  we  suppose,  be 
acknowledged.  But  would  it  be  less  dignified, 
or  less  useful  1  What  do  we  mean,  when  we 
say  that  one  past  event  is  important,  and  an 
other  insignificant  1  No  past  event  has  any 
intrinsic  importance.  The  knowledge  of  it  is 
valuable  only  as  it  leads  us  to  form  just  cal 
culations  with  respect  to  the  future.  A  history 
which  does  not  serve  this  purpose,  though  it 
may  be  filled  with  battles,  treaties,  and  corn- 
motions,  is  as  useless  as  the  series  of  turn 
pike-tickets  collected  by  Sir  Mathew  Mite. 

Let  us  suppose  that  Lord  Clarendon,  instead 
of  filling  hundreds  of  folio  pages  with  copies 
of  state  papers,  in  which  the  same  assertions 
and  contradictions  are  repeated,  till  the  reader 
is  overpowered  with  weariness,  had  conde 
scended  to  be  the  Bos  well  of  the  Long  Parlia 
ment.  Let  us  suppose  that  he  had  exhibited 
to  us  the  wise  and  lofty  self-government  of 
Hampden,  leading  while  he  seemed  to  follow, 
and  propounding  unanswerable  arguments  in 
the  strongest  forms,  with  the  modest  air  of  an 
inquirer  anxious  for  information ;  the  delu 
sions  which  misled  the  noble  spirit  of  Vane; 
the  coarse  fanaticism  which  concealed  the  yet 
loftier  genius  of  Cromwell,  destined  to  control 
a  mutinous  army  and  a  factious  people,  to  abase 
the  flag  of  Holland,  to  arrest  the  victorious 
arms  of  Sweden,  and  to  hold  the  balance  firm 
between  the  rival  monarchies  of  France  and 
Spain.  Let  us  suppose  that  he  had  made  his 
Cavaliers  and  Roundheads  talk  in  their  own 
style-,  that  he  had  reported  some  of  the  ribal 
dry  of  Rupert's  pages,  and  some  of  the  cant 
of  Harrison  and  Fleetwood.  Would  not  his 
work  in  that  case  have  been  more  interesting! 
Would  it  not  have  been  more  accurate  1 

A  history  in  which  every  particular  incident 
may  be  true,  may  on  the  whole  be  false.  The 
circumstances  which  have  most  influence  oa 
the  happiness  cf  mankind,  the  changes  of 
manners  and  morals,  the  transition  of  com 
munities  from  poverty  to  wealth,  from  know 
ledge  to  ignorance,  from  ferocity  to  humanity 
— these  are,  for  the  most  part,  noiseless  revo 
lutions.  Their  progress  is  rarely  indicated  by 
what  historians  are  pleased  to  call  important 


HISTORY. 


65 


events.  They  are  not  achieved  by  armies,  or 
enacted  by  senates.  They  are  sanctioned  by 
no  treaties,  and  recorded  in  no  archives.  They 
are  carried  on  in  every  school,  in  every  church, 
behind  ten  thousand  counters,  at  ten  thousand 
firesides.  The  upper  current  of  society  pre 
sents  no  certain  criterion  by  which  we  can 
judge  of  the  direction  in  which  the  under  cur 
rent  flows.  We  read  of  defeats  and  victories. 
But  we  know  that  nations  may  be  miserable 
amidst  victories,  and  prosperous  amidst  de 
feats.  We  read  of  the  fall  of  wise  ministers, 
and  of  the  rise  of  profligate  favourites.  But 
we  must  remember  how  small  a  proportion 
the  good  or  evil  effected  by  a  single  statesman 
can  bear  to  the  good  or  evil  of  a  great  social 
system. 

Bishop  Watson  compares  a  geologist  to  a 
gnat  mounted  on  an  elephant,  and  laying  down 
theories  as  to  the  whole  internal  structure  of 
the  vast  animal,  from  the  phenomena  of  the 
hide.  The  comparison  is  unjust  to  the  geolo 
gists  ;  but  it  is  very  applicable  to  those  his 
torians  who  write  as  if  the  body  politic  were 
homogeneous,  who  look  only  on  the  surface 
of  affairs,  and  never  think  of  the  mighty  and 
various  organization  which  lies  deep  below. 

In  the  works  of  such  writers  as  these,  Eng 
land,  at  the  close  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  is 
in  the  highest  state  of  prosperity.  At  the 
close  of  the  American  War,  she  is  in  a  mise 
rable  and  degraded  condition ;  as  if  the  people 
were  not  on  the  whole  as  rich,  as  well  go 
verned,  and  as  well  educated,  at  the  latter 
period  as  at  the  former.  We  have  read 
books  called  Histories  of  England,  under  the 
reign  of  George  the  Second,  in  which  the  rise 
of  Methodism  is  not  even  mentioned.  A  hun 
dred  years  hence  this  breed  of  authors  will,  we 
hope,  be  extinct.  If  it  should  still  exist,  the 
late  ministerial  interregnum  will  be  described 
in  terms  which  will  seem  to  imply  that  all  go 
vernment  was  at  an  end ;  that  the  social  con 
tract  was  annulled,  and  that  the  hand  of  every 
man  was  against  his  neighbour,  until  the  wis 
dom  and  virtue  of  the  new  cabinet  educed 
order  out  of  the  chaos  of  anarchy.  We  are 
quite  certain  that  misconceptions  as  gross 
prevail  at  this  moment,  respecting  many  im 
portant  parts  of  our  annals. 

The  effect  of  historical  reading  is  analogous, 
in  many  respects,  to  that  produced  by  foreign 
travel.  The  student,  like  the  tourist,  is  trans 
ported  into  a  new  state  of  society.  He  sees 
new  fashions.  He  hears  new  modes  of  ex 
pression.  His  mind  is  enlarged  by  contem 
plating  the  wide  diversities  of  laws,  of  morals, 
and  of  manners.  But  men  may  travel  far, 
and  return  with  minds  as  contracted  as  if  they 
had  never  stirred  from  their  own  market-town. 
In  the  same  manner,  men  may  know  the  dates 
of  many  battles,  and  the  genealogies  of  many 
royal  houses,  and  yet  be  no  wiser.  Most  peo 
ple  look  at  past  times,  as  princes  look  at 
foreign  countries.  More  than  one  illustrious 
stranger  has  landed  on  our  island  amidst  the 
shouts  of  a  mob,  has  dined  with  the  King,  has 
hunted  with  the  master  of  the  stag-hounds,  has 
seen  the  Guards  reviewed,  and  a  knight  of  the 
garter  installed;  has  cantered  along  Regent 
street;  has  visited  St.  Paul's,  and  noted  down 

VOL.  I.— 9 


its  dimensions,  and  has  then  departed,  think« 
ing  that  he  has  seen  England.  He  has,  in  fact, 
seen  a  few  public  buildings,  public  men,  and 
public  ceremonies.  But  of  the  vast  and  com 
plex  system  of  society,  of  the  fine  shades  of 
national  character,  of  the  practical  operation, 
of  government  and  laws,  he  knows  nothing. 
He  who  would  understand  these  things  rightly 
must  not  confine  his  observations  to  palaces 
and  solemn  days.  He  must  see  ordinary  men 
as  they  appear  in  their  ordinary  business  and 
in  their  ordinary  pleasures.  He  must  mingle 
in  the  crowds  of  the  exchange  and  the  coffee 
house.  He  must  obtain  admittance  to  the 
convivial  table  and  the  domestic  hearth.  He 
must  bear  with  vulgar  expressions.  He  must 
not  shrink  from  exploring  even  tht  *etreats  of 
misery.  He  who  wishes  to  understand  the 
condition  of  mankind  in  former  ages,  must 
proceed  on  the  same  principle.  If  he  attends 
only  to  public  transactions,  to  wars,  con 
gresses,  and  debates,  his  studies  will  be  as  un 
profitable  as  the  travels  of  those  imperial, 
royal,  and  serene  sovereigns,  who  form  their 
judgment  of  our  island  from  having  gone  in 
state  to  a  few  fine  sights,  and  from  having  held 
formal  conferences  with  a  few  great  officers. 

The  perfect  historian  is  he  in  whose  work 
the  character  and  spirit  of  an  age  is  exhibited 
in  miniature.  He  relates  no  fact,  he  attributes 
no  expression  to  his  characters,  which  is  not 
authenticated  by  sufficient  testimony.  But  by 
judicious  selection,  rejection,  and  arrange 
ment,  he  gives  to  truth  those  attractions  which 
hav6  been  usurped  by  fiction.  In  his  narra 
tive,  a  due  subordination  is  observed ;  some 
transactions  are  prominent,  others  retire.  But 
the  scale  on  which  he  represents  them  is  in 
creased  or  diminished,  not  according  to  the 
dignity  of  the  persons  concerned  m  them,  but 
according  to  the  degree  in  which  they  eluci 
date  the  condition  of  society  and  the  nature  of 
man.  He  shows  us  the  court,  the  camp,  and 
the  senate.  But  he  shows  us  also  the  nation 
He  considers  no  anecdote,  no  peculiarity  of 
manner,  no  familiar  saying,  as  too  insignifi 
cant  for  his  notice,  which  is  not  too  insigni 
ficant  to  illustrate  the  operation  of  laws,  of 
religion,  and  of  education,  and  to  mark  the 
progress  of  the  human  mind.  Men  will  not 
merely  be  described,  but  will  be  made  inti 
mately  known  to  us.  The  changes  of  man 
ners  will  be  indicated,  not  merely  by  a  few 
general  phrases,  or  a  few  extracts  from  sta 
tistical  documents,  but  by  appropriate  images 
presented  in  every  line. 

If  a  man,  such  as  we  are  supposing,  should 
write  the  history  of  England,  he  would  as 
suredly  not  omit  the  battles,  the  sieges,  the 
negotiations,  the  seditions,  the  ministerial 
changes.  But  with  these  he  would  intersperse 
the  details  which  are  the  charm  of  historical 
romances.  At  Lincoln  Cathedral  there  is  a 
beautiful  painted  window,  which  was  made  by 
an  apprentice  out  of  the  pieces  of  glass  which 
had  been  rejected  by  his  master.  It  is  so  far 
superior  to  every  other  in  the  church,  that, 
according  to  the  *radition,  the  vanquished 
artist  killed  himselt  from  mortification.  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  in  the  same  manner,  has  used 
those  fragments  of  truth  which  historians  navp 
r  2 


66 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


scornfully  thrown  behind  them,  in  a  manner 
which  may  well  excite  their  envy.  He  has 
constructed  out  of  their  gleanings  works 
which,  even  considered  as  histories,  are  scarce 
ly  less  valuable  than  theirs.  But  a  truly  great 
historian  would  reclaim  those  materials  which 
the  novelist  has  appropriated.  The  history 
of  the  government  and  the  history  of  the  peo 
ple  would  be  exhibited  in  that  mode  in  which 
alone  they  can  be  exhibited  justly,  in  insepa 
rable  conjunction  and  intermixture.  We  should 
not  then  have  to  look  for  the  wars  and  votes 
of  the  Puritans  in  Clarendon,  and  for  their 
phraseology  in  Old  Mortality ;  for  one  half  of 
King  James  in  Hume,  and  for  the  other  half 
in  the  Fortunes  of  Nigel. 

The  early  part  of  our  imaginary  history 
would  be  rich  with  colouring  from  romance, 
ballad,  and  chronicle.  We  should  find  our 
selves  in  the  company  of  knights  such  as 
those  of  Froissart,  and  of  pilgrims  such  as 
those  \vho  rode  with  Chaucer  from  the  Tabard. 
Society  would  be  shown  from  the  highest  to 
the  lowest — from  the  royal  cloth  of  state  to  the 
den  of  the  outlaw;  from  the  throne  of  the  le 
gate  to  the  chimney-corner  where  the  begging 
friar  regaled  himself.  Palmers,  minstrels, 
crusaders — the  stately  monastery,  with  the 
good  cheer  in  its  refectory,  and  the  high-mass 
in  its  chapel — the  manor-house,  with  its  hunt 
ing  and  hawking — the  tournament,  with  the 
heralds  and  ladies,  the  trumpets  and  the  cloth 
of  gold — would  give  truth  and  life  to  the  re 
presentation.  We  should  perceive,  in  a  thou 
sand  slight  touches,  the  importance  of  the  pri 
vileged  burgher,  and  the  fierce  and  haughty 
spirit  which  swelled  under  the  collar  of  the 
degraded  villain.  The  revival  of  letters  would 
not  merely  be  described  in  a  few  magnificent 
periods.  We  should  discern,  in  innumerable 
particulars,  the  fermentation  of  mind,  the  eager 
appetite  for  knowledge,  which  distinguished 
the  sixteenth  from  the  fifteenth  century.  In 
the  Reformation  we  should  see,  not  merely  a 
schism  which  changed  the  ecclesiastical  con 
stitution  of  England,  and  the  mutual  relations 
of  the  European  powers,  but  a  moral  war 
which  raged  in  every  family,  which  set  the 
father  against  the  son,  and  the  son  against  the 
father,  the  mother  against  the  daughter,  and 
the  daughter  against  the  mother.  Henry 
would  be  painted  with  the  skill  of  Tacitus. 
We  should  have  the  change  of  his  character 
from  his  profuse  and  joyous  youth  to  his 
savage  and  imperious  old  age.  We  should 
perceive  the  gradual  progress  of  selfish  and 
tyrannical  passions,  in  a  mind  not  naturally 
insensible  or  ungenerous  ;  and  to  the  last  we 
should  detect  some  remains  of  that  open  and 
noble  temper  which  endeared  him  to  a  people 
whom  he  oppressed,  struggling  with  the  hard 
ness  of  despotism  and  the  irritability  of  dis 
ease.  We  should  see  Elizabeth  in  all  her 
weakness,  and  in  all  her  strength,  surrounded 
by  the  handsome  favourites  whom  she  never 
trusted,  and  the  wise  old  statesmen,  whom  she 
never  dismissed,  uniting  in  herself  the  most 
contradictory  qualities  of  both  her  parents— 
the  coquetry,  the  caprice,  the  petty  malice  of 
Anne — the  haughty  and  resolute  spirit  of 
Henry.  We  have  no  hesitation  in  saying,  that 


a  great  artist  might  produce  a  portrait  of  this 
remarkable  woman,  at  least  as  striking  as  that 
in  the  novel  of  Kenilworth,  without  employing 
a  single  trait  not  authenticated  by  ample  tes 
timony.  In  the  mean  time,  we  should  see 
arts  cultivated,  wealth  accumulated,  the  conve 
niences  of  life  improved.  We  should  see  the 
keeps,  where  nobles,  insecure  themselves, 
spread  insecurity  around  them,  gradually 
giving  place  to  the  halls  of  peaceful  opulence, 
to  the  oriels  of  Longleat,  and  the  stately  pin 
nacles  of  Burleigh.  We  should  see  towns  ex 
tended,  deserts  cultivated,  the  hamlets  of  fish 
ermen  turned  into  wealthy  havens,  the  meal 
of  the  peasant  improved,  and  his  hut  more 
commodiously  furnished.  We  should  see 
those  opinions  and  feelings  which  produced 
the  great  struggle  against  the  house  of  Stuart, 
slowly  growing  up  in  the  bosom  of  private 
families,  before  they  manifested  themselves  in 
Parliamentary  debates.  Then  would  come 
the  Civil  War.  Those  skirmishes,  on  which 
Clarendon  dwells  so  minutely,  would  be  told, 
as  Thucydides  would  have  told  them,  with 
perspicuous  conciseness.  They  are  merely- 
connecting  links.  But  the  great  character 
istics  of  the  age,  the  loyal  enthusiasm  of  the 
brave  English  gentry,  the  fierce  licentiousness 
of  the  swearing,  dicing,  drunken  reprobates, 
whose  excesses  disgraced  the  royal  cause — 
the  austerity  of  the  Presbyterian  Sabbaths  in 
the  city,  the  extravagance  of  the  Independent 
preachers  in  the  camp,  the  precise  garb,  the 
severe  countenance,  the  petty  scruples,  the 
affected  accent,  the  absurd  names  and  phrases 
which  marked  the  Puritans — the  valour,  the 
policy,  the  public  spirit,  which  lurked  beneath 
these  ungraceful  disguises,  the  dreams  of  the 
raving  Fifth  Monarchy  man,  the  dreams,  scarce 
ly  less  wild,  of  the  philosophic  republican — all 
these  would  enter  into  the  representation,  and 
render  it  at  once  more  exact  arid  more  strik 
ing. 

The  instruction  derived  from  history  thus 
written  would  be  of  a  vivid  and  practical  cha 
racter.  It  would  be  received  by  the  imagina 
tion  as  well  as  by  the  reason.  It  would  be  not 
merely  traced  on  the  mind,  but  branded  into 
it.  Many  truths,  too,  would  be  learned,  which 
can  be  learned  in  no  other  manner.  As  the 
history  of  states  is  generally  written,  the  great 
est  and  most  momentous  revolutions  seem  to 
come  upon  them  like  supernatural  inflictions, 
without  warning  or  cause.  But  the  fact  is,  that 
such  revolutions  are  almost  always  the  conse 
quences  of  moral  changes,  which  have  gra 
dually  passed  on  the  mass  of  the  community, 
and  which  ordinarily  proceed  far,  before  their 
progress  is  indicated  by  any  public  measure. 
An  intimate  knowledge  of  the  domestic  history 
of  nations  is  therefore  absolutely  necessary  to 
the  prognosis  of  political  events.  A  narrative, 
defective  in  this  respect,  is  as  useless  as  a  me 
dical  treatise  which  should  pass  by  all  the 
symptoms  attendant  on  the  early  stage  of  a 
disease,  and  mention  only  what  occurs  when 
the  patient  is  beyond  the  reach  of  remedies. 

An  historian,  such  as  we  have  been  attempt 
ing  to  describe,  would  indeed  be  an  intellectual 
prodigy.  In  his  mind,  powers,  scarcely  com 
patible  with  each  other,  must  be  tempered  into 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


67 


an  exquisite  harmony.  We  shall  sooner  see  ment  of  the  mind.  It  cannot  inde3d  produce 
another  Shakspeare  or  another  Homer.  The  perfection,  but  it  produces  improvement,  and 
highest  excellence,  to  which  any  single  faculty  nourishes  that  generous  and  liberal  fastidious- 
can  be  brought,  would  be  less  surprising  than  ness,  which  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  strong- 
such  a  happy  and  delicate  combination  of  i  est  sensibility  to  merit,  and  which,  while  it  ex- 
qualities.  Yet  the  contemplation  of  imaginary  j  alts  our  conceptions  of  the  art,  does  not  render 
models  is  not  an  unpleasant  or  useless  employ- 1  us  unjust  to  the  artist. 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTOEY. 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1828.] 


Hi  STOUT,  at  least  in  its  state  of  imaginary 
perfection,  is  a  compound  of  poetry  and  philo 
sophy.  It  impresses  general  truths  on  the 
mind  by  a  vivid  representation  of  particular 
characters  and  incidents.  But,  in  fact,  the  two 
hostile  elements  of  which  it  consists  have 
never  been  known  to  form  a  perfect  amalgama 
tion  ;  and  at  length,  in  our  own  time,  they  have 
been  completely  and  professedly  separated. 
Good  histories,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word, 
we  have  not.  But  we  have  good  historical  ro 
mances  and  good  historical  essays.  The  ima 
gination  and  the  reason,  if  we  may  use  a  legal 
metaphor,  have  made  partition  of  a  province 
<>f  literature  of  which  they  were  formerly 
seised  per  my  et  pour  tout ;  and  now  they  hold 
their  respective  portions  in  severally,  instead 
of  holding  the  whole  in  common. 

To  make  the  past  present,  to  bring  the  dis 
tant  near,  to  place  us  in  the  society  of  a  great 
man,  or  on  the  eminence  which  overlooks  the 
field  of  a  mighty  battle,  to  invest  with  the  reali 
ty  of  human  flesh  and  blood  beings  whom  we 
are  too  much  inclined  to  consider  as  personi 
fied  qualities  in  an  allegory,  to  call  up  our  ances 
tors  before  us  with  all  their  peculiarities  of 
language,  manners,  and  garb,  to  show  us  over 
their  houses,  to  seat  us  at  their  tables,  to  rum 
mage  their  old-fashioned  wardrobes,  to  explain 
the  uses  of  their  ponderous  furniture — these 
parts  of  the  duty  which  properly  belongs  to  the 
historian  have  been  appropriated  by  the  histo 
rical  novelist.  On  the  other  hand,  to  extract 
the  philosophy  of  history — to  direct  our  judg 
ment  of  events  and  men — to  trace  the  connec 
tion  of  causes  and  effects,  and  to  draw  from  the 
occurrences  of  former  times  general  lessons  of 
moral  and  political  wisdom,  has  become  the 
business  of  a  distinct  class  of  writers. 

Of  the  two  kinds  of  composition  into  which 
history  has  been  thus  divided,  the  one  may  be 
compared  to  a  map,  the  other  to  a  painted  land 
scape.  The  picture,  though  it  places  the  ob 
ject  before  us,  does  not  enable  us  to  ascertain 
with  accuracy  the  form  and  dimensions  of  its 
component  parts,  the  distances,  and  the  angles. 
The  map  is  not  a  work  of  imitative  art.  It 
presents  no  scene  to  the  imagination  ;  but  it 
gives  HS  exact  information  as  to  the  bearings 
of  the  various  points,  and  is  a  more  useful 

*  The  Constitutional  History  of  England,  from  the  Ac 
cession  of  Henry  VIL  to  the  Death  of  Oeorge  II.  BY 
HENRY  HALLAM.  Iu2vo!s.  1827. 


companion  to  the  traveller  or  the  general  than 
the  painting  could  be,  though  it  were  the  grand 
est  that  ever  Rosa  peopled  with  outlaws,  or  the 
sweetest  over  which  Claude  ever  poured  the 
mellow  effulgence  of  a  setting  sun. 

It  is  remarkable  that  the  practice  of  separat 
ing  the  two  ingredients  of  which  history  is 
composed  has  become  prevalent  on  the  Conti 
nent  as  well  as  in  this  country.  Italy  has  al 
ready  produced  an  historical  novel,  of  high  merit 
and  of  still  higher  promise.  In  France,  the 
practice  has  been  carried  to  a  length  some 
what  whimsical.  M.  Sismondi  publishes  a 
grave  and  stately  history,  very  valuable,  and  a 
little  tedious.  He  then  sends  forth  as  a  com 
panion  toil  a  novel,  in  which  he  attempts  to 
give  a  lively  representation  of  characters  and 
manners.  This  course,  as  it  seems  to  us,  has 
all  the  disadvantages  of  a  division  of  labour, 
and  none  of  its  advantages.  We  understand 
the  expediency  of  keeping  the  functions  of 
cook  and  coachman  distinct — the  dinner  will 
be  better  dressed,  and  the  horses  better  ma 
naged.  But  where  the  two  situations  are  united, 
as  in  the  Maitre  Jaques  of  Moliere,  we  do  not 
see  that  the  matter  is  much  mended  by  the  so 
lemn  form  with  which  the  pluralist  passes  from 
one  of  his  employments  to  the  other. 

We  manage  these  things  better  in  England. 
Sir  Walter  Scott  gives  us  a  novel ;  Mr.  Hallam 
a  critical  and  argumentative  history.  Both  are 
occupied  with  the  same  matter.  But  the  for 
mer  looks  at  it  with  the  eye  of  a  sculptor.  His 
intention  is  to  give  an  express  and  lively 
image  of  its  external  form.  The  latter  is  an 
anatomist.  His  task  is  to  dissect  the  subject  to 
its  inmost  recesses,  and  to  lay  bare  before  us  all 
the  springs  of  motion  and  all  the  causes  of  de 
cay. 

Mr.  Hallam  is,  on  the  whole,  far  better  quali 
fied  than  any  other  writer  of  our  time  for  the 
office  which  he  has  undertaken.  He  has  great 
industry  and  great  acuteness.  His  knowledge 
is  extensive,  various,  and  profound.  His  mind 
is  equally  distinguished  fey  the  amplitude  of 
its  grasp  and  by  the  delicacy  of  its  tact.  His 
speculations  have  none  of  that  vagueness 
which  is  the  common  fault  of  political  philoso 
phy.  On  the  contrary,  they  are  strikingly 
practical.  They  teach  us  not  only  the  general 
rule,  but  the  mode  of  applying  it  to  solve  par. 
ticular  cases.  In  this  respect  they  often  re 
mind  us  of  the  Discourses  of  MacbiaveJi 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  style  is  sometimes  harsh,  and  sometimes 
obscure.  We  have  also  here  and  there  remark 
ed  a  little  of  that  unpleasant  trick  which  Gib 
bon  brought  into  fashion — the  trick,  we  mean, 
of  narrating  by  implication  and  allusion.  Mr. 
Hallam,  however,  has  an  excuse  which  Gib 
bon  had  not.  His  work  is  designed  for  readers 
who  are  already  acquainted  wiih  the  ordinary 
books  on  English  history,  and  who  can  there 
fore  unriddle  these  little  enigmas  without  dif 
ficulty.  The  manner  of  the  book  is,  on  the 
whole,  not  unworthy  of  the  matter.  The  lan 
guage,  even  where  most  faulty,  is  weighty  and 
massive,  and  indicates  strong  sense  in  every 
line.  It  often  rises  to  an  eloquence,  not  florid 
or  impassioned,  but  high,  grave,  and  sober; 
such  as  would  become  a  state  paper,  or  a  judg 
ment  delivered  by  a  great  magistrate,  a  Somers, 
or  a  D'Aguesseau. 

In  this  respect  the  character  of  Mr.  Hallam's 
mind  corresponds  strikingly  with  that  of  his 
style.  His  work  is  eminently  judicial.  Ils 
whole  spirit  is  that  of  the  bench,  not  of  the 
bar.  He  sums  up  with  a  calm,  steady  impar 
tiality,  turning  neither  to  the  right  nor  to  the 
Isft,  glossing  over  nothing,  exaggerating  no 
thing,  while  the  advocates  on  both  sides  are  al 
ternately  biting  their  lips  to  hear  their  conflict- 
ing  mis-statements  and  sophisms  exposed.  On 
a  general  survey,  we  do  not  scruple  to  pro 
nounce  the  Constitutional  History  the  most 
impartial  book  that  we  ever  read.  We  think 
it  the  more  incumbent  on  us  to  bear  this  testi 
mony  strongly  at  first  setting  out,  because,  in 
the  course  of  our  remarks,  we  shall  think  it 
right  to  dwell  principally  on  those  parts  of  it 
from  which  we  dissent. 

There  is  one  peculiarity  about  Mr.  Hallam, 
which,  while  it  adds  to  the  value  of  his  writings, 
will,  we  fear,  take  away  something  from  their 
popularity.  He  is  less  of  a  worshipper  than 
any  historian  whom  we  can  call  to  mind. 
Every  political  sect  has  its  esoteric  and  its 
exoteric  school ;  its  abstract  doctrines  for  the 
initiated,  its  visible  symbols,  its  imposing 
forms,  its  mythological  fables  for  the  vulgar. 
It  assists  the  devotion  of  those  who  are  unable 
to  raise  themselves  to  the  contemplation  of 
pure  truths,  by  all  the  devices  of  Pagan  or 
PapU  superstition.  It  has  its  altars  and  its 
deified  heroes,  its  relics  and  pilgrimages,  its 
canonized  martyrs  and  confessors,  its  festivals 
and  its  legendary  miracles.  Our  pious  ances 
tors,  we  are  told,  deserted  the  High  Altar  of 
Canterbury,  to  lay  all  their  oblations  on  the 
shrine  of  St.  Thomas.  In  the  same  manner  the 
great  and  comfortable  doctrines  of  the  Tory 
creed,  those  particularly  which  relate  to  re 
strictions  on  worship  and  on  trade,  are  adored 
by  squires  and  rectors,  in  Pitt  Clubs,  under  the 
name  of  a  minister,  who  was  as  bad  a  repre- 
*#ntative  of  the  system  which  has  been  chris- 
tf  ned  after  him,  as  Becket  of  the  spirit  of  the 
Gospel.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  the  cause  for 
which  Hampden  bled  on  the  field,  and  Sidney 
on  the  scaffold,  is  enthusiastically  toasted  by 
many  an  honest  radical,  who  would  be  puzzled 
to  explain  the  difference  between  Ship-money 
and  the  Habeas  Corpus  act.  It  may  be  added, 
lhat,  as  in  religion,  so  in  politics,  few,  even  of 
&0S5  who  are  enlightened  enough  to  compre 


hend  the  meaning  latent  under  the  emblems  of 
their  faith,  can  resist  the  contagion  of  the 
I  popular  superstition.  Often,  when  they  flatter 
themselves  that  they  are  merely  feigning  a 
compliance  with  the  prejudices  of  the  vulgar, 
they  are  themselves  under  the  influence  of 
those  very  prejudices.  It  probably  was  not 
altogether  on  grounds  of  expediency,  that  So 
crates  taught  his  followers  to  honour  the  gods 
whom  the  state  honoured,  and  bequeathed  a 
cock  to  Esculapius  with  his  dying  breath.  So 
there  is  often  a  portion  of  willing  credulity  and 
enthusiasm  in  the  veneration  which  the  most 
discerning  men  pay  to  their  political  idols. 
From  the  very  nature  of  man  it  must  be  so. 
The  faculty  by  which  we  inseparably  associate 
ideas  which  have  often  been  presented  to  us 
in  conjunction,  is  not  under  the  absolute  con 
trol  of  the  will.  It  may  be  quickened  into 
morbid  activity.  It  may  be  reasoned  into 
sluggishness.  But  in  a  certain  degree  it  will 
always  exist.  The  almost  absolute  mastery 
which  Mr.  Hallam  has  obtained  over  feelings 
of  this  class,  is  perfectly  astonishing  to  us  ; 
and  will,  we  believe,  be  not  only  astonishing, 
but  offensive  to  many  of  his  readers.  It  must 
particularly  disgust  those  people  who,  in  their 
speculations  on  politics,  are  not  reasoners,  but 
fanciers;  whose  opinions,  even  when  sincere, 
are  not  produced,  according  to  the  ordinary 
law  of  intellectual  births,  by  induction  and  in 
ference,  but  are  equivocally  generated  by  the 
heat  of  fervid  tempers  out  of  the  overflowings 
of  tumid  imaginations.  A  man  of  this  class  is 
always  in  extremes.  He  cannot  be  a  friend  tc 
liberty  without  calling  for  a  community  of 
goods,  or  a  friend  to  order  without  taking  under 
his  protection  the  foulest  excesses  of  tyranny. 
His  admiration  oscillates  between  the  most 
worthless  of  rebels  and  the  most  worthless  of 
oppressors ;  between  Marten,  the  scandal  of 
the  High  Court  of  Justice,  and  Laud,  the  scan 
dal  of  the  Star-Chamber.  He  can  forgive  any 
thing  but  temperance  and  impartiality.  He 
has  a  certain  sympathy  with  the  violence  of 
his  opponents,  as  well  as  with  that  of  his  as 
sociates.  In  every  furious  partisan  he  sees 
either  his  present  self  or  his  former  self,  the 
pensioner  that  is  or  the  Jacobin  that  has  been. 
But  he  is  unable  to  comprehend  a  writer  who, 
steadily  attached  to  principles,  is  indifferent 
about  names  and  badges ;  who  judges  of  cha 
racters  with  equable  severity,  not  altogether 
untinctured  with  cynicism,  but  free  from  the 
slightest  touch  of  passion,  party  spirit,  or  ca 
price. 

We  should  probably  like  Mr.  Hallam's  book 
more,  if  instead  of  pointing  out,  with  strict 
fidelity,  the  bright  points  and  the  dark  spots 
of  both  parties,  he  had  exerted  himself  to 
whitewash  the  one  and  to  blacken  the  other. 
But  we  should  certainly  prize  it  far  less. 
Eulogy  and  invective  may  be  had  for  the 
asking.  But  for  cold  rigid  justice — the  one 
weight  and  the  one  measure — we  know  nol 
where  else  we  can  look. 

No  portion  of  our  annals  has  been  more  per 

plexed  and  misrepresented  by  writers  of  dif 

ferent  parties,  than  the  history  of  the  Reform* 

j  tion.     In  this  labyrinth  of  falsehood  and  so 

!  phistry,  the  guidance  of  Mr.  Hallam  is  peca 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


liarly  valuable.    It  is  impossible  not  to  admire  I 
the  evenhanded  justice  with  which  he  deals 
out  castigation  to  right  and  left  on  the  rival 
persecutors. 

It  is  vehemently  maintained  by  some  writers 
of  the  present  day,  that  the  government  of 
Elizabeth  persecuted  neither  Papists  nor  Puri 
tans  as  such ;  and  occasionally  that  the  severe 
measures  which  it  adopted  were  dictated,  not 
by  religious  intolerance,  but  by  political  ne 
cessity.  Even  the  excellent  account  of  those 
times,  which  Mr.  Hallam  has  given,  has  not 
altogether  imposed  silence  on  the  authors  of 
this  fallacy.  The  title  of  the  Queen,  they  say, 
was  annulled  by  the  Pope;  her  throne  was 
given  to  another ;  her  subjects  were  incited  to 
rebellion;  her  life  was  menaced;  every  Ca 
tholic  was  bound  in  conscience  to  be  a  traitor; 
it  was  therefore  against  traitors,  not  against 
Catholics,  that  the  penal  laws  were  enacted. 

That  our  readers  may  be  the  better  able  to 
appreciate  the  merits  of  this  defence,  we  will 
state,  as  concisely  as  possible,  the  substance 
of  some  of  these  laws. 

As  soon  as  Elizabeth  ascended  the  throne, 
and  before  the  least  hostility  to  her  govern 
ment  had  been  shown  by  the  Catholic  popula 
tion,  an  act  passed,  prohibiting  the  celebration 
of  the  rites  of  the  Romish  church,  on  pain  of 
forfeiture  for  the  first  offence,  a  year's  impri 
sonment  for  the  second,  and  perpetual  impri 
sonment  for  the  third. 

A  law  was  next  made,  in  1562,  enacting,  that 
all  who  had  ever  graduated  at  the  Universities, 
or  received  holy  orders,  all  lawyers,  and  all  ma 
gistrates,  should  take  the  oath  of  supremacy 
when  tendered  to  them,  on  pain  of  forfeiture, 
and  imprisonment  during  the  royal  pleasure. 
After  the  lapse  of  three  months,  it  might  again  be 
tendered  to  them ;  and,  if  it  were  again  refused, 
the  recusant  was  guilty  of  high  treason.  A 
prospective  law,  however  severe,  framed  to 
exclude  Catholics  from  the  liberal  professions, 
would  have  been  mercy  itself  compared  with 
this  odious  act.  It  is  a  retrospective  statute ; 
it  is  a  retrospective  penal  statute ;  it  is  a  retro 
spective  penal  statute  against  a  large  class. 
We  will  not  positively  affirm  that  a  law  of  this 
description  must  always,  and  under  all  circum 
stances,  be  unjustifiable.  But  the  presumption 
against  it  is  most  violent ;  nor  do  we  remem 
ber  any  crisis,  either  in  our  own  history,  or  in 
the  history  of  any  other  country,  which  would 
have  rendered  such  a  provision  necessary. 
But  in  the  present,  what  circumstances  called 
for  extraordinary  rigour?  There  might  be 
disaffection  among  the  Catholics.  The  prohi 
bition  of  their  worship  would  naturally  pro 
duce  it.  But  it  is  from  their  situation,  not  from 
their  conduct;  from  the  wrongs  which  they 
bad  suffered,  not  from  those  which  they  had 
committed,  that  the  existence  of  discontent 
among  them  must  be  inferred.  There  were 
libels,  no  doubt,  and  prophecies,  and  rumours, 
and  suspicions ;  strange  grounds  for  a  law  in 
flicting  capital  penalties,  ex  post  facto,  on  a 
large  order  of  men. 

Eight  years  later,  the  bull  of  Pius  deposing 
Elizabeth  produced  a  third  law.  This  law,  to 
which  alone,  as  we  conceive,  the  defence  now 
under  our  consideration  can  apply,  provides, 


that  if  any  Catholic  shall  convert  a  Protestant 
to  the  Romish  church,  they  shall  both  suffer 
death,  as  for  high  treason. 

We  believe  that  we  might  safely  content 
ourselves  with  stating  the  fact,  and  leaving  it 
to  the  judgment  of  every  plain  Englishman. 
Recent  controversies  have,  however,  given  so 
much  importance  to  this  subject,  that  we  will 
offer  a  few  remarks  on  it. 

In  the  first  place,  the  arguments  which  are 
urged  in  favour  of  Elizabeth,  apply  with  much 
greater  force  to  the  case  of  her  sister  Mary. 
The  Catholics  did  not,  at  the  time  of  Eliza 
beth's  accession,  rise  in  arms  to  seat  a  Pre 
tender  on  her  throne.  But  before  Mary  had 
given,  or  could  give  provocation,  the  most  dis 
tinguished  Protestants  attempted  to  set  aside 
her  rights  in  favour  of  the  Lady  Jane.  That 
attempt,  and  the  subsequent  insurrection  of 
Wyatt,  furnished  at  least  as  good  a  plea  for 
the  burning  of  Protestants  as  the  conspiracies 
against  Elizabeth  furnish  for  the  hanging  and 
embowelling  of  Papists. 

The  fact  is,  that  both  pleas  are  worthless 
alike.  If  such  arguments  are  to  pass  current, 
it  will  be  easy  to  prove  that  there  was  never 
such  a  thing  as  religious  persecution  since 
the  creation.  For  thare  never  was  a  religious 
persecution,  in  which  some  odious  crime  was 
not  justly  or  unjustly  smd  to  be  obviously  de- 
ducible  from  the  doctrines  of  the  persecuted 
party.  We  might  say  that  the  Coesars  did  not 
persecute  the  Christians ;  that  they  only  pu 
nished  men  who  were  charged,  rightly  or 
wrongly,  with  burning  Rome,  and  with  com 
mitting  the  foulest  abominations^  in  their  as 
semblies  ;  that  the  refusal  to  throw  frankin- 
cence  on  the  altar  of  Jupiter  was  not  the 
crime,  but  only  evidence  of  the  crime.  We 
might  say  that  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew 
was  intended  to  extirpate,  not  a  religious  sect, 
but  a  political  party.  For,  beyond  all  doubt, 
the  proceedings  of  the  Huguenots,  from  the 
conspiracy  of  Amboise  to  the  battle  of  Mon- 
coutour,  had  given  much  mort  trouble  to  the 
French  monarchy  than  the  Catholics  have 
ever  given  to  England  since  the  Reformation; 
and  that  too  with  much  less  excuse. 

The  true  distinction  is  perfectly  obvious. 
To  punish  a  man  because  he  has  committed  a 
crime,  or  is  believed,  though  unjustly,  to  have 
committed  a  crime,  is  not  persecution.  To 
punish  a  man  because  we  infer  from  the  na 
ture  of  some  doctrine  which  he  holds,  or  from 
the  conduct  of  other  persons  who  hold  the  same 
doctrines  with  him,  that  he  will  commit  a  crime, 
is  persecution ;  and  is,  in  every  case,  foolish 
and  wicked. 

When  Elizabeth  put  Ballard  and  Babington 
to  death,  she  was  not  persecuting.  Nor  should 
we  have  accused  her  government  of  persecu 
tion  for  passing  any  law,  however*  severe, 
against  overt  acts  of  sedition.  But  to  argue 
that  because  a  man  is  a  Catholic  he  must 
think  it  right  to  murder  an  here  tical  sovereign, 
and  that  because  he  thinks  it  right  he  will  at 
tempt  to  do  it,  and  then  to  found  on  this  con 
clusion  a  law  for  punishing  him  as  if  he  nad 
done  it,  is  plain  persecution. 

If,  indeed,  all  men  reasoned  in  the  same 
manner  on  the  same  dara,  aW  ihrays  did  what 


70 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


they  thought  it  their  duty  to  do,  this  mode  of 
dispensing  punishment  might  be  extremely 
judicious.  But  as  people  who  agree  about 
premises  often  disagree  about  conclusions,  and 
as  no  man  in  the  world  acts  up  to  his  own 
standard  of  right,  there  are  two  enormous  gaps 
in  the  logic  by  which  alone  penalties  for  opi 
nions  can  be  defended.  The  doctrine  of  repro 
bation,  in  the  judgment  of  many  very  able 
men,  follows  by  syllogistic  necessity  from  the 
doctrine  of  election.  Others  conceive  that  the 
Antinomian  and  Manichean  heresies  directly 
follow  from  the  doctrine  of  reprobation ;  and 
it  is  very  generally  thought  that  licentiousness 
and  cruelty  of  the  worst  description  are  likely 
to  be  the  fruits,  as  they  often  have  been  the 
fruits,  of  Antinomian  and  Manichean  opinions. 
This  chain  of  reasoning,  we  think,  is  as  per 
fect  in  all  its  parts  as  that  which  makes  out 
a  Papist  to  be  necessarily  a  traitor.  Yet  it 
would  be  rather  a  strong  measure  to  hang  the 
Calvinists,  on  the  ground  that  if  they  were 
spared  they  would  infallibly  commit  all  the 
atrocities  of  Matthias  and  Knipperdoling.  For, 
reason  the  matter  as  we  may,  experience  shows 
us  that  a  man  may  believe  in  election  without 
believing  in  reprobation,  that  he  may  believe 
in  reprobation  without  being  an  Antinomian, 
and  that  he  may  be  an  Antinomian  without 
being  a  bad  citizen.  Man,  in  short,  is  so  in 
consistent  a  creature,  that  it  is  impossible  to 
reason  from  his  belief  to  his  conduct,  or  from 
one  part  of  his  belief  to  another. 

We  do  not  believe  that  every  Englishman 
who  was  reconciled  to  the  Catholic  church 
would,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  have 
thought  himself  justified  in  deposing  or  assas 
sinating  Elizabeth.  It  is  not  sufficient  to  say 
that  the  convert  must  have  acknowledged  the 
authority  of  the  Pope,  and  that  the  Pope  had 
issued  a  bull  against  the  queen.  We  know 
through  what  strange  loopholes  the  human 
mind  contrives  to  escape,  when  it  wishes  to 
avoid  a  disagreeable  inference  from  an  admit 
ted  proposition.  We  know  how  long  the  Jan- 
senists  contrived  to  believe  the  Pope  infallible 
in  matters  of  doctrine,  and  at  the  same  time  to 
believe  doctrines  which  he  pronounced  to  be 
heretical.  Let  it  pass,  however,  that  every 
Catholic  in  the  kingdom  thought  that  Eliza 
beth  might  be  lawfully  murdered.  Still  the 
old  maxim,  that  what  is  the  business  of  every 
body  is  the  business  of  nobody,  is  particularly 
likely  to  hold  good  in  a  case  in  which  a  cruel 
death  is  the  almost  inevitable  consequence  of 
making  any  attempt. 

Of  the  ten  thousand  clergymen  of  the  Church 
of  England,  there  is  scarcely  one  who  would 
not  say  that  a  man  who  should  leave  his  coun 
try  and  friends  to  preach  the  gospel  among 
savages,  and  who  should,  after  labouring  inde- 
fatigably  without  any  hope  of  reward,  termi 
nate  his  life  by  martyrdom,  would  deserve  the 
warmest  admiration.  Yet  we  doubt  whether 
len  of  the  ten  thousand  ever  thought  of  going 
on  such  an  expedition.  Why  should  we  sup 
pose  that  conscientious  motives,  feeble  as  they 
are  constantly  found  to  be  in  a  good  cause, 
should  be  omnipotent  for  evil]  Doubtless 
there  was  many  a  jolly  Popish  priest  in  the 
old  manor-houses  of  the  northern  counties, 


who  would  have  admitted  in  theory  the  depos 
ing  power  of  the  Pope,  but  who  would  not  have 
been  ambitious  to  be  stretched  on  the  rack, 
even  though  it  were  to  be  used,  according  to 
the  benevolent  proviso  of  Lord  Burleigh,  "as 
charitably  as  such  a  thing  can  be;"  or  to  be 
hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered,  even  though,  by 
that  rare  indulgence  which  the  queen,  of  her 
especial  grace,  certain  knowledge,  and  mere 
motion,  sometimes  extended  to  very  mitigated 
cases,  he  were  allowed  a  fair  time  to  choke 
before  the  hangman  began  to  grabble  in  his 
entrails. 

But  the  laws  passed  against  the  Puritans 
had  not  even  the  wretched  excuse  which  we 
have  been  considering.  In  their  case  the  cruel 
ty  was  equal,  the  danger  infinitely  less.  In  fact 
the  danger  was  created  solely  by  the  cruelty. 
But  it  is  superfluous  to  press  the  argument.  By 
no  artifice  of  ingenuity  can  the  stigma  of  perse 
cution,  the  worst  blemish  of  the  English  church, 
be  effaced  or  patched  over.  Her  doctrines  we 
well  know  do  not  tend  to  intolerance.  She 
admits  the  possibility  of  salvation  out  of  her 
own  pale.  But  this  circumstance,  in  itself  ho 
nourable  to  her,  aggravates  the  sin  and  the 
shame  of  those  who  persecuted  in  her  name. 
Dominic  and  De  Monfort  did  not  at  least  mur 
der  and  torture  for  differences  of  opinion  which 
they  considered  as  trifling.  It  was  to  stop  an 
infection  which,  as  they  believed,  hurried  to 
perdition  every  soul  which  it  seized  that  they 
employed  their  fire  and  steel.  The  measures 
of  the  English  government  with  respect  to  the 
Papists  and  Puritans  sprang  from  a  widely 
different  principle.  If  those  who  deny  that  the 
supporters  of  the  Established  Church  were 
guilty  of  religious  persecution  mean  only  that 
they  were  not  influenced  by  religious  motives, 
we  perfectly  agree  with  them.  Neither  the 
penal  code  of  Elizabeth,  nor  the  more  hateful 
system  by  which  Charles  the  Second  attempt 
ed  to  force  Episcopacy  on  the  Scotch,  had  an 
origin  so  noble.  Their  cause  is  to  be  sought 
in  some  circumstances  which  attended  the  Re 
formation  in  England — circumstances  of  which 
the  effects  long  continued  to  be  felt,  and  may 
in  some  degree  be  traced  even  at  the  present 
day. 

In  Germany,  in  France,  in  Switzerland,  and 
in  Scotland,  the  contest  against  the  Papal 
power  was  essentially  a  religious  contest.  In 
all  these  countries,  indeed,  the  cause  of  the 
Reformation,  like  every  other  great  cause,  at 
tracted  to  itself  many  supporters  influenced  by 
no  conscientious  principle,  many  who  quitted 
the  Established  Church  only  because  they 
thought  her  in  danger,  many  who  were  weary 
of  her  restraints,  and  many  who  were  greedy 
for  her  spoils.  But  it  was  not  by  these  ad 
herents  that  the  separation  was  there  conduct 
ed.  They  were  welcome  auxiliaries ;  their  sup 
port  was  too  often  purchased  by  unworthy 
compliances  ;  but,  however  exalted  in  rank  or 
power,  they  were  not  the  leaders  in  the  enter 
prise.  Men  of  a  widely  different  description, 
men  who  redeemed  great  infirmities  and  errors 
by  sincerity,  disinterestedness,  energy,  and  cou 
rage  ;  men  who,  with  many  of  the  vices  of  re 
volutionary  chiefs  and  of  polemic  divines,  unit 
ed  some  of  the  highest  lualities  of  apostles, 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


71 


•were  the  real  directors.  They  might  be  vio 
lent  in  innovation,  and  scurrilous  in  contro 
versy.  They  might  sometimes  act  with  inex 
cusable  severity  towards  opponents,  and  some 
times  connive  disreputably  at  the  vices  of 
powerful  allies.  But  fear  was  not  in  them, 
nor  hypocrisy,  nor  avarice,  nor  any  petty  self 
ishness.  Their  one  great  object  was  the  de 
molition  of  the  idols,  and  the  purification  of  the 
sanctuary.  If  they  were  too  indulgent  to  the 
failings  of  eminent  men,  from  whose  patronage 
they  expected  advantage  to  the  church,  they 
never  flinched  before  persecuting  tyrants  and 
hostile  armies.  If  they  set  the  lives  of  others 
at  nought  in  comparison  of  their  doctrines, 
they  were  equally  ready  to  throw  away  their 
own.  Such  were  the  authors  of  the  great 
schism  on  the  continent  and  in  the  northern 
part  of  this  island.  The  Elector  of  Saxony 
and  the  Landgrave  of  Hesse,  the  Prince  of 
Conde  and  the  King  of  Navarre,  Moray  and 
Morton,  might  espouse  the  Protestant  opinions, 
or  might  pretend  to  espouse  them ;  but  it  was 
from  Luther,  from  Calvin,  from  Knox,  that  the 
Reformation  took  its  character. 

England  has  no  such  names  to  show;  not 
that  she  wanted  men  of  sincere  piety,  of  deep 
learning,  of  steady  and  adventurous  courage. 
But  these  were  thrown  into  the  back-ground. 
Elsewhere  men  of  this  character  were  the  prin 
cipals.  Here  they  acted  a  secondary  part. 
Elsewhere  worldliness  was  the  tool  of  zeal. 
Here  zeal  was  the  tool  of  worldliness.  A  king, 
whose  character  may  be  best  described  by  say 
ing  that  he  was  despotism  itself  personified, 
unprincipled  ministers,  a  rapacious  aristocra 
cy,  a  servile  parliament — such  were  the  instru 
ments  by  which  England  was  delivered  from 
the  yoke  of  Rome.  The  work  which  had  been 
begun  by  Henry,  the  murderer  of  his  wives, 
was  continued  by  Somerset,  the  murderer  of 
his  brother,  and  completed  by  Elizabeth,  the 
murderer  of  her  guest.  Sprung  from  brutal 
passion,  nurtured  by  selfish  policy,  the  Refor 
mation  in  England  displayed  little  of  what  had 
in  other  countries  distinguished  it, — unflinch 
ing  and  unsparing  devotion,  boldness  of  speech, 
and  singleness  of  eye.  These  were  indeed  to 
be  found ;  but  it  was  in  the  lower  ranks  of  the 
party  which  opposed  the  authority  of  Rome,  in 
such  men  as  Hooper,  Latimer,  Rogers,  and 
Taylor.  Of  those  who  had  any  important 
share  in  bringing  the  alteration  about,  the  ex 
cellent  Ridley  was  perhaps  the  only  person 
who  did  not  consider  it  as  a  mere  political  job. 
Even  Ridley  did  not  play  a  very  prominent 
part.  Among  the  statesmen  and  prelates  who 
principally  give  the  tone  to  the  religious 
changes  there  is  one,  and  one  only,  whose 
conduct  partiality  itself  can  attribute  to  any 
other  than  interested  motives.  It  is  not  strange, 
therefore,  that  his  character  should  have  been 
the  subject  of  fierce  controversy.  We  need  not 
Bay  that  we  speak  of  Cranmer. 

Mr.  Hallam  has  been  severely  censured  for 
saying,  with  his  usual  placid  severity,  that  "if 
we  weigh  the  character  of  this  prelate  in  an  | 
equal  balance,  he  will  appear  far  indeed  re-  j 
moved  from  the  turpitude  imputed  to  him  by  | 
his  enemies  ;  yet  not  entitled  to  any  extraordi-  j 
nary  veneration."    We  will  venture  to  expand  > 


the  sense  of  Mr.  Hallam,  and  to  comment  on 
it  thus  :  If  we  consider  Cranmer  merely  as  a 
statesman,  he  will  not  appear  a  much  worse 
man  than  Wolsey,  Gardiner,  Cromwell,  or  So 
merset.  But  when  an  attempt  is  made  to  set 
him  up  as  a  saint,  it  is  scarcely  possible  for 
any  man  of  sense,  who  knows  the  history  of 
the  times  well,  to  preserve  his  gravity.  If  the 
memory  of  the  archbishop  had  been  left  to 
find  its  own  place,  he  would  soon  have  been 
lost  among  the  crowd  which  is  mingled 

"  A  quel  cattivo  coro 
Deffli*  aneeli,  che  non  ftiron  ribelli, 
N6  fur  fedeli  a  Dio,  ma  per  se  furo." 

And  the  only  notice  which  it  would  have  been 
necessary  to  take  of  his  name,  would  have 
been 

"  Non  ragioniam  di  lui ;  ma  guarda,  e  passa." 

But  when  his  admirers  challenge  for  him  a 
place  in  the  noble  army  of  martyrs,  his  claims 
require  fuller  discussion. 

The  shameful  origin  of  his  history,  common 
enough  in  the  scandalous  chronicles  of  courts, 
seems  strangely  out  of  place  in  a  hagiology. 
Cranmer  rose  into  favour  by  serving  Henry  in 
a  disgraceful  affair  of  his  first  divorce.  He 
promoted  the  marriage  of  Anne  Boleyn  with 
the  king.  On  a  frivolous  pretence  he  pro 
nounced  it  null  and  void.  On  a  pretence,  if 
possible,  still  more  frivolous,  he  dissolved  the 
ties  which  bound  the  shameless  tyrant  to 
Anne  of  Cleves.  He  attached  himself  to 
Cromwell,  while  the  fortunes  of  Cromwell 
flourished.  He  voted  for  cutting  off  his  head 
without  a  trial,  when  the  tide  of  royal  favour 
turned.  He  conformed  backwards  and  for 
wards  as  the  king  changed  his  mind.  While 
Henry  lived,  he  assisted  in  condemning  to  the 
flames  those  who  denied  the  doctrine  of  tran- 
substantiation.  When  Henry  died,  he  found 
out  that  the  doctrine  was  false.  He  was,  how 
ever,  not  at  a  loss  for  people  to  burn.  The 
authority  of  his  station,  and  of  his  gray  hairs, 
was  employed  to  overcome  the  disgust  with 
which  an  intelligent  and  virtuous  child  re 
garded  persecution. 

Intolerance  is  always  bad.  But  the  san 
guinary  intolerance  of  a  man  who  thus  wa 
vered  in  his  creed,  excites  a  loathing  to  which 
it  is  difficult  to  give  vent  without  calling  foul 
names.  Equally  false  to  political  and  to  re 
ligious  obligations,  he  was  first  the  tool  of 
Somerset,  and  then  the  tool  of  Northumber 
land.  When  the  former  wished  to  put  his 
own  brother  to  death,  without  even  the  form 
of  a  trial,  he  found  a  ready  instrument  in 
Cranmer.  In  spite  of  the  canon  law,  which 
forbade  a  churchman  to  take  any  part  in  mat 
ters  of  blood,  the  archbishop  signed  the  war 
rant  for  the  atrocious  sentence.  When  So 
merset  had  been  in  his  turn  destroyed,  his  de 
stroyer  received  the  support  of  Cranmer  in  hi* 
attempt  to  change  the  course  of  the  succes 
sion. 

The  apology  made  for  him  by  his  admirers 
only  renders  his  conduct  more  contemptible. 
He  complied,  it  is  said,  against  his  better  judg 
ment,  because  he  could  not  resist  the  entrea 
ties  of  Edward!  A  holy  prelate  of  sixty, .on* 
would  think,  might  be  better  employed  bv  th- 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


bedside  of  a  dying  child,  than  committing  j  and  have  nothing  to  hope  or  to  fear  on  earth. 


crimes  at  the  request  of  his  disciple.  If  he 
had  shown  half  as  much  firmness  when  Ed 
ward  requested  him  to  commit  treason,  as  he 
had  before  shown  when  Edward  requested  him 
not  to  commit  murder,  he  might  have  saved 
the  country  from  one  of  the  greatest  misfor 
tunes  that  it  ever  underwent.  He  became, 
from  whatever  motive,  the  accomplice  of  the 
worthless  Dudley.  The  virtuous  scruples  of 
another  young  and  amiable  mind  were  to  be 
overcome.  As  Edward  had  been  forced  into 
persecution,  Jane  was  to  seduced  into  usurpa 
tion.  No  transaction  in  our  annals  is  more 
unjustifiable  than  this.  If  a  hereditary  title 
were  to  be  respected,  Mary  possessed  it.  If  a 
parliamentary  title  were  preferable,  Mary  pos 
sessed  that  also.  If  the  interest  of  the  Pro 
testant  religion  required  a  departure  from  the 
ordinary  rule  of  succession,  that  interest  would 
have  been  best  served  by  raising  Elizabeth  to 
the  throne.  If  the  foreign  relations  of  the 
kingdom  were  considered,  still  stronger  rea 
sons  might  be  found  for  preferring  Elizabeth 
to  Jane.  There  was  great  doubt  whether  Jane 
or  the  Queen  of  Scotland  had  the  better  claim ; 
and  that  doubt  would,  in  all  probability,  have 
produced  a  war,  both  with  Scotland  and  with 
France,  if  the  project  of  Northumberland  had 
not  been  blasted  in  its  infancy.  That  Eliza 
beth  had  a  better  claim  than  the  Queen  of 
Scotland  was  indisputable.  To  the  part  which 
Cranmer,  and  unfortunately  some  better  men 
than  Cranmer,  took  in  this  most  reprehensible 
scheme,  much  of  the  severity,  with  which  the 
Protestants  were  afterwards  treated,  must  in 
fairness  be  ascribed. 

The  plot  failed;  popery  triumphed;  and 
Cranmer  recanted.  Most  people  look  on  his 
recantation  as  a  single  blemish  on  an  honour 
able  life,  the  frailty  of  an  unguarded  moment. 
But,  in  fact,  it  was  in  strict  accordance  with 
the  system  on  which  he  had  constantly  acted. 
It  was  part  of  a  regular  habit.  It  was  not  the 
first  recantation  that  he  had  made ;  and,  in  all 
probability,  if  it  had  answered  its  purpose  it 
would  not  have  been  the  last.  We  do  not 
blame  him  for  not  choosing  to  be  burned  alive. 
It  is  no  very  severe  reproach  to  any  person, 
that  he  dees  not  possess  heroic  fortitude.  But 
surely  a  man  who  liked  the  fire  so  little,  should 
have  had  some  sympathy  for  others.  A  per 
secutor  who  inflicts  nothing  which  he  is  not 
ready  to  endure  deserves  some  respect.  But 
when  a  man,  who  loves  his  doctrines  more 
than  the  lives  of  his  neighbours,  loves  his  own 
little  finger  better  than  his  doctrines,  a  very 
him  pie  argument,  a  fortiori,  will  enable  us  to 
estimate  the  amount  of  his  benevolence. 

But  his  martyrdom,  it  is  said,  redeemed 
every  thing.  It  is  extraordinary  that  so  much 
ignorance  should  exist  on  this  subject.  The 
fact  is,  that  if  a  martyr  be  a  man  who  chooses 
*o  die  rather  than  to  renounce  his  opinions, 
Cranmer  was  no  more  a  martyr  than  Dr.  Dodd. 
He  died  solely  because  he  could  not  help  it. 
He  never  retracted  his  recantation,  till  he  found 
he  had  made  it  in  vain.  The  queen  was  fully 
resolved  that,  Catholic  or  Protestant,  he  should 
l»ijrn.  Then  he  spoke  out,  as  people  generally 
«p^ak  out  when  they  are  at  the  point  of  death, 


If  Mary  had  suffered  him  to  live,  we  suspect 
that  he  would  have  heard  mass,  and  received 
absolution,  like  a  good  Catholic,  till  the  acces 
sion  of  Elizabeth;  and  that  he  would  then 
have  purchased,  by  another  apostasy,  the  power 
of  burning  men  better  and  braver  than  him 
self. 

We  do  not  mean,  however,  to  represent  him 
as  a  monster  of  wickedness.  He  was  not 
wantonly  cruel  or  treacherous.  He  was  mere 
ly  a  supple,  timid,  interested  courtier,  in  limes 
of  frequent  and  violent  change.  That  which 
has  always  been  represented  as  his  distinguish 
ing  virtue,  the  facility  with  which  he  forgave 
his  enemies,  belongs  to  the  character.  Those 
of  his  class  are  never  vindictive,  and  never 
grateful.  A  present  interest  effaces  past  ser 
vices  and  past  injuries  from  their  minds  to 
gether.  Their  only  object  is  self-preservation ; 
and  for  this  they  conciliate  those  who  wrong 
them,  just  as  they  abandon  those  who  serve 
them.  Before  we  extol  a  man  for  his  forgiv 
ing  temper,  we  should  inquire  whether  he  is 
above  revenge,  or  below  it. 

Somerset,  with  as  little  principle  as  his  co 
adjutor,  had  a  firmer  and  more  commanding 
mind.  Of  Henry,  an  orthodox  Catholic,  ex 
cepting  that  he  chose  to  be  his  own  Pope,  and 
of  Elizabeth,  who  certainly  had  no  objection 
to  the  theology  of  Rome,  we  need  say  nothing. 
But  these  four  persons  were  the  great  authors 
of  the  English  Reformation.  Three  of  them 
had  a  direct  interest  in  the  extension  of  the 
royal  prerogative.  The  fourth  was  the  ready 
tool  of  any  who  could  frighten  him.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  see  from  what  motives,  and  on  what 
plan,  such  persons  would  be  inclined  to  remo 
del  the  Church.  The  scheme  was  merely  to 
rob  the  Babylonian  enchantress  of  her  orna 
ments,  to  transfer  the  full  cup  of  her  sorceries 
to  other  hands,  spilling  as  little  as  possible  by 
the  way.  The  Catholic  doctrines  and  rites 
were  to  be  retained  in  the  Church  of  England. 
But  the  king  was  to  exercise  the  control  which 
formerly  belonged  to  the  Roman  Pontiff.  In 
this  Henry  for  a  time  succeeded.  The  extra 
ordinary  force  of  his  character,  the  fortunate 
situation  in  which  he  stood  with  respect  to 
foreign  powers,  and  the  vast  resources  which 
the  suppression  of  the  monasteries  placed  at 
his  disposal,  enabled  him  to  oppress  both  the 
religious  factions  equally.  He  punished  with 
impartial  severity  those  who  renounced  the 
doctrines  of  Rome,  and  those  who  acknow 
ledged  her  jurisdiction.  The  basis,  however, 
on  which  he  attempted  to  establish  his  power, 
was  too  narrow.  It  would  have  been  impossi 
ble  even  for  him  long  to  persecute  both  persua 
sions.  Even  under  his  reign  there  had  been 
insurrections  on  the  part  of  the  Catholics,  and 
signs  of  a  spirit  which  was  likely  soon  to  pro 
duce  insurrection  on  the  part  of  the  Protest 
ants.  It  was  plainly  necessary  therefore  that 
the  government  should  form  an  alliance  with 
one  or  the  other  side.  To  recognise  the  Papal 
supremacy,  would  have  been  to  abandon  its 
whole  design.  Reluctantly  and  sullenly  it  at 
last  joined  the  Protestants.  In  forming  this 
junction,  its  object  was  to  procure  as  much 
aid  as  possible  for  its  selfish  undertaking,  arid 


HALLAM'S   CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


73 


to  make  the  smallest  possible  concessions  to 
the  spirit  of  religious  innovation. 

From  this  compromise  the  Church  of  England 
sprung.  In  many  respects,  ndeed,  it  has  been 
well  for  ner,  that  in  an  age  of  exuberant  zeal, 
her  principal  founders  were  mere  politicians. 
To  this  circumstance  she  owes  her  moderate 
articles,  her  decent  ceremonies,  her  noble  and 
pathetic  liturgy.  Her  worship  is  not  disfigured 
by  mummery.  Yet  she  has  preserved,  in  a 
far  greater  degree  than  any  of  her  Protestant 
sisters,  that  art  of  striking  the  senses,  and  fill 
ing  the  imagination,  in  which  the  Catholic 
Church  so  eminently  excels.  But  on  the  other 
hand,  she  continued  to  be,  for  more  than  a 
hundred  and  fifty  years,  the  servile  handmaid 
of  monarchy,  the  steady  enemy  of  public  liber 
ty.  The  divine  rights  of  kings,  and  the  duty 
of  passively  obeying  all  their  commands,  were 
her  favourite  tenets.  She  held  them  firmly 
through  times  of  oppression,  persecution,  and 
licentiousness ;  while  law  was  trampled  down ; 
while  judgment  was  perverted;  while  the  peo 
ple  were  eaten  as  though  they  were  bread. 
Once  and  but  once — for  a  moment,  and  but  for 
a  moment — when  her  own  dignity  and  property 
were  touched,  she  forgot  to  practise  the  sub 
mission  which  she  had  taught. 

Elizabeth  clearly  discerned  the  advantages 
which  were  to  be  derived  from  a  close  connec 
tion  between  the  monarchy  and  the  priesthood. 
At  the  time  of  her  accession,  indeed,  she  evi 
dently  meditated  a  partial  reconciliation  with 
Rome.  And  throughout  her  whole  life,  she 
leaned  strongly  to  some  of  the  most  obnoxious 
parts  of  the  Catholic  system.  But  her  impe 
rious  temper,  her  keen  sagacity,  and  her  pecu 
liar  situation,  soon  led  her  to  attach  herself 
completely  to  a  church  which  was  all  her  own. 
On  the  same  principle  on  which  she  joined  it, 
she  attempted  to  drive  all  her  people  within 
its  pale  by  persecution.  She  supported  it  by 
severe  penal  laws,  not  because  she  thought 
conformity  to  its  discipline  necessary  to  salva 
tion,  but  because  it  was  the  fastness  which  ar 
bitrary  power  was  making  strong  for  itself; 
because  she  expected  a  more  profound  obedi 
ence  from  those  who  saw  in  her  both  their 
civil  and  their  ecclesiastical  head,  than  from 
those  who,  like  the  Papists,  ascribed  spiritual 
authority  to  the  Pope,  or  from  those  who,  like 
some  of  the  Puritans,  ascribed  it  only  to  Hea 
ven.  To  dissent  from  her  establishment  was 
to  dissent  from  an  institution  founded  with  an 
expres.  view  to  the  maintenance  and  extension 
of  the  royal  prerogative. 

This  great  queen  and  her  successors,  by 
considering  conformity  and  loyalty  as  identi 
cal,  at  length  made  them  so.  With  respect  to 
the  Catholics,  indeed,  the  rigour  of  persecu 
tion  abated  after  her  death.  James  soon  found 
that  they  were  unable  to  injure  him;  and  that 
the  animosity  which  the  Puritan  party  felt 
towards  them,  drove  them  of  necessity  to  take 
refuge  under  his  throne.  During  the  subse 
quent  conflict,  their  fault  was  any  thing  but 
disloyalty.  On  the  other  hand,  James  hated 
the  Puritans  with  far  more  than  the  hatred  of 
Elizabeth.  Her  aversion  to  them  was  politi 
cal  ;  his  was  personal.  The  sect  had  plagued 
him  in  Scotland,  where  he  was  weak:  and  he 

VOL.  I.— 10 


was  determined  to  be  even  with  them  in  Eng 
land,  where  he  was  powerful.  Persecution 
gradually  changed  a  sect  into  a  faction.  That 
there  was  any  thing  in  the  religious  opinions 
of  the  Puritans,  which  rendered  them  hostile 
to  monarchy,  has  never  been  proved  to  our 
satisfaction.  After  our  civil  contests,  it  be 
came  the  fashion  to  say  that  Presbyterianism 
was  connected  with  Republicanism ;  just  as 
it  has  been  the  fashion  to  say,  since  the  time 
of  the  French  Revolution,  that  Infidelity  is  con 
nected  with  Republicanism.  It  is  perfectly 
true,  that  a  church  constituted  on  the  Calvin- 
istic  model  will  not  strengthen  the  hands  of 
the  sovereign  so  much  as  a  hierarchy,  which 
consists  of  several  ranks,  differing  in  dignity 
and  emolument,  and  of  which  all  the  members 
are  constantly  looking  to  the  government  for 
promotion.  But  experience  has  clearly  shown 
that  a  Calvinistic  church,  like  every  other 
church,  is  disaffected  when  it  is  persecuted, 
quiet  when  it  is  tolerated,  and  actively  loyal 
when  it  is  favoured  and  cherished.  Scotland 
has  had  a  Presbyterian  establishment  during 
a  century  and  a  half.  Yet  her  General  As 
sembly  has  not,  during  that  period,  given  half 
so  much  trouble  to  the  government  as  the 
Convocation  of  the  Church  of  England  gave 
to  it  during  the  thirty  years  which  followed  the 
Revolution.  That  James  and  Charles  should 
have  been  mistaken  on  this  point,  is  not  sur 
prising.  But  we  are  astonished,  we  must  con 
fess,  when  writers  of  our  own  time,  men  who 
have  before  them  the  proof  of  what  toleration 
can  effect,  men  who  may  see  with  their  own 
eyes  that  the  Presbyterians  are  no  such  mon 
sters,  when  government  is  wise  enough  to  let 
them  alone,  should  defend  the  old  persecutions, 
on  the  ground  that  they  were  indispensable 
to  the  safety  of  the  church  and  the  throne. 

How  persecution  protects  churches  anu 
thrones  was  soon  made  manifest.  A  system 
atic  political  opposition,  vehement,  daring,  and 
inflexible,  sprang  from  a  schism  about  trifles, 
altogether  unconnected  with  the  real  interests 
of  religion  or  of  the  state.  Before  the  close 
of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  it  began  to  show 
itself.  It  broke  forth  on  the  question  of  the 
monopolies.  Even  the  imperial  Lioness  was 
compelled  to  abandon  her  prey,  and  slowly  and 
fiercely  to  recede  before  the  assailants.  The 
spirit  of  liberty  grew  with  the  growing  wealth 
and  intelligence  of  the  people.  The  feeble 
struggles  and  insults  of  James  irritated  instead 
of  suppressing  it.  And  the  events  which  im 
mediately  followed  the  accession  of  his  son, 
portended  a  contest  of  no  common  severity, 
between  a  king  resolved  to  be  absolute,  and  a 
people  resolved  to  be  free. 

The  famous  proceedings  of  the  third  Parlia 
ment  of  Charles,  and  the  tyrannical  measures 
which  followed  its  dissolution,  are  extremely 
well  described  by  Mr.  Hallam.  No  writer,  we 
think,  has  shown,  in  so  clear  and  satisfactory 
a  manner,  that  at  that  time  the  government  en 
tertained  a  fixed  purpose  of  destroying  the  old 
parliamentary  Constitution  of  England,  or  at 
least  of  reducing  it  to  a  mere  shadow.  We 
hasten,  however,  to  a  part  of  his  work,  which, 
though  it  abounds  invaluable  information,  ani 
in  remarks  well  deserving  to  be  attentively 
G 


74 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


considered ;  and  though  it  is,  like  the  rest,  evi 
dently  written  in  a  spirit  of  perfect  imparti 
ality,  appears  to  us,  in  many  points,  objection 
able. 

We  pass  to  the  year  1640.  The  fate  of  the 
short  Parliament  held  in  that  year  already  in 
dicated  the  views  of  the  king.  That  a  parlia 
ment  so  moderate  in  feeling  should  have  met 
after  so  many  years  of  oppression,  is  truly 
Wonderful  Hyde  extols  its  loyal  and  concili 
atory  spirit.  Its  conduct,  we  are  told,  made 
the  excellent  Falkland  in  love  with  the  very 
name  of  parliament.  We  think,  indeed,  with 
Oliver  St.  John,  that  its  moderation  was  carried 
too  far,  and  that  the  times  required  sharper 
and  more  decided  councils.  It  was  fortunate, 
however,  that  the  king  had  another  opportunity 
of  showing  that  hatted  of  the  liberties  of  his 
subjects,  which  was  the  ruling  principle  of  all 
his  conduct.  The  sole  crime  of  this  assembly 
was  that,  meeting  after  a  long  intermission  of 
parliaments,  and  after  a  long  series  of  cruelties 
and  illegal  imposts,  they  seemed  inclined  to 
examine  grievances  before  they  would  vote 
supplies.  For  this  insolence,  they  were  dis 
solved  almost  as  soon  as  they  met. 

Defeat,  universal  agitation,  financial  embar 
rassments,  disorganization  in  every  part  of  the 
government,  compelled  Charles  again  to  con 
vene  the  Houses  before  the  close  of  the  same 
year.  Their  meeting  was  one  of  the  great  eras 
in  the  history  of  the  civilized  world.  What 
ever  of  political  freedom  exists  either  in  Eu 
rope  or  in  America,  has  sprung,  directly  or  in 
directly,  from  those  institutions  which  they  se 
cured  and  reformed.  We  never  turn  to  the 
annals  of  those  times,  without  feeling  increased 
admiration  of  the  patriotism,  the  energy,  the  de 
cision,  the  consummate  wisdom,  which  marked 
the  measures  of  that  great  parliament,  from  the 
day  on  which  it  met,  to  the  commencement  of 
Civil  hostilities. 

The  impeachment  of  Strafford  was  the  first, 
and  perhaps  the  greatest  blow.  The  whole  con 
duct  of  that  celebrated  man  proved  that  he  had 
formed  a  deliberate  scheme  to  subvert  the  funda 
mental  laws  of  England.  Those  parts  of  his  cor 
respondence  which  have  been  brought  to  light 
since  his  death,  place  the  matter  beyond  a 
doubt.  One  of  his  admirers  has,  indeed,  offer 
ed  to  show,  "that  the  passages  which  Mr. 
Hallam  has  invidiously  extracted  from  the  cor 
respondence  between  Laud  and  Strafford,  as 
proving  their  design  to  introduce  a  thorough 
tyranny,  refer  not  to  any  such  design,  but  to  a 
thorough  reform  in  the  affairs  of  state,  and  the 
thorough  maintenance  of  just  authority !"  We 
will  recommend  two  or  three  of  these  passages 
to  the  especial  notice  of  our  readers. 

All  who  know  any  thing  of  those  times,  know 
\hat  the  conduct  of  Hampden  in  the  affair  of 
the  ship-money  met  with  the  warm  approbation 
of  every  respectable  royalist  in  England.  It 
drew  forth  the  ardent  eulogies  of  the  cham 
pions  of  the  prerogative,  and  even  of  the  crown 
lawyers  themselves.  Clarendon  allows  his  de 
meanour  through  the  whole  proceeding  to  have 
been  such,  that  even  those  whr«  watched  for  an 
occasion  against  the  defender  of  the  people, 
were  compelled  to  acknowledge  themselves 
unable  to  find  any  fault  in  him.  That  he  was 


right  in  the  point  of  law,  is  now  universally 
admitted.  Even  had  it  been  otherwise,  he  had 
a  fair  case.  Five  of  the  judges,  servile  as  our 
courts  then  were,  pronounced  in  his  favour. 
The  majority  against  him  was  the  smallest 
possible.  In  no  country  retaining  the  slightest 
vestige  of  constitutional  liberty,  can  a  modest 
and  decent  appeal  to  the  laws  be  treated  as  a 
crime.  Strafford,  however,  recommends  that, 
for  taking  the  sense  of  a  legal  tribunal  on  a 
legal  question,  Hampden  should  be  punished, 
and  punished  severely — "  whipt,"  says  the  in 
solent  apostate,  "  whipt  into  his  senses.  If  the 
rod,"  he  adds,  "  be  so  used  that  it  smarts  not, 
I  am  the  more  sorry."  This  is  the  maintenance 
of  just  authority. 

In  civilized  nations,  the  most  arbitrary  go 
vernments  have  generally  suffered  justice  to 
have  a  free  course  in  private  suits.  StrafforJ 
wished  to  make  every  cause  in  every  court 
subject  to  the  royal  prerogative.  He  com 
plained,  that  in  Ireland  he  was  not  permitted 
to  meddle  in  cases,  bet  ween  party  and  party. 
"  I  know  very  well,"  says  he,  "  that  the  common 
lawyers  will  be  passionately  against  it,  who 
are  wont  to  put  such  a  prejudice  upon  all 
other  professions,  as  if  none  were  to  be  trusted, 
or  capable  to  administer  justice  but  themselves : 
yet  how  well  this  suits  with  monarchy,  when 
they  monopolize  all  to  be  governed  by  their 
year-books,  you  in  England  have  a  costly  ex 
ample."  We  are  really  curious  to  know  by 
what  arguments  it  is  to  be  proved,  that  the 
power  of  interfering  in  the  lawsuits  of  indi 
viduals  is  part  of  the  just  authority  of  the  exe 
cutive  government. 

It  is  not  strange  that  a  man  so  careless  of 
the  common  civil  rights,  which  even  despots 
have  generally  respected,  should  treat  with 
scorn  the  limitations  which  the  constitution 
imposes  on  the  royal  perogative.  We  might 
quote  pages:  but  we  will  content  ourselves 
with  a  single  specimen  :  "  The  debts  of  the 
crown  being  taken  off,  you  may  govern  as  you 
please:  and  most  resolute  I  am  that  may  be 
done  without  borrowing  any  help  forth  of  the 
king's  lodgings." 

Such  was  the  theory  of  that  thorough  reform 
in  the  state  which  Strafford  meditated.  His 
whole  practice,  from  the  day  on  which  he  sold 
himself  to  the  court,  was  in  strict  conformity 
to  his  theory.  For  his  accomplices  various 
excuses  may  be  urged  ;  ignorance,  imbecility, 
religious  bigotry.  But  Wentworth  had  no 
such  plea.  His  intellect  was  capacious.  His 
early  prepossessions  were  on  the  side  of  popu 
lar  rights.  He  knew  the  whole  beauty  and 
value  of  the  system  which  he  attempted  to  de 
face.  He  was  the  first  of  the  Rats ;  the  first 
of  those  statesmen  whose  patriotism  has  been 
only  the  coquetry  of  political  prostitution; 
whose  profligacy  has  taught  governments  to 
adopt  the  old  maxim  of  the  slave-market,  that 
it  is  cheaper  to  buy  than  to  breed,  to  import 
defenders  from  an  opposition,  than  to  rear 
them  in  a  ministry.  He  was  the  first  English 
man  to  whom  a  peerage  was  not  an  addition 
of  honour,  but  a  sacrament  of  infamy — a  bap 
tism  into  the  communion  of  corruption.  As 
he  was  the  earliest  of  the  hateful  list,  so  was 
he  also  by  far  the  greatest — eloquent,  saga- 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


75 


eious,  adventurous,  intrepid,  ready  of  inven 
tion,  immutable  of  purpose,  in  every  talent 
which  exalts  or  destroys  nations,  pre-eminent, 
the  lost  Archangel,  the  Satan  of  the  apostasy. 
The  title  for  which,  at  the  time  of  his  deser 
tion,  he  exchanged  a  name  honourably  distin 
guished  in  the  cause  of  the  people,  reminds  us 
of  the  appellation  which,  from  the  moment  of 
the  first  treason,  fixed  itself  on  the  fallen  Son 
of  the  Morning — 

"  So  call  Mm  now.— His  former  name 

Is  heard  no  more  in  heaven." 

The  defection  of  StrafFord  from  the  popular 

Early  contributed  mainly  to  draw  on  him  the 
atred  of  his  contemporaries.  It  has  since 
made  him  an  object  of  peculiar  interest  to  those 
whose  lives  have  been  spent,  like  his,  in  prov 
ing  that  there  is  no  malice  like  the  malice  of 
a  renegade.  Nothing  can  be  more  natural  or 
becoming,  than  that  one  turn-coat  should  eulo 
gize  another. 

Many  enemies  of  public  liberty  have  been 
distinguished  by  their  private  virtues.  But 
Stratford  was  the  same  throughout.  As  was 
the  statesman,  such  was  the  kinsman  and  such 
the  lover.  His  conduct  towards  Lord  Mount- 
morris  is  recorded  by  Clarendon.  For  a  word 
which  can  scarcely  be  called  rash,  which 
could  not  have  been  made  the  subject  of  an 
ordinary  civil  action,  he  dragged  a  man  of  high 
rank,  married  to  a  relative  of  that  saint  about 
whom  he  whimpered  to  the  Peers,  before  a  tri 
bunal  of  his  slaves.  Sentence  of  death  was 
passed.  Every  thing  but  death  was  inflicted. 
Vet  the  treatment  which  Lord  Ely  experienced 
was  still  more  disgusting.  That  nobleman 
was  thrown  into  prison,  in  order  to  compel  him 
to  settle  his  estate  in  a  manner  agreeable  to 
his  daughter-in-law,  whom,  as  there  is  every 
reason  to  believe,  Strafford  had  debauched. 
These  stories  do  not  rest  on  vague  report. 
The  historians  most  partial  to  the  minister  ad 
mit  their  truth,  and  censure  them  in  terms 
which,  though  too  lenient  for  the  occasion,  are 
still  severe.  These  facts  are  alone  sufficient 
to  justify  the  appellation  with  which  Pym 
branded  him — "the  wicked  earl." 

In  spite  of  all  his  vices,  in  spite  of  all  his 
dangerous  projects,  Strafford  was  certainly  en 
titled  to  the  benefit  of  the  law ;  but  of  the  law 
in  all  its  rigour ;  of  the  lav/  according  to  the 
utmost  strictness  of  the  letter  which  killeth. 
He  was  not  to  be  torn  in  pieces  by  a  mob,  or 
stabbed  in  the  back  by  an  assassin.  He  was 
not  to  have  punishment  meted  out  to  him  from 
his  own  iniquitous  measure.  But  if  justice, 
in  the  whole  range  of  its  wide  armory,  con 
tained  one  weapon  which  could  pierce  him, 
that  weapon  his  pursuers  were  bound,  before 
God  and  man,  to  employ. 

"If  he  may 

Find  mercy  in  the  law,  Mis  his;  if  none, 
Let  him  not  seek  't  of  us." 

Such  was  the  language  which  the  Parliament 
mighi  justly  use. 

Did  then  the  articles  against  StrafFord  strict 
ly  amount  to  high  treason  ?  Many  people  who 
know  neither  what  the  articles  were,  nor  what 
high  treason  is,  will  answer  in  the  negative, 
timpvy  because  the  accused  person,  speaking 


for  his  life,  took  that  ground  of  defence.  Tha 
Journals  of  the  Lords  show  that  the  Judges 
were  consulted.  They  answered  with  one  ac 
cord,  that  the  articles  on  which  the  earl  was 
convicted  amounted  to  high  treason.  This 
judicial  opinion,  even  if  we  suppose  it  to  have 
been  erroneous,  goes  far  to  justify  the  Parlia 
ment.  The  judgment  pronounced  in  the  Ex 
chequer  Chamber  has  always  been  urged  by 
the  apologists  of  Charles  in  defence  of  his  con 
duct  respecting  ship-money.  Yet  on  that  oc 
casion  there  was  but  a  bare  majority  in  favour 
of  the  party,  at  whose  pleasure  all  the  magis 
trates  composing  the  tribunal  were  removable. 
The  decision  in  the  case  of  Straftbrd  was 
unanimous  ;  as  far  as  we  can  judge,  it  was  un 
biassed;  and  though  there  maybe  room  for 
hesitation,  we  think,  on  the  whole,  that  it  was 
reasonable.  "It  may  be  remarked,"  says  Mr. 
Hallam,  "that  the  fifteenth  article  of  the  im 
peachment  charging  Strafford  Math  raising  mo 
ney  by  his  own  authority,  and  quartering  troops 
on  the  people  of  Ireland,  in  order  to  compel 
their  obedience  to  his  unlawful  requisitions, 
upon  which,  and  upon  one  other  amde,  not 
upon  the  whole  matter,  the  Peers  voted  him 
guilty,  does,  at  least,  approach  very  nearly,  if 
we  may  not  say  more,  to  a  substantive  treason 
within  the  statute  of  Edward  III.,  as  a  levying 
of  war  against  the  king."  This  most  sound 
and  just  exposition  has  provoked  a  very  ridicu 
lous  reply.  "It  should  seem  to  be  an  Irish 
construction  this,"  says  an  assailant  of  Mr 
Hallam,  "which  makes  the  raising  money  for 
the  king's  service,  with  his  knowledge,  and  by 
his  approbation,  to  come  under  the  head  of 
levying  war  on  the  king,  and  therefore  to  be 
high  treason."  Now,  people  who  undertake  to 
write  on  points  of  constitutional  law  should 
know,  what  every  attorney's  clerk  and  every 
forward  schoolboy  on  an  upper  form  knows, 
that,  by  a  fundamental  maxim  of  our  polity, 
the  king  can  do  no  wrong ;  that  every  court 
is  bound  to  suppose  his  conduct  and  his  senti 
ments  to  be,  on  every  occasion,  such  as  they 
ought  to  be;  and  that  no  evidence  can  be  re 
ceived  for  the  purpose  of  setting  aside  this 
loyal  and  salutary  presumption.  The  Lords, 
therefore,  were  bound  to  take  it  for  granted, 
that  the  king  considered  arms  which  were  un 
lawfully  directed  against  his  people,  as  directed 
against  his  own  throne. 

The  remarks  of  Mr.  Hallam  on  the  bill  of  at 
tainder,  though,  as  usual,  weighty  and  acute, 
do  not  perfectly  satisfy  us.  He  defends  the 
principle,  but  objects  to  the  severity  of  the 
punishment.  That,  on  great  emergencies,  the 
state  may  justifiably  pass  a  retrospective  act 
against  an  offender,  we  have  no  doubt  what 
ever.  We  are  acquainted  with  only  one  argu 
ment  on  the  other  side,  which  has  in  it  enough 
of  reason  to  bear  an  answer.  Warning,  it  is 
said,  is  the  end  of  punishment.  But  a  punish 
ment  inflicted,  not  by  a  general  rule,  but  by  an 
arbitrary  discretion,  cannot  serve  the  purpose 
of  a  warning;  it  is  therefore  useless,  and  use 
less  pain  ought  not  to  be  inflicted.  This  so 
phism  has  found  its  way  into  several  books  on 
penal  legislation.  It  admits,  however,  of  a  very 
simple  refutation.  In  the  first  place,  punish 
ments  ex  post  facto  are  not  altogether  useless 


76 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


even  as  warnings.  They  are  warnings  to  a 
particular  class,  which  stands  in  great  need  of 
warnings — to  favourites  and  ministers.  They 
remind  persons  of  this  description,  that  there 
may  be  a  day  of  reckoning  for  those  who  ruin 
and  enslave  their  country  in  all  the  forms  of 
law.  But  this  is  not  all.  Warning  is,  in  or 
dinary  cases,  the  principal  end  of  punishment; 
but  it  is  not  the  only  end.  To  remove  the  of 
fender,  to  preserve  society  from  those  dangers 
which  are  to  be  apprehended  from  his  incorri 
gible  depravity,  is  often  one  of  the  ends.  In  the 
case  of  such  a  knave  as  Wild,  or  such  a  ruffian 
as  Thurtell,  it  is  a  very  important  end.  In  the 
case  of  a  powerful  and  wicked  statesmen,  it  is 
infinitely  more  important;  so  important,  as 
alone  to  justify  the  utmost  severity,  even 
though  it  were  certain  that  his  fate  would  not 
deter  others  from  imitating  his  example.  At 
present,  indeed,  we  should  think  it  extremely 
pernicious  to  take  such  a  course,  even  with  a 
worse  minister  than  Strafford,  if  a  worse  could 
exist ;  for,  at  present,  Parliament  has  only  to 
withhold  its  support  from  a  cabinet,  to  produce 
an  immediate  change  of  hands.  The  case  was 
widely  different  in  the  reign  of  Charles  the  First. 
That  prince  had  governed  for  eleven  years 
without  any  Parliament;  and  even  when  Par 
liament  was  sitting,  had  supported  Bucking 
ham  against  its  most  violent  remonstrances. 

Mr.  Hallam  is  of  opinion  that  a  bill  of  pains 
and  penalties  ought  to  have  been  passed 
against  Strafford ;  but  he  draws  a  distinction 
less  just,  we  think,  than  his  distinctions  usual 
ly  are.  His  opinion,  so  far  as  we  can  collect 
it,  is  this ;  that  there  are  almost  insurmounta 
ble  objections  to  retrospective  laws  for  capital 
punishment;  but  that  where  the  punishment 
stops  short  of  death,  the  objections  are  compa 
ratively  trifling.  Now  the  practice  of  taking 
the  severity  of  the  penalty  into  consideration, 
when  the  question  is  about  the  mode  of  proce 
dure  and  the  rules  of  evidence,  is  no  doubt  suf 
ficiently  common.  We  often  see  a  man  con 
victed  of  a  simple  larceny,  on  evidence  on 
which  he  would  not  be  convicted  of  a  burglary. 
It  sometimes  happens  that  a  jury,  when  there 
is  strong  suspicion,  but  not  absolute  demon 
stration,  that  an  act,  unquestionably  amounting 
to  murder,  was  committed  by  the  prisoner  be 
fore  them,  will  find  him  guilty  of  manslaughter; 
but  this  is  surely  very  irrational.  The  rules 
of  evidence  no  more  depends  on  the  magnitude 
of  the  interests  at  stake  than  the  rules  of 
arithmetic.  We  might  as  well  say,  that  we  have 
a  greater  chance  of  throwing  a  size  when  we  are 
playing  for  a  penny  than  when  we  are  playing 
for  a  thousand  pounds,  as  that  a  form  of  trial 
which  is  sufficient  for  the  purposes  of  justice, 
in  a  matter  affecting  liberty  and  property,  is  in 
sufficient  in  a  matter  affecting  life.  Nay,  if  a 
mode  of  proceeding  be  too  lax  for  capital 
cases,  \  is,  a  fortiori,  to0  lax  for  all  others ;  for, 
in  capital  cases,  the  principles  of  human  na 
ture  will  always  afford  considerable  security. 
No  judge  is  so  cruel  as  he  who  indemnifies 
himself  for  scrupulosity  in  cases  of  blood,  by 
license  in  affairs  cf  smaller  importance.  The 
difference  in  true  on  the  one  side  far  more  than 
makes  up  for  the  difference  in  weight  on  the 
elhei. 


If  there  be  any  universal  objection  to  retro- 
j  spective  punishment,  there  is  no  more  to  be 
|  said.  But  such  is  not  the  opinion  of  Mr.  Hal- 
j  lam.  He  approves  of  the  mode  of  proceeding. 
He  thinks  that  a  punishment  not  previously 
affixed  by  law  to  the  offences  of  Strafford, 
should  have  been  inflicted ;  that  he  should  have 
been  degraded  from  his  rank,  and  condemned 
to  perpetual  banishment,  by  act  of  Parliament; 
but  he  sees  strong  objections  to  the  taking 
away  of  his  life.  Our  difficulty  would  have 
been  at  the  first  step,  and  there  only.  Indeed, 
we  can  scarcely  conceive  that  any  case,  which 
does  not  call  for  capital  punishment,  can  call 
for  retrospective  punishment.  We  can  scarce 
ly  conceive  a  man  so  wicked  and  so  dangerous, 
that  the  whole  course  of  law  must  be  disturb 
ed  in  order  to  reach  him  ;  yet  not  so  wicked  as 
to  deserve  the  severest  sentence,  nor  so  danger 
ous  as  to  require  the  last  and  surest  custody — 
that  of  the  grave.  If  we  had  thought  that  Straf 
ford  might  be  safely  suffered  to  live  in  France, 
we  should  have  thought  it  better  that  he  should 
continue  to  live  in  England,  than  that  he  should 
be  exiled  by  a  special  act.  As  to  degradation,  it 
was  not  the  earl,  but  the  general  and  the  states 
man,  whom  the  people  had  to  fear.  Essex  said, 
on  that  occasion,  with  more  truth  than  elo 
quence,  "Stone-dead  hath  no  fellow."  And 
often  during  the  civil  wars  the  Parliament  had 
reason  to  rejoice,  that  an  irreversible  law  and 
an  impassable  barrier  protected  them  from  the 
valour  and  capacity  of  Straffbrd. 

It  is  remarkable  that  neither  Hyde  nor  Falk 
land  voted  against  the  bill  of  attainder.  There 
is,  indeed,  reason  to  believe  that  Falkland 
spoke  in  favour  of  it.  In  one  respect,  as  Mr. 
Hallam  has  observed,  the  proceeding  was  ho 
nourably  distinguished  from  others  of  the  same 
kind.  An  act  was  passed  to  relieve  the  child 
ren  of  Strafford  from  the  forfeiture  and  cor 
ruption  of  blood,  which  were  the  legal  conse 
quences  of  the  sentence.  The  crown  had  never 
shown  equal  generosity  in  a  case  of  treason. 
The  liberal  conduct  of  the  Commons  has  been 
fully  and  most  appropriately  repaid.  The  house 
of  Wentworth  has  since  been  as  much  distin 
guished  by  public  spirit  as  by  power  and  splen 
dour  ;  and  may  at  the  present  time  boast  of 
members,  with  whom  Say  and  Hampden  would 
have  been  proud  to  act. 

It  is  somewhat  curious  that  the  admirers  of 
Strafford  should  also  be,  without  a  single  ex-s 
ception,  the  admirers  of  Charles ;  for  whatever 
we  may  think  of  the  conduct  of  the  Parliament 
towards  the  unhappy  favourite,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  the  treatment  which  he  received 
from  his  master  was  disgraceful.  Faithless 
alike  to  his  people  and  his  tools,  the  king  did 
not  scruple  to  play  the  part  of  the  cowardly  ap 
prover,  who  hangs  his  accomplice.  It  is  good 
that  there  should  be  such  men  as  Charles  in 
every  league  of  villany.  It  is  for  such  men 
that  the  offers  of  pardon  and  reward,  which  ap 
pear  after  a  murder,  are  intended.  They  are 
indemnified,  remunerated,  and  despised.  The 
very  magistrate  who  avails  himself  of  their  as 
sistance  looks  on  them  as  wretches  more  de 
graded  than  the  criminal  Mrhom  they  betray. 
Was  Strafford  innocent  1  was  he  a  meritorious 
servant  of  the  crown  ]  If  so,  what  shall  w« 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


77 


think  of  the  prince,  who,  having  solemnly  pro 
mised  him  that  not  a  hair  of  his  head  should 
be  hurt,  and  possessing  an  unquestioned  con 
stitutional  right  to  save  him,  gave  him  up  to 
the  vengeance  of  his  enemies  1  There  were 
some  points  which  we  know  that  Charles 
would  not  concede,  and  for  which  he  was  will 
ing  to  risk  the  chances  of  civil  war.  Ought 
not  a  king,  who  will  make  a  stand  for  any 
thing,  to  make  a  stand  for  the  innocent  blood] 
Was  Strafford  guilty  1  Even  on  this  supposi 
tion,  it  is  difficult  not  to  feel  disdain  for  the 
partner  of  his  guilt — the  tempter  turned  pun- 
isher.  If,  indeed,  from  that  time  forth,  the  con 
duct  of  Charles  had  been  blameless,  it  might 
have  been  said  that  his  eyes  were  at  last  open 
ed  to  the  errors  of  his  former  conduct,  and  that 
in  sacrificing  to  the  wishes  of  his  Parliament, 
a  minister  whose  crime  had  been  a  devotion  too 
zealous  to  the  interests  of  his  prerogative,  he 
gave  a  painful  and  deeply  humiliating  proof 
of  the  sincerity  of  his  repentance.  We  may 
describe  his  behaviour  on  this  occasion  in 
terms  resembling  those  which  Hume  has  em 
ployed,  when  speaking  of  the  conduct  of 
Churchill  at  the  Revolution.  It  required  ever 
after  the  most  rigid  justice  and  sincerity  in  his 
dealings  with  his  people  to  vindicate  it.  His 
subsequent  dealings  with  his  people,  however, 
clearly  showed,  that  it  was  not  from  any  re 
spect  for  the  constitution, or  from  any  sense  of 
the  deep  criminally  of  the  plans  in  which  Straf 
ford  and  himself  had  been  engaged,  that  he  gave 
up  his  minister  to  the  axe.  It  became  evident 
that  he  had  abandoned  a  servant  who,  deeply 
guilty  as  to  all  others,  was  guiltless  to  him 
alone,  solely  in  order  to  gain  time  for  maturing 
other  schemes  of  tyranny,  and  purchasing  the 
aid  of  other  Wentworths.  He  who  would  not 
avail  himself  of  the  power  which  the  laws  gave 
him  to  save  a  friend,  to  whom  his  honour  was 
pledged,  soon  showed  that  he  did  not  scruple  to 
break  every  law  and  forfeit  every  pledge,  in 
order  to  work  the  ruin  of  his  opponents. 

"  Put  not  your  trust  in  princes  !"  was  the 
expression  of  the  fallen  minister,  when  he 
neard  that  Charles  had  consented  to  his  death. 
The  whole  history  of  the  times  is  a  sermon  on 
that  bitter  text.  The  defence  of  the  Long  Par 
liament  is  comprised  in  the  dying  words  of  its 
victim. 

The  early  measures  of  that  Parliament,  Mr. 
Hallam  in  general  approves.  But  he  consi 
ders  the  proceedings  which  took  place  after 
the  recess  in  the  summer  of  1641,  as  mischie 
vous  and  violent.  He  thinks,  that  from  that 
time,  the  demands  of  the  Houses  were  not  war 
ranted  by  any  imminent  danger  to  the  consti 
tution,  and  that  in  the  war  which  ensued  they 
were  clearly  the  aggressors.  As  this  is  one 
of  the  most  interesting  questions  in  our  his 
tory,  we  will  venture  to  state,  at  some  length, 
the  reasons  which  have  led  us  to  form  an  opi 
nion  on  it  contrary  to  that  of  a  writer  whose 
judgment  we  so  highly  respect. 

We  will  premise,  that  we  think  worse  of 
King  Charle?  the  First  than  even  Mr.  Hallam 
appears  to  do.  The  fixed  hatred  of  liberty, 
which  was  the  principle  of  all  his  public  con 
duct ;  the  unscrupulousness  with  which  he 
adopted  any  means  which  might  enable  him 


to  attain  his  ends  ;  the  readiness  with  which 
he  gave  promises ;  the  impudence  with  which 
he  broke  them ;  the  cruel  indifference  with 
which  he  threw  away  his  useless  or  damaged 
tools,  rendered  him,  at  least  till  his  character 
was  fully  exposed,  and  his  power  shaken  to  its 
foundations,  a  more  dangerous  enemy  to  the 
constitution  than  a  man  of  far  greater  talents 
and  resolution  might  have  been.  Such  princes 
may  still  be  seen — the  scandals  of  the  south 
ern  thrones  of  Europe ;  princes  false  alike  to 
the  accomplices  who  have  served  them,  and 
to  the  opponents  who  have  spared  them; 
princes  who,  in  the  hour  of  danger,  concede 
every  thing,  swear  every  thing,  hold  out  their 
cheeks  to  every  smiter,  give  up  to  punishment 
every  minister  of  their  tyranny,  and  await 
with  meek  and  smiling  implacability  the  bless 
ed  day  of  perjury  and  proscription. 

We  will  pass  by  the  instances  of  oppression 
and  falsehood  which  disgraced  the  early  years 
of  the  reign  of  Charles.  We  will  leave  out 
of  the  question  the  whole  history  of  his  third 
Parliament,  the  price  which  he  exacted  for 
assenting  to  the  Petition  of  Right,  the  perfidy 
with  which  he  violated  his  engagements,  the 
death  of  Eliot — the  barbarous  punishments  in 
flicted  by  the  Star  Chamber,  the  ship-money, 
and  all  the  measures,  now  universally  con 
demned,  which  disgraced  his  administration 
from  1630  to  1640.  We  will  admit,  that  it 
might  be  the  duty  of  the  Parliament,  after 
punishing  the  most  guilty  of  his  creatures, 
after  abolishing  the  inquisitorial  tribunals, 
which  had  been  the  instruments  of  his  ty 
ranny,  after  reversing  the  unjust  sentences  of 
his  victims,  to  pause  in  its  course.  The  con 
cessions  which  had  been  made  were  great,  the 
evils  of  civil  war  obvious,  the  advantages  even 
of  victory  doubtful.  The  former  errors  of  the 
king  might  be  imputed  to  youth,  to  the  pres 
sure  of  circumstances,  to  the  influence  of  evil 
counsel,  to  the  undefined  state  of  the  law. 
We  firmly  believe,  that  if,  even  at  this  eleventh 
hour,  Charles  had  acted  fairly  towards  his 
people,  if  he  had  even  acted  fairly  towards  his 
own  partisans,  the  House  of  Commons  would 
have  given  him  a  fair  chance  of  retrieving  the 
public  confidence.  Such  was  the  opinion  of 
Clarendon.  He  distinctly  states,  that  the  fury 
of  opposition  had  abated ;  that  a  reaction  had 
begun  to  take  place ;  that  the  majority  of  those 
who  had  taken  part  against  the  king  wers  de 
sirous  of  an  honourable  and  complete  recon 
ciliation  ;  and  that  the  more  violent,  or,  as  it 
soon  appeared,  the  more  judicious  members 
of  the  party  were  fast  declining  in  credit.  The 
remonstrance  had  been  carried  with  great  dif 
ficulty.  The  uncompromising  antagonists  of 
the  court,  such  as  Cromwell,  had  begun  to 
talk  of  selling  their  estates  and  leaving  Eng- 
!  land.  The  event  soon  showed  that  they  were 
I  the  only  men  who  really  understood  how  much 
!  inhumanity  and  fraud  lay  hid  under  the  con- 
!  stitutionai  language  and  gracious  demeanour 
!  of  the  king. 

The  attempt  to  seize  the  five  members  was 
undoubtedly  the  real  cause  of  the  war.  From 
that  moment,  the  loyal  confidence  with  which 
most  of  the  popular  party  were  beginning  tc 
regard  the  king,  was  turned  into  hatred  and 
u  2 


78 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


incurable  suspicion-  From  that  moment,  the 
Parliament  was  compelled  to  surround  itself 
with  defensive  arms;  from  that  moment,  the 
r.ity  assumed  the  appearance  of  a  garrison ; 
from  that  moment,  it  was  that,  in  the  phrase 
ot'  Clarendon,  the  carriage  of  Hampden  became 
fiercer,  that  he  drew  the  sword  and  threw  away 
the  scabbard.  For,  from  that  moment,  it  must 
have  been  evident  to  every  impartial  obser 
ver,  lhat  in  the  midst  of  professions,  oaths,  and 
smiles,  the  tyrant  was  constantly  looking  for 
ward  to  an  absolute  sway,  and  to  bloody  re 
venge. 

The  advocates  of  Charles  have  very  dex 
terously  contrived  to  conceal  from  their  read 
ers  the  real  nature  of  this  transaction.  By 
making  concessions  apparently  candid  and 
ample,  they  elude  the  great  accusation.  They 
allow  that  the  measure  was  weak,  and  even 
frantic,  an  absurd  caprice  of  Lord  Digby,  ab 
surdly  adopted  by  the  king.  And  thus  they 
save  their  client  from  the  full  penalty  of  his 
transgression,  by  entering  a  plea  of  guilty  to 
the  minor  offence.  To  us  his  conduct  appears 
at  this  day,  as  at  the  time  it  appeared  to  the 
Parliament  and  the  city.  We  think  it  by  no 
means  so  foolish  as  it  pleases  his  friends  to 
represent  it,  and  far  more  wicked. 

In  the  first  place,  the  transaction  was  illegal 
from  beginning  to  end.  The  impeachment 
was  illegal.  The  process  was  illegal.  The 
service  was  illegal.  If  Charles  wished  to  pro 
secute  the  five  members  for  treason,  a  bill 
against  them  should  have  been  sent  to  a  grand 
jury.  That  a  commoner  cannot  be  tried  for 
high  treason  by  the  Lords  at  the  suit  of  the 
crown,  is  part  of  the  very  alphabet  of  our  law. 
That  no  man  can  be  arrested  by  a  message  or 
a  verbal  summons  of  the  king,  with  or  without 
a  warrant  from  a  responsible  magistrate,  is 
equally  clear.  This  was  an  established  maxim 
of  our  jurisprudence  in  the  time  of  Edward  the 
Fourth.  "A  subject,"  Said  Chief  Justice 
Markham  to  that  prince,  "may  arrest  for  trea 
son  :  the  king  cannot ;  for  if  the  arrest  be  il 
legal,  the  party  has  no  remedy  against  the 
king." 

The  time  at  which  Charles  took  this  step 
also  deserves  consideration.  We  have  already 
said,  that  the  ardour  which  the  parliament  had 
displayed  at  the  time  of  its  first  meeting  had 
considerably  abated;  that  the  leading  oppo 
nents  of  the  court  were  desponding,  and  that 
their  followers  were  in  general  inclined  to  mild 
er  and  more  temperate  measures  than  those 
winch  had  hitherto  been  pursued.  In  every 
country,  and  in  none  more  than  in  England, 
there  is  a  disposition  to  take  the  part  of  those 
who  are  unmercifully  run  down,  and  who  seem 
destitute  of  all  means  of  defence.  Every  man 
who  has  observed  the  ebb  and  flow  of  public 
feeling  in  our  own  time,  will  easily  recall  ex 
amples  to  illustrate  this  remark.  An  English 
statesman  ought  to  pay  assiduous  worship  to 
Nemesis,  to  be  most  apprehensive  of  ruin  when 
he  is  at  I  he  height  of  power  and  popularity, 
and  to  dread  his  enemy  most,  when  most  com 
pletely  pr^irated.  The  fate  of  the  Coalition 
Ministry,  m  1784,  is  perhaps  the  strongest  in 
stance  in  our  history  of  the  operation  of  this 
principle.  A  rew  weeks  turned  the  ablest  and 


most  extended  ministry  that  ever  existed,  into 
a  feeble  opposition,  and  raised  a  king  who  was 
talking  of  retiring  to  Hanover,  to  a  height  of 
power  which  none  of  his  predecessors  had  en 
joyed  since  the  Revolution.  A  crisis  of  this 
description  was  evidently  approaching  in  1642. 
At  such  a  crisis,  a  prince  of  a  really  honest 
and  generous  nature,  who  had  em  d,  who  had 
seen  his  error,  who  had  regretted  the  lost  af 
fections  of  his  people,  who  rejoiced  in  the 
dawning  hope  of  regaining  them,  would  be 
peculiarly  careful  to  take  no  step  which  could 
give  occasion  of  offence,  even  to  the  unreason 
able.  On  the  other  hand,  a  tyrant,  whose 
whole  life  was  a  lie,  who  hated  the  constitution 
the  more  because  he  had  been  compelled  to 
feign  respect  for  it,  to  whom  his  honour  and 
the  love  of  his  people  were  as  nothing,  would 
select  such  a  crisis  for  some  appalling  viola 
tion  of  law,  for  some  stroke  which  might  re 
move  the  chiefs  of  an  opposition,  and  intimi 
date  the  herd.  This  Charles  attempted.  He 
missed  his  blow:  but  so  narrowly,  that  it 
would  have  been  mere  madness  in  those  at 
whom  it  was  aimed  to  trust  him  again. 

It  deserves  to  be  remarked,  that  the  king 
had,  a  short  time  before,  promised  the  most 
respectable  royalists  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
Falkland,  Colepepper,  and  Hyde,  that  he  would 
take  no  measure  in  which  that  House  was 
concerned,  without  consulting  them.  On  this 
occasion  he  did  not  consult  them.  His  con 
duct  astonished  them  more  than  any  other 
members  of  the  assembly.  Clarendon  says 
that  they  were  deeply  hurt  by  this  want  of 
confidence,  and  the  more  hurt,  because,  if 
they  had  been  consulted,  they  would  have  done 
their  utmost  to  dissuade  Charles  from  so  im 
proper  a  proceeding.  Did  it  never  occur  to 
Clarendon,  will  it  not  at  least  occur  to  men  less 
partial,  that  there  was  good  reason  for  this  ? 
When  the  danger  to  the  throne  seemed  immi 
nent,  the  king  was  ready  to  put  himself  for  a 
time  into  the  hands  of  those  who,  though  they 
had  disapproved  of  his  past  conduct,  thought 
that  the  remedies  had  now  become  worse  than 
the  distempers.  But  we  believe,  that  in  heart 
he  regarded  both  the  parties  in  the  Parliament 
with  feelings  of  aversion,  which  differed  only 
in  the  degree  of  their  intensity;  and  that  the 
lawful  warning  which  he  proposed  to  give  by 
immolating  the  principal  supporters  of  the 
remonstrance,  was  partly  intended  for  the  in 
struction  of  those  who  had  concurred  in  cen 
suring  the  ship-money,  and  in  abolishing  the 
Star  Chamber. 

The  Commons  informed  the  king  that  their 
members  should  be  forthcoming  to  answer 
any  charge  legally  brought  against  them.  The 
Lords  refused  to  assume  the  unconstitutional 
offices  with  which  he  attempted  to  invest  them. 
And  what  then  was  his  conduct  1  He  went, 
attended  by  hundreds  of  armed  men,  to  seize 
the  objects  of  his  hatred  in  the  House  itself! 
The  party  opposed  to  him  more  than  insinu 
ated  that  his  purpose  was  of  the  most  atrocious 
kind.  We  will  not  condemn  him  merely  on  their 
suspicions ;  we  will  not  hold  him  answerable 
for  the  sanguinary  expressions  of  the  loose 
brawlers  who  composed  his  train.  We  will 
!  judge  of  his  conduct  by  itself  slono.  And  we 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL   HISTORY. 


say,  without  hesitation,  that  it  is  impossible  to 
acquit  him  of  having  meditated  violence,  and 
violence  which  might  probably  end  in  blood. 
He  knew  that  the  legality  of  his  proceedings 
was  denied ;  he  must  have  known  that  some 
of  the  accused  members  were  not  men  likely 
to  submit  peaceably  to  an  illegal  arrest  There 
was  every  reason  to  expect  that  he  would  find 
them  in  their  places,  that  they  would  refuse  to 
obey  his  summons,  and  that  the  House  would 
support  them  in  their  refusal.  What  course 
would  then  have  been  left  to  him  1  Unless  we 
suppose  that  he  went  on  this  expedition  for  the 
sole  purpose  of  making  himself  ridiculous, 
we  must  believe  that  he  would  have  had  re 
course  to  force.  There  would  have  been  a 
scuffle  ;  and  it  might  not,  under  such  circum 
stances,  have  been  in  his  power,  even  if  it 
were  in  his  inclination,  to  prevent  a  scuffle 
from  ending  in  a  massacre.  Fortunately  for  his 
fame,  unfortunately,  perhaps,  for  what  he  prized 
far  more,  the  interests  of  his  hatred  and  his  am 
bition,  the  affair  ended  differently.  The  birds, 
as  he  said,  were  flown,  and  his  plan  was  dis 
concerted.  Posterity  is  not  extreme  to  mark 
abortive  crimes.  And  thus  his  advocates  have 
found  it  easy  to  represent  a  step  which,  but  for 
a  trivial  accident,  might  have  filled  England 
with  mourning  and  dismay,  as  a  mere  error 
of  judgment,  wild  and  foolish,  but  perfectly 
innocent.  Such  was  not,  however,  at  the  time, 
the  opinion  of  any  party.  The  most  zealous 
royalists  were  so  much  disgusted  and  ashamed, 
that  they  suspended  their  opposition  to  the  po 
pular  party,  and,  silently,  at  least,  concurred 
in  measures  of  precaution  so  strong  as  almost 
to  amount  to  resistance. 

From  that  day,  whatever  of  confidence  and 
loyal  attachment  had  survived  the  misrule  of 
seventeen  years,  was,  in  the  great  body  of  the 
people,  extinguished,  and  extinguished  forever. 
As  soon  as  the  outrage  had  failed,  the  hypo 
crisy  recommenced.  Down  to  the  very  eve 
of  his  flagitious  attempt,  Charles  had  been 
talking  of  his  respect  for  the  privileges  of 
Parliament  and  the  liberties  of  his  people. 
He  began  again  in  the  same  style  on  the  mor 
row  ;  but  it  was  too  late.  To  trust  him  now 
would  have  been,  not  moderation,  but  insanity. 
What  common  security  would  suffice  against 
a  prince  who  was  evidently  watching  his  sea 
son  with  that  cold  and  patient  hatred  which, 
in  the  long  run,  tires  out  every  other  pas 
sion  1 

It  is  certainly  from  no  admiration  of  Charles 
that  Mr.  Hallam  disapproves  of  the  conduct 
of  the  House  in  resorting  to  arms.  But  he 
thinks,  that  any  attempt  on  the  part  of  that 
prince  to  establish  a  despotism  would  have 
been  as  strongly  opposed  by  his  adherents  as 
by  his  enemies;  that  the  constitution  might 
be  considered  as  out  of  danger;  or,  at  least, 
that  it  had  more  to  apprehend  from  war  than 
from  the  king.  On  this  subject  Mr.  Hallam 
dilates  at  length ;  and  with  conspicuous  ability. 
We  will  offer  a  few  considerations,  which  lead 
us  to  incline  to  a  different  opinion. 

The  constitution  of  England  was  only  one 
of  a  large  family.  In  all  the  monarchies  of 
western  Europe,  during  the  middle  ages,  there 
existed  restraints  on  the  royal  authority,  fun 


damental  laws,  and  representative  assemblies. 
In  the  fifteenth  century,  the  government  of 
Castile  seems  to  have  been  as  free  as  that  of 
our  own  country.  That  of  Arragon  was  beyond 
all  question  far  more  so.  In  France,  the  sove 
reign  was  more  absolute.  Yet,  even  in  France, 
the  States-general  alone  could  constitutionally 
impose  taxes ;  and  at  the  very  time  when  the 
authority  of  those  assemblies  was  beginning 
to  languish,  the  Parliament  of  Paris  received 
such  an  accession  of  strength,  as  enabled  it, 
in  some  measure,  to  perform  the  functions  of 
a  legislative  assembly.  Sweden  and  Denmark 
had  constitutions  of  a  similar  description. 

Let  us  overleap  two  or  three  hundred  years, 
and  contemplate  Europe  at  the  commencement 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  Every  free  consti 
tution,  save  one,  had  gone  down.  That  of 
England  had  weathered  the  danger ;  and  was 
riding  in  full  security.  In  Denmark  and 
Sweden,  the  kings  had  availed  themselves  of 
the  disputes  which  raged  between  the  nobles 
and  the  commons,  to  unite  all  the  powers  of 
government  in  their  own  hands.  In  France 
the  institution  of  the  states  was  only  main 
tained  by  lawyers,  as  a  part  of  the  ancient 
theory  of  their  government.  It  slept  a  deep 
sleep — destined  to  be  broken  by  a  tremen 
dous  waking.  No  person  remembered  the  sit 
tings  of  the  three  orders,  or  expected  ever  to 
see  them  renewed.  Louis  the  Fourteenth  had 
imposed  on  his  Parliament  a  patient  silence 
of  sixty  years.  His  grandson,  after  the  war 
of  the  Spanish  succession,  assimilated  the 
constitution  of  Arragon  to  that  of  Castile,  and 
extinguished  the  last  feeble  remains  of  liberty 
in  the  Peninsula.  In  England,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  Parliament  was  infinitely  more  pow 
erful  than  it  had  ever  been.  Not  only  was  its 
legislative  authority  fully  established,  but  its 
right  to  interfere,  by  advice  almost  equivalent 
to  command,  in  every  department  of  the  ex 
ecutive  government,  was  recognised.  The 
appointment  of  ministers,  the  relations  with 
foreign  powers,  the  conduct  of  a  war  or  a  ne 
gotiation,  depended  less  on  the  pleasure  of  the 
prince  than  on  that  of  the  two  Houses. 

What  then  made  us  to  differ  1  Why  was  it 
that,  in  that  epidemic  malady  of  constitutions, 
ours  escaped  the  destroying  influence ;  or  ra 
ther  that,  at  the  very  crisis  of  the  disease,  a 
favourable  turn  took  place  in  England,  and  in 
England  alone  1  It  was  not  surely  without  a 
cause  that  so  many  kindred  systems  of  govern 
ment,  having  flourished  together  so  long,  lan 
guished  and  expired  at  almost  the  same  time. 

It  is  the  fashion  to  say,  that  the  progress 
of  civilization  is  favourable  to  liberty.  The 
maxim,  though  on  the  whole  true,  must  be 
limited  by  many  qualifications  and  exceptions. 
Wherever  a  poor  and  rude  nation,  in  which 
the  form  of  government  is  a  limited  monarchy, 
receives  a  great  accession  of  wealth  and 
knowledge,  it  is  in  imminent  danger  of  falling 
under  arbitrary  power. 

In  such  a  state  of  society  as  that  which  ex 
isted  all  over  Europe  during  the  middle  ages, 
it  was  not  from  the  king,  but  from  the  nobles, 
that  there  was  danger.  Very  slight  checks 
sufficed  to  keep  the  sovereign  in  order.  His 
means  of  corruption  and  intimidation  *-cr* 


so 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


very  scanty.  He  had  little  money,  little  pa 
tronage,  no  military  establishment.  His  armies 
resembled  juries.  They  were  draughted  out 
of  the  mass  of  the  people ;  they  soon  returned 
to  it  again  ;  and  the  character  which  was  ha 
bitual  prevailed  over  that  which  was  occa 
sional.  A  campaign  of  forty  days  was  too 
short,  the  discipline  of  a  national  militia  too 
lax,  to  efface  from  their  minds  the  feelings  of 
civil  life.  As  they  carried  to  the  camp  the 
sentiments  and  interests  of  the  farm  and  the 
shop,  so  they  carried  back  to  the  farm  and  the 
shop  the  military  accomplishments  which  they 
had  acquired  in  the  camp.  At  home  they 
learned  how  to  value  their  rights — abroad  how 
to  defend  them. 

Such  a  military  force  as  this  was  a  far 
stronger  restraint  on  the  regal  power  than  ^the 
legislative  assemblies.  Resistance  to  an  esta 
blished  government,  in  modern  times  so  diffi 
cult  and  perilous  an  enterprise,  was,  in  the 
fourteenth  a*id  fifteenth  centuries,  the  simplest 
and  easiest  matter  in  the  world.  Indeed,  it 
was  far  too  simple  and  easy.  An  insurrection 
was  got  up  then  almost  as  easily  as  a  petition 
is  got  up  now.  In  a  popular  cause,  or  even  in 
an  unpopular  cause  favoured  by  a  few  great 
nobles,  an  army  was  raised  in  a  week.  If  the 
king  were,  like  our  Edward  the  Second  and 
Richard  the  Second,  generally  odious,  he  could 
not  procure  a  single  bow  or  halbert.  He  fell 
at  once  and  without  an  effort.  In  such  times 
a  sovereign  like  Louis  the  Fifteenth,  or  the 
Emperor  Paul,  would  have  been  pulled  down 
before  his  misgovernment  had  lasted  for  a 
month.  We  find  that  all  the  fame  and  influ 
ence  of  our  Edward  the  Third  could  not  save 
his  Madame  de  Pompadour  from  the  effects  of 
the  public  hatred. 

Hume,  and  many  other  writers,  have  hastily 
concluded,  that  in  the  fifteenth  century  the 
English  Parliament  was  altogether  servile, 
because  it  recognised,  without  opposition, 
every  successful  usurper.  That  it  was  not 
servile,  its  conduct  on  many  occasions  of  in 
ferior  importance  is  sufficient  to  prove.  But 
surely  it  was  not  strange,  that  the  majority  of 
the  nobles,  and  of  the  deputies  chosen  by  the 
commons,  should  approve  of  revolutions  which 
the  nobles  and  commons  had  effected.  The 
Parliament  did  not  blindly  follow  the  event  of 
war;  but  participated  in  those  changes  of  pub 
lic  sentiment,  on  which  the  event  of  war  de 
pended.  The  legal  check  was  secondary  and 
auxiliary  to  that  which  the  nation  held  in  its 
own  hands.  There  have  always  been  mo 
narchies  in  Asia,  in  which  the  royal  authority 
has  been  tempered  by  fundamental  laws, 
though  no  legislative  body  exists  to  watch  over 
them.  The  guarantee  is  the  opinion  of  a  com 
munity,  of  which  every  individual  is  a  soldier. 
Thus  the  king  of  Caubul,  as  Mr.  Elphinstone 
informs  us,  cannot  augment  the  land  revenue, 
or  interfere  with  the  jurisdiction  of  the  ordinary 
tribunals. 

In  the  European  kingdoms  of  this  descrip 
tion,  there  were  representative  assemblies. 
But  it  was  not  necessary  that  those  assemblies 
should  meet  very  frequently,  that  they  should 
interfere  \vith  all  the  operations  of  the  execu 
tive  government,  that  they  should  watch  with 


jealousy,  and  resent  with  prompt  indignation, 
every  violation  of  the  laws  which  the  sovereign 
might  commit.  They  were  so  strong,  that  they 
might  safely  be  careless.  He  was  so  feeble, 
that  he  might  safely  be  suffered  to  encroach. 
If  he  ventured  too  far,  chastisement  and  ruin 
were  at  hand.  In  fact,  the  people  suffered  more 
from  his  weakness  than  from  his  authority. 
The  tyranny  of  wealthy  and  powerful  subjects 
was  the  characteristic  evil  of  the  times.  The 
royal  prerogatives  were  not  even  sufficient  for 
the  defence  of  property  and  the  maintenance 
of  police. 

The  progress  of  civilization  introduced  a 
great  change.  War  became  a  science ;  and, 
as  a  necessary  consequence,  a  separate  trade. 
The  great  body  of  the  people  grew  every  day 
more  reluctant  to  undergo  the  inconveniences 
of  military  service,  and  better  able  to  pay 
others  for  undergoing  them.  A  new  class  of 
men,  therefore — dependent  on  the  crown  alone; 
natural  enemies  of  those  popular  rights, 
which  are  to  them  as  the  dew  to  the  fleece  of 
Gideon  ;  slaves  among  freemen  ;  freemen 
among  slaves — grew  into  importance.  That 
physical  force,  which  in  the  dark  ages  had  be 
longed  to  the  nobles  and  the  commons,  and 
had,  far  more  than  any  charter  or  any  assem 
bly,  been  the  safeguard  of  their  privileges,  was 
transferred  entire  to  the  king.  Monarchy 
gained  in  two  ways.  The  sovereign  was 
strengthened,  the  subjects  weakened.  The 
great  mass  of  the  population,  destitute  of  all 
military  discipline  and  organization,  ceased  to 
exercise  any  influence  by  force  on  political 
transactions.  There  have,  indeed,  during  the 
last  hundred  and  fifty  years,  been  many  popu 
lar  insurrections  in  Europe  :  but  all  have 
failed,  except  those  in  which  the  regular  army 
has  been  induced  to  join  the  disaffected. 

Those  legal  checks,  which  had  been  ade 
quate  to  the  purpose  for  which  they  were 
designed  while  the  sovereign  remained  de 
pendent  on  his  subjects,  were  now  found 
wanting.  The  dykes,  which  had  been  sufficient 
while  the  waters  were  low,  were  not  high 
enough  to  keep  out  the  spring  tide.  The  deluge 
passed  over  them ;  and,  according  to  the  ex 
quisite  illustration  of  Butler,  the  formal  bound 
aries  which  had  excluded  it  now  held  it  in. 
The  old  constitutions  fared  like  the  old  shields 
and  coats  of  mail.  They  were  the  defences  of 
a  rude  age  ;  and  they  did  well  enough  against 
the  weapons  of  a  rude  age.  But  new  and  more 
formidable  means  of  destruction  were  invent 
ed.  The  ancient  panoply  became  useless; 
and  it  was  thrown  aside  to  rust  in  lumber- 
rooms,  or  exhibited  only  as  part  of  an  idle 
pageant. 

Thus  absolute  monarchy  was  established  on 
the  Continent.  England  escaped;  but  she  es 
caped  very  narrowly.  Happily,  our  insular 
situation  and  the  pacific  policy  of  James  ren 
dered  standing  armies  unnecessary  here,  till 
they  had  been  for  some  time  kept  up  in  the 
neighbouring  kingdoms.  Our  public  men  had 
therefore  an  opportunity  of  watching  the  effects 
produced  by  this  momentous  change,  in  forms 
of  government  which  bore  a  close  analogy  to 
that  established  in  England.  Everywhere 
they  saw  the  power  of  the  monarch  increasing, 


II ALLAH'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


the  resistance  of  assemblies,  which  were  no  - 
longer  supported  by  a  national  force,  gradually 
becoming  more  and  more  feeble,  and  at  length  ; 
altogether  ceasing.  The  friends  and  the  ene 
mies  of  liberty  perceived  with  equal  clearness  : 
the  causes  of  this  general  decay.  It  is  the  i 
favourite  theme  of  Strafford.  He  advises  the  ( 
king  to  procure  from  the  judges  a  recognition  ; 
of  his  right  to  raise  an  army  at  his  pleasure. 
"This  piece,  well  fortified,"  says  he,  "forever  i 
vindicates  the  monarchy  at  home  from  under 
the  conditions  and  restraints  of  subjects."  We 
firmly  believe  that  he  was  in  the  right.  Nay; 
we  believe  that,  even  if  no  deliberate  scheme 
of  arbitrary  government  had  been  formed  by 
the  sovereign  and  his  ministers,  there  was 
great  reason  to  apprehend  a  natural  extinction 
of  the  constitution.  If,  for  example,  Charles 
had  played  the  part  of  Gustavus  Adolphus;  if 
he  had  carried  on  a  popular  war  for  the  de 
fence  of  the  Protestant  cause  in  Germany ;  if 
he  had  gratified  the  national  pride  by  a  series 
of  victories  ;  if  he  had  formed  an  army  of  forty 
or  fifty  thousand  devoted  soldiers,  we  do  not 
see  what  chance  the  nation  would  have  had 
of  escaping  from  despotism.  The  judges 
would  have  given  as  strong  a  decision  in 
favour  of  camp-money  as  they  gave  in  favour 
of  ship-money.  If  they  had  scrupled,  it 
would  have  made  little  difference.  An  indivi 
dual  MTho  resisted  would  have  been  treated  as 
Charles  treated  Eliot,  and  as  Strafford  wished  to 
treat  Hampden.  The  Parliament  might  have 
been  summoned  once  in  twenty  years,  to  con 
gratulate  a  king  on  his  accession,  or  to  give 
solemnity  to  some  great  measure  of  state. 
Such  had  been  the  fate  of  legislative  assem 
blies  as  powerful,  as  much  respected,  as  high- 
gpirited,  as  the  English  Lords  and  Commons. 

The  two  Houses,  surrounded  by  the  ruins  of 
so  many  free  constitutions,  overthrown  or 
sapped  by  the  new  military  system,  were  re 
quired  to  intrust  the  command  of  an  army,  and 
the  conduct  of  the  Irish  war,  to  a  king  who 
had  proposed  to  himself  the  destruction  of 
liberty  as  the  great  end  of  his  policy.  We  are 
decidedly  of  opinion  that  it  would  have  been 
fatal  to  comply.  Many  of  those  who  took  the 
side  of  the  king  on  this  question  would  have 
cursed  their  own  loyalty  if  they  had  seen  him 
return  from  war  at  the  head  of  twenty  thou 
sand  troops,  accustomed  to  carnage  and  free 
quarters  in  Ireland. 

We  think  with  Mr.  Hallam,  that  many  of  the 
royalist  nobility  and  gentry  were  true  friends 
to  the  constitution  ;  and  that,  but  for  the  solemn 
protestations  by  which  the  king  bound  himself 
to  govern  according  to  the  law  for  the  future, 
they  never  would  have  joined  his  standard. 
But  surely  they  underrated  the  public  danger. 
Falkland  is  commonly  selected  as  the  most  re 
spectable  specimen  of  this  class.  He  was 
indeed  a  man  of  great  talents,  and  of  great 
virtues;  but,  we  apprehend,  infinitely  too  fas 
tidious  for  public  life.  He  did  not  perceive 
that  in  such  times  as  those  on  which  his  lot 
had  fallen,  the  duty  of  a  statesman  is  to  choose 
the  better  cause,  and  to  stand  by  it,  in  spite  of 
those  excesses  by  which  every  cause,  however 
good  in  itself,  will  be  disgraced.  The  present 
evil  always  seemed  to  him  the  worst.  He  was 

VOL.  I.I    11 


always  going  backward  and  forward;  but  it 
should  be  remembered  to  his  honour,  that  it 
was  always  from  the  stronger  to  the  weaker 
side  that  he  deserted.  While  Charles  was  op 
pressing  the  people,  Falkland  was  a  resolute 
champion  of  liberty.  He  attacked  Strafford. 
He  even  concurred  in  strong  measures  against 
Episcopacy.  But  the  violence  of  his  party 
annoyed  him,  and  drove  him  to  the  other  party, 
to  be  equally  annoyed  there.  Dreading  the 
success  of  the  cause  which  he  hart  espoused, 
sickened  by  the  courtiers  of  Oxford,  as  he  had 
been  sickened  by  the  patriots  of  Westminster, 
yet  bound  by  honour  not  to  abandon  them,  he 
pined  away,  neglected  his  person,  went  about 
moaning  for  peace,  apd  at  last  rushed  despe 
rately  on  death  as  the  best  refuge  in  such  mi 
serable  times.  If  he  had  lived  through  the 
scenes  that  followed,  we  have  little  doubt  that 
he  would  have  condemned  himself  to  share  the 
exile  and  beggary  of  the  royal  family  ;  that  he 
would  then  have  returned  to  oppose  all  their 
measures  ;  that  he  would  have  been  sent  to  the 
Tower  by  the  Commons  as  a  disbeliever  in  the 
Popish  Plot,  and  by  the  king  as  an  accomplice 
in  the  Rye-House  Plot ;  and  that,  if  he  had  es 
caped  being  hanged,  first  by  Scroggs,  and  then 
by  Jeffries,  he  would,  after  manfully  opposing 
James  the  Second  through  his  whole  reign, 
have  been  seized  with  a  fit  of  compassion  at 
the  very  moment  of  the  Revolution,  have  voted 
for  a  regency,  and  died  a  nonjuror. 

We  do  not  dispute  that  the  royal  party  con« 
tained  many  excellent  men  and  excellent  citi 
zens.  But  this  we  say — that  they  did  not  dis 
cern  those  times.  The  peculiar  glory  of  the 
Houses  of  Parliament  is,  that,  in  the  great 
plague  and  mortality  of  constitutions,  they 
took  their  stand  between  the  living  and  the 
dead.  At  the  very  crisis  of  our  destiny,  at  the 
very  moment  when  the  fate  which  had  passed 
on  every  other  nation  was  about  to  pass  on 
England,  they  arrested  the  danger. 

Those  who  conceive  that  the  parliamentary 
leaders  were  desirous  merely  to  maintain  the 
old  constitution,  and  those  who  represent  them 
as  conspiring  to  subvert  it,  are  equally  in  error. 
The  old  constitution,  as  we  have  attempted  to 
show,  could  not  be  maintained.  The  progress 
of  time,  the  increase  of  wealth,  the  diffusion 
of  knowledge,  the  great  change  in  the  Euro 
pean  system  of  war,  rendered  it  impossible 
that  any  of  the  monarchies  of  the  middle  ages 
should  continue  to  exist  on  the  old  footing. 
The  prerogative  of  the  crown  was  constantly 
advancing.  If  the  privileges  of  the  people 
were  to  remain  absolutely  stationary,  they 
would  relatively  retrograde.  The  monarchical 
and  democratical  parts  of  the  government  were 
|  placed  in  a  situation  not  unlike  that  of  the  two 
I  brothers  in  the  Fairy  Queen,  one  of  who-ni  saw 
I  the  soil  of  his  inheritance  daily  washed  away 
j  by  the  tide,  and  joined  to  that  of  his  rival. 
i  The  portions  had  at  first  been  fairly  meted  out  : 
by  a  natural  and  constant  transfer,  the  one  had 
been  extended;  the  other  had  dwindled  to  no- 
thing.  A  new  partition  or  a  compensation 
was  necessary  to  restore  the  original  equality. 

It  was  now  absolutely  necessary  to  violate 
the  formal  part  of  the  constitution,  in  order  tr 
preserve  its  spirit.  This  might  have  oe?r. 


82 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


done,  as  it  was  done  at  the  Revolution,  by  ex-  • 
pelling  the  reigning  family,  and  calling  to  the  ! 
throne  princes,  who,  relying  solely  on  an  elect-  | 
ive  title,  would  find  it  necessary  to  respect  the  j 
privileges  and  follow  the  advice  of  the  assem 
blies  to  which  they  owed  every  thing,  to  pass 
every  bill  which  the  legislature  strongly 
pressed  upon  them,  and  to  fill  the  offices  of 
state  with  men  in  whom  it  confided.  But  as 
the  two  Houses  did  not  choose  to  change  the 
dynasty,  it  was  necessary  that  they  should  do 
directly  what  at  the  Revolution  was  done  indi 
rectly.  Nothing  is  more  usual  than  to  hear  it 
said,  that  if  the  Long  Parliament  had  content 
ed  itself  with  making  such  a  reform  in  the 
government  under  Charles  as  was  afterwards 
made  under  William,  it  would  have  had  the 
highest  claim  to  national  gratitude ;  and  that 
in  its  violence  it  overshot  the  mark.  But  how 
was  it  possible  to  make  such  a  settlement  un 
der  Charles  1  Charles  was  not,  like  William 
and  the  princes  of  the  Hanoverian  line,  bound 
by  community  of  interests  and  dangers  to  the 
two  Houses.  It  was  therefore  necessary  that 
they  should  bind  him  by  treaty  and  statute. 

Mr.  Hal  lam  reprobates,  in  language  which 
has  a  little  surprised  us,  the  nineteen  proposi 
tions  into  which  the  Parliament  has  digested 
its  scheme.  We  will  ask  him  whether  he  does 
not  think  that,  if  James  the  Second  had  re 
mained  in  the  island,  and  had  been  suffered,  as 
he  probably  would  in  that  case  have  been  suf 
fered,  to  keep  his  crown,  conditions  to  the  full 
as  hard  would  have  been  imposed  on  him? 
On  the  other  hand,  if  the  Long  Parliament  had 
pronounced  the  departure  of  Charles  from 
London  an  abdication,  and  had  called  Essex 
or  Northumberland  to  the  throne,  the  new 
prince  might  have  safely  been  suffered  to  reign 
without  such  restrictions;  his  situation  would 
have  been  a  sufficient  guarantee,  fei  the  nine 
teen  propositions,  we  see  very  little  to  blame 
except  the  articles  against  the  Catholics. 
These,  however,  were  in  the  spirit  of  that  age  ; 
and  to  some  sturdy  churchmen  in  our  own, 
that  may  seem  to  palliate  even  the  good  which 
the  Long  Parliament  effected.  The  regulation 
with  respect  to  new  creations  of  Peers  is  the 
only  other  article  about  which  we  entertain 
any  doubt. 

One  of  the  propositions  is,  that  the  judges 
shall  hold  their  offices  during  good  behaviour. 
To  this  surely  no  exception  will  be  taken. 
The  right  of  directing  the  education  and  mar 
riage  of  the  princes  was  most  properly  claimed 
by  the  Parliament  on  the  same  ground  on 
which,  after  the  Revolution,  it  was  enacted, 
that  no  king,  on  pain  of  forfeiting  his  throne, 
should  espouse  a  papist.  Unless  we  condemn 
the  statesmen  of  the  Revolution,  who  conceived 
that  England  could  not  safely  be  governed  by 
a  sovereign  married  to  a  Catholic  queen,  we 
ran  scarcely  condemn  the  Long  Parliament, 
because,  having  a  sovereign  so  situated,  they 
thought  it  necessary  to  place  him  under  strict 
restraints.  The  influence  of  Henrietta  Maria 
had  alreadvbeen  deeply  felt  in  political  affairs, 
in  the  regulation  of  her  family,  in  the  educa 
tion  and  marriage  of  her  children,  it  was  still 
more  likely  to  be  iel*  There  might  be  another 
Catholic  queen;  possibly,  a  Catholic  king. 


Little  as  we  are  disposed  to  join  in  the  vulgar 
clamour  on  this  subject,  we  think  that  such  an 
event  ought  to  be,  if  possible,  averted;  and 
this  could  only  be  done,  if  Charles  was  to  be 
left  on  the  throne,  by  placing  his  domestic  ar 
rangements  under  the  control  of  Parliament. 

A  veto  on  the  appointment  of  ministers  was 
demanded.  But  this  veto  Parliament  had  vir 
tually  possessed  ever  since  the  Revolution.  It 
is  no  doubt  very  far  better  that  this  power  of 
the  legislature  should  be  exercised,  as  it  is  now 
exercised,  when  any  great  occasion  calls  for  in 
terference,  than  that  at  every  change  it  should 
have  to  signify  its  approbation  or  disapproba 
tion  in  form.  But,  unless  a  new  family  had 
been  placed  on  the  throne,  we  do  not  see  how  this 
power  could  have  been  exercised  as  it  is  now 
exercised.  We  again  repeat,  that  no  restraints 
which  could  be  imposed  on  the  princes  who 
reigned  after  the  Revolution  could  have  added 
to  the  security  which  their  title  afforded.  They 
were  compelled  to  court  their  parliaments. 
But  from  Charles  nothing  was  to  be  expected 
which  was  not  set  down  in  the  bond. 

It  was  not  stipulated  that  the  king  should 
give  up  his  negative  on  acts  of  Parliament. 
But  the  Commons  had  certainly  shown  a 
strong  disposition  to  exact  this  security  also. 
"Such  a  doctrine,"  says  Mr.  Hallam,  "was  in 
this  country  as  repugnant  to  the  whole  history 
of  our  laws  as  it  was  incompatible  with  the 
subsistence  of  the  monarchy  in  any  thing  more 
than  a  nominal  pre-eminence."  Now  this  ar 
ticle  has  been  as  completely  carried  into  effect 
by  the  Revolution,  as  if  it  had  been  formally 
inserted  in  the  Bill  of  Rights  and  the  Act  of 
Settlement.  We  are  surprised,  we  confess, 
that  Mr.  Hallam  should  attach  so  much  import 
ance  to  a  prerogative  which  has  not  been  exer 
cised  for  a  hundred  and  thirty  ye.ars,  which 
probably  will  never  be  exercised  again,  and 
which  can  scarcely,  in  any  conceivable  case, 
be  exercised  for  a  salutary  purpose. 

But  the  great  security,  that  without  which 
every  other  would  have  been  insufficient,  wa? 
the  power  of  the  sword.  This  both  parties 
thoroughly  understood.  The  Parliament  in 
sisted  on  having  the  command  of  the  miliria, 
and  the  direction  of  the  Irish  war.  "  By  Gi>d, 
not  for  an  hour !"  exclaimed  the  king.  •'  Keep 
the  militia,"  said  the  queen  after  the  vie  feat 
of  the  royal  party,  "keep  the  militia;  that 
will  bring  back  eveiy  thing."  That,  by 
the  old  constitution,  no  military  authority  was 
lodged  in  the  Parliament,  Mr.  Hallam  has 
clearly  shown.  That  it  is  a  species  of  power 
which  ought  not  to  be  permanently  lodged  in 
large  and  divided  assemblies,  must,  we  think, 
in  fairness  be  conceded.  Opposition,  publicity, 
long  discussion,  frequent  compromise,  these 
are  the  characteristics  of  the  proceedings  in 
such  bodies.  Unity,  secrecy,  decision,  are  the 
qualities  which  military  arrangements  require. 
This  undoubtedly  was  an  evil.  But,  on  the 
other  hand,  at  such  a  crisis  to  trust  such  a  king 
with  the  very  weapon  which,  in  hands  less 
dangerous,  had  destroyed  so  many  free  const! 
tutions,  would  have  been  the  extreme  of  rash 
ness.  The  jealousy  with  which  the  oligarchy 
of  Venice  and  the  States  of  Holland  regarded 
their  generals  and  armies  induced  them  per 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


83 


petiially  to  interfere  in  matters  of  which  they 
were  incompetent  to  judge.  This  policy  se 
cured  them  against  military  usurpation,  but 
placed  them  under  great  disadvantages  in  war. 
The  uncontrolled  power  which  the  king  of 
France  exercised  over  his  troops  enabled  him 
to  conquer  his  enemies,  but  enabled  him  also 
to  oppress  his  people.  Was  there  any  interme 
diate  course?  None,  we  confess,  altogether 
free  from  objection.  But,  on  the  whole,  we 
conceive  that  the  best  measure  would  have 
been  that  which  the  Parliament  over  and  over 
proposed;  that  for  a  limited  time  the  power  of 
the  swcrd  should  be  left  to  the  two  Houses,  and 
that  it  should  revert  to  the  crown  when  the 
constitution  should  be  firmly  established ;  when 
the  new  securities  of  freedom  should  be  so  far 
strengthened  by  prescription,  that  it  would  be 
difficult  to  employ  even  a  standing  army  for 
the  purpose  of  subverting  them. 

Mr.  Hallam  thinks  that  the  dispute  might 
easily  have  been  compromised,  by  enacting 
that  the  king  should  have  no  power  to  keep  a 
standing  army  on  foot  without  the  consent  of 
Parliament.  He  reasons  as  if  the  question  had 
been  merely  theoretical — as  if  at  that  time  no 
army  had  been  wanted.  "The  kingdom,"  he 
says,  "might  have  well  dispensed,  in  that  age, 
with  any  military  organization."  Now,  we 
think  that  Mr.  Hallam  overlooks  the  most  im 
portant  circumstance  in  the  whole  case.  Ire 
land  was  at  that  moment  in  rebellion ;  and  a 
great  expedition  would  obviously  be  necessary 
to  reduce  that  kingdom  to  obedience.  The 
Houses  had,  therefore,  to  consider,  not  an  ab 
stract  question  of  law,  but  an  urgent  practical 
question,  directly  involving  the  safety  of  the 
state.  They  had  to  consider  the  expediency 
of  immediately  giving  a  great  army  to  a  king, 
who  was  at  least  as  desirous  to  put  down  the 
Parliament  of  England  as  to  conquer  the  insur 
gents  of  Ireland. 

Of  course,  we  do  not  mean  to  defend  all  their 
measures.  Far  from  it.  There  never  was  a 
perfect  man ;  it  would,  therefore,  be  the  height 
of  absurdity  to  expect  a  perfect  party  or  a  per 
fect  assembly.  For  large  bodies  are  far  more 
likely  to  err  than  individuals.  The  passions 
are  inflamed  by  sympathy;  the  fear  of  punish 
ment  and  the  sense  of  shame  are  diminished 
by  partition.  Every  day  we  see  men  do  for 
their  faction  what  they  would  die  rather  than 
do  Cor  themselves. 

No  private  quarrel  ever  happens,  in  which 
the  right  and  wrong  are  so  exquisitely  divid 
ed,  that  all  the  right  lies  on  one  side,  and  all 
the  wrong  on  the  other.  But  here  was  a  schism 
which  separated  a  great  nation  into  two  parties. 
Of  these  parties,  each  was  composed  of  many 
smaller  parlies.  Each  contained  many  mem 
bers,  who  differed  far  less  from  their  moderate 
opponents  than  from  their  violent  allies.  Each 
reckoned  among  its  supporters  many  who 
wore  determined  in  their  choice,  by  some  acci 
dent  of  birth,  of  connection,  or  of  local  situa 
tion.  Each  of  them  attracted  to  itself  in  multi 
tudes  those  fierce  and  turbid  spirits,  to  whom 
the  clouds  and  whirlwinds  of  the  political  hur 
ricane  are  the  atmosphere  of  life.  A  party, 
like  a  camp,  has  its  sutlers  and  camp-follow 
ers,  as  well  as  its  soldiers.  In  its  progress  it 


collects  round  it  a  vast  retinue,  composed  of 
people  M'ho  thrive  by  its  custom,  or  ave  amused 
by  its  display,  who  may  be  sometimes  reckon 
ed,  in  an  ostentatious  enumeration,  as  forming 
a  part  of  it,  but  who  give  no  aid  to  its  opera 
tions,  and  take  but  a  languid  interest  in  its 
success :  who  relax  its  discipline  and  disho 
nour  its  flag,  by  their  irregularities;  and  who, 
after  a  disaster,  are  perfectly  ready  to  cut  the 
throats  and  rifle  the  baggage  of  their  com 
panions. 

Thus  it  is  in  every  great  division :  and  thus 
it  was  in  our  civil  war.  On  both  sides  there 
was,  undoubtedly,  enough  of  crime  and  enough 
of  error,  to  disgust  any  man  M'ho  did  not  re 
flect  that  the  whole  history  of  the  species  is 
nothing  but  a  comparison  of  crimes  and  errors. 
Misanthropy  is  not  the  temper  which  qualifies 
a  man  to  act  in  great  affairs,  or  to  judge  of 
them. 

"Of  the  Parliament,"  says  Mr.  Hallam,  "it 
may  be  said,  I  think,  with  not  greater  severity 
than  truth,  that  scarce  two  or  three  public  acts 
of  justice,  humanity,  or  generosity,  and  very 
few  of  political  wisdom  or  courage,  are  record 
ed  of  them,  from  their  quarrel  with  the  king  to 
their  expulsion  by  Cromwell."  Those  who 
may  agree  with  us  in  the  opinion  which  we 
have  expressed  as  to  the  original  demands  of 
the  Parliament,  will  scarcely  concur  in  this 
strong  censure.  The  propositions  which  tha 
Houses  made  at  Oxford,  at  Uxbridge,  and  at 
Newcastle,  were  in  strict  accordance  with 
these  demands.  In  the  darkest  period  of  the 
war,  they  showed  no  disposition  to  concede 
any  vital  principle.  In  the  fulness  of  their 
success,  they  showed  no  disposition  to  en 
croach  beyond  these  limits.  In  this  respect 
we  cannot  but  think  that  they  showed  justice 
and  generosity,  as  well  as  political  wisdom  and 
courage. 

The  Parliament  was  certainly  far  from  fault 
less.  We  fully  agree  with  Mr.  Hallam  in  re 
probating  their  treatment  of  Laud.  For  the 
individual,  indeed,  we  entertain  a  more  unmi 
tigated  contempt  than  for  any  other  character 
in  our  history.  The  fondness  with  which  a 
portion  of  the  church  regards  his  memory,  can 
be  compared  only  to  that  perversity  of  affection 
which  sometimes  leads  a  mother  to  select  the 
monster  or  the  idiot  of  the  family  as  the  object 
of  her  especial  favour.  Mr.  Hallam  ha,s  inci 
dentally  observed,  that  in  the  correspondence 
of  Laud  with  Strafford,  there  are  no  indica 
tions  of  a  sense  of  duty  towards  God  or  man. 
The  admirers  of  the  archbishop  have,  in  con 
sequence,  inflicted  upon  the  public  a  crowd  of 
extracts,  designed  to  prove  the  contrary.  Now, 
in  all  those  passages,  we  see  nothing  which  a 
prelate  as  wicked  as  Pope  Alexander  or  Car 
dinal  Dubois  might  not  have  written.  They 
indicate  no  sense  of  duty  to  God  or  man  ;  but 
simply  a  strong  interest  in  the  prosperity  and 
dignity  of  the  order  to  which  the  writer  be 
longed ;  an  interest  which,  when  kept  within 
certain  limits,  does  not  deserve  censure,  but 
which  can  never  be  considered  as  a  virtues. 
Laud  is  anxious  to  accommodate  satisfactorily 
the  disputes  in  the  University  of  Dublin.  He 
regrets  to  hear  that  a  church  is  used  as  a  stable, 
and  that  the  benefices  of  Irelani  are  very  poor 


84 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


He  is  desirous  that,  however  small  a  congre 
gation  may  be,  service  should  be  regularly 
performed.  He  expresses  a  wish  that  the 
judges  of  the  court  before  which  questions  of 
tithe  are  generally  brought,  should  be  selected 
with  a  view  to  the  interest  of  the  clergy.  All 
this  may  be  very  proper;  and  it  may  be  .very 
proper  that  an  alderman  should  stand  up  for 
the  tolls  of  his  borough,  and  an  East  Indian 
director  for  the  charter  of  his  company.  But 
it  is  ridiculous  to  say  that  these  things  indicate 
piety  and  benevolence.  No  primate,  though 
he  were  the  most  abandoned  of  mankind, 
would  wish  to  see  the  body,  with  the  conse 
quence  of  which  his  own  consequence  was 
identical,  degraded  in  the  public  estimation  by 
internal  dissensions,  by  the  ruinous  state  of  its 
edifices,  and  the  slovenly  performance  of  its 
rites.  We  willingly  acknowledge  that  the  par 
ticular  letters  in  question  have  very  little  harm 
in  them  ; — a  compliment  which  cannot  often 
be  paid  either  to  the  writings  or  to  the  actions 
of  Laud. 

Bad  as  the  archbishop  was,  however,  he 
was  not  a  traitor  within  the  statute.  Nor  was 
he  by  any  means  so  formidable  as  to  be  a  pro 
per  subject  for  a  retrospective  ordinance  of  the 
legislature.  His  mind  had  not  expansion 
enough  to  comprehend  a  great  scheme,  good  or 
bad.  His  oppressive  acts  were  not,  like  those 
of  the  Earl  of  Strafford,  parts  of  an  extensive 
system.  They  were  the  luxuries  in  which  a 
mean  and  irritable  disposition  indulges  itself 
from  day  to  day — the  excesses  natural  to  a 
little  mind  in  a  great  place.  The  severest 
punishment  which  the  two  Houses  could  have 
inflicted  on  him  would  have  been  to  set  him  at 
liberty,  and  send  him  to  Oxford.  There  he 
might  have  stayed,  tortured  by  his  own  diaboli 
cal  temper,  hungering  for  Puritans  to  pillory 
and  mangle,  plaguing  the  Cavaliers,  for  want 
of  somebody  else  to  plague,  Avith  his  peevish 
ness  and  absurdity,  performing  grimaces  and 
antics  in  the  cathedral,  continuing  that  incom 
parable  diary,  which  we  never  see  without  for 
getting  the  vices  of  his  heart  in  the  abject 
imbecility  of  his  intellect;  minuting  down  his 
dreams,  counting  the  drops  of  blood  which  fell 
from  his  nose,  watching  the  direction  of  the 
salt,  and  listening  for  the  note  of  the  screech- 
owl  !  Contemptuous  mercy  was  the  only 
vengeance  which  it  became  the  Parliament  to 
take  on  such  a  ridiculous  old  bigot. 

The  Houses,  it  must  be  acknowledged,  com 
mitted  great  errors  in  the  conduct  of  the  Avar; 
or  rather  one  great  error,  which  brought  their 
affairs  into  a  condition  requiring  the  most 
perilous  expedients.  The  Parliamentary  lead 
ers  of  what  may  be  called  the  first  generation, 
Essex,  Manchester,  Northumberland,  Hollis, 
even  Pym — all  the  most  eminent  men,  in  short, 
Hampden  excepted,  were  inclined  to  half-mea 
sures.  They  dreaded  a  decisive  victory 
almost  as  much  as  a  decisive  overthrow. 
They  wished  to  bring  the  king  into  a  situation 
which  might  render  it  necessary  for  him  to 
grant  their  just  and  wise  demands  ;  but  not  to 
bubvert  the  constitution  or  to  change  the  dy 
nasty.  They  were  afraid  of  serving  the  pur 
poses  of  those  fiercer  and  more  determined  j 
enemies  of  monarchy,  who  now  be^an  to  show  1 


themselves  in  the  lower  ranks  of  the  party. 
The  war  was,  therefore,  conducted  in  a  languid 
and  inefficient  manner.  A  resolute  leader 
might  have  brought  it  to  a  close  in  a  month. 
At  the  end  of  three  campaigns,  however,  the 
event  was  still  dubious;  and  that  it  had  not 
been  decidedly  unfavourable  to  the  cause  of 
liberty,  was  principally  owing  to  the  skill 
and  energy  which  the  more  violent  Round 
heads  had  displayed  in  subordinate  situations. 
The  conduct  of  Fairfax  and  Cromwell  at 
Marston  had  exhibited  a  remarkable  contrast 
to  that  of  Essex  at  Edgehill,  and  Waller  at 
Lansdown. 

If  there  be  any  truth  established  by  the  uni 
versal  experience  cf  nations,  it  is  this  ;  that  to 
carry  the  spirit  of  peace  into  war  is  a  weak 
and  cruel  policy.  The  time  of  negotiation  is 
the  time  for  deliberation  and  delay.  But  when 
an  extreme  case  calls  for  that  remedy,  which 
is  in  its  own  nature  most  violent,  and  which,  in 
such  cases,  is  a  remedy  only  because  it  is  vio 
lent,  it  is  idle  to  think  of  mitigating  and  dilut 
ing.  Languid  war  can  do  nothing  which 
negotiation  or  submission  will  not  do  better: 
and  to  act  on  any  other  principle  is  not  to  save 
blood  and  money,  but  to  squander  them. 

This  the  Parliamentary  leaders  found.  The 
third  year  of  hostilities  was  drawing  to  a  close: 
and  they  had  not  conquered  the  king.  They 
had  not  obtained  even  those  advantages  which 
they  had  expected,  from  a  policy  obviously 
erroneous  in  a  military  point  of  view.  They 
had  wished  to  husband  their  resources.  They 
now  found  that,  in  enterprises  like  their?,  par- 
simony  is  the  worst  profusion.  They  had 
hoped  to  effect  a  reconciliation.  The  evert, 
taught  them  that  the  best  way  to  conciliate  ij 
to  bring  the  work  of  destruction  to  a  speedj 
termination.  By  their  moderation  many  live; 
and  much  property  had  been  wasted.  Th* 
angry  passions  which,  if  the  contest  had  becw 
short,  would  have  died  away  almost  as  soon  cU 
they  appeared,  had  fixed  themselves  in  the 
form  of  deep  and  lasting  hatred.  A  miiJary 
caste  had  grown  up.  Those  who  ha/i  been 
induced  to  take  up  arms  by  the  patriotic  feel 
ings  of  citizens,  had  begun  to  entertain  the 
professional  feelings  of  soldiers.  Aoove  all, 
the  leaders  of  the  party  had  forfeited  its  confi 
dence.  If  they  had,  by  their  valour  and  abili 
ties,  gained  a  complete  victory,  tncir  influence 
might  have  been  sufficient  to  prevent  their 
associates  from  abusing  it.  It  is  now  neces 
sary  to  choose  more  resolute  and  uncompro 
mising  commanders.  Unhappily  the  illustrious 
man  who  alone  united  in  himself  all  the  talents 
and  virtues  which  the  crisis  required,  who 
alone  could  have  saved  his  country  from  the 
present  dangers  without  plunging  her  into 
others,  who  alone  could  have  united  all  the 
friends  of  liberty  in  obedience  to  his  com 
manding  genius  and  his  venerable  name,  was 
no  more.  Something  might  still  be  done.  The 
Houses  might  still  avert  that  worst  of  all  evils, 
the  triumphant  return  of  an  imperious  and  un 
principled  master.  They  might  still  preserve 
London  from  all  the  horrors  of  rapine,  mas 
sacre,  and  lust.  But  their  hopes  of  a  victory 
as  spotless  as  their  cause,  of  a  reconciliation 
which  might  knit  together  the  hearts  of  alJ 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


honest  Englishmen  for  the  defence  of  the  pub-  j 
lie  good,  of  durable  tranquillity,  of  temperate  i 
freedom,  were  buried  in  the  grave  of  Hamp-  j 
den. 

The  self-denying  ordinance  was  passed,  and 
the  army  was  remodelled.  These  measures  ' 
were  undoubtedly  full  of  danger.  But  all  that 
was  left  to  the  Parliament  was  to  take  the  less 
of  two  dangers.  And  we  think  that,  even  if 
they  could  have  accurately  foreseen  all  that 
followed,  their  decision  ought  to  have  been  the 
same.  Under  any  circumstances,  we  should 
have  preferred  Cromwell  to  Charles.  But 
there  could  be  no  comparison  between  Crom 
well  and  Charles  victorious — Charles  restored, 
Charles  enabled  to  feed  fat  all  the  hungry 
grudges  of  his  smiling  rancour,  and  his  cringing 
pride.  The  next  visit  of  his  majesty  to  his 
faithful  Commons  would  have  been  more  se 
rious  than  that  with  which  he  last  honoured 
them  ;  more  serious  than  that  which  their  own 
general  paid  them  some  years  after.  The 
king  would  scarce  have  been  content  with  col 
laring  Marten,  and  praying  that  the  Lord  would 
deliver  him  from  Vane.  If,  by  fatal  misman 
agement,  nothing  was  left  to  England  but  a 
choice  of  tyrants,  the  last  tyrant  whom  she 
should  have  chosen  was  Charles. 

From  the  apprehension  of  this  worst  evil  the 
Houses  were  soon  delivered  by  their  new  lead 
ers.  The  armies  of  Charles  were  everywhere 
routed  ;  his  fastnesses  stormed ;  his  party  hum 
bled  and  subjugated.  The  king  himself  fell 
into  the  hands  of  the  Parliament ;  and  both  the 
king  and  the  Parliament  soon  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  army.  The  fate  of  both  the  cap 
tives  was  the  same.  Both  were  treated  alter 
nately  with  respect  and  with  insult.  At  length 
the  natural  life  of  the  one,  and  the  political 
life  of  the  other,  were  terminated  by  violence; 
and  the  power  for  which  both  had  struggled 
was  united  in  a  single  hand.  Men  naturally 
sympathize  with  the  calamities  of  individuals  ; 
but  they  are  inclined  to  look  on  a  fallen  party 
with  contempt  rather  than  with  pity.  Thus 
misfortune  turned  the  greatest  of  Parliaments 
into  the  despised  Rump,  and  the  worst  of  kings 
into  the  Blessed  Martyr. 

Mr.  Hallam  decidedly  condemns  the  execu 
tion  of  Charles ;  and  in  all  that  he  says  on 
that  subject,  we  heartily  agree.  We  fully  con 
cur  with  him  in  thinking  that  a  great  social 
schism,  such  as  the  civil  war,  is  not  to  be  con 
founded  with  an  ordinary  treason;  and  that 
the  vanquished  ought  to  be  treated  according 
to  the  rules,  not  of  municipal,  but  of  interna 
tional  law.  In  this  case  the  distinction  is  of 
the  less  importance,  because  both  international 
and  municipal  law  were  in  favour  of  Charles. 

He  was  a  prisoner  of  war  by  the  former,  a 
king  by  the  latter.  By  neither  was  he  a  trai 
tor.  If  he  had  been  successful,  and  had  put 
his  leading  opponents  to  death,  he  would  have 
deserved  severe  censure ;  and  this  without  re- 
»erence  to  the  justice  or  injustice  of  his  cause. 
Yet  the  opponents  of  Charles,  it  must  be  ad 
mitted  were  technically  guilty  of  treason.  He 
might  have  sent  them  to  the  scaffold  without 
violating  any  established  principle  of  jurispru 
dence.  He  would  not  have  been  compelled  to 
overturn  the  whole  constitution  in  order  to 


reach  them.  Here  his  own  case  differed  widely 
from  theirs.  Not  only  was  his  condemnation 
in  itself  a  measure  which  only  the  strongest 
necessity  could  vindicate,  but  it  could  not  be 
procured  without  taking  several  previous 
steps,  every  one  of  which  would  have  re 
quired  the  strongest  necessity  to  vindicate  it. 
It  could  not  be  procured  without  dissolving 
the  government  by  military  force,  without  es 
tablishing  precedents  of  the  most  dangerous 
description,  without  creating  difficulties  which 
the  next  ten  years  were  spent  in  removing, 
without  pulling  down  institutions  which  it 
soon  became  necessary  to  reconstruct,  and 
setting  up  others  which  almost  every  man  was 
soon  impatient  to  destroy.  It  was  necessary 
to  strike  the  House  of  Lords  out  of  the  consti 
tution,  to  exclude  members  of  the  House  of 
Commons  by  force,  to  make  a  new  crime,  a 
new  tribunal,  a  new  mode  of  procedure.  The 
whole  legislative  and  judicial  systems  were 
trampled  down  for  the  purpose  of  taking  a  sin 
gle  head.  Not  only  those  parts  of  the  consti 
tution  which  the  republicans  were  desirous  to 
destroy,  but  those  which  they  wished  to  retain 
and  exalt,  were  deeply  injured  by  these  trans 
actions.  High  courts  of  justice  began  to  usurp 
the  functions  of  juries.  The  remaining  dele 
gates  of  the  people  were  soon  driven  from 
their  seats,  by  the  same  military  violence 
which  had  enabled  them  to  exclude  their  col 
leagues. 

If  Charles  had  been  the  last  of  his  line,  there 
would  have  been  an  intelligible  reason  for  put 
ting  him  to  death.  But  the  blow  which  termi 
nated  his  life,  at  once  transferred  the  allegiance 
of  every  royalist  to  an  heir,  and  an  heir  who 
was  at  liberty.  To  kill  the  individual,  was 
truly,  under  such  circumstances,  not  to  de 
stroy,  but  to  release  the  king. 

We  detest  the  character  of  Charles ;  but  a 
man  ought  not  to  be  removed  by  a  law  ex  post 
facto,  even  constitutionally  procured,  merely 
because  he  is  detestable.  He  must  also  be 
very  dangerous.  We  can  scarcely  conceive 
that  any  danger  which  a  state  can  apprehend 
from  any  individual,  could  justify  the  violent 
measures  which  were  necessary  to  procure  a 
sentence  against  Charles.  But  in  fact  the 
danger  amounted  to  nothing.  There  was  in 
deed  danger  from  the  attachment  of  a  large 
party  to  his  office.  But  this  danger,  his  execu 
tion  only  increased.  His  personal  influence 
was  little  indeed.  He  had  lost  the  confidence 
of  every  party.  Churchmen,  Catholics,  Presby 
terians,  Independents,  his  enemies,  his  friends, 
his  tools,  English,  Scotch,  Irish,  all  divisions 
and  subdivisions  of  his  people  had  been  de 
ceived  by  him.  His  most  attached  councillors 
turned  away  with  shame  and  anguish  from  his 
false  and  hollow  policy;  plot  intertwined  with 
plot,  mine  sprung  beneath  mine,  agents  dis 
owned,  promises  evaded,  one  pledge  given  in 
private,  another  in  public. — "Oh,  Mr.  Secreta 
ry,"  says  Clarendon,  in  a  letter  to  Nicholas, 
"those  stratagems  have  given  me  more  sad 
hours  than  all  the  misfortunes  in  war  which 
have  befallen  the  king;  ana  look  like  th« 
effects  of  God's  anger  towards  us." 

The  abilities  of  Charles  were  not  fornv'da 
ble.    His  taste  in  the  fine  arts  was  indeed  e* 
H 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


quisite.  He  was  as  good  a  writer  and  speaker 
as  any  modern  sovereign  has  been.  But  he 
was  not  fit  for  active  life.  In  negotiation  he 
was  always  trying  to  dupe  others,  and  duping 
only  himself.  As  a  soldier,  he  was  feeble, 
dilatory,  and  miserably  wanting,  not  in  perso 
nal  courage,  but  in  the  presence  of  mind  which 
his  station  required.  His  delay  at  Gloucester 
saved  the  parliamentary  party  from  destruc 
tion.  At  Naseby,  in  the  very  crisis  of  his  for 
tune,  his  want  of  self-possession  spread  a  fatal 
panic  through  his  army.  The  story  which 
Clarendon  tells  of  that  affair,  reminds  us  of 
the  excuses  by  which  Bessus  and  Bobadil  ex 
plain  their  cudgellings.  A  Scotch  nobleman, 
it  seems,  begged  the  king  not  to  run  upon  his 
death,  took  hold  of  his  bridle,  and  turned  his 
horse  round.  No  man  who  had  much  value 
for  his  life  would  have  tried  to  perform  the 
same  friendly  office  on  that  day  for  Oliver 
Cromwell. 

One  thing,  and  one  alone,  could  make  Charles 
dangerous — a  violent  death.  His  tyranny  could 
not  break  the  high  spirit  of  the  English  people. 
His  arms  could  not  conquer,  his  arts  could  not 
deceive  them ;  but  his  humiliation  and  his 
execution  melted  them  into  a  generous  com 
passion.  Men  who  die  on  a  scaffold  for  politi 
cal  offences  almost  always  die  well.  The  eyes 
of  thousands  are  fixed  upon  them.  Enemies 
and  admirers  are  watching  their  demeanour. 
Every  tone  of  voice,  every  change  of  colour, 
is  to  go  down  to  posterity.  Escape  is  impos 
sible.  Supplication  is  vain.  In  such  a  situa 
tion  pride  and  despair  have  often  been  known 
to  nerve  the  weakest  minds  with  fortitude  ade 
quate  to  the  occasion.  Charles  died  patiently 
and  bravely;  not  more  patiently  or  bravely, 
indeed,  than  many  other  victims  of  political 
rage ;  not  more  patiently  or  bravely  than  his 
own  judges,  who  were  not  only  killed,  but  tor 
tured  ;  or  than  Vane,  who  had  always  been 
considered  as  a  timid  man.  However,  his  con 
duct  during  his  trial  and  at  his  execution  made 
a  prodigious  impression.  His  subjects  began 
to  love  his  memory  as  heartily  as  they  had 
hated  his  person  ;  and  posterity  has  estimated 
his  character  from  his  death  rather  than  from 
his  life. 

To  represent  Charles  as  a  martyr  in  the 
cause  of  Episcopacy  is  absurd.  Those  who 
put  him  to  death  cared  as  little  for  the  Assem 
bly  of  Divines  as  for  the  Convocation;  and 
would  in  all  probability  only  have  hated  him 
the  more  if  he  had  agr°ed  to  set  up  the  Pres 
byterian  discipline;  and,  in  spite  of  the  opinion 
of  Mr.  Hallam,  we  are  inclined  to  think  that 
the  attachment  of  Charles  to  the  Church  of 
England  was  altogether  political.  Human  na 
ture  is  indeed  so  capricious  that  there  may  be 
a  single  sensitive  point  in  a  conscience  which 
everywhere  else  is  callous.  A  man  without 
truth  or  humanity  may  have  some  strange 
scruples  about  a  trifle.  There  was  one  devout 
warrior  in  the  royal  camp  whose  piety  bore  a 
great  resemblance  to  that  which  is  ascribed  to 
the  king.  We  mean  Colonel  Turner.  That 
gallant  cavalier  '.vas  hanged  after  the  Restora 
tion  for  a  flagitious  burglary.  At  the  gallows 
he  told  the  crowd  that  his  mind  received  great 
consolation  from  one  reflection — he  had  al- 


'  ways  taken  off"  his  hat  when  he  went  into  a 
;  church !  The  character  of  Charles  would 
scarcely  rise  in  our  estimation,  if  we  believed 
i  that  he  was  pricked  in  conscience  after  the 
i  manner  of  this  worthy  loyalist;  and  that,  while 
I  violating  all  the  first  rules  of  Christian  morali- 
1  ty,  he  was  sincerely  scrupulous  about  church- 
government.  But  we  acquit  him  of  such  weak 
ness.  In  1641,  he  deliberately  confirmed  the 
Scotch  declaration,  which  stated  that  the  go 
vernment  of  the  church  by  archbishops  and 
bishops  was  contrary  to  the  word  of  God.  la 
1645,  he  appears  to  have  offered  to  set  up 
Popery  in  Ireland.  That  a  king  who  had  es 
tablished  the  Presbyterian  religion  in  one 
kingdom,  and  who  was  willing  to  establish  the 
Catholic  religion  in  another,  should  have  in 
surmountable  scruples  about  the  ecclesiasti 
cal  constitution  of  the  third,  is  altogether  incre 
dible.  He  himself  says  in  his  letters  that  he 
looks  on  Episcopacy  as  a  stronger  support 
of  monarchical  power  than  even  the  army. 
From  causes  which  we  have  already  consi 
dered,  the  Established  Church  had  been,  since 
the  Reformation,  the  great  bulwark  of  the  pre 
rogative.  Charles  wished,  therefore,  to  pre 
serve  it.  He  thought  himself  necessary  both 
to  the  Parliament  and  to  the  army.  He  did 
not  foresee,  till  too  late,  that  by  paltering  with 
the  Presbyterians  he  should  put  both  them  and 
himself  into  the  power  of  a  fiercer  and  more  dar 
ing  party  If  he  had  foreseen  it,  we  suspect 
that  the  r.»yal  blood,  which  still  cries  to  Heaven 
every  thirtieth  of  January  for  judgments  only 
to  be  averted  by  salt  fish  and  egg-sauce,  would 
never  have  been  shed.  One  who  had  swal 
lowed  the  Scotch  Declaration  would  scarcely 
strain  at  the  Covenant. 

The  death  of  Charles,  and  the  strong  mea 
sures  which  led  to  it,  raised  Cromwell  to  a 
height  of  power  fatal  to  the  infant  common 
wealth.  No  men  occupy  so  splendid  a  place 
in  history  as  those  who  have  founded  mo 
narchies  on  the  ruins  of  republican  institu 
tions.  Their  glory,  if  not  of  the  purest,  is  as 
suredly  of  the  most  seductive  and  dazzling 
kind.  In  nations  broken  to  the  curb,  in  na 
tions  long  accustomed  to  be  transferred  from 
one  tyrant  to  another,  a  man  without  eminent 
qualities  may  easily  gain  supreme  power.  The 
defection  of  a  troop  of  guards,  a  conspiracy  of 
eunuchs,  a  popular  tumult,  might  place  an  in 
dolent  senator  or  a  brutal  soldier  on  the  throne 
of  the  Roman  world.  Similar  revolutions  have 
often  occurred  in  the  despotic  states  of  Asia. 
But  a  community  which  has  heard  the  voice 
of  truth  and  experienced  the  pleasures  of  liber 
ty,  in  which  the  merits  of  statesmen  and  of 
systems  are  freely  canvassed,  in  which  obe 
dience  is  paid  not  to  persons  but  to  laws,  in 
which  magistrates  are  regarded  not  as  the 
lords  but  as  the  servants  of  the  public,  in 
which  the  excitement  of  party  is  a  necessary 
of  life,  in  which  political  warfare  is  reduced 
to  a  system  of  tactics  ;— such  a  community  is 
not  easily  reduced  to  servitude.  Beasts  of  bur 
den  may  easily  be  managed  by  a  new  master; 
but  will  the  wild  ass  submit  to  the  bonds?  will 
the  unicorn  serve  and  abide  by  the  crib?  will 
leviathan  hold  out  his  nostrils  to  the  hook? 
i  The  mythological  conqueror  of  the  East,  whose. 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


enchantments  reduced  the  wild  beasts  to  the 
lameness  of  domestic  cattle,  and  who  har 
nessed  lions  and  tigers  to  his  chariot,  is  but 
an  imperfect  type  of  those  extraordinary  minds 
which  have  thrown  a  spell  on  the  fierce  spirits 
of  nations  unaccustomed  to  control,  and  have 
compelled  raging  factions  to  obey  their  reins, 
and  swell  their  triumph.  The  enterprise,  be  it 
good  or  bad,  is  one  which  requires  a  truly 
great  man.  It  demands  courage,  activity,  ener 
gy,  wisdom,  firmness,  conspicuous  virtues,  or 
vices  so  splendid  and  alluring  as  to  resemble 
virtues. 

Those  who  have  succeeded  in  this  arduous 
undertaking  form  a  very  small  and  a  very  re 
markable  class.  Parents  of  tyranny,  but  heirs 
of  freedom,  kings  among  citizens,  citizens 
among  kings,  they  unite  in  themselves  the 
characteristics  of  the  system  which  springs 
from  them,  and  of  the  system  from  which  they 
have  sprung.  Their  reigns  shine  with  a  dou 
ble  light,  the  last  and  dearest  rays  of  depart 
ing  freedom,  mingled  with  the  first  and  bright 
est  glories  of  empire  in  its  dawn.  Their  high 
qualities  lend  to  despotism  itself  a  charm 
drawn  from  the  institutions  under  which  they 
were  formed,  and  which  they  have  destroyed. 
They  resemble  Europeans  who  settle  within 
the  tropics,  and  carry  thither  the  strength  and 
the  energetic  habits  acquired  in  regions  more 
propitious  to  the  constitution.  They  differ  as 
widely  from  princes  nursed  in  the  purple  of 
imperial  cradles  as  the  companions  of  Gama 
from  their  dwarfish  and  imbecile  progeny, 
which,  born  in  a  climate  unfavourable  to  its 
growth  and  beauty,  degenerates  more  and  more 
at  every  descent  from  the  qualities  of  the  ori 
ginal  conquerors. 

In  this  class  three  men  stand  pre-eminent ; 
Caesar,  Cromwell,  and  Bonaparte.  The  high 
est  place  in  this  remarkable  triumvirate  be 
longs  undoubtedly  to  Ccesar.  He  united  the 
talents  of  Bonaparte  to  those  of  Cromwell ; 
and  he  possessed  also  what  neither  Cromwell 
nor  Bonaparte  possessed,  learning,  taste,  wit, 
eloquence,  the  sentiments  and  the  manners  of 
an  accomplished  gentleman. 

Between  Cromwell  and  Napoleon  Mr.  Hal- 
lam  has  instituted  a  parallel  scarcely  less  in 
genious  than  that  which  Burke  has  drawn  be 
tween  Richard  Coeur  de  Lion  and  Charles  the 
Twelfth  of  Sweden.  In  this  parallel,  however, 
and  indeed  throughout  his  work,  we  think 
that  he  hardly  gives  Cromwell  fair  measure. 
"  Cromwell,"  says  he,  "  far  unlike  his  anti 
type,  never  showed  any  signs  of  a  legislative 
mind,  or  any  desire  to  place  his  renown  on 
that  noblest  basis,  the  amelioration  of  .social 
institutions."  The  difference  in  this  respect, 
we  conceive,  was  not  in  the  characters  of  the 
men,  but  in  the  characters  of  the  revolutions 
by  means  of  which  they  rose  to  power.  The 
civil  war  in  England  had  been  undertaken  to 
defend  and  restore  ;  the  republicans  of  France 
set  themselves  to  destroy.  In  England  the 
principles  of  the  common  law  had  never  been 
disturbed,  and  most  even  of  its  forms  had  been 
held  sacred.  In  France  the  law  and  its  minis 
ters  had  been  swept  away  together.  In  France, 
therefore,  legislation  necessarily  became  the 
first  business  of  the  first  settled  government 


i  Avhich  rose  on  the  ruins  of  the  old  svstem. 
I  The  admirers  of  Inigo  Jones  have  always 
maintained  that  his  works  are  inferior  to  those 
I  of  Sir  Christopher  Wren  onl}  because  the  great 
fire  of  London  gave  to  the  latter  such  a  field 
for  the  display  of  his  powers  as  no  architect 
in  the  history  of  the  world  ever  possessed. 
Similar  allowance  must  be  made  for  Cromwell. 
If  he  erected  little  that  was  new,  it  was  because 
there  had  been  no  general  devastation  to  clear 
a  space  for  him.  As  it  was,  he  reformed  the 
representative  system  in  a  most  judicious 
manner.  He  rendered  the  administration  of 
justice  uniform  throughout  the  island.  We 
will  quote  a  passage  from  his  speech  to  the 
Parliament  in  September,  1656,  which  contains, 
we  think,  stronger  indications  of  a  legislative 
mind  than  are  to  be  found  in  the  whole  range 
of  orations  delivered  on  such  occasions  before 
or  since. 

"There  is  one  general  grievance  in  the  na 
tion.  It  is  the  law  ....  I  think,  I  may  say  it,  I 
have  as  eminent  judges  in  this  land  as  have 
been  had,  or  that  the  nation  has  had  for  these 
many  years.  Truly,  I  could  be  particular  as  to 
the  executive  part,  to  the  administration ;  but 
that  would  trouble  you.  But  the  truth  of  it  is, 
there  are  wicked  and  abominable  laws  that  will 
be  in  your  power  to  alter.  To  hang  a  man  for 
sixpence,  threepence,  I  know  not  what — to  hang 
for  a  trifle  and  pardon  murder,  is  in  the  minis 
tration  of  the  law  through  the  ill-framing  of  it. 
I  have  known  in  my  experience  abominable 
murders  quitted ;  and  to  see  men  lose  their 
lives  for  petty  matters  !  This  is  a  thing  thai 
God  will  reckon  for  ;  and  I  wish  it  may  not  lie 
upon  this  nation  a  day  longer  than  you  havo 
an  opportunity  to  give  a  remedy  ;  and  I  hope  I 
shall  cheerfully  join  with  you  in  it." 

Mr.  Hallam  truly  says,  that  though  it  is  im 
possible  to  rank  Cromwell  with  Napoleon  as  a 
general,  yet  "  his  exploits  were  as  much  above 
the  level  of  his  contemporaries,  and  more  the 
effects  of  an  original  uneducated  capacity." 
Bonaparte  was  trained  in  the  best  military 
schools;  the  army  which  he  led  to  Italy  was 
one  of  the  finest  that  ever  existed.  Cromwell 
passed  his  youth  and  the  prime  of  his  manhood 
in  a  civil  situation.  He  never  looked  on  war, 
till  he  was  more  than  forty  years  old.  He  had 
first  to  form  himself;  and  then  to  form  his 
troops.  Out  of  raw  levies  he  created  an  army, 
the  bravest  and  the  best  disciplined,  the  most 
orderly  in  peace,  and  the  most  terrible  in  war, 
that  Europe  had  seen.  He  called  .his  body 
into  existence.  He  led  it  to  conquest.  He  never 
fought  a  battle  without  gaining  a  victory.  He 
never  gained  a  victory  without  annihilating  the 
force  opposed  to  him.  Yet  his  triumphs  were 
not  the  highest  glory  of  his  military  system. 
The  respect  which  his  troops  paid  to  property, 
|  their  attachment  to  the  laws  and  religion  of 
i  their  country,  their  submission  to  the  civi' 
I  power,  their  temperance,  their  intelligence, 
;  their  industry,  are  without  parallel,  ft  was 
i  after  the  Restoration  that  the  spirit  which  their 
great  leader  had  infused  into  them  was  most 
signally  displayed.  At  the  command  of  the  es 
tablished  government,  a  government  which  had 
no  means  of  enforcing  obedience,  fifty  thou 
sand  soldiers,  whose  backs  no  enemy  bavi  evo* 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


seen,  either  in  domestic  or  continental  war, 
laid  down  their  arms,  and  retired  into  the  mass 
of  the  people  ;  thenceforward  to  be  distinguish 
ed  only  by  superior  diligence,  sobriety,  and 
regularity  in  the  pursuits  of  peace,  from  the 
other  members  of  the  community  which  they 
had  saved. 

In  the  general  spirit  and  character  of  his  ad 
ministration  we  think  Cromwell  far  superior 
to  Napoleon.  "In  civil  government,"  says  Mr. 
Hallam,  "  there  can  be  no  adequate  parallel  be 
tween  one  who  had  sucked  only  the  dregs  of 
a  besotted  fanaticism,  and  one  to  whom  the 
stores  of  reason  and  philosophy  were  open." 
These  expressions,  it  seems  to  us,  convey  the 
highest  eulogium  on  our  great  countryman. 
Reason  and  philosophy  did  not  teach  the  con 
queror  of  Europe  to  command  his  passions,  or 
to  pursue,  as  a  first  object,  the  happiness  of  the 
people.  They  did  not  prevent  him  from  risk 
ing  his  fame  and  his  power  in  a  frantic  contest 
against  the  principles  of  human  nature  and  the 
laws  of  the  physical  world,  against  the  rage  of 
the  winter  and  the  liberty  of  the  sea.  They  did 
not  exempt  him  from  the  influence  of  that  most 
pernicious  of  superstitions,  a  presumptuous  fa 
talism.  They  did  not  preserve  him  from  the 
inebriation  of  prosperity,  or  restrain  him  from 
indecent  querulousness  and  violence  in  adver 
sity.  On  the  other  hand,  the  fanaticism  of 
Cromwell  never  urged  him  on  impracticable 
undertakings,  or  confused  his  perception  of  the 
public  good.  Inferior  to  Bonaparte  in  inven 
tion,  he  was  far  superior  to  him  in  v/isdom. 
The  French  Emperor  is  among  conquerors 
what  Voltaire  is  among  writers,  a  miraculous 
child.  His  splendid  genius  was  frequently 
clouded  by  fits  of  humour  as  absurdly  perverse 
as  those  of  the  pet  of  the  nursery,  who  quar 
rels  with  his  food,  and  dashes  his  playthings  to 
pieces.  Cromwell  was  emphatically  a  man. 
He  possessed,  in  an  eminent  degree,  that  mas 
culine  and  full-grown  robustness  of  mind,  that 
equally  diffused  intellectual  health,  which,  if 
our  national  partiality  does  not  mislead  us, 
has  peculiarly  characterized  the  great  men  of 
England.  Never  was  any  ruler  so  conspicu 
ously  born  for  sovereignty.  The  cup  which 
has  intoxicated  almost  all  others,  sobered  him. 
His  spirit,  restless  from  its  buoyancy  in  a  lower 
sphere,  reposed  in  majestic  placidity  as  soon 
as  it  had  reached  the  level  congenial  to  it.  He 
had  nothing  in  common  with  that  large  class 
of  men  who  distinguished  themselves  in  lower 
posts,  and  whose  incapacity  becomes  obvious 
as  soon  as  the  public  voice  summons  them  to 
take  the  lead.  Rapidly  as  his  fortunes  grew, 
his  mind  expanded  more  rapidly  still.  Insigni 
ficant  as  a  private  citizen,  he  was  a  great  gene 
ral  ;  he  was  a  still  greater  prince.  The  manner 
of  Napoleon  was  a  theatrical  compound,  in 
which  the  coarseness  of  a  revolutionary  guard- 
roc  m  was  blended  with  the  ceremony  of  the  old 
court  of  Versailles.  Cromwell,  by  the  confes 
sion  even  of  his  enemies,  exhibited  in  his  de 
meanour  the  simple  and  natural  nobleness  of  a 
man  neither  ashamed  of  his  origin  nor  vain  of 
bis  elevation;  of  a  man  who  had  found  his  pro 
per  place  in  society,  and  who  felt  secure  that 
he  was  competent  to  fill  it.  Easy,  even  to  fa 
miliarity,  where  his  own  dignity  was  concern 


ed,  he  was  punctilious  only  for  his  country. 
His  own  character  he  left  to  take  care  of  itself; 
he  left  it  to  be  defended  by  his  victories  in  war 
and  his  reforms  in  peace.  But  he  was  a  jealous 
and  implacable  guardian  of  the  public  honour. 
He  suffered  a  crazy  Quaker  to  insult  him  in  the 
midst  of  Whitehall,  and  revenged  himself  only 
by  liberating  him  and  giving  him  a  dinner.  But 
he  was  prepared  to  risk  the  chances  of  war  to 
avenge  the  blood  of  a  private  Englishman. 

No  sovereign  ever  carried  to  the  throne  so 
large  a  portion  of  the  best  qualities  of  the  mid 
dling  orders,  so  strong  a  sympathy  with  the 
feelings  and  interests  of  his  people.  He  was 
sometimes  driven  to  arbitrary  measures  ;  but 
he  had  a  high,  stout,  honest,  English  heart. 
Hence  it  was  that  he  loved  to  surround  his 
throne  with  such  men  as  Hale  and  Blake. 
Hence  it  was  that  he  allowed  so  large  a  share 
of  political  liberty  to  his  subjects,  and  that,  even 
when  an  opposition,  dangerous  to  his  power 
and  to  his  person,  almost  compelled  him  to  go 
vern  by  the  sword,  he  was  still  anxious  to  leave 
a  germ  from  which,  at  a  more  favourable  sea 
son,  free  institutions  might  spring.  We  firmly 
believe,  that  if  his  first  parliament  had  not  com 
menced  its  debates  by  disputing  his  title,  his 
government  would  have  been  as  mild  at  home 
as  it  was  energetic  and  able  abroad.  He  was 
a  soldier — he  had  iit>en  by  war.  Had  his  am 
bition  been  of  an  impure  or  selfish  kind,  it 
would  have  been  easy  for  him  to  plunge  his 
country  into  continental  hostilities  on  a  large 
scale,  and  to  dazzle  the  restless  factions  which 
he  ruled  by  the  splendour  of  his  victories. 
Some  of  his  enemies  have  sneeringly  remark 
ed,  that  in  the  successes  obtained  under  his 
administration,  he  had  no  personal  share  ;  as 
if  a  man  who  had  raised  himself  from  obscuri 
ty  to  empire,  solely  by  his  military  talents, 
could  have  any  unworthy  reason  for  shrinking 
from  military  enterprise.  This  reproach  is  his 
highest  glory.  In  the  success  of  the  English 
navy  he  could  have  no  selfish  interests.  Its 
triumphs  added  nothing  to  his  fame ;  its  in 
crease  added  nothing  to  his  means  of  over 
awing  his  enemies ;  its  great  leader  was  not 
his  friend.  Yet  he  took  a  peculiar  pleasure  in 
encouraging  that  noble  service,  which,  of  all  the 
instruments  employed  by  an  English  govern 
ment,  is  the  most  impotent  for  mischief,  and  the 
most  powerful  for  good.  His  administration 
was  glorious,  but  with  no  vulgar  glory.  It  was 
not  one  of  those  periods  of  overstrained  and 
convulsive  exertion  which  necessarily  produce 
debility  and  languor.  Its  energy  was  natural, 
healthful,  temperate.  He  placed  England  at 
the  head  of  the  Protestant  interest,  and  in  the 
first  rank  of  Christian  powers.  He  taught 
every  nation  to  value  her  friendship  and  to 
dread  her  enmity.  But  he  did  not  squander  her 
resources  in  a  vain  attempt  to  invest  her  with 
that  supremacy  which  no  power,  in  the  modern 
system  of  Europe,  can  safely  affect,  or  can 
long  retain. 

This  noble  and  sober  wisdom  had  its  re 
ward.  If  he  did  not  carry  the  banners  of  the 
Commonwealth  in  triumph  to  distant  capitals  ; 
if  he  did  not  adorn  Whitehall  with  the  spoils 
of  the  Stadthouse  and  the  Louvre  ;  if  he  did  not 
portion  out  Flanders  and  Germany  into  princi 


HALLAM'S   CONSTITUTIONAL   HISTORY. 


palities  for  his  kinsmen  and  his  generals  ;  he 
did  nol,  on  the  other  hand,  see  his  country 
overrun  by  the  armies  of  nations  which  his 
ambition  had  provoked.  He  did  not  drag  out 
the  last  years  of  his  life  in  exile  and  a  prisoner, 
in  an  unhealthy  climate  and  under  an  ungener 
ous  jailor ;  raging  with  the  impotent  desire  of 
vengeance,  and  brooding  over  visions  of  de 
parted  glory.  He  went  down  to  his  grave  in 
the  fulness  of  power  and  fame  ;  and  left  to  his 
son  au  authority  which  any  man  of  ordinary 
firmness  and  prudence  would  have  retained. 

But  for  the  weakness  of  that  foolish  Ish- 
bosheth,  the  opinions  which  we  have  been  ex 
pressing  would,  we  believe,  now  have  formed 
the  orthodox  creed  of  good  Englishmen.  We 
/night  now  be  writing  under  the  government 
u'  his  Highness  Oliver  the  Fifth,  or  Richard 
fie  Fourth,  Protector,  by  the  Grace  of  God,  of 
die  Commonwealth  of  England,  Scotland  and 
Ireland,  and  the  dominions  thereto  belonging. 
The  form  of  the  great  founder  of  the  dynasty, 
on  horseback,  as  when  he  led  the  charge  at 
Nasebv.  or  on  foot,  a«  when  he  lock  the  mact: 
fivm  the  table  of  the  Commons-,  would  adorn 
all  our  squares,  and  overlook  our  public  of 
fices  from  Charing-Cioss;  and  sermons  in  his 
praise  would  be  duly  preached  on  his  lucky 
day,  the  third  of  September,  by  court-chaplains, 
guiltless  of  the  abominations  of  the  surplice. 

But,  though  his  memory  has  not  been  taken 
under  the  patronage  of  any  party,  though  every 
device  has  been  used  to  blacken  it,  though  to 
praise  him  would  long  have  been  a  punishable 
crime,  yet  truth  and  merit  at  last  prevail. 
Cowards,  who  had  trembled  at  the  very  sound 
of  his  name,  tools  of  office,  who,  like  Downing, 
had  been  proud  of  the  honour  of  lacqueying  his 
coach,  might  insult  him  in  loyal  speeches  and 
addresses.  Venal  poets  might  transfer  to  the 
king  the  same  eulogies,  little  the  worse  for 
wear,  which  they  had  bestowed  on  the  Pro 
tector.  A  fickle  multitude  might  crowd  to 
shout  and  scoff  round  the  gibbeted  remains  of 
the  greatest  Prince  and  Soldier  of  the  age. 
But  when  the  Dutch  cannon  startled  an  effemi 
nate  tyrant  in  his  own  palace,  when  the  con 
quests  which  had  been  made  by  the  armies  of 
Cromwell  were  sold  to  pamper  the  harlots  of 
Charles,  when  Englishmen  were  sent  to  fight, 
under  the  banners  of  France,  against  the  inde 
pendence  of  Europe  and  the  Protestant  reli 
gion,  many  honest  hearts  swelled  in  secret  at 
the  thought  of  one  who  had  never  suffered  his 
country  to  be  ill-used  by  any  but  himself.  It 
must  indeed  have  been  difficult  for  any  Eng 
lishman  to  see  the  salaried  Viceroy  of  France, 
at  the  most  important  crisis  of  his  fate,  saun 
tering  through  his  harem,  yawning  and  talking 
nonsense  over  a  despatch,  or  beslobbering  his 
brothers  and  his  courtiers  in  a  fit  of  maudlin 
affection,*  without  a  respectful  and  tender  re 
membrance  of  him,  before  whose  genius  the 
young  pride  of  Louis,  and  the  veteran  craft  of 
Mazarin,  had  stood  rebuked;  who  had  hum 
bled  Spain  on  the  land,  and  Holland  on  the 
sea;  and  whose  imperial  voice  had  arrested 
the  victorious  arms  of  Sweden,  and  the  perse- 


*  These  particulars,  and  many  more  of  the  same  kind, 
Brr  recorded  l>y  Pepyi. 
VOL.  I.— 12 


cuting  fires  of  Rome.  Even  to  the  present  day, 
his  character,  though  constantly  attacked,  and 
scarcely  ever  defended,  is  popular  with  the 
great  body  of  our  countrymen. 

The  most  questionable  act  of  his  life  was 
the  execution  of  Charles.  We  have  already 
strongly  condemned  that  proceeding ;  but  we 
by  no  means  consider  it  as  one  which  attaches 
any  peculiar  stigma  of  infamy  to  the  names  of 
those  who  participated  in  it.  It  was  an  unjust 
and  injudicious  display  of  violent  party  spirit; 
but  it  was  not  a  cruel  or  perfidious  measure. 
It  had  all  those  features  which  distinguish  the 
errors  of  magnanimous  and  intrepid  spirits 
from  base  and  malignant  crimes. 

We  cannot  quit  this  interesting  topic  with 
out  saying  a  few  words  on  a  transaction, 
which  Mr.  Hall  am  has  made  the  subjeo  'of  a 
severe  accusation  against  Cromwel  and 
which  has  been  made  by  others  the  subject  of 
a  severe  accusation  against  Mr.  Hallam.  We 
conceive  that  both  the  Protector  and  the  his 
torian  may  be  vindicated.  Mr.  Hallam  tells 
us1  that  CrenweJl  sold  fifty  Ene;!??h  genf.l°?nen 
as  slaves  in  Barbados.  For  making  this 
statement  he  has  been  charged  with  two  high 
literary  crimes.  The  first  accusation  is,  that, 
from  his  violent  prejudice  against  Oliver,  he 
has  calumniated  him  falsely.  The  second, 
preferred  by  the  same  accuser,  is,  that  from 
his  violent  fondness  for  the  same  Oliver,  he 
has  hidden  his  calumnies  against  him  at  the 
fag  end  of  a  note,  instead  of  putting  them  into 
the  text.  Both  these  imputations  cannot  pos 
sibly  be  true,  and  it  happens  that  neither  is  so 
His  censors  will  find,  when  they  take  the  trou 
ble  to  read  his  book,  that  the  story  is  mentioned 
in  the  text  as  well  as  in  the  notes ;  and  they 
will  also  find,  when  they  take  the  trouble  to 
read  some  other  books,  with  which  speculators 
on  English  history  ought  to  be  acquainted,  that 
the  story  is  true.  If  there  could  have  been 
any  doubt  about  the  matter,  Burton's  Diary 
must  have  set  it  at  rest.  But,  in  truth,  there 
was  abundant  and  superabundant  evidence, 
before  the  appearance  of  that  valuable  publi 
cation.  Not  to  mention  the  authority  to  which 
Mr.  Hallam  refers,  and  which  alone  is  per 
fectly  satisfactory,  there  is  Slingsby  Bethel's 
account  of  the  proceedings  of  Richard  Crom 
well's  Parliament,  published  immediately  after 
its  dissolution.  He  was  a  member :  he  must 
therefore  have  known  what  happened :  and 
violent  as  his  prejudices  were,  he  never  could 
have  been  such  an  idiot  as  to  state  positive 
falsehoods  with  respect  to  public  transactions 
which  had  taken  place  only  a  few  days  before. 
It  will  not  be  quite  so  easy  to  defend  Crom 
well  against  Mr.  Hallam,  as  to  defend  Mr. 
Hallam  against  those  who  attack  his  history. 
But  the  story  is  certainly  by  no  means  so  bad 
as  he  takes  it  to  be.  In  the  first  place,  this 
slavery  was  merely  the  compulsory  labour  to 
which  every  transported  convict  is  liable. 
Nobody  acquainted  with  the  language  of  the 
last  century  can  be  ignorant  that  such  con 
victs  were  generally  termed  slaves;  until  dis 
cussions  about  another  species  of  slavery,  far 
more  miserable  and  altogetfifr  -anmerited,  ren 
dered  the  word  too  odious  to  be  applied  even 
to  felons  of  English  origin.  Theso  person* 
u  2 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


enjoyed  the  protection  of  the  law  during  the 
torm  of  their  service,  which  was  only  five  years. 
The  punishment  of  transportation  has  been 
inflicted,  by  almost  every  government  that . 
England  has  ever  had,  for  political  offences,  j 
After  Monmouth's  insurrection,  and  after  the 
rebellions  in  1715  and  1745,  great  numbers 
of  the  prisoners  were  sent  to  America.  These 
considerations  ought,  we  think,  to  free  Crom 
well  from  the  imputation  of  having  inflicted 
on  his  enemies  any  punishment  which  in  it 
self  is  of  a  shocking  and  atrocious  character. 

To  transport  fifty  men,  however,  without  a 
trial,  is  bad  enough.  But  let  us  consider,  in 
the  first  place,  that  some  of  these  men  were 
taken  in  arms  against  the  government,  and 
that  it  is  not  clear  that  they  were  not  all  so 
taken.  In  that  case,  Cromwell  or  his  officers 
might,  according  to  the  usages  of  those  un 
happy  times,  have  put  them  to  the  sword,  or 
turned  them  over  to  the  provost-marshal  at 
once.  This,  we  allow,  is  not  a  complete  vin 
dication  ;  for  execution  by  martial  law  ought 
never  to  take  place  but  under  circumstances 
which  admit  of  no  delay;  and,  if  there  is  time 
to  transport  men,  there  is  time  to  try  them. 

The  defenders  of  the  measure  stated  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  that  the  persons  thus 
transported  not  only  consented  to  go,  but  went 
with  remarkable  cheerfulness.  By  this,  we 
suppose,  it  is  to  be  understood,  not  that  they  had 
any  very  violent  desire  to  be  bound  apprentices 
in  Barbadoes,  but  that  they  considered  them 
selves  as,  on  the  whole,  fortunately  and  leni 
ently  treated,  in  the  situation  in  which  they 
had  placed  themselves. 

When  these  considerations  are  fairly  esti 
mated,  it  must,  we  think,  be  allowed,  that  this 
selling  into  slavery  was  not,  as  it  seems  at  first 
sight,  a  barbarous  outrage,  unprecedented  in 
our  annals,  but  merely  a  very  arbitrary  pro 
ceeding,  which,  like  most  of  the  arbitrary  pro 
ceedings  of  Cromwell,  was  rather  a  violation 
of  positive  law  than  of  any  great  principle  of 
justice  and  mercy.  When  Mr.  Hallam  declares 
it  to  have  been  more  oppressive  than  any  of 
the  measures  of  Charles  the  Second,  he  forgets, 
we  imagine,  that  under  the  reign  of  that  prince, 
and  during  the  administration  of  Lord  Claren- 
den,  many  of  the  Roundheads  were,  without 
any  trial,  imprisoned  at  a  distance  from  Eng 
land,  merely  in  order  to  remove  them  beyond 
the  reach  of  the  great  liberating  writ  of  our 
law.  But,  in  fact,  it  is  not  fair  to  compare  the 
cases.  The  government  of  Charles  was  per 
fectly  secure.  The  "  res  dura  et  regni  novitas" 
is  the  great  apology  of  Cromwell, 

From  the  moment  that  Cromwell  is  dead  and 
buried,  we  go  on  in  almost  perfect  harmony 
with  Mr.  Hallam  to  the  end  of  his  book.  The 
times  which  followed  the  Restoration  peculiarly 
require  that  unsparing  impartiality  which  is 
his  most  distinguishing  virtue.  No  part  of 
our  history,  during  the  last  three  centuries, 
presents  a  spectacle  of  such  general  dreari 
ness.  The  whole  breed  of  our  statesmen  seem 
to  have  degenerated;  and  their  moral  and  in 
tellectual  littleness  strikes  us  with  the  more 
dissrust,  because  we  see  it  placed  in  immediate 
contrast  with  the  high  and  majestic  qualities  of 
th*  race  which  they  succeeded.  In  the  great  civil 


war,  even  the  bad  cause  had  been  rendered  res- 
pectable  arid  amiable,  by  the  purity  and  eleva 
tion  of  mind  which  manyof  its  friends  displayed. 
Under  Charles  the  Second,  the  best  and  noblest 
of  ends  was  disgraced  by  means  the  most 
cruel  and  sordid.  The  rage  of  faction  suc 
ceeded  to  the  love  of  liberty.  Loyalty  died 
away  into  servility.  We  look  in  vain  among 
the  leading  politicians  of  either  side  for  steadi 
ness  of  principle,  or  even  for  that  vulgar 
fidelity  to  party,  which,  in  our  time,  it  is  es 
teemed  infamous  to  violate.  The  inconsist 
ency,  perfidy,  and  baseness,  which  the  leaders 
constantly  practised,  which  their  followers  de 
fended,  and  which  the  great  body  of  the  people 
regarded,  as  it  seems,  with  little  disapproba 
tion,  appear  in  the  present  age  almost  incredi 
ble.  In  the  age  of  Charles  the  First,  they 
would,  we  believe,  have  excited  as  much  as 
tonishment. 

Man,  however,  is  always  the  same.  And 
when  so  marked  a  difference  appears  between 
two  generations,  it  is  certain  that  the  solution 
may  be  found  in  their  respective  circum 
stances.  The  principal  statesmen  of  the  reign 
of  Charles  the  Second  were  trained  during  the 
civil  war,  and  the  revolutions  which  followed 
it.  Such  a  period  is  eminently  favourable  to 
the  growth  of  quick  and  active  talents.  It 
forms  a  class  of  men,  shrewd,  vigilant,  in 
ventive,  of  men  whose  dexterity  triumphs  over 
the  most  perplexing  combinations  of  circum 
stances,  whose  presaging  instinct,  no  sign  of 
the  times,  no  incipient  change  of  public  feel 
ings,  can  elude.  But  it  is  an  unpropitions 
season  for  the  firm  and  masculine  virtues. 
The  statesman  who  enters  on  his  career  at 
such  a  time,  can  form  no  permanent  connec 
tions — can  make  no  accurate  observations  on 
the  higher  parts  of  political  science.  Before 
he  can  attach  himself  to  a  party,  it  is  scat 
tered  ;  before  he  can  study  the  nature  of  a 
government,  it  is  overturned.  The  oath  of 
abjuration  comes  close  on  the  oath  of  alle 
giance.  The  association  which  was  subscribed 
yesterday,  is  burned  by  the  hangmen  to-day. 
In  the  midst  of  the  constant  eddy  and  change, 
self-preservation  becomes  the  first  object  of 
the  adventurer.  It  is  a  task  too  hard  for  the 
strongest  head,  to  keep  itself  from  becoming 
giddy  in  the  eternal  whirl.  Public  spirit  is 
out  of  the  question;  a  laxity  of  principle, 
without  which  no  public  man  can  be  eminent, 
or  even  safe,  becomes  too  common  to  be  scan 
dalous  ;  and  the  whole  nation  looks  coolly  on 
instances  of  apostasy,  which  would  startle  the 
foulest  turncoat  of  more  settled  times. 

The  history  of  France  since  the  revolution 
affords  some  striking  illustrations  of  these 
remarks.  The  same  man  was  minister  of  the 
republic,  of  Bonaparte,  of  Louis  the  Eight- 
eenth.  of  Bonaparte  again  after  his  return  from 
Elba,  of  Louis  again  after  his  return  from 
Ghent.  Yet  all  these  manifold  treasons  by  no 
means  seemed  to  destroy  his  influence,  or  even 
to  fix  any  peculiar  stain  of  infamy  on  his  cha 
racter.  We,  to  be  sure,  did  not  know  what  to 
make  of  him;  but  his  countrymen  did  not 
seem  to  be  shocked ;  and  in  truth  they  had 
little  right  to  be  shocked :  for  there  waa 
scarcely  one  Frenchman  distinguished  in  th» 


HAL LAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


91 


state  or  in  the  army,  who  had  not,  according 
to  the  best  of  his  talents  and  opportunities, 
emulated  the  example.  It  was  natural,  too, 
lhat  this  should  be  the  case.  The  rapidity  and 
violence  with  which  change  followed  change 
in  the  affairs  of  France  towards  the  close  of 
the  last  century,  had  taken  away  the  reproach 
of  inconsistency,  unfixed  the  principles  of 
public  men,  and  produced  in  many  minds  a 
general  skepticism  and  indifference  about 
principles  of  government. 

No  Englishman  who  has  studied  attentively 
the  reign  of  Charles  the  Second,  will  think 
himself  entitled  to  indulge  in  any  feelings  of 
national  superiority  over  the  Didiotmaire  des 
Giroueftes.  Shaftesbury  was  surely  a  far  less 
respectable  man  than  Talleyrand;  and  it 
would  be  injustice  even  to  Fouche  to  compare 
him  with  Lauderdale.  Nothing,  indeed,  can 
more  clearly  show  how  low  the  standard  of 
political  morality  had  fallen  in  this  country 
than  the  fortunes  of  the  men  whom  we  have 
named.  The  government  wanted  a  ruffian  to 
carry  on  the  most  atrocious  system  of  misgo- 
vernment  with  which  any  nation  was  ever 
cursed— to  extirpate  Presbyterianism  by  fire 
and  sword,  the  drowning  of  women,  and  the 
frightful  torture  of  the  boot.  And  they  found 
him  among  the  chiefs  of  the  rebellion,  and  the 
subscribers  of  the  Covenant!  The  opposition 
looked  for  a  chief  to  head  them  in  the  most 
desperate  attacks  ever  made,  under  the  forms 
of  the  constitution,  on  any  English  administra 
tion  :  and  they  selected  the  minister  who  had 
the  deepest  share  in  the  worst  parts  of  that 
administration ;  the  soul  of  the  cabal ;  the 
counsellor  who  had  shut  up  the  Exchequer, 
and  urged  on  the  Dutch  war.  The  whole 
political  drama  was  of  the  same  cast.  No 
unity  of  plan,  no  decent  propriety  of  character 
and  costume,  could  be  found  in  the  wild  and 
monstrous  harlequinade.  The  whole  was 
made  up  of  extravagant  transformations  and 
burlesque  contrasts ;  Atheists  turned  Puritans ; 
Puritans  turned  Atheists;  republicans  defend 
ing  the  divine  right  of  kings ;  prostitute  cour 
tiers  clamouring  for  the  liberties  of  the  people ; 
judges  inflaming  the  rage  of  mobs ;  patriots 
pocketing  bribes  from  foreign  powers ;  a 
popish  prince  torturing  Presbyterians  into 
Episcopacy  in  one  part  of  the  island ;  Pres 
byterians  cutting  off  the  heads  of  popish  no 
blemen  and  gentlemen  in  the  other.  Public 
opinion  has  its  natural  flux  and  reflux.  After 
a  violent  burst,  there  is  commonly  a  reaction. 
But  vicissitudes  as  extraordinary  as  those 
which  marked  the  reign  of  Charles  the 
Second,  can  only  be  explained  by  supposing 
an  utter  want  of  principle  in  the  political 
world.  On  neither  side  was  there  fidelity 
enough  to  face  a  reverse.  Those  honourable 
retreats  from  power,  which,  in  later  days,  par 
ties  have  often  made,  with  loss,  but  still  in 
good  order,  in  firm  union,  with  unbroken  spi 
rit  and  formidable  means  of  annoyance,  were 
utterly  unknown.  As  soon  as  a  check  took 
place,  a  total  rout  followed  ;  arms  and  colours 
were  thrown  away.  The  vanquished  troops, 
like  the  Italian  mercenaries  of  the  fourteenth 
and  fifteenth  centuries,  enlisted,  on  the  very 
field  of  battle,  in  the  service  of  the  conquerors. 


In  a  nation  proud  of  its  sturdy  justice  anJ 
plain  good  sense,  no  party  could  be  found  to 
take  a  firm  middle  stand  between  the  worst  of 
oppositions  and  the  worst  of  courts.  When, 
on  charges  as  wild  as  Mother  Goose's  tales, 
on  the  testimony  of  wretches  who  proclaimed 
themselves  to  be  spies  and  traitors,  and  whom 
everybody  now  believes  to  have  been  also 
liars  and  murderers,  the  offal  of  jails  and' 
brothels,  the  leavings  of  the  hangman's  whip 
and  shears,  Catholics  guilty  of  nothing  but 
their  religion  were  led  like  sheep  to  the  Pro 
testant  shambles,  where  were  the  royal  Tory 
gentry  and  the  passively  obedient  clergy  t 
And  where,  when  the  time  of  retribution 
came,  when  laws  were  strained  and  juries 
packed,  to  destroy  the  leaders  of  the  Whigs, 
when  charters  were  invaded,  when  Jeffries 
and  Kirke  were  making  Somersetshire  what 
Lauderdale  and  Graham  had  made  Scotland, 
where  were  the  ten  thousand  brjsk  boys  of 
Shaftesbury,  the  members  of  ignoramus  juries, 
the  wearers  of  the  Polish  medal1?  All  powerful 
to  destroy  others,  unable  to  save  themselves, 
the  members  of  the  two  parties  oppressed 
and  were  oppressed,  murdered  and  were  mur 
dered,  in  their  turn.  No  lucid  interval  occurred 
between  the  frantic  paroxysms  of  two  contra- 
tradictory  illusions. 

To  the  frequent  changes  of  the  government 
during  the  twenty  years  which  had  preceded 
the  revolution,  this  unsteadiness  is  in  a  great 
measure  to  be  attributed.  Other  causes  had 
also  been  at  work.  Even  if  the  country  had 
been  governed  by  the  house  of  Cromwell,  or 
the  remains  of  the  Long  Parliament,  the  ex 
treme  austerity  of  the  Puritans  would  neces 
sarily  have  produced  a  revulsion.  Towards 
the  close  of  the  Protectorate,  many  signs  indi 
cated  that  a  time  of  license  was  at  hand.  But 
the  restoration  of  Charles  the  Second  rendered 
the  change  wonderfully  rapid  and  violent. 
Profligacy  became  a  test  of  orthodoxy  and 
loyalty,  a  qualification  for  rank  and  office.  A 
deep  and  general  taint  infected  the  morals  of 
the  most  influential  classes,  and  spread  itself 
through  every  province  of  letters.  Poetry 
inflamed  the  passions  ;  philosophy  undermined 
the  principles;  divinity  itself,  inculcating  an 
an  abject  reverence  for  the  court,  gave  addi 
tional  effect  to  its  licentious  example.  We 
look  in  vain  for  those  qualities  which  give  a 
charm  to  the  errors  of  high  and  ardent  natures, 
for  the  generosity,  the  tenderness,  the  chival 
rous  delicacy,  which  ennoble  appetites  into 
passions  and  impart  to  vice  itself  a  portion  of 
the  majesty  of  virtue.  The  excesses  of  the 
age  remind  us  of  the  humours  of  a  gang  of 
footpads,  revelling  with  their  favourite  beauties 
at  a  flash-house.  In  the  fashionable  libertinism 
there  is  a  hard,  cold  ferocity,  an  impudence,  a 
lowness,  a  dirtiness,  which  can  be  paralleled 
only  among  the  heroes  and  heroines  of  thai 
filthy  and  heartless  literature  which  encou 
raged  it.  One  nobleman  of  great  abilities 
wanders  about  as  a  Merry-Andrew.  Another 
harangues  the  mob  stark-naked  f-om  a  win 
dow.  A  third  lays  an  ambush  to  cudgel  a 
man  who  has  offended  him.  A  knot  of  gen 
tlemen  of  high  rank  and  influence  combine  to 
push  their  fortunes  at  court,  by  circulating 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


stories  intended  to  ruin  an  innocent  girl,  sto 
ries  which  had  no  foundation,  and  which,  if 
they  had  been  true,  would  never  have  passed 
the  lips  of  a  man  of  honour.*  A  dead  child 
is  found  in  the  palace,  the  offspring  of  some 
maid  of  honour,  by  some  courtier,  or  perhaps 
by  Charles  himself.  The  whole  flight  of  pan 
ders  and  buffoons  pounce  upon  it,  and  carry  it 
in  triumph  to  the  royal  laboratory,  where  his 
majesty,  after  a  brutal  jest,  dissects  it  for  the 
amusement  of  the  assembly,  and  probably  of 
its  father  among  the  rest!  The  favourite 
duchess  stamps  about  Whitehall,  cursing  and 
swearing.  The  ministers  employ  their  time 
at  the  council-board  in  making  mouths  at  each 
other,  and  taking  off  each  other's  gestures  for 
the  amusement  of  the  king.  The  peers  at  a 
conference  begin  to  pommel  each  other,  and 
to  tear  collars  and  periwigs.  A  speaker  in 
the  House  of  Commons  gives  offence  to  the 
court.  He  is  waylaid  by  a  gang  of  bullies, 
and  his  nose  is  cut  to  the  bone.  This  igno 
minious  dissoluteness,  or  rather,  if  we  may 
venture  to  designate  it  by  the  only  proper 
word,  blackguardism  of  feelings  and  manners, 
could  not  but  spread  from  private  to  public 
life.  The  cynical  sneers,  the  epicurean  so 
phistry,  which  had  driven  honour  and  virtue 
from  one  part  of  the  character,  extended  their 
influence  over  every  other.  The  second  ge 
neration  of  the  statesmen  of  this  reign  were 
worthy  pupils  of  the  schools  in  which  they 
had  been  trained,  of  the  gaming-table  of 
Grammont,  and  the  tiring-room  of  Nell.  In 
no  other  age  could  such  a  trifler  as  Bucking 
ham  have  exercised  any  political  influence. 
In  no  other  age  could  the  path  to  power  and 
glory  have  been  thrown  open  to  the  manifold 
infamies  of  Churchill. 

The  history  of  that  celebrated  man  shows, 
more  clearly  perhaps  than  that  of  any  other 
individual,  the  malignity  and  extent  of  the  cor 
ruption  which  had  eaten  into  the  heart  of  the 
public  morality.  An  English  gentleman  of 
family  attaches  himself  to  a  prince  who  has 
seduced  his  sister,  and  accepts  rank  and 
wealth  as  the  price  of  her  shame  and  his  own. 
He  then  repays  by  ingratitude  the  benefits 
which  he  has  purchased  by  ignominy,  betrays 
his  patron  in  a  manner  which  the  best  cause 
cannot  excuse,  and  commits  an  act,  not  only 
of  private  treachery,  but  of  distinct  military 
desertion.  To  his  conduct  at  the  crisis  of  the 
fa'e  of  James,  no  service  in  modern  times  has, 
as  far  as  we  remember,  furnished  any  parallel. 
The  conduct  of  Ney,  scandalous  enough  no 
doubt,  is  the  very  fastidiousness  of  honour  in 
comparison  of  it.  The  perfidy  of  Arnold  ap 
proaches  it  most  nearly.  In  our  age  and 
country  no  talents,  no  services,  no  party  at 
tachments,  could  bear  any  man  up  under  such 
mountains  of  infamy.  Yet,  even  before 
Chnrchilj  had  performed  those  great  actions, 
which  in  some  degree  redeem  his  character 
with  poslerity,  the  load  lay  very  lightly  on  him. 
He  had  others  in  abundance  to  keep  him  coun 
tenance.  Godolphin,  Oxford,  Danny,  the  trim- 

*  T'ue  manner  in  which  Hamilton  relates  the  circurn- 
tiances  of  the  atrocious  plot  against  poor  Ann  Hyde  is, 
f  possible,  more  disgraceful  to  the  court,  of  which  he 
ney  t>e  considered  as  a  specimen,  than  the  plot  itself. 


]  mer  Halifax,  the  renegade  Sunderland,  wer» 

j  all  men  of  the  same  class. 

Where  such  was  the  political  morality  of  the 
noble  and  the  wealthy,  it  may  easily  be  con 
ceived  that  those  professions  which,  even  in 
the  best  times,  are  peculiarly  liable  to  corrup 
tion,  were  in  a  frightful  state.  Such  a  bench 
and  such  a  bar  England  has  never  seen. 
Jones,  Scroggs,  Jeffries,  North,  Wright,  Saw 
yer,  Williams,  Shower,  are  to  this  day  the  spots 
and  blemishes  of  our  legal  chronicles.  Differ 
ing  in  constitution  and  in  situation,  whether 
blustering  or  cringing,  whether  persecuting 
Protestants  or  Catholics,  they  were  equally 
unprincipled  and  inhuman.  The  part  which 
the  church  played  was  not  equally  atrocious  ; 
but  it  must  have  been  exquisitely  diverting  to 
a  scoffer.  Never  were  principles  so  loudly 
professed,  and  so  flagrantly  abandoned.  The 
royal  prerogative  had  been  magnified  to  the 
skies  in  theological  works  ;  the  doctrine  of 
passive  obedience  had  been  preached  from  in 
numerable  pulpits.  The  University  of  Oxford 
had  sentenced  the  works  of  the  most  moderate 
constitutionalists  to  the  flames.  The  accession 
of  a  Catholic  king,  the  frightful  cruelties  com 
mitted  in  the  West  of  England,  never  shook 
the  steady  loyalty  of  the  clergy.  But  did  they 
serve  the  king  for  naught?  He  laid  his  hand 
on  them,  and  they  cursed  him  to  his  face.  He 
touched  the  revenue  of  a  college  and  the 
liberty  of  some  prelates,  and  the  whole  pro 
fession  set  up  a  yell  worthy  of  Hugh  Peters 
himself.  Oxford  sent  its  plate  to  an  invader 
with  more  alacrity  than  she  had  shown  when 
Charles  the  First  requested  it.  Nothing  was 
said  about  the  wickedness  of  resistance  till 
resistance  had  done  its  work,  till  the  anointed 
vicegerent  of  heaven  had  been  driven  away, 
and  it  had  become  plain  that  he  would  never 
be  restored,  or  would  be  restored  at  least 
under  strict  limitations.  The  clergy  went 
back,  it  must  be  owned,  to  their  old  theory,  as 
soon  as  they  found  that  it  would  do  them  no 
harm. 

To  the  general  baseness  and  profligacy  of 
the  times,  Clarendon  is  principally  indebted 
for  his  high  reputation.  He  was,  in  every 
respect,  a  man  unfit  for  his  age,  at  once  too 
good  for  it  and  too  bad  for  it.  He  seemed  to 
be  one  of  the  statesmen  of  Elizabeth,  trans 
planted  at  once  to  a  state  of  society  widely 
different  from  that  in  which  the  abilities  of 
such  statesmen  had  been  serviceable.  In  the 
sixteenth  century,  the  royal  prerogative  had 
scarcely  been  called  in  question.  A  minister 
who  held  it  high  was  in  no  danger,  so  long  as 
he  used  it  well.  The  attachment  to  the  crown, 
that  extreme  jealousy  of  popular  encroach 
ments,  that  love,  half  religious,  half  political, 
for  the  church,  which,  from  the  beginning  of 
the  Long  Parliament,  showed  itself  in  Claren 
don,  and  which  his  sufferings,  his  long  resi 
dence  in  France,  and  his  high  station  in  the 
government,  served  to  strengthen,  would,  a 
hundred  years  earlier,  have  secured  to  him  the 
favour  of  his  sovereign  without  rendering  him 
odious  to  the  people.  His  probity,  his  correct 
ness  in  private  life,  his  decency  of  deportment, 
and  his  general  ability,  would  not  have  misbe 
come  a  colleague  of  Walsingham  and  Bur- 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY 


leigh.  But  in  the  times  on  which  he  was  cast, 
his  errors  and  his  virtues  were  alike  out  of 
place.  He  imprisoned  men  without  trial.  He 
was  accused  of  raising  unlawful  contributions 
on  the  people  for  the  support  of  the  army.  The 
abolition  of  the  Triennial  Act  was  one  of  his 
favourite  objects.  He  seems  to  have  meditated 
the  revival  of  the  Star-Chamber  and  the  High 
Commission  Court.  His  zeal  for  the  preroga 
tive  made  him  unpopular;  but  it  could  not 
secure  to  him  the  favour  of  a  master  far  more 
desirous  of  ease  and  pleasure  than  of  power. 
Charles  would  rather  have  lived  in  exile  and 
privacy,  with  abundance  of  money,  a  crowd 
of  mimics  to  amuse  him,  and  a  score  of  mis 
tresses,  than  have  purchased  the  absolute 
dominion  of  the  world  by  the  privations  and 
exertions  to  which  Clarendon  was  constantly 
urging  him.  A  councillor  who  was  always 
bringing  him  papers  and  giving  him  advice, 
and  who  stoutly  refused  to  compliment  Lady 
Castlemaine  and  to  carry  messages  to  Miss 
Stewart,  soon  became  more  hateful  to  him 
than  ever  Cromwell  had  been.  Thus  consi 
dered  by  the  people  as  an  oppressor,  by  the 
court  as  a  censor,  the  minister  fell  from  his 
high  office,  with  a  ruin  more  violent  and 
destructive  than  could  ever  have  been  his  fate, 
if  he  had  either  respected  the  principles  of  the 
constitution,  or  flattered  the  vices  of  the  king. 

Mr.  Hallam  has  formed,  we  think,  a  most 
correct  estimate  of  the  character  and  adminis 
tration  of  Clarendon.  But  he  scarcely  makes 
sufficient  allowance  for  the  wear  and  tear 
which  honesty  almost  necessarily  sustains  in 
the  friction  of  political  life,  and  which,  in 
times  so  rough  as  those  through  which  Claren 
don  passed,  must  be  very  considerable.  When 
these  are  fairly  estimated,  we  think  that  his 
integrity  may  be  allowed  to  pass  muster.  A 
highminded  man  he  certainly  was  not,  either 
in  public  or  in  private  affairs.  His  own  ac 
count  of  his  conduct  in  the  affair  of  his  daugh 
ter  is  the  most  extraordinary  passage  in  auto 
biography.  We  except  nothing  even  in  the 
Confessions  of  Rousseau.  Several  writers 
have  taken  a  perverted  and  absurd  pride  in 
representing  themselves  as  detestable  ;  but  no 
other  ever  laboured  hard  to  make  himself  des 
picable  and  ridiculous.  In  one  important 
particular,  Clarendon  showed  as  little  regard 
to  the  honour  of  his  country  as  he  had  shown 
to  that  of  his  family.  He  accepted  a  subsidy 
from  France  for  the  relief  of  Portugal.  But 
this  method  of  obtaining  money  was  afterwards 
practised  to  a  much  greater  extent,  and  for 
objects  much  less  respectable,  both  by  the 
Court  and  by  the  Opposition. 

These  pecuniary  transactions  are  commonly 
considered  as  the  most  disgraceful  part  of  the 
history  of  those  times  ;  and  they  were  no  doubt 
highly  reprehensible.  Yet,  in  justice  to  the 
Whigs,  and  to  Charles  himself,  we  must  admit 
that  they  were  not  so  shameful  or  atrocious 
as  at  the  present  day  they  appear.  The  effect 
of  violent  animosities  between  parties  has 
always  been  an  indifference  to  the  general 
welfare  and  honour  of  the  state.  A  politician, 
where  factions  run  high,  is  interested,  not  for 
the  whole  people,  but  for  his  own  section  of  it. 
The  rest  are,  in  his  view,  strangers,  enemies, 


or  rather  pirates.  The  strongest  aversion 
which  he  can  feel  to  any  foreign  power  is  the 
ardour  of  friendship,  compared  with  the  loath 
ing  which  he  entertains  towards  those  domes 
tic  foes  with  whom  he  is  cooped  up  in  a  narrow 
space,  with  whom  he  lives  in  a  constant  inter 
change  of  petty  injuries  and  insults,  and  from 
whom,  in  the  day  of  their  success,  he  has  to 
expect  severities  far  beyond  any  that  a  con 
queror  from  a  distant  country  would  inflict. 
Thus,  in  Greece,  it  was  a  point  of  honour  for  a 
man  to  leave  his  country  and  cleave  to  his 
party.  No  aristocratical  citizen  of  Samos  or 
Corcyra  would  have  hesitated  to  call  in  the  aid 
of  Lacedccmon.  The  multitude,  on  the  con 
trary,  looked  to  Athens.  In  the  Italian  states 
of  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries,  from 
the  same  cause,  no  man  was  so  much  a  Flo 
rentine  or  a  Pisan,  as  a  Ghibeline  or  a  Guelf. 
It  may  be  doubted  whether  there  was  a  single 
individual  who  would  have  scrupled  to  raise 
his  party  from  a  state  of  depression,  by  open 
ing  the  gates  of  his  native  city  to  a  French  or 
an  Arragonese  force.  The  Reformation,  di 
viding  almost  every  European  country  into 
two  parts,  produced  similar  effects.  The  Ca 
tholic  was  too  strong  for  the  Englishman:  the 
Huguenot  for  the  Frenchman.  The  Protestant 
statesmen  of  Scotland  and  France  accordingly 
called  in  the  aid  of  Elizabeth  ;  and  the  Papists 
of  the  League  brought  a  Spanish  army  into  the 
very  heart  of  France.  The  commotions  to 
which  the  French  Revolution  gave  rise  have 
been  followed  by  the  same  consequences.  The 
republicans  in  every  part  of  Europe  were 
eager  to  see  the  armies  of  the  National  Con 
vention  and  the  Directory  appear  among  them; 
and  exulted  in  defeats  which  distressed  arid 
humbled  those  whom  they  considered  as  their 
worst  enemies,  their  own  rulers.  The  princes 
and  nobles  of  France,  c  n  the  other  hand,  diJ 
their  utmost  to  bring  foreign  invaders  to  Paris, 
A  very  short  time  has  elapsed  since  the  Apos 
tolical  party  in  Spain  invoked,  too  success* 
fully,  the  support  of  strangers. 

The  great  contest,  which  raged  in  England 
during  the  seventeenth  century  and  the  earlier 
part  of  the  eighteenth,  extinguished,  not  indeed 
in  the  body  of  the  people,  but  in  those  classes 
which  were  most  actively  engaged  in  politics, 
almost  all  national  feelings.  Charles  the  Se 
cond  and  many  of  his  courtiers  had  passed  a 
large  part  of  their  lives  in  banishment,  serv« 
ing  in  foreign  armies,  living  on  the  bounty 
of  foreign  treasuries,  soliciting  foreign  aid  to 
re-establish  monarchy  in  their  native  country. 
The  oppressed  Cavaliers  in  England  constant 
ly  looked  to  France  and  Spain  for  deliverance 
arid  revenge.  Clarendon  censures  the  Ccnti- 
nental  governments  with  great  bitterness  for 
not  interfering  in  our  internal  dissensions. 
During  the  protectorate,  not  only  the  royalists, 
but  the  disaffected  of  all  parties,  appear  to  have 
been  desirous  of  assistance  from  abroad.  It 
is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  amidst  the  fu 
rious  contests  which  followed  the  Restoration, 
the  violence  of  party  feeling  should  produce 
effects,  which  would  probably  have  attended 
it  even  in  an  age  less  distinguished  by  laxity 
of  principle  and  indelicacy  of  sentiment.  It 
was  not  till  a  natural  death  had  terminated  ih« 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


paralytic  old  age  of  the  Jacobite  party,  that  the 
evil  was  completely  at  an  end.  The  Whigs 
looked  to  Holland;  the  High  Tories  to  France. 
The  former  concluded  the  Barrier  Treaty; 
some  of  the  latter  entreated  the  court  of  Ver 
sailles  to  send  an  expedition  to  England. 
Many  men  who,  however  erroneous  their  poli 
tical  notions  might  be,  were  unquestionably 
honourable  in  private  life,  accepted  money 
without  scruple  from  the  foreign  powers  fa 
vourable  to  the  Pretender. 

Never  was  there  less  of  national  feeling 
among  the  higher  orders,  than  during  the  reign 
of  Charles  the  Second.  That  prince,  on  the 
one  side,  thought  it  better  to  be  the  deputy  of 
an  absolute  king,  than  the  king  of  a  free  peo 
ple.  Algernon  Sydney,  on  the  other  hand, 
would  gladly  have  aided  France  in  all  her 
ambitious  schemes,  and  have  seen  England 
reduced  to  the  condition  of  a  province,  in  the 
wild  hope  that  a  foreign  despot  would  assist 
him  to  establish  his  darling  republic.  The 
king  took  the  money  of  France  to  assist  him 
in  the  enterprise  which  he  meditated  against 
the  liberty  of  his  subjects,  with  as  little  scru 
ple  as  Frederic  of  Prussia  or  Alexander  of 
Russia  accepted  our  subsidies  in  time  of  war. 
The  leaders  of  the  Opposition  no  more  thought 
themselves  disgraced  by  the  presents  of  Louis, 
than  a  gentleman  of  our  own  time  thinks  him 
self  disgraced  by  the  liberality  of  a  powerful 
and  wealthy  member  of  his  party  who  pays 
his  election  bill.  The  money  which  the  king 
received  from  France  had  been  largely  em 
ployed  to  corrupt  members  of  Parliament.  The 
enemies  of  the  court  might  think  it  fair,  or 
even  absolutely  necessary,  to  encounter  bribe 
ry  with  bribery.  Thus  they  took  the  French 
gratuities,  the  needy  among  them  for  their 
own  use,  the  rich  probably  for  the  general 
purposes  of  the  party,  without  any  scruple.  If 
we  compare  their  conduct,  not  with  that  of 
English  statesmen  in  our  own  time,  but  with 
that  of  persons  in  those  foreign  countries 
which  are  now  situated  as  England  then  was, 
we  shall  probably  see  reason  to  abate  some 
thing  of  the  severity  of  censure  with  which  it 
has  been  the  fashion  to  visit  those  proceed 
ings.  Yet,  when  every  allowance  is  made, 
the  transaction  is  sufficiently  offensive.  It  is 
satisfactory  to  find  that  Lord  Russel  stands  free 
from  any  imputation  of  personal  participation  in 
the  spoil.  An  age,  so  miserably  poor  in  all  the 
moral  qualities  which  render  public  characters 
respectable,  can  ill  spare  the  credit  which  it 
derives  from  a  man,  not  indeed  conspicuous 
for  talents  or  knowledge,  but  honest  even  in 
his  errors,  respectable  in  every  relation  of  life, 
rationally  pious,  steadily  and  placidly  brave. 

The  great  improvement  which  took  place  in 
our  breed  of  public  men  is  principally  to  be 
ascribed  to  the  Revolution.  Yet  that  memo 
rable  event,  in  a  great  measure,  took  its  cha 
racter  from  the  very  vices  which  it  was  the 
means  of  reforming.  It  was,  assuredly,  a  hap 
py  revolution,  and  a  useful  revolution;  but  it 
was  not,  what  it  has  often  been  called,  a  glo 
rious  revolution.  William,  and  William  alone, 
derived  glory  from  it.  The  transaction  was, 
in  almost  every  part,  discreditable  to  England. 
That  a  tyrant,  who  had  violated  the  fundamen 


tal  laws  of  the  country,  who  had  attacked  the 
rights  of  its  greatest  corporations,  who  had 
begun  to  persecute  the  established  religion  of 
the  state,  who  had  never  respected  the  law 
either  in  his  superstition  or  in  his  revenge, 
could  not  be  pulled  down  without  the  aid  of  a 
foreign  army,  is  a  circumstance  not  very 
grateful  to  our  national  pride.  Yet  this  is  the 
least  degrading  part  of  the  story.  The  shame 
less  insincerity,  the  warm  assurances  of  gene 
ral  support  which  James  received  down  to 
the  moment  of  general  desertion,  indicate  a 
meanness  of  spirit  and  a  looseness  of  morali 
ty  most  disgraceful  to  the  age.  That  the  en 
terprise  succeeded,  at  least  that  it  succeeded 
without  bloodshed  or  commotion,  was  princi 
pally  owing  to  an  act  of  ungrateful  perfidy, 
such  as  no  soldier  had  ever  before  committed, 
and  to  those  monstrous  fictions  respecting  the 
birth  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  which  persons  of 
the  highest  rank  were  not  ashamed  to  circu 
late.  In  all  the  proceedings  of  tbe  Conven 
tion,  in  the  conference  particularly,  we  see 
that  littleness  of  mind  which  is  the  chief  cha 
racteristic  of  the  times.  The  resolutions  on 
which  the  two  Houses  at  last  agreed  were  as 
bad  as  any  resolutions  for  so  excellent  a  pur 
pose  could  be.  Their  feeble  and  contradictory 
language  was  evidently  intended  to  save  the 
credit  of  the  Tories,  who  were  ashamed  to 
name  what  they  were  not  ashamed  to  do. 
Through  the  whole  transaction,  no  command 
ing  talents  were  displayed  by  any  Englishman; 
no  extraordinary  risks  were  run  ;  no  sacrifices 
were  made,  except  the  sacrifice  which  Church 
ill  made  of  honour,  and  Anne  of  natural  affec 
tion. 

It  was  in  some  sense  fortunate,  as  we  have 
already  said,  for  the  Church  of  England,  that 
the  Reformation  in  this  country  was  effected 
by  men  who  cared  little  about  religion.  And, 
in  the  same  manner,  it  was  fortunate  for  our 
civil  government  that  the  Revolution  was  in  a 
great  measure  effected  by  men  who  cared  little 
about  their  political  principles.  At  such  a 
crisis,  splendid  talents  and  strong  passions 
might  have  done  more  harm  than  good.  There 
was  far  greater  reason  to  fear  that  too  much 
would  be  attempted,  and  that  violent  move 
ments  would  produce  an  equally  violent  reac 
tion,  than  that  too  little  would  be  done  in  the 
way  of  change.  But  narrowness  of  intellect 
and  flexibility  of  principles,  though  they  may 
be  serviceable,  cnn  never  be  respectable. 

If  in  the  Revolution  itself  there  was  little  that 
can  properly  be  called  glorious,  there  was  still 
less  in  the  events  which  followed.  In  a  church 
which  had  as  one  man  declared  the  doctrine 
of  resistance  unchristian,  only  four  hundred 
persons  refused  to  take  the  oath  of  allegiance 
to  a  government  founded  on  resistance!  In 
the  preceding  generation,  bo'ih  the  Episcopal 
and  the  Presbyterian  clergy,  rather  than  con 
cede  points  of  conscience  not  more  important^ 
had  resigned  their  livings  by  thousands. 

The.  churchmen,  at  the  time  of  the  Revolu 
tion,  justified  their  conduct  by  all  those  profli 
gate  sophisms  which  are  ca/led  Jesuitical,  and 
which  are  commonly  reckoned  among  the  pe 
culiar  sins  of  Popery ;  but  which  in  fact  are 
everywhere  the  anodynes  employed  by  minds 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


95 


rather  subtle  than  strong,  to  quiet  those  inter 
nal  twinges  which  they  cannot  but  feel,  and 
which  they  will  not  obey.  As  their  oath  was 
in  the  teeth  of  their  principles,  so  was  their 
conduct  in  the  teeth  of  their  oath.  Their  con 
stant  machinations  against  the  government  to 
which  they  had  sworn  fidelity,  brought  a  re 
proach  on  their  order,  ard  on  Christianity 
itself.  A  distinguished  churchman  has  not 
scrupled  to  say,  that  the  rapid  increase  of  infi 
delity  at  that  time  was  principally  produced  by 
the  disgust,  which  the  faithless  conduct  of  his 
brethren  excited,  in  men  not  sufficiently  can 
did  or  judicious,  to  discern  the  beauties  of  the 
lystem  amidst  the  vices  of  its  ministers. 

But  the  reproach  was  not  confined  to  the 
church.  In  every  political  party,  in  the  cabi 
net  itself,  duplicity  and  perfidy  abounded.  The 
very  men  whom  William  loaded  with  benefits, 
and  in  whom  he  reposed  most  confidence,  with 
his  seals  of  office  in  their  hands,  kept  up  a 
correspondence  with  the  exiled  family.  Ox 
ford,  Carmarthen,  and  Shrewsbury  were  guilty 
of  this  odious  treachery.  Even  Devonshire  is 
not  altogether  free  from  suspicion.  It  may 
well  be  conceived  that  at  such  a  time  such  a 
nature  as  that  of  Marlborough  would  riot  in 
the  very  luxury  of  baseness.  His  former  trea 
son,  thoroughly  furnished  with  all  that  makes 
infamy  exquisite,  placed  him  indeed  under  the 
disadvantage  which  attends  every  artist  from 
the  lime  that  he  produces  a  masterpiece.  Yet 
his  second  great  stroke  may  excite  wonder, 
even  in  those  who  appreciate  all  the  merit  of 
the  first.  Lest  his  admirers  should  be  able  to 
say  that  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution  he  had 
betrayed  his  king  from  any  other  than  selfish 
motives,  he  proceeded  to  betray  his  country. 
He  sent  intelligence  to  the  French  court  of  a 
secret  expedition  intended  to  attack  Brest.  The 
consequence  was  that  the  expedition  failed,  and 
that  eight  hundred  British  soldiers  lost  their 
lives  from  the  abandoned  villany  of  a  British 
general.  Yet  this  man  has  been  canonized  by 
so  many  eminent  writers,  that  to  speak  of  him 
as  he  deserves  may  seem  scarcely  decent.  To 
us  he  seems  to  be  the  very  San  Ciappelletto 
of  the  political  calendar. 

The  reign  of  William  the  Third,  as  Mr.  Hal- 
lam  happily  says,  was  the  nadir  of  the  nation 
al  prosperity.  It  was  also  the  nadir  of  the 
national  character.  During  that  period  was 
gathered  in  the  rank  harvest  of  vices  sown 
during  thirty  years  of  licentiousness  and  con 
fusion  ;  but  it  was  also  the  seed-time  of  great 
virtues. 

The  press  was  emancipated  from  the  cen 
sorship  soon  after  the  Revolution,  and  the  go 
vernment  fell  immediately  under  the  censor 
ship  of  the  I  ress.  Statesmen  had  a  scrutiny 
to  endure  which  was  every  day  becoming  more 
and  more  severe.  The  extreme  violence  of 
opinions  abated.  The  Whigs  learned  modera 
tion  in  office;  the  Tories  learned  the  principles 
of  liberty  in  opposition.  The  parties  almost 
constantly  approximated,  often  met,  sometimes 
crossed  each  other.  There  were  occasional 
bu  rsts  of  violence ;  but  from  the  time  of  the  Re 
volution  those  bursts  were  constantly  becom 
ing  less  and  less  terrible.  The  severities  with 
•which  the  Tories,  at  the  c'ose  of  the  reign  OA 


Anne,  treated  some  of  those  who  had  directed 
public  affairs  during  the  war  of  the  Grand  Al 
liance,  and  the  retaliatory  measures  of  the 
Whigs  after  the  accession  of  the  house  of  Ha 
nover,  cannot  be  justified;  but  they  were  by 
no  means  in  the  style  of  the  infuriated  parties 
whose  alternate  murders  had  disgraced  our 
history  towards  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Charles 
the  Second.  At  the  fall  of  Walpole  far  greater 
moderation  was  displayed.  And  from  that  time 
it  has  been  the  practice — a  practice  not  strict 
ly  according  to  the  theory  of  our  constitution, 
but  still  most  salutary — to  consider  the  loss  of 
office  and  the  public  disapprobation  as  punish 
ments  sufficient  for  errors  in  the  administration 
not  imputable  to  personal  corruption.  Nothing, 
we  believe,  has  contributed  more  than  this  le 
nity  to  raise  the  character  of  public  men.  Am 
bition  is  of  itself  a  game  sufficiently  hazardous 
and  sufficiently  deep  to  inflame  the  passions, 
without  adding  property,  life,  and  liberty  to  the 
stake.  Where  the  play  runs  so  desperately 
high  as  in  the  seventeenth  century,  honour  is 
at  an  end.  Statesmen,  instead  of  being  as  they 
should  be,  at  once  mild  and  steady,  are  at  once 
ferocious  and  inconsistent.  The  axe  is  forever 
before  their  eyes.  A  popular  outcry  some 
times  unnerves  them,  and  sometimes  makes 
them  desperate;  it  drives  them  to  unworthy 
compliances,  or  to  measures  of  vengeance  as 
cruel  as  those  which  they  have  reason  to  expect. 
A  minister  in  our  times  need  not  fear  either  to 
be  firm  or  to  be  merciful.  Our  old  policy  in 
this  respect  was  as  absurd  as  that  of  the  king 
in  the  Eastern  Tales,  who  proclaimed  that  any 
physician  who  pleased  might  come  to  court 
and  prescribe  for  his  disease,  but  that  if  the 
remedies  failed  the  adventurer  should  lose  his 
head.  It  is  easy  to  conceive  how  many  able 
men  would  refuse  to  undertake  the  cure  on 
such  conditions ;  how  much  the  sense  of  ex 
treme  danger  would  confuse  the  perceptions 
and  cloud  the  intellect  of  the  practitioner  at 
the  very  crisis  which  most  called  for  self-pos 
session,  and  how  strong  his  temptation  would 
be,  if  he  found  that  he  had  committed  a  blun 
der,  to  escape  the  consequences  of  it  by  poi 
soning  his  patient. 

But  in  fact  it  would  have  been  impossible, 
since  the  Revolution,  to  punish  any  minister 
for  the  general  course  of  his  policy  with  the 
slightest  semblance  of  justice ;  for  since  that 
time  no  minister  has  been  able  to  pursue  any 
general  course  of  policy  without  the  approba 
tion  of  the  Parliament.  The  most  important  ef 
fects  of  that  great  change  were,  as  Mr.  Hallam 
has  most  truly  said  and  most  ably  shown,  those 
which  it  indirectly  produced.  Thenceforward 
it  became  the  interest  of  the  executive  gov*>rn- 
ment  to  protect  those  very  doctrines  which  an 
executive  government  is  in  general  inclined 
to  persecute.  The  sovereign,  the  ministers, 
the  courtiers,  at  last  even  the  universities  and 
the  clergy,  were  changed  into  advocates  of 
the  right  of  resistance.  In  the  theory  of  th« 
Whigs,  in  the  situation  of  the  Tories,  m  the 
common  interest  of  all  public  men,  the  Pariia 
mentary  constitution  of  the  country  found  per 
fect  security.  The  power  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  in  particular,  has  been  steadily  on 
the  increase.  By  the  practice  of  granting  sup 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


plies  for  short  terms,  and  appropriating  them 
to  particular  services,  it  has  rendered  its  ap 
probation  as  necessary  in  practice  to  all  the 
measures  of  the  executive  government  as  it  is 
in  theory  to  a  legislative  act. 

Mr.  Hallam  appears  to  have  begun  with  the 
reign  of  Henry  the  Seventh,  as  the  period  at 
which  what  is  called  modern  history,  in  con 
tradistinction  to  the  history  of  the  middle  ages, 
is  generally  supposed  to  commence.  He  has 
stopped  at  the  accession  of  George  the  Third, 
*'  from  unwillingness,"  as  he  says,  "  to  excite 
the  prejudices  of  modern  politics,  especially 
those  connected  with  personal  character." 
These  two  eras,  we  think,  deserved  the  dis 
tinction  on  other  grounds.  Our  remote  pos 
terity,  when  looking  back  on  our  history  in 
that  comprehensive  manner  in  which  remote 
posterity  alone  can  without  much  danger  of 
error  look  back  on  it,  will  probably  observe 
those  points  with  peculiar  interest.  They  are, 
if  we  mistake  not,  the  beginning  and  the  end 
of  an  entire  and  separate  chapter  in  our  an 
nals.  The  period  which  lies  between  them 
is  a  perfect  cycle,  a  great  ytar  of  the  public 
mind. 

In  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Seventh,  all  the 
political  differences  which  had  agitated  Eng 
land  since  the  Norman  conquest  seemed  to  be 
set  at  rest.  The  long  and  fierce  struggle  be 
tween  the  crown  and  the  barons  had  termi 
nated.  The  grievances  which  had  produced 
the  rebellions  of  Tyler  and  Cade  had  disap 
peared.  Villanage  was  scarcely  known.  The 
two  royal  houses  whose  conflicting  claims  had 
long  convulsed  the  kingdom  were  at  length 
united.  The  claimants  whose  pretensions,  just 
or  unjust,  had  .disturbed  the  new  settlement 
were  overthrown.  In  religion  there  was  no  open 
dissent,  and  probably  very  little  secret  heresy. 
The  old  subjects  of  contention,  in  short,  had 
vanished ;  those  which  were  to  succeed  had 
not  yet  appeared. 

Soon,  however,  new  principles  were  an 
nounced  ;  principles  which  were  destined  to 
keep  England  during  two  centuries  and  a  half 
in  a  state  of  commotion.  The  Reformation 
divided  the  people  into  two  great  parties.  The 
Protestants  were  victorious.  They  again  sub 
divided  themselves.  Political  systems  were 
engrafted  on  theological  doctrines.  The  mu 
tual  animosities  of  the  two  parties  gradually 
emerged  into  the  light  of  public  life.  First 
came  conflicts  in  Parliament;  then  civil  war; 
then  revolutions  upon  revolutions,  each  at 
tended  by  its  appurtenance  of  proscriptions 
and  persecutions,  and  tests  ;  each  followed  by 
severe  measures  on  the  part  of  the  conquer 
ors  ;  each  exciting  a  deadly  and  festering  ha 
tred  in  the  conquered.  During  the  reign  of 
George  the  Second  things  were  evidently  tend 
Ing  to  repose.  At  the  close  of  it  the  nation 
had  completed  the  great  revolution  which  com 
menced  in  the  early  part  of  the  sixteenth  cen 
tury,  and  was  again  at  rest.  The  fury  of  sects 
had  died  away.  The  Catholics  themselves 
practically  enjoyed  toleration  ;  and  more  than 
toleration  they  did  not  yet  venture  even  to  de 
sire.  Jacobitism  was  a  mere  name.  Nobody 
was  left  to  fight  for  that  wretched  cause,  anc 
?ery  few  to  drink  for  it.  The  constitution 


ourchased  so  dearly,  was  on  every  side  ex- 
olled  and  worshipped.  Even  those  distinc- 
ions  of  party,  which  must  almost  always  be 
bund  in  a  free  state,  could  scarcely  be  traced. 
The  two  great  bodies  which  from  the  time  of 
he  Revolution  had  been  gradually  tending  to 
approximation,  were  now  united  in  emulous 
support  of  that  splendid  administration  which 
smote  to  the  dust  both  the  branches  of  the 
louse  of  Bourbon.  Tne  great  battle  for  our 
ecclesiastical  and  civil  polity  had  been  fought 
and  won.  The  wounds  had  been  healed.  The 
victors  and  the  vanquished  were  rejoicing  to 
gether.  Every  person  acquainted  with  the  po- 
itical  writers  of  the  last  generation  will  recol- 
ect  the  terms  in  which  they  generally  speak 
of  that  time.  It  was  a  glimpse  of  a  golden  age 
of  union  and  glory — a  short  interval  of  rest 
which  had  been  preceded  by  centuries  of  agi- 
;ation,  and  which  centuries  of  agitation  were 
destined  to  follow. 

How  soon  faction  again  began  to  ferment,  is 
well  known.  In  the  Letters  of  Junius,  in 
Burke's  Thoughts  on  the  Cause  of  the  Discon 
tents,  and  in  many  other  writings  of  less  merit, 
the  violent  dissensions,  which  speedily  con 
vulsed  the  country,  are  imputed  to  the  system 
of  favouritism  which  George  the  Third  intro- 
ducedi  to  the  influence  of  Bute,  or  the  profli- 
acy  of  those  who  called  themselves  the  king's 
friends.  With  all  deference  to  the  eminent 
writers  to  whom  we  have  referred,  we  may 
venture  to  say  that  they  lived  too  near  the 
events  of  which  they  treated,  to  judge  of  them 
correctly.  The  schism  which  was  then  ap 
pearing  in  the  nation,  and  which  has  been 
from  that  time  almost  constantly  widening,  had 
little  in  common  with  those  which  had  divided 
it  during  the  reigns  of  the  Tudors  and  the 
Stuarts.  The  symptoms  of  popular  feeling, 
indeed,  will  always  in  a  great  measure  be  the 
same ;  but  the  principle  which  excited  thai 
feeling  was  here  new.  The  support  which 
was  given  to  Wilkes,  the  clamour  for  reform 
during  the  American  war,  the  disaffected  con 
duct  of  large  classes  of  people  at  the  time  of 
the  French  Revolution,  no  more  resembled  the 
opposition  which  had  been  offered  to  the  go 
vernment  of  Charles  the  Second,  than  that  op 
position  resembled  the  contest  between  the 
Roses. 

In  the  political  as  in  the  natural  body,  a  sen 
sation  is  often  referred  to  a  part  widely  differ 
ent  from  that  in  which  it  really  resides.  A 
man,  whose  leg  is  cut  off,  fancies  that  he  feels 
a  pain  in  his  toe.  And  in  the  same  manner  the 
people,  in  the  earlier  part  of  the  late  reign,  sin 
cerely  attributed  their  discontent  to  grievances 
which  had  been  effectually  lopped  off.  They 
imagined  that  the  prerogative  was  too  strong 
for  the  constitution,  that  the  principles  of  the 
Revolution  were  abandoned,  and  the  system  of 
the  Stuarts  restored.  Every  impartial  man 
must  now  acknowledge  that  these  charges 
were  groundless.  The  proceedings  of  the 
government  with  respect  to  the  Middlesex 
election  would  have  been  contemplated  with, 
delight  by  the  first  generation  of  Whigs.  They 
would  have  thought  it  a  splendid  triumph  of 
the  cause  of  liberty,  that  the  King  and  the 
Lords  should  resign  to  the  House  of  Comrpoos 


HALLAM'S  CONSTITUTIONAL  HISTORY. 


a  portion  of  their  legislative  power,  and  allow 
it  to  incapacitate  without  their  consent.  This, 
indeed,  Mr.  Burke  clearly  perceived.  "When 
the  House  of  Commons,"  says  he,  "  in  an  en 
deavour  to  obtain  new  advantages  at  the  ex 
pense  of  the  other  orders  of  the  state,  for  the 
benefit  of  the  commons  at  large,  have  pursued 
strong  measures,  if  it  were  not  just,  it  was  at 
least  natural,  that  the  constituents  should  con 
nive  at  all  their  proceedings  ;  because  we  our 
selves  were  ultimately  to  profit.  But  when  this 
submission  is  urged  to  us  in  a  contest  between 
the  representatives  and  ourselves,  and  where  no 
thing  can  be  put  into  their  scale  which  is  not 
taken  from  ours,  they  fancy  us  to  be  children 
when  they  tell  us  that  they  are  our  representa 
tives,  our  own  flesh  and  blood,  and  that  all  the 
stripes  they  give  us  are  for  our  good."  These 
sentences  contain,  in  fact,  the  whole  explana 
tion  of  Ihe  mystery.  The  conflict  of  the  seven 
leenth  century  was  maintained  by  the  Parlia 
ment  against  the  crown.  The  conflict  which 
commenced  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  which  still  remains  undecided,  and  in 
which  our  children  and  grandchildren  will 
probably  be  called  to  act  or  suffer,  is  between 
a  large  portion  of  the  people  on  the  one  side, 
and  the  crown  and  the  Parliament  united  on 
the  other. 

The  privileges  of  the  House  of  Commons 
those  privileges  which,  in  1642,  all  London 
rose  in  arms  to  defend,  which  the  people  con 
sidered  as  synonymous  with  their  own  liberties 
and  in  comparison  with  which  they  took  no 
account  of  the  most  precious  and  sacred  prin 
ciples  of  English  jurisprudence,  have  now  be 
come  nearly  as  odious  as  the  rigours  of  mar 
tial  law.  That  power  of  committing,  which 
the  people  anciently  loved  to  see  the  House  of 
Commons  exercise,  is  now,  at  least,  when  em 
ployed  against  libellers,  the  most  unpopular 
power  in  the  constitution.  If  the  Commons 
were  to  suffer  the  Lords  to  amend  money-bills 
we  do  not  believe  that  the  people  would  care 
one  straw  about  the  matter.  If  they  were  to 
suffer  the  Lords  even  to  originate  money-bills 
we  doubt  whether  such  a  surrender  of  their 
constitutional  rights  would  excite  half  so 
much  dissatisfaction  as  the  exclusion  of 
strangers  from  a  single  important  discussion 
The  gallery  in  which  the  reporters  sit  has  be 
come  a  fourth  estate  of  the  realm.  The  pub 
lication  of  the  debates,  a  practice  which 
seemed  to  the  most  liberal  statesmen  of  the  ok 
school  full  of  danger  to  the  great  safeguards 
of  public  liberty,  is  now  regarded  by  many 
persons  as  a  safeguard,  tantamount,  and  more 
than  tantamount,  to  all  the  rest  together. 

Burke,  in  a  speech  on  parliamentary  reform, 
which  is  the  more  remarkable  because  it  was 
delivered  long  before  the  French  Revolution 
has  described,  in  striking  language,  the  change 
in  public  feeling  of  which  we  speak.  "  It  sug 
gests  melancholy  reflections,"  says  he,  "in 
consequence  of  the  strange  course  we  have 
long  held,  that  we  are  now  no  longer  quarrel 
ling  about  the  character,  or  about  the  conduc 
of  men,  or  the  tenour  of  measures ;  but  we 
are  grown  out  of  humour  with  the  English 
constitution  itself;  this  is  become  the  object  of 
the  animosity  of  Englishmen.  This  constitu- 

VOL.I.— 13 


ion  in  former  days  used  to  be  the  envy  of  the 
world;  it  was  the  pattern  for  politicians;  the 
heme  of  the  eloquent;  the  meditation  of  the 
philosopher  in  every  part  of  the  world. — As  to 
Englishmen,  it  was  their  pride,  their  consola 
tion.  By  it  they  lived,  and  for  it  they  were 
ready  to  die.  Its  defects,  if  it  had  any,  were 
partly  covered  by  partiality,  and  partly  borne 
by  prudence.  Now  all  its  excellencies  are 
forgot,  its  faults  are  forcibly  dragged  into  day, 
exaggerated  by  every  artifice  of  misrepresenta 
tion.  It  is  despised  and  rejected  of  men  ;  and 
every  device  and  invention  of  ingenuity  or 
idleness  is  set  up  in  opposition,  or  in  prefer 
ence  to  it."  We  neither  adopt  nor  condemn 
the  language  of  reprobation  which  the  great 
orator  here  employs.  We  call  him  only  as 
witness  to  the  fact.  That  the  revolution  of 
public  feeling  which  he  described  was  then  in 
progress  is  indisputable  ;  and  it  is  equally  in 
disputable,  we  think,  that  it  is  in  progress  still. 
To  investigate  and  classify  the  cause  of  so 
great  a  change,  would  require  far  more  thought, 
and  far  more  space,  than  we  at  present  have  to 
bestow.  But  some  of  them  are  obvious.  Dur 
ing  the  contest  which  the  Parliament  carried 
on  against  the  Stuarts,  it  had  only  to  check  and 
complain.  It  has  since  had  to  govern.  As  an 
attacking  body,  it  could  select  its  points  of  at 
tack,  and  it  naturally  chose  those  on  which  it 
was  likely  to  receive  public  support.  As  a 
ruling  body,  it  has  neither  the  same  liberty  of 
choice,  nor  the  same  interest  to  gratify  the 
people.  With  the  power  of  an  executive  go 
vernment,  it  has  drawn  to  itself  some  of  the 
vices  and  all  the  unpopularity  of  an  executive 
government.  On  the  House  of  Commons, 
above  all,  possessed  as  it  is  of  the  public  purse,, 
and  consequently  of  the  public  sword,  the  na 
tion  throws  all  the  blame  of  an  ill-conducted 
war,  of  a  blundering  negotiation,  of  a  disgrace 
ful  treaty,of  anembarrassingcommercialcrisis. 
The  delays  of  the  Court  of  Chancery,  the  mis 
conduct  of  a  judge  at  Van  Diemsn's  land,  any 
thing,  in  short,  which  in  any  part  of  the  admi 
nistration  any  person  feels  as  a  grievance,  is 
attributed  to  the  tyranny,  or  at  least  to  the 
negligence,  of  that  all-powerful  body.  Private 
individuals  pester  it  with  their  wrongs  and 
claims.  A  merchant  appeals  to  it  from  the  courts- 
of  Rio  Janeiro  or  St.  Petersburg.  A  painter, 
who  can  find  nobody  to  buy  the  acre  of  spoiled 
canvass,  which  he  calls  an  historical  picture, 
pours  into  its  sympathizing  ear  the  whole  story 
of  his  debts  and  his  jealousies.  Anciently  the 
Parliament  resembled  a  member  of  opposition, 
from  whom  no  places  are  expected,  who  is  not 
required  to  confer  favours  and  propose  mea 
sures,  but  merely  to  watch  and  censure;  and 
who  may,  therefore,  unless  he  is  grossly  inju 
dicious,  be  popular  with  the  great  body  of  the 
community.  The  Parliament  now  resembles 
the  same  person  put  into  office,  surrounded  by 
petitioners,  whom  twenty  times  his  patronage 
would  not  satisfy,  stunned  with  complaints, 
buried  in  memorials,  compelled  by  the  duties 
of  his  station  to  bring  forward  measure.-.,  simi 
lar  to  those  which  he  was  formerly  accustomed 
to  observe  and  to  check,  and  perp°tuaily  en 
countered  by  objections  similar  to  those  which 
it  was  formerly  his  business  to  rai.se. 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Perhaps  it  may  be  laid  down  as  a  general 
rule,  that  a  legislative  assembly,  not  constituted 
on  democratic  principles,  cannot  be  popular 
long  after  it  ceases  to  be  weak.  Its  zeal  for 
what  the  people,  rightly  or  wrongly,  conceive 
to  be  their  interest,  its  sympathy  with  their 
mutable  and  violent  passions,  are  merely  the 
effects  of  the  particular  circumstances  in  which 
it  is  placed.  As  long  as  it  depends  for  exist 
ence  on  the  public  favour,  it  will  employ  all 
the  means  in  its  power  to  conciliate  that  favour. 
While  this  is  the  case,  defects  in  its  constitu 
tion  are  of  little  consequence.  But  as  the  close 
union  of  such  a  body  with  the  nation  is  the 
effect  of  an  identity  of  interest,  not  essential, 
but  accidental,  it  is  in  some  measure  dissolved 
from  the  time  at  which  the  danger  which  pro 
duced  it  ceases  to  exist. 

Hence,  before  the  Revolution,  the  question 
of  parliamentary  reform  was  of  very  little  im 
portance.  The  friends  of  liberty  had  no  very 
ardent  wish  for  it.  The  strongest  Tories  saw 
no  objections  to  it.  It  is  remarkable  that  Cla 
rendon  loudly  applauds  the  changes  which 
Cromwell  introduced,  changes  far  stronger 
than  the  Whigs  of  the  present  day  would  in 
general  approve.  There  is  no  reason  to  think, 
however,  that  the  reform  effected  by  Cromwell 
made  any  great  difference  in  the  conduct  of 
the  Parliament.*  Indeed,  if  the  House  of  Com 
mons  had,  during  the  reign  of  Charles  the  Se 
cond,  been  elected  by  universal  suffrage,  or  if 
all  the  seats  had  been  put  up  to  sale,  as  in  the 
French  Parliaments,  it  would,  we  suspect,  have 
acted  very  much  as  it  did.  We  know  how 
strongly  the  Parliament  of  Paris  exerted  itself 
in  favour  of  the  people  on  many  important 
occasions ;  and  the  reason  is  evident.  Though 
it  did  not  emanate  from  the  people,  its  whole 
consequence  depended  on  the  support  of  the 
people.  From  the  time  of  the  Revolution  the 
House  of  Commons  was  gradually  becoming 
what  it  now  is — a  great  council  of  state,  con 
taining  many  members  chosen  freely  by  the 
people,  and  many  others  anxious  to  acquire 
the  favour  of  the  people ;  but,  on  the  whole, 
aristocratical  in  its  temper  and  interest.  It  is 
very  far  from  being  an  illiberal  and  stupid  oli 
garchy;  but  it  is  equally  far  from  being  an 
express  image  of  the  general  feeling.  It  is 
influenced  by  the  opinion  of  the  people,  and 
influenced  powerfully,  but  slowly  and  circuit- 
ously.  Instead  of  outrunning  the  public  mind 
us  before  the  Revolution  it  frequently  did,  it 
now  follows  with  slow  steps  and  at  a  wide 
distance.  It  is  therefore  necessarily  unpopu 
lar;  and  the  more  so,  because  the  good  which 
it  produces  is  much  less  evident  to  common 
perception  than  the  evil  which  it  inflicts.  I 
hears  the  blame  of  all  the  mischief  which  is 
done,  or  supposed  to  be  done,  by  its  authority 
or  by  its  connivance.  It  does  not  get  the 
credit,  on  the  other  hand,  of  having  pre 
vented  those  innumerable  abuses  which  do 
not  exist  solely  because  the  House  of  Com 
mons  exists. 

A  large  part  of  the  nation  is  certainly  de> 
fcirous  of  a  reform  in  the  representative  system 
How  large  that  part  may  be,  and  how  strong 
us  desires  on  the  subject  may  be,  it  is  difficul 
V»  say.  It  is  only  at  intervals  that  the  clamour 


m  the  subject  is  loud  and  vehement.  But  it 
eems  to  us  that,  during  the  remissions,  the 
eeling  gathers  strength,  and  that  every  suc 
cessive  burst  is  more  violent  than  that  which 
)receded  it.  The  public  attention  may  be  for 
a  time  diverted  to  the  Catholic  claims  or  the 
mercantile  code ;  but  it  is  probable  that  at  no 
very  distant  period,  perhaps  in  the  lifetime  of 
he  present  generation,  all  other  questions  will 
merge  in  that  which  is,  in  a  certain  degree, 
connected  with  them  all. 

Already  we  seem  to  ourselves  to  perceive 
the  signs  of  unquiet  times,  the  vague  presenti 
ment  of  something  great  and  strange  which 
pervades  the  community;  the  restless  and  tur 
bid  hopes  of  those  who  have  every  thing  to 

ain,  the  dimly-hinted  forebodings  of  those  wh:> 
have  every  thing  to  lose.  Many  indication!! 
might  be  mentioned,  in  themselves  indeed  as 
insignificant  as  straws ;  but  even  the  direction 
of  a  straw,  to  borrow  the  illustration  of  Bacon, 
will  show  from  what  quarter  the  hurricane  is 
setting  in. 

A  great  statesman  might,  by  judicious  and 
timely  reformations,  by  reconciling  the  two 
great  branches  of  the  natural  aristocracy,  the 
capitalists  and  the  landowners,  by  so  widening 
the  base  of  the  government  as  to  interest  in  its 
defence  the  whole  of  the  middling  class,  that 
brave,  honest,  and  sound-hearted  class,  which 
is  as  anxious  for  the  maintenance  of  order  and 
the  security  of  property  as  it  is  hostile  to  cor 
ruption  and  oppression,  succeed  in  averting  a 
struggle  to  which  no  rational  friend  of  liberty 
or  of  law  can  look  forward  without  great  ap 
prehensions.  There  are  those  who  will  be 
contented  with  nothing  but  demolition ;  and 
there  are  those  who  shrink  from  all  repair. 
There  are  innovators  who  long  for  a  President 
and  a  National  Convention ;  and  there  are 
bigots  who,  while  cities  larger  and  richer  than 
the  capitals  of  many  great  kingdoms  are  call 
ing  out  for  representatives  to  watch  over  their 
interests,  select  some  hackneyed  jobber  in  bo 
roughs,  some  peer  of  the  narrowest  and  small 
est  mind,  as  the  fittest  depositary  of  a  forfeited 
franchise.  Between  these  extremes  there  lies 
a  more  excellent  way.  Time  is  bringing  around 
another  crisis  analogous  to  that  which  occurred 
in  the  seventeenth  century.  We  stand  in  a 
situation  similar  to  that  in  which  our  ancestors 
stood  under  the  reign  of  James  the  First.  It 
will  soon  again  be  necessary  to  reform,  that 
we  may  preserve ;  to  save  the  fundamental 
principles  of  the  constitution,  by  alterations  in 
the  subordinate  parts.  It  will  then  be  possible, 
as  it  was  possible  two  hundred  years  ago,  to 
protect  vested  rights,  to  secure  every  useful 
institution — every  institution  endeared  by  an 
tiquity  and  noble  associations;  and,  at  the 
same  time,  to  introduce  into  the  system  im 
provements  harmonizing  with  th^  original 
plan.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether  two  hun 
dred  years  have  made  us  wiser. 

We  know  of  no  great  revolution  which  might 
not  have  been  prevented  by  compromise  early 
and  graciously  made.  Firmness  is  a  grea 
virtue  in  public  affairs,  but  it  has  its  proper 

sphere.  Conspiracies  and  insurrections  in 
which  tmall  minorities  are  engaged,  the  out- 
breakings  of  popular  violence  unconnected 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


99 


with  any  extensive  project  or  any  durable  prin 
ciple,  are  best  repressed  by  vigour  and  decision. 
To  shrink  from  them  is  to  make  them  formida 
ble.  But  no  wise  ruler  will  confound  the  per 
vading  taint  with  the  slight  local  irritation. 
No  wise  ruler  will  treat  the  deeply-seated  dis 
contents  of  a  great  party  as  he  treats  the  con 
duct  of  a  mob  which  destroys  mills  and  power- 
looms.  The  neglect  of  this  distinction  has 
been  fatal  even  to  governments  strong  in  the 
power  of  the  sword.  The  present  time  is  in 
deed  a  time  of  peace  and  order.  But  it  is  at 
such  a  time  that  fools  are  most  thoughtless, 
and  wise  men  most  thoughtful.  That  the  dis 


contents  which  have  agitated  the  country  dur 
ing  the  late  and  the  present  reign,  and  which, 
though  not  always  noisy,  are  never  wholly 
dormant,  will  again  break  forth  with  aggravated 
symptoms,  is  almost  as  certain  as  that  the  tides 
and  seasons  will  follow  their  appointed  course. 
But  in  all  movements  of  the  human  mind 
which  tend  to  great  revolutions,  there  is  a  cri 
sis  at  which  moderate  concession  may  amend, 
conciliate,  and  preserve.  Happy  will  it  be  for 
England  if,  at  that  crisis,  her  interests  be  con 
fided  to  men  for  whom  history  has  not  recorded 
the  long  series  of  human  crimes  and  follies  in 
vain. 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOUUIES  ON  SOCIETY.* 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1830.] 


IT  would  be  scarcely  possible  for  a  man  of 
Mr.  Southey's  talents  and  acquirements  to  write 
two  volumes  so  large  as  those  before  us,  which 
should  be  wholly  destitute  of  information  and 
amusement.  Yet  we  do  not  remember  to  have 
rpad  with  so  little  satisfaction  any  equal  quan- 
vity  of  matter,  written  by  any  man  of  real  abili 
ties.  We  have,  for  some  time  past,  observed 
with  great  regret  the  strange  infatuation  which 
leads  the  Poet-laureate  to  abandon  those  de 
partments  of  literature  in  which  he  might  ex 
cel,  and  to  lecture  the  public  on  sciences  of 
which  he  has  still  the  very  alphabet  to  learn. 
He  has  now,  we  think,  done  his  worst.  The  sub 
ject,  which  he  has  at  last  undertaken  to  treat,  is 
one  which  demands  all  the  highest  intellectual 
and  moral  qualities  of  a  philosophical  states 
man — an  understanding  at  once  comprehen 
sive  and  acute — a  heart  at  cnce  upright  and 
charitable.  Mr.  Southey  brings  to  the  task  two 
faculties  which  were  never,  we  believe,  vouch 
safed  in  measure  so  copious  to  any  human  be 
ing  ;  the  faculty  of  believing  without  a  reason, 
and  the  faculty  of  hating  without  a  provoca 
tion. 

It  is,  indeed,  most  extraordinary  that  a  mind 
like  Mr.  Southey's,  a  mind  richly  endowed  in 
many  respects  by  nature  and  highly  cultivated 
by  study,  a  mind  which  has  exercised  con 
siderable  influence  on  the  most  enlightened 
generation  of  the  most  enlightened  people  that 
ever  existed,  should  be  utterly  destitute  of  the 
power  of  discerning  truth  from  falsehood.  Yet 
such  is  the  fact.  Government  is  to  Mr.  Southey 
one  of  the  fine  arts.  He  judges  of  a  theory  or 
a  public  measure,  of  a  religion,  a  political 
party,  a  peace  or  a  war,  as  men  judge  of  a  pic 
ture  or  a  statue,  by  the  effect  produced  on  his 
imagination.  A  chain  of  associations  is  to  him 
what  a  chain  of  reasoning  is  to  other  men ; 
and  what  he  calls  his  opinions,  are  in  fact 
merely  his  tastes. 

*  Sir  Thomas  More  ;  or  Colloquies  on  the  Progress  and 
Prospects  of  Society.  By  ROBEKT  SOUTHEY,  Esq.,  LL.D. 
Poet  Laureate.  2  vols.  8vo.  London.  1829. 


Part  of  this  description  might,  perhaps, 
apply  to  a  much  greater  man,  Mr.  Burke.  But 
Mr.  Burke,  assuredly  possessed  an  understand 
ing  admirably  fitted  for  the  investigation  of 
truth — an  understanding  stronger  than  that  of 
any  statesman,  active  or  speculative,  of  the 
eighteenth  century — stronger  than  every  thing, 
except  his  own  fierce  and  ungovernable  sensi 
bility.  Hence,  he  generally  chose  his  side  like 
a  fanatic,  and  defended  it  like  a  philosopher. 
His  conduct,  in  the  most  important  events  of 
his  life,  at  the  time  of  the  impeachment  of 
Hastings,  for  example,  and  at  the  time  of  th« 
French  Revolution,  seems  to  have  been  prompt- 
ed  by  those  feelings  and  motives  which  Mr. 
Coleridge  has  so  happily  described  : 

"  Stormy  pity,  and  the  cherish'd  lure 
Of  pomp,  arid  proud  precipitance  of  soul." 

Hindostan,  with  its  vast  cities,  its  gorgeous 
pagodas,  its  infinite  swarms  of  dusky  popula 
tion,  its  long-descended  dynasties,  its  stately 
etiquette,  excited  in  a  mind  so  capacious,  so 
imaginative,  and  so  susceptible,  the  most  in 
tense  interest.  The  peculiarities  of  the  costume, 
of  the  manners,  and  of  the  laws,  the  very  mys 
tery  which  hung  over  the  language  and  origin 
of  the  people  seized  his  imagination.  To  plead 
in  Westminster  Hall,  in  the  name  of  the  English 
people,  at  the  bar  of  the  English  nobles,  for 
great  nations  and  kings  separated  from  him  by 
half  the  world,  seemed  to  him  the  height  of  hu 
man  glory.  Again,  it  is  not  difficult  to  perceive, 
that  his  hostility  to  the  French  Revolution  prin 
cipally  arose  from  the  vexation  which  he  felt, 
at  having  all  his  old  political  associations  dis 
turbed,  at  seeing  the  well-known  boundary- 
marks  of  states  obliterated,  and  the  names  and 
distinctions  with  which  the  history  of  Europe 
had  been  filled  for  ages,  swept  away.  He  felt 
like  an  antiquary  whose  shield  had  been 
scoured,  or  a  connoisseur  who  found  his  Ti 
tian  retouched.  But  however  he  came  oy  au 
opinion,  he  had  no  sooner  got  it  than  he  did  his 
best  to  make  out  a  legitimate  title  to  it.  Hi* 
reason,  like  a  spirit  in  the  service  of  an  en- 


100 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


chanter,  though  spell-bound,  was  still  mighty. 
It  did  whatever  work  his  passions  and  his 
imagination  might  impose.  But  it  did  that 
work,  however  arduous,  with  marvellous  dex 
terity  and  vigour.  His  course  was  not  de 
termined  by  argument;  but  he  could  defend 
the  wildest  course  by  arguments  more  plausi 
ble  than  those  by  which  common  men  support 
•pinions  which  they  have  adopted,  after  the 
fullest  deliberation.  Reason  has  scarcely  ever 
displayed,  even  in  those  well-constituted  minds 
of  which  she  occupies  the  throne,  so  much 
power  and  energy  as  in  the  lowest  offices  of 
that  imperial  servitude. 

Now,  in  the  mind  of  Mr.  Southey,  reason  has 
no  place  at  all,  as  either  leader  or  follower,  as 
either  sovereign  or  slave.  He  does  not  seem 
to  know  what  an  argument  is.  He  never  uses 
arguments  himself.  He  never  troubles  himself 
to  answer  the  arguments  of  his  opponents.  It 
has  never  occurred  to  him,  that  a  man  ought 
to  be  able  to  give  some  belter  account  of  the 
way  in  which  he  has  arrived  at  his  opinions, 
than  merely  that  it  is  his  will  and  pleasure  to 
hold  them,  that  there  is  a  difference  between 
assertion  and  demonstration,  that  a  rumour 
does  not  always  prove  a  fact,  that  a  fact  does 
not  always  prove  a  theory,  that  two  contradic 
tory  propositions  cannot  be  undeniable  truths, 
that  to  beg  the  question  is  not  the  way  to  set 
tle  it,  or  that  when  an  objection  is  raised,  it 
ought  to  met  with  something  more  convincing 
than  "scoundrel"  and  "blockhead." 

It  would  be  absurd  to  read  ihe  works  of  such 
a  writer  for  political  instruction.  The  utmost 
that  can  be  expected  from  any  system  promul 
gated  by  him  is,  that  it  may  be  splendid  and 
affecting,  that  it  may  suggest  sublime  and 
pleasing  images.  His  scheme  of  philosophy  is 
a  mere  daydream,  a  poetical  creation,  like  the 
Domdaniel  caverns,  the  Swerga,  or  Padalon ; 
and,  indeed,  it  bears  no  inconsiderable  resem 
blance  to  those  gorgeous  visions.  Like  them 
it  has  something  of  invention,  grandeur,  and 
brilliancy.  But,  like  them,  it  is  grotesque  and 
extravagant,  and  perpetually  violates  that  con 
ventional  probability  which  is  essential  to  the 
effect  even  of  works  of  art. 

The  warmest  admirers  of  Mr.  Southey  will 
scarcely,  we  think,  deny  that  his  success  has 
almost  always  borne  an  inverse  proportion  to 
the  degree  in  which  his  undertakings  have  re 
quired  a  logical  head.  His  poems,  taken  in 
the  mass,  stand  far  higher  than  his  prose 
works.  The  Laureate  Odes,  indeed,  among 
which  the  Vision  of  Judgment  must  be  classed, 
are,  for  the  most  part,  worse  than  Pye's  and  as 
bad  as  Cibber's ;  nor  do  we  think  him  generally 
happy  in  short  pieces.  But  his  longer  poems, 
though  full  of  faults,  are  nevertheless  very  ex 
traordinary  productions.  We  doubt  greatly 
whether  they  will  be  read  fifty  years  hence ; 
but  that  if  they  are  read,  they  will  be  admired, 
we  have  no  doubt  whatever. 

But  though  in  general  we  prefer  Mr.  Sou- 
they's  poetry  to  his  prose,  we  must  make  one 
exception.  The  Life  of  Nelson  is,  beyond  all 
doubt,  the  most  perfect  and  the  most  delightful 
of  his  works.  The  fact  is,  as  his  poems  most 
abundantly  prove,  that  he  is  by  no  means  so 
skilful  in  designing  as  filling  up.  It  was 


1  therefore  an  advantage  to  him  to  be  furnished 
i  with  an  outline  of  characters  and  events,  and 
I  to  have  no  other  task  to  perform  than  that  of 
j  touching  the  cold  sketch  into  life.  No  writer, 
perhaps,  ever  Jived,  whose  talents  so  precisely 
'  qualified  him  to  write  the  history  of  the  great 
naval  warrior.  There  were  no  fine  riddles  of 
the  human  heart  to  read,  no  theories  to  found, 
no  hidden  causes  to  develope,  no  remote  con 
sequences  to  predict.  The  character  of  the 
hero  lay  on  the  surface.  The  exploits  were 
brilliant  and  picturesque.  The  necessity  of 
adhering  to  the  real  course  of  events  saved  Mr. 
Southey  from  those  faults  which  deform  the 
original  plan  of  almost  every  one  of  his  poems, 
and  which  even  his  innumerable  beauties  of 
detail  scarcely  redeem.  The  subject  did  not  re 
quire  the  exercise  of  those  reasoning  powers 
the  want  of  which  is  the  blemish  of  his  prose. 
It  would  not  be  easy  to  find,  in  all  literary  his 
tory,  an  instance  of  a  more  exact  hit  between 
wind  and  water.  John  Wesley,  and  the  Penin 
sular  War,  were  subjects  of  a  very  different 
kind,  subjects  which  required  all  the  qualities 
of  a  philosophic  historian.  In  Mr.  Southey's 
works  on  these  subjects,  he  has,  on  the  whole, 
failed.  Yet  there  are  charming  specimen's  of 
the  art  of  narration  in  both  of  them.  The  Life 
of  Wesley  will  probably  live.  Defective  as  it 
is,  it  contains  the  only  popular  account  of  a 
most  remarkable  moral  revolution,  and  of  a  man 
whose  eloquence  and  logical  acuteness  might 
have  rendered  him  eminent  in  literature,  whose 
genius  for  government  was  not  inferior  to  that 
of  Richelieu,  and  who,  whatever  his  errors  may 
have  been,  devoted  all  his  powers,  in  defiance 
of  obloquy  and  derision,  to  what  he  sincerely 
considered  as  the  highest  good  of  his  species. 
The  History  of  the  Peninsular  War  is  already 
dead:  indeed  the  second  volume  was  dead- 
born.  The  glory  of  producing  an  imperishable 
record  of  that  great  conflict  seems  to  be  re 
served  for  Colonel  Napier. 

The  Book  of  the  Church  contains  some  sto 
nes  very  prettily  told.  The  rest  is  mere  rub 
bish.  The  adventure  was  manifestly  one 
which  could  be  achieved  only  by  a  profound 
thinker,  and  in  which  even  a  profound  thinker 
might  have  failed,  unless  his  passions  had 
been  kept  under  strict  control.  In  all  those 
works  in  which  Mr.  Southey  has  completely 
abandoned  narration,  and  undertaken  to  argue 
moral  and  political  questions,  his  failure  has 
been  complete  and  ignominious.  On  such 
occasions  his  writings  are  rescued  from  utter 
contempt  and  derision,  solely  by  the  beauty 
and  purity  of  the  English.  We  find,  we  con« 
fess,  so  great  a  charm  in  Mr.  Southey's  style, 
that,  even  when  he  writes  nonsense,  we  ge 
nerally  read  it  with  pleasure,  except  indeed 
when  he  tries  to  be  droll.  A  more  insuffera 
ble  jester  never  existed.  He  very  often  at 
tempts  to  be  humorous,  and  yet  we  do  not 
remember  a  single  occasion  on  which  he  has 
succeeded  farther  than  to  be  quaintly  and  flip 
pantly  dull.  In  one  of  his  works,  he  tells  us 
that  Bishop  Sprat  was  very  properly  so  called, 
inasmuch  as  he  was  a  very  small  poet.  And 
in  the  book  now  before  us,  he  cannot  quot» 
Francis  Bugg  without  a  remark  on  his  unsa 
vory  name.  A  man  might  talk  folly  like  »hi» 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


101 


ly  his  own  fireside ;  but  that  any  human  being;, 
after  having  made  such  a  joke,  should  write  it 
down,  and  copy  it  out,  and  transmit  it  to  the 
printer,  and  correct  the  proof-sheets,  and  send 
it  f^rth  into  the  world,  is  enough  to  make  us 
ashamed  of  our  species. 

The  extraordinary  bitterness  of  spirit  which 
Mr.  Sou  they  manifests  towards  his  opponents 
is,  no  doubt,  in  a  great  measure  to  be  attri 
buted  to  the  manner  in  which  he  forms  his  opi 
nions.  Differences  of  taste,  it  has  often  been 
remarked,  produce  greater  exasperation  than 
differences  on  points  of  science.  But  this  is 
not  all.  A  peculiar  austerity  marks  almost 
all  Mr.  Southey's  judgments  of  men  and  ac 
tions.  We  are  far  from  blaming  him  for  fix 
ing  on  a  high  standard  of  morals,  and  for 
applying  that  standard  to  every  case.  But 
rigour  ought  to  be  accompanied  by  discern 
ment,  and  of  discernment  Mr.  Southey  seems 
to  be  utterly  destitute.  His  mode  of  judging 
is  monkish ;  it  is  exactly  what  we  should  ex 
pect  from  a  stern  old  Benedictine,  who  had 
been  preserved  from  many  ordinary  frailties 
by  the  restraints  of  his  situation.  No  man 
out  of  a  cloister  ever  wrote  about  love,  for  ex 
ample,  so  coldly  and  at  the  same  time  so 
grossly.  His  descriptions  of  it  are  just  what 
we  should  hear  from  a  recluse,  who  knew  the 
passion  only  from  the  details  of  the  confes 
sional.  Almost  all  his  heroes  make  love 
either  like  seraphim  or  like  cattle.  He  seems 
to  have  no  notion  of  any  thing  between  the 
Platonic  passion  of  the  Glendoveer,  who  gazes 
with  rapture  on  his  mistress's  leprosy,  and  the 
brutal  appetite  of  Arvalan  and  Roderick.  In 
Roderick,  indeed,  the  two  characters  are  united. 
He  is  first  all  clay,  and  then  all  spirit,  he  goes 
forth  a  Tarquin,  and  comes  back  too  ethereal 
to  be  married.  The  only  love-scene,  as  far  as 
we  can  recollect,  in  Madoc,  consists  of  the 
delicate  attentions  which  a  savage,  who  has 
drunk  too  much  of  the  Prince's  metheglin, 
offers  to  Goervyl.  It  would  be  the  labour  of  a 
week  to  find,  in  all  the  vast  mass  of  Mr.  Sou 
they's  poetry,  a  single  passage  indicating  any 
sympathy  with  those  feelings  which  have  con 
secrated  the  shades  of  Vaucluse  and  the  rocks 
of  Meillerie. 

Indeed,  if  we  except  some  very  pleasing 
images  of  paternal  tenderness  and  filial  duty, 
there  is  scarcely  any  thing  soft  or  humane  in 
Mr.  Southey's  poetry.  What  theologians  call 
the  spiritual  sins  are  his  cardinal  virtues — 
hatred,  pride,  and  the  insatiable  thirst  of  ven 
geance.  These  passions  he  disguises  under 
the  name  of  duties;  he  purifies  them  from  the 
alloy  of  vulgar  interests  ;  he  ennobles  them  by 
uniting  them  with  energy,  fortitude,  and  a 
severe  sanctity  of  manners,  and  then  holds 
them  up  to  the  admiration  of  mankind.  This 
is  the  spirit  of  Thalaba,  of  Ladurlad,  of  Ado- 
iinda,  of  Roderick  after  his  regeneration.  It  is 
the  spirit  which,  in  all  his  writings,  Mr.  Sou 
they  appears  to  effect.  "  I  do  well  to  be  angry," 
seems  to  be  the  predominant  feeling  of  his 
mind.  Almost  the  only  mark  of  charity  which 
he  vouchsafes  to  his  opponents  is  to  pray  for 
their  conversion,  and  this  he  does  in  terms  not 
unlike  ihose  in  which  we  can  imagine  a  Por 
tuguese  priest  interceding  with  Heaven  for  a 


Jew,  delivered  over  to  the  secular  arm  after  a 
relapse. 

We  have  always  heard,  and  fully  believe, 
that  Mr.  Southey  is  a  very  amiable  arid  hu 
mane  man ;  nor  do  we  intend  to  apply  to  him 
personally  any  of  the  remarks  which  we  have 
made  on  the  spirit  of  his  writings.  Such  are 
the  caprices  of  human  nature.  Even  Uncle 
Toby  troubled  himself  very  little  abcut  the 
French  grenadiers  who  fell  on  the  glacis  of 
Namur.  And  when  Mr.  Southey  takes  up  his 
pen,  he  changes  his  nature  as  much  as  Cap 
tain  Shandy  when  he  girt  on  his  sword.  The 
only  opponents  to  whom  he  gives  quarter  are 
those  in  whom  he  finds  something  of  his  own 
character  reflected.  He  seems  to  have  an  in 
stinctive  antipathy  for  calm,  moderate  men — 
for  men  who  shun  extremes,  and  who  render 
reasons.  He  has  treated  Mr.  Owen  of  Lanark, 
for  example,  with  infinitely  more  respect  than 
he  has  shown  to  Mr.  Hallam  or  to  Dr.  Lin- 
gard  ;  and  this  for  no  reason  than  we  can  dis 
cover  except  that  Mr.  Owen  is  more  unrea 
sonably  and  hopelessly  in  the  wrong  than  any 
speculator  of  our  time. 

Mr.  Southey's  political  system  is  just  what 
we  might  expect  from  a  man  who  regards  po 
lilies,  not  as  a  matter  of  science,  but  as  a  mat 
ter  of  taste  and  feeling.  All  his  schemes  of 
government  have  been  inconsistent  with  them 
selves.  In  his  youth  he  was  a  republican ; 
yet,  as  he  tells  us  in  his  preface  to  these  Col 
loquies,  he  was  even  then  opposed  to  the  Ca 
tholic  claims.  He  is  now  a  violent  Ultra- 
Tory.  Yet  while  he  maintains,  with  vehemence 
approaching  to  ferocity,  all  the  sterner  and 
harsher  parts  of  the  Ultra-Tory  theory  of  go 
vernment,  the  baser  and  dirtier  part  of  that 
theory  disgusts  him.  Exclusion,  persecution, 
severe  punishments  for  libellers  and  dema 
gogues,  proscriptions,  massacres,  civil  war,  if 
necessary,  rather  than  any  concession  to  a 
discontented  people — these  are  the  measures 
which  he  seems  inclined  to  recommend.  A 
severe  and  gloomy  tyranny,  crushing  opposi 
tion,  silencing  remonstrance,  drilling  the  minds 
of  the  people  into  unreasoning  obedience,  has 
in  it  something  of  grandeur  which  delights  his 
imagination.  But  there  is  nothing  fine  in  the 
shabby  tricks  and  jobs  of  office.  And  Mr. 
Southey,  accordingly,  has  no  toleration  for 
them.  When  a  democrat,  he  did  not  perceive 
that  his  system  led  logically,  and  would  have 
led  practically,  to  the  removal  of  religious  dis 
tinctions.  He  now  commits  a  similar  error. 
He  renounces  the  abject  and  paltry  part  of  the 
creed  of  his  party,  without  perceiving  that  it  is 
also  an  essential  part  of  that  creed.  He  woivld 
have  tyranny  and  purity  together;  though  the 
most  superficial  observation  might  have  shown 
him  that  there  can  be  no  tyranny  without  cor 
ruption. 

It  is  high  time,  however,  that  we  shou'd  pn. 
ceed  to  the  consideration  of  the  work,  which  is 
our  more  immediate  subject,  and  which,  in 
deed,  illustrates  in  almost  every  page  our 
general  remarks  on  Mr.  Southey's  writings. 
In  the  preface,  we  are  informed  that  the  author, 
notwithstanding  some  statements  to  the  con 
trary,  was  always  opposed  to  the  Catholic 
claims.  We  fully  believe  this;  both  because 


102 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


we  are  sure  that  Mr.  Southey  is  incapable  of 
publishing  a  deliberate  falsehood,  and  because 
his  averment  is  in  itself  probable.  It  is  ex 
actly  what  we  should  have  expected  that,  even 
in  his  wildest  paroxysms  of  democratic  enthu 
siasm,  Mr.  Southey  would  have  felt  no  wish  to 
see  a  simple  remedy  applied  to  a  great  practical 
evil ;  that  the  only  measure,  which  all  the  great 
statesmen  of  two  generations  have  agreed  with 
each  other  in  supporting,  would  be  the  only 
measure  which  Mr.  Southey  would  have  agreed 
with  himself  in  opposing.  He  had  passed 
from  one  extreme  of  political  opinion  to  an 
other,  as  Satan  in  Milton  went  round  the  globe, 
contriving  constantly  to  "  ride  with  darkness." 
Wherever  the  thickest  shadow  of  the  night 
may  at  any  moment  chance  to  fall,  there  is 
Mr.  Southey.  It  is  not  everybody  who  could 
have  so  dexterously  avoided  blundering  on  the 
daylight  in  the  course  of  a  journey  to  the  anti 
podes. 

Mr.  Southey  has  not  been  fortunate  in  the 
plan  of  any  of  his  fictitious  narratives.  But  he 
has  never  failed  so  conspicuously  as  in  the 
work  before  us ;  except,  indeed,  in  the  wretched 
Vision  of  Judgment.  In  November,  1817,  it 
seems,  the  laureate  was  sitting  over  his  news 
paper,  and  meditating  about  the  death  of  the 
Princess  Charlotte.  An  elderly  person,  of 
very  dignified  aspect,  makes  his  appearance, 
announces  himself  as  a  stranger  from  a  dis 
tant  country,  and  apologizes  very  politely  for 
not  having  provided  himself  with  letters  of  in 
troduction.  Mr.  Southey  supposes  his  visiter 
to  be  some  American  gentleman,  who  has 
come  to  see  the  lakes  and  the  lake-poets,  and 
accordingly  proceeds  to  perform,  with  that 
grace  which  only  long  experience  can  give, 
all  the  duties  which  authors  owe  to  starers. 
He  assures  his  guest  that  some  of  the  most 
agreeable  visits  which  he  has  received  have 
been  from  Americans,  and  that  he  knows  men 
among  them  whose  talents  and  virtues  would 
do  honour  to  any  country.  In  passing,  we  may 
observe,  to  the  honour  of  Mr.  Southey,  that, 
though  he  evidently  has  no  liking  for  the  Ame 
rican  institutions,  he  never  speaks  of  the  people 
of  the  United  States  with  that  pitiful  affectation 
of  contempt,  by  which  some  members  of  his 
party  have  done  more  than  wars  or  tariffs  can  do 
to  excite  mutual  enmity  between  two  communi 
ties  formed  for  mutual  friendship.  Great  as  the 
faults  of  his  mind  are,  paltry  spite  like  this  has 
no  place  in  it.  Indeed,  it  is  scarcely  conceiv 
able  that  a  man  of  his  sensibility  and  his  ima 
gination  should  look  without  pleasure  and 
national  pride  on  the  vigorous  and  splendid 
youth  of  a  great  people,  whose  veins  are  filled 
with  our  blood,  whose  minds  are  nourished 
with  our  literature,  and  on  whom  is  entailed 
the  rich  inheritance  of  our  civilization,  our 
freedom,  and  our  glory. 

But  we  must  now  return  to  Mr.  Southey's  study 
at  Keswick.  The  visiter  informs  the  hospitable 
poet  that  he  is  not  an  American,  but  a  spirit. 
Mr.  Southey,  with  more  frankness  than  civility, 
tells  hiri  that  he  is  a  very  queer  one.  The 
stranger  holds  out  his  hand.  It  has  neither 
weight  nor  substance.  Mr.  Southey  upon  this 
t  ecomeb  more  serious;  his  hair  stands  on  end:  i 
Mid  he  adjures  the  spectre  to  tell  him  what  he  i 


is,  and  why  he  comes.  The  ghost  turns  out  to 
be  Sir  Thomas  More.  The  traces  of  martyr 
dom,  it  seems,  are  worn  in  the  other  world,  as 
stars  and  ribands  are  worn  in  this.  Sir  Thomas 
shows  the  poet  a  red  streak  round  his  neck, 
brighter  than  a  ruby,  and  informs  him  that 
Cranmer  wears  a  suit  of  flames  in  Paradise, 
the  right-hand  glove,  we  suppose,  of  peculiar 
brilliancy. 

Sir  Thomas  pays  but  a  short  visit  on  this 
occasion,  but  promises  to  cultivate  the  new 
acquaintance  which  he  has  formed,  and,  after 
begging  that  his  visit  may  be  kept  secret  from 
Mrs.  Southey,  vanishes  into  air. 

The  rest  of  the  book  consists  of  conversa 
tions  between  Mr.  Southey  and  the  spirit  about 
trade,  currency,  Catholic  emancipation,  peri 
odical  literature,  female  nunneries,  butchers, 
snuff,  book-stalls,  and  a  hundred  other  subjects. 
Mr.  Southey  very  hospitably  takes  an  opportu 
nity  to  lionize  the  ghost  round  the  lakes,  and 
directs  his  attention  to  the  most  beautiful  points 
of  view.  Why  a  spirit  was  to  be  evoked  for 
the  purpose  of  talking  over  such  matters,  and 
seeing  such  sights,  when  the  vicar  of  the  parish, 
a  blue-stocking  from  London,  or  an  American, 
such  as  Mr.  Southey  supposed  his  aerial 
visiter  to  be,  might  not  have  done  as  well,  we 
are  unable  to  conceive.  Sir  Thomas  tells 
Mr.  Southey  nothing  about  future  events,  and 
indeed  absolutely  disclaims  the  gift  of  pre 
science.  He  has  learned  to  talk  modern  English : 
he  has  read  all  the  new  publications,  and  loves 
a  jest  as  well  as  when  he  jested  with  the  execu 
tioner,  though  we  cannot  say  that  the  quality 
of  his  wit  has  materially  improved  in  Paradise. 
His  powers  of  reasoning,  too,  are  by  no  means 
in  as  great  vigour  as  when  he  sate  on  the  wool 
sack  ;  and  though  he  boasts  that  he  is  "  divested 
of  all  those  passions  which  cloud  the  intellects 
and  warp  the  understandings  of  men,"  we 
think  him,  we  must  confess,  far  less  stoical 
than  formerly.  As  to  revelations,  he  tells  Mr. 
Southey  at  the  outset  to  expect  none  from  him. 
The  laureate  expresses  some  doubts,  which 
assuredly  will  not  raise  him  in  the  opinion  of 
our  modern  millenarians,  as  to  the  divine  au 
thority  of  the  Apocalypse.  But  the  ghost  pre 
serves  an  impenetrable  silence.  As  far  as  we 
remember,  only  one  hint  about  the  employ 
ments  of  disembodied  spirits  escapes  him.  He 
encourages  Mr.  Southey  to  hope  that  there  is  a 
Paradise  Press,  at  which  all  the  valuable  pub 
lications  of  Mr.  Murray  and  Mr.  Colburn  are 
reprinted  as  regularly  as  at  Philadelphia;  and 
delicately  insinuates,  that  Thalaba  and  the 
Curse  of  Kehama  are  among  the  number. 
What  a  contrast  does  this  absurd  fiction  pre 
sent  to  those  charming  narratives  which  Plato 
and  Cicero  prefix  to  their  dialogues  !  What 
cost  in  machinery,  yet  what  poverty  of  effect ! 
A  ghost  brought  in  to  say  what  any  man  might 
have  said !  The  glorified  spirit  of  a  great 
statesman  and  philosopher  dawdling,  like  a 
bilious  old  nabob  at  a  watering-place,  over 
quarterly  reviews  and  novels,  dropping  in  to 
pay  long  calls,  making  excursions  in  search 
of  the  picturesque  !  The  scene  of  St.  George 
and  St.  Denys  in  the  Pucelle  is  hardly  more 
ridiculous.  We  know  what  Voltaire  meant. 
Nobody,  however,  can  suppose  that  Mr 


SOUTHEY'S   COLLOQUIES   ON  SOCIETY. 


103 


Southey  means  to  make  game  of  the  mysteries 
of  a.  higher  state  of  existence.  The  fact  is, 
that  in  the  work  before  us,  in  the  Vision  of 
Judgment,  and  in  some  of  his  other  pieces,  his 
mode  of  treating  the  most  solemn  subjects 
differs  from  that  of  open  scoffers,  only  as  the 
extravagant  representations  of  sacred  persons 
and  things  in  some  grotesque  Italian  paintings 
differ  from  the  caricatures  which  Carlisle  ex 
poses  in  the  front  of  his  shop.  We  interpret 
the  particular  act  by  the  general  character. 
What  in  the  window  of  a  convicted  blasphe 
mer  we  call  blasphemous,  we  call  only  absurd 
and  ill-judged  in  an  altar-piece. 

We  now  come  to  the  conversations  which 
pass  between  Mr.  Southey  and  Sir  Thomas 
More,  or  rather  between  two  Southeys  equally 
eloquent,  equally  angry,  equally  unreasonable, 
and  equally  given  to  talking  about  what  they 
do  not  understand.  Perhaps  we  could  not  se 
lect  a  better  instance  of  the  spirit  which  per 
vades  the  whole  book  than  the  discussion 
1  ching  butchers.  These  persons  are  repre- 
r  ^  ted  as  castaways,  as  men  whose  employ- 
i  ent  hebetates  the  faculties  and  hardens  the 
heart.  Not  that  the  poet  has  any  scruples 
about  the  use  of  animal  food.  He  acknow 
ledges  that  it  is  for  the  good  of  the  animals 
themselves  that  men  should  feed  upon  them. 
"Nevertheless,"  says  he,  "I  cannot  but  ac 
knowledge,  like  good  old  John  Fox,  that  the 
sight  of  a  slaughter-house  or  shambles,  if  it 
does  not  disturb  this  clear  conviction,  excites 
in  me  uneasiness  and  pain,  as  well  as  loathing. 
And  that  they  produce  a  worse  effect  upon  the 
persons  employed  in  them,  is  a  fact  acknow 
ledged  by  the  law  or  custom  which  excludes 
such  persons  from  sitting  on  juries  upon  cases 
of  life  and  death." 

This  is  a  fair  specimen  of  Mr.  Southey's 
mode  of  looking  at  all  moral  questions.  Here 
is  a  body  of  men  engaged  in  an  employment, 
which,  by  his  own  account,  is  beneficial,  not 
only  to  mankind,  but  to  the  very  creatures  on 
whom  we  feed.  Yet  he  represents  them  as 
men  who  are  necessarily  reprobates,  as  men 
who  must  necessarily  be  reprobates,  even  in 
the  most  improved  state  of  society,  even,  to 
use  his  own  phrase,  in  a  Christian  Utopia. 
And  what  reasons  are  given  for  a  judgment  so 
directly  opposed  to  every  principle  of  sound 
and  manly  morality  ]  Merely  this,  that  he  can 
not  abide  the  sight  of  their  apparatus ;  that, 
from  certain  peculiar  associations,  he  is 
affected  with  disgust  when  he  passes  by  their 
shops.  He  gives,  indeed,  another  reason;  a 
certain  law  or  custom,  which  never  existed  but 
in  the  imaginations  of  old  women,  and  which, 
if  it  had  existed,  would  have  proved  just  as 
much  against  butchers  as  the  ancient  preju 
dice  against  the  practice  of  taking  interest  for 
money  proves  against  the  merchants  of  Eng 
land.  Is  a  surgeon  a  castaway1?  We  believe 
that  nurses,  when  they  instruct  children  in  that 
venerable  law  or  custom  which  Mr.  Southey 
so  highly  approves,  generally  join  the  surgeon 
to  the  butcher.  A  dissecting-room  would,  we 
should  think,  affect  the  nerves  of  most  people 
as  much  as  a  butcher's  shambles.  But  the 
most  amusing  circumstance  is,  that  Mr. 
Southey,  who  detest*5  a  butcher,  should  look 


with  special  favour  on  a  so.dier.  He  seerns 
highly  to  approve  of  the  sentiment  of  Genera! 
Meadows,  who  swore  that  a  grenadier  was  the 
highest  character  in  this  world  or  in  the  next; 
and  assures  us,  that  a  virtuous  soldier  is  placed 
in  the  situation  which  most  tends  to  his  im 
provement,  and  will  most  promote  his  eternal 
interests.  Human  blood,  indeed,  is  by  no 
means  an  object  of  so  much  loathing  to  Mr. 
Southey,  as  the  hides  and  paunches  of  cattle. 
In  1814,  he  poured  forth  poetical  maledictions 
on  all  who  talked  of  peace  with  Bonaparte. 
He  went  over  the  field  of  Waterloo,  a  field,  be 
neath  which  twenty  thousand  of  the  stoutest 
hearts  that  ever  beat  are  mouldering,  and  cam* 
back  in  an  ecstasy,  which  he  mistook  for  poet 
ical  inspiration.  In  most  of  his  poems,  parti 
cularly  in  his  best  poem,  Roderick,  and  in  most 
of  his  prose  works,  particularly  in  The  History 
of  the  Peninsular  War,  he  shows  a  delight  in 
snuffing  up  carnage,  which  would  not  have 
misbecome  a  Scandinavian  bard,  but  which 
sometimes  seems  to  harmonize  ill  with  the 
Christian  morality.  We  do  not,  however, 
blame  Mr.  Southey  for  exulting,  even  a  little 
ferociously,  in  the  brave  deeds  of  his  country 
men,  or  for  finding  something  "comely  and 
reviving"  in  the  bloody  vengeance  inflicted  by 
an  oppressed  people  on  its  oppressors.  Now, 
surely,  if  we  find  that  a  man  whose  business  is 
to  kill  Frenchmen  may  be  humane,  we  may 
hope  that  means  may  be  found  to  render  a 
man  humane  whose  business  is  to  kill  sheep. 
If  the  brutalizing  effect  of  such  scenes  as  the 
storm  of  St.  Sebastian  may  be  counteracted, 
we  may  hope  that  in  a  Christian  Utopia,  some 
minds  might  be  proof  against  the  kennels  and 
dresses  of  Aldgate.  Mr.  Southey's  feeling, 
however,  is  easily  explained.  A  butcher's 
knife  is  by  no  means  so  elegant  as  a  sabre, 
and  a  calf  does  not  bleed  with  half  the  grace 
of  a  poor  wounded  hussar. 

It  is  in  the  same  manner  that  Mr.  Southej 
appears  to  have  formed  his  opinions  of  the 
manufacturing  system.  There  is  nothing 
which  he  hates  so  bitterly.  It  is,  according  to 
him,  a  system  more  tyrannical  than  that  of  the 
feudal  ages,  a  system  of  actual  servitude,  a 
system  which  destroys  the  bodies  and  de 
grades  the  minds  of  those  who  are  engaged 
in  it.  He  expresses  a  hope  that  the  competi 
tion  of  other  nations  may  drive  us  out  of  the 
field ;  that  our  foreign  trade  may  decline,  and 
that  we  may  thus  enjoy  a  restoration  of  na 
tional  sanity  and  strength.  But  he  seems  to 
think  that  the  extermination  of  the  whole  ma 
nufacturing  population  would  be  a  blessing, 
if  the  evil  could  be'Temoved  in  no  other  way. 

Mr.  Southey  does  not  bring  forward  a  single 
fact  in  support  of  these  views,  and,  as  it  seems 
to  us,  there  are  facts  which  lead  to  a  very- 
different  conclusion.  In  the  first  place,  the 
poor-rate  is  very  decidedly  lower  in  the  manu 
factoring  than  in  the  agricultural  districts. 
If  Mr.  Southey  will  look  over  the  Parliament 
ary  returns  on  this  subject,  he  will  nnd  that  the 
amount  of  parish  relief  required  by  the  la 
bourers  in  the  different  counties  of  England, 
is  almost  exactly  in  inverse  proportion  to  the 
degree  in  which  the  manufacturing  system 
has  been  introduced  into  those  counties.  I'W 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


returns  for  the  year  ending  in  March,  1825, 
and  in  March,  1828,  are  now  before  us.  In 
the  former  year,  we  find  the  poor-rates  highest 
in  Sussex — about  20s.  to  every  inhabitant. 
Then  come  Buckinghamshire,  Essex,  Suffolk', 
Bedfordshire,  Huntingdonshire,  Kent  and  Nor 
folk.  In  all  these  the  rate  is  above  15s.  a  head. 
We  will  not  go  through  the  whole.  Even  in 
Westmoreland,  and  the  North  Riding  of  York 
shire,  the  rate  is  at  more  than  8s.  In  Cumber 
land  and  Monmouthshire,  the  most  fortunate 
of  all  the  agricultural  districts,  it  is  at  6s. 
But  in  the  West  Riding  of  Yorkshire,  it  is  as 
low  as  5s. ;  and  when  we  come  to  Lancashire, 
we  find  it  at  4s. — one-fifth  of  what  it  is  in  Sussex. 
The  returns  of  the  year  ending  in  March,  1828, 
are  a  little,  and  but  a  little,  more  unfavourable  to 
the  manufacturing  districts.  Lancashire,  even 
in  that  season  of  distress,  required  a  smaller 
poor-rate  than  any  other  district,  and  little 
more  than  one-fourth  of  the  poor-rate  raised 
in  Sussex.  Cumberland  alone,  of  the  agricul 
tural  districts,  was  as  well  off  as  the  West 
Riding  of  Yorkshire.  These  facts  seem  to  in 
dicate  that  the  manufacturer  is  both  in  a  more 
comfortable  and  in  a  less  dependent  situation 
than  the  agricultural  labourer. 

As  to  the  effect  of  the  manufacturing  system 
on  the  bodily  health,  we  must  beg  leave  to 
estimate  it  by  a  standard  far  too  low  and  vul 
gar  for  a  mind  so  imaginative  as  that  of  Mr. 
Southey,  the  proportion  of  births  and  deaths. 
We  know  that,  during  the  growth  of  this 
atrocious  system,  this  new  misery,  (we  use 
the  phrase  of  Mr.  Southey,)  this  new  enormity, 
this  birth  of  an  portentous  age,  this  pest,  which 
no  man  can  approve  whose  heart  is  not  seared, 
or  whose  understanding  has  not  been  darkened, 
there  has  been  a  great  diminution  of  mortality, 
and  that  this  diminution  has  been  greater  in 
the  manufacturing  towns  than  anywhere  else. 
The  mortality  still  is,  as  it  always  was,  greater 
in  towns  than  in  the  country.  But  the  differ 
ence  has  diminished  in  an  extraordinary  de 
gree.  There  is  the  best  reason  to  believe,  that 
the  annual  mortality  of  Manchester,  about  the 
middle  of  the  last  century,  was  one  in  twenty- 
eight.  It  is  now  reckoned  at  one  in  forty-five. 
In  Glasgow  and  Leeds  a  similar  improvement 
has  taken  place.  Nay,  the  rate  of  mortality 
in  those  three  great  capitals  of  the  manufac 
turing  districts,  is  now  considerably  less  than 
it  Avas  fifty  years  ago  over  England  and  Wales 
taken  together,  open  country  and  all.  We 
might  with  some  plausibility  maintain,  that  the 
people  live  longer  because  they  are  better  fed, 
better  lodged,  better  clothed,  and  better  attend 
ed  in  sickness ;  and  that  these  improvements 
are  owing  to  that  increase  of  national  wealth 
which  the  manufacturing  system  has  produced. 

Much  more  might  be  said  on  this  subject. 
But  to  what  end  1  It  is  not  from  bills  of  mor 
tality  and  statistical  tables  that  Mr.  Southey 
has  learned  his  political  creed.  He  cannot 
Moop  to  study  the  history  of  the  system  which 
he  abuses,  to  strike  the  balance  between  the 
good  and  evil  which  it  has  produced,  to  com- 
paie  district  with  district,  or  generation  with 
generation.  We  will  give  his  own  reason  for 
his  opinion,  the  only  reason  which  he  gives 
£»r  it,  in  his  own  words : 


|  "We  remained  a  while  in  silence,  looking 
upon  the  assemblage  of  dwellings  below. 
I  Here,  and  in  the  adjoining  hamlet  of  Millbeck, 
the  effects  of  manufactures  and  of  agriculture 
may  be  seen  and  compared.  The  old  cottages 
are  such  as  the  poet  and  the  painter  equally 
delight  in  beholding.  Substantially  built  of 
the  native  stone  without  mortar,  dirtied  with 
no  white  lime,  and  their  long,  low  roofs  covered 
with  slate ;  if  they  had  been  raised  by  the 
magic  of  some  indigenous  Amphion's  music, 
the  materials  could  not  have  adjusted  them 
selves  more  beautifully  in  accoid  with  tho 
surrounding  scene  ;  and  time  has  still  further 
harmonized  them  with  weather-stains,  lichens, 
and  moss,  short  grasses,  and  short  fern,  and 
stone-plants  of  various  kinds.  The  orna 
mented  chimneys,  round  or  square,  less  adorn 
ed  than  those  which,  like  little  turrets,  crest 
the  houses  of  the  Portuguese  peasantry :  and 
yet  not  less  happily  suited  to  their  place,  the 
hedge  of  clipt  box  beneath  the  windows,  the 
rose  bushes  beside  the  door,  the  little  patch  of 
flower  ground,  with  its  tall  hollyhocks  in 
front;  the  garden  beside,  the  bee-hives,  and 
the  orchard  with  its  bank  of  daffodils  and 
snow-drops,  the  earliest  and  the  profusest  in 
these  parts,  indicate  in  the  owners  some  por 
tion  of  ease  and  leisure,  some  regard  to  neat 
ness  and  comfort,  some  sense  of  natural,  and 
innocent,  and  healthful  enjoyment.  The  new 
cottages  of  the  manufacturers  are  upon  the 
manufacturing  pattern — naked,  and  in  a  row. 

"How  is  it,  said  I,  that  every  thing  which  is 
connected  with  manufactures  presents  such 
features  of  unqualified  deformity  1  From  the 
largest  of  Mammon's  temples  down  to  the 
poorest  hovel  in  which  his  helotry  are  stalled, 
these  edifices  have  all  one  character.  Time 
will  not  mellow  them  ;  nature  will  never  clothe 
nor  conceal  them;  and  they  will  remain  al 
ways  as  offensive  to  the  eye  as  to  the  mind." 

Here  is  wisdom.  Here  are  the  principles 
on  which  nations  are  to  be  governed.  Rose 
bushes  and  poor-rates,  rather  than  steam-en 
gines  and  independence.  Mortality  and  cot 
tages  with  weather-stains,  rather  than  health 
and  long  life  with  edifices  which  time  cannot 
mellow.  We  are  told,  that  our  age  has  in 
vented  atrocities  beyond  the  imagination  of 
our  fathers :  that  society  has  been  brought  into 
a  state,  compared  with  which  extermination 
would  be  a  blessing;  and  all  because  the 
dwellings  of  cotton-spinners  are  naked  and 
rectangular.  Mr.  Southey  has  found  out  a 
way,  he  tells  us,  in  which  the  effects  of  manu 
factures  and  agriculture  may  be  compared. 
And  what  is  this  way  1  To  stand  on  a  hill,  to 
look  at  a  cottage  and  a  manufactory,  and  to 
ee  which  is  the  prettier.  Does  Mr.  Southey 
think  that  the  body  of  the  English  peasantry 
live,  or  ever  lived,  in  substantial  and  orna 
mented  cottages,  with  box  hedges,  flower  gar 
dens,  bee-hives,  and  orchards  ?  If  not,  what  is 
his  parallel  worth  ?  We  despise  those  filoso 
fastri,  who  think  that  they  serve  the  cause  of 
science  by  depreciating  literature  and  the  fine 
arts.  But  if  anything  could  excuse  their  nar 
rowness  of  mind,  it  would  be  such  a  book  as 
this.  It  is  not  strange  that  when  one  enthusi 
ast  makes  the  picturesque  the  test  of  political 


SOUTHEY'S   COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


105 


good,  another  should  feel  inclined  to  proscribe 
altogether  the  pleasures  of  taste  and  imagina 
tion. 

Thus  it  is  that  Mr.  Southey  reasons  about 
matters  with  which  be  thinks  himself  perfectly 
conversant.  We  cannot,  therefore,  be  surprised 
to  find  that  he  commits  extraordinary  blunders 
when  he  writes  on  points  of  which  he  acknow 
ledges  himself  to  be  ignorant.  He  confesses  that 
he  is  not  versed  in  political  economy,  that  he  has 
neither  liking  nor  aptitude  for  it ;  and  he  then 
proceeds  to  read  the  public  a  lecture  concern 
ing  it,  which  fully  bears  out  his  confession. 

"All  wealth,"  says  Sir  Thomas  More,  "in 
former  times  was  tangible.  Ijt  consisted  in 
land,  money,  or  chattels,  which  were  either  of 
real  or  conventional  value." 

Montesinos,  as  Mr.  Southey  somewhat  affect 
edly  calls  himself,  ansv/ers  : 

"  Jewels,  for  example,  and  pictures,  as  in 
Holland— where  indeed  at  one  time  tulip  bulbs 
answered  the  same  purpose." 

"That  bubble,"  says  Sir  Thomas,  "was  one 
of  those  contagious  insanities  to  which  com 
munities  are  subject.  All  wealth  was  real,  till 
the  extent  of  commerce  rendered  a  paper  cur 
rency  necessary;  which  differed  from  precious 
stones  and  pictures  in  this  important  point, 
that  there  was  no  limit  to  its  production." 

"  We  regard  it,"  says  Montesinos,  "  as  the 
representative  of  real  wealth,  and,  therefore, 
limited  always  to  the  amount  of  what  it  repre 
sents." 

"  Pursue  that  notion,"  answers  the  ghost, 
"and  you  will  be  in  the  dark  presently.  Your 
provincial  bank-notes,  which  constitute  almost 
wholly  the  circulating  medium  of  certain  dis 
tricts,  pass  current  to-day.  To-morrow,  tidings 
may  come  that  the  house  which  issued  them 
has  stopped  payment,  and  what  do  they  repre 
sent  then  1  You  will  find  them  the  shadow  of 
a  shade." 

We  scarcely  know  at  which  end  to  begin  to 
disentangle  this  knot  of  absurdities.  We  might 
ask  why  it  should  be  a  greater  proof  of  insanity 
in  men  to  set  a  high  value  on  rare  tulips  than  on 
rare  stones,  which  are  neither  more  useful  nor 
more  beautiful?  We  might  ask  how  it  can  be 
said  that  there  is  no  limit  to  the  production  of 
paper-money,  when  a  man  is  hanged  if  he 
issues  any  in  the  name  of  another,  and  is  forced 
to  cash  what  he  issues  in  his  own  ?  But  Mr. 
Southey's  error  lies  deeper  still.  "  All  wealth," 
says  he,  "was  tangible  and  real,  till  paper  cur 
rency  was  introduced."  Now,  was  there  ever, 
since  man  emerged  from  a  state  of  utter  bar 
barism,  an  age  in  which  there  were  no  debts  1 
Is  not  a  debt,  while  the  solvency  of  the  debtor 
is  undoubted,  always  reckoned  as  part  of  the 
wealth  of  the  creditor1?  Yet  is  it  tangible  and 
real  wealth  ]  Does  it  cease  to  be  wealth,  be 
cause  there  is  the  security  of  a  written  acknow 
ledgment  for  it  ]  And  what  else  is  paper  cur 
rency  1  Did  Mr.  Southey  ever  read  a  bank 
note  ]  If  he  did,  he  would  see  that  it  is  a  writ 
ten  acknowledgment  of  a  debt,  and  a  promise 
to  pay  that  debt.  The  promise  may  be  violated, 
the  debt  may  remain  unpaid,  those  to  whom  it 
was  due  may  suffer:  but  this  is  a  risk  not  con 
fined  to  cases  of  paper  currency;  it  is  a  risk 
inseparable  from  the  relation,  of  debtor  and 

VOL.   I.— -14 


creditor.  Every  man  who  sells  goods  for  any 
thing  but  ready  money,  runs  the  risk  of  finding 
that  what  he  considered  as  part  of  his  wealih 
one  day,  is  nothing  at  all  the  next  day.  Mr. 
Southey  refers  to  the  picture-galleries  of  Hol 
land.  The  pictures  were  undoubtedly  real  and 
tangible  possessions.  But  surely  it  might  hap 
pen  that  a  burgomaster  might  owe  a  picture- 
dealer  a  thousand  guilders  for  a  Teniers. 
What  in  this  case  corresponds  to  our  paper- 
money  is  not  the  picture,  which  is  tangible, 
but  the  claim  of  the  picture-dealer  on  his  cus 
tomer  for  the  price  of  the  picture,  Avhich  is  not 
tangible.  Now,  would  not  the  picture-dealer 
consider  this  claim  as  part  of  his  wealth] 
Would  not  a  tradesman  who  knew  of  it  give 
credit  to  the  picture-dealer  the  more  readiiy  on 
account  of  it]  The  burgomaster  might  be 
ruined.  If  so,  would  not  those  consequences 
follow  which,  as  Mr.  Southey  tells  us,  were 
never  heard  of  till  paper-money  came  into  use? 
Yesterday  this  claim  was  worth  a  thousand 
guilders.  To-day  what  is  it]  The  shadow  of 
a  shade. 

It  is  true,  that  the  more  readily  claims  of 
this  sort  are  transferred  from  hand  to  hand,  the 
more  extensive  will  be  the  injury  produced  by 
a  single  failure.  The  laws  of  all  nations  sanc 
tion,  in  certain  cases,  the  transfer  of  rights  not 
yet  reduced  into  possession.  Mr.  Southey 
would  scarcely  wish,  we  should  think,  that  all 
endorsements  of  bills  and  notes  should  be  de 
clared  invalid.  Yet  even  if  this  were  done,  the 
transfer  of  claims  would  imperceptibly  take 
place  to  a  very  great  extent.  When  the  baker 
trusts  the  butcher,  for  example,  he  is  in  fact, 
though  not  in  form,  trusting  the  butcher's  cus 
tomers.  A  man  who  owes  large  bills  to  trades 
men,  and  fails  to  pay  them,  almost  always  pro 
duces  distress  through  a  very  wide  circle  of 
people  whom  he  never  dealt  with. 

In  short,  what  Mr.  Southey  takes  for  a  differ 
ence  in  kind,  is  only  a  difference  of  form  and 
degree.  In  every  society  men  have  claims  on 
the  property  of  others.  In  every  society  there 
is  a  possibility  that  some  debtors  may  not  be 
able  to  fulfil  their  obligations.  In  every  socie 
ty,  therefore,  there  is  wealth  which  is  not  tan 
gible,  and  which  may  become  the  shadow  of  a 
shade. 

Mr.  Southey  then  proceeds  to  a  dissertation 
on  the  national  debt,  which  he  considers  in  a 
new  and  most  consolatory  light,  as  a  clear  ad 
dition  to  the  income  of  the  country. 

"  You  can  understand,"  says  Sir  Thomas, 
"  that  it  constitutes  a  great  part  of  the  national 
wealth." 

"  So  large  a  part,"  answers  Montesinos, "  that 
the  interest  amounted,  during  the  prosperous 
time  of  agriculture,  to  as  much  as  the  rental 
of  all  the  land  in  Great  Britain  ;  and  at  present 
to  the  rental  of  all  lands,  all  houses,  and  ail 
other  fixed  property  put  together." 

The  ghost  and  the  laureate  agree  that  it  is 
very  desirable  that  there  should  be  so  secure 
and  advantageous  a  deposit  for  wealth  as  the 
funds  afford.  Sir  Thomas  then  proceeds  : 

"  Another  and  far  more  momentous  benefit 
must  not  be  overlooked  :  the  expenditure  of  an 
annual  interest,  equalling,  as  you  have  stated, 
the  present  rental  of  all  fixed  property." 


106 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


"  That  expenditure,"  quoth  Montesinos, 
"gives  employment  to  half  the  industry  in  the 
kingdom,  and  feeds  half  the  mouths.  Take, 
indeed,  the  weight  of  the  national  debt  from 
this  great  and  complicated  social  machine, 
and  the  wheels  must  stop." 

From  this  passage  we  should  have  been  in 
clined  to  think  that  Mr.  Southey  supposes  the 
dividends  to  be  a  free  gift  periodically  sent 
down  from  heaven  to  the  fundholders,  as  quails 
and  manna  were  sent  to  the  Israelites,  were  it 
not  that  he  has  vouchsafed,  in  the  following 
question  and  answer,  to  give  the  public  some 
information  which,  we  believe,  was  very  little 
needed. 

"Whence  comes  the  interest  1"  says  Sir 
Thomas. 

"  It  is  raised,"  answers  Montesinos, "  by  tax 
ation." 

Now,  has  Mr.  Southey  ever  considered  what 
would  be  done  with  this  sum,  if  it  were  not 
paid  as  interest  to  the  national  creditor  1  If 
he  would  think  over  this  matter  for  a  short 
time,  we  suspect  that  the  "  momentous  benefit" 
of  which  he  talks  would  appear  to  him  to  shrink 
strangely  in  amount.  A  fundholder,  we  will 
suppose,  spends  an  income  of  five  hundred 
pounds  a  year,  and  his  ten  nearest  neighbours 
pay  fifty  pounds  each  to  the  tax-gatherer,  for 
the  purpose  of  discharging  the  interest  of  the 
national  debt.  If  the  debt  were  wiped  out,  (a 
measure,  be  it  understood,  which  we  by  no 
means  recommend,)  the  fundholder  would 
cease  to  spend  his  five  hundred  pounds  a  year. 
He  would  no  longer  give  employment  to  indus 
try,  or  put  food  into  the  mouths  of  labourers. 
This  Mr.  Southey  thinks  a  fearful  evil.  But  is 
there  no  mitigating  circumstance!  Each  of 
his  ten  neighbours  has  fifty  pounds  more  than 
formerly.  Each  of  them  will,  as  it  seems  to 
our  feeble  understandings,  employ  more  indus 
try  and  feed  more  mouths  than  formerly.  The 
sum  is  exactly  the  same.  It  is  in  different 
hands.  But  on  what  grounds  does  Mr.  Southey 
call  upon  us  to  believe  that  it  is  in  the  hands 
of  men  who  will  spend  less  liberally  or  less 
judiciously  1  He  seems  to  think  that  nobody 
but  a  fundholder  can  employ  the  poor ;  that  if 
a  tax  is  remitted,  those  Avho  formerly  used  to 
pay  it  proceed  immediately  to  dig  holes  in  the 
earth,  and  bury  the  sum  which  the  government 
had  been  accustomed  to  take ;  that  no  money 
can  set  industry  in  motion  till  it  has  been  taken 
by  the  tax-gatherer  out  of  one  man's  pocket 
and  put  into  another  man's.  We  really  wish 
that  Mr.  Southey  would  try  to  prove  this  prin 
ciple,  which  is,  indeed,  the  foundation  of  his 
whole  theory  of  finance  ;  for  we  think  it  right 
to  hint  to  him,  that  our  hard-hearted  and  un 
imaginative  generation  will  expect  some  more 
satisfactory  reason  than  the  only  one  with 
which  he  has  yet  favoured  it — a  similitude 
touching  evaporation  and  dew. 

Boih  the  theory  and  the  illustration,  indeed, 
are  old  friends  of  ours.  In  every  season  of 
distress  which  we  can  remember,  Mr.  Southey 
has  been  proclaiming  that  it  is  not  from  eco 
nomy,  but  from  increased  taxation,  that  the 
country  must  expect  relief;  and  he  still,  we 
find,  places  the  undoubting  faith  of  a  political 
Dialoirus  in  his 


"Resaignare,  rfpurgare,  et  reclysterizare." 

"A  people,"  he  tells  us,  "  may  be  too  rich, 
but  a  government  cannot  be  so." 

"A  state,"  says  he,  "cannot  have  more 
'  wealth  at  its  command  than  may  be  employed 
for  the  general  good,  a  liberal  expenditure  in 
national  works  being  one  of  the  surest  means 
for  promoting  national  prosperity,  and  the  be 
nefit  being  still  more  obvious  of  an  expenditure 
directed  to  the  purposes  of  national  improve 
ment.  But  a  people  may  be  too  rich." 

We  fully  admit  that  a  state  cannot  have  at 
its  command  more  wealth  than  may  be.  employ 
ed  for  the  general  good.  But  neither  can  indi 
viduals  or  bodies  of  individuals  have  at  their 
command  more  wealth  than  may  be  employed 
for  the  general  good.  If  there  be  no  limit  to 
the  sum  which  may  be  usefully  laid  out  in 
public  works  and  national  improvement,  then 
wealth,  whether  in  the  hands  of  private  men 
or  of  the  government,  may  always,  if  the  pos 
sessor  choose  to  spend  it  usefully,  bs  usefully 
spent.  The  only  ground,  therefore,  en  which 
Mr.  Southey  can  possibly  maintain  that  a  go 
vernment  cannot  be  too  rich,  but  that  a  people 
may  be  too  rich,  must  be  this,  that  governments 
are  more  likely  to  spend  their  money  on  good 
objects  than  private  individuals. 

But  what  is  useful  expenditure?  "A  libe 
ral  expenditure  in  national  works,"  says  Mr. 
Southey,  "  is  one  of  the  surest  moans  for  pro 
moting  national  prosperity."  What  does  he 
mean  by  national  prosperity  ?  Does  he  mean 
the  wealth  of  the  state?  If  so,  his  reasoning 
runs  thus : — The  more  wealth  a  state  has  the 
better;  for  the  more  wealth  a  state  has  the 
more  wealth  it  will  have.  This  is  surely 
something  like  that  fallacy  which  is  ungal- 
lantly  termed  a  lady's  reason.  If  by  national 
prosperity  he  means  the  wealth  of  the  people, 
of  how  gross  a  contradiction  is  he  guilty!  A 
people,  he  tells  us,  may  be  too  rich  ;  a  govern 
ment  cannot;  for  a  government  can  employ 
its  riches  in  making  the  people  richer.  The 
wealth  of  the  people  is  to  be  taken  from  them, 
because  they  have  too  much,  and  laid  out  in 
works  which  yield  them  more. 

We  are  really  at  a  loss  to  determine  whe 
ther  Mr.  Southey's  reason  for  recommending 
large  taxation  is  that  it  will  make  the  people 
rich,  or  that  it  will  make  them  poor.  But  we 
are  sure  that  if  his  object  is  to  make  them 
rich,  he  takes  the  wrong  course.  There  are 
two  or  three  principles  respecting  public 
works,  which,  as  an  experience  of  vast  extent 
proves,  may  be  trusted  in  almost  every  case. 

It  scarcely  ever  happens  that  any  private 
man,  or  body  of  men,  will  invest  property  ir 
canal,  a  tunnel,  or  a  bridge,  but  from  an  ex 
pectation  that  the  outlay  will  be  profitable  to 
them.  No  work  of  this  sort  can  be  profitable 
to  private  speculators,  unless  the  public  be 
willing  to  pay  for  the  use  of  it.  The  public 
will  not  pay  of  their  own  accord  for  what 
yields  no  profit  or  convenience  to  them.  There 
is  thus  a  direct  and  obvious  connection  be 
tween  the  motive  which  induces  individuals 
to  undertake  such  a  work,  and  the  utility  of 
the  work. 

Can  we  find  any  such  connection  in  the 
case  of  a  public  work  executed  by  a  govern- 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


107 


merit.  If  it  is  useful,  are  the  individuals  who 
rule  the  country  richer  1  If  it  is  useless,  are 
they  poorer  1  A  public  man  may  be  solicitous 
for  his  credit:  but  is  not  he  likely  to  gain 
Tiore  credit  by  a  useless  display  of  ostenta 
tious  architecture  in  a  great  town,  than  by  the 
best  road  or  the  best  canal  in  some  remote 
province1?  The  fame  of  public  works  is  a 
much  less  certain  test  of  their  utility,  than  the 
amount  of  toll  collected  at  them.  In  a  corrupt 
age,  there  will  be  a  direct  embezzlement.  In 
the  purest  age,  there  will  be  abundance  of 
jobbing.  Never  were  the  statesmen  of  any 
country  more  sensitive  to  public  opinion,  and 
more  spotless  in  pecuniary  transactions,  than 
those  who  have  of  late  governed  England. 
Yet  we  have  only  to  look  at  the  buildings  re 
cently  erected  in  London  for  a  proof  of  our 
rule.  In  a  bad  age,  the  fate  of  the  public  is  to 
be  robbed.  In  a  good  age,  it  is  much  milder 
—merely  to  have  the  dearest  and  the  worst  of 
every  thing. 

Buildings  for  state  purposes  the  state  must 
erect.  And  here  we  think  that,  in  general,  the 
state  ought  to  stop.  We  firmly  believe,  that 
five  hundred  thousand  pounds  subscribed  by 
individuals  for  railroads  or  canals,  would  pro 
duce  more  advantage  to  the  public  than  five 
millions  voted  by  Parliament  for  the  same 
purpose.  There  are  certain  old  saws  about 
the  master's  eye,  and  about  everybody's  busi 
ness,  in  which  we  place  very  great  faith. 

There  is,  we  have  said,  no  consistency  in 
Mr.  Southey's  political  system.  But  if  there 
be  in  it  any  leading  principle,  if  there  be  any 
one  error  which  diverges  more  widely  and 
variously  than  any  other,  it  is  that  of  which 
his  theory  about  national  works  is  a  rami 
fication.  He  conceives  that  the  business  of 
the  magistrate  is,  not  merely  to  see  that  the 
persons  and  property  of  the  people  are  secure 
from  attack,  but  that  he  ought  to  be  a  perfect 
jack  of  all  trades,  architect,  engineer,  school 
master,  merchant,  theologian,  a  Lady  Boun 
tiful  in  every  parish,  a  Paul  Pry  in  every 
house,  spying,  eaves-dropping,  relieving,  ad 
monishing,  spending  our  money  for  us,  and 
choosing  our  opinions  for  us.  His  principle 
is,  if  we  understand  it  rightly,  that  no  man  can 
do  any  thing  so  well  for  himself,  as  his  rulers, 
be  they  who  they  may,  can  do  it  for  him ;  that 
a  government  approaches  nearer  and  nearer 
to  perfection,  in  proportion  as  it  interferes 
more  and  more  with  the  habits  and  notions  of 
individuals. 

He  seems  to  be  fully  convinced,  that  it  is  in 
the  power  of  government  to  relieve  the  dis 
tresses  under  which  the  lower  orders  labour. 
Nay,  he  considers  doubt  on  this  subject  as  im 
pious.  We  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  his 
argumen/  on  this  subject.  It  is  a  perfect  jewel 
of  logic. 

"  Many  thousands  in  your  metropolis,"  says 
Sir  Thomas  More,  "  rise  every  morning  with 
out  knowing  how  they  are  to  subsist  during 
the  day ;  as  many  of  them,  where  they  are  to 
lay  their  heads  at  night.  All  men,  even  the 
vicious  themselves,  know  that  wickedness 
leads  to  misery;  but  many,  even  among  the 
good  and  the  wise,  have  yet  to  learn  that  mise 
ry  is  almost  as  often  the  cause  of  wickedness." 


"  There  are  many,"  says  Montesinos,  "  who 
know  this,  but  believe  that  it  is  not  in  the 
power  of  human  institutions  to  prevent  thi» 
misery.  They  see  the  effect,  but  regard  the 
causes  as  inseparable  from  the  condition  of 
human  nature." 

"As  surely  as  God  is  good,"  replies  Sir 
Thomas,  "  so  surely  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
necessary  evil.  For,  by  the  religious  mind, 
sickness,  and  pain,  and  death  are  not  to  be  ac 
counted  evils." 

Now,  if  sickness,  pain,  and  death  are  not 
evils,  we  cannot  understand  why  it  should  be 
an  evil  that  thousands  should  rise  without 
knowing  how  they  are  to  subsist.  The  only 
evil  of  hunger  is,  that  it  produces  first  pain, 
then  sickness,  and  finally  death.  If  it  did  not 
produce  these,  it  would  be  no  calamity.  If 
these  are  not  evils,  it  is  no  calamity.  We 
cannot  conceive  why  it  should  be  a  greater 
impeachment  of  the  Divine  goodness,  that 
some  men  should  not  be  able  to  find  food  to 
eat,  than  that  others  should  have  stomachs 
which  derive  no  nourishment  from  food  when 
they  have  eaten  it.  Whatever  physical  effects 
want  produces,  may  also  be  produced  by 
disease.  Whatever  salutary  effects  disease 
may  produce,  may  also  be  produced  by  want. 
If  poverty  makes  men  thieves,  disease  and 
pain  often  sour  the  temper  and  contract  the 
heart. 

We  will  propose  a  very  plain  dilemma: 
Either  physical  pain  is  an  evil,  or  it  is  not  an 
evil.  If  it  is  an  evil,  then  there  is  necessary 
evil  in  the  universe :  if  it  is  not,  why  should 
the  poor  be  delivered  from  it  1 

Mr.  Southey  entertains  as  exaggerated  a 
notion  of  the  wisdom  of  governments  as  of 
their  power.  He  speaks  with  the  greatest  dis 
gust  of  the  respect  now  paid  to  public  opinion. 
That  opinion  is,  according  to  him,  to  be  dis 
trusted  and  dreaded ;  its  usurpation  ought  to  be 
vigorously  resisted;  and  the  practice  of  yield 
ing  to  it  is  likely  to  ruin  the  country.  To 
maintain  police  is,  accoiding  to  him,  only  une 
of  the  ends  of  government.  Its  duties  are  pa 
triarchal  and  paternal.  It  ought  to  consider 
the  moral  discipline  of  the  people  as  its  first 
object,  to  establish  a  religion,  to  train  the 
whole  community  in  that  religion,  and  to  con 
sider  all  dissenters  as  its  OAvn  enemies. 

"  Nothing,"  says  Sir  Thomas,  "  is  more  cer 
tain  than  that  religion  is  the  basis  upon  which 
civil  government  rests;  that  from  religion 
power  derives  its  authority,  laws  their  efficacy, 
and  both  their  zeal  and  sanction ;  and  it  is  ne 
cessary  that  this  religion  be  established  for 
the  security  of  the  state  and  for  the  welfare  of 
the  people,  who  would  otherwise  be  moved  to 
and  fro  with  every  wind  of  doctrine.  A  state 
is  secure  in  proportion  as  the  people  are  at 
tached  to  its  institutions ;  it  is,  therefore,  the 
first  and  plainest  rule  of  sound  policy,  that  the 
people  be  trained  up  in  the  way  they  should 
go.  The  state  that  neglects  this  prepares  its 
,  own  destruction  ;  and  they  who  train  them  up 
in  any  other  way  are  undermining  it.  Nothing 
in  abstract  science  can  be  more  certain  than 
these  positions  are." 

"  All  of  which,"  answers  Montesinos,  "are 
I  nevertheless  denied  by  our  professors  "f  tia* 


108 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


arts  Babblative  and  Scribblative,  some  in  the 
audacity  of  evil  designs,  and  others  in  the 
glorious  assurance  of  impenetrable  igno 
rance." 

The  greater  part  of  the  two  volumes  before 
us  is  merely  an  amplification  of  these  absurd 
paragraphs.  What  does  Mr.  Southey  mean 
by  saying,  that  religion  is  demonstrably  the 
basis  of  civil  government  ?  He  cannot  surely 
mean  that  men  have  no  motives,  except  those 
derived  from  religion,  for  establishing  and 
supporting  civil  government,  that  no  temporal 
advantage  is  derived  from  civil  government, 
that  man  would  experience  no  temporal  incon 
venience  from  living  in  a  state  of  anarchy. 
If  he  allows,  as  we  think  he  must  allow,  that 
it  is  for  the  good  of  mankind  in  this  world 
to  have  civil  government,  and  that  the  great 
majority  of  mankind  have  always  thought  it 
for  their  good  in  this  world  to  have  civil  go 
vernment,  we  then  have  a  basis  for  govern 
ment  quite  distinct  from  religion.  It  is  true, 
that  the  Christian  religion  sanctions  govern 
ment,  as  it  sanctions  every  thing  which  pro 
motes  the  happiness  and  virtue  of  our  species. 
But  we  are  at  a  loss  to  conceive  in  what  sense 
religion  can  be  said  to  be  the  basis  of  govern 
ment,  in  which  it  is  not  also  the  basis  of  the 
practices  of  eating,  drinking,  and  lighting  fires 
in  cold  weather.  Nothing  in  history  is  more 
certain  than  that  government  has  existed,  has 
received  some  obedience  and  given  some  pro- 
lection,  in  times  in  which  it  derived  no  sup 
port  from  religion,  in  times  in  which  there 
was  no  religion  that  influenced  the  hearts  and 
lives  of  men.  It  was  not  from  dread  of  Tarta 
rus,  or  belief  in  the  Elysian  fields,  that  an 
Athenian  wished  to  have  some  institutions 
which  might  keep  Orestes  from  filching  his 
cloak,  or  Midias  from  breaking  his  head.  "It 
is  from  religion,"  says  Mr.  Southey,  "that 
power  derives  its  authority,  and  laws  their 
efficacy."  From  what  religion  does  our  power 
over  the  Hindoos  derive  its  authority,  or  the 
law  in  virtue  of  which  we  hang  Brahmins,  its 
efficacy  ?  For  thousands  of  years  civil  go 
vernment  has  existed  in  almost  every  corner 
of  the  world,  in  ages  of  priestcraft,  in  ages  of 
fanaticism,  in  ages  of  epicurean  indifference, 
in  ages  of  enlightened  piety.  However  pure 
or  impure  the  faith  of  the  people  might  be, 
whether  they  adored  a  beneficent  or  malignant 
power,  whether  they  thought  the  soul  mortal 
or  immortal,  they  have,  as  soon  as  they  ceased 
to  be  absolute  savages,  found  out  their  need  of 
civil  government,  and  instituted  it  according 
ly.  It  is  as  universal  as  the  practice  of  cook 
ery.  Yet,  it  is  as  certain,  says  Mr.  Southey, 
as  any  thing  in  abstract  science,  that  govern 
ment  Is  founded  on  religion.  We  should  like 
to  know  what  notion  Mr.  Southey  has  of  the 
demonstrations  of  abstract  science.  But  a 
vague  one,  we  suspect. 

The  proof  proceeds.  As  religion  is  the  basis 
of  government,  and  as  the  state  is  secure  in 
proportion  as  the  people  are  attached  to  its  in 
stitutions,  it  is,  therefore,  says  Mr.  Southey,  the 
first  rule  of  policy,  that  the  government  should 
train  the  people  in  the  way  in  which  they 
should  go ;  and  it  is  plain,  that  those  who 


train  them  in  any  other  way,  are  undermining 
the  state. 

Now  it  does  not  appear  to  us  to  be  the  first 
object  that  people  should  always  believe  in  the 
established  religion,  and  be  attached  to  the 
established  government.  A  religion  may  be 
false.  A  government  may  be  oppressive.  And 
whatever  support  government  gives  to  false 
religions,  or  religion  to  oppressive  govern 
ments,  we  consider  as  a  clear  evil. 

The  maxim,  that  governments  ought  to  train 
the  people  in  the  \vay  in  \vhich  they  should  go, 
sounds  well.  But  is  there  any  reason  for 
believing  that  a  government  is  more  likely  to 
lead  the  people  in  the  right  way,  than  the 
people  to  fall  into  the  right  way  of  themselves! 
Have  there  not  been  governments  which  were 
blind  leaders  of  the  blind?  Are  there  not  still 
such  governments  1  Can  it  be  laid  down  as  a 
general  rule  that  the  movement  of  political  and 
religious  truth  is  rather  downwards  from  the 
government  to  the  people,  than  upwards  from 
the  people  to  the  government !  These  are 
questions  which  it  is  of  importance  to  have 
*clearly  resolved.  Mr.  Southey  declaims  against 
public  opinion,  which  is  now,  he  tells  us, 
usurping  supreme  power.  Formerly,  accord 
ing  to  him,  the  laws  governed ;  now  public 
opinion  governs.  What  are  laws  but  expres 
sions  of  the  opinion  of  some  class  which  has 
poAver  over  the  rest  of  the  community?  By 
what  was  the  world  ever  governed,  but  by  the 
opinion  of  some  person  or  persons  ?  By  what 
else  can  it  ever  be  governed?  What  are  all 
systems,  religious,  political,  or  scientific,  but 
opinions  resting  on  evidence  more  or  less  sa 
tisfactory  ?  The  question  is  not  between  hu 
man  opinion,  and  some  higher  and  more  cer 
tain  mode  of  arriving  at  truth,  but  between 
opinion  and  opinion,  between  the  opinion  of 
one  man  and  another,  or  of  one  class  and 
another,  or  of  one  generation  and  another 
Public  opinion  is  not  infallible;  but  can  Mr 
Southey  construct  any  institutions  which  shall 
secure  to  us  the  guidance  of  an  infallible  opi 
nion?  Can  Mr.  Southey  select  any  family, 
any  profession,  any  class  in  short, distinguished 
by  any  plain  badge  from  the  rest  of  the  com 
munity,  whose  opinion  is  more  likely  to  be 
just  than  this  much  abused  public  opinion  t 
Would  he  choose  the  peers,  for  example  ?  Or 
the  two  hundred  tallest  men  in  the  country  1 
Or  the  poor  Knights  of  Windsor  ?  Or  children 
who  are  born  with  cauls,  seventh  sons  of  se 
venth  sons?  We  cannot  suppose  that  he 
would  recommend  popular  election :  for  that 
is  merely  an  appeal  to  public  opinion.  And 
to  say  that  society  ought  to  be  governed  by  the 
opinion  of  the  wisest  and  best,  though  true,  is 
useless.  Whose  opinion  is  to  decide  who  are 
the  wisest  and  best  ? 

Mr.  Southey  and   many  other    respectable 

people  seem  to  think  that  when  they  have  once 

proved  the  moral  and  religious  training  of  the 

people  to  be  a  most  important  object,  it  fol- 

lows,  of  course,  that  it  is  an  object  which  the 

j  government  ought  to  pursue.   They  forget  that 

i  we  have  to  consider,  not  merely  the  goodness 

j  of  the  end,  but  also  the  fitness  of  the  means. 

1  Neither  in  the  natural  nor  in  the  political  body 


SOUTHEY'S   COLLOQUIES   ON  SOCIETY. 


109 


have  all  members  the  same  office.  There  is  j 
surely  no  contradiction  in  saying  that  a  certain  ' 
section  of  the  community  may  be  quite  com-  j 
pelent  to  protect  the  persons  and  property  of 
the  rest,  yet  quite  unfit  to  direct  our  opinions,  | 
or  to  superintend  our  private  habits. 

So  strong  is  the  interest  of  a  ruler  to  pro 
tect  his  subjects  against  all  depredations  and 
outrages  except  his  own,  so  clear  and  simple 
are  the  means  by  which  this  end  is  to  be 
effected,  that  men  are  probably  better  off  under 
the  worst  governments  in  the  world  than  they 
would  be  in  a  state  of  anarchy.  Even  when 
the  appointment  of  magistrates  has  been  left 
to  chance,  as  in  the  Italian  republics,  things 
have  gone  on  better  than  they  would  have 
done,  if  there  had  been  no  magistrates  at  all, 
and  every  man  had  done  what  seemed  right  in 
his  own  eyes.  But  we  see  no  reason  for  think 
ing  that  the  opinions  of  the  magistrate  are 
more  likely  to  be  right  than  those  of  any  other 
man.  None  of  the  modes  by  which  rulers  are 
appointed,  popular  election,  the  accident  of  the 
lot,  or  the  accident  of  birth,  afford,  as  far  as 
we  can  perceive,  much  security  for  their  being 
wiser  than  any  of  their  neighbours.  The  chance 
of  their  being  wiser  than  all  their  neighbours 
together  is  still  smaller.  Now  we  cannot  con 
ceive  how  it  can  be  laid  down,  that  it  is  the 
duty  and  the  right  of  one  class  to  direct  the 
opinions  of  another,  unless  it  can  be  proved 
that  the  former  class  is  more  likely  to  form 
just  opinions  than  the  latter. 

The  duties  of  government  would  be,  as  Mr. 
Southey  says  that  they  are,  paternal,  if  a  go 
vernment  were  necessarily  as  much  superior 
in  wisdom  to  a  people,  as  the  most  foolish 
father,  for  a  time,  is  to  the  most  intelligent 
child,  and  if  a  government  loved  a  people  as 
fathers  generally  love  their  children.  But 
there  is  no  reason  to  believe,  that  a  govern 
ment  will  either  have  the  paternal  warmth  of 
affection  or  the  paternal  superiority  of  intel 
lect.  Mr.  Soulhey  might  as  well  say,  that  the 
duties  of  the  shoemaker  are  paternal,  and  that 
it  is  a  usurpation  in  any  man  not  of  the  craft 
to  say  that  his  shoes  are  bad,  and  to  insist  on 
having  better.  The  division  of  labour  would 
be  no  blessing,  if  those  by  whom  a  thing  is 
done  were  to  pay  no  attention  to  the  opinion 
of  those  for  whom  it  is  done.  The  shoemaker, 
in  the  Relapse,  tells  Lord  Foppington,  that  his 
lordship  is  mistaken  in  supposing  that  his 
shoe  pinches.  "It  does  not  pinch,  it  cannot 
pinch;  I  know  my  business,  and  I  never  made 
a  better  shoe."  This  is  the  way  in  which  Mr. 
Southey  would  have  a  government  treat  a 
people  who  usurp  the  privilege  of  thinking. 
Nay,  the  shoemaker  of  Vanbrugh  has  the  ad 
vantage  in  the  comparison.  He  contented 
himself  with  regulating  his  customer's  shoes, 
about  which  he  knew  something,  and  did  not 
presume  to  dictate  about  the  coat  and  hat. 
But  Mr.  Southey  would  have  the  rulers  of  a 
country  prescribe  opinions  to  the  people,  not 
only  about  politics,  but  about  matters  concern 
ing  which  a  government  has  no  peculiar 
sources  of  information,  concerning  which  any 
man  in  the  streets  may  know  as  much,  and 
think  as  justly,  as  a  king — religion  and  mo 
rals. 


Men  are  never  so  likely  to  settle  a  question 
rightly  as  when  they  discuss  it  freely.  A  go 
vernment  can  interfere  in  discussion,  only  by 
making  it  less  free  than  it  would  otherwise  be. 
Men  are  most  likely  to  form  just  opinions 
when  they  have  no  other  wish  than  to  know 
he  truth,  and  are  exempt  from  all  influence, 
either  of  hope  or  fear.  Government,  as  go 
vernment,  can  bring  nothing  but  the  influence 
of  hopes  and  fears  to  support  its  doctrines.  It 
carries  on  controversy,  not  with  reasons,  but 
with  threats  and  bribes.  If  it  employs  reasons, 
t  does  so  not  in  virtue  of  any  powers  which 
belong  to  it  as  a  government.  Thus,  instead 
of  a  contest  between  argument  and  argument, 
we  have  a  contest  between  argument  and 
force.  Instead  of  a  contest  in  which  truth, 
from  the  natural  constitution  of  the  human 
mind,  has  a  decided  advantage  over  falsehood, 
we  have  a  contest  in  which  truth  can  be  vic 
torious  only  by  accident. 

And  v/hat,  after  all,  is  the  security  which 
this  training  gives  to  governments!  Mr.  Sou 
they  would  scarcely  recommend  that  discus- 
ion  should  be  more  effectually  shackled,  that 
public  opinion  should  be  more  strictly  disci 
plined  into  conformity  with  established  insti 
tutions,  than  in  Spain  and  Italy.  Yet  we  know 
that  the  restraints  which  exist  in  Spain  and 
Italy  have  not  prevented  atheism  from  spread 
ing  among  the  educated  classes,  and  especially 
among  those  whose  office  it  is  to  minister  at 
the  altars  of  God.  All  our  readers  know  how, 
at  the  time  of  the  French  Revolution,  priest 
after  priest  came  forward  to  declare  that  his 
doctrine,  his  ministry,  his  whole  life,  had  been 
a  lie,  a  mummery  during  which  he  could 
scarcely  compose  his  countenance  sufficiently 
to  carry  on  the  imposture.  This  was  the  case 
of  a  false,  or  at  least  a  grossly  corrupted  reli 
gion.  Let  us  take,  then,  the  case  of  all  others 
the  most  favourable  to  Mr.  Southey's  argu 
ment.  Let  us  take  that  form  of  religion  which 
he  holds  to  be  the  purest,  the  system  of  the  Ar- 
minian  part  of  the  Church  of  E'ngland.  Let  us 
take  the  form  of  government  which  he  most 
admires  and  regrets,  the  government  of  Eng 
land  in  the  time  of  Charles  the  First.  Would 
he  wish  to  see  a  closer  connection  between 
church  and  state  than  then  existed  1  Would 
he  wish  for  more  powerful  ecclesiastical  tri 
bunals]  for  a  more  zealous  king?  for  a  more 
active  primate]  Would  he  wish  to  see  a  more 
complete  monopoly  of  public  instruction  given 
to  the  Established  Church]  Could  any  govern 
ment  do  more  to  train  the  people  in  the  way 
in  which  he  would  have  them  go?  And  in 
what  did  all  this  training  end]  The  Report 
of  the  state  of  the  province  of  Canterbury,  de 
livered  by  Laud  to  his  Master  at  the  close  of 
1639,  represents  the  Church  of  England  as  in 
the  highest  and  most  palmy  state.  So  effectu 
ally  had  the  government  pursued  that  policy 
which  Mr.  Southey  wishes  to  see  revived,  that 
there  was  scarcely  the  least  appearance  of  dis 
sent.  Most  of  the  bishops  stated  that  all  was 
well  among  their  flocks.  Seven  or  eight  per 
sons  of  the  diocese  of  Peterborough  had  iseem- 
ed  refractory  to  the  church,  but  had  made  am 
ple  submission.  In  Norfolk  and  Suffolk  all 
whom  there  had  been  reason  to  suspect  had 
K 


110 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


made  profession  of  conformity,  and  appeared 
to  observe  it  strictly.  It  is  confessed  that 
there  was  a  little  difficulty  in  bringing  some 
of  the  vulgar  in  Suffolk  to  take  the  sacrament 
at  the  rails  in  the  chancel.  This  is  the  only 
open  instance  of  nonconformity  which  the 
vigilant  eye  of  Laud  could  find  in  all  the  dio 
ceses  of  his  twenty-one  suffragans,  on  the 
very  eve  of  a  revolution  in  which  primate  and 
church,  and  monarch  and  monarchy,  were  to 
perish  together. 

At  which  time  would  Mr.  Southey  pronounce 
the  constitution  more  secure;  in  1639,  when 
Laud  presented  this  report  to  Charles,  or  now, 
when  thousands  of  meetings  openly  collect 
millions  of  dissenters,  when  designs  against 
the  tithes  are  openly  avofwed,  when  books  at 
tacking  not  only  the  Establishment,  but  the 
first  principles  of  Christianity,  are  openly  sold 
in  the  streets?  The  signs  of  discontent,  he 
tells  us,  are  stronger  in  England  now  than  in 
France  when  the  States-general  met ;  and 
hence  he  would  have  us  infer  that  a  revolu 
tion  like  that  of  France  may  be  at  hand.  Does 
he  not  know  that  the  danger  of  states  is  to  be 
estimated,  not  by  what  breaks  cut  of  the  pub 
lic  mind,  but  by  what  stays  in  itl  Can  he 
conceive  any  thing  more  terrible  than  the  situ 
ation  of  a  government  which  rules  without  ap 
prehension  over  a  people  of  hypocrites;  which 
is  flattered  by  the  press,  and  cursed  in  the  in 
ner  chambers ;  which  exults  in  the  attachment 
and  obedience  of  its  subjects,  and  knows  not 
that  those  subjects  are  leagued  against  it  in  a 
freemasonry  of  hatred,  the  sign  of  which  is 
every  day  conveyed  in  the  glance  of  ten  thou 
sand  eyes,  the  pressure  of  ten  thousand  hands, 
and  the  tone  of  ten  thousand  voices  1  Pro 
found  and  ingenious  policy!  Instead  of  cur 
ing  the  disease,  to  remove  those  symptoms  by 
which  alone  its  nature  can  be  known !  To 
leave  the  serpent  his  deadly  sting,  and  deprive 
him  only  of  his  warning  rattle  ! 

When  the  people  whom  Charles  had  so  as 
siduously  trained  in  the  good  -way  had  reward 
ed  his  paternal  care  by  cutting  off  his  head,  a 
new  kind  of  training  came  into  fashion.  An 
other  government  arose,  which,  like  the  for 
mer,  considered  religion  as  its  surest  basis, 
and  the  religious  discipline  of  the  people  as 
its  first  duty.  Sanguinary  laws  were  enacted 
against  libertinism;  profane  pictures  were 
burned;  drapery  was  put  on  indecorous  sta 
tues ;  the  theatres  were  shut  up ;  fast-days 
were  numerous;  and  the  Parliament  resolved 
that  no  person  should  be  admitted  into  any 
public  employment  unless  the  House  should 
be  first  satisfied  of  his  vital  godliness.  We 
know  what  »vas  the  end  of  this  training.  We 
know  tha*  it  ended  in  impiety,  in  filthy  and 
hearties?  sensuality,  'n  the  dissolution  of  all 
lies  of  honour  and  morality.  We  know  that 
at  this  very  day  scriptural  phrases,  scriptural 
names,  perhaps  some  scriptural  doctrines,  ex 
cite  disgust  and  ridicule  solely  because  they  are 
associated  with  the  austerity  of  that  period. 

Thus  has  the  experiment  of  training  the 
people  in  established  forms  of  religion  been 
twice  tried  in  England  en  a  large  scale ;  once 
by  Charles  and  Laud,  and  once  by  the  Puri- 
huis.  The  High  Tories  of  our  time  still  enter 


tain  many  of  the  feelings  and  opinions  of 
Charles  and  Laud,  though  in  a  mitigated  form; 
nor  is  it  difficult  to  see  that  the  heirs  of  the 
Puritans  are  still  amongst  us.  It  would  be  de 
sirable  that,  each  of  these  parties  should  re 
member  how  little  advantage  or  honour  it  for 
merly  derived  from  the  closest  alliance  Avith 
power;  that  it  fell  by  the  support  of  rulers,  and 
rose  by  their  opposition ;  that  of  the  two  sys 
tems,  that  in  which  the  people  were  at  any  time 
being  drilled  was  always  at  that  time  the  un 
popular  system ;  that  the  training  of  the  High 
Church  ended  in  the  reign  of  the  Puritans,  and 
the  training  of  the  Puritans  in  the  reign  of  the 
harlots. 

This  was  quite  natural.  Nothing  is  so  gall 
ing  and  detestable  to  a  people  not  broken  in 
from  the  birth,  as  a  paternal,  or,  in  other  words, 
a  meddling  government — a  government  which 
tells  them  what  to  read,  and  say,  and  eat,  and 
drink,  and  wear.  Our  fathers  could  not  bear 
it  two  hundred  years  ago ;  and  we  are  not  more 
patient  than  they.  Mr.  Southey  thinks  that  the 
yoke  of  the  church  is  dropping  off  because  it 
is  loose.  We  feel  convinced  that  it  is  borne 
only  because  it  is  easy,  and  that  in  the  instant 
in  which  an  attempt  is  made  to  tighten  it,  it 
will  be  flung  away.  It  will  be  neither  the  first 
nor  the  strongest  yoke  that  has  been  broken 
asunder  and  trampled  under  foot  in  the  day  of 
the  vengeance  of  England. 

How  far  Mr.  Southey  would  have  the  govern 
ment  carry  its  measures  for  training  the  peo 
ple  in  the  doctrines  of  the  church,  we  are  un 
able  to  discover.  In  one  passage  Sir  Thomas 
More  asks  with  great  vehemence, 

"  Is  it  possible  that  your  laws  should  suffer 
the  unbelievers  to  exist  as  a  party'! 

**  Vetitum  est  adeo  sceleris  niliil  1" 
Montesinos  answers.  "They  avow  them 
selves  in  defiance  of  the  laws.  The  fashion 
able  doctrine  which  the  press  at  this  time 
maintains  is,  that  this  is  a  matter  in  which  the 
laws  ought  not  to  interfere,  every  man  having 
a  right  both  to  form  what  opinion  he  pleases 
upon  religious  subjects  and  to  promulgate  that 
opinion." 

It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  Mr.  Southey  would 
not  give  full  and  perfect  toleration  to  infidelity. 
In  another  passage,  however,  he  observes  with 
some  truth,  though  too  sweepingly,  that  "  any 
degree  of  intolerance,  short  of  that  full  extent 
which  the  Papal  church  exercises  where  it  has 
the  power,  acts  upon  the  opinions  which  it  is 
intended  to  suppress  like  pruning  upon  vigo 
rous  plants,  they  grow  the  stronger  for  it." 
These  two  passages,  put  together,  would  lead 
us  to  the  conclusion  that,  in  Mr.  Southey's 
opinion,  the  utmost  severity  ever  employed 'by 
the  Roman  Catholic  church  in  the  days  of  its 
greatest  power  ought  to  be  employed  against 
unbelievers  in  England;  in  plain  words,  that 
Carlile  and  his  shopmen  ought  to  be  burned 
in  Smithfield,  and  that  every  person  who  when 
called  upon  should  decline  to  make  a  solemn 
profession  of  Christianity,  ought  to  suffer  the 
same  fate.  We  do  not,  however,  believe  that 
Mr.  Southey  would  recommend  such  a  course, 
though  his  language  would,  in  the  case  of  any 
other  writer,  justify  us  in  supposing  this  to  be 
his  meaning.  His  opinions  form  no  system  at 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


Ill 


all.  He  never  sees  at  one  glance  more  of  a 
question  than  will  furnish  matter  for  one  flow 
ing  and  well-turned  sentence  ;  so  that  it  would 
be  the  height  of  unfairness  to  charge  him  per 
sonally  with  holding  a  doctrine  merely  because 
that  doctrine  is  deducible,  though  by  the  closest 
and  most  accurate  reasoning,  from  the  pre 
mises  which  he  has  laid  down.  We  are,  there 
fore,  .eft  completely  in  the  dark  as  to  Mr. 
Southey's  opinion  about  toleration.  Imme 
diately  after  censuring  the  government  for  not 
punishing  infidels,  he  proceeds  to  discuss  the 
question  of  the  Catholic  disabilities,  now,  thank 
God,  removed,  and  defends  them  on  the  ground 
that  the  Catholic  doctrines  tend  to  persecution, 
and  that  the  Catholics  persecuted  when  they 
had  power. 

"They  must  persecute,"  says  he,  "if  they 
believe  their  own  creed,  for  conscience'  sake  ; 
and  if  they  do  not  believe  it,  they  must  perse 
cute  for  policy;  because  it  is  only  by  intole 
rance  that  so  corrupt  and  injurious  a  system 
can  be  upheld." 

That  unbelievers  should  not  be  persecuted, 
is  an  instance  of  national  depravity  at  which 
the  glorified  spirit  stands  aghast.  Yet  a  sect 
of  Christians  is  to  be  excluded  from  power 
because  those  who  formerly  held  the  same 
opinions  were  guilty  of  persecution.  We  have 
said  that  we  do  not  very  well  know  what  Mr. 
Southey's  opinion  about  toleration  is.  But,  on 
the  whole,  we  take  it  to  be  this,  that  every 
body  is  to  tolerate  him,  and  that  he  is  to  tole 
rate  nobody. 

We  will  not  be  deterred  by  any  fear  of  mis 
representation  from  expressing  our  hearty 
approbation  of  the  mild,  wise,  and  eminently 
Christian  manner,  in  which  the  church  and  the 
government  have  lately  acted  with  respect  to 
blasphemous  publications.  We  praise  them 
for  not  having  thought  it  necessary  to  encircle 
a  religion  pure,  merciful,  and  philosophical — 
a  religion,  to  the  evidences  of  which  the 
highest  intellects  have  yielded — with  the  de 
fences  of  a  false  and  bloody  superstition.  The 
ark  of  God  was  never  taken  till  it  was  sur 
rounded  by  the  arms  of  earthly  defenders.  In 
captivity,  its  sanctity  was  sufficient  to  vindicate 
it  from  insult,  and  to  lay  the  hostile  fiend  pros 
trate  on  the  threshold  of  his  own  temple. 
The  real  security  of  Christianity  is  to  be  found 
in  its  benevolent  morality,  in  its  exquisite 
adaptation  to  the  human  heart,  in  the  facility 
with  which  its  scheme  accommodates  itself  to 
the  capacity  of  every  human  intellect,  in  the 
consolation  which  it  bears  to  the  house  of 
mourning,  in  the  light  with  which  it  brightens 
the  great  mystery  of  the  grave.  To  such  a  system 
it  can  bring  no  addition  of  dignity  or  of 
strength,  that  it  is  part  and  parcel  of  the  com 
mon  law.  It  is  not  now  for  the  first  time  left 
to  rely  on  the  force  of  its  own  evidences  and 
the  attractions  of  its  own  beauty.  Its  sublime 
theology  confounded  the  Grecian  schools  in  the 
fair  conflict  of  reason  with  reason.  The 
bravest  and  wisest  of  the  Caesars  found  their 
arms  and  their  policy  unavailing,  when  op 
posed  to  the  weapons  that  were  not  carnal,  and 
the  kingdom  that  was  not  of  this  world.  The 
victory  which  Porphyry  and  Diocletian  failed 
to  gain  is  not,  to  all  appearance,  reserved  for 


any  of  those  who  have  in  this  age  directed 
their  attacks  against  the  last  restraint  of  the 
powerful,  and  the  last  hope  of  the  wretched. 
The  whole  history  of  the  Christian  religion 
shows,  that  she  is  in  far  greater  danger  of 
being  corrupted  by  the  alliance  of  power  than, 
of  being  crushed  by  its  opposition.  Those 
who  thrust  temporal  sovereignty  upon  her 
treat  her  as  their  prototypes  treated  her  author. 
They  bow  the  knee,  and  vSpit  upon  her ;  they 
cry  Hail !  and  smite  her  on  the  cheek ;  they 
put  a  sceptre  into  her  hand,  but  it  is  a  fragile 
reed ;  they  crown  her,  but  it  is  with  thorns ; 
they  cover  with  purple  the  wounds  which  their 
own  hands  have  inflicted  on  her;  and  inscribe 
magnificent  titles  over  the  cross  on  whicn 
they  have  fixed  her  to  perish  in  ignominy  and 
pain. 

The  general  view  which  Mr.  Southey  takes 
of  the  prospects  of  society  is  very  gloomy  ;  but 
we  comfort  ourselves  with  the  consideration 
that  Mr.  Southey  is  no  prophet.  He  foretold, 
we  remember,  on  the  very  eve  of  the  abolition 
of  the  Test  and  Corporation  Acts,  that  these 
hateful  laws  were  immortal,  and  that  pious 
minds  would  long  be  gratified  by  seeing  the 
most  solemn  religious  rite  of  the  church  pro 
faned,  for  the  purpose  of  upholding  her  politi 
cal  supremacy.  In  the  book  before  us,  he  says 
that  Catholics  cannot  possibly  be  admitted  into 
Parliament,  until  those  whom  Johnson  called 
"the  bottomless  Whigs"  come  into  power. 
While  the  book  was  in  the  press,  the  prophecy 
was  falsified,  and  a  Tory  of  the  Tories,  Mr. 
Southey's  own  favourite  hero,  won  and  wore 
that  noblest  wreath,  "  Ob  elves  servatos" 

The  signs  of  the  times,  Mr.  Southey  tells  us, 
are  very  threatening.  His  fears  for  the  country 
would  decidedly  preponderate  over  his  hopes, 
but  for  his  firm  reliance  on  the  mercy  of  God. 
Now,  as  we  know  that  God  has  once  suffered 
the  civilized  world  to  be  overrun  by  savages, 
and  the  Christian  religion  to  be  corrupted  by 
doctrines  which  made  it,  for  some  ages,  almost 
as  bad  as  Paganism,  we  cannot  think  it  incon 
sistent  with  his  attributes  that  similar  calami 
ties  should  again  befall  mankind. 

We  look,  however,  on  the  state  of  the  world, 
and  of  this  kingdom  in  particular,  with  much 
greater  satisfaction,  and  with  better  hopes. 
Mr.  Southey  speaks  with  contempt  of  those 
who  think  the  savage  state  happier  than  the 
social.  On  this  subject,  he  says,  Rousseau 
never  imposed  on  him  even  in  his  youth.  But 
he  conceives  that  a  community  which  has  ad 
vanced  a  little  way  in  civilization  is  happier 
than  one  which  has  made  greater  progress. 
The  Britons  in  the  time  of  Caesar  were  happier, 
he  suspects,  than  the  English  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  On  the  whole,  he  selects  the  genera 
tion  which  preceded  the  Reformation  as  that 
in  which  the  people  of  this  country  were  bet 
ter  off  than  at  any  time  before  or  since. 

This  opinion  rests  on  nothing,  as  far  as  we 
can  see,  except  his  own  individual  associa 
tions.  He  is  a  man  of  letters ;  and  a  life  des  • 
titute  of  literary  pleasures  seems  insipid  tc 
him.  He  abhors  the  spirit  of  the  present  gene 
ration,  the  severity  of  its  studies,  the  Doldnesk 
of  its  inquiries,  and  the  disdain  with  wnich  it 
regards  some  old  prejudice?  by  which  his  own 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Eiind  is  held,  in  bondage.  He  dislikes  an  ut 
terly  unjnlighioncd  sge;  he  dislikes  an  inves 
tigating  and  reforming  age.  The  first  twenty 
years  of  the  sixteenth  century  would  have  ex 
actly  suited  him.  They  furnished  just  the 
quantity  of  intellectual  excitement  -which  he 
requires.  The  learned  few  read  and  wrote 
largely.  A  scholar  was  held  in  high  estima 
tion  ;  but  the  rabble  did  not  presume  to  think ; 
and  even  the  most  inquiring  and  independent 
of  the  educated  classes  paid  more  reverence  to 
authority,  and  less  to  reason,  than  is  usual  in 
our  time.  This  is  a  state  of  things  in  which 
Mr.  Southey  would  have  found  himself  quite 
comfortable ;  and,  accordingly,  he  pronounces 
it  the  happiest  state  of  things  ever  known  in 
the  world. 

The  savages  were  wretched,  says  Mr.  Sou 
they  ;  but  the  people  in  the  time  of  Sir  Thomas 
More  were  happier  than  either  they  or  we. 
Now,  we  think  it  quite  certain,  that  we  have 
the  advantage  over  the  contemporaries  of  Sir 
Thomas  More,  in  every  point  in  which  they 
had  any  advantage  over  savages. 

Mr.  Southey  does  not  even  pretend  to  main 
tain  that  the  people  in  the  sixteenth  century 
were  better  lodged  or  clothed  than  at  present. 
He  seems  to  admit  that  in  these  respects  there 
has  been  some  little  improvement.  It  is  indeed 
a  matter  about  which  scarcely  any  doubt  can 
exbt  in  the  most  perverse  mind,  that  the  im 
provements  of  machinery  have  lowered  the 
price  of  manufactured  articles,  and  have  brought 
within  the  reach  of  the  poorest  some  conve 
niences  which  Sir  Thomas  More  or  his  master 
could  not  have  obtained  at  any  price. 

The  labouring  classes,  however,  were,  ac 
cording  to  Mr.  Southey,  better  fed  three  hun 
dred  years  ago  than  at  present.  We  believe 
that  he  is  completely  in  error  on  this  point. 
The  condition  of  servants  in  noble  and  weal 
thy  families,  and  of  scholars  at  the  Universi 
ties,  must  surely  have  been  better  in  those 
times  than  that  of  common  day-labourers  ;  and 
we  are  sure  that  it  was  not  better  than  that  of 
our  workhouse  paupers.  From  the  house 
hold  book  of  the  Northumberland  family,  we 
find  that  in  one  of  the  greatest  establishments 
of  the  kingdom,  the  servants  lived  almost  en 
tirely  on  salt  meat,  without  any  bread  at  all.  A 
more  unwholesome  diet  can  scarcely  be  con 
ceived.  In  the  reign  of  Edward  the  Sixth,  the 
state  of  the  students  at  Cambridge  is  described 
to  us,  on  the  very  best  authority,  as  most 
wretched.  Many  of  them  dined  on  pottage 
made  of  a  farthing's  worth  of  beef  with  a  little 
*alt  and  oatmeal,  and  literally  nothing  else. 
This  account  we  have  from  a  contemporary 
master  of  St.  John's.  Our  parish  poor  now 
eat  wheaten  bread.  In  the  sixteenth  century 
the  labourer  was  glad  to  get  barley,  and  was 
often  forced  to  content  himself  with  poorer 
fare.  In  Harrison's  introduction  to  Holinshed 
we  have  an  account  of  the  state  of  our  working 
population  in  the  "golden  days,"  as  Mr.  Southey 
calls  them,  of  good  Queen  Bess.  "The  genti- 
litie,"  says  he,  "commonly  provide  themselves 
sufficiently  of  wheat  for  their  own  tables, 
whyle.st  their  household  and  poore  neighbours 
ir.  some  shires  are  inforced  to  content  themselves 
H  iih  rice  or  barley;  yea,  and  in  time  of  dearth, 


many  with  bread  maat  eyther  of  beanes,  pea- 
son,  or  otes,  or  of  altogether,  and  some  acornes 
among.  I  will  not  say  that  this  extremity  is 
oft  so  well  to  be  seen  in  time  of  plentie  as  of 
dearth;  but  if  I  should  I  could  easily  bring 
my  trial;  for  albeit  there  be  much  more 
grounde  eared  nowe  almost  in  everye  place 
then  hath  beene  of  late  yeares,  yet  such  a 
price  of  come  continueth  in  each  town  and 
markete,  without  any  just  cause,  that  the  arti 
ficer  and  poore  labouring  man  is  not  able  to 
reach  unto  it,  but  is  driven  to  content  himself 
with  horsc-corne  ;  I  mean  beanes,  peason,  otes, 
tares,  and  lintelles."  We  should  like  to  see 
what  the  effect  would  be  of  putting  any  parish 
in  England  now  on  allowance  of  "  horse- 
corne."  The  helotry  of  Mammon  are  not,  in 
our  day,  so  easily  enforced  to  content  them 
selves  as  the  peasantry  of  that  happy  period, 
as  Mr.  Southey  considers  it,  which  elapsed 
between  the  fall  of  the  feudal  and  the  rise  of 
commercial  tyranny. 

"  The  people,"  says  Mr.  Southey, "  are  worse 
fed  than  when  they  were  fishers."  And  yet  in 
another  place  he  complains  that  they  will  not 
eat  fish.  "  They  have  contracted,"  says  he, 
"I  know  not  how,  some  obstinate  prejudice 
against  a  kind  of  food  at  once  wholesome  and 
delicate,  and  everywhere  to  be  obtained 
cheaply  and  in  abundance,  were  the  demand 
for  it  as  general  as  it  ought  to  be."  It  is 
true  that  the  lower  orders  have  an  obstinate 
prejudice  against  fish.  But  hunger  has  no 
such  obstinate  prejudices.  If  what  was  for 
merly  a  common  diet  is  now  eaten  only  in  times 
of  severe  pressure,  the  inference  is  plain. 
The  people  must  be  fed  with  what  they  at 
least  think  better  food  than  that  of  their  an 
cestors. 

The  advice  and  medicine  which  the  poorest 
labourer  can  now  obtain,  in  disease  or  after 
an  accident,  is  far  superior  to  what  Henry  the 
Eighth  could  have  commanded.  Scarcely  any 
part  of  the  country  is  out  of  the  reach  of  prac 
titioners,  who  are  probably  not  so  far  inferior 
to  Sir  Henry  Halford  as  they  are  superior  to 
Sir  Anthony  Denny.  That  there  has  been  a 
great  improvement  in  this  respect  Mr.  Southey 
allows.  Indeed,  he  could  not  well  have  denied 
it.  "But,"  says  he,  "the  evils  for  which  the 
sciences  are  the  palliative,  have  increased 
since  the  time  of  the  Druids  in  a  proportion 
that  heavily  outweighs  the  benefit  of  improved 
therapeutics.''  We  know  nothing  either  of  the 
diseases  or  the  remedies  of  the  Druids.  But 
we  are  quite  sure  that  the  improvement  of 
medicine  has  far  more  than  kept  pace  with  the 
increase  of  disease,  during  the  last  three  cen 
turies.  This  is  proved  by  the  best  possible 
evidence.  The  term  of  human  life  is  decided 
ly  longer  in  England  than  in  any  former  age, 
respecting  which  we  possess  any  information 
on  which  we  can  rely.  All  the  rants  in  the 
world  about  picturesque  cottages  arid  temples 
of  Mammon  will  not  shake  this  argument.  No 
test  of  the  state  of  society  can  be  named  so 
decisive  as  that  which  is  furnished  by  bills  of 
mortality.  That  the  lives  of  the  people  of  this 
|  country 'have  been  gradually  lengthening  dur- 
ing  the  course  of  several  generations,  is  as 
certain  as  anv  fact  in  statistics,  and  thai  the 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES  ON  SOCIETY. 


113 


Hires  of  men  should  become  longer  and  longer, 
while  the  physical  condition,  during  life,  is  he- 
coming  worse  and  worse,  is  utterly  incredible. 

Let  our  readers  think  over  these  circum 
stances.  Let  them  take  into  the  account  the 
sweating  sickness  and  the  plague.  Let  them 
take  into  the  account  that  fearful  disease  whi~,h 
first  made  its  appearance  in  the  generation  to 
which  Mr.  Southey  assigns  the  palm  of  feli 
city,  and  raged  through  Europe  with  a  fury  at 
which  the  physician  stood  aghast,  and  before 
which  the  people  were  swept  away  by  thou 
sands.  Let  them  consider  the  state  of  the 
northern  counties,  constantly  the  scene  of  rob 
beries,  rapes,  massacres,  and  conflagrations. 
Let  them  add  to  all  this  the  fact  that  seventy- 
two  thousand  persons  suffered  death  by  the 
hands  of  the  executioner  during  the  reign  of 
Henry  the  Eighth,  and  judge  between  the  nine 
teenth  and  the  sixteenth  century. 

We  do  not  say  that  the  lower  orders  in  Eng 
land  do  not  suffer  severe  hardships.  But,  in 
spite  of  Mr.  S  >uthey's  assertions,  and  in  spite 
of  the  assertions  of  a  class  of  politicians,  who, 
differing  from  Mr.  Southey  in  every  other 
point,  agree  with  him  in  this,  we  are  inclined 
to  doubt  whether  they  really  suffer  greater 
physical  distress  than  the  labouring  classes  of 
the  most  flourishing  countries  of  the  Conti 
nent. 

It  will  scarcely  be  maintained  that  the  lazza- 
roni  who  sleep  under  the  porticos  of  Naples, 
or  the  beggars  who  besiege  the  convents  of 
Spain,  are  in  a  happier  situation  than  the  Eng 
lish  commonalty.  The  distress  which  has 
lately  been  experienced  in  the  northern  part  of 
Germany,  one  of  the  best  governed  and  most 
prosperous  districts  of  Europe,  surpasses,  if 
we  have  been  correctly  informed,  any  thing 
which  has  of  late  years  been  known  among 
us.  In  Norway  and  Sweden  the  peasantry  are 
constantly  compelled  to  mix  bark  with  their 
bread,  and  even  this  expedient  has  not  always 
preserved  whole  families  and  neighbourhoods 
from  perishing  together  of  famine.  An  expe 
riment  has  lately  been  tried  in  the  kingdom  of 
the  Netherlands,  which  has  been  cited  to  prove 
the  possibility  of  establishing  agricultural  colo 
nies  on  the  waste-lands  of  England;  but  which 
proves  to  our  minds  nothing  so  clearly  as  this, 
that  the  rate  of  subsistence  to  which  the  labour 
ing  classes  are  reduced  in  the  Netherlands  is 
miserably  low,  and  very  far  inferior  to  that -of 
the  English  paupers.  No  distress  which  the 
people  here  have  endured  for  centuries,  ap 
proaches  to  that  which  has  been  felt  by  the 
French  in  our  own  time.  The  beginning  of 
the  year  1817  was  a  time  of  great  distress  in 
this  island  But  the  state  of  the  lowest  classes 
here  was  luxury  compared  with  that  of  the 
people  of  France.  We  find  in  Magendie's 
Jobrruil  dc  Phyriologie  Experimental?,  a  paper  on 
a  point  of  physiology  connected  with  the  dis 
tress  of  that  season.  It  appears  that  the  inha 
bitants  of  six  departments,  Aix,  Jura,  Doubs, 
Haute  Saone,  Vosges,  and  Saone  et  Loire,  i 
were  reduced  first  to  oatmeal  and  potatoes,  and  j 
at  last  to  nettles,  bean-stalks,  and  other  kind  ! 
of  herbage  fit  only  for  cattle;  that  when  the  ' 
next  harvest  enabled  them  to  eat  barley-bread,  ! 
many  of  them  died  from  intemperate  indul  I 

You  L-lft 


I  gence  in  what  they  thought  an  exquisite  repast; 
I  and  that  a  dropsy  of  a  peculiar  description 
I  was  produced  by  the  hard  fare  of  the  year. 
j  Dead  bodies  were  found  on  the  roads  and  in 
j  the  fields.  A  single  surgeon  dissected  six  of 
|  these,  and  found  the  stomachs  shrunk,  and 
filled  with  the  unwholesome  aliments  which 
'  hunger  had  driven  men  to  share  with  beasts. 
Such  extremity  of  distress  as  this  is  never 
heard  of  in  England,  or  even  in  Ireland. 
We  are,  on  the  whole,  inclined  to  think,  though 
we  would  speak  with  diffidence  on  a  point  on 
which  it  would  be  rash  to  pronounce  a  posi 
tive  judgment,  without  a  much  longer  and 
closer  investigation  than  we  have  bestowed 
npon  it,  that  the  labouring  classes  of  this 
island,  though  they  have  their  grievances  and 
distresses,  some  produced  by  their  own  impro 
vidence,  some  by  the  errors  of  their  rulers,  are 
on  the  whole  better  off,  as  to  physical  comforts, 
than  the  inhabitants  of  any  equally  extensive 
district  of  the  old  world.  On  this  very  account, 
suffering  is  more  acutely  felt  and  more  loudly 
bewailed  here  than  elsewhere.  We  must  take 
into  the  account  the  liberty  of  discussion,  and 
the  strong  interest  which  the  opponents  of  a 
ministry  always  have  to  exaggerate  the  extent 
of  the  public  disasters.  There  are  many  parts 
of  Europe  in  which  the  people  quietly  endure 
distress  that  here  would  shake  the  foundation* 
of  the  state ;  in  which  the  inhabitants  of  a 
whole  province  turn  out  to  eat  grass,  with  less 
clamour  than  one  Spitalfields  weaver  would 
make  here,  if  the  overseers  were  to  put  him 
on  barley-bread.  In  those  new  countries  in 
which  a  civilized  population  had  at  its  com 
mand  a  boundless  extent  of  the  richest  soil, 
the  condition  of  the  labourer  is  probabl/  hap 
pier  than  in  any  society  which  has  lasted  for 
many  centuries.  But  in  the  old  world  we  must 
confess  ourselves  unable  to  find  any  satisfac 
tory  record  of  any  great  nation,  past  or  pre 
sent,  in  which  the  working  classes  have  been 
in  a  more  comfortable  situation  than  in  Eng 
land  during  the  last  thirty  years.  When  this 
island  was  thinly  peopled,  it  was  barbarous. 
There  was  little  capital ;  and  that  little  was  in 
secure.  It  is  now  the  richest  and  the  most 
highly  civilized  spot  in  the  world;  but  the 
population  is  dense.  Thus  we  have  never 
known  that  golden  age  which  the  lower  orders 
in  the  United  States  are  now  enjoying.  We  have 
never  known  an  age  of  liberty,  of  order,  and  of 
education,  an  age  in  which  the  mechanical  sci 
ences  were  carried  to  a  great  height,  yet  in 
which  the  people  were  net  sufficiently  nume 
rous  to  cultivate  even  the  most  fertile  valleys. 
But  when  we  compare  our  own  condition  with 
that  of  our  ancestors,  we  think  it  clear  that  the 
advantages  arising  from  the  progress  of  civili 
zation  have  far  more  than  counterbalanced  the 
disadvantages  arising  from  the  progress  of 
population.  While  our  numbers  have  in 
creased  tenfold,  our  wealth  has  increased  a 
hundredfold.  Though  there  are  so  many  more 
people  to  share  the  wealth  now  existing  in  the 
country  than  there  were  in  the  sixteenth  centu 
ry,  it  seems  certain  that  a  greater  share  falk  tc» 
almost  every  individual  than  fell  to  the  shan., 
of  any  of  the  corresponding  class  in  the  six 
teenth  century.  The  king  keeps  a  moi<?  spie<- 

K.2 


114 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


4id  court.  The  establishments  of  the  nobles 
Are  more  magnificent.  The  esquires  are 
richer,  the  merchants  are  richer,  the  shopkeep 
ers  are  richer.  The  serving-man,  the  artisan, 
and  the  husbandman  have  a  more  copious  and 
palatable  supply  of  food,  better  clothing,  and 
better  furniture.  This  is  no  reason  for  tole 
rating  abuses,  or  for  neglecting  any  means  of 
ameliorating  the  condition  of  our  poorer  coun 
tryman.  But  it  is  a  reason  against  telling 
them,  as  some  of  our  philosophers  are  con 
stantly  telling  them,  that  they  are  the  most 
wretched  people  who  ever  existed  on  the  face 
of  the  earth. 

We  have  already  adverted  to  Mr.  Southey's 
amusing  doctrine  about  national  wealth.  A 
state,  says  he,  cannot  be  too  rich  ;  but  a  peo 
ple  may  be  too  rich.  His  reason  for  thinking 
this,  is  extremely  curious. 

"  A  people  may  be  too  rich,  because  it  is  the 
tendency  of  the  commercial,  and  more  espe 
cially,  of  the  manufacturing  system,  to  collect 
wealth  rather  than  to  diffuse  it.  Where  wealth 
is  necessarily  employed  in  any  of  the  specula 
tions  of  trade,  its  increase  is  in  proportion  to 
its  amount.  Great  capitalists  become  like 
pikes  in  a  fish-pond,  who  devour  the  weaker 
fish;  and  it  is  but  too  certain,  that  the  poverty 
of  one  part  of  the  people  seems  to  increase  in 
the  same  ratio  as  the  riches  of  another.  There 
are  examples  of  this  in  history.  In  Portugal, 
when  the  high  tide  of  wealth  flowed  in  from 
the  conquests  in  Africa  and  the  East,  the  effect 
of  that  greut  influx  was  not  more  visible  in  the 
augmented  splendour  of  the  court,  and  the 
luxury  of  the  higher  ranks,  than  in  the  distress 
of  the  people." 

Mr.  Southey's  instance  is  not  a  very  fortu 
nate  one.  The  wealth  which  did  so  little  for 
the  Portuguese  was  not  the  fruit  either  of 
manufactures  or  of  commerce  carried  on  by 
private  individuals.  It  was  the  wealth,  not  of 
the  people,  but  of  the  government  and  its  crea 
tures,  of  those  who,  as  Mr.  Southey  thinks, 
never  can  be  too  rich.  The  fact  is,  that  Mr. 
Sowthey's  proposition  is  opposed  to  all  history, 
and  to  the  phenomena  which  surround  us  on 
every  side.  England  is  the  richest  country  in 
Europe,  the  most  commercial,  and  the  most 
manufacturing.  Russia  and  Poland  are  the 
poorest  countries  in  Europe.  They  have 
scarcely  any  trade,  and  none  but  the  rudest 
manufactures.  Is  wealth  more  diffused  in 
Russia  and  Poland  than  in  England?  There 
are  individuals  in  Russia  and  Poland  whose 
incomes  are  probably  equal  to  those  of  our 
jichest  countrymen.  It  may  be  doubted,  whe 
ther  there  are  not,  in  those  countries,  as  many 
fortunes  of  eighty  thousand  a  year  as  here. 
Hut  are  there  as  many  fortunes  of  five  thou 
sand  a  year,  or  of  one  thousand  a  year  1  There 
are  parishes  in  England  which  contain  more 
people  of  between  five  hundred  and  thre« 
thousand  pounds  a  year  than  could  be  foui,d 
in  all  the  dominions  of  the  Emperor  Nicholas. 
The  neat  and  commodious  houses  which  have 
be^n  built  in  London  and  its  vicinity,  for  peo 
ple  of  this  clasr»,  within  the  last  thirty  years, 
would  of  themselves  form  a  city  larger  than 
»foe  capitals  of  ssrne  European  kingdoms.  And 


:  this  is  the  state  of  society  in  which  the  great 
proprietors  have  devoured  the  smaller! 

The  cure  which  Mr.  Southey  thinks  that  h«» 
i  has  discovered  is  worthy  of  the  sagacity  which 
I  he  has  shown  in  detecting  the  evil.     The  ca- 
j  lamities  arising  from  the  collection  of  wealth 
j  in  the  hands  of  a  few  capitalists  are  to  be  re 
medied  by  collecting  it  in  the  hands  of  one 
great  capitalist,  who  has  no  conceivable  mo 
tive  to  use  it  better  than  other  capitalists, — the 
all-devouring  state. 

It  is  not  strange  that,  differing  so  widely 
from  Mr.  Southey  as  to  the  past  progress  of 
society,  we  should  differ  from  him  also  as  to 
its  probable  destiny.  He  thinks,  that  to  ail 
out\vard  appearance,  the  country  is  hastening 
to  destruction ;  but  he  relies  firmly  on  the 
goodness  of  God.  We  do  not  see  either  the 
piety  or  the  rationality  of  thus  confidently  ex 
pecting  that  the  Supreme  Being  will  interfere 
to  disturb  the  common  .succession  of  causes 
and  effects.  We,  too,  rely  on  his  goodness — 
on  his  goodness  as  manifested,  not  in  extra 
ordinary  interpositions,  but  in  those  general 
laws  which  it  has  pleased  him  to  establish  in 
the  physical  and  in  the  moral  world.  We  rely 
on  the  natural  tendency  of  the  human  intel 
lect  to  truth,  and  on  the  natural  tendency  of 
society  to  improvement.  We  know  no  well 
authenticated  instance  of  a  people  which  has 
decidedly  retrograded  in  civilization  and  pros 
perity,  except  from  the  influence  of  violent  and 
terrible  calamities — such  as  those  which  laid 
the  Roman  empire  in  ruins,  or  those  which, 
about  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
desolated  Italy.  We  know  of  no  country 
which,  at  the  end  of  fifty  years  of  peace  and 
tolerably  good  government,  has  been  less  pros 
perous  than  at  the  beginning  of  that  period. 
The  political  importance  of  a  state  may  de 
cline,  as  the  balance  of  power  is  disturbed  by 
the  introduction  of  new  forces.  Thus  the 
influence  of  Holland  and  of  Spain  is  much 
diminished.  But  are  Holland  and  Spain  poor 
er  than  formerly"?  We  doubt  it.  Other  coun 
tries  have  outrun  them.  But  we  suspect  that 
they  had  been  positively,  though  not  relatively, 
advancing.  We  suspect  that  Holland  is  richer 
than  when  she  sent  her  navies  up  the  Thames ; 
that  Spain  is  richer  than  when  a  French  king 
was  brought  captive  to  the  footstool  of  Charles 
the  Fifth. 

History  is  full  of  the  signs  of  this  natural 
progress  of  society.  We  see  in  almost  eve~y 
part  of  the  annals  of  mankind  how  the  indus 
try  of  individuals,  struggling  up  against  wars, 
taxes,  famines,  conflagrations,  mischievous 
prohibitions,  and  more  mischievous  protec 
tions,  creates  faster  than  governments  can 
squander,  and  repairs  whatever  invaders  can 
destroy.  We  see  the  capital  of  nations  increas 
ing,  and  all  the  arts  of  life  approaching  nearer 
and  nearer  to  perfection,  in  spite  of  the  grossest 
corruption  and  the  wildest  profusion  on  the 
part  of  rulers. 

The  present  moment  is  one  of  great  distress. 

But  how  small  will  that  distress  appear  when 

we  think   over  the  history  of  the  last   forty 

j  years; — a  war,  compared  with  which  all  other 

!  wars  sink  into  insignificance ;  taxation,  such 


SOUTHEY'S  COLLOQUIES   ON  SOCIETY. 


115 


an  the  most  heavily  taxed  people  of  former 
times  could  not  have  conceived;  a  debt  larger 
than  all  the  public  debts  that  ever  existed  in 
the  world  added  together;  the  food  of  the  peo 
ple  studiously  rendered  dear;  the  currency 
imprudently  debased,  and  imprudently  restored. 
Yet  is  the  country  poorer  than  in  1790  1  We 
fully  believe  that,  in  spite  of  all  the  misgo- 
vcrnment  of  her  rulers,  she  has  been  almost 
constantly  becoming  richer  and  richer.  Now 
and  then  there  has  been  a  stoppage,  now  and 
then  a  short  retrogression  ;  but  as  to  the  ge 
neral  tendency  there  can  be  no  doubt.  A  sin 
gle  breaker  may  recede,  but  the  tide  is  evi 
dently  coming  in. 

If  we  were  to  prophesy  that  in  the  year  1930, 
a  population  of  fifty  millions,  better  fed,  clad, 
and  lodged  than  the  English  of  our  time,  will 
cover  these  islands;  that  Sussex  and  Hunting 
donshire  will  be  wealthier  than  the  wealthiest 
parts  of  the  West-Riding  of  Yorkshire  now 
are ;  that  cultivation,  rich  as  that  of  a  flower- 
garden,  will  be  carried  up  to  the  very  tops  of 
Ben  Nevis  and  Helvellyn;  that  machines,  con 
structed  on  principles  yet  undiscovered,  will 
be  in  every  house  ;  that  there  will  be  no  high 
ways  hut  railroads,  no  travelling  but  by  steam  ; 
and  our  debt,  vast  as  it  seems  to  us,  will  ap 
pear  to  our  great-grandchildren  a  trifling 
encumbrance,  which  might  easily  be  paid  oif 
in  a  year  or  two.  many  people  would  think  us 
insane.  We  prophesy  nothing;  but  this  we 
say — If  any  person  had  told  the  Parliament 
which  met  in  perplexity  and  terror  after  the 
crash  in  1720,  that  in  1830  the  wealth  of  Eng 
land  would  surpass  all  their  wildest  dreams  ; 
that  the  annual  revenue  would  equal  the  prin 
cipal  of  that  debt  which  they  considered  as 
an  intolerable  burden  ;  that  for  one  man  of 
10.000/.  then  living,  there  would  be  five  men 
of  50.000/. ;  that  London  would  he  twice  as  large 
and  twice  as  populous, and  that  nevertheless  the 
mortality  would  have  diminished  to  one-half 
what  it  then  was;  that  the  postoffice  would  bring 
more  into  the  exchequer  than  the  excise  and  cus 
toms  had  brought  in  together  under  Charles  II. ; 
that  stage-coaches  would  run  from  London  to 
York  in  twenty-four  hours;  that  men  would 
sail  without  wind,  and  would  be  beginning  to 
ride  without  horses,  our  ancestors  would  have 
given  as  much  credit  to  the  prediction  as  they 
gave  to  Gulliver's  Travels.  Yet  the  pre.lic- 
tion  would  have  been  true;  and  they  would 
have  perceived  that  it  was  not  altogether  ab 
surd  if  they  had  considered  that  the  country 
was  then  raising  every  year  a  sum  which 
would  have  purchased  the  fee-simple  of  the  I 
revenue  of  the  Plantagenets,  ten  times  what  j 
supported  the  government  of  Elizabeth,  three  [ 


times  what,  in  the  time  of  Oliver  Cromwell, 
had  been  thought  intolerably  oppressive.  To 
almost  all  men  the  state  of  things  under  which 
S  they  have  been  used  to  live  seems  to  be  the 
necessary  state  of  things.  We  have  heard  it 
said  that  five  per  cent,  is  the  natural  interest 
of  money,  that  twelve  is  the  natural  number 
of  a  jury,  that  forty  shillings  is  the  natural 
qualification  of  a  county  voter.  Hence  it  is 
that,  though  in  every  age  everybody  knows 
that  up  to  his  own  time  progressive  improve 
ment  has  been  taking  place,  nobody  seems  to 
reckon  on  any  improvement  during  the  next 
generation.  We  cannot  absolutely  prove  that 
those  are  in  error,  who  tell  us  that  society  has 
reached  a  turning  point. — that  we  have  seen 
our  best  days.  But  so  said  all  who  came  be 
fore  us,  and  with  just  as  much  apparent  rea 
son.  "  A  million  a  year  will  beggar  us,"  said 
the  patriots  of  1640*  "Two  millions  a  year 
will  grind  the  country  to  powder,"  was  the  crjr 
in  1660.  "Six  millions  a  year,  and  a  debt  of 
fifty  millions!"  exclaimed'  Swift;  "the  high 
allies  have  been  the  ruin  of  us."  "A  hundred 
and  forty  millions  of  debt!"  said  Junius; 
"  well  may  we  say  that  we  owe  Lord  Chatham 
more  than  we  shall  ever  pay,  if  we  owe  him 
such  a  load  as  this."  "  Two  hundred  and 
forty  millions  of  debt !"  cried  all  the  states 
men  of  1783  in  chorus;  "what  abilities,  or 
what  economy  on  the  part  of  a  minister,  can. 
save  a  country  so  burdened?"  We  know  that 
if,  since  1783,  no  fresh  debt  had  been  incurred, 
the  increased  resources  of  the  country  would 
have  enabled  us  to  defray  that  burden  at  which. 
Pitt,  Fox,  and  Burke  stood  aghast — to  defray  it 
over  and  over  again,  arid  that  with  much  lighter 
taxation  than  what  we  have  actually  borne. 
On  what  principle  is  it,  that  when  we  see  no 
thing  but  improvement  behind  us,  we  are  t« 
expect  nothing  but  deterioration  before  us  ? 

It  is  not  by  the  intermeddling  of  Mr.  Sou- 
they's  idol,  the  omniscient  and  omnipotent 
State,  but  by  the  prudence  and  energy  of  the 
people,  that  England  has  hitherto  been  carried 
forward  in  civilization;  and  it  is  to  the  same 
prudence  and  the  same  energy  that  we  now 
look  with  comfort  and  good  hope.  Our  rulers 
will  best  promote  the  improvement  of  the 
people  by  strictly  confining  themselves  to  their 
own  legitimate  duties  ;  by  leaving  capital  to 
find  its  most  lucrative  course,  commodities 
their  fair  price,  industry  and  intelligence  iheir 
natural  reward,  idleness  and  folly  their  natuial 
punishment;  by  maintaining  peace,  by  deffnd- 
ing  property,  by  diminishing  the  price  of  law, 
and  by  observing  strict  economy  in  every  de 
partment  of  the  state.  Let  the  government  dn 
this — the  people  will  assuredly  lo  ihe  rest 


116 


MACALLAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


MOORE'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON.* 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1831.] 


WE  have  read  this  book  with  the  greatest 
pleasure.  Considered  merely  as  a  composition, 
it  deserves  to  be  classed  among  the  best  spe 
cimens  of  English  prose  which  our  age  has 
produced.  It  contains,  indeed,  no  single  pas 
sage  equal  to  two  or  three  which  we  could  se 
lect  from  the  Life  of  Sheridan.  But,  as  a 
•whole,  it  is  immeasurably  superior  to  that 
work.  The  style  is  agreeable,  clear,  and  manly ; 
and  when  it  rises  into  eloquence,  rises  without 
•ffbrt  or  ostentation.  Nor  is  the  matter  inferior 
to  the  manner. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  name  a  book  which 
exhibits  more  kindness,  fairness,  and  modesty. 
It  has  evidently  been  written,  not  for  the  pur 
pose  of  showing,  what,  however,  it  often  shows, 
how  well  its  author  can  write  ;  but  for  the  pur 
pose  of  vindicating,  as  far  as  truth  will  per 
mit,  the  memory  of  a  celebrated  man  who  can 
no  longer  vindicate  himself.  Mr.  Moore  never 
thrusts  himself  between  Lord  Byron  and  the 
public.  With  the  strongest  temptations  to 
egotism,  he  has  said  no  more  about  himself 
than  the  subject  absolutely  required.  A  great 
part,  indeed  the  greater  part  of  these  volumes, 
consists  of  extracts  from  the  Letters  and  Jour 
nals  of  Lord  Byron  ;  and  it  is  difficult  to  speak 
U)o  highly  of  the  skill  which  has  been  shown 
in  the  selection  and  arrangement.  We  will 
not  say  that  we  have  not  occasionally  remark 
ed  in  these  two  large  quartos  an  anecdote 
which  should  have  been  omitted,  a  letter 
•which  should  have  been  suppressed,  a  name 
•which  should  have  been  concealed  by  aste 
risks  ;  or  asterisks  which  do  not  answer  the 
purpose  of  concealing  the  name.  But  it  is; 
impossible,  on  a  general  survey,  to  deny  that 
the  task  has  been  executed  with  great  judg 
ment  and  great  humanity.  When  we  consider 
the  life  which  Lord  Byron  had  led,  his  petu 
lance,  his  irritability,  and  his  communicative 
ness,  we  cannot  but  admire  the  dexterity  with 
which  Mr.  Moore  has  contrived  to  exhibit  so 
much  of  the  character  and  opinions  of  his 
friend,  with  so  little  pain  to  the  feelings  of  the 
living. 

The  extracts  from  the  journals  and  corres 
pondence  of  Lord  Byron  are  in  the  highest  de 
gree  valuable — not  merely  on  account  of  the 
information  which  they  contain  respecting  the 
distinguished  man  by  whom  they  were  written, 
but  on  account,  a'  >o.  of  their  rare  merit  as  com 
positions.  The  Letters,  at  least  those  which 
were  sent  from  Italy,  are  among  the  best  in  our 
language.  They  are  less  affected  than  those 
of  Pope  and  Walpole;  they  have  more  matter 
iu  them  than  those  of  Cowper.  Knowing  that 
many  of  them  were  not  written  merely  for  the 
person  to  whom  they  were  directed,  but  were 

*  Letters  and  Juiirnnls  of  Lord  Ryrun  f  wit h  Niitiesx  of 
}r«  Life  By  THOMAS  MOORE,  ESQ.  2  vola.  4to.  Lon 
don  :  1830. 


general  epistles,  meant  to  be  read  by  a  large 
circle,  we  expected  to  find  them  clever  and 
spirited,  but  deficient  in  ease.  We  looked 
with  vigilance  for  instances  of  stiffness  in  the 
language,  and  awkwardness  in  the  transitions. 
We  have  been  agreeably  disappointed  ;  and 

I  we  must  confess,  that  if  the  epistolary  style  of 
Lord  Byron  was  artificial,  it  was  a  rare  and 

|  admirable  instance  of  that  highest  art,  which 
cannot  be  distinguished  from  nature. 

Of  the  deep  and  painful  interest  which  this 

!  book  excites,  no  abstract  can  give  a  just  no 

I  lion.     So  sad  and  dark  a  story  is  scarcely  to  be 
found  in  any  work  of  fiction  ;  and  we  are  littl 
disposed  to  envy  the  moralist  who  can  read  i 
without  being  softened. 

The  pretty  fable  by  which  the  Duchess  of 
Orleans  illustrates  the  character  of  her  son  the 
regent,  might,  with  little  change,  be  applied  to 
Byron.  All  the  fairies,  save  one,  had  been  bid 
den  to  his  cradle.  All  the  gossips  had  been 
profuse  of  their  gifts.  One  had  bestowed  no 
bility,  another  genius,  a  third  beauty.  The 
malignant  elf  who  had  been  uninvited  came 
last,  and,  unable  to  reverse  what  her  sisters  had 
done  for  their  favourite,  had  mixed  up  a  curse 
with  every  blessing.  In  the  rank  of  Lord 
Byron,  in  his  understanding,  in  his  character, 
in  his  very  person,  there  was  a  strange  union 
of  opposite  extremes.  He  was  born  to  all  that 
men  covet  and  admire.  But  in  every  one  of 
those  eminent  advantages  which  he  possessed 
over  others,  there  was  mingled  someihing  of 
misery  and  debasement.  He  was  sprung  from 
a  house,  ancient  indeed  and  noble,  but  de 
graded  and  impoverished  by  a  series  of  crimes 
and  follies,  which  had  attained  a  scandalous 
publicity.  The  kinsman  whom  he  succeeded 
had  died  poor,  and,  but  for  merciful  judges, 
would  have  died  upon  the  gallows.  The  young 
peer  had  great  intellectual  powers;  yet  thers 
was  an  unsound  part  in  his  mind.  He  had  na 
turally  a  generous  and  tender  heart;  but  his 
temper  was  wayward  and  irritable.  He  had 
a  head  which  statuaries  loved  to  copy,  and  a 
foot  the  deformity  of  which  the  beggars  in  the 
streets  mimicked.  Distinguished  at  once  by  the 
strength  and  by  the  weakness  of  his  intellect, 
affectionate  yet  perverse,  a  poor  lord,  and  a 
handsome  cripple,  he  required,  if  ever  man  re 
quired,  the  firmest  and  the  most  judicious  train 
ing.  But,  capriciously  as  nature  had  dealt 
with  him,  the  relative  to  whom  the  office  of 
forming  his  character  was  intrusted  was  more 
capricious  still.  She  passed  from  paroxysms 
of  rage  to  paroxysms  of  fondness.  At  one  time 
she  stirled  him  with  her  caresses,  at  another 
time  she  insulted  his  deformity.  He  came  into 
the  world,  and  the  world  treated  him  as  his 

I  mother  treated  him  —  sometimes  with  kind 
ness,  sometimes  with  seventy,  never  with 
justice.  It  indulged  him  without  discrimina- 


MOORE'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON. 


117 


tion,  and  punished  him  without  discrimination. 
He  was  truly  a  spoiled  child;  not  merely  the 
spoiled  child  of  his  parents,  but  the  spoiled 
child  of  nature,  the  spoiled  child  of  fortune,  the 
spoiled  child  of  fame,  the  spoiled  child  of  so 
ciety.  His  first  poems  were  received  with  a 
contempt  which,  feeble  as  they  were,  they  did 
not  absolutely  deserve.  The  poem  which  he 
published  on  his  return  from  his  travels,  was, 
on  the  other  hand,  extolled  far  above  its  merits. 
At  twenty-four  he  found  himself  on  the  highest 
pinnacle  of  literary  fame,  with  Scott,  Words 
worth,  Southey,  and  a  crowd  of  other  distin 
guished  writers,  beneath  his  feet.  There  is 
scarcely  an  instance  in  history  of  so  sudden  a 
rise  to  so  dizzy  an  eminence. 

Every  thing  that  could  stimulate,  and  every 
thing  that  could  gratify  the  strongest  propensi 
ties  of  our  nature — the  gaze  of  a  hundred 
drawing-rooms,  the  acclamations  of  the  whole 
nation,  the  applause  of  applauded  men,  the 
love  of  the  loveliest  women — all  this  world, 
and  all  the  glory  of  it,  were  at  once  offered  to 
a  young  man,  to  whom  nature  had  given  vio 
lent  passions,  and  whom  education  had  never 
taught  to  control  them.  He  lived  as  many  men 
live  who  have  no  similar  excuses  to  plead 
for  their  faults.  But  his  countrymen  and  his 
countrywomen  would  love  him  and  admire 
him.  They  were  resolved  to  see  in  his  ex 
cesses  only  the  flash  and  outbreak  of  that  same 
fiery  mind  which  glowed  in  his  poetry.  He 
attacked  religion  ;  yet  in  religious  circles  his 
name  was  mentioned  with  fondness,  and  in 
many  religious  publications  his  works  were 
censured  with  singular  tenderness.  He  lam 
pooned  the  Prince  Regent;  yet  he  could  not 
alienate  the  Tories.  Every  thing,  it  seemed, 
was  to  be  forgiven  to  youth,  rank,  and  genius. 
.  Then  came  the  reaction.  Society,  capricious 
in  its  indigna'ion  as  it  had  been  capricious  in 
its  fondness,  flew  into  a  rage  with  its  froward 
and  petted  darling.  He  had  been  worshipped 
with  an  irrational  idolatry.  He  was  perse 
cuted  with  an  irrational  fury.  Much  has  been 
written  about  those  unhappy  domestic  occur 
rences  which  decided  the  fate  of  his  life.  Yet 
nothing  ever  was  positively  known  to  the 
public,  but  this — that  he  quarrelled  with  his 
lady,  and  that  she  refused  to  live  with  him. 
There  have  been  hints  in  abundance,  and 
shrugs  and  shakings  of  the  head,  and  "Well, 
well,  we  know,"  and  "We  could  an  if  we 
would,"  and  "  If  we  list  to  speak,"  and  "There 
be  that  might  an  they  list."  But  we  are  not 
aware  that  there  is  before  the  world,  substan 
tiated  by  credible,  or  even  by  tangible  evi 
dence,  a  single  fact  indicating  that  Lord  Byron 
was  more  to  blame  than  any  other  man  who  is 
on  Dad  terms  with  his  wife.  The  professional 
men  whom  Lady  Byron  consulted  were  un 
doubtedly  of  opinion  that  she  ought  not  to  live 
with  her  husband.  But  it  is  to  be  remembered 
that  thev  formed  that  opinion  without  hearing 
both  sides.  We  do  not  say,  we  do  not  mean 
to  insinuate  that  Lady  Byron  was  in  any  re 
spect  to  blame.  We  think  that  those  who  con 
demn  her  on  the  evidence  which  is  now  before, 
the  public,  are  as  rash  as  those  who  condemn 
her  husband.  We  will  not  pronounce  any 
judgment;  we  cannot,  even  in  our  own  minds, 


form  any  judgment  on  a  transaction  which  is 
so  imperfectly  known  to  us.  It  would  have 
been  well  if,  at  the  time  of  the  separation,  all 
those  who  knew  as  little  about  the  matter  then 
as  we  know  about  it  now,  had  shown  that  for 
bearance,  which,  under  such  circumstances,  is 
but  common  justice. 

We  know  no  spectacle  so  ridiculous  as  the 
British  public  in  one  of  its  periodical  fits  of 
morality.  In  general,  elopements,  divorces, 
and  family  quarrels  pass  with  little  notice. 
We  read  the  scandal,  talk  about  it  for  a  day, 
and  forget  it.  But  once  in  six  or  seven  years, 
our  virtue  becomes  outrageous.  We  cannot 
suffer  the  laws  of  religion  and  decency  to  be 
violated.  We  must  make  a  stand  against  vice. 
We  must  teach  libertines,  that  the  English 
people  appreciate  the  importance  of  domestic 
ties.  Accordingly,  some  unfortunate  man,  in 
no  respect  more  depraved  than  hundreds  whose 
offences  have  been  treated  with  lenity,  is 
singled  out  as  an  expiatory  sacrifice.  If  he 
has  children,  they  are  to  be  taken  from  him.  If 
he  has  a  profession,  he  is  to  be  driven  from  iu 
He  is  cut -by  the  higher  orders,  and  hissed  by 
the  lower.  He  is,  in  truth,  a  sort  of  whipping- 
boy,  by  whose  vicarious  agonies  all  the  other 
transgressors  of  the  same  class  are,  it  is  sup 
posed,  sufficiently  chastised.  We  reflect  very 
complacently  on  our  own  severity,  and  com 
pare  with  great  pride  the  high  standard  of  mo 
rals  established  in  England,  with  the  Parisian 
laxity.  At  length  our  anger  is  satiated.  Our 
victim  is  ruined  and  heart-broken.  And  our 
virtue  goes  quietly  to  sleep  for  seven  year* 
more. 

It  is  clear  that  those  vices  which  destroy  do 
mestic  happiness  ought  to  be  as  much  as  pos 
sible  repressed.  It  is  equally  clear  that  they 
cannot  be  repressed  by  penal  legislation.  It  is 
therefore  right  and  desirable  that  public  opi 
nion  should  be  directed  against  them.  But  it 
should  be  directed  against  them  uniformly, 
steadily,  and  temperately,  not  by  sudden  fits 
and  starts.  There  should  be  one  weight  and 
one  measure.  Decimation  is  always  an  ob 
jectionable  mode  of  punishment.  It  is  the 
resource  of  judges  loo  indolent  and  hasty  to 
investigate  facts,  and  to  discriminate  nicely 
between  shades  of  guilt.  It  is  an  irrational 
practice,  even  when  adopted  by  military  tribu 
nals.  When  adopted  by  the  tribunal  of  public 
opinion,  it  is  infinitely  more  irrational.  It  is 
good  that  a  certain  portion  of  disgrace  should 
constantly  attend  on  certain  bad  actions.  But 
it  is  not  good  that  the  offenders  merely  have  to 
stand  the  risks  of  a  lottery  of  infamy;  that 
ninety-nine  out  of  every  hundred  should 
escape;  and  that  the  hundredth,  perhaps  the 
most  innocent  of  the  hundred,  should  pay  for 
all.  We  remember  to  have  seen  a  rnob  assem 
bled  in  Lincoln's  Inn  to  hoot  a  gentleman, 
against  whom  the  most  oppressive  proceeding 
known  to  the  English  law  was  then  in  pro- 
gress.  He  was  hooted  because  he  had  been  an 
indifferent  and  unfaithful  husband,  as  if  some 
of  the  most  popular  men  of  the  age,  Lord  Nel 
son,  for  example,  had  not  been  indifferent  and 
unfaithful  husbands.  We  remember  a  still 
stronger  case.  Will  posterity  believe,  tnat  in 
an  age  in  which  men,  whose  gallantries  wer« 


118 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


universally  known,  and  had  been  legally 
proved,  filled  some  of  the  highest  offices  in  the 
state,  and  in  the  army,  presided  at  the  meetings 
of  religious  and  benevolent  institutions,  were 
the  delight  of  every  society,  and  the  favourites 
of  the  multitude,  a  crowd  of  moralists  went  to 
the  theatre,  in  order  to  pelt  a  poor  actor  for 
disturbing  the  conjugal  felicity  of  an  alder 
man  ?  What  there  was  in  the  circumstances, 
either  of  the  offender  or  of  the  sufferer,  to  vin 
dicate  the  zeal  of  the  audience,  we  could  never 
conceive.  It  has  never  been  supposed  that  the 
situation  of  an  actor  is  peculiarly  favourable 
to  the  rigid  virtues,  or  that  an  alderman  enjoys 
any  special  immunity  from  injuries  such  as 
that  which  on  this  occasion  roused  the  anger 
of  the  public.  But  such  is  the  justice  of  man 
kind. 

In  these  cases,  the  punishment  was  exces 
sive  ;  but  the  offence  was  known  and  proved. 
The  case  of  Lord  Byron  was  harder.  True 
Jedwood  justice  was  dealt  out  to  him.  First 
came  the  execution,  then  the  investigation,  and 
last  of  all,  or  rather  not  at  all,  the  accusation. 
The  public,  without  knowing  any  thing  what 
ever  about  the  transactions  in  his  family,  flew 
into  a  violent  passion  with  him,  arid  proceeded 
to  invent  stones  which  might  justify  its  anger. 
Ten  or  twenty  different  accounts  of  the  sepa 
ration,  inconsistent  with  each  other,  with 
themselves,  and  with  common  sense,  circu 
lated  at  the  same  time.  What  evidence  there 
might  be  for  any  one  of  these,  the  virtuous 
people  who  repeated  them  neither  knew  nor 
cared.  For  in  fact  these  stories  were  not  the 
causes,  but  the  effects  of  the  public  indigna 
tion.  They  resembled  those  loathsome  slanders 
which  Goldsmith,  and  other  abject  libellers  of 
the  same  class,  were  in  the  habit  of  publishing 
about  Bonaparte — how  he  poisoned  a  girl  with 
arsenic,  when  he  was  at  the  military  school — 
how  he  hired  a  grenadier  to  shoot  Dessaix  at 
Marengo — how  he  filled  St.  Cloud  with  all  the 
pollutions  of  Capreoe.  There  was  a  time  when 
anecdotes  like  these  obtained  some  credence 
from  persons,  who,  hating  the  French  Emperor 
without  knowing  why,  were  eager  to  believe 
any  thing  which  might  justify  their  hatred. 
Lord  Byron  fared  in  the  same  way.  His 
countrymen  were  in  a  bad  humour  with  him. 
His  writings  and  his  character  had  lost  the 
charm  of  novelty.  He  had  been  guilty  of  the 
offence  which,  of  all  offences,  is  punished  more 
severely;  he  had  been  over-praised;  he  had 
excited  too  warm  an  interest;  and  the  public, 
with  its  usual  justice,  chastised  him  for  its 
own  folly.  The  attachments  of  the  multitude 
bear  no  small  resemblance  to  those  of  the 
wanton  enchantress  in  the  Arabian  Tales,  who, 
when  the  forty  days  of  her  fondness  were  over, 
was  not  content  with  dismissing  her  lovers, 
out  condemned  them  to  expiate,  in  loathsome 
shapes,  and  under  severe  punishments,  the 
crime  of  having  once  pleased  her  too  well. 

The  obloquy  which  Byron  had  to  endure 
was  such  as  might  well  have  shaken  a  more 
constant  mind.  The  newspapers  were  filled 
w.tn  lampoons.  The  theatres  shook  with  exe 
crations.  He  was  excluded  from  circles  where 
be  had  lately  been  the  observed  of  all  observ 
ers  AJ)  those  creeping  things  that  riot  in  the 


decay  of  nobler  natures,  hastened  to  their  re 
past;  and  they  were  right;  they  did  after  their 
kind.  It  is  not  every  day  that  the  savage  envy 
of  aspiring  dunces  is  gratified  by  the  agcnies 
of  such  a  spirit  and  the  degradation  of  such  a 
name. 

The  unhappy  man  left  his  country  forever. 
The  howl  of  contumely  followed  him  across 
the  sea,  up  the  Rhine,  over  the  Alps;  it  gradu 
ally  waxed  fainter;  it  died  away.  Those  who 
had  raised  it  began  to  ask  each  other,  what, 
after  all,  was  the  matter  about  which  they  had 
been  so  clamorous;  and  wished  to  invite  back 
the  criminal  whom  they  had  just  chased  from 
them.  His  poetry  became  more  popular  than 
it  had  ever  been  ;  and  his  complaints  were  read 
with  tears  by  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands 
who  had  never  seen  his  face. 

He  had  fixed  his  home  on  the  shores  of  the 
Adriatic,  in  the  most  picturesque  and  interest 
ing  of  cities,  beneath  the  brightest  of  skies, 
and  by  the  brightest  of  seas.  Censoriousness 
was  not  the  vice  of  the  neighbours  whom  he 
had  chosen.  They  were  a  race  corrupted  by 
a  bad  government  and  a  bad  religion  ;  long  re 
nowned  for  skill  in  the  arts  of  voluptuousness, 
and  tolerant  of  all  the  caprices  of  sensuality. 
From  the  public  opinion  of  the  country  of  his 
adontion  he  had  nothing  to  dread.  With  the 
public  opinion  of  the  country  of  his  birth  he 
was  at  open  war.  He  plunged  into  wild  and 
desperate  excesses,  ennobled  by  no  generous 
or  tender  sentiment.  From  his  Venetian  harem 
he  sent  forth  volume  after  volume,  full  of  elo 
quence,  of  wit,  of  pathos,  of  ribaldry,  and  of 
bitter  disdain.  His  health  sank  under  tho 
effects  of  his  intemperance.  His  hair  turned 
gray.  His  food  ceased  to  nourish  him.  A 
hectic  fever  withered  him  up.  It  seemed  tha* 
his  body  and  mind  were  about  to  perish  to 
gether. 

From  this  wretched  degradation  he  was  in 
some  measure  rescued  by  an  attachment, 
culpable  indeed,  yet  such  as,  judged  by  the 
standard  of  morality  established  in  the  country 
where  he  lived,  might  be  called  virtuous.  But 
an  imagination  polluted  by  vice,  a  temper  im- 
bittered  by  misfortune,  and  a  frame  habituated 
to  the  fatal  excitement  of  intoxication,  pre 
vented  him  from  fully  enjoying  the  happiness 
which  he  might  have  derived  from  the  purest 
and  most  tranquil  of  his  many  attachments. 
Midnight  draughts  of  ardent  spirits  and  Rhe 
nish  wines  had  begun  to  work  the  ruin  of  his 
fine  intellect.  His  verse  lost  much  of  the 
energy  and  condensation  which  had  distin 
guished  it.  But  he  would  not  resign,  without 
a  struggle,  the  empire  which  he  had  exercised 
over  the  men  of  his  generation.  A  new  dream 
of  ambition  arose  before  him,  to  be  the  centre 
of  a  literary  party;  the  great  mover  of  an  in 
tellectual  revolution;  to  guide  the  public  mind 
of  England  from  his  Italian  retreat,  as  Voltaire 
had  guided  the  public  mind  of  France  from 
the  villa  of  Ferney.  With  this  hope,  as  it 
should  seem,  he  established  The  Liberal.  But 
powerfully  as  he  had  affected  the  imaginations 
of  his  contemporaries,  he  mistook  his  own 
powers,  if  he  hoped  to  direct  their  opinions: 
and  he  still  more  grossly  mistook  his  own  dis 
position,  if  he  thought  that  he  could  Hng  act 


MOORE'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON. 


119 


hi  concert  with  other  men  of  letters.  The 
,»lan  failed,  and  failed  ignominiously.  Angry 
with  himself,  angry  with  his  coadjutors,  he  re 
linquished  it:  and  turned  to  another  project, 
the  last  and  the  noblest  of  his  life. 

A  nation,  once  the  first  among  the  nations, 
pre-eminent  in  knowledge,  pre-eminent  in  mi 
litary  glory,  the  cradle  of  philosophy,  of  elo 
quence,  and  of  the  fine  arts,  had  been  for  ages 
bowed  down  under  a  cruel  yoke.  All  the  vices 
which  tyranny  generates — the  abject  vices 
which  it  generates  in  those  who  submit  to  it, 
the  ferocious  vices  which  it  generates  in  those 
who  struggle  against  it — had  deformed  the 
character  of  that  miserable  race.  The  valour 
which  had  won  the  great  battle  of  human 
civilization,  which  had  saved  Europe,  and 
subjugated  Asia,  lingered  only  among  pirates 
and  robbers.  The  ingenuity,  once  so  conspi 
cuously  displayed  in  every  department  of  phy 
sical  and  moral  science,  had  been  depraved 
into  a  timid  and  servile  cunning.  On  a  sudden 
this  degraded  people  had  risen  on  their  op 
pressors.  Discountenanced  or  betrayed  by  the 
surrounding  potentates,  they  had  found  in 
themselves  something  of  that  which  might 
well  supply  the  place  of  all  foreign  assistance 
—something  of  the  energy  of  their  fathers. 

As  a  man  of  letters,  Lord  Byron  could  not 
but  be  interested  in  the  event  of  this  contest. 
HLs  political  opinions,  though,  like  all  his  opi 
nions,  unsettled,  leaned  strongly  towards  the 
side  of  liberty.  He  had  assisted  the  Italian 
insurgents  with  his  purse;  and  if  their  struggle 
against  the  Austrian  government  had  been 
prolonged,  would  probably  have  assisted  them 
with  his  sword.  But  to  Greece  he  was  at 
tached  by  peculiar  ties.  He  had,  when  young, 
resided  in  that  country.  Much  of  his  most 
splendid  and  popular  poetry  had  been  inspired 
by  its  scenery  and  by  its  history.  Sick  of  in 
action,  degraded  in  his  own  eyes  by  his  private 
vices  and  by  his  literary  failures,  pining  for 
untried  excitement  and  honourable  distinction, 
he  carried  his  exhausted  body  and  his  wound 
ed  spirit  to  the  Grecian  camp. 

His  conduct  in  his  new  situation  showed  so 
much  vigour  and  good  sense  as  to  justify  us 
in  believing,  that,  if  his  life  had  been  pro 
longed,  he  might  have  distinguished  himself 
as  a  soldier  and  a  politician.  But  pleasure 
and  sorrow  had  done  the  work  of  seventy 
years  upon  his  delicate  frame.  The  hand  of 
death  was  on  him;  he  knew  it;  and  the  only 
wish  which  he  uttered  was  that  he  might  die 
sword  in  hand. 

This  was  denied  to  him.  Anxiety,  exertion, 
exposure,  and  those  fatal  stimulants  which  had 
become  indispensable  to  him,  soon  stretched 
him  on  a  sick-bed,  in  a  strange  land,  amidst 
strange  faces,  without  one  human  being  that 
he  loved  near  him.  There,  at  thirty-six,  the 
most  celebrated  Englishman  of  the  nineteenth 
century  closed  his  brilliant  and  miserable 
career. 

We  cannot  even  now  retrace  those  events 
without  feeling  something  of  what  was  felt  by 
the  nation,  when  it  was  first  known  that  the 
grave  had  closed  over  so  much  sorrow  and  so 
much  glory  ; — something  of  what  was  felt  by 
Ihjse  win:  saw  the  hearse,  with  its  long  train 


of  coaches,  turn  slowly  northward,  leaving  be* 
hind  it  that  cemetery,  which  had  l>een  conse 
crated  by  the  dust  of  so  many  great  poets,  but 
of  which  the  doors  were  closed  against  all 
that  remained  of  Byron.  We  well  remember 
that,  on  that  day,  rigid  moralists  could  not  re 
frain  from  weeping  for  one  so  young,  so  illus 
trious,  so  unhappy,  gifted  with  such  rare  gifts, 
and  tried  by  such  strong  temptations.  It  is 
unnecessary  to  make  any  reflections.  The 
history  carries  its  mora.  with  it.  Our  age  has 
indeed  been  fruitful  of  warnings  to  the  emi 
nent,  and  of  consolations  to  the  obscure.  Two 
men  have  died  within  our  recollection,  who  &. 
a  time  of  life  at  which  few  people  have  com 
pleted  their  education,  had  raised  themselves, 
each  in  his  own  department,  to  the  height  of 
glory.  One  of  them  died  at  Longwood,  the 
other  at  Missolonghi. 

It  is  always  difficult  to  separate  the  literary 
character  of  a  man  who  lives  in  our  own  time 
from  his  personal  character.  It  is  peculiarly 
difficult  to  make  this  separation  in  the  case  of 
Lord  Byron.  For  it  is  scarcely  too  much  to 
say,  that  .Lord  Byron  never  wrote  without  some 
reference,  direct  or  indirect,  to  himself.  The 
interest  excited  by  the  events  of  his  life  mingles 
itself  in  our  minds,  and  probably  in  the  minds 
of  almost  all  our  readers,  with  the  interest 
which  properly  belongs  to  his  works.  A  ge 
neration  must  pass  away  before  it  will  be  pos 
sible  to  form  a  fair  judgment  of  his  books, 
considered  merely  as  books.  At  present  they 
are  not  only  books,  but  relics.  We  will,  hovr- 
ever,  venture,  though  with  unfeigned  diffidence, 
to  offer  some  desultory  remarks  on  his  poetry. 

His  lot  was  cast  in  the  time  of  a  great  lite 
rary  revolution.  That  poetical  dynasty  which 
had  dethroned  the  successors  of  Shakspeare 
and  Spenser  was,  in  its  turn,  dethroned  by  a 
race  who  represented  themselves  as  heirs  of 
the  ancient  line,  so  long  dispossessed  by  usurp 
ers.  The  real  nature  of  this  revolution  has 
not,  we  think,  been  comprehended  by  the  great 
majority  of  those  who  concurred  in  it. 

If  this  question  were  proposed — wherein 
especially  does  the  poetry  of  our  times  differ 
from  that  of  the  last  century!  ninety-nine 
persons  out  of  a  hundred  would  answer,  that 
the  poetry  of  the  last  century  was  correct,  but 
cold  and  mechanical,  and  that  the  poetry  of  our 
time,  though  wild  and  irregular,  presented  far 
more  vivid  images,  and  excited  the  }  assions 
far  more  strong^,  than  that  of  Parnell,  '»f  Ad- 
dison,  or  of  Pope.  In  the  same  mann  *r  we 
constantly  hear  it  said,  that  the  poets  or  the 
age  of  Elizabeth  had  far  more  genius,  bin  far 
less  correctness,  than  those  of  the  age  of  An  \e. 
It  seems  to  be  taken  for  granted,  that  there  is 
some  necessary  incompatibility,  some  antithe 
sis,  between  correctness  and  creative  power. 
We  rather  suspect  that  this  notion  arises  mere 
ly  from  an  abuse  of  words  ;  and  that  it  has 
been  the  parent  of  many  of  the  fallacies  which 
perplex  the  science  of  criticism. 

What  is  meant  by  correctness  in  poetry  * 
If  by  correctness  be  meart  the  conforming  to 
rules  which  have  their  foundation  in  truth 
and  in  the  principles  of  human  natuie,  ihert 
correctness  is  only  another  name  for  excel 
lence.  If  by  correctness  be  meant  the  C.OD 


120 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


forming  to  rules  purely  arbitrary,  correctness 
may  be  another  name  for  dulness  and  ab 
surdity. 

A  writer  who  describes  visible  objects  false 
ly,  and  violates  the  propriety  of  character — a 
writer  who  makes  the  mountains  "  nod  their 
drowsy  heads"  at  night,  or  a  dying  man  take 
leave  of  the  world  with  a  rant  like  that  of 
Maximin,  may  be  said,  in  the  high  arid  just 
sense  of  the  phrase,  to  write  incorrectly.  He 
violates  the  first  great  law  of  his  art.  His 
imitation  is  altogether  unlike  the  thing  imi 
tated.  The  four  poets  who  are  most  eminently 
free  from  incorrectness  of  this  description  are 
Homer,  Dante,  Shakspeare,  and  Milton.  They 
are,  therefore,  in  one  sense,  and  that  the  best 
sense,  the  most  correct  of  poets. 

When  it  is  said  that  Virgil,  though  he  had 
less  genius  than  Homer,  was  a  more  correct 
writer,  what  sense  is  attached  to  the  word  cor 
rectness  1  Is  it  meant  that  the  story  of  the 
^Eneid  is  developed  more  skilfully  than  that 
of  the  Odyssey!  that  the  ROD  an  describes  the 
face  of  the  external  world,  01  he  emotions  of 
the  mind,  more  accurately  inan  the  Greek  1 
that  the  characters  of  Achates  and  Mnestheus 
are  more  nicely  discriminated,  and  more  con 
sistently  supported,  than  those  of  Achilles,  of 
Nestor,  and  of  Ulysses  1  The  fact  incontesta- 
bly  is,  that  for  every  violation  of  the  funda 
mental  laws  of  poetry,  which  can  be  found  in 
Homer,  it  would  be  easy  to  find  twenty  in 
Virgil. 

Troilus  and  Cressida  is  perhaps  of  all  the 
plays  of  Shakspeare  that  which  is  commonly 
considered  as  the  most  incorrect.  Yet  it  seems 
to  us  infinitely  more  correct,  in  the  sound 
sense  of  the  term,  than  what  are  called  the 
most  correct  plays  of  the  most  correct  drama 
tists.  Compare  it,  for  example,  with  the  Iphi- 
genie  of  Racine.  We  are  sure  that  the  Greeks 
of  Shakspeare  bear  a  far  greater  resemblance 
than  the  Greeks  of  Racine,  to  the  real  Greeks 
who  besieged  Troy ;  and  for  this  reason,  that 
the  Greeks  of  Shakspeare  are  human  beings, 
and  the  Greeks  of  Racine  mere  names  ; — mere 
words  printed  in  capitals  at  the  head  of  para 
graphs  of  declamation.  Racine,  it  is  true, 
would  have  shuddered  at  the  thought  of 
making  Agamemnon  quote  Aristotle.  But  of 
what  use  is  it  to  avoid  a  single  anachronism, 
when  the  whole  play  is  one  anachronism — the 
topics  and  phrases  of  Versailles  in  the  camp 
of  Aul's? 

In  toe  sense  in  which  we  are  now  using  the 
word  correctness,  we  think  that  Sir  Walter 
Sco'i,  Mr.  Wordsworth,  Mr.  Coleridge,  are  far 
nu  re  correct  writers  than  those  who  are  com- 
mon.y  extolled  as  the  models  of  correctness — 
Pope  for  example,  and  Addison.  The  single 
description  of  a  moonlight  night  in  Pope's 
Iliad  r'on tains  more  inaccuracies  than  can  be 
found  in  all  the  Excursion.  There  is  not  a 
single  scene  in  Cato  in  which  every  thing  that 
conduces  to  poetical  illusion — the  propriety  of 
character,  of  language,  of  situation,  is  not 
more  grossly  violated  than  in  any  part  of  the 
Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel.  No  man  can  possi 
bly  think  that  the  Romans  *bf  Addison  resem- 
h'e  the  real  Romans  so  closely  as  the  moss- 
of  Scott  resemble  the  real  moss-troop 


ers.  Watt  Tinlinn  and  William  of  Deloraine 
are  not,  it  is  true,  persons  of  so  much  dignity 
as  Cato.  But  the  dignity  of  the  persons  repre 
sented  has  as  little  to  do  with  the  correctness 
of  poetry  as  with  the  correctness  of  painting. 
We  prefer  a  gipsy  by  Reynolds  to  his  majes 
ty's  head  on  a  signpost,  and  a  borderer  by 
Scott  to  a  senator  by  Addison. 

In  what  sense,  then,  is  the  word  correctness 
used  by  those  who  say,  with  the  author  of  the 
Pursuits  of  Literature,  that  Pope  was  the  most 
correct  of  English  poets,  and,  that  next  to  Pope, 
came  the  late  Mr.  Gifford  ]  What  is  the  na 
ture  and  value  of  that  correctness,  the  praise 
of  which  is  denied  to  Macbeth,  to  Lear,  and  to 
Othello,  and  given  to  Hoole's  translations  and 
to  all  the  Seatonian  prize-poems  1  We  caa 
discover  no  eternal  rule,  no  rule  founded  in, 
reason  and  in  the  nature  of  things,  which 
Shakspeare  does  not  observe  much  more 
strictly  than  Pope.  But  if  by  correctness  be 
meant  the  conforming  to  a  narrow  legislation, 
which,  while  lenient  to  the  mala  in  se,  multi 
plies,  without  the  shadow  of  a  reason,  the  mala 
proliibita;  if  by  correctness  be  meant  a  strict 
attention  to  certain  ceremonious  observances, 
which  are  no  more  essential  to  poetry  than 
etiquette  to  good  government,  or  than  the 
washings  of  a  Pharisee  to  devotion  ;  then,  as 
suredly,  Pope  may  be  a  more  correct  poet  than 
Shakspeare;  and,  if  the  code  were  a  little 
altered,  Colley  Gibber  might  be  a  more  correct 
poet  than  Pope.  But  it  may  well  be  doubted 
whether  this  kind  of  correctness  be  a  merit; 
nay,  whether  it  be  not  an  absolute  fault. 

It  would  be  amusing  to  make  a  digest  of  the 
irrational  laws  which  bad  critics  have  framed 
for  the  government  of  poets.  First  in  celebrity 
and  in  absurdity  stand  the  dramatic  unities  of 
place  and  time.  No  human  being  has  ever 
been  able  to  find  any  thing  that  could,  even  by 
courtesy,  be  called  an  argument  for  these  uni 
ties,  except  that  they  have  been  deduced  from 
the  general  practice  of  the  Greeks.  It  requires 
no  very  profound  examination  to  discover  that 
the  Greek  dramas,  often  admirable  as  compo 
sitions,  are,  as  exhibitions  of  human  charac 
ter  and  human  life,  far  inferior  to  the  English 
plays  of  the  age  of  Elizabeth.  Every  scholar 
knows  that  the  dramatic  part  of  the  Athenian 
tragedies  was  at  first  subordinate  to  the  lyrical 
part.  It  would,  therefore,  have  been  little  less 
than  a  miracle  if  the  laws  of  the  Athenian 
stage  had  been  found  to  suit  plays  in  which 
there  was  no  chorus.  All  the  great  master 
pieces  of  the  dramatic  art  have  been  com 
posed  in  direct  violation  of  the  unities,  and 
could  never  have  been  composed  if  the  unities 
had  not  been  violated.  It  is  clear,  for  exam 
ple,  that  such  a  character  as  that  of  Harnlet 
could  never  have  been  developed  within  the 
limits  to  which  Alfieri  confined  himself.  Yet 
such  was  the  reverence  of  literary  men  during 
the  last  century  for  these  unities,  that  Johnson, 
who,  much  to  his  honour,  took  the  opposite 
side,  was,  as  he  says,  "  frighted  at  his  own  te 
merity  ;"  and  "  afraid  to  stand  against  the  au 
thorities  which  might  be  pioduced  against 
him." 

There  are  other  rules  of  the  same  kind 
without  end.  "Shakspeare,"  says  Rymer, 


MOORE'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON. 


see  in  old  Bibles  —  an  exact  square,  er,olose<J 
by  the  rivers  Pison,  Gihon,  Hiddekel,  and  Eu 
phrates,  each  with  a  convenient  bridge  in  the 
centre  —  rectangular  beds  of  flowers  —  a  long1 
canal  neatly  bricked  and  railed  in  —  the  tree  of 
knowledge,  clipped  like  one  of  the  limes  be 
hind  the  Tuileries,  standing  in  the  centre  of 
the  grand  alley  —  the  snake  twined  round  a—  • 
the  man  on  the  right  hand,  the  woman  on  the 
left,  and  the  beasts  drawn  up  in  an  exact  cir 
cle  round  them.  In  one  sense  the  picture  is 
correct  enough.  That  is  to  say,  the  sq-iares 
are  correct;  the  circles  are  correct;  the  ri,att 
and  woman  are  in  a  most  correct  ,  rit  Amh  th« 
tree  ;  and  the  snake  forms  a  n_:>st  correct 
spi  al. 

But  if  there  were  a  painter  so  gifted,  that  he 
should  place  in  the  canvass  that  glorious  para 
dise  seen  by  the  interior  eye  of  him  whose  out 
ward  :-;ight  had  failed  with  long  watching  and 
labouring  for  liberty  and  truth  —  if  there  were 
a  painter  who  could  set  before  us  the  mazes  of 
the  sapphire  brook,  the  lake  with  its  fringe  of 
myrtles,  the  flowery  meadows,  the  grottoes 
overhung  by  vines,  the  forests  shining  with. 
Hesperian  fruit  and  with  the  plumage  of  gor 
geous  birds,  the  massy  shade  of  that  nuptial 
bower  which  showered  down  roses  on  the 
sleeping  lovers  —  what  should  we  think  of  a 
connoisseur  who  should  tell  us  that  this  paint 
ing,  though  finer  than  the  absurd  picture  of  the 
old  Bible,  was  not  so  correct!  Surely  we 
should  answer,  It  is  both  finer  and  more  cor 
rect  ;  and  it  is  finer  because  it  is  more  correct. 
It  is  not  made  up  of  correctly  drawn  diagrams, 
but  it  is  A  correct  painting,  a  worthy  representa 
tion  of  that  which  it  is  intended  to  represent. 

It  is  not  in  the  fine  arts  alone  that  this  false 
correctness  is  prized  by  narrow-minded  men, 
by  men  who  cannot  distinguish  means  from 
ends,  or  what  is  accidental  from  what  is  essen 
tial.  Mr.  Jourdain  admired  correctness  in. 
fencing.  "You  had  no  business  to  hit  me  then. 
You  must  never  thrust  in  quart  till  you  have 
thrust  in  tierce"  M.  Tomes  liked  correctness 
in  medical  practice.  "  I  stand  up  for  Artemms. 
That  he  killed  his  patient  is  plain  enough. 
But  still  he  acted  quite  according  to  rule.  A 
man  dead  is  a  man  dead,  and  there  is  an  end 
of  the  matter.  But  if  rules  are  to  be  broken, 
there  is  no  saying  what  consequences  may 
follow."  We  have  heard  of  an  old  German 
officer,  who  was  a  great  admirer  of  correctness 
in  military  operations.  He  used  to  revile  Bo 
naparte  for  spoiling  the  science  of  war,  which 
had  been  carried  to  such  an  exquisite  perfec 
tion  by  Marshal  Daun.  "In  my  youth  we  used 
to  march  and  countermarch  all  the  summer, 
without  gaining  or  losing  a  square  league,  and 
then  we  went  into  winter-quarters.  And  no\v 

sixth  line  sball  have  twelve  syllables.  If  we  [  comes  an  ignorant,  hot-headed  young  man, 
were  to  lay  down  these  canons,  and  to  call  who  flies  about  from  Boulogne  *o  Ulm,  and 
Pope,  Goldsmith,  and  Addison  incorrect  wri-  from  Ulm  to  the  middle  of  Moravia,  and  rights 
ters  for  not  having  complied  with  our  whims,  ;  battles  in  December.  The  whole  system  of 
•we  should  act  precisely  as  those  critics  act  his  tactics  is  monstrously  incorrect."  The 
who  find  incorrectness  in  the  magnificent  ima-  ;  world  is  of  opinion,  in  spite  of  critics  like  these, 
gery  and  the  varied  music  of  Coleridge  and  that  the  end  of  fencing  is  to  hit,  that  the  end  of 
Shelley. 

The    correctness   which    the   last   century 
prized  so  much  resembled  the  correctness  of 
those  pictures  of  the  garden  of  Eden  which  we 
VoL.1,-16 


B ought  not  to  have  made  Othello  black;  for 
the  hero  of  a  tragedy  ought  always  to  be 
white."  «•  Milton,"  says  another  critic,  "  ought 
not  to  have  taken  Adam  for  his  hero  ;  for  the 
hero  of  an  epic  poem  ought  always  to  be  vic 
torious."  "Milton,"  says  another,  "ought  not 
to  have  put  so  many  similes  into  his  first 
book;  for  the  first  book  of  an  epic  poem  ought 
always  to  be  the  most  unadorned.  There  are 
no  similes  in  the  first  book  of  the  Iliad." 
**  Milton,"  says  another,  "ought  not  to  have 
placed  in  an  epic  poem  such  lines  as  these : 

•  I  rlso  tarred  in  overmuch  admiring.'  " 

And  why  not  1  The  critic  is  ready  with  a  reason 
— a  lady's  reason.  "  Such  lines,"  says  he,  "  are 
not,  it  must  be  allowed,  unpleasing  to  the  ear; 
but  the  redundant  syllable  ought  to  be  confined 
to  the  drama,and  not  admitted  into  epic  poetry." 
As  to  the  redundant  syllable  in  heroic  rhyme, 
on  serious  subjects,  it  has  been,  from  the  time 
of  Pope  downward,  proscribed  by  the  general 
consent  of  all  the  correct  school.  No  maga 
zine  would  have  admitted  so  incorrect  a  coup 
let  as  that  of  Dayton, 

"A*  when  w«  lived  untouched  with  the^i  disgraces, 
When  as  our  kingdom  was  our  dear  eniuraces." 

Another  law  of  heroic  poetry  which,  fifty  years 
ago,  was  considered  as  fundamental,  was,  that 
there  should  be  a  pause — a  comma  at  least,  at 
the  end  of  every  couplet.  It  was  also  provided 
that  there  should  never  be  a  full  stop  except 
at  the  end  of  a  couplet.  Well  do  we  remem 
ber  to  have  heard  a  most  correct  judge  of  poe 
try  revile  Mr.  Rogers  for  the  incorrectness  of 
that  most  sweet  and  graceful  passage, 

•"Twas  thhie,  Maria,  thine,  without  a  sigh, 
At  midnight  in  u  sister's  arms  to  die, 
Nursing  the  young  to  health." 

Sir  Roger  Newdigate  is  fairly  entitled,  we 
think,  to  be  ranked  among  the  great  critics  of 
this  school.  He  made  a  law  that  none  of  the 
poems  written  for  the  prize  which  he  estab 
lished  at  Oxford  should  exceed  fifty  lines. 
This  law  seems  to  us  to  have  at  least  as  much 
foundation  in  reason  as  any  of  those  which 
we  have  mentioned ;  nay,  much  more,  for  the 
world,  we  believe,  is  pretty  well  agreed  in 
thinking  that  the  shorter  a  prize-poem  is,  the 
better. 

We  do  not  see  why  we  should  not  make  a 
few  more  rules  of  the  same  kind — why  we 
should  not  enact  that  the  number  of  scenes  in 
every  act  shall  be  three,  or  some  multiple  of 
three;  that  the  number  of  lines  in  every  scene 
shall  be  an  exact  square ;  that  the  dramatis 
persmiff  shall  never  be  more  nor  fewer  than  six 
teen  ;  and  that,  in  heroic  rhymes,  every  thirty- 


medicine  is  to  cure,  that  the  end  or  war  is 
conquer,  and  that  those  means  are  the  mote 
correct  which  best  accomplish  the  ends. 
And  has  poetry  no  end,  no  eternal  and  ini 


122 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


mutable  principles?  Is  poetry,  like  heraldry, 
mere  matter  of  arbitrary  regulation  1  The 
heralds  tell  us  that  certain  scutcheons  and 
bearings  denote  certain  conditions,  and  that  to 
put  colours  on  colours,  or  metals  on  rnetals,  is 
false  blazonry.  If  all  this  were  reversed;  if 
every  coat  of  arms  in  Europe  were  new-fash 
ioned;  if  it  were  decreed  that  or  should  never 
be  placed  but  on  argent,  or  argent  but  on  or; 
that  illegitimacy  should  be  denoted  by  a  lozenge, 
and  widowhood  by  a  bend,  the  new  science 
would  be  just  as  good  as  the  old  science,  be 
cause  both  the  new  and  the  old  would  be  good 
for  nothing.  The  mummery  of  Portcullis  and 
Rouge  Dragon,  as  it  has  no  other  value  than 
that  which  caprice  has  assigned  to  it,  may  well 
submit  to  any  laws  which  caprice  may  impose 
on  it.  But  it  is  not  so  with  that  great  imitative 
art,  to  the  power  of  which  all  ages,  the  rudest 
and  the  most  enlightened,  bear  witness.  Since 
its  first  grea»  masterpieces  were  produced, 
every  thing  t*  at  is  changeable  in  this  world 
has  been  changed.  Civilization  has  been 
gained,  los',  gained  again.  Religions,  and 
languages,  and  forms  of  government,  and 
usages  of  private  life,  and  the  modes  of  think 
ing,  ?1I  have  undergone  a  succession  of  revo 
lutions.  Every  thing  has  passed  away  but  the 
great  features  of  nature,  the  heart  of  man,  and 
the  miracles  of  that  art  of  which  it  is  the  office 
to  reflect  back  the  heart  of  man  and  the  fea 
tures  of  nature.  Those  two  strange  old  poerns, 
the  wonder  of  ninety  generations,  still  retain 
all  their  freshness.  They  still  command  the 
veneration  of  minds  enriched  by  the  literature 
'>f  many  nations  and  ages.  They  are  still,  even 
Ji  wretched  translations,  the  delight  of  school- 
•oys.  Having  survived  ten  thousand  capri 
cious  fashions,  having  seen  successive  codes 
»f  criticism  become  obsolete,  they  still  remain, 
nn mortal  with  the  immortality  of  truth,  the 
same  when  perused  in  the  study  of  an  English 
scholar  as  when  they  were  first  chanted  at  the 
banquets  of  the  Ionian  princes. 

Poetry  is,  as  that  most  acute  of  human 
beings,  Aristotle, said,  more  than  two  thousand 
years  ago,  imitation.  It  is  an  art  analogous  in 
many  respects  to  the  art  of  painting,  sculpture, 
and  acting.  The  imitations  of  the  painter,  the 
sculptor,  and  the  actor  are,  indeed,  within  cer 
tain  limits,  more  perfect  than  those  of  the  poet. 
The  machinery  which  the  poet  employs  con 
sists  merely  of  words  ;  and  words  cannot,  even 
when  employed  by  such  an  artist  as  Homer  or 
Dante,  present  to  the  mind  images  of  visible 
objects  quite  so  lively  and  exact  as  those  which 
we  carry  away  from  looking  on  the  works  of 
the  brush  and  the  chisel.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  range  of  poetry  is  infinitely  wider 
than  that  of  any  other  imitative  art,  or  than 
that  of  all  the  other  imitative  arts  together. 
The  sculptor  can  imitate  only  form ;  the  painter 
only  form  and  colour ;  the  actor,  until  the  poet 
supplies  him  with  words,  only  form,  colour, 
and  motion.  Poetry  holds  the  outer  world  in 
common  with  the  other  arts.  The  heart  of 
man  is  the  province  of  poetry,  and  or  poetry 
alone.  The  painter,  the  sculptor,  and  the 
actor,  when  the  actor  is  unassisted  by  the  poet, 
can  exhibit  no  more  of  human  passion  and 
character  than  that  small  portion  which  over- 


!  flows  into  the  gesture  and  the  face — always  an 
imperfect,  often  a  deceitful  sign  of  that  which 
!  is  within.    The  deeper  and  more  complex  parts 
i  of  human  nature  can  be  exhibited  by  means 
of  words  alone.    Thus  the  objects  of  the  imi- 
i  tation  of  poetry  are  the  whole  external  and  the 
j  whole  internal  universe,  the  face  of  nature,  the 
j  vicissitudes  of  fortune,  man  as  he  is  in  himself, 
I  man  as  he  appears  in  society,  all  things  of 
1  which  we  can  form  an  image  in  our  minds,  by 
combining  together  parts  of  things  which  really 
exist.    The  domain  of  this  imperial  art  is  com 
mensurate  with  the  imaginative  faculty. 

An  art  essentially  imitative  ought  not  surely 
to  be  subjected  to  rules  which  tend  to  make  its 
imitations  less  perfect  than  they  would  other 
wise  be;  and  those  who  obey  such  rules  ought 
to  be  called,  not  correct,  but  incorrect  nrtists.| 
The  true  way  to  judge  of  the  rules  by  which 
English  poetry  was  governed  during  the  last 
century,  is  to  look  at  the  effects  which  they 
produced. 

It  was  in  1780  that  Johnson  completed  hi$ 
Lives  of  the  Poets.  He  tells  us  in  that  work 
that  since  the  time  of  Dryden,  English  poetry 
had  shown  no  tendency  to  relapse  into  its  ori 
ginal  savlgeness  ;  that  its  language  had  been 
refined,  its  numbers  tuned,  and  itj>  sentiments 
improved.  It  may,  perhaps,  be  doubted  whether 
the  nation  had  any  great  reason  to  exult  in  the 
refinements  and  improvements  which  gav-»  it 
Douglas  for  Othello,  and  the  Triumphs  of 
Temper  for  the  Faerie  Queen. 

It  was  during  the  thirty  years  which  preceded 
the  appearance  of  Johnson's  Lives,  that  the 
diction  and  versification  of  English  poetry 
were,  in  the  sense  in  which  the  word  is  com 
monly  used,  most  correct.  Those  thirty  years 
form  the  most  deplorable  part  of  our  literary 
history.  They  have  bequeathed  to  us  scarcely 
any  poetry  which  deserves  to  be  remembered. 
Two  or  three  hundred  lines  of  Gray,  twice  as 
many  of  Goldsmith,  a  few  stanzas  of  Beattie 
and  Collins,  a  few  strophes  of  Mason,  and  a 
few  clever  prologues  and  satires,  were  the 
masterpieces  of  this  age  of  consummate  excel 
lence.  They  may  all  be  printed  in  one  volume, 
and  that  volume  would  be  by  no  means  a  vo 
lume  of  extraordinary  merit.  It  would  contain, 
no  poetry  of  the  highest  class,  and  little  which 
could  be  placed  very  high  in  the  second  class. 
The  Paradise  Regained,  or  Comus,  would  out 
weigh  it  all. 

At  last,  when  poetry  had  fallen  intc  such 
utter  decay  that  Mr.  Hayley  was  thought  a  great 
poet,  it  began  to  appear  that  the  excess  of  the 
evil  was  about  to  work  the  cure.  Men  became 
tired  of  an  insipid  conformity  to  a  standard 
which  derived  no  authority  from  nature  or  rea 
son.  A  shallow  criticism  had  taught  them  to 
ascribe  a  superstitious  value  to  the  spurious 
correctness  of  poetasters.  A  deeper  criticism 
brought  them  back  to  the  free  correctness  of 
the  first  great  masters.  The  eternal  laws  of 
poetry  regained  their  power,  and  the  temporary 
fashions  which  had  superseded  those  laws 
went  after  the  wig  of  Lovelace  and  the  hoop 
of  Clarissa. 

It  was  in  a  cold  and  barren  season  that  the 
seeds  of  that  rich  harvest  which  we  have 
reaped  were  first  sown.  While  poetry  waj 


MOOilE'S  LIFE   OF  LORD   BYRON. 


123 


every  year  becoming  more  feeble  and  more 
mechanical,  while  the  monotonous  versifica 
tion  which  Pope  had  introduced,  no  longer  re 
deemed  by  his  brilliant  wit  and  his  compact 
ness  of  expression,  palled  on  the  ear  of  the 
public,  t.ie  great  works  of  the  dead  were  every 
day  attracting  more  and  more  of  the  admiration 
•which  they  deserved.  The  plays  of  Shakspeare 
were  better  acted,  better  edited,  and  better 
known  than  they  had  ever  been.  Our  noble 
old  ballads  were  again  read  with  pleasure,  and 
it  became  a  fashion  to  imitate  them.  Many 
of  the  imitations  were  altogether  contemptible. 
But  they  showed  that  men  had  at  least  begun 
to  admire  the  excellence  which  they  couKI  not 
rival.  A  literary  revolution  was  evidently  at 
hand.  There  was  a  ferment  in  the  minds  of 
men,  a  vague  craving  for  something  new,  a 
disposition  to  hail  with  delight  any  thing  which 
might  at  first  sight  wear  the  appearance  of 
originality.  A  reforming  age  is  always  fertile 
of  impostors.  The  same  excited  state  of  pub 
lic  feeling  which  produced  the  great  separation 
from  the  see  of  Rome,  produced  also  the  ex 
cesses  of  the  Anabaptists.  The  same  stir  in 
the  public  mind  of  Europe  which  overthrew 
the  abuses  of  the  old  French  government,  pro 
duced  the  Jacobins  and  Theophilanthropists. 
Macpherscn  and  the  Delia  Cruscans  were  to 
the  true  reformers  of  English  poetry  what 
Cnipperdoling  was  to  Luther,  or  what  Clootz 
was  to  Turgot.  The  public  was  never  more 
disposed  to  believe  stories  without  evidence, 
and  to  admire  books  without  merit.  Anything 
which  could  break  the  dull  monotony  of  the 
correct  school  was  acceptable. 

The  forerunner  of  the  great  restoration  of 
our  literature  was  Cowper.  His  literary  ca 
reer  began  and  ended  at  nearly  the  same  time 
with  that  of  Alfieri.  A  parallel  between  Alfieri 
and  Cowper  may,  at  first  sight,  seem  as  un 
promising  as  that  which  a  loyal  Presbyterian 
minister  is  said  to  have  drawn,  in  1745,  be 
tween  George  the  Second  and  Enoch.  It  may 
seem  that  the  gentle,  shy,  melancholy  Calvin- 
ist,  whose  spirit  had  been  broken  by  fagging  at 
school,  who  had  not  courage  to  earn  a  liveli 
hood  by  reading  the  titles  of  bills  in  the  House 
of  Lords,  and  whose  favourite  associates  were 
a  blind  old  lady  and  an  evangelical  divine, 
could  have  nothing  in  common  with  the 
haughty,  ardent,  and  voluptuous  nobleman,  the 
horse-jockey,  the  libertine,  who  fought  Lord 
Ligonier  in  Hyde  Park,  and  robbed  the  Preten 
der  of  his  queen.  But  though  the  private  lives 
of  these  remarkable  men  present  scarcely  any 
points  of  resemblance,  their  literary  lives  bear 
a  close  analogy  to  each  other.  They  both 
found  poetry  in  its  lowest  state  of  degradation, 
feeble,  artificial,  and  altogether  nerveless. 
They  both  possessed  precisely  the  talents 
which  fitted  them  for  the  task  of  raising  it 
from  that  deep  abasement.  They  cannot,  in 
strictness,  be  called  great  poets.  They  had 
noi  in  any  very  high  degree  the  creative 
power, 

"  The  vision  and  the  faculty  divine  ;" 

but  they  had  great  vigour  of  thought,  great 
warmth  of  feeling,  and  what,  in  their  circum- 
•tarices.  was  above  all  things  important,  a. 


manliness  of  taste  which  approached  t»  rough 
ness.  They  did  not  deal  in  mechanical  versi 
fication  and  conventional  j  hrases.  They  wrote 
concerning  things,  the  thought  of  which  set 
their  hearts  on  fire ;  and  thus  what  they  wrote, 
even  when  it  wanted  every  other  grace,  had  that 
inimitable  grace  which  sincerity  and  strong 
passion  impart  to  the  rudest  and  most  homely 
compositions.  Each  of  them  sought  for  inspi 
ration  in  a  noble  and  affecting  subject,  fertile 
of  images,  which  had  not  yet  i  een  hackneyed. 
Liberty  was  the  muse  of  Alfieri ;  religion  was 
the  muse  of  Cowper.  The  same  truth  is  found 
in  their  lighter  pieces.  They  were  not  amoritg 
those  who  deprecated  the  seventy,  or  deplored 
the  absence  of  an  unreal  mistress  in  melodious 
commonplaces.  Instead  of  raving  about  ima 
ginary  Chloes  and  Sylvias,  Cowper  wrote  of 
Mrs.  Unwin's  knitting-needles.  The  only  Iov« 
verses  of  Alfieri  were  addressed  to  one  whom 
he  truly  and  passionately  loved.  "  Tune  le 
rime  amorose  che  seguono,"  says  he,  "tune 
sono  per  essa,  e  ben  sue,  e  di  lei  solamentc 
poiche  mai  d'altra  donna  per  certo  non  cantero." 
These  great  men  were  not  free  from  affecta 
tion.  But  their  affectation  was  directly  op 
posed  to  the  affectation  which  generally  pre 
vailed.  Each  of  them  has  expressed,  in  strong 
arid  bitter  language,  the  contempt  which  h« 
felt  for  the  effeminate  poetasters  who  were  in 
fashion  both  in  England  and  Italy.  Cowper 
complains  that 

"  Manner  is  all  in  al!,  whate'er  is  writ. 
The  substitute  for  genius, taste,  and  wit." 

He  praised  Pope ;  yet  he  regretted  that  PC  p« 
had 

"  Made  poetry  a  mere  mechanic  art, 
And  every  warbler  had  his  tune  by  heart." 

Alfieri  speaks  with  similar  scorn  of  the  trage 
dies  of  his  predecessors.  "Mi  cadevano  dalle 
mani  per  la  languidezza,  trivialta  e  prolissiti 
dei  modi  e  del  verso,  benza  parlare  poi  del  la 
snervatezza  dei  pensieri.  Or  perche  mai  questa 
nostra  divina  lingua,  si  maschia  anco,  ed  ener- 
gica,  e  feroce,  in  bocca  di  Dante,  dovra  elle 
farci  cosi  sbiadata  ed  eunuca  nel  dialogo  tra- 
gico." 

To  men  thus  sick  of  the  languid  manner  of 
their  contemporaries,  ruggedness  seemed  a  ve 
nial  fault,  or  rather  a  positive  merit.  In  their 
hatred  of  meretricious  ornament,  and  of  what 
Cowper  calls  "creamy  smoothness,"  they  erred 
on  the  opposite  side.  Their  style  was  too  aus 
tere,  their  versification  too  harsh.  It  is  not 
easy,  however,  to  overrate  the  service  which 
they  rendered  to  literature.  Their  merit  is 
rather  that  of  demolition  than  that  of  construe 
tion.  The  intrinsic  value  of  their  poems  is 
considerable.  But  the  example  which  they  set 
f  mutiny  against  an  absurd  system  was  in 
valuable.  The  part  which  they  performed  was 
rather  that  of  Moses  than  that  of  Joshua.  They 
opened  the  house  of  bondage  ;  but  they  did  not 
enter  the  promised  land. 

During  the  twenty  years  which  followed  «ho 
death  of  Cowper,  the  revolution  in  English 
^oetry  was  fully  consummated.  None  of  th« 
vyriters  o1  this  period,  not  even  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  contributed  so  much  to  the  consummat 
ion  as  Lord  Byron.  Yet  he,  Lord  Byron,  con 
tributed  to  it  unwillingly,  and  with  cot.staiii 


124 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


K«-if-reproach  and  shame.  All  his  tastes  and  in 
clinations  led  him  to  take  part  with  the  school 
of  poetry  which  was  going  out,  against  the 
school  which  was  coming  in.  Of  Pope  him 
self  he  spoke  with  extravagant  admiration. 
He  did  not  venture  directly  to  say  that  the  little 
man  of  Twickenham  was  a  greater  poet  than 
Shakspeare  or  Milton.  But  he  hinted  pretty 
clearly  that  he  thought  so.  Of  his  con  tempo- 
Caries,  scarcely  any  had  so  much  of  his  admi 
ration  as  Mr  Giflbrd,  who,  considered  as  a 
poet,  was  merely  Pope,  without  Pope's  wit  and 
fancy ;  and  whose  satires  are  decidedly  inferior 
in  vigour  and  poignancy  to  the  very  imperfect 
juvenile  performance  of  Lord  Byron  himself. 
He  now  and  then  praised  Mr.  Wordsworth  and 
Mr.  Coleridge;  but  ungraciously  and  without 
cordiality.  When  he  attacked  them,  he  brought 
his  whole  soul  to  the  work.  Of  the  most  elabo 
rate  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  poems  he  could  find 
nothing  to  say,  but  that  it  was  "clumsy,  and 
frowsy, and  his  aversion."  Peter  Bell  excited  his 
spleen  to  such  a  degree  that  he  apostrophized 
the  shades  of  Pope  and  Dryden,and  demanded 
of  them  whether  it  were  possible  that  such 
trash  could  evade  contempt  1  In  his  heart,  he 
thought  his  own  Pilgrimage  of  Harold  inferior 
to  his  Imitation  of  Horace's  Art  of  Poetry — a 
feeble  echo  of  Pope  and  Johnson.  This  insipid 
performance  he  repeatedly  designed  to  pub 
lish,  and  was  withheld  only  by  the  solicitations 
of  his  friends.  He  has  distinctly  declared  his 
approbation  of  the  unities;  the  most  absurd 
Jaws  by  which  genius  was  ever  held  in  servi 
tude.  In  one  of  his  works,  we  think  in  his 
Letter  to  Mr.  Bowles,  he  compares  the  poetry 
of  the  eighteenth  century  to  the  Parthenon,  and 
that  of  the  nineteenth  to  a  Turkish  mosque  ; 
and  boasts  that,  though  he  had  assisted  his 
contemporaries  in  building  their  grotesque  and 
barbarous  edifice,  he  had  never  joined  them  in 
defacing  the  remains  of  a  chaster  and  more 
graceful  architecture.  In  another  letter,  he 
compares  the  change  which  had  recently  pass 
ed  on  English  poetry,  to  the  decay  of  Latin 
poetry  after  the  Augustan  age.  In  the  time  of 
Pope,  he  tells  his  friend,  it  was  all  Horace  with 
Us.  It  is  all  Claudian  now. 

For  the  great  old  masters  of  the  art  he  had 
no  very  enthusiastic  veneration.  In  his  Letter 
to  Mr.  Bowles  he  uses  expressions  which 
clearlv  indicate  that  he  preferred  Pope's  Iliad 
to  the  original.  Mr.  Moore  confesses  that  his 
friend  was  no  very  fervent  admirer  of  Shak- 
speare.  Of  all  the  poets  of  the  ti  rst  class,  Lord 
Byron  seems  to  have  admired  Dante  and  Mil 
ton  most.  Yet  in  the  fourth  canto  of  Childe 
Harold  he  places  Tasso,  a  writer  not  merelv 
inferior  to  them,  but  of  quite  a  different  order 
of  mind,  on  at  least  a  footing  of  equality  with 
them.  Mr.  Hunt  is,  we  suspect,  quite  correct 
in  saying,  that  Lord  Byron  could  see  little  or 
no  merit  in  Spenser. 

But  Lord  Byron  the  critic,  and  Lore1  Byron 
the  poet,  were  two  very  different  men.  The  ef 
fects  of  his  theory  may  indeed  often  be  traced 
in  his  practice.  But  his  disposition  led  him 
to  accommodate  himself  to  the  literary  taste  of 
the  age  in  which  he  lived;  and  his  talents 
would  have  enabled  him  to  accommodate  him- 
nHf  ut  the  taste  of  any  age.  Though  he  said 


much  of  his  contempt  for  men,  and  though  he 
boasted  that  amidst  all  the  inconstancy  of  for 
tune  and  of  fame  he  was  all-sufficient  to  him 
self,  his  litrrary  career  indicated  nothing  of 
that  lonely  and  unsocial  pride  which  he  a  fleet 
ed.  We  cannot  conceive  him,  like  Milton  or 
Wordsworth,  defying  the  criticisms  of  his  con 
temporaries,  retorting  their  scorn,  and  labour 
ing  on  a  poem  in  the  full  assurance  that  it 
would  be  unpopular,  and  in  the  full  assurance 
that  it  would  be  immortal.  He  has  said,  I  /  the 
mouth  of  one  of  his  heroes  in  speaking  of  poli 
tical  greatness,  that  "  he  must  serve  who  gain 
would  sway;"  and  this  he  assigns  as  a  reason 
for  not  entering  into  political  life.  He  did  not 
consider  that  the  sway  which  he  exercised  in 
literature  had  been  purchased  by  servitude— 
by  the  sacrifice  of  his  own  taste  to  the  taste  of 
the  public. 

He  was  the  creature  of  his  age;  and  wher 
ever  he  had  lived  he  would  have  been  the 
creature  of  his  age.  Under  Charles  the  First 
he  would  have  been  more  quaint  than  Donne. 
Under  Charles  the  Second  the  rants  of  his 
rhyming  plays  would  have  pitted  it,  boxed  it, 
and  galleried  it,  with  those  of  any  Bayes  or 
Bilboa.  Under  George  the  First  the  monoto 
nous  smoothness  of  his  versification  and  the 
terseness  of  his  expression  would  have  made 
Pope  himself  envious. 

As  it  was,  he  was  the  man  of  the  last  thir 
teen  years  of  the  eighteenth  century  and  of  the 
first  twenty-three  ^ears  of  the  nineteenth  cen 
tury.  He  belonged  half  to  the  old  and  half  to 
the  new  school  of  poetry.  His  personal  taste 
led  him  to  the  former,  his  thirst  of  fame  to  the 
latter;  his  talents  were  equally  suited  to  both. 
His  fame  was  a  common  ground  on  which  the 
zealots  of  both  sides — GifTord,  for  example,  and 
Shelley — might  meet.  He  was  the  representa 
tive,  not  of  either  literary  party,  but  of  both  at 
once,  and  of  their  conflict,  and  of  the  victory 
by  which  that  conflict  was  terminated.  His 
poetry  fills  and  measures  the  whole  of  the 
vast  interval  through  which  our  literature  has 
moved  since  the  time  of  Johnson.  It  touches 
the  Essay  on  Man  at  the  one  extremity  and  the 
Excursion  at  the  other. 

There  are  several  parallel  instances  in  lite 
rary  history.  Voltaire,  for  example,  was  the 
connecting  link  between  the  France  of  Louis 
the  Fourteenth  and  the  France  of  Louis  the 
Sixteenth — between  Racine  and  Boileau  on  the; 
one  side,  and  Condorcet  and  Beaumarchais  on 
the  other.  He,  like  Lord  Byron,  put  himself  at 
the  head  of  an  intellectual  revolution,  diead- 
ing  it  all  the  time,  murmuring  at  it,  sneering 
at  it,  yet  choosing  rather  to  move  before  his 
age  in  any  direction  than  to  be  left  behind 
and  forgotten.  Dryden  was  the  connect 
ing  link  between  the  literature  of  the  age  of 
James  the  First  and  the  literature  of  the  age 
of  Anne.  Oromazdes  and  Arimanes  fought  for 
him — Arimanes  carried  him  off.  But  his  heart 
was  to  the  last  with  Oromazdes.  Lord  Byron 
was  in  the  same  manner  the  mediator  between 
two  generations,  between  two  hostile  poetical 
sects.  Though  always  sneering  at  Mr.  Words 
worth,  he  was  yet,  though  perhaps  nncon 
sciously,  the  interpreter  between  Mr.  Words 
worth  and  the  multitude.  In  the  Lyrica 


MOORE'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  BYRON. 


125 


Ballads  and  the  Excursion,  :Vf  r.  Wordsworth  ap 
peared  as  the  high  priest  of  a  worship  of  which 
Nature  was  the  idol.  No  poems  have  ever  in 
dicated  so  exquisite  a  perception  of  the  beauty 
of  the  outer  world,  or  so  passionate  a  love  and 
reverence  for  that  beauty.  Yet  they  were  not 
popular;  and  it  is  not  likely  that  they  ever  will 
be  popular  as  the  works  of  Sir  Walter  Scott 
are  popular  The  feeling  which  pervaded 
them  was  too  deep  for  general  sympathy. 
Their  style  was  often  too  mysterious  for  gene 
ral  comprehension.  They  made  a  few  esote 
ric  disciples,  and  many  scoffers.  Lord  Byron 
Ibunded  what  may  be  called  an  exoteric  Lake 
school  of  poetry ;  and  all  the  readers  of  poetry 
in  England,  we  might  say  in  Europe,  hastened 
to  sit  at  his  feet.  What  Mr.  Wordsworth  had 
said  like  a  recluse,  Lord  Byron  said  like  a  man 
of  the  world;  with  less  profound  feeling,  but 
with  more  perspicuity,  energy,  and  concise 
ness.  We  would  refer  our  readers  to  the  last 
two  cantos  of  Childe  Harold  and  to  Manfred  in 
proof  of  these  observations. 

Lord  Byron,  like  Mr.  Wordsworth,  had  no 
thing  dramatic  in  his  genius.  He  was,  indeed, 
the  reverse  of  a  great  dramatist ;  the  very  an 
tithesis  to  a  great  dramatist.  All  his  charac 
ters — Harold  looking  back  on  the  western  sky 
from  which  his  country  and  the  sun  are  reced 
ing  together;  the  Giaour,  standing  apart  in  the 
gloom  of  the  side-aisle,  and  casting  a  haggard 
scowl  from  under  his  long  hood  at  the  crucifix 
and  the  censer;  Conrad,  leaning  on  his  sword 
by  the  watch-tower;  Lara,  smiling  on  the 
dancers;  Alp,  gazing  steadily  on  the  fatal 
cloud  as  it  passes  before  the  moon;  Manfred, 
wandering  among  the  precipices  of  Berne ; 
Azo,  on  the  judgment-seat;  Ugo,  at  the  bar; 
Lainbrn,  frown  ing  on  the  siesta  of  his  daughter 
and  Juan  ;  Cain,  presenting  his  unacceptable 
offering — all  are  essentially  the  same.  The 
varieties  are  varieties  merely  of  age,  situation, 
and  costume.  If  ever  Lord  Byron  attempted 
to  exhibit  men  of  a  different  kind,  he  always 
made  them  either  insipid  or  unnatural.  Selim 
is  nothing.  Bonnivart  is  nothing.  Don  Juan 
in  the  first  and  best  cantos  is  a  feeble  copy  of 
the  Page  in  the  Marriage  of  Figaro.  Johnson, 
the  man  whom  Juan  meet.";  in  the  slave-mar 
ket,  is  a  most  striking  failure.  How  differently 
would  Sir  Walter  Scott  have  drawn  a  bluff, 
fearless  Englishman  in  such  a  situation!  The 
portrait  would  have  seemed  to  walk  out  of  the 
canvass. 

Sardanapalus  is  more  hardly  drawn  than 
any  dramatic  personage  that  we  can  remem 
ber.  His  heroism  and  his  effeminacy,  his  con 
tempt  of  death,  and  his  dread  of  a  weighty  hel 
met,  his  kingly  resolution  to  be  seen  in  the 
foremost  ranks,  and  the  anxiety  with  which  he 
calls  for  a  looking-glass  that  he  may  be  seen 
to  advantage,  are  contrasted  with  all  the  point 
Of  Juvenal.  Indeed,  the  hint  of  the  character 
seems  to  have  been  taken  from  what  Juvenal 
says  of  Otho, — 

"  Sppriilnni  civilis  snrcinn  belli. 
Nimirum  suunni  dicis  est  :>cciil«iv  Oullmin. 
Ki  riirtrv  cMipin;   stimuli  constantin  rivis 
Behriaci  c;tm|»«>  spnliiim  afTtvtartt  I'ahti, 
Et  [tr^ssuui  in  facie  in  dig  it  ui  exlemlere  p;inem." 

Thase  are  excellent  lines  in  a  satire.     But 


it  is  not  the  business  of  the  dramatist  to  ex« 
hibit  characters  in  this  sharp,  antithetical  way. 
It  is  not  in  this  way  that  Shakspeare  makes 
Prince  Hal  rise  from  the  rake  of  Ea.-,tcheap 
into  the  hero  of  Shrewsbury,  and  sink  again 
into  the  rake  of  Eastcheap.  It  is  not  thus  that 
Shakspeare  has  exhibited  the  union  of  effemi 
nacy  and  valour  in  Antony.  A  dramatist  can 
not  commit  a  great  error  than  that  of  follow 
ing  those  pointed  descriptions  of  character  in 
which  satirists  and  historians  indulge  so  much. 
It  is  by  rejecting  what  is  natural  that  satirists 
and  historians  produce  these  striking  charac 
ters.  Their  great  object  generally  is  to  ascribe 
to  every  man  as  many  contradictory  q Utilities 
as  possible;  and  this  is  an  object  easily  at 
tained.  By  judicious  selections  and  judicious 
exaggeration,  the  intellect  and  the  disposition 
of  any  human  being  might  be  described  as 
being  made  up  of  nothing  but  startling  con 
trasts.  If  the  dramatist  attempts  to  create  a 
being  answering  to  one  of  these  descriptions, 
he  fails;  because  he  reverses  an  imperfect 
analytical  process.  He  produces,  not  a  man, 
but  a  personified  epigram.  Very  eminent  wri 
ters  have  fallen  into  this  snare.  Ben  Jonson 
has  given  us  an  Hermogenes  taken  from  the 
lively  lines  of  Horace;  but  the  inconsistency 
which  is  so  amusing  in  the  satire  appears  un 
natural  and  disgusts  us  in  the  play.  Sir  Wal 
ter  Scott  has  committed  a  far  more  glaring 
error  of  the  same  kind  in  the  novel  of  PeveriJ. 
Admiring,  as  every  reader  must  admire,  the 
keen  and  vigorous  lines  in  which  Drydun  sa 
tirized  the  Duke  of  Buckingham,  he  attempted 
to  make  a  Duke  of  Buckingham  to  suit  them— 
a  real  living  Zimri;  and  he  made,  not  a  man, 
but  the  most  grotesque  of  all  monsters.  A 
writer  who  should  attempt  to  introduce  into  a 
play  or  a  novel  such  a  Wharton  as  the  Whar 
ton  of  Pope,  or  a  Lord  Hervey  answering  to 
Sporus,  would  fail  in  the  same  manner. 

But  to  return  to  Lord  Byron :  his  women, 
like  his  men,  are  all  of  one  breed.  Haidee  is 
a  half-savage  and  girlish  Julia;  Julia  is  a  civil 
ized  and  matronly  Haidee.  Leila  is  a  wedded 
Zuleika — Zuleika  a  virgin  Leila.  Gulnare  and 
Medora  appear  to  have  been  intentionally  op 
posed  to  each  other.  Yet  the  difference  is  a 
difference  of  situation  only.  A  slight  change 
of  circumstance  would,  it  should  seem,  have 
sent  Gulnare  to  the  lute  of  Medora,  and  armed 
Medora  with  the  dagger  of  Gulnare. 

It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that  Lord  Byron 
could  exhibit  only  one  man  and  only  one  wo 
man — a  man  proud,  moody,  cynical,  with  de 
fiance  on  his  brow,  and  misery  in  his  heail ;  a 
scornerof  his  kind,  implacable  in  revenue,  yet 
capable  of  deep  and  strong  affection; — a  woman 
all  softness  and  gentleness,  loving  to  caress  and 
to  be  caressed,  but  capable  of  being  transformed 
bv  love  into  a  tigress. 

Even  these  two  characters,  his  only  t\ro 
characters,  he  could  not  exhibit  dramatically 
He  exhibited  them  in  the  manner,  not  of  Sh:jk 
speare,  but  of  Clarendon.  He  analyzed  them 
He  made  them  analyze  themselves,  hut  he  <hj 
not  make  them  show  themselves.  He  telN  us, 
for  example,  in  many  lines  of  great  force  arid 
spirit,  that  the  speech  of  Lara  was  bitterly  sar 
castic,  that  he  talked  little  of  his  travels,  thv 
i  2 


126 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


if  much  questioned  about  them,  his  answers 
became  short,  and  his  brow  gloomy.     But  we 
have   none   of  Lara's   sarcastic   speeches   or! 
short  answers.     It  is  not  thus  that  the  great ! 
ma>iers  of  human  nature  have  portrayed  hu- { 
man  beings.     Homer  never  tells  us  that  Nestor  I 
loved    to   tell    long   stories    about   his   youth ; 
Shakspeare  never  tells  us  that  in  the  mind  of 
lago,  every  thing  that  is  beautiful  and  endear 
ing  was   associated  with  some  filthy  and  de 
basing  idea. 

It  N  curious  to  observe  the  tendency  which 
the  dialogue  of  Lord  Byron  always  has  to  lose 
its  character  of  dialogue,  and  to  become  soli 
loquy.  The  scenes  between  Manfred  and  the 
Chamois-hunter,  between  Manfred  and  the 
\Vnch  of  the  Alps,  between  Manfred  and  the 
A!)bot,  are  instances  of  this  tendency.  Man 
fred,  after  a  few  unimportant  speeches,  has 
all  the  talk  to  himself.  The  other  interlocutors 
are  nothing  more  than  good  listeners.  They 
drop  an  occasional  question,  or  ejaculation, 
which  sets  Manfred  off  again  on  the  inexhaust 
ible  topic  of  his  personal  feelings.  If  we  ex 
amine  the  fine  passages  in  Lord  Byron's 
dramas,  the  description  of  Rome,  for  example, 
in  Manfred,  the  description  of  a  Venetian  revel 
in  Marino  Faliero,  the  dying  invective  which 
the  old  Doge  pronounces  against  Venice,  we 
shall  find  there  is  nothing  dramatic  in  them  : 
that  they  derive  none  of  their  effect  from  the 
character  or  situation  of  the  speaker ;  and  that 
they  would  have  been  as  fine,  or  finer,  if  they 
had  been  published  as  fragments  of  blank 
verse  by  Lord  Byron.  There  is  scarcely  a 
speech  in  Shakspeare  of  which  the  same  could 
be  said.  No  skilful  reader  of  the  plays  of 
Shakspeare  can  endure  to  see  what  are  called 
the  fine  things  taken  out,  under  the  name  of 
"  Heauties"  or  of  "Elegant  Extracts;"  or  to 
hear  any  single  passage — "To  be  or  not  to 
be,"  for  example,  quoted  as  a  sample  of  the 
great  poet.  *•  To  be  or  not  to  be,"  has  merit 
undoubtedly  as  a  composition.  It  would  have 
merit  if  put  into  the  mouth  of  a  chorus.  But 
its  merit  as  a  composition  vanishes,  when 
compared  with  its  merit  as  belonging  to  Ham 
let.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  great 
plays  of  Shakspeare  would  lose  less  by  being 
deprived  of  all  the  passages  which  are  com 
monly  called  the  fine  passages,  than  those  pas 
sages  IOMC  by  being  read  separately  from  the 
play.  This  is  perhaps  the  highest  praise 
which  can  he  given  to  a  dramatist. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  doubted  whe 
ther  there  is,  in  all  Lord  Byron's  plays,  a  sin 
gle  remarkable  passage  which  owes  any  por 
tion  of  its  interest  or  effect  to  its  connection 
with  the  characters  or  the  action.  He  has 
written  only  one  scene,  as  far  as  we  can  re 
collect,  which  is  dramatic  even  in  manner — 
the  scene  between  Lucifer  and  Cain.  The 
conference  in  that  scene  is  animated,  and  each 
of  the  interlocutors  has  a  fair  share  of  it.  But 
Jr.'s  jtcene,  when  examined,  will  be  found  to  be 
a  confirmation  of  our  remarks.  It  is  a  dia 
logue  only  in  form.  It  is  a  soliloquy  in  es 
sence.  It  is  in  reality  a  debate  carried  on 
v  itniri  une  single  unquiet  and  skeptical  mind. 
The  questions  and  the  answers,  the  objections 


and  the  solutions,  all  belong  to  the  same  cha 
racter. 

A  writer  who  showed  so  little  of  dramatic 
skill  in  works  professedly  dramatic  was  not 
likely  to  write  narrative  with  dramatic  effect. 
Nothing  could  indeed  be  more  rude  and  care 
less  than  the  structure  of  his  narrative  poems. 
He  seems  to  have  thought,  with  the  hero  of 
the  Rehearsal,  that  the  plot  was  good  for  no 
thing  but  to  bring  in  fine  things.  His  two 
longest  works,  Childe  Harold  and  Don  Juan, 
have  no  plan  whatever.  Either  of  them  might 
have  been  extended  to  any  length,  or  cut  short 
at  any  point.  The  state  in  which  the  Giaour 
appears  illustrates  the  manner  in  which  all 
his  poems  were  constructed.  They  are  all, 
like  the  Giaour,  collections  of  fragments  ;  and, 
though  there  may  be  no  empty  spaces  marked 
by  asterisks,  it  is  still  easy  to  perceive,  by  the 
clumsiness  of  the  joining,  where  the  parts,  for 
the  sake  of  which  the  whole  was  composed, 
end  and  begin. 

It  was  in  description  and  meditation  that  he 
excelled. — "  Description,"  as  he  said  in  Don 
Juan,  "was  his  forte."  His  manner  is  indeed 
peculiar,  and  is  almost  unequalled  —  rapid, 
sketchy,  full  of  vigour:  the  selection  happy; 
the  strokes  few  and  bold.  In  spite  of  the  reve 
rence  which  we  feel  for  the  genius  of  Mr. 
Wordsworth,  we  cannot  but  think  that  the 
minuteness  of  his  descriptions  often  diminishes 
their  effect.  He  has  accustomed  himself  to 
gaze  on  nature  with  the  eye  of  a  lover — to 
dwell  on  every  feature,  and  to  mark  every 
chansre  of  aspect.  Those  beauties  which  strike 
the  most  negligent  observer,  and  those  which 
only  a  close  attention  discovers,  are  equally 
familiar  to  him,  and  are  equally  prominent  in 
his  poetry.  The  proverb  of  old  Hesiod,  that 
half  is  often  more  than  the  whole,  is  eminently 
applicable  to  description.  The  policy  of  the 
Dutch,  who  cut  down  most  of  the  precious 
trees  in  the  Spice  Islands,  in  ord^r  to  raise  the 
value  of  what  remained,  was  a  policy  which 
poets  would  do  well  to  imitate.  It  was  a  policy 
which  no  poet  understood  better  than  Lord 
Byron.  Whatever  his  faults  might  be,  he  was 
never,  while  his  mind  retained  its  vigour,  ac 
cused  of  prolixity. 

His  descriptions,  great  as  was  their  intrinsic 
merit,  derived  their  principal  interest  from  the 
feeling  which  always  mingled  with  them.  He 
was  himself  the  beginning,  the  middle,  and 
the  end  of  all  his  own  poetry,  the  hero  of  every 
tale,  the  chief  object  in  every  landscape.  Ha 
rold,  Lara,  Manfred,  and  a  crowd  of  other 
characters,  were  universally  considered  mere 
ly  as  loose  incognitos  of  Byron;  and  there  is 
every  reason  to  believe  that  he  meant  them  to 
be  so  considered.  The  wonders  of  the  outer 
world,  the  Tagus,  with  the  mighty  fleets  of 
England  riding  on  its  bosom,  the  towers  of 
Cintra  overhanging  the  shaggy  forest  of  cork 
trees  and  willows,  the  glaring  marble  of  Pen- 
telicus,  the  banks  of  the  Rhine,  the  glaciers  of 
Clarens,  the  sweet  Lake  of  Leman,  the  dell  of 
Egeria,  with  its  summer-birds  and  rustling 
lizards,  the  shapeless  ruins  of  Rome,  over 
grown  with  ivy  and  wall-flowers,  thr  stars,  the 
sea,  the  mountains— all  were  mere  accessaries 


MOORE'S  LIFE   OF    LOKD  BYRON. 


127 


—the  background  to  one  dark  and  melancholy 
figure. 

Never  had  any  writer  so  vast  a  command 
of  the  whole  eloquence  of  scorn,  misanthropy, 
and  despair.  That  Marah  was  never  dry.  No 
art  could  sweeten,  no  draughts  could  exhaust, 
its  perennial  waters  of  bitterness.  Never  was 
there  such  variety  in  monotony  as  that  of  By 
ron.  From  maniac  laughter  to  piercing  la 
mentation,  there  was  not  a  single  note  of  hu 
man  anguish  of  which  he  was  not  master. 
Year  after  year,  and  month  after  month,  he 
continued  to  repeat  that  to  be  wretched  is  the 
destiny  of  all ;  that  to  be  eminently  wretched, 
is  the  destiny  of  the  eminent;  that  all  the  de 
sires  by  which  we  are  cursed  lead  alike  to 
misery ; — if  they  are  not  gratified,  to  the  misery 
of  disappointment;  if  they  are  gratified,  to  the 
misery  of  satiety.  His  principal  heroes  are 
men  who  have  arrived  by  different  roads  at 
the  same  goal  of  despair,  who  are  sick  of  life, 
who  are  at  war  with  society,  who  are  support 
ed  in  their  anguish  only  by  an  unconquerable 
pride,  resembling  that  of  Prometheus  on  the 
rock,  or  of  Satan  in  the  burning  marl ;  who  can 
master  their  agonies  by  the  force  of  their  will, 
and  who,  to  the  last,  defy  the  whole  power  of 
earth  and  heaven.  He  always  described  him 
self  as  a  man  of  the  same  kind  with  his  fa 
vourite  creations,  as  a  man  whose  heart  had 
been  withered,  whose  capacity  for  happiness 
was  gone,  and  could  not  be  restored;  but  whose 
invincible  spirit  dared  the  worst  that  could  be 
fall  him  here  or  hereafter. 

How  much  of  this  morbid  feeling  sprung 
from  an  original  disease  of  mind,  how  much 
from  real  misfortune,  how  much  from  the 
nervousness  of  dissipation,  how  much  of  it  was 
fanciful,  how  much  of  it  was  merely  affected, 
it  is  impossible  for  us,  and  would  probably 
have  been  impossible  for  the  most  intimate 
friends  of  Lord  Byron,  to  decide.  Whether 
there  ever  existed,  or  can  ever  exist,  a  person 
answering  to  the  description  which  he  gave  of 
himself,  may  be  doubted:  but  that  he  was  not 
such  a  person  is  beyond  all  doubt.  It  is  ri 
diculous  to  imagine  that  a  man  whose  mind 
was  really  imbued  with  scorn  of  his  fellow- 
creatures,  would  have  published  three  or  four 
books  every  year  in  order  to  tell  them  so;  or 
that  a  man,  who  could  say  with  truth  that  he 
neither  sought  sympathy  nor  needed  it,  would 
have  admitted  all  Europe  to  hear  his  farewell 
to  his  wife,  and  his  blessings  on  his  child.  In 
the  second  canto  of  Childe  Harold,  h»  tells  us 
that  he  is  insensible  to  fame  and  obloquy : 

"  III  IMHV  such  contest  now  the  spirit  move, 
Wiiich  heeds  nor  keen  reproof  nor  partial  praise." 

Yet  we  know,  on  the  best  evidence,  that  a  day 
or  two  before  he  published  these  lines,  he  was 
greatly,  indeed  childishly,  elated  by  the  com 
pliments  paid  to  his  maiden  speech  in  the 
House  of  Lords. 

We  are  far,  however,  from  thinking  that  his 
sadness  was  altogether  feigned.  He  was  na 
turally  a  man  of  great  sensibility  ;  he  had  been 
ill-educated;  his  feelings  had  been  early  ex 
posed  to  sharp  trials ;  he  had  been  crossed  in 
his  boyish  love ;  he  had  been  mortified  by  the 
failure  of  his  first  literary  efforts;  he  was  strait 
ened  iu  pecuniary  circumstances;  he  was  un 


fortunate  in  his  domestic  relations  ;  the  public 
treated  him  with  cruel  injustice;  t;?  health 
and  spirits  suffered  from  his  dissipated  habits 
cf  life ;  he  was,  on  the  whoie,  an  unhappy 
man.  He  early  discovered  that,  by  parading 
his  unhappiness  before  the  multitude,  h«  ex 
cited  an  unrivalled  interest.  The  world  gave 
him  every  encouragement  to  talk  about  his 
mental  sufferings.  The  effect  which  his  first 
confessions  produced,  induced  him  to  affect 
much  that  he  did  not  feel ;  and  the  affectation 
probably  reacted  on  his  feelings.  How  far 
the  character  in  which  he  exhibited  himself 
was  genuine,  and  how  far  theatrical,  would 
probably  have  puzzled  himself  to  say. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  remarkable 
man  owed  the  vast  influence  which  he  exer 
cised  over  his  contemporaries,  at  least  as 
much  to  his  gloomy  egotism  as  to  the  real 
power  of  his  poetry.  We  never  could  very 
clearly  understand  how  it  is  that  egotism,  so 
unpopular  in  conversation,  should  be  so  popu 
lar  in  writing ;  or  how  it  is  that  men  who  af 
fect  in  their  compositions  qualities  and  feel 
ings  which  they  have  not,  irrpose  so  much 
more  easily  on  their  contemporaries  than  on 
posterity.  The  interest  which  the  loves  of 
Petrarch  excited  in  his  own  time,  and  the  pity 
ing  fondness  with  which  half  Europe  looked 
upon  Rousseau,  are  well  known.  To  readers 
of  our  time,  the  love  of  Petrarch  seems  to 
have  been  love  of  that  kind  which  breaks  no 
hearts  ;  and  the  suffering?  of  Rousseau  to  have 
deserved  laughter  rather  than  pity — to  have 
been  partly  counterfeited,  and  partly  the  con 
sequences  of  his  own  perverseness  and  vanity. 

What  our  grandchildren  may  think  of  the 
character  of  Lord  Byron,  as  exhibited  in  his 
poetry,  we  will  not  pretend  to  guess.  It  is 
certain,  that  the  interest  which  he  excited  dur 
ing  his  life  is  without  a  parallel  in  literary 
history.  The  feeling  with  which  young  read 
ers  of  poetry  regarded  him,  can  be  conceived 
only  by  those  who  have  experienced  it.  To 
people  who  are  unacquainted  with  the  real  ca 
lamity,  "  nothing  is  so  dainty  sweet  as  lovely 
melancholy."  This  faint  image  of  sorrow  has 
in  all  ages  been  considered  by  young  gentle 
men  as  an  agreeable  excitement.  Old  gentle 
men  and  middle-aged  gentlemen  have  so  many- 
real  causes  of  sadness,  that  they  are  rarely 
inclined  "to  be  as  sad  as  night  only  for  wan 
tonness."  Indeed  they  want  the  power  almost 
as  much  as  the  inclination.  We  know  very 
few  persons  engaged  in  active  life,  who,  even 
if  they  were  to  procure  stools  to  be  melancholy 
upon,  and  were  to  sit  down  with  all  the  pre 
meditation  of  Master  Stephen,  would  be  able 
to  enjoy  much  of  what  somebody  calls  the 
"  ecstasy  of  wo." 

Among  that  large  class  of  young  persons 
whose  reading  is  almost  entirely  confined  to 
works  of  imagination,  the  popularity  of  Lord 
Byron  was  unbounded.  They  bought  pictures 
of  him,  they  treasured  up  the  smallest  relics 
of  him  ;  they  learned  his  poems  by  heart,  and 
did  their  best  to  write  like  him,  and  to  '->ok 
like  him.  Many  of  them  practised  at  the  gfass, 
in  the  hope  of  catching  the  curl  of  the  upper 
lip,  and  the  scowl  of  the  brow,  which  appear 
in  some  of  his  portraits.  A  few  discarded 


128 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


their  neckcloths  in  imitation  of  their  great 
leader.  For  some  years,  the  Minerva  press 
sent  forth  no  novel  without  a  mysterious,  un 
happy,  Lara-like  peer.  The  number  of  hope 
ful  undergraduates  and  medical  students  who 
became  things  of  dark  imaginings,  on  whom 
the  freshness  of  the  heart  ceased  to  fall  like 
dew,  whose  passions  had  consumed  themselves 
to  dust,  and  to  whom  the  relief  of  tears  was 
denied,  passes  all  calculation.  This  was  not 
the  worst.  There  was  created  in  the  minds  of 
many  of  these  enthusiasts,  a  pernicious  and 
absurd  association  between  intellectual  power 
and  moral  depravity.  From  the  poetry  of  Lord 
Byron  they  drew  a  system  of  ethics,  compound 
ed  of  misanthropy  and  voluptuousness:  a  sys 
tem  in  which  the  two  great  commandments 


were,  to  hate  your  neighbour,  and  to  love  your 
neighbour's  wife. 

This  affectation  has  passed  away ;  and  a  few 
more  years  will  destroy  whatever  yet  remains 
of  that  magical  potency  which  once  belonged 
to  ths  name  of  Byron.  To  us  he  is  still  a  man, 
young,  noble,  and  unhappy.  To  our  children 
he  will  be  merely  a  writer;  and  their  impar 
tial  judgment  will  appoint  his  place  among 
writers,  without  regard  to  his  rank  or  to  his 
private  history.  That  his  poetry  will  undergo 
a  severe  sifting;  that  much  of  what  has  been 
admired  by  his  contemporaries  will  be  reject 
ed  as  worthless,  we  have  little  doubt.  But  we 
have  as  little  doubt,  that,  after  the  closest  scru 
tiny,  there  will  srill  remain  much  that  can  only 
perish  with  the  English  language. 


SOUTHEY'S  EDITION  OF  THE  PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS/ 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1831.] 


Tins  is  an  eminently  beautiful  and  splendid 
edition  of  a  book  which  well  deserves  all  that 
the  printer  and  the  engraver  can  do  for  it. 
The  life  of  Bunyan  is,  of  course,  not  a  per 
formance  which  can  add  much  to  the  literary 
reputation  of  such  a  writer  as  Mr.  Southey. 
But  it  is  written  in  excellent  English,  and,  for 
the  most  part,  in  an  excellent  spirit.  Mr.  Sou 
they  propounds,  we  need  not  say,  many  opi 
nions  from  which  we  altogether  dissent;  and 
his  attempts  to  excuse  the  odious  persecution 
to  which  Bunyan  was  subjected,  have  some- 
tim^s  moved  our  indignation.  But  we  will 
avoid  this  topic.  We  are  at  present  much 
more  inclined  to  join  in  paying  homage  to  the 
genius  of  a  great  man,  than  to  engage  in  a 
controversy  concerning  church  government 
and  toleration. 

We  must  not  pass  without  notice  the  en 
gravings  with  which  this  beautiful  volume  is 
decorated.  Some  of  Mr.  Heath's  woodcuts  are 
admirably  designed  and  executed.  Mr.  Mar 
tin's  illustrations  do  not  please  us  quite  so 
well.  His  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death  is 
not  that  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death  which 
Bunyan  imagined.  At  all  events,  it  is  not  that 
dark  and  horrible  glen  which  has  from  child 
hood  been  in  our  mind's  eye.  The  valley  is  a 
cavern:  the  quagmire  is  a  lake:  the  straight 
path  runs  zigzag:  and  Christian  appears  like 
a  speck  in  the  darkness  of  the  immense  vault. 
We  miss,  too,. those  hideous  forms  which  make 
so  striking  a  part  of  the  description  of  Bunyan, 
and  which  Salvator  Rosa  would  have  loved  to 
draw.  It  is  with  unfeigned  diffidence  that  we 
pronounce  judgment  on  any  question  relating 
to  the  art  of  painting.  But  it  appears  to  us 
that  Mr.  Martin  has  not  of  late  been  fortunate 


+  The  riltrriin's  Prnrrrfss,  witJi  a  life  r>f  Jnhn  Bunyan. 
Ify  ROBKRT  SoUTHBf,  Esq.,  I, (,.!).,  Po^t  Laureate.  II- 
•  u»tralecl  with  Engravings.  8vo.  London.  1830. 


in  his  choice  of  subjects.  He  should  never 
have  attempted  to  illustrate  the  Paradise  Lost. 
There  can  be  no  two  manners  more  directly 
opposed  to  each  other,  than  the  manner  of  his 
painting  and  the  manner  of  Milton's  poetry. 
Those  things  which  are  mere  accessaries  in 
the  descriptions,  become  the  principal  objects 
in  the  pictures  ;  and  those  figures  which 
are  most  prominent  in  the  descriptions  can  be 
detected  in  the  pictures  only  by  a  very  close 
scrutiny.  Mr.  Martin  has  succeeded  perfectly 
in  representing  the  pillars  and  candelabras  of 
Pandemonium.  But  he  has  forgotten  that 
Milton's  Pandemonium  is  merely  the  back 
ground  to  Satan.  In  the  picture,  the  Archangel 
is  scarcely  visible  amidst  the  endless  colon 
nades  of  his  infernal  palace.  Milton's  Para 
dise,  again,  is  merely  the  background  to  his 
Adam  and  Eve.  But  in  Mr.  Martin's  picture 
the  landscape  is  every  thing.  Adam,  Eve, 
and  Raphael  attract  much  less  notice  than  the 
lake  and  the  mountains,  the  gigantic  flowers, 
and  the  giraffes  which  feed  upon  them.  We 
have  read,  we  forget  where,  that  James  the 
Second  sat  to  Verelst,  the  great  flower-painter. 
When  the  performance  was  finished,  his  ma 
jesty  appeared  in  the  midst  of  sunflowers  and 
tulips,  which  completely  drew  away  all  atten 
tion  from  the  central  figure.  All  who  looked 
at  the  portrait  took  it  for  a  flower-piece.  Mr. 
Martin,  we  think,  introduces  his  immeasurable 
spaces,  his  innumerable  multitudes,  his  gor 
geous  prodigies  of  architecture  and  landscape, 
almost  as  unseasonably  as  Verelst  introduced 
his  flower-pots  and  nosegays.  If  Mr.  Martin 
were  to  paint  Lear  in  the  storm,  the  blazing 
sky,  the  sheets  of  rain,  the  swollen  torrents, 
and  the  tossing  forest,  would  draw  away  all 
attention  from  the  agonies  of  the  insulted  kin* 
and  father.  If  he  were  to  paint  the  death  of 
Lear-  the  old  man,  asking  the  bystander?  to 


SOUTHEY'S  EDITION  OF  THE  PILGRIM'S   PROGRESS. 


129 


undo  his  button,  would  be  thrown  into  the  ! 
shade  by  a  vast  blaze  of  pavilions,  standards, ' 
armour,  and  herald's  coats.  He  would  illus 
trate  the  Orlando  Furioso  well,  the  Orlando 
Innamorato  still  better,  the  Arabian  Nights 
best  of  all.  Fairy  palaces  and  gardens,  porti 
coes  of  agate,  and  groves  flowering  with  eme 
ralds  and  rubies,  inhabited  by  people  for  whom 
nobody  cares,  these  are  his  proper  domain. 
He  would  succeed  admirably  in  the  enchanted 
ground  of  Alcina,  or  the  mansion  of  Aladdin. 
But  he  should  avoid  Milton  and  Bunyan. 

The  characteristic  peculiarity  of  the  Pil 
grim's  Progress  is,  that  it  is  the  only  work  of 
its  kind  which  possesses  a  strong  human  in 
terest.  Other  allegories  only  amuse  the  fancy. 
The  allegory  of  Bunyan  has  been  read  by  many 
thousands  with  tears.  There  are  some  good 
allegories  in  Johnson's  works,  and  some  of 
still  higher  merit  by  Addison.  In  these  per 
formances  there  is,  perhaps,  as  much  wit  and 
ingenuity  as  in  the  Pilgrim's  Progress.  But 
the  pleasure  which  is  produced  by  the  Vision 
of  Mirza,  or  the  Vision  of  Theodore,  the  gene 
alogy  of  Wit,  or  the  contest  between  Rest  and 
Labour,  is  exactly  similar  to  the  pleasure 
which  we  derive  from  one  of  Cowley's  Odes, 
or  from  a  Canto  of  Hudibras.  It  is  a  pleasure 
which  belongs  wholly  to  the  understanding, 
and  in  which  the  feelings  have  no  part  what 
ever.  Nay,  even  Spenser  himself,  though 
assuredly  one  of  the  greatest  poets  that  ever 
lived,  could  not  succeed  in  the  attempt  to  make 
allegory  interesting.  It  was  in  vain  that  he 
lavished  the  riches  of  his  mind  on  the  House 
of  Pride,  and  the  House  of  Temperance.  One 
unpardonable  fault,  the  fault  of  tediousness, 
pervades  the  whole  of  the  Faerie  Queen.  We 
become  sick  of  Cardinal  Virtues  and  Deadly 
Sins,  and  long  for  the  society  of  plain  men  and 
women.  Of  the  persons  who  read  the  first 
Canto,  not  one  in  ten  reaches  the  end  of  the 
First  Book,  and  not  one  in  a  hundred  perse 
veres  to  the  end  of  the  poem.  Very  few  and 
very  weary  are  those  who  are  in  at  the  death 
of  the  Blatant  Beast.  If  the  last  six  books, 
which  are  said  to  have  been  destroyed  in  Ire 
land,  had  been  preserved,  we  doubt  whether 
any  heart  less  stout  than  that  of  a  commentator 
would  have  held  out  to  the  end. 

It  is  not  so  with  the  Pilgrim's  Progress. 
That  wonderful  book,  while  it  obtains  admira 
tion  from  the  most  fastidious  critics,  is  loved 
by  those  who  are  too  simple  to  admire  it. 
Doctor  Johnson,  all  whose  studies  were  desul 
tory,  and  who  hated,  as  he  said,  to  read  books 
through,  made  an  exception  in  favour  of  the 
Pilgrim's  Progress.  That  work,  he  said,  was 
cne  of  the  two  or  three  works  which  he  wished 
longer.  It  was  by  no  common  merit  that  the 
illiterate  sectary  extracted  praise  like  this  from 
the  most  pedantic  of  critics  and  the  most 
bigoted  of  Tories.  In  the  wildest  parts  of 
Scotlar.d  the  Pilgrim's  Progress  is  the  delight 
of  the  peasantry.  In  every  nursery  the  Pil 
grim's  Progress'  is  a  greater  favourite  than 
Jack  the  Giant-Killer.  Every  reader  knows 
the  straight  and  narrow  path,  as  well  as  he 
knows  a  road  in  which  he  has  gone  backward 
and  forward  a  hundred  times.  This  is  the 
highest  miracle  of  genius — that  things  which 

VOL.  I.— IT 


are  not  should  be  as  though  they  were,  that  the 
imaginations  of  one  mind  should  become  the 
personal  recollections  of  another.  And  this 
miracle  the  tinker  has  wrought.  There  is  no 
ascent,  no  declivity,  no  resting-place,  no  turn 
stile,  with  which  we  are  not  perfectly  acquaint 
ed.  The  wicket  gate,  and  the  desolate  swamp 
which  separates  it  from  the  Oity  of  Destruc 
tion;  the  long  line  of  road,  as  straight  as  a  rule 
can  make  it ;  the  Interpreter's  house,  and  all 
its  fair  shows ;  the  prisoner  in  the  iron  cage ; 
the  palace,  at  the  doors  of  which  armed  men 
kept  guard,  and  on  the  battlements  of  which 
walked  persons  clothed  all  in  gold ;  the  cross 
and  the  sepulchre ;  the  steep  hill  and  the  plea 
sant  arbour;  the  stately  front  of  the  House 
Beautiful  by  the  wayside ;  the  low  green  valley 
of  Humiliation,  rich  with  grass  and  covered 
with  flocks,  all  are  as  well  known  to  us  as  the 
sights  of  our  own  street.  Then  we  come  to  the 
narrow  place  where  Apollyon  strode  right 
across  the  whole  breadth  of  the  way,  to  stop 
the  journey  of  Christian,  and  where  afterwards 
the  pillar  was  set  up  to  testify  how  bravely  the 
pilgrim  had  fought  the  good  light.  As  we  ad 
vance,  the  valley  becomes  deeper  and  deeper. 
The  shade  of  the  precipices  on  both  sides  falls 
blacker  and  blacker.  The  clouds  gather  over 
head.  Doleful  voices,  the  clanking  of  chains, 
and  the  rushing  of  many  feet  to  and  fro,  are 
heard  through  the  darkness.  The  way,  hardly 
discernible  in  gloom,  runs  close  by  the  mouth 
of  the  burning  pit,  which  sends  forth  its  flames, 
its  noisome  srnoke,  and  its  hideous  shapes,  to 
terrify  the  adventurer.  Thence  he  goes  on, 
amidst  the  snares  and  pitfalls,  with  the  mangled 
bodies  of  those  who  have  perished  lying  in  the 
ditch  by  his  side.  At  the  end  of  the  long  dark 
valley,  he  passes  the  dens  in  which  the  old 
giants  dwelt,  amidst  the  bones  and  ashes  of 
those  whom  they  had  slain. 

Then  the  road  passes  straight  on  through  a 
waste  moor,  till  at  length  the  towers  of  a  dis 
tant  city  appear  before  the  traveller;  and  soon 
he  is  in  the  midst  of  the  innumerable  multi 
tudes  of  Vanity  Fair.  There  are  the  jugglers 
and  the  apes,  the  shops  and  the  puppet-shows. 
There  are  Italian  Row,  and  French  Row,  and 
Spanish  Row,  and  Britain  Row,  with  their 
crowds  of  buyers,  sellers,  and  loungers,  jab 
bering  all  the  languages  of  the  earth. 

Thence  we  go  on  by  the  little  hill  of  the  sil 
ver  mine,  and  through  the  meado\v  of  lilies, 
along  the  bank  of  that  pleasant  river  which  is 
bordered  on  both  sides  by  fruit  trees.  On  the 
left  side,  branches  off  the  path  leading  to  thcit 
horrible  castle,  the  court-yard  of  which  is 
paved  with  the  skulls  01"  pilgrims;  and  right 
onward  are  the  sheepfolds  and  orchards  of  the 
Delectable  Mountains. 

From  the  Delectable  Mountains,  the  way  lies 
through  the  fogs  and  briers  of  the  Enchanted 
Ground,  with  here  and  there  a  bed  of  soft 
cushions  spread  under  a  green  arbour.  And 
beyond  is  the  land  of  Beulah,  where  the  lloweis, 
the  grapes,  and  the  songs  of  birds  never  cease, 
and  where  the  sun  shines  night  and  day. 
Thence  are  plainly  seen  the  golden  pavements 
and  streets  of  pearl,  on  the  other  side  of  that 
black  and  cold  river  over  which  there  is  ix« 
bridge. 


130 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


All  the  stages  of  the  journey,  all  the 
forms  which  cross  or  overtake  the  pilgrims, 
—giants  and  hobgoblins,  ill-favoured  ones 
and  shining  ones  ;  the  tall,  comely,  swarthy 
Madam  Bubble,  with  her  great  purse  by  her 
side,  and  her  fingers  playing  with  the  money  ; 
the  black  man  in  the  bright  vesture  ;  Mr. 
Worldly-  Wiseman,  and  my  Lord  Hategood  ; 
Mr.  Talkative,  and  Mrs.  Timorous  —  are  all 
actually  existing  beings  to  us.  We  follow  the 
travellers  through  their  allegorical  progress 
with  interest  not  inferior  to  that  with  which 
we  follow  Elizabeth  from  Siberia  to  Moscow, 
or  Jeanie  Deans  from  Edinburgh  to  London. 
Bunyan  is  almost  the  only  writer  that  ever 
gave  to  the  abstract  the  interest  of  the  con 
crete.  In  the  works  of  many  celebrated  au 
thors,  men  are  mere  personifications.  We 
have  not  an  Othello,  but  jealousy  ;  not  an  lago, 
but  perfidy  ;  not  a  Brutus,  but  patriotism. 
The  mind  of  Bunyan,  on  the  contrary,  was  so 
imaginative,  that  personifications,  when  he 
dealt  with  them,  became  men.  A  dialogue 
between  two  qualities  in  his  dream,  has  more 
dramatic  effect  than  a  dialogue  between  two 
human  beings  in  most  plays.  In  this  respect 
the  genius  of  Bunyan  bore  a  great  resem 
blance  to  that  of  a  man  who  had  very  little 
else  in  common  with  him,  Percy  Bysshe  Shel 
ley.  The  strong  imagination  of  Shelley  made 
him  an  idolater  in  his  own  despite.  Out  of 
the  most  indefinite  terms  of  a  hard,  cold,  dark, 
metaphysical  system,  he  made  a  gorgeous 
Pantheon,  full  of  beautiful,  majestic,  and  life 
like  forms.  He  turned  atheism  itself  into  a 
mythology,  rich  with  visions  as  glorious  as  the 
gods  that  live  in  the  marble  of  Phidias,  or  the 
virgin  saints  that  smile  on  us  from  the  canvass 
of  Murillo.  The  Spirit  of  Beauty,  the  Prin 
ciple  of  Good,  the  Principle  of  Evil,  when  he 
treated  of  them,  ceased  to  be  abstractions. 
They  took  shape  and  colour.  They  were  no 
longer  mere  words  ;  but  "  intelligible  forms  ;" 
"fair  humanities;"  objects  of  love,  of  adora 
tion,  or  of  fear.  As  there  can  be  no  stronger 
signs  of  a  mind  destitute  of  the  poetical  faculty 
than  that  tendency  which  was  so  common 
among  the  writers  of  the  French  school  to  turn 
images  into  abstractions  —  Venus,  for  example, 
into  Love,  Minerva  into  Wisdom,  Mars  into 
War,  and  Bacchus  into  Festivity  —  so  there  can 
be  no  stronger  sign  of  a  mind  truly  poetical, 
than  a  disposition  to  reverse  this  abstracting 
process,  and  to  make  individuals  out  of  gene 
ralities.  Some  of  the  metaphysical  and  ethical 
theories  of  Shelley  were  certainly  most  absurd 
and  pernicious.  But  we  doubt  whether  any 
modern  poet  has  possessed  in  an  equal  degree 
the  highest  qualities  of  the  great  ancient  mas 
ters.  The  words  bard  and  inspiration,  which 
seem  oo  cold  and  affected  when  applied  to 
other  modern  writers,  have  a  perfect  propriety 
when  applied  to  him.  He  was  not  an  author, 
but  a  bard.  His  poetry  seems  not  to  have  been 
an  art,  but  an  inspiration.  Had  he  lived  to  the 
full  age  of  man,  he  might  not  improbably  have 
given  to  the  world  some  great  work  of  the  very 
highest  rank  ia  design  and  execution.  But, 


aas 


Ma>cra< 


f  s/3a  poov  CK\vat  <?<?• 
ivipa,  rer  on  Nv^f»a«r 


But  we  must  return  to  Bunyan.  The  Pil 
grim's  Progress  undoubtedly  is  not  a  perfect 
allegory.  The  types  are  often  inconsistent 
with  each  other ;  and  sometimes  the  allegori 
cal  disguise  is  altogether  thrown  off.  The 
river,  for  example,  is  emblematic  of  death, 
and  we  are  told  that  every  human  being  must 
pass  through  the  river.  But  Faithful  does  not 
pass  through  it.  He  is  martyred,  not  in  sha 
dow,  but  in  reality,  at  Vanity  Fair.  Hopeful 
talks  to  Christian  about  Esau's  birthright,  and 
about  his  own  convictions  of  sin,  as  Bunyan 
might  have  talked  with  one  of  his  own  con 
gregation.  The  damsels  at  the  House  Beauti 
ful  catechise  Christiana's  boys,  as  any  good 
ladies  might  catechise  any  boys  at  a  Sunday- 
school.  But  we  do  not  believe  that  any  man, 
whatever  might  be  his  genius,  and  whatever 
his  good  luck,  could  long  continue  a  figurative 
history  without  falling  into  many  inconsist 
encies.  We  are  sure  that  inconsistencies, 
scarcely  less  gross  than  the  worst  into  which 
Bunyan  has  fallen,  may  be  found  in  the  short 
est  and  most  elaborate  allegories  of  the  Spec 
tator  and  the  Rambler.  The  Tale  of  a  Tub  and 
the  History  of  John  Bull  swarm  with  similar 
errors,  if  the  name  of  error  can  be  properly 
applied  to  that  which  is  unavoidable.  It  is  not 
easy  to  make  a  simile  go  on  all-fours.  But 
we  believe  that  no  human  ingenuity  could 
produce  such  a  centipede  as  a  long  allegory, 
in  which  the  correspondence  between  the  out 
ward  sign  and  the  thing  signified  should  be 
exactly  preserved.  Certainly  no  writer,  an 
cient  or  modern,  has  yet  achieved  the  adven 
ture.  The  best  thing,  on  the  whole,  that  an 
allegorist  can  do,  is  to  present  to  his  readers  a 
succession  of  analogies,  each  of  which  may 
separately  be  striking  and  happy,  without  look 
ing  very  nicely  to  see  whether  they  harmonize 
with  each  other.  This  Bunyan  has  done;  and, 
though  a  minute  scrutiny  may  detect  incon 
sistencies  in  every  page  of  his  tale,  the  general 
effect  which  the  tale  produces  on  all  persons, 
learned  and  unlearned,  proves  that  he  has  done 
well.  The  passages  which  it  is  most  difficult 
to  defend,  are  those  in  which  he  altogether 
drops  the  allegory,  and  puts  into  the  mouth  of 
his  pilgrims  religious  ejaculations  and  disqui 
sitions,  better  suited  to  his  own  pulpit  at  Bed 
ford  or  Reading,  than  to  the  Enchanted  Ground 
of  the  Interpreter's  Garden.  Yet  even  these 
passages,  though  we  will  not  undertake  to  de 
fend  them  against  the  objections  of  critics, 
we  feel'that  we  could  ill  spare.  We  feel  that 
the  story  owes  much  of  its  charm  to  these  oc 
casional  glimpses  of  solemn  and  affecting 
subjects,  which  will  not  be  hidden,  which  force 
themselves  through  the  veil,  and  appear  before 
us  in  their  native  aspect.  The  effect  is  not 
unlike  that  which  is  said  to  have  been  pro 
duced  on  the  ancient  stage,  when  the  eyes  of 
the  actor  were  seen  flaming  through  his  mask, 
and  giving  life  and  expression  to  what  would 
else  have  been  inanimate  and  uninteresting 
disguise. 

It  is  very  amusing  and  very  instructive  ta 
compare  the  Pilgrim's  Progress  with  the  Grace 
Abounding.  The  latter  work  is  indeed  one  of 
the  most  remarkable  pieces  of  autobiography 
in  the  world.  It  is  a  full  and  open  confession 


SOUTHEY'S  EDITION  OF  THE  PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS. 


131 


of  the  fancies  which  passed  through  the  mind 
of  an.  illiterate  man,  whose  affections  were 
warm,  whose  nerves  were  irritable,  whose 
imagination  was  ungovernable,  and  who  was 
under  the  influence  of  the  strongest  religious 
excitement.  In  whatever  age  Bunyan  had 
lived,  the  history  of  his  feelings  would,  in  all 
probability,  have  been  very  curious.  But  the 
time  in  which  his  lot  was  cast  was  the  time 
of  a  great  stirring  of  the  human  mind.  A 
tremendous  burst  of  public  feeling,  produced 
by  the  tyranny  of  the  hierarchy,  menaced  the 
old  ecclesiastical  institutions  with  destruction. 
To  the  gloomy  regularity  of  one  intolerant 
church  had  succeeded  the  license  of  innume 
rable  sects,  drunk  with  the  sweet  and  heady 
K  ist  of  their  new  liberty.  Fanaticism,  en- 
g<  idered  by  persecution,  and  destined  to  en 
gender  fresh  persecution  in  turn,  spread  rapid 
ly  through  society.  Even  the  strongest  and 
most  commanding  minds  were  not  proof  against 
this  strange  taint.  Any  time  might  have  pro 
duced  George  Fox  and  James  Naylor.  But  to 
one  time  alone  belong  the  frantic  delusions 
of  such  a  statesman  as  Vane,  and  the  hyste 
rical  tears  of  such  a  soldier  as  Cromwell. 

The  history  of  Bunyan  is  the  history  of  a 
most  excitable  mind  in  an  age  of  excitement. 
By  most  of  his  biographers  he  has  been  treated 
with  gross  injustice.    They  have  understood 
in  a  popular  sense  all  those  strong  terms  of 
self-condemnation  which  he   employed  in  a 
theological  sense.    They  have,  therefore,  re 
presented  him  as  an   abandoned  wretch,  re 
claimed  by  means  almost  miraculous ;  or,  to 
use   their  favourite   metaphor,  "as   a  brand 
plucked  from  the  burning."     Mr.  Ivimey  calls  ( 
him  the  depraved  Bunyan,  and  the  wicked  J 
tinker  of  Elstow.     Surely  Mr.  Ivimey  ought ' 
to  have  been  too  familiar  with  the  bitter  accu 
sations  which  the  most  pious  people  are  in  the 
habit  of  bringing  against  themselves,  to  under 
stand  literally  all  the  strong  expressions  which 
are  to  be  found  in  the  Grace  Abounding.    It  is 
quite   clear,  as   Mr.  Southey  most  justly  re 
marks,  that  Mr.  Bunyan  never  was  a  vicious 
man.    He  married  very  early ;  and  he  solemn 
ly  declares  that  he  was  strictly  faithful  to  his 
wife.    He  does   not  appear  to   have  been  a 
drunkard.    He  owns,  indeed,  that  when  a  boy, 
he  never  spoke  without  an  oath.    But  a  single 
admonition  cured  him  of  this  bad  habit  for  life ; 
and  the  cure  must  have  been  wrought  early : 
for  at  eighteen  he  was  in  the  army  of  the  Par 
liament;  and  if  he  had  carried  the  vice  of 
profaneness  into  that  service,  he  would  doubt 
less  have  received  something  more  than  an 
admonition  from  Sergeant  Bind-their-kings-in- 
chains,  or  Captain  Hew-Agag-in-pieces-before- 
the-Lord.     Bell-ringing,  and  playing  at  hockey 
on  Sundays,  seem  to  have   been   the   worst 
vices  of  this   depraved  tinker.    They  would 
have  pas.sed  for  virtues  with  Archbishop  Laud. ! 
It  is  quite  clear  that,  from  a  very  early  age, ! 
Bunyan  was  a  man  of  a  strict  life  and  of  a  I 
tender  conscience.    "  He  had  been,*'  says  Mr.  | 
Southey,  "  a  blackguard."     Even  this  we  think  | 
too  hard  a  censure.    Bunyan  was  not,  we  ad-  | 
mil,  so  fine  a  gentleman  as  Lord  Digby ;  yet ! 
be  was  a  blackguard  no  otherwise  than  as  , 


every  tinker  that  ever  lived  has  been  a  black 
guard.  Indeed  Mr.  Southey  acknowledges  this 
"  Such  he  might  have  been  expected  to  be  by 
his  birth,  breeding,  and  vocation.  Scarcely 
indeed,  by  possibility,  could  he  have  been 
otherwise."  A  man,  whose  manners  and  sen 
timents  are  decidedly  below  those  of  his  cla?s, 
deserves  to  be  called  a  blackguard.  But  it  is 
surely  unfair  to  apply  so  strong  a  word  of  re 
proach  to  one  who  is  only  what  the  great  mass 
of  every  community  must  inevitably  be. 

Those  horrible  internal  conflicts  which  Bun 
yan  has  described  with  so  much  power  of 
language  prove,  not  that  he  was  a  worse  man 
than  his  neighbours,  but  that  his  mind  was 
constantly  occupied  by  religious  considera 
tions,  that  his  fervour  exceeded  his  knowledge, 
and  that  his  imagination  exercised  despotic 
power  over  his  body  and  mind.  He  heard 
voices  from  heaven :  he  saw  strange  visions 
of  distant  hills,  pleasant  and  sunny  as  his  own 
Delectable  Mountains ;  from  those  seats  he  was 
shut  out,  and  placed  in  a  dark  and  horrible 
wilderness,  where  he  wandered  through  ice 
and  snow,  striving  to  make  his  way  into  the 
happy  region  of  light.  At  one  time  he  was 
seized  with  an  inclination  to  work  miracles. 
At  another  time  he  thought  himself  actually 
possessed  by  the  devil.  He  could  distinguish 
the  blasphemous  whispers.  He  felt  his  infer 
nal  enemy  pulling  at  his  clothes  behind  him. 
He  spurned  with  his  feet,  and  struck  with  his 
hands,  at  the  destroyer.  Sometimes  he  was 
tempted  to  sell  his  part  in  the  salvation  of  man 
kind.  Sometimes  a  violent  impulse  urged  him 
to  start  up  from  his  food,  to  fall  on  his  knees, 
and  break  forth  into  prayer.  At  length  he 
fancied  that  he  had  committed  the  unpardon 
able  sin.  His  agony  convulsed  his  robust 
frame.  He  was,  he  says,  as  if  his  breastbone 
would  split ;  and  this  he  took  for  a  sign  that 
he  was  destined  to  burst  asunder  like  Judas. 
The  agitation  of  his  nerves  made  all  his  move 
ments  tremulous;  and  this  trembling,  he  sup 
posed,  was  a  visible  mark  of  his  reprobation, 
like  that  which  had  been  set  on  Cain.  At  one 
time,  indeed,  an  encouraging  voice  seemed 
to  rush  in  at  the  window,  like  the  noise  of 
wind,  but  very  pleasant,  and  commanded,  as 
he  says,  a  great  calm  in  his  soul.  At  another 
time,  a  word  of  comfort  "was  spoke  loud 
unto  him ;  it  showed  a  great  word ;  it  seemed 
to  be  writ  in  great  letters."  But  these  intervals 
of  ease  were  short.  His  state,  during  two 
years  and  a  half,  was  generally  the  most  horri 
ble  that  the  human  mind  can  imagine.  "I 
walked,"  says  he,  with  his  own  peculiar  elo 
quence,  "  to  a  neighbouring  town ;  and  sat 
down  upon  a  settle  in  the  street,  and  fell  into 
a  very  deep  pause  about  the  most  /earful  stata 
my  sin  had  brought  me  to ;  and,  after  lon» 
musing,  I  lifted  up  my  head;  but  methought  I 
saw  as  if  the  sun  that  shineth  in  the  heavens 
did  grudge  to  give  me  light ;  and  as  if  the  very 
stones  in  the  streets  and  tiles  upon  the  houses 
did  band  themselves  against  me.  Methought 
that  they  all  combined  together  to  banish  me 
out  of  the  world  !  I  was  abhorred  of  them,  and 
unfit  to  dwell  among  them,  because  I  had  sin 
ned  against  the  Saviour.  Oh,  how  happy  now 


133 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


was  every  creature  over  I !  for  they  stood  fast, 
and  kept  their  station.  But  I  was  gone  and 
lo^t."  Scarcely  any  madhouse  could  produce 
an  instance  of  delusion  so  strong,  or  of  misery 
so  acute. 

It  was  through  this  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of 
Death,  overhung  by  darkness,  peopled  with 
devils,  resounding  with  blasphemy  and  lamen 
tation,  and  passing  amidst  quagmires,  snares, 
and  pitfalls,  close  by  the  very  mouth  of  hell, 
that  Bunyan  journeyed  to  that  bright  and 
fruitful  land  of  Beulah,  in  which  he  sojourned 
during  the  latter  days  of  his  pilgrimage.  The 
only  trace  which  his  cruel  sufferings  and 
temptations  seem  to  have  left  behind  them,  was 
an  affectionate  compassion  for  those  who  were 
still  in  the  state  in  which  he  had  once  been. 
Religion  has  scarcely  ever  worn  a  form  so 
calm  and  soothing  as  in  his  allegory.  The  feel 
ing  which  predominates  through  the  whole 
book  is  a  feeling  of  tenderness  for  weak,  timid, 
and  harassed  minds.  The  character  of  Mr. 
Fearing,  of  Mr.  Feeble-Mind,  of  Mr.  Despond 
ency  and  his  daughter  Miss  Muchafraid ;  the 
account  of  poor  Littlefaith,  who  was  robbed 
by  the  three  thieves  of  his  spending-money ; 
the  description  of  Christian's  terror  in  the 
dungeons  of  Giant  Despair,  and  in  his  passage 
through  the  river,  all  clearly  show  how  strong 
a  sympathy  Bunyan  felt,  after  his  own  mind 
had  become  clear  and  cheerful,  for  persons 
afflicted  with  religious  melancholy. 

Mr.  Southey,  who  has  no  love  for  the  Cal- 
vinists,  admits  that,  if  Calvinism  had  never 
worn  a  blacker  appearance  than  in  Bunyan's 
works,  it  would  never  have  become  a  term  of 
reproach.  In  fact,  those  works  of  Bunyan 
with  which  we  are  acquainted,  are  by  no 
means  more  Calvinistic  than  the  homilies  of 
the  Church  of  England.  The  moderation  of 
his  opinions  on  the  subject  of  predestination, 
gave  offence  to  some  zealous  persons.  We 
have  seen  an  absurd  allegory,  the  heroine  of 
which  is  named  Hephzibah,  written  by  some 
raving  supralapsarian  preacher,  who  was  dis 
satisfied  with  the  mild  theology  of  the  Pilgrim's 
Progress.  In  this  foolish  book,  if  Are  recollect 
rightly,  the  Interpreter  is  called  the  Enlight- 
ener,  and  the  House  Beautiful  is  Castle 
Strength.  Mr.  Southey  tells  us  that  the  Ca 
tholics  had  also  their  Pilgrim's  Progress  with 
out  a  Giant  Pope,  in  which  the  Interpreter  is 
the  Director,  and  the  House  Beautiful  Grace's 
Hall.  It  is  surely  a  remarkable  proof  of  the 
power  of  Bunyan's  genius,  that  two  religious 
parties,  both  of  which  regarded  his  opinions  as 
heterodox,  should  have  had  recourse  to  him  for 
assistance. 

There  are,  we  think,  some  characters  and 
scenes  in  the  Pilgrim's  Progress,  which  can  be 
ully  comprehended  and  enjoyed  only  by  per 
sons  familiar  with  the  history  of  the  times 
througi  which  Bunyan  lived.  The  character 
of  Mr.  Greatheart,  the  guide,  is  an  example. 
His  fighting  is,  of  course,  allegorical ;  but  the 
allegory  is  not  strictly  preserved.  He  delivers 
a  sermon  on  imputed  righteousness  to  his  com 
panions  ;  and,  soon  after,  he  gives  battle  to 
Gian*  Grim,  who  had  taken  upon  him  to  back 
tU«  li^ns  He  expounds  the  fifty-third  chapter 


of  Isaiah  to  the  household  and  guests  of  Gaius; 
and  then  sallies  out  to  altuck  Slaygood,  who 
was  of  the  nature  of  flesh-eaters,  in  his  den. 
There  are  inconsistencies;  but  they  are  incon 
sistencies  which  add,  we  think,  to  the  interest 
of  the  narrative.  We  have  not  the  least  doubt 
that  Bunyan  had  in  view  some  stout  old  Great- 
heart  of  Naseby  and  Worcester,  who  prayed 
with  his  men  before  he  drilled  them ;  who 
knew  the  spiritual  state  of  every  dragoon  in 
his  troop ;  and  who,  with  the  praises  of  God  in 
his  mouth,  and  a  two-edged  sword  in  his  hand, 
had  turned  to  flight,  on  many  fields  of  battle, 
the  swearing,  drunken  bravoes  of  Rupert  and 
Lunsford. 

Every  age  produces  such  men  as  By-ends* 
But  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  wa.» 
eminently  prolific  of  such  men.  Mr.  Southey 
thinks  that  the  satire  was  aimed  at  some  par 
ticular  individual ;  and  this  seems  by  no  means 
improbable.  At  all  events,  Bunyan  must  have 
known  many  of  those  hypocrites  who  followed 
religion  only  when  religion  walked  in  silver 
slippers,  when  the  sun  shone,  and  when  the 
people  applauded.  Indeed,  he  might  have 
easily  found  all  the  kindred  of  By-ends  among 
the  public  men  of  his  time.  He  might  have 
found  among  the  peers,  my  Lord  Turn-about, 
my  Lord  Time-server,  and  my  Lord  Fair- 
speech;  in  the  House  of  Commons,  Mr. 
Smooth-man,  Mr.  Anything,  and  Mr.  Facing- 
both-ways ;  nor  would  "  the  parson  of  the 
parish,  Mr.  Two-tongues,"  have  been  wanting. 
The  town  of  Bedford  probably  contained  more 
than  one  politician,  who,  after  contriving  to 
raise  an  estate  by  seeking  the  Lord  during  the 
reign  of  the  saints,  contrived  to  keep  what  he 
had  got  by  persecuting  the  saints  during  the 
reign  of  the  strumpets;  and  more  than  one 
priest  who,  during  repeated  changes  in  the 
discipline  and  doctrines  of  the  church,  had 
remained  constant  to  nothing  but  his  bene 
fice. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  passages  in  the 
Pilgrim's  Progress,  is  that  in  which  the  pro 
ceedings  against  Faithful  are  described.  It  is 
impossible  to  doubt  that  Bunyan  intended  to 
satirize  the  mode  in  which  state  trials  were 
conducted  under  Charles  the  Second.  The 
license  given  to  the  witnesses  for  the  prosecu 
tion,  the  shameless  partiality  and  ferocious  in 
solence  of  the  judge,  the  precipitancy  and  the 
blind  rancour  of  the  jury,  remind  us  of  those 
odious  mummeries  which,  from  the  Restoration 
to  the  Revolution,  were  merely  forms  prelimi 
nary  to  hanging,  drawing,  and  quartering. 
Lord  Hategood  performs  the  office  of  counsel 
for  the  prisoners  as  well  as  Scroggs  himself 
could  have  performed  it. 

11  JUDOE.  Thou  runagate,  heretic,  and  traitor, 
hast  thou  heard  what  these  honest  gentlemen 
have  witnessed  against  thee  ? 

"FAITHFUL.  May  I  speak  a  few  words  in  my 
own  defence  1 

"  JUDGE.  Sirrah,  Sirrah!  thou  deservest  to 
live  no  longer,  but  to  be  slain  immediately 
upon  the  place;  yet,  that  all  men  may  see  our 
gentleness  to  thee,  let  us  hear  what  thou,  vile 
runagate,  hast  to  say." 

No  person  who  knows  the  state  trials  can  b 


SOUTHEY'S  EDITION  OF  THE  PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS. 


133 


at  a  loss  for  parallel  cases.  Indeed,  write  what 
Bunyan  would,  the  baseness  and  cruelty  of  the 
lawyers  of  those  times  "  sinned  up  to  it  still," 
and  even  went  beyond  it.  The  imaginary  trial 
Df  Faithful  before  a  jury  composed  of  personi 
fied  vices,  was  just  and  merciful,  when  com 
pared  with  the  real  trial  of  Lady  Alice  Lisle 
before  that  tribunal  where  all  the  vices  sat  in 
the  person  of  Jeffries. 

The  style  of  Bunyan  is  delightful  to  every 
reader,  and  invaluable  as  a  study  to  every  per 
son  who  wishes  to  obtain  a  wide  command 
over  the  English  language.  The  vocabulary 
is  the  vocabulary  of  the  common  people. 
There  is  not  an  expression,  if  we  except  a  few 
technical  terms  of  theology,  which  would  puz 
zle  the  rudest  peasant.  We  have  observed 
several  pages  which  do  not  contain  a  single 
word  of  more  than  two  syllables.  Yet  no  wri 
ter  has  said  more  exactly  what  he  meant  to 
say.  For  magnificence,  for  pathos,  for  vehe 
ment  exhortation,  for  subtle  disquisition,  for 
erery  purpose  of  the  poet,  the  orator,  and  the 


divine,  this  homely  dialect,  the  dialect  of  plain 
workingmen,  was  perfectly  sufficient.  There 
is  no  book  in  our  literature  on  which  we  could 
so  readily  stake  the  fame  of  the  old  unpolluted 
English  language ;  no  book  which  shows  so 
well  how  rich  that  language  is  in  its  own  pro 
per  wealth,  and  how  little  it  has  been  improved 
by  all  that  it  has  borrowed. 

Cowper  said,  forty  or  fifty  years  ago,  that  he 
dared  not  name  John  Bunyan  in  his  verse,  for 
fear  of  moving  a  sneer.  To  our  refined  fore 
fathers,  we  suppose,  Lord  Roscommun's  Essay 
on  Translated  Ver^e,  and  the  Duke  of  Buck 
inghamshire's  Essay  on  Poetry,  appeared  to 
be  compositions  infinitely  superior  to  the  alle 
gory  of  the  preaching  tinker.  We  live  in 
better  times;  and  we  are  not  afraid  to  say 
that,  though  there  were  many  clever  men  in 
England  during  the  latter  half  of  the  seven 
teenth  century,  there  were  only  two  great 
creative  minds.  One  of  those  minds  pro 
duced  the  Paradise  Lost,  the  other  the  Pil 
grim's  Progress. 


END  OF  VOL.  L 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE  OF  JOHNSON. 


135 


CHOKER'S  EDITION  OF  BOSWELL'S  LIFE  0¥ 

JOHNSON.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1831.] 


Tnt»  work  has  greatly  disappointed  us. 
Whatever  faults  we  may  have  been  prepared 
to  find  in  it,  we  fully  expected  that  it  would  be 
a  valuable  addition  to  English  literature,  that 
it  would  contain  many  curious  facts  and  many 
judicious  remarks ;  that  the  style  of  the  notes 
would  be  neat,  clear,  and  precise  ;  and  that  the 
typographical  execution  would  be,  as  in  new 
editions  of  classical  works  it  ought  to  be,  al 
most  faultless.  We  are  sorry  to  be  obliged  to 
say,  that  the  merits  of  Mr.  Croker's  perform 
ance  are  on  a  par  with  those  of  a  certain  leg 
of  mutton  on  which  Dr.  Johnson  dined,  while, 
travelling  from  London  to  Oxford,  and  which 
he,  with  characteristic  energy,  pronounced  to 
be,  "  as  bad  as  bad  could  be ;  ill-fed,  ill-killed, 
ill-kept,  and  ill-dressed ."f  That  part  of  the 
volumes  before  us,  for  which  the  editor  is  re 
sponsible,  is  ill-compiled,  ill-arranged,  ill-ex 
pressed,  and  ill-printed. 

Nothing  in  the  work  had  astonished  us  so 
much  as  the  ignorance  or  carelessness  of  Mr. 
Croker  with  re-spect  to  facts  and  dates.  Many 
of  his  blunders  are  such  as  we  should  be  sur 
prised  to  hear  any  well-educated  gentleman 
commit,  even  in  conversation.  The  notes  ab 
solutely  swarm  with  misstatements,  into  which 
the  editor  never  would  have  fallen,  if  he  had 
taken  the  slightest  pains  to  investigate  the 
truth  of  his  assertions,  or  if  he  had  even  been 
well  acquainted  with  the  very  book  on  which 
he  undertook  to  comment  We  will  give  a  few 
instances. 

Mr.  Croker  tells  us,  in  a  note,  that  Derrick, 
who  was  master  of  the  ceremonies  at  Bath, 
died  very  poor,  in  17604  We  read  on ;  and,  a 
few  pages  later,  we  find  Dr.  Johnson  and  Bos- 
well  talking  of  the  same  Derrick  as  still  living 
and  reigning,  as  having  retrieved  his  character, 
as  possessing  so  much  power  over  his  subjects 
at  Bath,  that  his  opposition  might  be  fatal  to 
Sheridan's  lectures  on  oratory.^  And  all  this 
in  1763.  The  fact  is,  that  Derrick  died  in 
1769. 

In  one  note  we  read,  that  Sir  Herbert  Croft, 
the  author  of  that  pompous  and  foolish  account 
of  Young,  which  appears  among  the  Lives  of 
the  Poets,  died  in  1805.)  Another  note  in  the 
same  volume  states,  that  this  same  Sir  Her 
bert  Croft  died  at  Paris,  after  residing  abroad 
for  fifteen  years,  on  the  27th  of  April,  1816.J 

Mr.  Croker  informs  us,  that  Sir  William 
Forbes  of  Pitsligo,  the  author  of  the  life  of 


*  The  Life  of  Samuel  Johnson,  LL.D.  ;  including  a. 
Journal  of  a.  Tour  to  the  Hebrides.  By  James  Boswell, 
Esq.  A  JWtc  Edition,  vith  numerous  Additions  and 
tes.  By  JOHN  WILSON  CnoKER,  LL.D.,  F.R.8.  5 
a.  8vo.  London.  1831. 

t  V.  184.  $  I.  394.  *  I.  404. 

It  IV.  321.  H  IV.  428. 


Beattie,  died  in  1816.*  A  Sir  William  Forbes 
undoubtedly  died  in  that  year ;  but  not  the  Sir 
William  Forbes  in  question,  whose  death  took 
place  in  1806.  It  is  notorious,  indeed,  that  the 
biographer  of  Bealtie  lived  just  long  enough  to 
complete  the  history  of  his  friend.  Eight  or 
nine  years  before  the  date  which  Mr.  Croker 
has  assigned  for  Sir  William's  death.  Sir  Wal 
ter  Scott  lamented  that  event,  in  the  introduc 
tion,  we  think,  to  the  fourth  canto  of  Marmion. 
Every  school-girl  knows  the  lines : 

"  Scarce  had  lamented  Forbes  paid 
The  tribute  to  hi*  Minstrel's  shade  ; 
The  tale  of  friendship  scarce  wag  told, 
Ere  the  narrator's  heart  was  cold — 
Far  may  we  search  before  we  find 
A  heart  so  manly  and  ao  kind  1" 

In  one  place,  we  are  told,  that  Allan  Ramsay 
the  painter,  was  born  in  1709,  and  died  in 
1784  ;f  in  another,  that  h«  died  in  1784,  in  the 
seventy-first  year  of  his  age4  If  the  latter 
statement  be  correct,  he  must  have  been  bora 
in  or  about  1713. 

In  one  place,  Mr.  Croker  says,  that  at  the 
commencement  of  the  intimacy  between  Dr. 
Johnson  and  Mrs.  Thrale,  in  1765,  the  lady 
was  twenty-five  years  old.§  In  other  places 
he  says,  that  Mrs.  Thrale's  thirty-fifth  year  co 
incided  with  Johnson's  seventieth.il  Johnson 
was  born  in  1709.  If,  therefore,  Mrs.  Thrale's 
thirty-fifth  year  coincided  with  Johnson's  se 
ventieth,  she  could  have  been  only  twenty-one 
years  old  in  1765.  This  is  not  all.  Mr. 
Croker,  in  another  place,  assigns  the  year 
1777  as  the  date  of  the  complimentary  lines 
which  Johnson  made  on  Mrs.  Thrale's  thirty- 
fifth  birthday.^  If  this  date  be  correct,  Mrs. 
Thrale  must  have  been  born  in  1742,  and  could 
have  been  only  twenty-three  when  her  ac 
quaintance  with  Johnson  commenced.  Two 
of  Mr.  Croker's  three  statements  must  be  false. 
We  will  not  decide  between  them;  we  wiH 
only  say,  that  the  reasons  which  he  gives  for 
thinking  that  Mrs.  Thrale  was  exactly  thirty- 
five  years  old  when  Johnson  was  seventy,  ap 
pear  to  us  utterly  frivolous. 

Again,  Mr.  Croker  informs  his  readers  that 
"Lord  Mansfield  survived  Johnson  full  ten 
years."**  Lord  Mansfield  survived  Dr.  John 
son  just  eight  years  and  a  quarter. 

Johnson  found  in  the  library  of  a  French 
lady,  whom  he  visited  during  his  short  visit  to 
Paris,  some  works  which  he  regarded  with 
great  disdain.  "  I  looked,"  says  he,  "  into  the 
books  in  the  lady's  closet,  and,  in  contempt, 
showed  them  to  Mr.  Thrale— Prince  Titi ;  Bi- 
blotheque  des  Fees,  and  other  books."ff  "  The 


*  II.  262.  f  IV.  105.        t  V.  281.        *  1.  510. 

a  IV.  271,  322.      ?  III.  463.        **  II.  151.      ft  III  271 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


history  of  Prince  Titi,"  observes  Mr.  Croker,  | 
"was  said  to  be  the  autobiography  of  Frederic  j 
Prince  of  Wales,  but  was  probably  written  by  | 
Ralph,  his  secretary."  A  more  absurd  note  j 
never  was  penned.  The  history  of  Prince 
Titi,  to  which  Mr.  Croker  refers,  whether  writ 
ten  by  Prince  Frederic  or  by  Ralph,  was  cer 
tainly  never  published.  If  Mr.  Croker  had 
taken  the  trouble  to  read  with  attention  the 
very  passage  in  Park's  Royal  and  Noble  Au 
thors,  which  he  cites  as  his  authority,  he 
would  have  seen  that  the  manuscript  was 
given  up  to  the  government.  Even  if  this 
memoir  had  been  printed,  it  was  not  very  likely 
to  find  its  way  into  a  French  lady's  bookcase. 
And  would  any  man  in  his  senses  speak  con 
temptuously  of  a  French  lady,  for  having  in 
her  possession  an  English  work  so  curious 
and  interesting  as  a  Life  of  Prince  Frederic, 
whether  written  by  himself  or  by  a  confidential 
secretary,  must  have  been  ]  The  history  at 
which  Johnson  laughed  was  a  veiy  proper 
companion  to  the  Bibliotheque  des  Fees— a 
fairy  tale  about  good  Prince  Titi  and  naughty 
Prince  Violent.  Mr.  Croker  may  find  it  in  the 
Magasin  des  Enfans,  the  first  French  book 
which  the  little  girls  of  England  read  to  their 
governesses. 

Mr.  Croker  states,  that  Mr.  Henry  Bate,  who 
afterwards  assumed  the  name  of  Dudley,  was 
proprietor  of  the  Morning  Herald,  and  fought 
a  duel  with  George  Robinson  Stoney,  in  con 
sequence  of  some  attacks  on  Lady  Strathmore, 
which  appeared  in  that  paper.*  Now  Mr. 
Bate  was  connected,  not  with  the  Morning  He 
rald,  but  with  the  Morning  Post,  and  the  dis 
pute  took  place  before  the  Morning  Herald 
was  in  existence.  The  duel  was  fought  in 
January,  1777.  The  Chronicle  of  the  Annual 
Register  for  that  year  contains  an  account  of 
the  transaction,  and  distinctly  states  that  Mr. 
Bate  was  editor  of  the  Morning  Post.  The 
Morning  Herald,  as  any  person  may  see  by 
looking  at  any  number  of  it,  was  not  establish 
ed  till  some  years  after  this  affair.  For  this 
blunder  there  is,  we  must  acknowledge,  some 
excuse  :  for  it  certainly  seems  almost  incredi 
ble  to  a  person  living  in  our  time,  that  any 
human  being  should  ever  have  stooped  to 
fight  with  a  writer  in  the  Morning  Post. 

"James  de  Duglas,"  says  Mr.  Croker,  "was 
requested  by  King  Robert  Bruce,  in  his  last 
hours,  to  repair  with  his  heart  to  Jerusalem, 
and  humbly  to  deposit  it  at  the  sepulchre  of 
our  Lord,  which  he  did  in  1329."f  Now  it  is 
well  known  that  he  did  no  such  thing,  and  for 
a  very  sufficient  reason — because  he  was  killed 
by  the  way.  Nor  was  it  in  1329  that  he  set 
out.  Robert  Bruce  died  in  1329,  and  the  ex 
pedition  of  Douglas  took  place  in  the  follow 
ing  year, — "  quand  le  print  ems  vint  el  la  saison" 
says"  Froissart,  —  in  June,  1330,  says  Lord 
HailM,  whom  Mr.  Croker  cites  as  the  author 
ity  for  his  statement. 

Mr.  UroKer  lens  us  tnat  tne  great  Marquis 
of  Montrosa  was  beheaded  in  Edinburgh  in 
16504  There  is  not  a  forward  boy  at  any 
sciiocl  in  England  who  does  not  know  that  the 
marquix  was  hanged.  The  account  of  the  j 


execution  is  one  of  the  finest  passages  in  Lord 
Clarendon's  History.  We  can  scarcely  sup 
pose  that  Mr.  Croker  has  never  read  that  pas 
sage  ;  and  yet  we  can  scarcely  suppose  that 
any  person  who  has  ever  perused  so  noble  and 
pathetic  a  story  can  have  utterly  forgotten  all 
its  most  striking  circumstances. 

"Lord  Townshend,"  says  Mr.  Croker,  "wai 
not  secretary  of  state  till  1720."*  Can  Mr, 
Croker  possibly  be  ignorant  that  Lord  Town 
shend  was  made  secretary  of  state  at  the  ac 
cession  of  George  the  First,  in  1714,  that  he 
continued  to  be  secretary  of  state  till  lie  was 
displaced  by  the  intrigues  of  Sunderland  and 
Stanhope  at  the  close  of  1716,  and  that  he  re 
turned  to  the  office  of  secretary  of  state,  not  in 
1720,  but  in  1721?  Mr.  Croker,  indeed,  is  ge 
nerally  unfortunate  in  his  statements  respect 
ing  the  Townshend  family.  He  tells  us  that 
Charles  Townshend,  the  chancellor  of  the  ex 
chequer,  was  "nephew  of  the  prime  minister, 
and  son  of  a  peer  who  was  secretary  of  state, 
and  leader  of  the  House  of  Lords."-]-  Charles 
Townshend  was  not  nephew,  but  grand-ne 
phew  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle — not  son, 
but  grandson  of  the  Lord  Townshend  who  was 
secretary  of  state  and  leader  of  the  House  of 
Lords. 

"  General  Burgoyne  surrendered  at  Sarato 
ga,"  says  Mr.  Croker,  "in  March,  1778."*  Ge 
neral  Burgoyne  surrendered  on  the  17th  of 
October,  1777. 

"Nothing,"  says  Mr.  Crocker,  "can  be  more 
unfounded  than  the  assertion  that  Byng  fell  a 
martyr  to  political  party.  By  a  strange  coinci 
dence  of  circumstances,  it  happened  that  there 
was  a  total  change  of  administration  between 
his  condemnation  and  his  death;  so  that  one 
party  presided  at  his  trial  and  another  at  his 
execution;  there  can  be  no  stronger  proof  that 
he  was  not  a  political  martyr."§  Now,  what 
will  our  readers  think  of  this  writer  when  we 
assure  them  that  this  statement,  so  confidently 
made  respecting  events  so  notorious,  is  abso 
lutely  untrue  1  One  and  the  same  administra 
tion  was  in  office  when  the  court-martial  on 
Byng  commenced  its  sittings,  through  the  whole 
trial,  at  the  condemnation,  and  at  the  execu 
tion.  In  the  month  of  November,  1756,  the 
Duke  of  Newcastle  and  Lord  Hardwicke  re 
signed;  the  Duke  of  Devonshire  became  first 
lord  of  the  treasury,  and  Mr.  Pitt  secretary  of 
state.  This  administration  lasted  till  the  month 
of  April,  1757.  Byng's  court-martial  began  to 
sit  on  the  28th  of  December,  1756.  He  was 
shot  on  the  14th  of  March,  1757.  There  is 
something  at  once  diverting  and  provoking  in 
the  cool  and  authoritative  manner  in  which 
Mr.  Croker  makes  these  random  assertions. 
We  do  not  suspect  him  of  intentionally  falsify 
ing  history.  But  of  this  high  literary  misde 
meanor  we  do  without  hesitation  accuse  him 
— that  he  has  no  adequate  sense  of  the  obliga 
tion  which  a  writer,  who  professes  to  relate 
facts,  owes  tc  the  public.  We  accuse  him  of 
a  negligence  and  an  ignorance  analogous  to 
that  crassa  negligentia  and  that  crassa  ignorantia 
on  which  the  law  animadverts  in  magistrates 
and  surgeon:*  even  wnen  maiice  and  corrup- 


*  v.  196. 


t  IV.  29. 


JII.  526.          !      *  III.  52.          fill.  368.          f  IV.  222.  J  I.  2M. 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE  OF  JOHNSON. 


137 


tion  are  not  imputed.  We  accuse  him  of  hav 
ing  undertaken  a  work  which,  if  not  performed 
with  strict  accuracy,  must  be  very  much  worse 
than  useless,  and  of  having  performed  it  as 
if  the  difference  between  an  accurate  and  an 
inaccurate  statement  was  not  worth  the  trouble 
of  looking  into  the  most  common  book  of  re 
ference. 

But  we  must  proceed.  These  volumes  con 
tain  mistakes  more  gross,  if  possible,  than  any 
that  we  have  yet  mentioned.  Boswell  has  re 
corded  some  observations  made  by  Johnson  on 
the  changes  which  took  place  in  Gibbon's  re 
ligious  opinions.  "It  is  said,"  cried  the  doc 
tor,  laughing,  "that  he  has  been  a  Mahome 
tan."  "This  sarcasm,"  says  the  editor,  "pro 
bably  alludes  to  the  tenderness  with  which 
Gibbon's  malevolence  to  Christianity  induced 
him  to  treat  Mahometanism  in  his  history."* 
Now  the  sarcasm  was  uttered  in  1776,  and 
that  part  of  the  History  of  the  Decline  and 
Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  which  relates  to 
Mahometanism  was  not  published  till  1788, 
twelve  years  after  the  date  of  this  conversa 
tion,  and  nearly  four  years  after  the  death  of 
Johnson. 

"It  was  in  the  year  1761,"  says  Mr.  Croker, 
"that  Goldsmith  published  his  Vicar  of  Wake- 
field.  This  leads  the  editor  to  observe  a  more 
serious  inaccuracy  of  Mrs.  Piozzi  than  Mr.  Bos- 
well  notices,  when  he  says  Johnson  left  her 
table  to  go  and  sell  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield  for 
Goldsmith.  Now  Dr.  Johnson  was  not  ac 
quainted  with  the  Thrales  till  1765,  four  years 
after  the  book  had  been  published."!  Mr. 
Croker,  in  reprehending  the  fancied  inaccu 
racy  of  Mrs.  Thrale,  has  himself  shown  a  de 
gree  of  inaccuracy,  or,  to  speak  more  proper 
ly,  a  degree  of  ignorance,  hardly  credible.  The 
Traveller  was  not  published  till  1765 ;  and  it 
is  a  fact  as  notorious  as  any  in  literary  his 
tory  that  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  though  writ 
ten  before  the  Traveller,  was  published  after 
it.  It  is  a  fact  which  Mr.  Croker  may  find  in 
any  common  life  of  Goldsmith;  in  that  written 
by  Mr.  Chalmers,  for  example.  It  is  a  fact 
which,  as  Boswell  tells  us,  was  distinctly 
stated  by  Johnson  in  a  conversation  with  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds.*  It  is  therefore  quite  possi 
ble  and  probable  that  the  celebrated  scene  of 
the  landlady,  the  sheriff's  officer,  and  the  bottle 
of  Madeira,  may  have  taken  place  in  1765. 
Now  Mrs.  Thrale  expressly  says  that  it  was 
near  the  beginning  of  her  acquaintance  with 
Johnson,  in  1765,  or  at  all  events  not  later  than 
1766,  that  he  left  her  table  to  succour  his  friend. 
Her  accuracy  is  therefore  completely  vindi 
cated. 

The  very  page  which  contains  this  mon 
strous  blunder  contains  another  blunder,  if 
possible,  more  monstrous  still.  Sir  Joseph 
Mawbey,  a  foolish  member  of  Parliament,  at 
whose  speeches  and  whose  pig-styes  the  wits 
of  Brookes's  were  fifty  years  ago  in  the  habit 
of  laughing  most  unmercifully,  stated,  on  the 
authority  cf  Garrick,  that  Johnson,  while  sit 
ting  in  a  coffee-house  at  Oxford  about  the  time 
of  his  doctor's  degree,  used  some  contemptu 
ous  exp^s^i  >iis  respecting  Home's  play  and 


]  Macpherson's  Ossian.  "  Many  men,"  he  said, 
|  "  many  women,  and  many  children  might  have 
written  Douglas."  Mr.  Croker  conceives  that 
he  has  detected  an  inaccuracy,  and  glories 
over  poor  Sir  Joseph  in  a  most  characteristic 
manner.  "  I  have  quoted  this  anecdote  solely 
with  the  view  of  showing  to  how  little  credit 
hearsay  anecdotes  are  in  general  entitled. 
Here  is  a  story  published  by  Sir  Joseph  Maw- 
bey,  a  member  of  the  House  of  Commons,  and 
a  person  every  way  worthy  of  credit,  who  says 
he  had  it  from  Garrick.  Now  mark : — John 
son's  visit  to  Oxford,  about  the  time  of  his  doc 
tor's  degree,  was  in  1754,  the  first  time  he  had 
been  there  since  he  left  the  university.  But 
Douglas  was  not  acted  till  1756,  and  Ossian 
not  published  till  1760.  All,  therefore,  that  is 
new  in  Sir  Joseph  Mawbey's  story  is  false.* 
Assuredly  we  need  not  go  far  to  find  ample 
proof  that  a  member  of  the  House  of  Commons 
may  commit  a  very  gross  error."  Now  mark, 
say  we,  in  the  language  of  Mr.  Croker.  The 
fact  is,  that  Johnson  took  his  Master's  degree 
in  1754,f  and  his  Doctor's  degree  in  17754  In 
the  spring  of  1776§  he  paid  a  visit  to  Oxford, 
and  at  this  visit  a  conversation  respecting  the 
works  of  Home  and  Macpherson  might  have 
taken  place,  and  in  all  probability  did  take 
place.  The  only  real  objection  to  the  story  Mr. 
Croker  has  missed.  Boswell  states,  apparent 
ly  on  the  best  authority,  that  as  early  at  least 
as  the  year  1763,  Johnson,  in  conversation  with 
Blair,  used  the  same  expressions  respecting  Os 
sian  which  Sir  Joseph  represents  him  as  hav 
ing  used  respecting  Douglas.!)  Sir  Joseph  or 
Garrick  confounded,  we  suspect,  the  two  sto 
ries.  But  their  error  is  venial  compared  with 
that  of  Mr.  Croker. 

We  will  not  multiply  instances  of  this  scan 
dalous  inaccuracy.  It  is  clear  that  a  writer 
who,  even  when  warned  by  the  text  on  which 
he  is  commenting,  falls  into  such  mistakes  as 
these,  is  entitled  to  no  confidence  whatever. 
Mr.  Croker  has  committed  an  error  of  four 
years  with  respect  to  the  publication  of  Gold 
smith's  nove1 ;  an  error  of  twelve  years  with 
respect  to  the  publication  of  Gibbon's  history; 
an  error  of  twenty-one  years  with  respect  to 
one  of  the  most  remarkable  events  of  John 
son's  life.  Two  of  these  three  errors  he  has 
committed  while  ostentatiously  displaying  his 
own  accuracy,  and  correcting  what  he  repre 
sents  as  the  loose  assertions  of  others.  How  can 
his  readers  take  on  trust  his  statements  concern 
ing  the  births,  marriages,  divorces,  and  deaths 
of  a  crowd  of  people  whose  names  are  scarce 
ly  known  to  this  generation  ?  It  is  not  likely 
that  a  person  who  is  ignorant  of  what  almost 
everybody  knows  can  know  that  of  which  al 
most  everybody  is  ignorant.  We  did  not  open 
this  book  with  any  wish  to  find  blemishes  in 
it.  We  have  made  no  curious  researches. 
The  work  itself,  and  a  very  common  know 
ledge  of  literary  and  political  history,  have  en 
abled  us  to  detect  the  mistakes  which  we  have 
pointed  out,  and  many  other  mistakes  of  the 
same  kind.  We  must  say,  and  we  say  it  with 
regret,  that  we  do  not  consider  th°  authority 
of  Mr.  Croker,  unsupported  by  othei  evidence, 


» Til.  336. 
VOL.  II.    -18. 


t  V.  409. 


IV.  180. 


*  V.  409.      f  I-  262.      %  III.  205. 


M  2 


HI  405 


108 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


as  sufficient  to  justify  any  writer  who  may  fol 
low  him,  in  relating  a  single  anecdote,  or  in  as 
signing  a  date  to  a  single  event. 

Mr.  Croker  shows  almost  as  much  ignorance 
and  heedlessness  in  his  criticisms  as  in  his 
statements  concerning  facts.  Dr.  Johnson  said, 
very  reasonably  as  it  appears  to  us,  that  some 
of  the  satires  of  Juvenal  are  too  gross  for  imi 
tation.  Mr.  Croker,  who,  by  the  way,  is  angry 
with  Johnson  for  defending  Prior's  tales  against 
the  charge  of  indecency,  resents  this  aspersion 
on  Juvenal,  and  indeed  refuses  to  believe  that 
the  doctor  can  have  said  any  thing  so  absurd. 
"He  probably  said — some  passages  of  them — 
for  there  are  none  of  Juvenal's  satires  to  which 
the  same  objection  may  be  made  as  to  one  of 
Horace's,  that  it  is  altogether  gross  and  licen 
tious."*  Surely  Mr.  Croker  can  never  have 
read  the  second  and  ninth  satires  of  Juvenal. 

Indeed,  the  decisions  of  this  editor  on  points 
of  classical  learning,  though  pronounced  in  a 
very  authoritative  tone,  are  generally  such,  that 
if  a  schoolboy  under  our  care  were  to  utter 
them,  our  soul  assuredly  should  not  spare  for 
his  crying.  It  is  no  disgrace  to  a  gentleman, 
who  has  been  engaged  during  nearly  thirty 
years  in  political  life,  that  he  has  forgotten 
his  Greek  and  Latin.  But  he  becomes  justly 
ridiculous,  if,  when  no  longer  able  to  construe 
a  plain  sentence,  he  affects  to  sit  in  judgment 
on  the  most  delicate  questions  of  style  and 
metre.  From  one  blunder,  a  blunder  which 
no  good  scholar  would  have  made,  Mr.  Croker 
was  saved,  as  he  informs  us,  by  Sir  Robert 
Peel,  who  quoted  a  passage  exactly  in  point 
from  Horace.  We  heartily  wish  that  Sir  Ro 
bert,  whose  classical  attainments  are  well 
known,  had  been  more  frequently  consulted. 
Unhappily  he  was  not  always  at  his  friend's 
elbow,  and  we  have  therefore  a  rich  abundance 
of  the  strangest  errors.  Boswell  has  preserved 
a  poor  epigram  by  Johnson,  inscribed  "Ad 
Lauram  parituram."  Mr.  Croker  censures 
the  poet  for  applying  the  word  puella  to  a  lady 
in  Laura's  situation,  and  for  talking  of  the 
beauty  of  Lucina.  "  Lucina,"  he  says,  "  was 
never  famed  for  her  beauty ."f  If  Sir  Robert 
Peel  had  seen  this  note,  he  probably  would 
have  again  refuted  Mr.  Croker's  criticisms  by 
an  appeal  to  Horace.  In  the  secular  ode,  Lu 
cina  is  used  as  one  of  the  names  of  Diana, 
and  the  beauty  of  Diana  is  extolled  by  all  the 
most  orthodox  doctors  of  the  ancient  mytholo 
gy,  from  Homer,  in  his  Odyssey,  to  Claudian, 
in  his  Rape  of  Proserpine.  In  another  ode, 
Horace  describes  Diana  as  the  goddess  who 
assists  the  "  laborantes  utero  puellas"  But  we 
are  ashamed  to  detain  our  readers  with  this 
fourth-form  learning. 

Boswell  found,  in  his  tour  to  the  Hebrides,  an 
inscription  written  by  a  Scotch  minister.  It  runs 
tnus : "  Joannes  Macleod,  &c.,  gentis  suae  Philar- 
chus,  &c.,  Florae  Macdonald  matrimonial!  vin- 
culo  conjugatus  turrem  hanc  Beganodunensem 
proaevorum  habitaculum  longe  vetustissimum, 
diu  penitus  labefactatam,  anno  aerae  vulgaris 
MPCLXXXVI.,  instauravit."  —  "The  minister," 
•ays  Mr.  Croker,  "  seems  to  have  been  no  con- 
Umptible  Latinist.  Is  not  Philarchus  a  very 


•  1. 1«7. 


f.I.  133. 


happy  term  to  express  the  paternal  and  kindly 
authority  of  the  head  of  the  clan!"*  Th« 
composition  of  this  eminent  Latinist,  short  as 
it  is,  contains  several  words  that  are  just  as 
much  Coptic  as  Latin,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
incorrect  structure  of  the  sentence.  The  word 
Philarchus,  even  if  it  were  a  happy  term  ex 
pressing  a  paternal  and  kindly  authority,  would 
prove  nothing  for  the  minister's  Latin,  what 
ever  it  might  prove  for  his  Greek.  But  it  is 
clear  that  the  word  Philarchus  means,  not  a 
man  who  rules  by  love,  but  a  man  who  loves 
rule.  The  Attic  writers  of  the  best  age  use  the 
word  <^/A5«5^6f  in  the  sense  which  we  assign  to 
it.  Would  Mr.  Croker  translate  <^A«rs<j>4?,  a 
man  who  acquires  wisdom  by  means  of  love ; 
or  qHteKtyfii;,  a  man  who  makes  money  by  means 
of  love  1  In  fact  it  requires  no  Benlley  or  Ca- 
saubon  to  perceive  that  Philarchus  is  merely 
a  false  spelling  for  Phy  larch  us,  the  chief  of  a 
tribe. 

Mr.  Croker  has  favoured  us  with  some 
Greek  of  his  own.  "At  the  altar,"  says  Dr. 
Johnson,  "I  recommend  my  S-.  ?."  These  let 
ters,"  says  the  editor,  "  (which  Dr.  Strahan 
seems  not  to  have  understood,)  probably  mean 
•S'fXTM  ptKoi,  departed  friends"^  Johnson  was  not 
a  first-rate  Greek  scholar;  but  he  knew  more 
Greek  than  most  boys  when  they  leave  school ; 
and  no  schoolboy  could  venture  to  use  the 
word  Sv»r6i  in  the  sense  which  Mr.  Croker 
ascribes  to  it  without  imminent  danger  of  a 
flogging. 

Mr.  Croker  has  also  given  us  a  specimen  of 
his  skill  in  translating  Latin.  Johnson  Avrole 
a  note  in  which  he  consulted  his  friend,  Dr. 
Lawrence,  on  the  propriety  of  losing  some 
blood.  The  note  contains  these  words  : — "  Si 
perte  licet,  imperatur  nuncio  Hoklerum  ad  me 
deducere."  Johnson  should  rather  have  writ 
ten  "  imperatum  est."  But  the  meaning  of  the 
words  is  perfectly  clear.  "If  you  say  yes,  the 
messenger  has  orders  to  bring  Holder  to  me." 
Mr.  Croker  translates  the  words  as  follows: 
"If  you  consent,  pray  tell  the  messenger  to 
bring  Holder  to  me."t  If  Mr.  Croker  is  re 
solved  to  write  on  points  of  classical  learning, 
we  would  advise  him  to  begin  by  giving  an 
hour  every  morning  to  our  old  friend  Corde- 
rius. 

Indeed,  we  cannot  open  any  volume  of  this 
work  in  any  place,  and  turn  it  over  for  two 
minutes  in  any  direction,  without  lighting  on 
a  blunder.  Johnson,  in  his  Life  of  Tickell, 
stated  that  the  poem  entitled  "The  Royal  Pro 
gress,"  which  appears  in  the  last  volume  of 
the  Spectator,  was  written  on  the  accession  of 
George  I.  The  word  "  arrival "  was  after 
wards  substituted  for  "accession."  "The 
reader  will  observe,"  says  Mr.  Croker,  "  that 
the  Whig  term  accession,  which  might  imply 
legality,  was  altered  into  a  statement  of  the 
simple  fact  of  King  George's  arrival"^  Now 
Johnson,  though  a  bigoted  Tory,  was  not  quite 
such  a  fool  as  Mr.  Croker  here  represents 
him  to  be.  In  the  Life  of  Granville,  Lord 
Lansdowne,  which  stands  next  to  the  Life  of 
Tickell,  mention  is  made  of  the  accession  of 
Anne,  and  of  the  accession  of  George  I.  Th« 


•  11.458.          f  IV.  351.          JV.  17.          *  IV.  415 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE   OF  JOHNSON. 


139 


word  arrival  was  used  in  the  Life  of  Tickell 
for  the  simplest  of  all  reasons.  It  was  used 
because  the  subject  of  the  "  Royal  Progress  " 
was  the  arrival  of  the  king,  and  not  his  acces 
sion,  which  took  place  nearly  two  months  be 
fore  his  arrival. 

The  editor's  want  of  perspicacity  is  indeed 
very  amusing.  He  is  perpetually  telling  us 
that  he  cannot  understand  something  in  the 
text  which  is  as  plain  as  language  can  make 
it.  "Mattaire,"  said  Dr.  Johnson,  "wrote 
jLatin  verses  from  time  to  time,  and  published 
a  set  in  his  old  age,  which  he  called  Senilia,  in 
which  he  shows  so  little  learning  or  taste  in 
writing,  as  to  make  Carteret  a  dactyl."*  Here 
upon  we  have  this  note :  "  The  editor  does  not 
understand  this  objection,  nor  the  following 
observation."  The  following  observation  which 
Mr.  Croker  cannot  understand  is  simply  this  : 
u  In  matters  of  genealogy,"  says  Johnson,  "  it 
is  necessary  to  give  the  bare  names  as  they 
are.  But  in  poetry,  and  in  prose  of  any  ele 
gance  in  the  writing,  they  require  to  have 
inflection  given  to  them."  If  Mr.  Croker  had 
told  Johnson  that  this  was  unintelligible,  the 
doctor  would  probably  have  replied,  as  he  re 
plied  on  another  occasion,  "  I  have  found  you 
a  reason,  sir;  I  am  not  bound  to  find  you  an 
understanding."  Everybody  who  knows  any 
thing  of  Latinity  knows  that,  in  genealogical 
tables,  Joannes  Baro  de  Carteret,  or  Vice- 
comes  de  Carteret,  may  be  tolerated,  but  that 
in  compositions  which  pretend  to  elegance, 
Carteretus,  or  some  other  form  which  admits 
of  inflection,  ought  to  be  used. 

All  our  readers  have  doubtless  seen  the  two 
distichs  of  Sir  William  Jones,  respecting  the 
division  of  the  time  of  a  lawyer.  One  of  the 
distichs  is  translated  from  some  old  Latin 
lines,  the  other  is  original.  The  former  runs 
thus  : 

"Six  hours  to  sleep,  to  law's  grave  study  six, 
Four  spend  in  prayer,  the  rest  on  nature  fix." 

"  Rather,"  says  Sir  William  Jones, 

"  Six  hours  to  law,  to  soothing  slumbers  seven, 
Ten  to  the  world  allot,  and  all  to  heaven." 

The  second  couplet  puzzles  Mr.  Croker 
strangely.  "Sir  William,"  says  he,  "has 
shortened  his  day  to  twenty-three  hours,  and 
the  general  advice  of  « all  to  heaven,'  destroys 
the  peculiar  appropriation  of  a  certain  period 
to  religious  exercise."!  Now,  we  did  not 
think  that  it  was  in  human  dulness  to  miss  the 
meaning  of  the  lines  so  completely.  Sir  Wil 
liam  distributes  twenty-three  hours  among  va 
rious  employments.  One  hour  is  thus  left  for 
devotion.  The  reader  expects  that  the  verse 
will  end  with— "and  one  to  heaven."  The 
whole  point  of  the  lines  consist  in  the  unex 
pected  substitution  of  "all"  for  "one."  The 
conceit  is  wretched  enough ;  but  it  is  perfectly 
intelligible,  and  never,  we  will  venture  to  say, 
perplexed  man,  woman,  or  child  before. 

Poor  Tom  Davies,  after  failing  in  business, 
tried  to  live  by  his  pen.  Johnson  called  him 
"an  author  generated  by  the  corruption  of  a 
bookseller."  This  is  a  very  obvious,  and  even 
a  commonplace  allusion  to  the  famous  dogma 


of  the  old  physiologists.  Dryden  made  a  simi 
lar  allusion  to  the  dogma  before  Johnson  was 
born.  Mr.  Croker,  however,  is  unable  to  under- 
stand  it.  " The  expression,"  he  says,  "seems 
not  quite  clear."  And  he  proceeds  to  talk 
about  the  generation  of  insects,  about  bursting 
into  gaudier  life,  and  Heaven  knows  what.* 

There  is  a  still  stranger  instance  of  the  edi 
tor's  talent  for  finding  out  difficulty  in  what  is 
perfectly  plain.  "No  man,"  said  Johnson, 
"  can  now  be  made  a  bishop  for  his  learning 
and  piety."  "  From  this  too  just  observation," 
says  Boswell,  "  there  are  some  eminent  excep 
tions."  Mr.  Croker  is  puzzled  by  Boswell's 
very  natural  and  simple  language.  "  That  a 
general  observation  should  be  pronounced  too 
just,  by  the  very  person  who  admits  that  it  is 
not  universally  just,  is  not  a  little  odd."f 

A  very  large  portion  of  the  two  thousand  five 
hundred  notes  which  the  editor  boasts  of  hav 
ing  added  to  those  of  Boswell  and  Malone, 
consists  of  the  flattest  and  poorest  reflections — 
reflections  such  as  the  least  intelligent  reader 
is  quite  competent  to  make  for  himself,  and 
such  as  no  intelligent  reader  would  think  it 
worth  while  to  utter  aloud.  They  remind  us 
of  nothing  so  much  as  of  those  profound  and 
interesting  annotations  which  are  pencilled  by 
sempstresses  and  apothecaries'  boys  on  the 
dog-eared  margins  of  novels  borrowed  trom 
circulating  libraries — "  How  beautiful  !" — 
"cursed  prosy" — "I  don't  like  Sir  Reginald 
Malcolm  at  all."— "I  think  Pelham  is  a  sad 
dandy."  Mr.  Croker  is  perpetually  stopping 
us  in  our  progress  through  the  most  delightful 
narrative  in  the  language,  to  observe.,  that 
really  Dr.  Johnson  was  very  rude;  that  he 
talked  more  for  victory  than  for  truth  ;  that  his 
taste  for  port-wine  with  capillaire  in  it  was 
very  odd;  that  Boswell  was  impertinent;  that 
it  was  foolish  in  Mrs.  Thrale  to  marry  the 
music-master ;  and  other  "  merderies"  of  the 
same  kind,  to  borrow  the  energetic  word  of 
Rabelais. 

We  cannot  speak  more  favourabty  of  the 
manner  in  which  the  notes  are  written,  than  of 
the  matter  of  which  they  consist.  We  find  in 
every  page  words  used  in  wrong  senses,  and 
constructions  which  violate  the  plainest  rules 
of  grammar.  We  have  the  low  vulgarism  of 
"  mutual  friend,"  for  "  common  friend."  We 
have  "  fallacy"  used  as  synonymous  with 
"falsehood,"  or  "  misstate  men  t."  We  have 
many  such  inextricable  labyrinths  of  pronouns 
as  that  which  follows :  "  Lord  Erskine  was 
fond  of  this  anecdote;  he  told  it  to  the  editor 
the  first  time  that  he  had  the  honour  of  being 
in  his  company."  Lastly,  we  have  a  plentiful 
supply  of  sentences  resembling  those  which 
we  subjoin.  "  Markland,  who,  with  Jarlin  and 
Thirlby,  Johnson  calls  three  contemporaries 
of  great  eminence." t  "  Warburton  himself  did 
not  feel,  as  Mr.  Boswell  was  disposed  to  think 
he  did,  kindly  or  gratefully  of  Johnson  ?"§  "It 
was  him  that  Horace  Walpole  called  a  man 
who  never  made  a  bad  figure  but  as  an  au 
thor.'^  We  must  add  that  the  printer  has 
done  his  best  to  fill  both  the  text  and  notes 
with  all  sorts  of  blunders;  and  he  and  the 


*  IV.  335. 


f  V.  933. 


•  IV.  3*3.     fill.  558.     t  IV.  377.    JiV.«5.     «111.4tt. 


140 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


editor  have  between  them  made  the  book  so 
bad,  that  we  do  not  well  see  how  it  could  have 
been  worse. 

When  we  turn  from  the  commentary  of  Mr. 
Croker  to  the  work  of  our  old  friend  Boswell, 
we  find  it  not  only  worse  printed  than  in  any 
other  edition  with  which  we  are  acquainted, 
but  mangled  in  the  most  wanton  manner. 
Much  that  Boswell  inserted  in  his  narrative 
is,  without  the  shadow  of  a  reason,  degraded 
to  the  appendix.  The  editor  has  also  taken 
upon  himself  to  alter  or  omit  passages  which 
he  considers  as  indecorous.  This  prudery  is 
quite  unintelligible  to  us.  There  is  nothing 
immoral  in  Boswell's  book — nothing  which 
tends  to  inflame  the  passions.  He  sometimes 
uses  plain  words.  But  if  this  be  a  taint  which 
requires  expurgation,  it  would  be  desirable  to 
begin  by  expurgating  the  morning  and  evening 
lessons.  Mr.  Croker  has  performed  the  deli 
cate  office  which  he  has  undertaken  in  the 
most  capricious  manner.  A  strong,  old-fashion 
ed,  English  word,  familiar  to  all  who  read  their 
Bibles,  is  exchanged  for  a  softer  synonyme  in 
some  passages,  and  suffered  to  stand  unaltered 
in  others.  In  one  place,  a  faint  allusion  made 
by  Johnson  to  an  indelicate  subject — an  allu 
sion  so  faint  that,  till  Mr.  Croker's  note  pointed 
it  out  to  us,  we  had  never  noticed  it,  and  of 
which  we  are  quite  sure  that  the  meaning 
would  never  be  discovered  by  any  of  those  for 
whose  sake  books  are  expurgated — is  alto 
gether  omitted.  In  another  place,  a  coarse 
and  stupid  jest  of  Doctor  Taylor,  on  the  same 
subject,  expressed  in  the  broadest  language — 
almost  the  only  passage,  as  far  as  we  remem 
ber,  in  all  Boswell's  book,  which  we  should 
have  been  inclined  to  leave  out — is  suffered  to 
remain. 

We  complain,  however,  much  more  of  the 
additions  than  of  the  omissions.  We  have 
half  of  Mrs.  Thrale's  book,  scraps  of  Mr. 
Tyers,  scraps  of  Mr.  Murphy,  scraps  of  Mr. 
Cradock,  long  prosings  of  Sir  John  Hawkins, 
and  connecting  observations  by  Mr.  Croker 
himself,  inserted  into  the  midst  of  Boswell's 
text.  To  this  practice  we  most  decidedly  ob 
ject.  An  editor  might  as  well  publish  Thucy- 
dides  with  extracts  from  Diodorus  interspers 
ed,  or  incorporate  the  Lives  of  Suetonius  with 
the  History  and  Annals  of  Tacitus.  Mr.  Croker 
tells  us,  indeed,  that  he  has  done  only  what 
Boswell  wished  to  do,  and  was  prevented  from 
doing  by  the  law  of  copyright.  We  doubt  this 
greatly.  Boswell  has  studiously  abstained 
from  availing  himself  of  the  information  con 
tained  in  the  works  of  his  rivals,  on  many  oc 
casions  on  which  he  might  have  done  so  with 
out  subjecting  himself  to  the  charge  of  piracy 
Mr.  Croker  has  himself,  on  one  occasion,  re 
marked  very  justly  that  Boswell  was  very 
reluctant  to  owe  any  obligations  to  Hawkins. 
But  be  this  as  it  may,  if  Boswell  had  quoted 
from  Sir  John  and  from  Mrs.  Thrale,  he  would 
have  been  guided  by  his  own  taste  and  judg 
ment  in  selecting  his  quotations.  On  what  he 
qucted,  he  would  have  commented  with  perfect 
freedom ,  and  the  borrowed  passages,  so  se 
tected,  and  accompanied  by  such  comments, 
would  have  become  original.  They  would 
have  dovetailed  into  tne  work :  no  hitch,  no 


crease  would  have   been   discernible.      The 
whole  would  appear  one  and  indivisible, 

"Ut  per  Ireve  severos 
Effundat  junctura  ungues." 

This  is  not  the  case  with  Mr.  Croker's  in 
sertions.  They  are  not  chosen  as  Boswell 
would  have  chosen  them.  They  are  not  intro 
duced  as  Boswell  would  have  introduced  them. 
They  differ  from  the  quotations  scattered 
through  the  original  Life  of  Johnson,  as  a 
withered  bough  stuck  in  the  ground  differs 
from  a  tree  skilfully  transplanted,  with  all  its 
life  about  it. 

Not  only  do  these  anecdotes  disfigure  Bos 
well's  book ;  they  are  themselves  disfigured 
by  being  inserted  in  his  book.  The  charm  ot 
Mrs.  Thrale's  little  volume  is  utterly  destroyed. 
The  feminine  quickness  of  observation,  the 
feminine  softness  of  heart,  the  colloquial  incor 
rectness  and  vivacity  of  style,  the  little  amuso 
ing  airs  of  a  halt-learned  lady,  the  delightful 
garrulity,  the  "  dear  Doctor  Johnson,"  the  "  it 
was  so  comical,"  all  disappear  in  Mr.  Croker's 
quotations.  The  lady  ceases  to  speak  in  the 
first  person;  and  her  anecdotes,  in  the  process 
of  transfusion,  become  as  flat  as  champagne 
in  decanters,  or  Herodotus  in  Beloe's  version. 
Sir  John  Hawkins,  it  is  true,  loses  nothing; 
and  for  the  best  of  reasons.  Sir  John  had  no 
thing  to  lose. 

The  course  which  Mr.  Croker  ought  to  have 
taken  is  quite  clear.  He  should  have  reprinted 
Boswell's  narrative  precisely  as  Boswell  wrote 
it;  and  in  the  notes  or  the  appendix  he  should 
have  placed  any  anecdotes  which  he  might 
have  thought  it  advisable  to  quote  from  other 
writers.  This  would  have  been  a  much  more 
convenient  course  for  the  reader,  who  has  now 
constantly  to  keep  his  eye  on  the  margin  in 
order  to  see  whether  he  is  perusing  Boswell, 
Mrs.  Thrale,  Murphy,  Hawkins,  Tyers,  Cra- 
docls,  or  Mr.  Croker.  We  greatly  doubt  whe 
ther  even  the  Tour  to  the  Hebrides  ought  to 
have  been  inserted  in  the  midst  of  the  Life. 
There  is  one  marked  distinction  between  the 
two  works.  Most  of  the  Tour  was  seen  by 
Johnson  in  manuscript.  It  does  not  appear 
that  he  ever  saw  any  part  of  the  Life. 

We  love,  we  own,  to  read  the  great  produc 
tions  of  the  human  mind  as  they  were  written. 
We  have  this  feeling  even  about  scientific 
treatises ;  though  we  know  that  the  science} 
are  always  in  a  state  of  progression,  and  that 
the  alterations  made  by  a  modern  editor  in  an 
old  book  on  any  branch  of  natural  or  political 
philosophy  are  likely  to  be  improvements. 
Many  errors  have  been  detected  by  writers  of 
this  generation  in  the  speculations  of  Adam 
Smith.  A  short  cut  has  been  made  to  much 
knowledge,  at  which  Sir  Isaac  Newton  arrived 
through  arduous  and  circuitous  paths.  Yet 
we  still  look  with  peculiar  veneration  on  the 
Wealth  of  Nations  and  on  the  Principia,  and 
should  regret  to  see  either  of  those  great  works 
garbled  even  by  the  ablest  hands.  But  in 
works  which  owe  much  of  their  interest  to  the 
character  and  situation  of  the  writers,  the  case 
is  infinitely  stronger.  What  man  of  taste  and 
feeling  can  endure  harmonies,  nfacimentos 
abridgments,  expurgated  editions  ?  'Who  ever 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE   OF  JOHNSON. 


141 


reacts  a  stage-copy  of  a  play,  when  he  can  pro 
cure  the  original]  Who  ever  cut  open  Mrs. 
Siddons's  Milton?  Who  ever  got  through  ten 
pages  of  Mr.  Gilpin's  translation  of  John  Bun- 
yan's  Pilgrim  into  modern  English  ]  Who 
would  lose,  in  the  confusion  of  a  diatesseron, 
the  peculiar  charm  which  belongs  to  the  nar 
rative  of  the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved  1  The 
feeling  of  a  reader  who  has  become  intimate 
with  any  great  original  work,  is  that  which 
Adam  expressed  towards  his  bride  : 

"  Should  God  create  another  Eve,  and  I 
Another  rib  afford,  yet  loss  of  thee 
Would  never  from  my  heart." 

No  substitute,  however  exquisitely  formed, 
will  fill  the  void  left  by  the  original.  The 
second  beauty  may  be  equal  or  superior  to  the 
first ;  but  still  it  is  not  she. 

The  reasons  which  Mr.  Croker  has  given 
for  incorporating  passages  from  Sir  John 
Hawkins  and  Mrs.  Thrale  with  the  narrative 
of  Bos  well,  would  vindicate  the  adulteration 
of  half  the  classical  works  in  the  language. 
If  Pepys's  Diary  and  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  Me 
moirs  had  been  published  a  hundred  years  ago, 
no  human  being  can  doubt  that  Mr.  Hume 
would  have  made  great  use  of  those  books  in 
his  History  of  England.  But  would  it,  on  that 
account,  be  judicious  in  a  writer  of  our  times 
to  publish  an  edition  of  Hume's  History  of 
England,  *n  which  large  additions  from  Pepys 
and  Mrs.  Hutchinson  should  be  incorporated 
with  the  original  text?  Surely  not.  Hume's 
history,  be  its  faults  what  they  may,  is  now 
one  great  entire  work — the  production  of  one 
vigorous  mind,  working  on  such  materials 
as  were  within  its  reach.  Additions  made  by 
another  hand  may  supply  a  particular  defi 
ciency,  but  would  grievously  injure  the  gene 
ral  effect.  With  Boswell's  book  the  case  is 
stronger.  There  is  scarcely,  in  the  whole 
compass  of  literature,  a  book  which  bears  in 
terpolation  so  ill.  We  know  no  production 
of  the  human  mind  which  has  so  much  of 
what  may  be  called  the  race,  so  much  of  the 
peculiar  flavour  of  the  soil  from  which  it 
sprang.  The  work  could  never  have  been 
written,  if  the  writer  had  not  been  precisely 
what  he  was.  His  character  is  displayed  in 
every  page,  and  this  display  of  character  gives 
a  delightful  interest  to  many  passages  which 
have  no  other  interest. 

The  life  of  Johnson  is  assuredly  a  great,  a 
very  great  work.  Homer  is  not  more  decided 
ly  the  first  of  heroic  poets,  Shakspeare  is  not 
more  decidedly  the  first  of  dramatists,  Demos 
thenes  is  not  more  decidedly  the  first  of  ora 
tors,  than  Boswell  is  the  first  of  biographers. 
He  has  no  second.  He  has  distanced  all  his 
competitors  so  decidedly,  that  it  is  not  worth 
while  to  place  them.  Eclipse  is  first,  and  the 
rest  nowhere. 

We  are  not  sure  that  there  is  in  the  whole 
history  of  the  human  intellect  so  strange  a 
phenomenon  as  this  book.  Many  of  the  great 
est  men  that  ever  lived  have  wri^en  biogra 
phy.  Boswell  was  one  of  the  smallest  men 
tha't  ever  lived ;  and  he  has  beaten  them  all. 
He  was,  if  we  are  to  give  any  credit  to  his  own 
account,  or  to  the  united  testimony  of  all  who 
knew  him,  a  man  of  the  meanest  and  feeblest 


intellect.  Johnson  described  him  as  a  fellow 
who  had  missed  his  only  chance  of  immortality, 
by  not  having  been  alive  when  the  Dunciad 
was  written.  Beauclerk  used  his  name  as  a 
proverbial  expression  for  a  bore.  He  was  the 
laughing-stock  of  the  whole  of  that  brilliant 
society  which  has  owed  to  him  the  greater  part 
of  its  fame.  He  was  always  laying  himself 
at  the  feet  of  some  eminent  man,  and  begging 
to  be  spit  upon  and  trampled  upon.  He  was 
always  earning  some  ridiculous  nickname, 
and  then  "  binding  it  as  a  crown  unto  him,'* 
— not  merely  in  metaphor,  but  literally.  He 
exhibited  himself  at  the  Shakspeare  Jubilee, 
to  all  the  crowd  which  filled  Stafford-on-Avon, 
with  a  placard  around  his  hat  bearing  the  in 
scription  of  Corsica  Boswell.  In  his  Tour,  he 
proclaimed  to  all  the  world,  that  at  Edinburgh 
he  was  known  by  the  appellation  of  Paoli  Bos- 
well.  Servile  and  impertinent — shallow  and 
pedantic — a  bigot  and  a  sot — bloated  with  fa 
mily  pride,  and  eternally  blustering  about  the 
dignity  of  a  born  gentleman,  yet  stooping  to  be 
a  talebearer,  an  eavesdropper,  a  common  butt 
in  the  taverns  of  London — so  curious  to  know 
everybody  who  was  talked  about,  that,  Tory  and 
High  Churchman  as  he  was,  he  manosuvred, 
we  have  been  told,  for  an  introduction  to 
Tom  Paine — so  vain  of  the  most  childish  dis 
tinctions,  that,  when  he  had  been  to  court,  he 
drove  to  the  office  where  his  book  was  being 
printed  without  changing  his  clothes,  and  sum 
moned  all  the  printer's  devils  to  admire  his 
new  ruffles  and  sword; — such  was  this  man: 
and  such  he  was  content  and  proud  to  be. 
Every  thing  which  another  man  would  have 
hidden — every  thing,  the  publication  of  which 
would  have  made  another  man  hang  himself, 
was  matter  of  gay  and  clamorous  exultation 
to  his  weak  and  diseased  mind.  What  silly 
things  he  said — what  bitter  retorts  he  provoked 
— how  at  one  place  he  was  troubled  with  evil 
presentiments  which  came  to  nothing — how  at 
another  place,  on  waking  from  a  drunken  doze, 
he  read  the  Prayer-book,  and  took  a  hair  of  the 
dog  that  had  bitten  him — how  he  went  to  see 
men  hanged,  and  came  away  maudlin — how 
he  added  five  hundred  pounds  to  the  fortune  of 
one  of  his  babies,  because  she  was  not  fright 
ened  at  Johnson's  ugly  face — how  he  M'as 
frightened  out  of  his  wits  at  sea — and  how  the 
sailors  quieted  him  as  they  would  have  quieted 
a  child — how  tipsy  he  was  at  Lady  Cork's  one 
evening,  and  how  much  his  merriment  annoyed 
the  ladies — how  impertinent  he  was  to  the  Duch 
ess  of  Argyle,  and  with  what  stately  contempt 
she  put  down  his  impertinence — how  Colonel 
Macleod  sneered  to  his  face  at  his  impudent  ob- 
trusiveness — how  his  father  and  the  very  wifi 
of  his  bosom  laughed  and  fretted  at  his  fooleries 
— all  these  things  he  proclaimed  to  all  the  world, 
as  if  they  had  been  subjects  for  pride  and  osten 
tatious  rejoicing.  All  the  caprices  of  his  tern, 
per,  all  the  illusions  of  his  vanity,  all  the  hypo 
chondriac  whimsies,  all  his  castles  in  the  air, 
he  displayed  with  a  cool  self-complacency,  a 
perfect  unconsciousness  that  he  was  making 
a  fool  of  himself,  to  which  it  is  impossible  to 
find  a  parallel  in  the  whole  history  of  man 
kind.  He  has  used  many  people  ill,  but  assu 
redly  he  has  used  nobody  so  ill  as  himself, 


142 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


That  such  a  man  should  have  written  one 
of  the  best  books  in  the  world,  is  strange 
enough.  But  this  is  not  all.  Many  persons 
who  have  conducted  themselves  foolishly  in 
active  life,  and  whose  conversation  has  indi 
cated  no  superior  powers  of  mind,  have  writ 
ten  valuable  books.  Goldsmith  was  very  just 
ly  described  by  one  of  his  contemporaries  as 
an  inspired  idiot,  and  by  another  as  a  being, 

"  Who  wrote  like  an  angel,  and  talked  like  poor  Poll." 

La  Fontaine  was  in  society  a  mere  simpleton. 
His  blunders  would  not  come  in  amiss  among 
the  stories  of  Hierocles.  But  these  men  at 
tained  literary  eminence  in  spite  of  their  weak 
nesses.  Boswell  attained  it  by  reason  of  his 
weaknesses.  If  he  had  not  been  a  great  fool, 
h«  would  never  have  been  a  great  writer. 
Without  all  the  qualities  which  made  him  the 
jest  and  the  torment  of  those  among  whom  he 
lived — without  the  officiousness,  the  inquisi- 
tiveness,  the  effrontery,  the  toad-eating,  the 
insensibility  to  all  reproof,  he  never  could  have 
produced  so  excellent  a  book.  He  was  a  slave, 
proud  of  his  servitude ;  a  Paul  Pry,  convinced 
that  his  own  curiosity  and  garrulity  were  vir 
tues  ;  an  unsafe  companion,  who  never  scru- 
j'ed  to  repay  the  most  liberal  hospitality  by 
ti  i  basest  violation  of  confidence ;  a  man 
Without  delicacy,  without  shame,  without  sense 
enough  to  know  when  he  was  hurting  the  feel 
ings  cf  others,  or  when  he  was  exposing  him 
self  to  derision ;  and  because  he  was  all  this, 
he  has,  in  an  important  department  of  litera 
ture,  immeasurably  surpassed  such  writers  as 
Tacitus,  Clarendon,  Alfieri,  and  his  own  idol 
Johnson. 

Of  the  talents  which  ordinarily  raise  men  to 
eminence  as  writers,  he  had  absolutely  none. 
There  is  not,  in  all  his  books,  a  single  remark 
of  his  own  on  literature,  politics,  religion,  or 
society,  which  is  not  either  commonplace  or 
absurd.  His  dissertations  on  hereditary  gen 
tility,  on  the  slave  trade,  and  on  the  entailing 
of  landed  estates,  may  serve  as  examples.  To 
say  that  these  passages  are  sophistical,  would 
be  to  pay  them  an  extravagant  compliment. 
They  have  no  pretence  to  argument  or  even  to 
meaning.  He  has  reported  innumerable  ob 
servations  made  by  himself  in  the  course  of 
conversation.  Of  those  observations  we  do 
not  remember  one  which  is  above  the  intellec 
tual  capacity  of  a  boy  of  fifteen.  He  has 
printed  many  of  his  own  letters,  and  in  these 
letters  he  is  always  ranting  or  twaddling.  Lo 
gic,  eloquence,  wit,  taste,  all  those  things  which 
are  generally  considered  as  making  a  book 
valuable,  were  utterly  wanting  to  him.  He 
had,  indeed,  a  quick  observation  and  a  retentive 
memory.  These  qualities,  if  he  had  been  a 
man  of  sense  and  virtue,  would  scarcely  of 
themselves  have  sufficed  to  make  him  conspi 
cuous  ;  but,  as  he  was  a  dunce,  a  parasite,  and 
a  coxcomb,  they  have  made  him  immortal. 

Those  parts  of  his  book  which,  considered 
abstractedly,  are  most  utterly  worthless,  are 
delightful  when  we  read  them  as  illustrations 
of  thp  character  of  the  writer.  Bad  in  them 
selves,  they  are  good  dramatically,  like  the 
nonsense  of  Justice  Shallow,  the  clipped  Eng 
lish  of  Dr.  Caius,  or  the  misplaced  consonants 


|  of  Fluellen.  Of  all  confessors,  Boswell  is  the 
most  candid.  Other  men  who  have  pretended 
i  to  lay  open  their  own  hearts — Rousseau,  for 
!  example,  and  Lord  Byron — have  evidently 
I  written  with  a  constant  view  to  effect,  and  are 
j  to  be  then  most  distrusted  when  they  seem 
j  to  be  most  sincere.  There  is  scarcely  any 
man  who  would  not  rather  accuse  himself  of 
great  crimes  and  of  dark  and  tempestuous 
passions,  than  proclaim  all  his  little  vanities, 
and  all  his  wild  fancies.  It  would  be  easier  to 
find  a  person  who  would  avow  actions  like 
those  of  Caesar  Borgia  or  Danton,  than  one 
who  would  publish  a  day-dream  like  those  of 
Alnaschar  and  Malvolio.  Those  weaknesses 
which  most  men  keep  covered  up  in  the  most 
secret  places  of  the  mind,  not  to  be  disclosed 
to  the  eye  of  friendship  or  of  love,  were  pre 
cisely  the  weaknesses  which  Boswell  paraded 
before  all  the  world.  He  was  perfectly  frank, 
because  the  weakness  of  his  understanding 
and  the  tumult  of  his  spirit  prevented  him 
from  knowing  when  he  made  himself  ridicu 
lous.  His  book  resembles  nothing  so  much 
as  the  conversation  of  the  inmates  of  the  Pa 
lace  of  Truth. 

His  fame  is  great,  and  it  will,  we  have  no 
doubt,  be  lasting;  but  it  is  fame  of  a  peculiar 
kind,  and  indeed  marvellously  resembles  infa 
my.  We  remember  no  other  case  in  which  the 
world  has  made  so  great  a  distinction  between 
a  book  and  its  author.  In  general,  the  book  and 
the  author  are  considered  as  one.  To  admire 
the  book  is  to  admire  the  author.  The  case  of 
Boswell  is  an  exception,  we  think  the  only  ex 
ception,  to  this  rule.  His  work  is  universally 
allowed  to  be  interesting,  instructive,  eminent 
ly  original ;  yet  it  has  brought  him  nothing  but 
contempt.  All  the  world  reads  it,  all  the  world 
delights  in  it ;  yet  we  do  not  remember  ever  to 
have  read  or  even  to  have  heard  any  expres 
sion  of  respect  and  admiration  for  the  man  to 
whom  we  owe  so  much  instruction  and  amuse 
ment.  While  edition  after  edition  of  his  book 
was  coming  forth,  his  son,  as  Mr.  Croker  tells 
us,  was  ashamed  of  it,  and  hated  to  hear  it 
mentioned.  This  feeling  was  natural  and  rea 
sonable.  Sir  Alexander  saw,  that  in  proportion 
to  the  celebrity  of  the  work  was  the  degradation 
of  the  author.  The  very  editors  of  this  unfor 
tunate  gentleman's  books  have  forgotten  their 
allegiance,  and,  like  those  Puritan  casuists 
who  took  arms  by  the  authority  of  the  king 
against  his  person,  have  attacked  the  writer 
while  doing  homage  to  the  writings.  Mr.  Cro 
ker,  for  example,  has  published  two  thousand 
five  hundred  notes  on  the  Life  of  Johnson,  and 
yet  scarcely  ever  mentions  the  biographer, 
whose  performance  he  has  taken  such  pains 
to  illustrate,  without  some  expression  of  con 
tempt. 

An  ill-natured  man  Boswell  certainly  was 
not.  Yet  the  malignity  of  the  most  malignan, 
satirist  could  scarcely  cut  deeper  than  hii 
thoughtless  loquacity.  Having  himself  na 
sensibility  to  derision  and  contempt,  he  took  il 
for  granted  that  all  others  were  equally  callous 
He  was  not  ashamed  to  exhibit  himself  to  th# 
whole  world  as  a  common  spy,  a  common  tat 
tler,  a  humble  companion  without  th-e  excuse 
of  poverty,  to  tell  a  hundred  stories  of  his  owa 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE   OF  JOHNSON. 


143 


pertness  and  folly,  and  of  the  insults  which 
his  pertness  and  folly  brought  upon  him.  It 
was  natural  that  he  should  show  little  discre 
tion  in  cases  in  which  the  feelings  or  the  ho 
nour  of  others  might  be  concerned.  No  man, 
surely,  ever  published  such  stories  respecting 
persons  whom  he  professed  to  love  and  revere. 
He  would  infallibly  have  made  his  hero  as 
contemptible  as  he  has  made  himself,  had  not 
this  hero  really  possessed  some  moral  and  in 
tellectual  qualities  of  a  very  high  order.  The 
best  proof  that  Johnson  was  really  an  extraor 
dinary  man,  is,  that  his  character,  instead  of 
being  degraded,  has,  on  the  whole,  been  de 
cidedly  raised  by  a  work  in  which  all  his  vices 
and  weaknesses  are  exposed  more  unsparingly 
than  they  ever  were  exposed  by  Churchill  or 
by  Kenrick. 

Johnson  grown  old,  Johnson  in  the  fulness 
of  his  fame  and  in  the  enjoyment  of  a  compe 
tent  fortune,  is  better  known  to  us  than  any 
other  man  in  history.  Every  thing  about  him, 
his  coat,  his  wig,  his  figure,  his  face,  his  scro 
fula,  his  St.  Vitus's  dance,  his  rolling  walk,  his 
blinking  eye,  the  outward  signs  which  too 
clearly  marked  his  approbation  of  his  dinner, 
his  insatiable  appetite  for  fish-sauce  and  veal- 
pie  with  plums,  his  inextinguishable  thirst  for 
tea,  his  trick  of  touching  the  posts  as  he 
walked,  his  mysterious  practice  of  treasuring 
up  scraps  of  orange-peel,  his  morning  slum 
bers,  his  midnight  disputations,  his  contortions, 
his  mutterings,  his  gruntings,  his  puffings,  his 
vigorous,  acute,  and  ready  eloquence,  his  sar 
castic  wit,  his  vehemence,  his  insolence,  his 
fits  of  tempestuous  rage,  his  queer  inmates,  old 
Mr.  Levett  and  blind  Mrs.  Williams,  the  cat 
Hodge  and  the  negro  Frank— all  are  as  fami 
liar  to  us  as  the  objects  by  which  we  have  been 
surrounded  from  childhood.  But  we  have  no 
minute  information  respecting  those  years  of 
Johnson's  life  during  which  his  character  and 
his  manners  became  immutably  fixed.  We 
know  him  not  as  he  was  known  to  the  men  of 
his  own  generation,  but  as  he  was  known  to 
men  whose  father  he  might  have  been.  That 
celebrated  club  of  which  he  was  the  most  dis 
tinguished  member  contained  few  persons  who 
could  remember  a  time  when  his  fame  was  not 
fully  established  and  his  habits  completely 
formed.  He  had  made  himself  a  name  in  lite 
rature  while  Reynolds  and  the  Wartons  were 
still  boys.  He  was  about  twenty  years  older 
than  Burke,  Goldsmith,  and  Gerard  Hamilton; 
about  thirty  years  older  than  Gibbon,  Beau- 
clerk,  and  Langton;  and  about  forty  years 
older  than  Lord  Stowell,  Sir  William  Jones, 
and  Windham.  Boswell  and  Mrs.  Thrale,  the 
two  writers  from  whom  we  derive  most  of  our 
knowledge  respecting  him,  never  saw  him  till 
long  after  he  was  fifty  years  old,  till  most  of 
his  great  works  had  become  classical,  and  till 
the  pension  bestowed  on  him  by  Lord  Bute  had 
placed  him  above  poverty.  Of  those  eminent 
men  who  were  his  most  intimate  associates 
towards  the  close  of  his  life,  the  only  one,  as 
far  as  we  remember,  who  knew  him  during 
the  first  ten  or  twelve  years  of  his  residence  in 
the  capital,  was  David  Garrick;  and  it  does 
not  appear  that,  during  those  years,  David 
Garrick  saw  much  of  his  fellow-townsman. 


Johnson  came  up  to  London  precisely  at  the 
time  when  the  condition  of  a  man  of  letters 
was  most  miserable  and  degraded.  It  was  a 
dark  night  between  two  sunny  days.  The  age 
of  Maecenases  had  passed  away.  The  age  of 
general  curiosity  and  intelligence  had  not  ar 
rived.  The  number  of  readers  is  at  present 
so  great,  that  a  popular  author  rnay  subsist  in 
comfort  and  opulence  on  the  profits  of  his 
works.  In  the  reigns  of  William  the  Third,  of 
Anne,  and  of  George  the  First,  even  such  men 
as  Congreve  and  Addison  would  scarcely  have 
been  able  to  live  like  gentlemen  by  the  mere 
sale  of  their  writings.  But  the  deficiency  of 
the  natural  demand  for  literature  was,  at  the 
close  of  the  seventeenth  and  at  the  beginning 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  more  than  made  up 
by  artificial  encouragement,  by  a  vast  system 
of  bounties  and  premiums.  There  was,  per 
haps,  never  a  time  at  which  the  rewards  of 
literary  merit  were  so  splendid — at  which  men 
who  could  write  well  found  such  easy  admit 
tance  into  the  most  distinguished  society  and 
to  the  highest  honours  of  the  state.  The  chiefs 
of  both  the  great  parties  into  which  the  king 
dom  was  divided  patronised  literature  with 
emulous  munificence.  Congreve,  when  he  had 
scarcely  attained  his  majority,  was  rewarded 
for  his  first  comedy  with  places  which  made 
him  independent  for  life.  Smith,  though  his 
Hippolytus  and  Phoedra  failed,  would  have 
been  consoled  with  £300  a  year,  but  for  his 
own  folly.  Rowe  was  not  only  poet-laureate, 
but  land-surveyor  of  the  customs  in  the  port 
of  London,  clerk  of  the  council  to  the  Prince 
of  Wales,  and  secretary  of  the  Presentations 
to  the  Lord  Chancellor.  Hughes  was  secretary 
to  the  Commissions  of  the  Peace.  Ambrose 
Philips  was  judge  of  the  Prerogative  Court  in 
Ireland.  Locke  was  Commissioner  of  Appeals 
and  of  the  Board  of  Trade.  Newton  was 
Master  of  the  Mint.  Stepney  and  Prior  were 
employed  in  embassies  of  high  dignity  and 
importance.  Gay,  who  commenced  life  as 
apprentice  to  a  silk-mercer,  became  a  secre 
tary  of  legation  at  five-and-twenty.  It  was  to 
a  poem  on  the  Death  of  Charles  II.,  and  to  the 
City  and  Country  Mouse,  that  Montague  owed 
his  introduction  into  public  life,  his  earldom, 
his  garter,  and  his  auditorship  of  the  Exche 
quer.  Swift,  but  for  the  unconquerable  preju 
dice  of  the  queen,  would  have  been  a  bishop. 
Oxford,  with  his  white  staff  in  his  hand,  passed 
through  the  crowd  of  his  suitors  to  welcome 
Parnell,  when  that  ingenious  writer  deserted 
the  Whigs.  Steele  was  a  commissioner  of 
stamps  and  a  member  of  Parliament.  Arthur 
Mainwaring  was  a  commissioner  of  the  cus* 
toms  and  auditor  of  the  imprest.  Tickell  was 
secretary  to  the  Lords  Justices  of  Ireland.  Ad 
dison  was  secretary  of  state. 

This  liberal  patronage  was  brought  into 
fashion,  as  it  seems,  by  the  magnificent  Dor 
set,  who  alone,  of  all  the  noble  versifiers  in  the 
court  of  Charles  the  Second,  possessed  talents 
for  composition  which  would  have  made  him 
eminent  without  the  aid  of  a  coronet.  Monta 
gue  owed  his  elevation  to  the  favour  of  Dorset, 
and  imitated  through  the  whole  course  of  his 
life  the  liberality  to  which  he  was  himself  so 
greatly  indebted.  The  Tory  leaders, 


i44 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS 


and  Bolingbroke  in  particular,  vied  with  the  j 
chiefs  of  the  Whig  party  in  zeal  for  the  encou-  : 
ragement  of  letters.  But  soon  after  the  acces 
sion  of  the  house  of  Hanover  a  change  took  ; 
place.  The  supreme  power  passed  to  a  man 
who  cared  little  for  poetry  or  eloquence.  The 
importance  of  the  House  of  Commons  was 
constantly  on  the  increase.  The  government 
was  under  the  necessity  of  bartering,  for  par 
liamentary  support,  much  of  that  patronage 
which  had  been  employed  in  fostering  literary 
merit;  and  Walpole  was  by  no  means  inclined 
to  divert  any  part  of  the  fund  of  corruption  to 
purposes  which  he  considered  as  idle.  He 
had  eminent  talents  for  government  and  for 
debate ;  but  he  had  paid  little  attention  to  books, 
and  felt  little  respect  for  authors.  One  of  the 
coarse  jokes  of  his  friend,  Sir  Charles  Han- 
bury  Williams,  was  far  more  pleasing  to  him 
than  Thomson's  Seasons  or  Richardson's  Pa 
mela.  He  had  observed  that  some  of  the  dis 
tinguished  writers  whom  the  favour  of  Halifax 
had  turned  into  statesmen,  had  been  mere  en 
cumbrances  to  their  party,  dawdlers  in  office, 
and  mutes  in  Parliament.  During  the  whole 
course  of  his  administration,  therefore,  he 
scarcely  patronised  a  single  man  of  genius. 
The  best  writers  of  the  age  gave  all  their  sup 
port  to  the  opposition,  and  contributed  to  excite 
that  discontent  which,  after  plunging  the  nation 
into  a  foolish  and  unjust  war,  overthrew  the 
minister  to  make  room  for  men  less  able  and 
equally  unscrupulous.  The  opposition  could 
reward  its  eulogists  with  little  more  than  pro 
mises  and  caresses.  St.  James  would  give 
nothing,  Leicester-house  had  nothing  to  give. 

Thus  at  the  time  when  Johnson  commenced 
his  Jiterary  career,  a  writer  had  little  to  hope  from 
the  patronage  of  powerful  individuals.  The 
patronage  of  the  public  did  not  yet  furnish  the 
means  of  comfortable  subsistence.  The  prices 
paid  by  booksellers  to  authors  were  so  low, 
that  a  man  of  considerable  talents  and  unre 
mitting  industry  could  do  little  more  than  pro- 
ride  for  the  day  which  was  passing  over  him. 
The  lean  kine  had  eaten  up  the  fat  kine. 
The  thin  and  withered  ears  had  devoured  the 
good  ears.  The  season  of  rich  harvest  was 
over,  and  the  period  of  famine  had  begun.  All 
that  is  squalid  and  miserable  might  now  be 
summed  up  in  the  one  word — Poet.  That 
word  denoted  a  creature  dressed  like  a  scare 
crow,  familiar  with  compters  and  spunging- 
houses,  and  perfectly  qualified  to  decide  on  the 
comparative  merits  of  the  Common  Side  in  the 
King's  Bench  prison,  and  of  Mount  Scoundrel 
in  the  Fleet.  Even  the  poorest  pitied  him; 
and  they  well  might  pity  him.  For  if  their 
condition  was  equally  abject,  their  aspirings 
were  not  equally  high,  nor  their  sense  of  insult 
equally  acute.  To  lodge  in  a  garret  up  four 
pair  of  stairs,  to  dine  in  a  cellar  amongst  foot 
men  out  of  place  ;  to  translate  ten  hours  a  day 
for  the  wages  of  a  ditcher;  to  be  hunted  by 
bailiffs  from  one  haunt  of  beggary  and  pesti 
lence  to  another,  from  Grub  street  to  St. 
George's  Fields,  and  from  St.  George's  Fields 
to  the  alleys  behind  St.  Martin's  church;  to 
sleep  on  a  bulk  in  June,  and  amidst  the  ashes 
of  a  glasshouse  in  December,  to  die  in  an  hos- 
pual,  and  to  be  buried  in  a  parish  vault,  was 


the  fate  of  more  than  one  writer,  who,  if  he  had 
lived  thirty  years  earlier,  would  have  been  ad 
mitted  to  the  sittings  of  the  Kit-Cat  or  the  Scri. 
blerus  Club,  would  have  sat  in  the  Parlia 
ment,  and  would  have  been  intrusted  with  em 
bassies  to  the  High  Allies ;  who,  if  he  had  lived 
in  our  time,  would  have  received  from  the 
booksellers  several  hundred  pounds  a  year. 

As  every  climate  has  its  peculiar  diseases, 
so  every  walk  of  life  has  its  peculiar  tempta 
tions.  The  literary  character,  assuredly,  has 
always  had  its  share  of  faults — vanity,  jealousy,, 
morbid  sensibility.  To  these  faults  were  now 
superadded  all  the  faults  which  are  commonly 
found  in  men  whose  livelihood  is  precarious, 
and  whose  principles  are  exposed  to  the  trial 
of  severe  distress.  All  the  vices  of  the  gam 
bler  and  of  the  beggar  were  blended  with  those 
of  the  author.  The  prizes  in  the  wretched  lot 
tery  of  book-making  were  scarcely  less  ruinous 
than  the  blanks.  If  good  fortune  came,  it  came 
in  such  a  manner  that  it  was  almost  certain  to 
be  abused.  After  months  of  starvation  and  de 
spair,  a  full  third  night,  or  a  well-received  dedi 
cation,  filled  the  pocket  of  the  lean,  ragged,  un 
washed  poet  with  guineas.  He  hastened  to 
enjoy  those  luxuries  with  the  images  of  which 
his  mind  had  been  haunted  while  sleeping 
amidst  the  cinders,  and  eating  potatoes  at  the 
Irish  ordinary  in  Shoe  Lane.  A  week  of  ta 
verns  soon  qualified  him  for  another  year  of 
night  cellars.  Such  was  the  life  of  Savage, 
of  Boyce,  and  of  a  crowd  of  others.  Some 
times  blazing  in  gold-laced  hats  and  waistcoats, 
sometimes  lying  in  bed  because  their  coats  had 
gone  to  pieces,  or  wearing  paper  cravats  be 
cause  their  linen  was  in  pawn  ;  sometimes 
drinking  Champagne  and  Tokay  with  Betty 
Careless ;  sometimes  standing  at  the  window 
of  an  eating-house  in  Porridge  island,  to  snuff 
up  the  scent  of  what  they  could  not  afford  to 
taste  ; — they  knew  luxury ;  they  knew  beggary ; 
but  they  never  knew  comfort.  These  men 
were  irreclaimable.  They  looked  on  a  regular 
and  frugal  life  with  the  same  aversion  which 
an  old  gipsy  or  a  Mohawk  hunter  feels  for  a 
stationary  abode,  and  for  the  restraints  and 
securities  of  civilized  communities.  They 
were  as  untameable,  as  much  wedded  to  their 
desolate  freedom,  as  the  wild  ass.  They  could 
no  more  be  broken  in  to  the  offices  of  social 
man,  than  the  unicorn  could  be  trained  to  serve 
and  abide  by  the  crib.  It  was  well  if  they  did 
not,  like  beasts  of  a  still  fiercer  race,  tear  the 
hands  which  ministered  to  their  necessities. 
To  assist  them  was  impossible ;  and  the  most 
benevolent  of  mankind  at  length  became  weary 
of  giving  relief,  which  was  dissipated  with  the 
wildest  profusion  as  soon  as  it  had  been  re 
ceived.  If  a  sum  was  bestowed  on  the  wretch 
ed  adventurer,  such  as,  properly  husbanded, 
might  have  supplied  him  for  six  months,  it  was 
instantly  spent  in  strange  freaks  of  sensuality, 
and  before  forty-eight  hours  had  elapsed,  the 
poet  was  again  pestering  all  his  acquaintances 
for  twopence  to  get  a  plate  of  shin  of  beef  at  a 
subterraneous  cook-shop.  If  his  friends  gave 
him  an  asylum  in  their  houses,  those  houses 
were  forthwith  turned  into  bagnios  and  taverns. 
All  order  was  destroyed,  all  business  was  sus 
pended.  The  most  good-natured  host  began 


BOSWELL'S   LIFE   OF  JOHNSON. 


145 


to  repent  of  his  eagerness  to  serve  a  man  of  ' 
genius   in  distress,  when  he  heard  his  guest 
roaring  for  fresh  punch  at  five  o'clock  in  the 
morning. 

A  few  eminent  writers  were  more  fortunate. 
Pope  had  been  raised  above  poverty  by  the 
active  patronage  which,  in  his  youth,  both 
the  great  political  parties  had  extended  to  his 
Homer.  Young  had  received  the  only  pension 
ever  bestowed,  to  the  best  of  our  recollection, 
by  Sir  Robert  Walpole,  as  the  reward  of  mere 
literary  merit.  One  or  two  of  the  many  poets 
who  attached  themselves  to  the  opposition, 
Thomson  in  particular,  and  Mallet,  obtained, 
after  much  severe  suffering,  the  means  of  sub 
sistence  from  their  political  friends.  Richard 
son,  like  a  man  of  sense,  kept  his  shop,  and 
his  shop  kept  him,  which  his  novels,  admirable 
as  they  are,  would  scarcely  have  done.  But 
nothing  could  be  more  deplorable  than  the 
state  even  of  the  ablest  men,  who  at  that  time 
depended  for  subsistence  on  their  writings. 
Johnson,  Collins,  Fielding,  and  Thomson  were 
certainly  lour  of  the  most  distinguished  per 
sons  that  England  produced  during  the  eight 
eenth  century.  It  is  well  known  that  they  were 
all  four  arrested  for  debt. 

Into  calamities  and  difficulties  such  as  these 
Johnson  plunged  in  his  twenty-eighth  year. 
From  that  time,  till  he  was  three  or  four-and- 
fifty,  we  have  little  information  respecting 
him  ; — little,  we  mean,  compared  with  the  full 
and  accurate  information  which  we  possess 
respecting  his  proceedings  and  habits  towards 
the  close  of  his  life.  He  emerged  at  length 
from  cocklofts  and  sixpenny  ordinaries  into 
the  society  of  the  polished  and  the  opulent. 
His  fame  was  established.  A  pension  sufficient 
for  his  wants  had  been  conferred  on  him;  and 
he  came  forth  to  astonish  a  generation  with 
which  he  had  almost  as  little  in  common  as 
with  Frenchmen  or  Spaniards. 

In  his  early  years  he  had  occasionally  seen 
the  great;  but  he  had  seen  them  as  a  beggar. 
He  now  came  among  them  as  a  companion. 
The  demand  for  amusement  and  instruction 
had.  during  the  course  of  twenty  years,  been 
gradually  increasing.  The  price  of  literary 
labours  had  risen;  and  those  rising  men  of 
letters,  with  whom  Johnson  was  henceforth  to 
associate,  were  for  the  most  part  persons  wide 
ly  different  from  those  who  had  walked  about 
with  him  all  night  in  the  streets,  for  want  of  a 
lodging.  Burke,  Robertson,  the  Wartons, 
Gray,  Mason,  Gibbon,  Adam  Smith,  Beattie, 
Sir  William  Jones,  Goldsmith,  and  Churchill 
were  the  most  distinguished  writers  of  what 
may  be  called  the  second  generation  of  the 
Johnsonian  age.  Of  these  men,  Churchill  was 
the  only  one  in  whom  \v;  can  trace  the  stronger 
lineaments  of  th.tt  character,  which,  when 
Johnson  first  came  up  to  London,  was  common 
among  authors.  Of  the  rest,  scarcely  any  had 
felt  the  pressure  of  severe  poverty.  All  had 
been  early  admitted  into  the  most  respectable 
society  on  an  equal  footing.  They  were  men 
of  quite  a  different  species  from  the  dependants 
of  Curl  I  and  Osborne. 

Johnson  came  among  them  the  solitary  spe 
cimen  of  a  past  age — the  last  survivor  of  a 
genuine  race  of  Grub-street  hacks;  the  last  of 
VOL.  II.— 19 


that  generation  cf  authors  w  hose  abject  misery 
and  whose  dissolute  manners  had  furnished 
inexhaustible  matter  to  the  satirical  genius  of 
Pope.  From  nature,  he  had  received  an  un 
couth  figure,  a  diseased  constitution,  and  an 
irritable  temper.  The  manner  in  which  the 
earlier  years  of  his  manhood  had  been  passed, 
had  given  to  his  demeanour,  and  even  to  his 
moral  character,  some  peculiarities,  appalling 
to  the  civilized  beings  who  were  the  compa 
nions  of  his  old  age.  The  perverse  irregularity 
of  his  hours,  the  slovenliness  of  his  person,  his 
fits  of  strenuous  exertion,  interrupted  by  long 
intervals  of  sluggishness;  his  strange  absti 
nence,  and  his  equally  strange  voracity ;  his 
active  benevolence,  contrasted  with  the  con 
stant  rudeness  and  the  occasional  ferocity  of 
his  manners  in  society,  made  him,  in  the 
opinion  of  those  with  whom  he  lived  during 
the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life,  a  complete 
original.  An  original  he  was,  undoubtedly,  in 
some  respects.  But  if  we  possessed  full  in 
formation  concerning  those  who  shared  his 
early  hardships,  we  should  probably  find,  that 
what  we  call  his  singularities  of  manner,  were, 
for  the  most  part,  failings  which  he  had  in 
common  with  the  class  to  which  he  belonged. 
He  ate  at  Streatham  Park  as  he  had  been  used 
to  eat  behind  the  screen  at  St.  John's  Gate, 
when  he  was  ashamed  to  show  his  ragged 
clothes.  He  ate  as  it  was  natural  that  a  man 
should  eat  who,  during  a  great  part  of  his 
life,  had  passed  the  morning  in  doubt  whether 
he  should  have  food  for  the  afternoon.  The 
habits  of  his  early  life  had  accustomed  him  to 
bear  privation  with  fortitude,  but  not  to  taste 
pleasure  with  moderation.  He  could  fast; 
but  when  he  did  not  fast,  he  tore  his  dinner  like 
a  famished  wolf,  with  the  veins  swelling  on  his 
forehead,  and  the  perspiration  running  down 
his  cheeks.  He  scarcely  ever  took  wine.  But 
when  he  drank  it,  he  drank  it  greedily,  and  in 
large  tumblers.  These  were,  in  fact,  mitigated 
symptoms  of  that  same  moral  disease,  which 
raged  with  such  deadly  malignity  in  his  friends 
Savage  and  Boyce.  The  roughness  and  vio 
lence  which  he  showed  in  society  were  to  be 
expected  from  a  man  whose  temper,  not  natu 
rally  gentle,  had  been  long  tried  by  the  bitterest 
calamities — by  the  want  of  meat,  of  fire,  and  of 
clothes  ;  by  the  importunity  of  creditors,  by  the 
insolence  of  booksellers,  by  the  derision  of 
fools,  by  the  insincerity  of  patrons,  by  that 
bread  which  is  the  bitterest  of  all  foo.?,  bj 
those  stairs  which  are  the  most  toilsome  of 
all  paths,  by  that  deferred  hope  which  makes 
the  heart  sick.  Through  all  these  things  the 
ill-dressed,  coarse,  ungainly  pedant  had  strug 
gled  manfully  up  to  eminence  and  command. 
It  was  natural,  that,  in  the  exercise  of  his. 
power,  he  should  be  "  eo  immitior,  quia  tolera- 
verat" — that  though  his  heart  was  undoubtedly 
generous  and  humane,  his  demeanour  in  so 
ciety  should  be  harsh  and  despotic.  For 
severe  distress  he  had  sympathy,  and  not  only 
sympathy,  but  munificent  relief.  But  for  the 
suffering  which  a  harsh  word  inflicts  upon  a 
delicate  mind,  he  had  no  pity;  for  it  was  a  kind 
of  suffering  which  he  could  scarcely  conceive. 
He  would  carry  home  on  his  shoulders  a  sick 
and  starving  girl  from  the  streets.  He 


146 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


his  house  into  a  place  of  refuge  for  a  crowd  of 
wretched  old  creatures  who  could  find  no  other 
asylum  ;  nor  could  all  their  peevishness  and 
ingratitude  weary  out  his  benevolence.  But  the 
pangs  of  wounded  vanity  seemed  to  him  ridi 
culous;  and  he  scarcely  felt  sufficient  compas 
sion  even  for  the  pangs  of  wounded  affection. 
He  had  seen  and  felt  so  much  of  sharp  misery, 
that  he  was  not  affected  by  paltry  vexations ; 
and  he  seemed  to  think  that  everybody  ought 
to  be  as  much  hardened  to  those  vexations  as 
himself.  He  was  angry  with  Boswell  for  com 
plaining  of  a  headache;  with  Mrs.  Thrale  for 
grumbling  about  the  dust  on  the  road,  or  the 
smell  of  the  kitchen.  These  were,  in  his  phrase, 
"foppish  lamentations,"  which  people  ought 
to  be  ashamed  to  utter  in  a  world  so  full  of 
misery.  Goldsmith  crying  because  the  Good- 
natured  Man  had  failed,  inspired  him  with  no 
pity.  Though  his  own  health  was  not  good,  he 
detested  and  despised  valetudinarians.  Even 
great  pecuniary  losses,  unless  they  reduced 
the  loser  absolutely  to  beggary,  moved  him 
very  little.  People  whose,  hearts  had  been 
softened  by  prosperity  might  cry,  he  said,  for 
such  events  ;  but  all  that  could  be  expected  of 
a  plain  man  was  not  to  laugh. 

A  person  who  troubled  himself  so  little 
about  the  smaller  grievances  of  human  life, 
was  not  likely  to  be  very  attentive  to  the  feel 
ings  of  others  in  the  ordinary  intercourse  of 
society.  He  could  not  understand  how  a  sar 
casm  or  a  reprimand  could  make  any  man 
really  unhappy.  "  My  dear  doctor,"  said  he  to 
Goldsmith,  "  what  harm  does  it  do  to  a  man  to 
call  him  Holofernes  1"  "Poh,  ma'am,"  he 
exclaimed  to  Mrs.  Carter,  "who  is  the  worse 
for  being  talked  of  uncharitably  ?"  Politeness 
has  been  well  defined  as  benevolence  in  small 
things.  Johnson  was  impolite,  not  because  he 
wanted  benevolence,  but  because  small  things 
appeared  smaller  to  him  than  to  people  who 
had  never  known  what  it  was  to  live  for  four- 
pence  half-penny  a  day. 

The  characteristic  peculiarity  of  his  intel 
lect  was  the  union  of  great  powers  with  low 
prejudices.  If  we  judged  of  him  by  the  best 
parts  of  his  mind,  we  should  place  him  almost 
as  high  as  he  was  placed  by  the  idolatry  of 
Boswell ;  if  by  the  worst  parts  of  his  mind, 
we  should  place  him  even  below  Boswell  him 
self.  Where  he  was  not  under  the  influence 
of  some  strange  scruple,  or  some  domineering 
passion,  which  prevented  him  from  boldly  and 
fairly  investigating  a  subject,  he  was  a  wary 
and  accurate  reasoner,  a  little  too  much  in 
clined  to  skepticism,  and  a  little  too  fond  of 
paradox.  No  man  was  less  likely  to  be  im 
posed  upon  by  fallacies  in  argument,  or  by 
exaggerated  statements  of  fact.  But,  if,  while 
he  was  beating  down  sophisms,  and  exposing 
false  testimony,  some  childish  prejudices,  such 
as  would  excite  laughter  in  a  well-managed 
nursery,  came  across  him,  he  wa.s  smitten  as 
if  by  enchantment.  His  mind  dwindled  away 
under  the  spell  from  gigantic  elevation  to 
dwarfish  littleness.  Tho^e  who  had  lately 
beer,  admiring  its  amplitude  and  its  force,  were 
now  as  much  astonished  at  its  strange  narrow 
ness  and  feebleness,  as  the  fisherman,  in  the 
Arabian  tale,  when  he  saw  the  genie,  whose 


statue  had  overshadowed  the  whole  seacoast, 
and  whose  might  seemed  equal  to  a  contest 
with  armies,  contract  himself  to  the  dimen 
sions  of  his  small  prison,  and  lie  there  the 
helpless  slave  of  the  charm  of  Solomon. 

Johnson  was  in  the  habit  of  sifting  with 
extreme  severity  the  evidence  for  all  stories 
which  were  merely  odd.  But  when  they  were 
not  only  odd  but  miraculous,  his  severity  re 
laxed.  He  began  to  be  credulous  precisely  at 
the  point  where  the  most  credulous  people 
begin  to  be  skeptical.  It  is  curious  to  observe, 
both  in  his  writings  and  in  his  conversation, 
the  contrast  between  the  disdainful  manner  in 
which  he  rejects  unauthenticated  anecdotes, 
even  when  they  are  consistent  with  the  general 
laws  of  nature,  and  the  respectful  manner  in 
which  he  mentions  the  wildest  stories  relating 
to  the  invisible  world.  A  man  who  told  him  of 
a  waterspout  or  a  meteoric  stone  generally  had 
the  lie  direct  given  him  for  his  pains.  A  man 
who  told  him  of  a  prediction  or  a  dream  wonder 
fully  accomplished,  was  sure  of  a  courteous 
hearing.  "Johnson,"  observes  Hogarth,  "like 
King  David,  says  in  his  haste  that  all  men  are 
liars."  "His  incredulity,"  says  Mrs.  Thrale, 
"  amounted  almost  to  disease."  She  tells  us  how 
he  browbeat  a  gentleman,  who  gave  him  an 
account  of  a  hurricane  in  the  West  Indies,  and 
a  poor  Quaker,  who  related  some  strange  cir 
cumstance  about  the  red-hot  balls  fired  at  the 
siege  of  Gibraltar.  "  It  is  not  so.  It  cannot 
be  true.  Don't  tell  that  story  again.  You 
cannot  think  how  poor  a  figure  you  make  in 
telling  it."  He  once  said,  half  jestingly  we 
suppose,  that  for  six  months  he  refused  to 
credit  the  fact  of  the  earthquake  at  Lisbon, 
and  that  he  still  believed  the  extent  of  the  cala 
mity  to  be  greatly  exaggerated.  Yet  he  related 
with  a  grave  face  how  old  Mr.  Cave  of  St. 
John's  Gate  saw  a  ghost,  and  how  this  ghost 
was  something  of  a  shadowy  being.  He  went 
himself  on  a  ghost-hunt  to  Cock-lane,  and  was 
angry  with  John  Wesley  for  not  following  up 
another  scent  of  the  same  kind  with  proper 
spirit  and  perseverance.  He  rejects  the  Celtic 
genealogies  and  poems  without  the  least  hesi 
tation  ;  yet  he  declares  himsf-.lf  willing  to  be 
lieve  the  stories  of  the  second  sight.  If  he  had 
examined  the  claims  of  the  Highland  seers 
with  half  the  severity  with  which  he  sifted  the 
evidence  for  the  genuineness  of  Fingal,  he 
would,  we  suspect,  have  come  away  from 
Scotland  with  a  mind  fully  made  up.  In  his 
Lives  of  the  Poets,  we  find  that  he  is  unwilling 
to  give  credit  to  the  accounts  of  Lord  Ros- 
common's  early  proficiency  in  his  studies;  but 
he  tells  with  great  solemnity  an  absurd  ro 
mance  about  some  intelligence  preternaturally 
impressed  on  the  mind  of  that  nobleman.  He 
avows  himself  to  be  in  great  doubt  about  the 
truth  of  the  story,  and  ends  by  warning  his 
readers  not  wholly  to  slight  such  impressions. 

Many  of  his  sentiments  on  religious  subjects 
are  worthy  of  a  liberal  and  enlarged  mind. 
He  could  discern  clearly  enough  the  folly  and 
|  meanness  of  all  bigotry  except  his  own. 
When  he  spoke  of  the  scruples  of  the  Puri 
tans,  he  spoke  like  a  person  who  had  really 
obtained  an  insight  into  the  divine  philosophy 
of  the  New  Testament,  and  who  considered 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE   OF  JOHNSON. 


147 


Christianity  as  a  noble  scheme  of  government,  j  skeptical  as  to  the  good  or  evil  tendency  of 
lending  to  promote  the  happiness  and  to  elevate  any  form  of  polity.  His  passions,  on  the  con- 
the  moral  nature  of  man.  The  horror  which  trary,  were  violent  even  to  slaying  against  all 
the  sectaries  felt  for  cards,  Christmas  ale,  plum-  who  leaned  to  Whiggish  principles.  The  well 
porridge,  mince-pies,  and  dancing-bears,  ex-  known  lines  which  he  inserted  in  Goldsmith's 
cited  his  contempt.  To  the  arguments  urged  I  Traveller  express  what  seems  to  have  been 


by  some  very  worthy  people  against  showy 
dress,  he  replied  with  admirable  sense  and 
spirit,  "Let  us  not  be  found,  when  our  Master 
calls  us,  stripping  the  lace  off  our  waistcoats, 
but  the  spirit  of  contention  from  our  souls  and 
tongues.  Alas!  sir,  a  man  who  cannot  get  to 
heaven  in  a  green  coat,  will  not  find  his  way 
thither  the  sooner  in  a  gray  one."  Yet  he  was 
himself  under  the  tyranny  of  scruples  as  un 
reasonable  as  those  of  Hudibras  or  Ralpho ; 
and  carried  his  zeal  for  ceremonies  and  for 
ecclesiastical  dignities  to  lengths  altogether 
inconsistent  with  reason,  or  with  Christian 
charity.  He  has  gravely  noted  down  in  his 
diary,  that  he  once  committed  the  sin  of  drink 
ing  coffee  on  Good  Friday.  In  Scotland,  he 
thought  it  his  duty  to  pass  several  months 
without  joining  in  public  worship,  solely  be 
cause  the  ministers  of  the  kirk  had  not  been 
ordained  by  bishops.  His  mode  of  estimating 
the  piety  of  his  neighbours  was  somewhat 
singular.  "Campbell,"  said  he,  "is  a  good 
man — a  pious  man.  I  am  afraid  he  has  not 
been  in  the  inside  of  a  church  for  many  years; 
but  he  never  passes  a  church  without  pulling 
cfT  his  hat ;  this  shows  he  has  good  principles." 
Spain  and  Sicily  must  surely  contain  many 
pious  robbers  and  well-principled  assassins. 
Johnson  could  easily  see  that  a  Roundhead, 
who  named  all  his  children  after  Solomon's 
singers,  and  talked  in  the  House  of  Commons 
about  seeking  the  Lord,  might  be  an  unprin 
cipled  villain,  whose  religious  mummeries 
only  aggravated  his  guilt.  But  a  man  who 
took  off  his  hat  when  he  passed  a  church 
ep  scopally  consecrated,  must  be  a  good  man, 
a  pious  man,  a  man  of  good  principles.  John 
son  could  easily  see  that  those  persons  who 
looked  on  a  dance  or  a  laced  waistcoat,  as  sin 
ful,  deemed  most  ignobly  of  the  attributes  of 
God,  arid  of  the  ends  of  revelation.  But  with 
what  a  storm  of  invective  he  would  have  over 
whelmed  any  man  who  had  blamed  him  for 
celebrating  the  close  of  Lent  with  sugarless 
tea  and  butterless  bunns. 

Nobody  spoke  more  contemptuously  of  the 
cant  of  patriotism.  Nobody  saw  more  clearly 
the  error  of  those  who  represented  liberty,  not 
as  a  means,  but  as  an  end;  and  who  proposed 
to  themselves,  as  the  object  of  their  pursuit, 
the  prosperity  of  the  state  as  distinct  from  the 
prosperity  of  the  individuals  who  compose  the 
slate.  His  calm  and  settled  opinion  seems  to 
have  been  that  forms  of  government  have  little 
or  no  influence  on  the  happiness  of  society. 
This  opinion,  erroneous  as  it  is,  ought  at  least 
to  have  preserved  him  from  all  intemperance 
on  political  questions.  It  did  not,  however, 
preserve  him  from  the  lowest,  fiercest,  and 
most  absurd  extravagance  of  party  spirit — 
from  rants  which,  in  every  thing  but  the  dic 
tion,  resembled  those  of  Squire  Western.  He 
was,  as  a  politician,  half  ice  and  half  fire — on 
the  side  of  his  intellect  a  mere  Pococurante — 
far  too  apathetic  about  public  affairs — far  too 


his  deliberate  judgment: — 

"How  small,  of  all  that  human  hearts  endure, 
That  part  which  kings  or  laws  can  cause  or  cure." 

He  had  previously  put  expressions  very  simi 
lar  into  the  mouth  of  Rasselas.  It  is  amusing 
to  contrast  these  passages  with  the  torrents  of 
raving  abuse  which  he  poured  forth  against 
the  Long  Parliament  and  the  American  Con 
gress.  In  one  of  the  conversations  reported 
by  Boswell,  this  strange  inconsistency  displays 
itself  in  the  most  ludicrous  manner. 

"  Sir  Adam  Ferguson,"  says  Boswell,  "  sug 
gested  that  luxury  corrupts  a  people  and  de 
stroys  the  spirit  of  liberty." — JOHNSON.  "Sir, 
that  is  all  visionary,  I  would  not  give  half  a 
guinea  to  live  under  one  form  of  government 
rather  than  another.  It  is  of  no  moment  to 
the  happiness  of  an  individual.  Sir,  the  dan 
ger  of  the  abuse  of  power  is  nothing  to  a  pri 
vate  man.  What  Frenchman  is  prevented 
from  passing  his  life  as  he  pleases '!" — SIR 
ADAM.  "But,  sir,  in  the  British  constitution 
it  is  surely  of  importance  to  keep  up  a  spirit 
in  the  people,  so  as  to  preserve  a  balance 
against  the  crown." — JOHNSON.  "Sir,  I  per 
ceive  you  are  a  vile  Whig.  Why  all  this 
childish  jealousy  of  the  power  of  the  ciownl 
The  crown  has  not  power  enough." 

One  of  the  old  philosophers,  Lord  Bacon  tells 
us,  used  to  say  that  life  and  death  were  just  the 
same  to  him.  "  Why,  then,"  said  an  objector, 
"do  you  not  kill  yourself?"  The  philosopher 
answered,  "  Because  it  is  just  the  same."  If 
the  difference  between  two  forms  of  govern 
ment  be  not  worth  half  a  guinea,  it  is  not  easy 
to  see  how  Whiggism  can  be  viler  than  Tory 
ism,  or  how  the  crown  can  have  too  little 
power.  If  private  men  suffer  nothing  from  po 
litical  abuses,  zeal  for  liberty  is  doubt»ess  ridi 
culous.  But  zeal  for  monarchy  must  be  equally 
so.  No  person  would  have  been  more  quick- 
sighted  than  Johnson  to  such  a  contradiction 
as  this  in  the  logic  of  an  antagonist. 

The  judgments  which  Johnson  passed  >n 
books  were  in  his  own  time  regarded  with  su 
perstitious  veneration ;  and  in  our  time  are 
generally  treated  with  indiscriminate  contempt. 
They  are  the  judgments  of  a  strong  but  en 
slaved  understanding.  The  mind  of  the  critic 
was  hedged  round  by  an  uninterrupted  fence 
of  prejudices  and  superstitions.  Within  his 
narrow  limits  he  displayed  a  vigour  and  an. 
activity  which  ought  to  have  enabled  him  to 
clear  the  barrier  that  confined  him. 

How  it  chanced  that  a  man  who  reasoned 
on  his  premises  so  ably  should  assume  his 
premises  so  foolishly,  is  one  of  the  great  my* 
teries  of  human  nature.  The  same  inoons;st 
ency  may  be  observed  in  the  schoolmen  of  the 
middle  ages.  Those  writers  show  so  much 
acuteness  and  force  of  mind  in  arguing  :>n 
their  wretched  data,  that  a  modern  reader  ii 
perpetually  at  a  loss  to  comprehend  how  such 
minds  came  by  such  datji.  Not  a  flav,r  in  ibfi 


149 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS, 


superstructure  of  the  theory  whicTi  they  are 
rearing  escapes  their  vigilance.  Yet  they  are 
blind  to  the  obvious  unsoundness  of  the  found 
ation.  It  is  the  same  with  some  eminent  law 
yers.  Their  legal  arguments  are  intellectual 
prodigies,  abounding  with  the  happiest  analo 
gies  and  the  most  refined  distinctions.  The 
principles  of  their  arbitrary  science  being  once 
admitted,  the  statute-book  and  the  reports  be 
ing  once  assumed  as  the  foundations  of  juris 
prudence,  these  men  must  be  allowed  to  be 
perfect  masters  of  logic.  But  if  a  question 
arises  as  to  the  postulates  on  which  their  whole 
system  rests,  if  they  are  called  upon  to  vindi 
cate  the  fundamental  maxims  of  that  system 
which  they  have  passed  their  lives  in  study 
ing,  these  very  men  often  talk  the  language  of 
savages  or  of  children.  Those  who  have  list 
ened  to  a  man  of  this  class  in  his  own  court, 
and  who  have  witnessed  the  skill  with  which 
he  analyzes  and  digests  a  vast  mass  of  evi 
dence,  or  reconciles  a  crowd  of  precedents 
which  at  first  sight  seem  contradictory,  scarce 
ly  know  him  again  when,  a  few  hours  later, 
they  hear  him  speaking  on  the  other  side  of 
Westminster  Hall  in  his  capacity  of  legisla 
tor.  They  can  scarcely  believe  that  the  paltry 
quirks  which  are  faintly  heard  through  a  storm 
of  coughing,  and  which  cannot  impose  on  the 
plainest  country  gentleman,  can  proceed  from 
the  same  sharp  and  vigorous  intellect  which 
had  excited  their  admiration  under  the  same 
roof  and  on  the  same  day. 

Johnson  decided  literary  questions  like  a 
lawyer,  not  like  a  legislator.  He  never  exa 
mined  foundations  where  a  point  was  already 
ruled.  His  whole  code  of  criticism  rested  on 
pure  assumption,  for  which  he  sometimes  gave 
a  precedent  or  an  authority,  but  rarely  troubled 
himself  to  give  a  reason  drawn  from  the  na 
ture  of  things.  He  took  it  for  granted  that  the 
kind  of  poetry  which  flourished  in  his  own 
time,  which  he  had  been  accustomed  to  hear 
praised  from  his  childhood,  and  which  he  had 
himself  written  with  success,  was  the  best  kind 
of  poetry.  In  his  biographical  work  he  has 
repeatedly  laid  it  down  as  an  undeniable  pro 
position  that,  during  the  latter  part  of  the  seven 
teenth  century  and  the  earlier  part  of  the  eight 
eenth,  English  poetry  had  been  in  a  constant 
progress  of  improvement.  Waller,  Denham, 
Dryden,  and  Pope  had  been,  according  to  him, 
the  great  reformers.  He  judged  of  all  works 
of  the  imagination  by  the  standard  established 
amohg  his  own  contemporaries.  Though  he 
allowed  Homer  to  have  been  a  greater  man 
than  Virgil,  he  seems  to  have  thought  the 
JEneid  a  greater  poem  than  the  Iliad.  Indeed 
he  well  might  have  thought  so,  for  he  preferred 
Pope's  Iliad  to  Homer's.  He  pronounced  that, 
after  Hoole's  translation  of  Tasso,  Fairfax's 
would  hardly  be  reprinted.  He  could  see  no 
merit  in  oar  fine  old  English  ballads,  and  al 
ways  spoke  with  the  most  provoking  contempt 
of  Percy's  fondness  for  them.  Of  all  the  great 
original  works  which  appeared  during  his  time 
Richardson's  novels  alone  excited  his  admira 
tion.  He  could  see  little  or  no  merit  in  Tom 
Jonrs,  in  Gulliver's  Travels,  or  in  Tristram 
fchandy.  To  Thomson's  Castle  of  Indolence  j 
hv  vouchsafed  only  a  line  of  cold  commenda-  i 


1  tion — of  commendation  much  colder  than  what 
he  has  bestowed  on  the  Creation  of  that  por- 
'tentous  bore,  Sir  Richard  Blackmore.  Gray 
was,  in  his  dialect,  a  barren  rascal.  Churchill 
was  a  blockhead.  The  contempt  which  he  felt 
for  the  trash  of  Macpherson  Avas  indeed  just; 
but  it  was,  we  suspect,  just  by  chance.  He 
despised  the  Fingal  for  the  very  reason  which 
j  led  many  men  of  genius  to  admire  it.  He  de 
spised  it,  not  because  it  was  essentially  com 
monplace,  but  because  it  had  a  superficial  air 
of  originality. 

He  was  undoubtedly  an  excellent  judge  of 
compositions  fashioned  on  his  own  principles 
But  when  a  deeper  philosophy  was  required — 
when  he  undertook  to  pronounce  judgment  on 
the  works  of  those  great  minds  which  "yield 
homage  only  to  eternal  laws" — his  failure  was 
ignominious.  He  criticised  Pope's  Epitaphs  ex 
cellently.  But  his  observations  on  Shakspeare's 
plays  and  Milton's  poems  seem  to  us  as  wretch 
ed  as  if  they  had  been  written  b}'  Rymer  him 
self,  whom  we  take  to  have  been  the  worst  cri 
tic  that  ever  lived. 

Some  of  Johnson's  whims  on  literary  sub 
jects  can  be  compared  only  to  that  strange, 
nervous  feeling  which  made  him  uneasy  if  he 
had  not  touched  every  post  between  the  Mitre 
tavern  and  his  own  lodgings.  Hi.s  preference 
of  Latin  epitaphs  to  English  epitaphs  is  an  in 
stance.  An  English  epitaph,  he  said,  would 
disgrace  Smollett.  He  declared  that  he  would 
not  pollute  the  walls  of  Westminster  Abbey 
with  an  English  epitaph  on  Goldsmith.  What 
reason  there  can  be  for  celebrating  a  British 
writer  in  Latin  which  there  was  not  for  cover 
ing  the  Roman  arches  of  triumph  with  Greek 
inscriptions,  or  for  commemorating  the  deed 
of  the  heroes  of  Thermopylae  in  Egyptian  hie 
roglyphics,  we  are  utterly  unable  to  imagine. 

On  men  and  manners — at  least,  on  the  men 
and  manners  of  a  particular  place  and  a  par 
ticular  age — Johnson  had  certainly  looked  with 
a  most  observant  and  discriminating  eye.  His 
remarks  on  the  education  of  children,  on  mar 
riage,  on  the  economy  of  families,  on  the  rules 
of  society,  are  always  striking,  and  generally 
sound.  In  his  writings,  indeed,  the  knowledge 
of  life  which  he  possessed  in  an  eminent  de 
gree  is  very  imperfectly  exhibited.  Like  those 
unfortunate  chiefs  of  the  middle  ages,  who 
were  suffocated  by  their  own  chainmail  and 
cloth  of  gold,  his  maxims  perish  under  that 
load  of  words,  which  was  designed  for  their 
ornament  and  their  defence.  But  it  is  clear, 
from  the  remains  of  his  conversation,  that  he 
had  more  of  that  homely  wisdom  which  no 
thing  but  experience  and  observation  can  give, 
that  any  writer  since  the  time  of  Swift.  If  he 
had  been  content  to  write  as  he  talked,  he 
might  have  left  books  on  the  practical  art  of 
living  superior  to  the  Directions  to  Servant?. 

Yet  even  his  remarks  on  society,  like  his  re 
marks  on  literature,  indicate  a  mind  at  least  as 
remarkable  for  narrowness  as  for  strength. 
He  was  no  master  of  the  great  science  of  hu 
man  nature.  He  had  studied,  not  the  gtniu 
man,  but  the  s]>erics  Londoner.  Nobody  was 
ever  so  thoroughly  conversant  with  all  the 
forms  of  life,  and  all  the  shades  of  moral  and 
intellectual  character,  which  were  to  be  seen 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE  OF  JOHNSON. 


149 


from  Islington  to  the  Thames,  and  from  Hyde- 
Park  corner  to  Mile-end  green.  But  his  phi 
losophy  stopped  at  the  first  turnpike  gate. 
Of  the  rural  life  of  England  he  knew  nothing  ; 
and  he  took  it  for  granted  that  everybody  who 
lived  in  the  country  was  either  stupid  or  mise 
rable.  "Country  gentlemen,"  said  he,  "  must 
be  unhappy ;  for  they  have  not  enough  to  keep 
their  lives  in  motion."  As  if  all  those  peculiar 
habits  and  associations,  which  made  Fleet 
Street  and  Charing  Cross  the  finest  views  in 
the  world  to  himself,  had  been  essential  parts 
of  human  nature.  Of  remote  countries  and 
past  times  he  talked  with  wild  and  ignorant 
presumption.  "The  Athenians  of  the  age  of 
Demosthenes,"  he  said  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  "  were 
a  people  of  brutes,  a  barbarous  people."  In 
conversation  with  Sir  Adam  Ferguson  he  used 
similar  language.  "The  boasted  Athenians," 
he  said,  "  were  barbarians.  The  mass  of  every 
people  must  be  barbarous,  where  there  is  no 
printing."  The  fact  was  this :  he  saw  that  a 
Londoner  who  could  not  read  was  a  very  stupid 
and  brutal  fellow :  he  saw  that  great  refine 
ment  of  taste  and  activity  of  intellect  were 
rarely  found  in  a  Londoner  who  had  not  read 
much  ;  and  because  it  was  by  means  of 
books  that  people  acquired  almost  all  their 
knowledge  in  the  society  with  which  he  was 
acquainted,  he  concluded,  in  defiance  of  the 
strongest  and  clearest  evidence,  that  the  human 
mind  can  be  cultivated  by  means  of  books 
alone.  An  Athenian  citizen  might  possess 
very  few  volumes ;  and  even  the  largest  library 
to  which  he  had  access  might  be  much  less 
valuable  than  Johnson's  bookcase  in  Bolt 
Court.  But  the  Athenian  might  pass  every 
morning  in  conversation  with  Socrates,  and 
might  hear  Pericles  speak  four  or  five  times 
every  month.  He  saw  the  plays  of  Sophocles 
and  Aristophanes;  he  walked  amidst  the 
friezes  of  Phidias  and  the  paintings  of  Zeuxis  ; 
he  knew  by  heart  the  choruses  of  JSschylus  ; 
he  heard  the  rhapsodist  at  the  corner  of  the 
street  reciting  the  Shield  of  Achilles,  or  the 
Death  of  Argus;  he  was  a  legislator  conver 
sant  with  high  questions  of  alliance,  revenue, 
and  war;  he  was  a  soldier,  trained  under  a 
liberal  and  generous  discipline ;  he  was  a 
judge,  compelled  every  day  to  weigh  the  ef 
fect  of  opposite  arguments.  These  things  were 
in  themselves  an  education ;  an  education 
eminently  fitted,  not  indeed,  to  form  exact  or 
profound  thinkers,  but  to  give  quickness  to  the 
perceptions,  delicacy  to  the  taste,  fluency  to 
the  expression,  and  politeness  to  the  manners. 
But  this  Johnson  never  considered.  An  Athe 
nian  who  did  not  improve  his  mind  by  read 
ing,  was,  in  his  opinion,  much  such  a  person 
as  a  Cockney  who  made  his  mark;  much  such 
a  person  as  black  Frank  before  he  went  to 
school,  and  far  inferior  to  a  parish-clerk  or  a 
printer's  devil. 

His  friends  have  allowed  that  he  carried  to 
a  ridiculous  extreme  his  unjust  contempt  for 
foreigners.  He  pronounced  the  French  to  be 
a  very  silly  people — much  behind  us — stupid, 
ignorant  creatures.  And  this  judgment  he 
formed  after  having  been  at  Paris  about  a 
month,  during  which  he  would  not  talk  French, 
for  fear  of  giving  the  natives  an  advantage 


I  over  him  'in  conversation.  He  pronounced 
!  them,  also,  to  be  an  indelicate  people,  because 
a  French  footman  touched  the  sugar  with  his 
fingers.  That  ingenious  and  amusing  travel- 
j  ler,  M.  Simond,  has  defended  his  countrymen 
very  successfully  against  Johnson's  accusa- 
|  tion,  and  has  pointed  out  some  English  prac- 
;  tices,  which,  to  an  impartial  spectator,  would 
j  seem  at  least  as  inconsistent  with  physical 
cleanliness  and  social  decorum  as  those  which 
Johnson  so  bitterly  reprehended.  To  the  sage, 
as  Boswell  loves  to  call  him,  it  never  occurred 
to  doubt  that  there  must  be  something  eternally 
and  immutably  good  in  the  usages  to  which  he 
had  been  accustomed.  In  fact,  Johnson's  re 
marks  on  society  beyond  the  bills  of  mortality, 
are  generally  of  much  the  same  kind  with 
those  of  honest  Tom  Dawson,  the  English  foot 
man  of  Dr.  Moore's  Zeluco.  "Suppose  the 
King  of  France  has  no  sons,  but  only  a  da  ugh- 
ter,  then,  when  the  king  dies,  this  here  daugh 
ter,  according  to  that  there  law,  cannot  be  made 
queen,  but  the  next  near  relative,  provided  he 
is  a  man,  is  made  king,  and  not  the  last  king's 
daughter,  which,  to  be  sure,  is  very  unjust. 
The  French  footguards  are  dressed  in  blue, 
and  all  the  marching  regiments  in  white,  which 
has  a  very  foolish  appearance  for  soldiers; 
and  as  for  blue  regimentals,  it  is  only  fit  for 
the  blue  horse  or  the  artillery." 

Johnson's  visit  to  the  Hebrides  introduced 
him  to  a  state  of  society  completely  new  to 
him:  and  a  Salutary  suspicion  of  his  own  de 
ficiencies  seems  on  that  occasion  to  have 
crossed  his  mind  for  the  first  time.  He  con 
fessed,  in  the  last  paragraph  of  his  Journey, 
that  his  thoughts  on  national  manners  were  the 
thoughts  of  one  who  had  seen  but  little ;  of 
one  who  had  passed  his  time  almost  wholly  in 
cities.  This  feeling,  however,  soon  passed 
away.  It  is  remarkable,  that  to  the  last  he  en 
tertained  a  fixed  contempt  for  all  those  modes 
of  life  and  those  studies,  which  lead  to  eman 
cipate  the  mind  from  the  prejudices  of  a  par 
ticular  age  or  a  particular  nation.  Of  foreign 
travel  and  of  history  he  spoke  with  the  fierce 
and  boisterous  contempt  of  ignorance.  "  What 
does  a  man  learn  by  travelling  ?  Is  Beauclerk 
the  better  for  travelling'?  What  did  Lord 
Charlernont  learn  in  his  travels,  except  that 
there  was  a  snake  in  one  of  the  pyramids  of 
Egypt  1"  History  was,  in  his  opinion,  to  use 
the  fine  expression  of  Lord  Plunkett,  an  old 
almanac  :  historians  could,  as  he  conceived, 
claim  no  higher  dignity  than  that  of  almanac- 
makers;  and  his  favourite  historians  were 
those  who,  like  Lord  Hailes,  aspired  to  no 
higher  dignity.  He  always  spoke  with  con 
tempt  of  Robertson.  Hume  he  would  not  even 
read.  He  affronted  one  of  his  friends  for  talk 
ing  to  him  about  Catiline's  conspiracy,  and 
declared  that  he  never  desired  to  hear  of  the 
Punic  War  again  as  long  as  he  lived. 

Assuredly  one  fact,  which  does  not  directly 
affect  our  own  interests,  considered  in  itself,  is 
no  better  worth  knowing  than   another  facu 
The  fact  that  there  is  a  snake  in  a  pyramid, 
or  the  fact  that  Hannibal  crossed  the  Alps  by 
|  the  Great  St.  Bernard,  are  in  themselves  as  un 
profitable  to  us  as  the  fact  that  there  is  a  green 
,  blind  in  a  particular  house  in  Threadne<>a> 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


street,  or  the  fact  that  a  Mr.  Smith  comes  into 
the  city  every  morning  on  the  top  of  one  of  the 
Blackwall  stages.  But  it  is  certain  that  those 
who  will  not  crack  the  shell  of  history  will 
never  get  at  the  kernel.  Johnson,  with  hasty 
arrogance,  pronounced  the  kernel  worthless, 
because  he  saw  no  value  in  the  shell.  The 
real  use  of  travelling  to  distant  countries,  and 
of  studying  the  annals  of  past  times,  is  to  pre 
serve  men  from  the  contraction  of  mind  which 
those  can  hardly  escape,  whose  whole  com 
munion  is  with  one  generation  and  one  neigh 
bourhood,  who  arrive  at  conclusions  by  means 
of  an  induction  not  sufficiently  copious,  and 
who  therefore  constantly  confound  exceptions 
with  rules,  and  accidents  with  essential  pro 
perties.  In  short,  the  real  use  of  travelling, 
and  of  studying  history,  is  to  keep  men  from 
being  what  Tom  Dawson  was  in  fiction,  and 
Samuel  Johnson  in  reality. 

Johnson,  as  Mr.  Burke  most  justly  observed, 
appears  far  greater  in  Boswell's  books  than  in 
his  own.  His  conversation  appears  to  have 
been  quite  equal  to  his  writings  in  matter,  and 
far  superior  to  them  in  manner.  When  he 
talked,  he  clothed  his  wit  and  his  sense  in  for 
cible  and  natural  expressions.  As  soon  as  he 
took  his  pen  in  his  hand  to  write  for  the  pub 
lic,  his  style  became  systematically  vicious. 
All  his  books  are  written  in  a  learned  lan 
guage — in  a  language  which  nobody  hears 
from  his  mother  or  his  nurse — in  a  language 
in  which  nobody  ever  quarrels,  o*-  drives  bar 
gains,  or  makes  love — in  a  language  in  which 
nobody  ever  thinks.  It  is  clear,  that  Johnson 
himself  did  not  think  in  the  dialect  in  which 
he  wrote.  The  expressions  which  came  first 
to  his  tongue  were  simple,  energetic,  and  pic 
turesque.  When  he  wrote  for  publication,  he 
did  his  sentences  out  of  English  into  John 
sonese.  His  letters  from  the  Hebrides  to  Mrs. 
Thrale  are  the  original  of  that  work  of  which 
the  Journey  to  the  Hebrides  is  the  translation ; 
and  it  is  amusing  to  compare  the  two  versions. 
"  When  we  were  taken  up  stairs,"  says  he  in 
one  of  his  letters,  "  a  dirty  fellow  bounced  out 
of  the  bed  on  which  one  of  us  was  to  lie." 
This  incident  is  recorded  in  the  Journey  as 
follows  :  "  Out  of  one  of  the  beds  on  which  we 
were  to  repose,  started  up,  at  our  entrance,  a 
man  black  as  a  Cyclops  from  the  forge." 
Sometimes  Johnson  translated  aloud.  "The 
Rehearsal,"  he  said,  very  unjustly,  "  has  not 
wit  enough  to  keep  it  sweet;"  then,  after  a 
pause,  "it  has  not  vitality  enough  to  preserve 
it  from  putrefaction." 

Mannerism  is  pardonable,  and  is  sometimes 
even  agreeable,  when  the  manner,  though  vi 
cious,  is  natural.  Few  readers,  for  example, 
would  be  willing  to  part  with  the  mannerism 
of  Milton  or  of  Burke.  But  a  mannerism 
which  does  not  sit  easy  on  the  mannerist,  which 
has  been  adopted  on  principle,  and  which  can 
l»e  sustained  only  by  constant  effort,  is  always 
offensive.  And  such  is  the  mannerism  of 
Johnson. 

The  characteristic  faults  of  his  style  are  so 
familiar  to  all  our  readers,  and  have  been  so 
often  burlesqued,  that  it  is  almost  superfluous 
to  point  them  out.  It  is  well  known  that  he 
male  less  use  than  any  other  eminent  writer 


of  those  strong  plain  words,  Anglo-Saxon  or 
Norman  French,  of  which  the  roots  lie  in  the 
inmost  depths  of  our  language;  and  that  he 
felt  a  vicious  partiality  for  terms  which,  long 
after  our  own  speech  had  been  fixed,  were 
borrowed  from  the  Greek  and  Latin,  and 
which,  therefore,  even  when  lawfully  natural 
ized,  must  be  considered  as  born  aliens,  not 
entitled  to  rank  with  the  king's  English.  His 
constant  practice  of  padding  out  a  sentence 
with  useless  epithets,  till  it  became  as  stiff  as 
the  bust  of  an  exquisite  ;  his  antithetical  forms 
of  expression,  constantly  employed  even  where 
there  is  no  opposition  in  the  ideas  expressed ; 
his  big  words  wasted  on  little  things ;  his  harsh 
inversions,  so  widely  different  from  those 
graceful  and  easy  inversions  which  give  va 
riety,  spirit,  and  sweetness  to  the  expression, 
of  our  great  old  writers — all  these  peculiarilies 
have  been  imitated  by  his  admirers,  and  paro 
died  by  his  assailants,  till  the  public  has  be 
come  sick  of  the  subject. 

Goldsmith  said  to  him,  very  wittily  and  very 
justly,  "If  you  were  to  write  a  fable  about 
little  fishes,  doctor,  you  would  make  the  little 
fishes  talk  like  whales."  No  man  surely  ever 
had  so  little  talent  for  personation  as  Johnson. 

Whether  he  wrote  in  the  character  of  a  dis 
appointed  legacy-hunter  or  an  empty  town  fop, 
of  a  crazy  virtuoso  or  a  flippant  coquette,  he 
wrote  in  the  same  pompous  and  unbending 
style.  His  speech,  like  Sir  Piercy  Shafton's 
Euphuistic  eloquence,  bewrayed  him  under 
every  disguise.  Euphelia  arid  Rhodoclia  talk 
as  finely  as  Imlac  the  poet,  or  Seged,  Emperor 
of  Ethiopia.  The  gay  Cornelia  describes  her 
reception  at  the  country-house  of  her  relations 
in  such  terms  as  these  :  "  I  was  surprised,  after 
the  civilities  of  my  first  reception,  to  find,  in 
stead  of  the  leisure  and  tranquillity  which  a 
rural  life  always  promises,  and,  if  well  con 
ducted,  might  always  afford,  a  ronfused  wild- 
ness  of  care,  and  a  tumultuous  hurry  of 
diligence,  by  which  every  face  was  clouded, 
and  every  motion  agitated."  The  gentle  Tran- 
quilla  informs  us,  that  she  "  had  not  passed 
the  earlier  part  of  life  without  the  flattery  of 
courtship  and  the  joys  of  triumph  ;  but  had 
danced  the  round  of  gayety  amidst  the  mur 
murs  of  envy  and  the  gratulations  of  applause ; 
had  been  attended  from  pleasure  to  pleasure 
by  the  great,  the  sprightly,  and  the  vain  ;  and 
had  seen  her  regard  solicited  by  the  obsequi 
ousness  of  gallantry,  the  gayety  of  wit,  and  the 
timidity  of  love."  Surely  Sir  John  Falstnff 
himself  did  not  wear  his  petticoats  with  a 
worse  grace.  The  reader  may  well  cry  out 
with  honest  Sir  Hugh  Evans,  "I  like  not  when 
a  'oman  has  a  great  peard:  I  spy  a  great  peard 
under  her  muffler." 

We  had  something  more  to  say.  But  oui 
article  is  already  too  long;  and  we  must  close 
it.  We  would  fain  part  in  good  humour  from 
the  hero,  from  the  biographer,  and  even  from 
the  editor,  who,  ill  as  he  has  performed  his 
task,  has  at  least  this  claim  to  our  gratitude, 
that  he  has  induced  us  to  read  Boswell's  book 
again.  As  we  close  it,  the  club-room  is  before 
us,  and  the  table  on  which  stands  the  omelet 
for  Nugent  and  the  lemons  for  Johnson.  There 
are  assembled  those  heads  which  live  forever 


BOSWELL'S  LIFE   OF   JOHNSON. 


151 


era  the  canvass  of  Reynolds.  There  are  the 
spectacles  of  Burke  and  the  tall  thin  form  of 
Langton ;  the  courtly  sneer  of  Beauclerk  and 
the  beaming  smile  of  Garrick ;  Gibbon  tapping 
his  snuff-box,  and  Sir  Joshua  with  his  trumpet 
in  his  ear.  In  the  foreground  is  that  strange 
figure  which  is  as  familiar  to  us  as  the  figures 
of  those  among  whom  we  have  been  brought 
up — the  gigantic  body,  the  huge  massy  face, 
seamed  with  the  scars  of  disease ;  the  brown 
coat,  the  black  worsted  stockings,  the  gray 
•wig  with  a  scorched  foretop ;  the  dirty  hands, 
the  nails  bitten  and  pared  to  the  quick.  We 
see  the  eyes  and  mouth  moving  with  convul 
sive  twitches;  we  see  the  heavy  form  rolling; 
we  hear  it  puffing;  and  then  comes  the  "Why, 
sir!"  and  the  "What  then,  sir!"  and  the  "No, 
sir !"  and  the  "You  dont  see  your  way  through 
the  question,  sir !" 


J      What  a  singular  destiny  has  been  that  of 

i  this  remarkable  man !     To  be  regarded  in  his 

|  own  age  as  a  classic,  and  in  ours  as  a  compa- 

i  nion — to  receive  from  his  contemporaries  that 

|  full  homage  which   men  of  genius    have   in 

',  general  received  only  from   posterity — to  be 

j  more  intimately  known  to  posterity  than  other 

!  men  are  known  to  their  contemporaries !  That 

j  kind  of  fame  which  is  commonly   the  most 

j  transient,  is,  in   his   case,  the  most  durable. 

The   reputation  of  those  writings,  which  he 

probably  expected  to  be  immortal,  is  every  day 

fading;  while  those  peculiarities  of  manner, 

and  that   careless   table-talk,  the   memory  of 

which,  he  probably  thought,  would  die  with 

him,  are  likely  to  be  remembered  as  long  as  th« 

English  language  is  spoken  in  any  quarter  of 

the  globe. 


LORD  NUGENT' S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1831.] 


WE  have  read  this  book  with  great  pleasure, 
though  not  exactly  with  that  kind  of  pleasure 
which  we  had  expected.  We  had  hoped  that 
Lord  Nugent  would  have  been  able  to  collect, 
from  family  papers  and  local  traditions,  much 
new  and  interesting  information  respecting  the 
life  and  character  of  the  renowned  leader  of 
the  Long  Parliament,  the  first  of  those  great 
English  commoners,  whose  plain  addition  of 
Mister,  has,  to  our  ears,  a  more  majestic  sound 
than  the  proudest  of  the  feudal  titles.  In  this 
hope  we  have  been  disappointed ;  but  assuredly 
not  from  any  want  of  zeal  or  diligence  on  the 
part  of  the  noble  biographer.  Even  at  Hamp 
den,  there  are,  it  seems,  no  important  papers 
relative  to  the  most  illustrious  proprietor  of 
that  ancient  domain.  The  most  valuable  me 
morials  of  him  which  still  exist,  belong  to  the 
family  of  his  friend,  Sir  John  Eliot.  Lord 
Eliot  has  furnished  the  portrait  which  is  en 
graved  for  this  work,  together  with  some 
very  interesting  letters.  The  portrait  is  un 
doubtedly  an  original,  and  probably  the  only 
original  now  in  existence.  The  intellectual 
forehead,  the  mild  penetration  of  the  eye,  and 
the  inflexible  resolution  expressed  by  the  lines 
of  the  mouth,  sufficiently  guaranty  the  like 
ness.  We  shall  probably  make  some  extracts 
from  the  letters.  They  contain  almost  all  the 
new  information  that  Lord  Nugent  has  been 
able  to  procure,  respecting  the  private  pursuits 
of  the  great  man  whose  memory  he  worships 
with  an  enthusiastic,  but  not  an  extravagant, 
veneration. 

The  public  life  of  Hampden  is  surrounded 
by  no  obscurity.  His  history,  more  particu 
larly  from  the  beginning  of  the  year  1640  to  his 
death,  is  the  history  of  England.  These  me- 


*  Some  Memorials  of  John  Hampden,  his  Party,  and  his 
Times.    l\v  LOUD  NUGENT.    2  vols.  8vo.    London.  1831. 


moirs  must  be  considered  as  Memoirs  of  the 
history  of  England;  and,  as  such,  they  well 
deserve  to  be  attentively  perused.  They  con 
tain  some  curious  facts,  which,  to  us  at  least, 
are  new,  much  spirited  narrative,  many  judi 
cious  remarks,  and  much  eloquent  declama 
tion. 

We  are  not  sure  that  even  the  want  of  in 
formation  respecting  the  private  character  of 
Hampden  is  not  in  itself  a  circumstance  as 
strikingly  characteristic  as  any  which  the 
most  minute  chronicler — O'Meara,  Las  Cases, 
Mrs.  Thrale,  or  Boswell  himself— ever  record 
ed  concerning  their  heroes.  The  celebrated 
Puritan  leader  is  an  almost  solitary  instance 
of  a  great  man  who  neither  sought  nor  shunned 
greatness;  who  found  glory  only  because  glory 
lay  in  the  plain  path  of  duty.  During  more 
than  forty  years,  he  was  known  to  his  country 
neighbours  as  a  gentleman  of  cultivated  mind, 
of  high  principles,  of  polished  address,  happy 
in  his  family,  and  active  in  the  discharge  of 
local  duties ;  to  political  men,  as  an  honest, 
industrious,  and  sensible  member  of  Parlia 
ment,  not  eager  to  display  his  talents,  stanch 
to  his  party,  and  attentive  to  the  interests  of 
his  constituents.  A  great  and  terrible  crisis 
came.  A  direct  attack  was  made,  by  an  arbi 
trary  government,  on  a  sacred  right  of  Eng 
lishmen,  on  a  right  which  was  the  chief  secu 
rity  for  all  their  other  rights.  The  nation 
looked  round  for  a  defender.  Calmly  and  un 
ostentatiously  the  plain  Buckinghamshire  Es 
quire  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  his  coun 
trymen,  and  right  before  the  face,  and  across 
the  path  of  tyranny.  The  times  grew  darker 
and  more  troubled.  Public  service,  perilous, 
arduous,  delicate,  was  required;  and  to  every 
service,  the  intellect  and  ihe  courage  of  ihis 
wonderful  man  were  found  fully  equal.  He 
became  a  debater  of  the  first  order,  a 


152 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS 


dexterous  manager  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
a  negotiator,  a  soldier.  He  governed  a  fierce 
and  turbulent  assembly,  abounding  in  able 
men,  as  easily  as  he  had  governed  his  family. 
He  showed  himself  as  competent  to  direct  a 
campaign  as  to  conduct  the  business  of  the 
petty  sessions.  We  can  scarcely  express  the 
admiration  which  we  feel  for  a  mind  so  great, 
and,  at  the  same  time,  so  healthful  and  so  well 
proportioned;  so  willingly  contracting  itself 
to  the  humblest  duties ;  so  easily  expanding 
itself  to  the  highest ;  so  contented  in  repose ; 
so  powerful  in  action.  Almost  every  part  of 
this  virtuous  and  blameless  life,  which  is  not 
hidden  from  us  in  modest  privacy,  is  a  pre 
cious  and  splendid  portion  of  our  national  his 
tory.  Had  the  private  conduct  of  Hampden 
afforded  the  slightest  pretence  for  censure,  he 
would  have  been  assailed  by  the  same  blind 
malevolence  which,  in  defiance  of  the  clearest 
proofs,  still  continues  to  call  Sir  John  Eliot  an 
assassin.  Had  there  been  even  any  weak  part 
in  the  character  of  Hampden,  had  his  manners 
been  in  any  respect  open  to  ridicule,  we  may 
be  sure  that  no  mercy  would  have  been  shown 
to  him  by  the  writers  of  Charles's  faction. 
Those  writers  have  carefully  preserved  every 
little  circumstance  which  could  tend  to  make 
their  opponents  cdious  or  contemptible.  They 
have  told  us  that  Pym  broke  down  in  a  speech, 
that  Ireton  had  his  nose  pulled  by  Hollis,  that 
Ihe  Earl  of  Northumberland  cudgelled  Henry 
Martin,  that  St.  John's  manners  were  sullen, 
that  Vane  had  an  ugly  face,  that  Cromwell 
had  a  red  nose.  They  have  made  themselves 
merry  with  the  canting  phrases  of  injudicious 
zealots.  But  neither  the  artful  Clarendon  nor 
the  scurrilous  Denham  could  venture  to  throw 
the  slightest  imputation  on  the  morals  or  the 
manners  of  Hampden.  What  was  the  opinion 
entertained  respecting  him  by  the  best  men  of 
his  time,  we  learn  from  Baxter.  That  eminent 
person. — eminent  not  only  for  his  piety  and  his 
fervid  devotional  eloquence,  but  for  his  mode 
ration,  his  knowledge  of  political  affairs,  and 
his  skill  in  judging  of  characters — declared  in 
the  Saint's  Rest,  that  one  of  the  pleasures  which 
he  hoped  to  enjoy  in  Heaven  was  the  society 
of  Hampden.  In  the  editions  printed  after  the 
restoration,  the  name  of  Hampden  was  omit 
ted.  "  But  I  must  tell  the  reader,"  says  Baxter, 
"that  I  did  blot  it  out,  not  as  changing  my 

opinion  of  the  person Mr.  John 

Hampden  was  one  that  friends  and  enemies 
acknowledged  to  be  most  eminent  for  pru 
dence,  piety,  and  peaceable  counsels,  having 
the  most  universal  praise  of  any  gentleman 
that  I  remember  of  that  age.  I  remember  a 
moderate,  prudent,  aged  gentleman,  far  from 
him,  but  acquainted  with  him,  whom  I  have 
heard  saying,  that  if  he  might  choose  what 
person  he  would  be  then  in  the  world,  he  would 
be  John  Hampden."  We  cannot  but  regret 
that  we  have  not  fuller  memorials  of  a  man, 
who,  after  passing  through  the  most  severe 
temptations  by  which  human  virtue  can  be 
.rieci,  after  acting  a  most  conspicuous  part  in 
a  revolution  and  a  civil  war,  could  yet  deserve 
such  praise  as  this  from  such  authority.  Yet 
Ihe  want  of  memorials  is  surely  the  best  proof 


that  hatred  itself  could  find  no  blemish  on  his 
memory. 

The  story  of  his  early  life  is  soon  told.  He 
was  the  head  of  a  family  which  had  been  set 
tled  in  Buckinghamshire  before  the  Conquest 
Part  of  the  estate  which  he  inherited  had  been 
bestowed  by  Edward  the  Confessor  on  Bald- 
wyn  de  Hampden,  whose  name  seems  to  indi 
cate  that  he  was  one  of  the  Norman  favourites 
of  the  last  Saxon  king.  During  the  contest 
between  the  houses  of  York  and  Lancaster, 
the  Hampdens  adhered  to  the  party  of  the  Red 
Rose,  and  were  consequently  persecuted  by 
Edward  the  Fourth,  and  favoured  by  Henry 
the  Seventh.  Under  the  Tudors,  the  family 
was  great  and  flourishing.  Griffith  Hampden, 
high  sheriff  of  Buckinghamshire,  entertained 
Elizabeth  with  great  magnificence  at  his  seat. 
His  son,  William  Hampden,  sate  in  the  Parlia 
ment  which  that  queen  summoned  in  the  year 
1593.  William  married  Elizabeth  Cromwell, 
aunt  of  the  celebrated  man  who  afterwards 
governed  the  British  islands  with  more  than 
regal  power ;  and  from  this  marriage  sprang 
John  Hampden. 

He  was  born  in  1594.  In  1597  his  father 
died,  and  left  him  heir  to  a  very  large  estate. 
After  passing  some  years  at  the  grammar 
school  of  Thame,  young  Hampden  was  sent, 
at  fifteen,  to  Magdalen  College,  in  the  Univer 
sity  of  Oxford.  At  nineteen,  he  was  admitted 
a  student  of  the  Inner  Temple,  where  he  made 
himself  master  of  the  principles  of  the  English 
law.  In  1619  he  married  Elizabeth  Symeon, 
a  lady  to  whom  he  appears  to  have  been  fond 
ly  attached.  In  the  following  year  he  was 
returned  to  Parliament  by  a  borough  which 
has  in  our  time  obtained  a  miserable  celebrity, 
the  borough  of  Grampound. 

Of  his  private  life  during  his  early  years, 
little  is  known  beyond  what  Clarendon  has 
told  us.  "  In  his  entrance  into  the  world," 
says  that  great  historian,  "he  indulged  him 
self  in  all  the  license  in  sports,  and  exercises, 
and  company,  which  were  used  by  men  of 
the  most  jolly  conversation."  A  remarkable 
change,  however,  passed  in  his  character. 
"  On  a  sudden,"  says  Clarendon,  "  from  a  life 
of  great  pleasure  and  license,  he  retired  to  ex 
traordinary  sobriety  and  strictness,  to  a  more 
reserved  and  melancholy  society."  It  is  proba 
ble  that  this  change  took  place  when  Hamp 
den  was  about  twenty-five  years  old.  At  that 
age  he  was  united  to  a  woman  whom  he  loved 
and  esteemed.  At  that  age  he  entered  inlo 
political  life.  A  mind  so  happily  constituted 
as  his,  would  naturally,  under  such  circum 
stances,  relinquish  the  pleasures  of  dissipation 
for  domestic  enjoyments  and  public  duties. 

His  enemies  have  allowed  that  he  was  a 
man  in  whom  virtue  showed  itself  in  its  mild 
est  and  least  austere  form.  With  the  morals 
of  a  Puritan,  he  had  the  manners  of  an  accom 
plished  courtier.  Even  after  the  change  in 
his  habits,  "he  preserved,"  says  Clarendon, 
"his  own  natural  cheerfulness  and  vivacity, 
and,  above  all,  a  flowing  courtesy  to  all  men." 
These  qualities  distinguished  him  from  most 
of  the  members  of  his  sect  and  his  party;  and, 
in  the  great  crisis  in  which  he  afterwards  took 


LORD  NUGENT'S   MEMORIALS  OF   HAMPDEN. 


15J 


a  principal  part,  were  of  scarcely  less  service 
to  the  country  than  his  keen  sagacity  and  his 
dauntless  courage. 

On  the  30th  of  January,  1621,  Hampden  took 
his  seat  in  the  House  of  Commons.  His 
mother  was  exceedingly  desirous  that  her  son 
should  obtain  a  peerage.  His  family,  his  pos 
sessions,  and  his  personal  accomplishments 
were  such  as  would,  in  any  age,  have  justified 
him  in  pretending  to  that  honour.  But,  in  the 
reign  of  James  the  First,  there  was  one  short 
cut  to  the  House  of  Lords.  It  was  but  to  ask, 
to  pay,  and  to  have.  The  sale  of  titles  was 
carried  on  as  openly  as  the  sale  of  boroughs 
in  our  times.  Hampden  turned  away  with 
contempt  from  the  degrading  honours  with 
which  his  family  desired  to  see  him  invested, 
and  attached  himself  to  the  party  which  was 
in  opposition  to  the  court. 

It  was  about  this  time,  as  Lord  Nugent  has 
justly  remarked,  that  parliamentary  opposition 
began  to  take  a  regular  form.  From  a  very 
early  age,  the  English  had  enjoyed  a  far  larger 
share  of  liberty  than  had  fallen  to  the  lot  of 
any  neighbouring  people.  How  it  chanced 
that  a  country  conquered  and  enslaved  by  in 
vaders,  a  country  of  which  the  soil  had  been 
portioned  out  among  foreign  adventurers,  and 
of  which  the  laws  were  written  in  a  foreign 
tongue,  a  country  given  over  to  that  worst  ty 
ranny,  the  tyranny  of  caste  over  caste,  should 
have  become  the  seat  of  civil  liberty,  the  object 
of  the  admiration  and  envy  of  surrounding 
states,  is  one  of  the  most  obscure  problems  in 
the  philosophy  of  history.  But  the  fact  is  cer 
tain.  Within  a  century  and  a  half  after  the 
Norman  Conquest,  the  Great  Charter  was  con 
ceded.  Within  two  centuries  after  the  Con 
quest,  the  first  House  of  Commons  met.  Frois- 
sart  tells  us,  what  indeed  his  whole  narrative 
sufficiently  proves,  that  of  all  the  nations  of  the 
fourteenth  century,  the  English  were  the  least 
disposed  to  endure  oppression.  "  C'est  le  plus 
perilleux  peuple  qui  soit  au  monde,  et  plus 
outrageux  et  orgueilleux."  The  good  Canon 
probably  did  not  perceive  that  all  the  prospe 
rity  and  internal  peace  which  this  dangerous 
people  enjoyed  were  the  fruits  of  the  spirit 
which  he  designates  as  proud  and  outrageous. 
He  has,  however,  borne  ample  testimony  to  the 
effect,  though  he  was  not  sagacious  enough  to 
trace  it  to  its  cause.  "En  le  royaume  d'An- 
gleterre,"  says  he,  "toutes  gens,  laboureurs  et 
marchands,  ont  appris  de  vivre  en  pays,  et  a 
mener  leurs  marchandises  paisiblement,  et  les 
laboureurs  labourer."  In  the  fifteenth  century, 
though  England  was  convulsed  by  the  struggle 
between  the  two  branches  of  the  royal  family, 
the  physical  and  moral  condition  of  the  people 
continued  to  improve.  Villanage  almost  wholly 
disappeared.  The  calamities  of  war  were  little 
felt,  except  by  those  who  bore  arms.  The 
oppressions  of  the  government  were  little  felt, 
except  by  the  aristocracy.  The  institutions  of 
thi  country,  when  compared  with  the  institu 
tions  of  the  neighbouring  kingdoms,  seem  to 
have  been  not  undeserving  of  the  praises  of 
Fortescue.  The  government  of  Edward  the 
Fourth,  though  we  call  it  cruel  and  arbitrary, 
was  humane  and  liberal,  when  compared  with 
lhat  of  Louis  the  Eleventh,  or  that  of  Charles 

VOL.  II.— 20 


the  Bold.     Comines,  who  had  lived  amidst  th 

:  wealthy  cities  of  Flanders,  and  who  had  visited 

j  Florence  and  Venice,  had  never  seen  a  peopl 

'  so  well  governed  as  the  English.     "  Or  selon 

!  mon  advis,"  says  he,  "  entre  toutes  les  seigneu- 

ries  du  monde,  dont  j'ay  connoissance,  ou  la 

chose  publique  est  mieux  traitee,  et  ou  regne 

moins  de  violence  sur  le  peuple,  et  ou  il  n'y  a 

mils  edifices  abbatus  n'y  demolis  pour  guerre, 

c'est  Angleterre;  et  tombe  le  sort  et  le  malheur 

sur  ceux  qui  font  la  guerre." 

About  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  and  the  com 
mencement  of  the  sixteenth  century,  a  great 
portion  of  the  influence  which  ihe  aristocracy 
had  possessed  passed  to  the  crown.  No  Eng 
lish  king  has  ever  enjoyed  such  absolute  power 
as  Henry  the  Eighth.  But  while  the  royal  pre 
rogatives  were  acquiring  strength  at  the  ex 
pense  of  the  nobility,  two  great  revolutions 
took  place,  destined  to  be  the  parents  of  many 
revolutions — the  discovery  of  printing  and  the 
reformation  of  the  Church. 

The  immediate  effect  of  the  Reformation  in 
England  was  by  no  means  favourable  to  poli 
tical  liberty.  The  authority  which  had  been 
exercised  by  the  Popes  was  transferred  almost 
entire  to  the  king.  Two  formidable  powers 
which  had  often  served  to  check  each  other, 
were  united  in  a  single  despot.  If  the  system 
on  which  the  founders  of  the  Church  of  Eng 
land  acted  could  have  been  permanent,  the  Re 
formation  would  have  been,  in  a  political 
sense,  the  greatest  curse  that  ever  fell  on  our 
country.  But  that  system  carried  within  it  the 
seeds  of  its  own  death.  It  was  possible  to  trans 
fer  the  name  of  Head  of  the  Church  from 
Clement  to  Henry ;  but  it  was  impossible  to 
transfer  to  the  new  establishment  the  venera 
tion  which  the  old  establishment  had  inspired. 
Mankind  had  not  broken  one  yoke  in  pieces 
only  in  order  to  put  on  another.  The  supre 
macy  of  the  Bishop  of  Rome  had  been  for 
ages  considered  as  a  fundamental  principle  of 
Christianity.  It  had  for  it  every  thing  that 
could  make  a  prejudice  deep  and  strong- 
venerable  antiquity,  high  authority,  general 
consent.  It  had  been  taught  in  the  first  lessons 
of  the  nurse.  It  was  taken  for  granted  in  all 
the  exhortations  of  the  priest.  To  remove  it 
was  to  break  innumerable  associations,  and  to 
give  a  great  and  perilous  shock  to  the  mind. 
Yet  this  prejudice,  strong  as  it  was,  could 
not  stand  in  the  great  day  of  the  deliverance 
of  the  human  reason.  And  as  it  was  not  to  be 
expected  that  the  public  mind,  just  after  fret' 
ing  itself,  by  an  unexampled  effort,  from  <* 
bondage  which  it  had  endured  for  ages,  would 
patiently  submit  to  a  tyranny  which  could 
plead  no  ancient  title.  Rome  had  at  least  pre 
scription  on  its  side.  But  Protestant  intole 
rance,  despotism  in  an  upstart  sect,  infallibility 
claimed  by  guides  who  acknowledged  that  they 
had  passed  the  greater  part  of  their  lives  in 
error,  restraints  imposed  on  the  liberty  cf  pri 
vate  judgment  by  rulers  who  could  vindicate 
their  own  proceedings  only  by  asserting  the 
liberty  of  private  judgment — ihese  things  could 
not  long  be  borne.  Those  who  had  pulled 
down  the  crucifix  could  not  long  continue  tc 
persecute  for  the  surplice.  It  required  no  great 
sagacity  to  perceive  the  inconsistency  and  <lis 


154 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


honesty  of  men  who,  dissenting  from  almost  all 
Christendom,  would  suffer  none  to  dissent  from 
themselves;  who  demanded  freedom  of  con 
science,  yet  refused  to  grant  it ;  who  execrated 
persecution,  yet  persecuted;  who  urged  reason 
against  the  authority  of  one  opponent,  and 
authority  against  the  reasons  of  another.  Bon- 
ner  at  least  acted  in  accordance  with  his  own 
principles.  Cranmer  could  vindicate  himself 
from  the  charge  of  being  a  heretic,  only  by 
arguments  which  made  him  out  to  be  a  mur 
derer. 

Thus  the  system  on  which  the  English 
princes  acted  with  respect  to  ecclesiastical  af 
fairs  for  some  time  after  the  Reformation,  was 
a  system  too  obviously  unreasonable  to  be 
lasting.  The  public  mind  moved  while  the 
government  moved;  but  would  not  stop  where 
the  government  stopped.  The  same  impulse 
which  had  carried  millions  away  from  the 
Church  of  Rome,  continued  to  carry  them  for 
ward  in  the  same  direction.  As  Catholics  had 
become  Protestants,  Protestants  became  Puri 
tans;  and  the  Tudors  and  Stuarts  "were  as  un 
able  to  avert  the  laiter  change  as  the  Popes 
had  been  to  avert  the  former.  The  dissenting 
party  increased,  and  became  strong  under 
every  kind  of  discouragement  and  oppression. 
They  were  a  sect.  The  government  persecuted 
them,  and  they  became  an  opposition.  The 
old  constitution  of  England  furnished  to  them 
the  means  of  resisting  the  sovereign  without 
breaking  the  laws.  They  were  the  majority  of 
the  House  of  Commons.  They  had  the  power 
of  giving  or  withholding  supplies;  and,  by  a 
judicious  exercise  of  this  power,  they  might 
hope  to  take  from  the  Church  its  usurped 
authority  over  the  consciences  of  men ;  and 
from  the  Crown  some  part  of  the  vast  preroga 
tive  which  it  had  recently  acquired  at  the 
expense  of  the  nobles  and  of  the  Pope. 

The  faint  beginnings  of  this  memorable  con 
test  may  be  discerned  early  in  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth.  The  conduct  of  her  last  Parliament 
made  it  clear  that  one  of  those  great  revolutions 
which  policy  may  guide,  but  cannot  stop,  was 
in  progress.  It  was  on  the  question  of  Mono 
polies  that  the  House  of  Commons  gained  its 
first  great  victory  over  the  throne.  The  con 
duct  of  the  extraordinary  woman  who  then 
governed  England  is  an  admirable  study  for 
politicians  who  live  in  unquiet  times.  It  shows 
how  thoroughly  she  understood  the  people 
whom  she  ruled,  and  the  crisis  in  which  she 
was  called  to  act.  What  she  held,  she  held 
firmly.  What  she  gave,  she  gave  graciously. 
She  saw  that  it  was  necessary  to  make  a  con 
cession  to  the  nation:  and  she  made  it,  not 
grudgingly,  not  tardily,  not  as  a  matter  of  bar 
gain  and  sale,  not,  in  a  word,  as  Charles  the 
First  would  have  made  it,  but  promptly  and 
cordially.  Before  a  bill  could  be  framed  or  an 
address  presented,  she  applied  a  remedy  to  the 
evil  of  which  the  nation  complained.  She  ex 
pressed  in  the  warmest  terms  her  gratitude  to 
her  faithful  Commons  for  detecting  abuses 
which  interested  persons  had  concealed  from 
her  If  her  successors  had  inherited  her  wis 
dom  with  her  crown,  Charles  the  First  might 
nave  died  of  old  age,  and  James  the  Second 
*culd  never  have  seen  St.  Germains. 


She  died;  and  the  kingdom  passed  to  ono 
who  was,  in  his  own  opinion,  the  greatest  mas 
ter  of  kingcraft  that,  ever  lived;  who  was,  in 
truth,  one  of  those  kings  whom  God  seems  to 
send  for  the  express  purpose  of  hastening  re 
volutions.  Of  all  the  enemies  of  liberty  whom 
Britain  has  produced,  he  was  at  once  the  most 
harmless  and  the  most  provoking.  His  office 
resembled  that  of  the  man  who,  in  a  Spanish 
bull-fight,  goads  the  torpid  savage  to  fury,  by 
shaking  a  red  rag  in  the  air,  and  now  and'then 
throwing  a  dart,  sharp  enough  to  sting,  but  too 
small  to  injure.  The  policy  of  wise  tyrants 
has  always  been  to  cover  their  violent  acts 
with  popular  forms.  James  was  always  ob 
truding  his  despotic  theories  on  his  subjects 
without  the  slightest  necessity.  His  foolish 
talk  exasperated  them  infinitely  more  than 
forced  loans  or  benevolences  would  have  done. 
Yet,  in  practice,  no  king  ever  held  his  preroga 
tives  less  tenaciously.  He  neither  gave  way 
gracefully  to  the  advancing  spirit  of  liberty, 
nor  took  vigorous  measures  to  stop  it,  but 
retreated  before  it  with  ludicrous  haste,  blus 
tering  and  insulting  as  he  retreaied.  The 
English  people  had  been  governed  for  nearly 
a  hundred  and  fifty  years  by  princes  who, 
whatever  might  be  their  frailties  or  their  vices, 
had  all  possessed  great  force  of  character, 
and  who,  whether  beloved  or  hated,  had  always 
been  feared.  Now,  at  length,  for  the  first  time 
since  the  day  when  the  sceptre  of  Henry  the 
Fourth  dropped  from  the  hand  of  his  lethargic 
grandson,  England  had  a  king  whom  she  de 
spised. 

The  follies  and  vices  of  the  man  increased 
the  contempt  which  was  produced  by  the 
feeble  policy  of  the  sovereign.  The  indeco 
rous  gallantries  of  the  Court,  the  habits  of 
gross  intoxication  in  which  even  the  ladies 
indulged,  were  alone  sufficient  to  disgust  a 
people  whose  manners  were  beginning  to  be 
strongly  tinctured  with  austerity.  But  these 
were  trifles.  Crimes  of  the  most  frightful 
kind  had  been  discovered;  others  were  sus 
pected.  The  strange  story  of  the  Cowries  was 
riot  forgotten.  The  ignominious  fondness  of 
the  king  for  his  minions,  the  perjuries,  the  sor 
ceries,  the  poisonings,  which  his  chief  favour 
ites  had  planned  within  the  -.vails  of  his  palace, 
the  pardon  which,  in  direct  violation  of  his 
duty,  and  of  his  word,  he  had  granted  to  the 
mysterious  threats  of  a  murderer,  made  him  an 
object  of  loathing  to  many  of  his  subjects. 
What  opinion  grave  and  moral  persons  re 
siding  at  a  distance  from  the  court  entertained 
respecting  him,  we  learn  from  Mrs.  Hutchin- 
son's  Memoirs.  England  was  no  place,  the 
seventeenth  century  no  time,  for  Sporus  and 
Locusta. 

This  was  not  all.  The  most  ridiculous 
weaknesses  seemed  to  meet  in  the  wretched 
Solomon  of  Whitehall ;  pedantry,  buffoonery, 
garrulity,  low  curiosity,  the  most  contemptible 
personal  cowardice.  Nature  and  education 
had  done  their  best  to  produce  a  finished  spe 
cimen  of  all  that  a  king  ought  not  to  be.  His 
awkward  figure,  his  rolling  eye,  his  rickety 
walk,  his  nervous  tremblings,  his  slobbering 
mouth,  his  broad  Scotch  accent,  were  impe  • 
fections  which  might  have  been  found  in  th« 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS   OF  HAMPDEN. 


151 


best  and  greatest  man.  Their  effect,  however, 
was  to  make  James  and  his  office  objects  of 
contempt ;  and  to  dissolve  those  associations 
which  had  been  created  by  the  noble  bearing 
of  preceding  monarchs,  and  which  were  in 
themselves  no  inconsiderable  fence  to  royalty. 

The  sovereign  whom  James  most  resembled 
was,  we  think,  Claudius  Caesar.  Both  had  the 
same  feeble  and  vacillating  temper,  the  same 
childishness,  the  same  coarseness,  the  same 
poltroonery.  Both  were  men  of  learning;  both 
wrote  and  spoke — not,  indeed,  well — but  still 
in  a  manner  in  which  it  seems  almost  incredi 
ble  that  men  so  foolish  should  have  written  or 
spoken.  Tlve  follies  and  indecencies  of  James 
are  well  described  in  the  words  which  Sueto 
nius  uses  respecting  Claudius  :  "  Multa  talia, 
etiam  privatis  deformia,  necdum  principi,  ne- 
que  infacundo,  neque  indocto,  immo  etiam 
pertinaciter  liberalibus  studiis  dedito."  The 
description  given  by  Suetonius  of  the  manner 
in  which  the  Roman  prince  transacted  busi 
ness,  exactly  suits  the  Briton.  "In  cogno- 
scendo  ac  decernendo  mira  varietate  animi 
fuit,  modo  circumspectus  et  sagax,  modo  in- 
con  sultus  ac  prseceps,  non  nunquam  frivolus 
amentique  similis."  Claudius  was  ruled  suc 
cessively  by  two  bad  women ;  James  success 
ively  by  two  bad  men.  Even  the  description 
of  the  person  of  Claudius,  which  we  find  in 
the  ancient  memoirs,  might,  in  many  points, 
serve  for  that  of  James.  "  Ceterum  et  ingre- 
dientem  destituebant  poplites  minus  firmi,  et 
remisse  quid  vel  serio  agentem  multa  dehone- 
stabant:  risus  indecens;  ira  turpior,  spumante 
dctu,  proeterea  linguae  titubantia." 

The  Parliament  which  James  had  called 
loon  after  his  accession  had  been  refractory. 
rtis  second  Parliament,  called  in  the  spring 
of  1814,  had  been  more  refractory  still.  It  had 
6ecn  dissolved  after  a  session  of  two  months ; 
and  during  six  years  the  king  had  governed 
without  having  recourse  to  the  legislature. 
During  those  six  years,  melancholy  and  dis 
graceful  events,  at  home  and  abroad,  had  fol 
lowed  one  ancrher  in  rapid  succession ; — the 
divorce  of  Lady  Essex,  the  murder  of  Overbury, 
the  elevation  of  Vil!i.°rs,  the  pardon  of  Somer 
set,  the  disgrace  of  Coke,  the  execution  of  Ra 
leigh,  the  battle  of  Pra^oe,  the  invasion  of  the 
Palatinate  by  Spinola,  the  ignominious  flight 
of  the  son-in-law  of  the  English  king,  the  de 
pression  of  the  Protestant  interest  all  over  the 
Continent.  Allfrthe  extraordinary  modes  by 
which  James  could  venture  to  raise  money 
had  been  tried.  His  necessities  were  greater 
than  ever;  and  he  was  compelled  to  summon 
the  Parliament  in  which  Hampden  made  his 
first  appearance  as  a  public  man. 

This  Parliament  lasted  about  twelvs  months. 
During  that  time  it  visited  with  deserved  pu 
nishment  several   of  those  who,  during  the 
preceding  six  years,  had  enriched  themselves 
by  peculation  and  monopoly.     Michell,  one  of  I 
those  grasping  patentees,  who  had  purchased  j 
of  the  favourite  the  power  of  robbing  the  na 
tion,  was  fined  and  imprisoned  for  life.     Mom- 
pesson,  the  original,  it  is  said,  of  Massinger's 
"Overreach/*  was  outlawed  and  deprived  of 
his  ill-gotten  wealth.    Even  Sir  Edward  Vil-  I 
>»iers,   the   brother  of  Buckingham,  found  it  | 


convenient  to  leave  England.  A  greater  name 
is  to  be  added  to  the  ignominious  list.  By  this 
Parliament  was  brought  to  justice  that  illus 
trious  philosopher,  whose  memory  genius  has 
half  redeemed  from  the  infamy  due  to  servility, 
to  ingratitude,  and  to  corruption. 

After  redressing  internal  grievances,  the 
Commons  proceeded  to  take  into  considera 
tion  the  state  of  Europe.  The  king  flew  into 
a  rage  with  them  for  meddling  with  such  mat 
ters,  and,  with  characteristic  judgment,  drew 
them  into  a  controversy  about  the  origin  of 
the  House  and  of  its  privileges.  When  he 
found  that  he  could  not  convince  them,  he 
dissolved  them  in  a  passion,  and  sent  some  of 
the  leaders  of  the  Opposition  to  ruminate  jn 
his  logic  in  prison. 

During  the  time  which  elapsed  between  this 
dissolution  and  the  meeting  of  the  next  Parlia 
ment,  took  place  the  celebrated  negotiation  re 
specting  the  Infanta.  The  would-be  despot  was 
unmercifully  browbeaten.  The  would-be  Solo 
mon  was  ridiculously  overreached.  "Steenie," 
in  spite  of  the  begging  and  sobbing  of  his  dear 
"dad  and  gossip,"  carried  off  "baby  Charles" 
in  triumph  to  Madrid.  The  sweet  lads,  as 
James  called  them,  came  back  safe,  but  with 
out  their  errand.  The  great  master  of  king 
craft,  in  looking  for  a  Spanish  match,  found  a 
Spanish  war.  In  February,  1624,  a  Parlia 
ment  met,  during  the  whole  sitting  of  which 
James  was  a  mere  puppet  in  the  hands  of  his 
"baby,"  and  of  his  "poor  slave  and  dog."  The 
Commons  were  disposed  to  support  the  king 
in  the  vigorous  policy  which  his  son  and  his 
favourite  urged  him  to  adopt.  But  they  were 
not  disposed  to  place  any  confidence  in  their 
feeble  sovereign  and  his  dissolute  courtiers, 
or  to  relax  in  their  efforts  to  remove  public 
grievances.  They  therefore  lodged  the  money 
which  they  voted  for  the  war  in  the  hands 
of  parliamentary  commissioners.  They  im 
peached  the  treasurer,  Lord  Middlesex,  for 
corruption,  and  they  passed  a  bill  by  which 
patents  of  monopoly  were  declared  illegal. 

Hampden  did  not,  during  the  reign  of  James, 
take  any  prominent  part  in  public  affairs.  It 
is  certain,  however,  that  he  paid  great  atten 
tion  to  the  details  of  parliamentary  business, 
and  to  the  local  interests  of  his  own  county. 
It  was  in  a  great  measure  owing  to  his  exer 
tions,  that  Wendover  and  some  other  boroughs, 
on  which  the  popular  party  could  depend,  re 
covered  the  elective  franchise,  in  spite  of  the 
opposition  of  the  court. 

The  health  of  the  king  had  for  some  time 
been  declining.  On  the  27th  of  March,  1625, 
he  expired.  Under  his  weak  rule, "the  spirit 
of  liberty  had  grown  strong,  and  had  become 
equal  to  the  great  contest.  The  contest  was 
brought  on  by  the  policy  of  his  successor. 
Charles  bore  no  resemblance  to  his  father 
He  was  not  a  driveller,  or  a  pedant,  or  a  buf 
foon.  or  a  coward.  It  would  be  absurd  to  deny 
that  he  was  a  scholar  and  a  gentleman,  a  man 
of  exquisite  taste  in  the  fine  arts,  a  man  of 
strict  morals  in  private  life.  His  talents  for 
business  were  respectable ;  his  demeanour 
was  kingly.  But  he  was  false,  imperious,  ob 
stinate,  narrowminded,  ignorant  of  the  temper 
of  his  people,  unobservant  of  the  signs  of  hja 


156 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


times.  The  whole  principle  of  his  government 
was  resistance  to  public  opinion ;  nor  did  he 
make  any  real  concession  to  that  opinion  till 
it  mattered  not  whether  he  resisted  or  con 
ceded  ;  till  the  nation,  which  had  long  ceased 
to  love  him  or  to  trust  him,  had  at  last  ceased 
to  tear  him. 

His  first  Parliament  met  in  June,  1625. 
Hampdcn  sat  in  it  as  burgess  for  Wendover. 
The  Icing  wished  for  money.  The  Commons 
wished  for  the  redress  of  grievances.  The 
war,  however,  could  not  be  carried  on  without 
funds.  The  plan  of  the  Opposition  was,  it 
should  seem,  to  dole  out  supplies  by  small 
sums  in  order  to  prevent  a  speedy  dissolution. 
They  gave  the  king  two  subsidies  only,  and 
proceeded  to  complain  that  his  ships  had  been 
employed  against  the  Huguenots  in  France, 
arid  to  petition  in  behalf  of  the  Puritans  who 
were  persecuted  in  England.  The  king  dis 
solved  them,  and  raised  money  by  letters  un 
der  his  privy  seal.  The  supply  fell  far  short 
of  \vhnt  he  needed;  and,  in  the  spring  of  1626, 
he  called  together  another  Parliament.  In  this 
Parl iament,  Hampden  again  sat  for  Wendover. 

The  Commons  resolved  to  grant  a  very  libe 
ral  supply,  but  to  defer  the  final  passing  of 
the  act  for  that  purpose  till  the  grievances  of 
the  nation  should  be  redressed.  The  struggle 
which  followed  far  exceeded  in  violence  any 
that  had  yet  taken  place.  The  Commons  im 
peached  Buckingham.  The  king  threw  the 
managers  of  the  impeachment  into  prison. 
The  Commons  denied  the  right  of  the  king 
to  levy  tonnage  and  poundage  without  their 
consent.  The  king  dissolved  them.  They  put 
forth  a  remonstrance.  The  king  circulated  a 
declaration  vindicating  his  measures,  and  com 
mitted  some  of  the  most  distinguished  members 
of  the  Opposition  to  close  custody.  Money 
was  raised  by  a  forced  loan,  which  was  appor 
tioned  among  the  people  according  to  the  rate 
at  which  they  had  been  respectively  assessed 
to  the  last  subsidy.  On  this  occasion  it  was 
that  Hampden  made  his  first  stand  for  the  fun 
damental  principle  of  the  English  constitution. 
He  positively  refused  to  lend  a  farthing.  He 
was  required  to  give  his  reasons.  He  answer 
ed,  "mat  he  could  be  content  to  lend  as  well 
as  others,  but  feared  to  draw  upon  himself 
that  curse  in  Magna  Charta  which  should 
De  read  twice  a  year  against  those  who  in 
fringe  it."  For  this  noble  answer  the  Privy 
Council  committed  him  close  prisoner  to  the 
Gate-House.  After  some  lime,  he  was  again 
brought  up;  but  he  persisted  in  his  refusal, 
and  was  sent  to  a  place  of  confinement  in 
Hampshire. 

The  government  went  on,  oppressing  at 
home,  and  blundering  in  all  its  measures 
abroad.  A  war  was  foolishly  undertaken 
against  France,  and  more  foolishly  conducted. 
Buckingham  led  an  expedition  against  Rhe, 
and  failed  ignominiously.  In  the  mean  time, 
soldiers  were  billeted  on  the  people.  Crimes, 
of  which  ordinary  justice  should  have  taken 
cognisance,  were  punished  by  martial  law. 
Nearly  eighty  gentlemen  were  imprisoned  for 
refusing  to  contribute  to  the  forced  loan.  The 
ower  people,  who  showed  any  signs  of  insub- 
rdination.  were  pressed  into  the  fleet,  or  com 


pelled  to  serve  in  the  army.  Money,  however, 
came  in  slowly:  and  the  king  was  compelled 
to  summon  another  Parliament.  In  the  hope 
of  conciliating  his  subjects,  he  set  at  liberty 
the  persons  who  had  been  imprisoned  for  re 
fusing  to  comply  with  his  unlawful  demands. 
Hampden  regained  his  freedom ;  and  was  im 
mediately  re-elected  burgess  for  Wendover. 

Early  in  1628  the  Parliament  met.  During 
its  first  session,  the  Commons  prevailed  on  the 
king,  after  many  delays  and  much  equivoca 
tion,  to  give,  in  return  for  five  subsidies,  his 
full  and  solemn  assent  to  that  celebrated  in 
strument,  the  second  great  charter  of  the  liber 
ties  of  England,  known  by  the  name  of  the 
Petition  of  Right.  By  agreeing  to  this  act,  the 
king  bound  himself  to  raise  no  taxes  without 
the  consent  of  Parliament,  to  imprison  no  man 
except  by  legal  process,  to  billet  no  more  sol 
diers  on  the  people,  and  to  leave  the  cognisance 
of  ofiences  to  the  ordinary  tribunals. 

In  the  summer  this  memorable  Parliament 
was  prorogued.  It  rnet  again  in  January,  1629. 
Buckingham  was  no  more.  That  weak,  vio 
lent,  and  dissolute  adventurer,  who,  with  no 
talents  or  acquirements  but  those  of  a  mere 
courtier,  had,  in  a  great  crisis  of  foreign  and 
domestic  politics,  ventured  on  the  part  of 
prime  minister,  had  fallen,  during  the  recess 
of  Parliament,  by  the  hand  of  an  assassin. 
Both  before  and  after  his  death,  the  war  had 
been  feebly  and  unsuccessfully  conducted. 
The  king  had  continued,  in  direct  violation  of 
the  Petition  of  Right,  to  raise  tonnage  and 
poundage,  without  the  consent  of  Parliament. 
The  troops  had  again  been  billeted  on  the 
people ;  and  it  was  clear  to  the  Commons,  that 
the  five  subsidies  which  they  had  given,  as  the 
price  of  the  national  liberties,  had  been  given 
in  vain. 

They  met  accordingly  in  no  complying  hu 
mour.  They  took  into  their  most  serious  con 
sideration  the  measures  of  the  government 
concerning  tonnage  and  poundage.  They 
summoned  the  officers  of  the  custom-house  to 
their  bar.  They  interrogated  the  barons  of 
the  exchequer.  They  committed  one  of  the 
sheriffs  of  London.  Sir  John  Eliot,  a  distin 
guished  member  of  the  opposition,  and  an, 
intimate  friend  of  Hampden,  proposed  a  reso 
lution  condemning  the  unconstitutional  impo 
sition.  The  speaker  said  that  the  king  had 
commanded  him  to  put  no  such  question  to 
the  vote.  This  decision  produced  the  most 
violent  burst  of  feeling  ever  seen  within  the 
walls  of  Parliament.  Hay  man  remonstrated 
vehemently  against  the  disgraceful  language 
which  had  been  heard  from  the  chair.  Eliot 
dashed  the  paper  which  contained  his  resolu 
tion  on  the  floor  of  the  House.  Valentine  and 
Hollis  held  the  speaker  down  in  his  seat  by 
main  force,  and  read  the  motion  amidst  the 
loudest  shouts.  The  door  was  locked ;  the  key 
was  laid  on  the  table.  Black  Rod  knocked  for 
admittance  in  vain.  After  passing  several 
strong  resolutions,  the  House  adjourned. — On 
the  day  appointed  for  its  meeting,  it  was 
dissolved  by  the  king,  and  several  of  its 
most  eminent  members,  among  whom  were 
Hollis  and  Sir  John  Eliot,  were  committed  to 
prison. 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


157 


Though  Hampden  had  as  yet  taken  little 
part  in  the  debates  of  the  House,  he  had  been 
a  member  of  many  very  important  committees, 
and  had  read  and  written  much  concerning  the 
law  of  Parliament.  A  manuscript  volume  of 
Parliamentary  Cases,  which  is  still  in  exist 
ence,  contains  many  extracts  from  his  notes. 

He  now  retired  to  the  duties  and  pleasures 
of  a  rural  life.  During  the  eleven  years  which 
followed  the  dissolution  of  the  Parliament  of 
1628,  he  resided  at  his  seat  in  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  parts  of  the  county  of  Buckingham. 
The  hou.se,  which  has,  since  his  time,  been 
greatly  altered,  and  which  is  now,  we  believe, 
almost  entirely  neglected,  was  then  an  old 
English  mansion,  built  in  the  days  of  the 
Plantagenets  and  the  Tudors.  It  stood  on  the 
brow  of  a  hill  which  overlooks  a  narrow  val 
ley.  The  extensive  woods  which  surround  it 
were  pierced  by  long  avenues.  One  of  those 
avenues  the  grandfather  of  the  great  statesman 
cut  for  the  approach  of  Elizabeth ;  and  the 
opening,  which  is  still  visible  for  many  miles, 
retains  the  name  of  the  Queen's  Gap.  In  this 
delightful  retreat  Hampden  passed  several 
years,  performing  with  great  activity  all  the 
duties  of  a  landed  gentleman  and  a  magistrate, 
and  amusing  himself  with  books  and  with 
fieldsports. 

He  was  not  in  his  retirement  unmindful  of 
his  prosecuted  friends.  In  particular,  he  kept 
up  a  close  correspondence  with  Sir  John  Eliot, 
who  was  confined  in  the  Tower.  Lord  Nugent 
has  published  several  of  the  letters.  We  may 
perhaps  be  fanciful;  but  it  seems  to  us  that 
every  one  of  them  is  an  admirable  illustration 
of  some  part  of  the  character  of  Hampden 
•which  Clarendon  has  drawn. 

Part  of  the  correspondence  relates  to  the 
two  sons  of  Sir  John  Eliot.  These  young 
men  were  wild  and  unsteady;  and  their  father, 
who  was  now  separated  from  them,  was  na 
turally  anxious  about  their  conduct.  He  at 
length  resolved  to  send  one  of  them  to  France, 
and  the  other  to  serve  a  campaign  in  the  Low 
Countries.  The  letter  which  we  subjoin  shows 
that  Hampden,  though  rigorous  towards  him 
self,  was  not  uncharitable  towards  others,  and 
that  his  puritanism  was  perfectly  compatible 
with  the  sentiments  and  the  taste's  of  an  accom 
plished  gentleman.  It  also  illustrates  admi 
rably  what  has  been  said  of  him  by  Clarendon : 
"He  was  of  that  rare  affability  and  temper  in 
debate,  and  of  that  seeming  humility  and  sub 
mission  of  judgment,  as  if  he  brought  no  opi 
nion  of  his  own  with  him,  but  a  desire  of 
information  and  instruction.  Yet  he  had  so 
subtle  a  way  of  interrogating,  and,  under 
cover  of  doubts,  insinuating  his  objections 
that  he  infused  his  own  opinions  into  thoftf 
from  whom  he  pretended  to  learn  and  rece'vc; 
them." 

The  letter  runs  thus:  "I  am  so  perte.tly 
acquainted  with  your  clear  insight  irko  '-he 
dispositions  of  men,  and  ability  to  f.t  them 
with  courses  suitable,  that,  had  you  oestowed 
sons  of  mine  as  you  have  done  your  own,  my 
judgment  durst  hardly  have  called  it  into 
question,  especially  when,  in  laying  the  de 
sign,  you  have  prevented  the  objections  to  be 
ttiade  against  it  For  if  Mr.  Richard  Eliot 


will,  in  the  intermissions  of  action,  add  study 
to  practice,  and  adorn  that  lively  spirit  with 
flowers  of  contemplation,  he  will  raise  our 
expectations  of  another  Sir  Edward  Vere,  that 
had  this  character — all  summer  in  the  field,  all 
winter  in  his  study — in  whose  fall  fame  makes 
this  kingdom  a  great  loser;  and,  having  taken 
this  resolution  from  counsel  with  the  highest 
wisdom,  as  I  doubt  not  you  have,  I  hope  and 
pray  that  the  same  Power  will  crown  it  with  a 
blessing  answerable  to  our  wish.  The  way 
you  take  with  my  other  friend  shows  you  to  be 
none  of  the  Bishop  of  Exeter's  converts;*  of 
whose  mind  neither  am  I  superstitiously.  But 
had  my  opinion  been  asked,  I  should,  as  vulgar 
conceits  use  to  do,  have  showed  my  power 
rather  to  raise  objections  than  to  answer  them. 
A  temperf  between  France  and  Oxford  might 
have  taken  away  his  scruples,  with  more  ad 
vantage  to  his  years For 

although  he  be  one  of  those  that,  if  his  age 
were  looked  for  in  no  other  book  but  that  of 
the  mind,  would  be  found  no  ward  if  you  should 
die  to-morrow;  yet  it  is  a  great  hazard,  me- 
thinks,  to  see  so  sweet  a  disposition  guarded 
with  no  more,  amongst  a  people  whereof  many 
make  it  their  religion  to  be  superstitious  in 
impiety,  and  their  behaviour  to  be  affected  in 
ill  manners.  But  God,  who  only  knoweth  the 
periods  of  life  and  opportunities  to  come,  hath 
designed  him,  I  hope,  for  his  own  service  he- 
time,  and  stirred  up  your  providence  to  hus 
band  him  so  early  for  great  affairs.  Then 
shall  he  be  sure  to  find  Him  in  France  that 
Abraham  did  in  Sechem  and  Joseph  in  Egypt, 
under  whose  wing  alone  is  perfect  safety." 

Sir  John  Eliot  employed  himself,  during  his 
imprisonment,  in  writing  a  treatise  on  govern 
ment,  which  he  transmitted  to  his  iriend, 
Hampden's  criticisms  are  strikingly  olianto 
teristic.  They  are  written  with  ?!i  th.it  '-/low- 
ing  courtesy"  which  is  ascribe'!  to  him  by 
Clarendon.  The  objections  are  insinuated 
with  so  much  delicacy,  that  they  conic!  scarce 
ly  gall  the  most  irritable-  author.  We  see,  too, 
how  highly  Hampden  valued  in  the  writings 
of  others  that  concise-ness  which  was  one  of 
the  most  striking  peculiarities  of  his  own  elo 
quence.  Sir  Jjh;i  Eliot's  style  was,  it  seems, 
too  diffuse,  ar.d  Jt  is  impossible  not  to  admire 
the  skill  vi'.n  which  this  is  suggested.  "  The 
piece,"  sp.ys  Hampden,  "is  as  complete  an 
image  or  t'.-e  pattern  as  can  be  drawn  by  lines 
— a  Kvjly  character  of  a  large  mind — the  sub- 
jec',  method,  and  expression,  excellent  and 
horro<Teriial,  and  to  say  truth,  sweetheart, 
?jr/u.what  exceeding  my  commendations.  My 
vordi.  cannot  render  them  to  the  life.  Yet 
'.o  show  my  ingenuity  rather  than  wit — would 
not  a  less  model  have  given  a  full  representa* 
tion  of  that  subject — not  by  diminution  but  by 
contraction  of  parts?  I  desire  to  learn.  *I 
dare  not  say. — The  variations  upon  each  pai 


*  Lord  Nugent,  we  .htnk,  has  misunderstood  this  pas 
sage.  Hampden  seems  to  allude  to  IJishop  Hall's  sixth 
satire,  in  which  the  custom  of  sending  young  men 
ahroad  is  censured,  and  an  academic  life  recommend"*. 
We  have  a  general  recollection  that  tncre  is  soniftthinf 
to  the  same  effect  in  Hall's  prose  works;  but  we  hart 
not  time  to  search  them. 

t  "  A.  nitldle  COU«M> — c.  compromise." 


158 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ticular  seem  many — all,  I  confess,  excellent. 
The  fountain  was  full,  the  channel  narrow ; 
that  may  be  the  cause ;  or  that  the  author  re 
sembled  Virgil,  who  made  more  verses  by 
many  than  he  intended  to  write.  To  extract 
a  just  number,  had  I  seen  all  his,  I  could  easily 
have  bid  him  make  fewer;  but  if  he  had  bade 
me  tell  which  he  could  have  spared,  I  had  been 
posed." 

This  is  evidently  the  writing,  not  only  of  a 
man  of  good  sense  and  good  taste,  but  of  a  man 
of  literary  habits.  Of  the  studies  of  Hampden 
little  is  known.  But  as  it  was  at  one  time  in 
contemplation  to  give  him  the  charge  of  the 
education  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  it  cannot  be 
doubted  that  his  acquirements  were  consider 
able.  Davila,  it  is  said,  was  one  of  his  fa 
vourite  writers.  The  moderation  of  Davila's 
opinions,  and  the  perspicuity  and  manliness 
of  his  style,  could  not  but  recommend  him  to 
so  judicious  a  reader.  It  is  not  improbable 
that  the  parallel  between  France  and  England, 
the  Huguenots  and  the  Puritans,  had  struck 
the  mind  of  Hampden,  and  that  he  already  felt 
within  himself  powers  not  unequal  to  the  lofty 
part  of  Coligni.  While  he  was  engaged  in 
these  pursuits,  a  heavy  domestic  calamity  fell 
on  him.  His  wife,  who  had  borne  him  nine 
children,  died  in  the  summer  of  1634.  She 
lies  in  the  parish  church  of  Hampden,  close  to 
the  manor-house  The  tender  and  energetic 
language  of  her  tpilaph  still  attests  the  bitter 
ness  of  her  husband's  sorrow,  and  the  consola 
tion  which  he  found  in  a  hope  full  of  immor 
tality. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  aspect  of  public  affairs 
grew  darker  and  darker.  The  health  of  Eliot 
had  sunk  under  an  unlawful  imprisonment  of 
several  years.  The  brave  sufferer  refused  to 
purchase  liberty,  though  liberty  would  to  him 
have  been  life,  by  recognising  the  authority 
which  had  confined  him.  In  consequence  of 
the  representations  of  his  physicians,  the  se 
verity  of  restraint  was  somewhat  relaxed.  But 
it  was  in  vain.  He  languished  and  expired  a 
martyr  to  that  good  cause,  for  which  his  friend 
Hampden  was  destined  to  meet  a  more  brilliant 
but  not  a  more  honourable  death. 

All  the  promises  of  the  king  were  violated 
without  scruple  or  shame.  The  Petition  of 
Right,  to  which  he  had,  in  consideration  of 
moneys  duly  numbered,  given  a  solemn  assent, 
was  set  at  naught.  Taxes  were  raised  by  the 
royal  authority.  Patents  of  monopoly  were 
granted.  The  old  usages  of  feudal  times  were 
made  pretexts  for  harassing  the  people  with 
exactions  unknown  during  many  years.  The 
Puritans  were  persecuted  with  cruelty  worthy 
of  the  Holy  Office.  They  were  forced  to  fly 
from  the  country.  They  were  imprisoned. 
They  were  whipped.  Their  ears  were  cut  off. 
Their  noses  were  slit.  Their  cheeks  were 
branded  with  red-hot  iron.  But  the  cruelty  of 
tne  oppressor  could  not  tire  out  the  fortitude 
>.f  the  victims.  The  mutilated  defenders  of 
liberty  again  defied  the  vengeance  of  the  Star- 
Chamber,  came  back  with  undiminished  reso 
lution  to  the  place  of  their  glorious  infamy,  and 
manfully  presented  the  stumps  of  their  ears  to 
be  grubbed  out  by  the  hangman's  knife.  The 
oardv  sect  gre\r  up  and  flourished,  in  spite  of 


everything  that  seemed  likely  to  stunt  it,  struck 
its  roots  deep  into  a  barren  soil,  and  spread  its 
branches  wide  to  an  inclement  sky.  The  mul 
titude  thronged  round  Prynne  in  the  pillory 
with  more  respect  than  they  paid  to  Main  war 
ing  in  the  pulpit,  and  treasured  up  the  rags 
which  the  biood  of  Burton  had  soaked,  with  a 
veneration  such  as  rochets  and  surplices  had 
ceased  to  inspire. 

For  the  misgovernment  of  this  disastrous 
period,  Charles  himself  is  principally  respon 
sible.  After  the  death  of  Buckingham,  he 
seemed  to  have  been  his  own  prime  minister. 
He  had,  however,  two  counsellors  Avho  se 
conded  him,  or  went  beyond  him,  in  intolerance 
and  lawless  violence ;  the  one  a  superstitious 
driveller,  as  honest  as  a  vile  temper  would 
suffer  him  to  be ;  the  other  a  man  of  great  va 
lour  and  capacity,  but  licentious,  faithless, 
corrupt,  and  cruel. 

Never  were  faces  more  strikingly  character 
istic  of  the  individuals  to  whom  they  belonged, 
than  those  of  Laud  and  Strafford,  as  they  still 
remain  portrayed  by  the  most  skilful  hand  of 
that  age.  The  mean  forehead,  the  pinched 
features,  the  peering  eyes  of  the  prelate  suit 
admirably  with  his  disposition.  They  mark 
him  out  as  a  lower  kind  of  Saint  Dominic, 
differing  from  the  fierce  and  gloomy  enthu 
siast  who  founded  the  Inquisition,  as  we  might 
imagine  the  familiar  imp  of  a  spiteful  witch  to 
differ  from  an  archangel  of  darkness.  When 
we  read  his  judgments,  when  we  read  the  re 
port  which  he  drew  up,  setting  forth  that  he 
had  sent  some  separatists  to  prison,  and  im 
ploring  the  royal  aid  against  others,  we  feel  a 
movement  of  indignation.  We  turn  to  his 
Diary,  and  we  are  at  once  as  cool  as  contemrft 
can  make  us.  There  we  read  how  his  picture 
fell  down,  and  how  fearful  he  was  lest  the  fall 
should  be  an  omen;  how  he  dreamed  that  ths 
Duke  of  Buckingham  came  to  bed  to  him  ;  that 
King  James  walked  past  him;  that  he  saw 
Thomas  Flaxage  in  green  garments,  and  the 
Bishop  of  Worcester  with  his  shoulders  wrap 
ped  in  linen.  In  the  early  part  of  1627,  the 
sleep  of  this  great  ornament  of  the  church 
seems  to  have  been  much  disturbed.  On  the 
5th  of  January,  he  saw  a  merry  old  man  with 
a  wrinkled  countenance,  named  Grove,  lying 
on  the  ground.  On  the  fourteenth  of  the  same 
memorable  month,  he  saw  the  Bishop  of  Lin 
coln  jump  on  a  horse  and  ride  away.  A  day 
or  two  after  this,  he  dreamed  that  he  gave  th* 
king  drink  in  a  silver  cup,  and  that  the  king 
refused  it,  and  called  for  a  glass.  Then  he 
Ireamed  that  he  had  turned  Papist — of  all  his 
dreams  the  only  one,  we  suspect,  which  came 
through  the  gate  of  horn.  But  of  these  visions, 
our  favourite  is  that  which,  as  he  has  record 
ed,  he  enjoyed  on  the  night  of  Friday  the  9th 
of  February,  1627.  "I  dreamed,"  says  he, 
'*  that  I  had  the  scurvy ;  and  that  forthwith  all 
my  teeth  became  loose.  There  was  one  in 
especial  in  my  lower  jaw,  which  I  could 
scarcely  keep  in  with  my  finger  till  I  had  called 
help."  Here  was  a  man  to  have  the  super 
intendence  of  the  opinions  of  a  great  nation  ! 

But  Wentworth — who  ever  names  him  with 
out  thinking  of  those  harsh  dark  features,  en 
nobled  by  their  expressions  into  more  than  the 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


150 


majesty  of  an  antique  Jupiter;  of  that  brow, 
that  eye,  that  cheek,  that  lip,  wherein,  as  in  a 
chronicle,  are  written  the  events  of  many 
stormy  and  disastrous  years;  high  enterprise 
accomplished,  frightful  dangers  braved,  power  i 
unsparingly  exercised,  suffering  unshrink-  j 
ingly  borne ;  of  that  fixed  look,  so  full  of  se 
verity,  of  mournful  anxiety ;  of  deep  thought, 
of  dauntless  resolution,  which  seems  at  once 
to  forebode  and  defy  a  terrible  fate,  as  it 
lowers  on  us  from  the  living  canvass  of  Van- 
djkel  Even  at  this  day  the  haughty  earl 
overawes  posterity  as  he  overawed  his  con 
temporaries,  and  excites  the  same  interest 
when  arraigned  before  the  tribunal  of  history, 
which  he  excited  at  the  bar  of  the  House  of 
Lords.  In  spite  of  ourselves,  we  sometimes 
feel  towards  his  memory  a  certain  relenting, 
similar  to  that  relenting  which  his  defence,  as 
Sir  John  Denham  tells  us,  produced  in  West 
minster  Hall. 

This  great,  brare,  bad  man  entered  the 
House  of  Commons  at  the  same  time  with 
Hampden,  and  took  the  same  side  with  Hamp- 
den.  Both  were  among  the  richest  and  most 
powerful  commoners  in  the  kingdom.  Both 
were  equally  distinguished  by  force  of  charac 
ter  and  by  personal  courage.  Hampden  had 
more  judgment  and  sagacity  than  Wentworth. 
But  no  orator  of  that  time  equalled  Wentworth 
in  force  and  brilliancy  of  expression.  In  1626, 
both  these  eminent  men  were  committed  to  pri 
son  by  the  king ;  Wentworth,  who  was  among 
the  leaders  of  the  Opposition,  on  account  of  his 
parliamentary  conduct;  Hampden,  who  had 
not  as  yet  taken  a  prominent  part  in  debate, 
for  refusing  to  pay  taxes  illegally  imposed. 

Here  their  paths  separated.  After  the  death 
of  Buckingham,  the  king  attempted  to  seduce 
some  of  the  chiefs  of  the  opposition  from  their 
party  ;  and  Wentworth  was  among  those  who 
yielded  to  the  seduction.  He*abandoned  his 
associates,  and  hated  them  ever  after  with  the 
deadly  hatred  of  a  renegade.  High  titles  and 
great  employments  were  heaped  upon  him. 
He  became  Earl  of  Strafford,  Lord-Lieutenant 
of  Ireland,  President  of  the  Council  of  the 
North  ;  and  he  employed  all  his  power  for  the 
purpose  of  crushing  those  liberties  of  which 
he  had  been  the  most  distinguished  champion. 
His  counsels  respecting  public  affairs  were 
fierce  and  arbitrary.  His  correspondence  with 
Laud  abundantly  proves  that  government  with 
out  Parliaments,  government  by  the  sword,  was 
his  favourite  scheme.  He  was  unwilling  even 
that  the  course  of  justice  between  man  and 
man  should  be  unrestrained  by  the  royal  pre 
rogative.  He  grudged  to  the  Courts  of  King's 
Bench  and  Common  Pleas  even  that  measure 
of  liberty,  which  the  most  absolute  of  the 
Bourbons  have  allowed  to  the  Parliaments  of 
France. 

In  Ireland,  where  he  stood  in  the  place  of 
the  king,  his  practice  was  in  strict  accordance 
with  his  theory.  He  set  up  the  authority  of  the 
executive  government  over  that  of  the  courts 
of  law.  He  permitted  no  person  to  leave  the 
island  without  his  license.  He  established 
vast  monopolies  for  his  own  private  benefit. 
He  imposed  taxes  arbitrarily.  He  levied  them 
by  military  force.  Some  of  his  acts  are  de 


scribed  even  by  the  partial  Clarendon  as  pow 
erful  acts — acts  which  marked  a  nature  exces 
sively  imperious — acts  which  caused  dislike 
and  terror  in  sober  and  dispassionate  persons 
— high  acts  of  oppression.  Upon  a  most  fri 
volous  charge,  he  obtained  a  capital  sentence 
from  a  court-martial  against  a  man  of  high 
rank  who  had  given  him  offence.  He  debauch 
ed  the  daughter-in-law  of  the  Lord  Chan 
cellor  of  Ireland,  and  then  commanded  that 
nobleman  to  settle  his  estate  according  to  the 
wishes  of  the  lady.  The  chancellor  refused. 
The  Lord-Lieutenant  turned  him  out  of  oliice, 
and  threw  him  into  prison.  When  the  violent 
acts  of  the  Long  Parliament  are  blamed,  let  it 
not  be  forgotten  from  what  a  tyranny  they 
rescued  the  nation. 

Among  the  humbler  tools  of  Charles,  were 
Chief-justice  Finch,  and  Noy,  the  attorney- 
general.  Noy  had,  like  Wentworth,  supported 
the  cause  of  liberty  in  Parliament,  and  had, 
like  Wentworth,  abandoned  that  cause  for  the 
sake  of  office.  He  devised,  in  conjunction 
with  Finch,  a  scheme  of  exaction  which  made 
the  alienation  of  the  people  from  the  throne 
complete.  A  writ  was  issued  by  the  king,  com- 
ma-nding  the  city  of  London  to  equip  and  man 
ships  of  war  for  his  service.  Similar  writs 
were  sent  to  the  towns  along  the  coast.  These 
measures,  though  they  were  direct  violations  of 
the  Petition  of  Right,  had  at  least  some  show 
of  precedent  in  their  favour.  But,  after  a  time, 
the  government  took  a  step  for  M'hich  no  pre 
cedent  could  be  pleaded,  and  sent  writs  of  ship- 
money  to  the  inland  counties.  This  was  a 
stretch  of  power  on  which  E'izabeth  herself 
had  not  ventured,  even  at  a  time  when  all  laws 
might  with  propriety  have  been  made  to  bend 
to  that  highest  law,  the  safety  of  the  state.  The 
inland  counties  had  not  been  required  to  fur 
nish  ships,  or  money  in  the  room  of  ships, 
even  when  the  Armada  was  approaching  our 
shores.  It  seemed  intolerable  that  a  prince, 
who,  by  assenting  to  the  Petition  of  Right,  had 
relinquished  the  power  of  levying  ship-money 
even  in  the  outports,  should  be  the  first  to  levy 
it  on  paru  of  the  kingdom  where  it  had  been 
unknown,  under  the  most  absolute  of  his  prr- 
decessors. 

Clarendon  distinctly  admits  that  this  tax  va$ 
intended,  not  only  for  the  support  of  the  flavy, 
but  "for  a  spring  and  magazine  th£t  should 
have  no  bcttom,  and  for  an  everlasting  supply 
of  all  occasions."  The  nation  well  understood 
this;  and  from  one  end  of  England  to  the 
other,  the  public  mind  was  strongly  excited. 

Buckinghamshire  was  assessed  at  a  ship  of 
four  hundred  and  fifty  tons,  or  a  sum  of  four 
thousand  five  hundred  pounds.  The  share  of 
the  tax  which  fell  to  Hampden  was  very  small ; 
so  small,  indeed,  that  the  sheriff  was  blamed 
for  setting  so  wealthy  a  man  at  so  low  a  rate. 
But  though  the  sum  demanded  was  a  trifle,  the 
principle  of  the  demand  was  despotism.  Hamn- 
den,  after  consulting  the  most  eminent  cons^- 
tutional  lawyers  of  the  time,  refused  to  pay  the 
few  shillings  at  which  he  was  assessed ;  and 
determined  to  incur  all  the  certain  expense, 
and  the  probable  danger,  of  bringing  to  a 
solemn  hearing  this  great  controversy  betwren 
th<»  people  and  the  crown.  "Till  this  time," 


160 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


says  Clarendon,  "he  was  rather  of  reputation 
in  his  own  county,  than  of  puhlic  discourse  or 
fame  in  the  kingdom;  but  then  he  grew  the 
argument  of  all  tongues,  every  man  inquiring 
who  and  what  he  was  that  durst,  at  his  own 
charge,  support  the  liberty  and  prosperity  of 
the  kingdom." 

Towards  the  close  of  the  year  1636,  this 
great  cause  came  on  in  the  Exchequer  Cham 
ber  before  all  the  judges  of  England.  The 
leading  counsel  against  the  writ  \vas  the  cele 
brated  Oliver  St.  John;  a  man  whose  temper 
was  melancholy,  whose  manners  were  re 
served,  and  who  was  as  yet  little  known,  in 
Westminster  Hall;  but  whose  great  talents 
had  not  escaped  the  penetrating  eye  of  Hamp- 
den.  The  attorney-general  and  solicitor-gene 
ral  appeared  for  the  crown. 

The  arguments  of  the  counsel  occupied 
many  days  ;  and  the  Exchequer  Chamber  took 
a  considerable  time  for  deliberation.  The  opi 
nion  of  the  bench  was  divided.  So  clearly 
was  the  law  in  favour  of  Hampden,  that  though 
{he  judges  held  their  situations  only  during  the 
royal  pleasure,  the  majority  against  him  was 
the  least  possible.  Four  of  the  twelve  pro 
nounced  decidedly  in  his  favour;  a  fifth  took  a 
middle  course.  The  remaining  seven  gave 
their  voices  in  favour  of  the  writ. 

The  only  effect  of  this  decision  was  to  make 
the  public  indignation  stronger  and  deeper. 
"The  judgment,"  says  Clarendon,  "proved  of 
more  advantage  and  credit  to  the  gentleman 
condemned  than  to  the  king's  service."  The 
courage  which  Hampden  had  shown  on  this 
occasion,  as  the  same  historian  tells  us,  "raised 
his  reputation  to  a  great  height  generally 
throughout  the  kingdom."  Even  courtiers  and 
crown-lawyers  spoke  respectfully  of  him. 
"His  carriage,"  says  Clarendon,  "throughout 
that  agitation,  was  with  that  rare  temper  and 
modesty,  that  they  who  watched  him  narrowly 
to  find  some  advantage  against  his  person,  to 
make  him  less  resolute  in  his  cause,  were  com 
pelled  to  give  him  a  just  testimony."  But  his 
demeanour,  though  it  impressed  Lord  Falkland 
with  the  deepest  respect,  though  it  drew  forth 
the  praises  of  Solicitor-general  Herbert,  only 
kindled  into  a  fiercer  name  the  ever-burning 
hatred  of  Strafford.  That  minister,  in  his  let 
ters  to  Laud,  murmured  against  the  lenity  with 
which  Hampden  was  treated.  "  In  good  faith," 
he  wrote,  "were  such  men  rightly  served,  they 
should  be  whipped  into  their  right  wits." 
Again  he  says,  "I  still  wish  Mr.  Hampden, 
and  others  to  his  likeness,  were  well  whipped 


into  their  right  senses, 
used  that  it  smart  not, 


And  if  the  rod  be  so 
am  the  more  sorry.' 


The  person  of  Hampden  was  now  scarcely 


by  the  sentence  of  the  Star-Chamber,  and  smt 
to  rot  in  remote  dungeons.  The  estate  ani  the 
person  of  every  man  who  had  opposed  the 
court  were  at  its  mercy. 

Hampden  determined  to  leave  England. 
Beyond  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  a  few  of  the  per 
secuted  Puritans  had  formed,  in  the  wilderness 
of  Connecticut,  a  settlement  which  has  since 
become  a  prosperous  commonwealth;  and 
which,  in  spile  of  the  lapse  of  time,  and  of  the 
change  of  government,  still  retains  something 
of  the  character  given  to  it  by  its  first  founders. 
Lord  Say  and  Lord  Brooke  were  the  original 
projectors  of  this  scheme  of  emigration. 
Hampden  had  been  early  consulted  respecting 
it.  He  was  now,  it  appears,  desirous  to  with 
draw  himself  beyond  the  reach  of  oppressors, 
who,  as  he  probably  suspected,  and  as  we 
know,  were  bent  on  punishing  his  manful  re 
sistance  to  their  tyranny.  He  was  accompa 
nied  by  his  kinsman  Oliver  Cromwell,  over 
whom  he  possessed  great  influence,  and  in 
whom  he  alone  had  discovered,  under  an  ex 
terior  appearance  of  coarseness  and  extrava 
gance,  those  great  and  commanding  talents 
which  were  afterwards  the  admiration  and  the 
dread  of  Europe. 

The  cousins  took  their  passage  in  a  vessel 
which  lay  in  ths  Thames,  bound  for  North 
America.  They  were  actually  on  board,  when 
an  order  of  Council  appeared,  by  which  the 
ship  was  prohibited  from  sailing.  Seven  other 
ships,  filled  with  emigrants,  were  stopped  at 
the  same  time. 

Hampden  and  Cromwell  remained  ;  and  with 
them  remained  the  Evil  Genius  of  the  house 
of  Stuart.  The  tide  of  public  affairs  was  even 
now  on  the  turn.  The  king  had  resolved  to 
change  the  ecclesiastical  constitution  of  Scot 
land,  and  to  introduce  into  the  public  worship  of 
that  kingdom  ceremonies  which  the  great  body 
of  the  Scots  regarded  as  popish.  This  absurd 
attempt  produced,  first  discontents,  then  riots, 
and  at  length  open  rebellion.  A  provisional 
government  was  established  at  Edinburgh,  and 
its  authority  was  obeyed  throughout  the  king 
dom.  This  government  raised  an  army,  ap 
pointed  a  general,  and  called  a  General 
Assembly  of  the  Kirk.  The  far.rr*  instru 
ment  called  the  Covenant  was  put  fcr-'h  at 
this  time,  and  was  eagerly  subscribed  by  the 
people. 

The  beginnings  of  this  formidable  insurrec 
tion  were  strangely  neglected  by  the  king  and 
his  advisers.  But  towards  the  close  of  the 
year  1638,  the  danger  became  pressing.  An 
army  was  raised;  and  early  in  the  following 
spring  Charles  marched  northward,  at  the  head 
of  a  force  sufficient,  as  it  seemed,  to  reduce  the 


Covenanters  to  submission. 

But  Charles  acted,  at  this  conjuncture,  as  he 
acted  at  every  important  conjuncture, through 
out  his  life.  After  oppressing,  threatening,  and 


safe.  His  prudence  and  moderation  had 
hitherto  disappointed  those  who  would  gladly 
have  had  a  pretence  for  sending  him  to  the 
prison  of  Eliot.  But  he  knew  that  the  eye  of 

a  tyrant  was  oh  him.  In  the  year  1637,  mis-  blustering, he  hesitated  and  failed.  He  was  bold 
government  had  reached  its  height.  Eight  I  in  the  wrong  place,  and  timid  in  the  wrong  place, 
years  had  passed  without  a  Parliament.  The  !  He  would  have  shown  his  wisdom  by  being 
decision  of  the  Exchequer  Chamber  had  placed  !  afraid  before  the  liturgy  was  read  in  St.  Giles's 
at  the  disposal  of  the  crown  the  whole  pro-  j  church.  He  put  off  his  fear  till  he  had  reached 
perty  of  the  English  people.  About  the  time  the  Scottish  border  with  his  troops.  Then, 
at  which  that  decision  was  pronounced,  after  a  feeble  campaign,  he  concluded  a  treaty 
P  >nne,  Bastwick,  and  Burton  were  mutilated  with  the  insurgents,  and  withdrew  his  army. 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


161 


But  the  terms  of  the  pacification  were  not  ob- 1 
served.  Each  party  charged  the  other  with 
foul  play.  The  Scot&jefused  to  disarm.  The 
king  found  great  difficulty  in  reassembling  his 
forces.  His  late  expedition  had  drained  his 
treasury.  The  revenues  of  the  next  year  had 
been  anticipated.  At  another  time,  he  might 
have  attempted  to  make  up  the  deficiency  by 
illegal  expedients :  but  such  a  course  would 
clearly  have  been  dangerous  when  part  of  the 
island  was  in  rebellion.  It  was  necessary  to 
call  a  Parliament.  After  eleven  years  of  suf 
fering,  the  voice  of  the  nation  was  to  be  heard 
once  mere. 

In  April,  1640,  the  Parliament  met;  and  the 
king  had  another  chance  of  conciliating  his 
people.  The  new  House  of  Commons  was, 
beyond  all  comparison,  the  least  refractory 
House  of  Commons  that  had  been  known  for 
many  years.  Indeed,  we  have  never  been  able 
to  understand  how,  after  so  long  a  period  of 
misgovernment,  the  representatives  of  the  na 
tion  should  have  shown  so  moderate  and  so 
loyal  a  disposition.  Clarendon  speaks  with 
admiration  of  their  dutiful  temper.  "The 
House  generally,"  says  he,  "  was  exceedingly 
disposed  to  please  the  king  and  to  do  him  ser 
vice."  "It  could  never  be  hoped,"  he  observes 
elsewhere,  "that  more  sober  or  dispassionate 
men  would  ever  meet  together  in  that  place, 
or  fewer  who  brought  ill  purposes  with  them." 

In  this  Parliament  Hampden  took  his  seat 
as  member  for  Buckinghamshire;  and  thence 
forward  till  the  day  of  his  death  gave  himself 
up,  with  scarcely  any  intermission,  to  public 
affairs.  He  took  lodgings  in  Gray's  Inn  Lane, 
near  the  house  occupied  by  Pym,  with  whom 
he  lived  in  habits  of  the  closest  intimacy.  He 
was  now  decidedly  the  most  popular  man  in 
England.  The  Opposition  looked  to  him  as 
their  leader.  The  servants  of  the  king  treated 
him  with  marked  respect.  Charles  requested 
the  Parliament  to  vote  an  immediate  supply, 
and  pledged  his  word  that  if  they  would  gratify 
him  in  this  request,  he  would  afterwards  give 
them  time  to  represent  their  grievances  to 
him.  The  grievances  under  which  the  nation 
suffered  were  so  serious,  and  the  royal  word  had 
been  so  shamefully  violated,  that  the  Commons 
could  hardly  be  expected  to  comply  with  this 
request.  Daring  the  first  week  of  the  session 
the  minutes  of  the  proceedings  against  Hamp 
den  were  liid  on  the  table  by  Oliver  St.  John, 
and  the  committee  reported  that  the  case  was 
matter  of  grievance.  The  king  sent  a  message 
to  the  Commons,  offering,  if  they  would  vote 
him  twelve  subsidies,  to  give  up  the  preroga 
tive  of  ship-money.  Many  years  before  he  had 
received  five  subsidies  in  consideration  of  his 
assent  to  the  Petition  of  Right.  By  assenting 
to  that  petition,  he  had  given  up  the  right  of 
levying  ship-money,  if  he  ever  possessed  it. 
How  he  had  observed  the  promises  made  to 
his  third  Parliament  all  England  knew;  and  it 
was  not  strange  that  the  Commons  should  be 
somewhat  unwilling  to  buy  from  him  over  and 
over  again  their  own  ancient  and  undoubted 
inheritance. 

His  message,  however,  was  not  unfavour 
ably  received.  The  Commons  were  ready  to 
give  a  large  supply,  but  they  were  not  disposed 

VOL.  II.— 21 


to  give  it  in  exchange  for  a  prerogative  of  which 
they  altogether  denied  the  existence.  If  they 
acceded  to  the  proposal  of  the  king,  they  recog« 
nised  the  legality  of  the  writs  of  ship-money. 

Hampden,  who  was  a  greater  master  of  par 
liamentary  tactics  than  any  man  of  his  time, 
saw  that  this  was  the  prevailing  feeling,  and 
availed  himself  of  it  with  great  dexterity.  He 
moved  that  the  question  should  be  put,  "Whe 
ther  the  House  would  consent  to  the  proposi 
tion  made  by  the  king  as  contained  in  the 
message."  Hyde  interfered,  and  proposed  that 
the  question  should  be  divided ;  that  the  sense 
of  the  House  should  be  taken  merely  on  the 
point,  "Supply,  or  no  supply  1"  and  that  the 
manner  and  the  amount  should  be  left  for  sub 
sequent  consideration. 

The  majority  of  the  House  was  for  granting 
a  supply,  but  against  granting  it  in  the  manner 
proposed  by  the  king.  If  the  House  had  di 
vided  on  Hampden's  question,  the  court  would 
have  sustained  a  defeat ;  if  on  Hyde's,  the 
court  would  have  gained  an  apparent  victory. 
Some  members  called  for  Hyde's  motion,  others 
for  Hampden's.  In  the  midst  of  the  uproar  the 
secretary  of  state,  Sir  Harry  Vane,  rose  and 
stated  that  the  supply  would  not  be  accepted 
unless  it  were  voted  according  to  the  tenor  of 
the  message.  Vane  was  supported  by  Her 
bert,  the  solicitor-general.  Hyde's  motion  was 
therefore  no  further  pressed,  and  the  debate 
on  the  general  question  was  adjourned  till  the 
next  day. 

On  the  next  day  the  king  came  down  to  the 
House  of  Lords,  and  dissolved  the  Parliament 
with  an  angry  speech. 

His  conduct  on  this  occasion  has  never  been 
defended  by  any  of  his  apologists.  Clarendon 
condemns  it  severely.  "No  man,"  says  he, 
•4  could  imagine  what  offence  the  Commons 
had  given."  The  offence  which  they  had  given 
is  plain.  They  had,  indeed,  behaved  most  tem 
per:. tely  and  most  respectfully.  But  they  had 
shown  a  disposition  to  redress  wrongs  and  to 
vindicate  the  laws ;  and  this  was  enough  to 
make  them  hateful  to  a  king  whom  no  law 
could  bind,  and  whose  whole  government  was 
one  system  of  wrong. 

The  nation  received  the  intelligence  of  the 
dissolution  with  sorrow  and  indignation.  The 
only  persons  to  whom  this  event  gave  pleasure 
were  those  few  discerning  men  who  thought 
that  the  maladies  of  the  state  were  beyond  the 
reach  of  gentle  remedies.  Oliver  St.  John's 
joy  was  too  great  for  concealment.  It  lighted 
up  his  dark  and  melancholy  features,  an.-l  made 
him,  for  the  first  time,  indiscreetly  communica 
tive.  He  told  Hyde  that  things  must  be  worse 
before  they  could  be  better;  and  that  the  dis 
solved  Parliament  would  never  have  done  ,ili 
that  was  necessary.  St.  John,  we  think,  was 
in  the  right.  No  good  could  then  have  beea 
done  by  any  Parliament  which  did  not  adopt 
as  its  great  principle  that  no  confidence  could 
safely  be  placed  in  the  king,  and  that,  while  he 
enjoyed  more  than  the  shadow  of  power,  the 
nation  would  never  enjoy  more  than  the  sha 
dow  of  liberty. 

As  soon  as  Charles  had  dismissed  the  Par 
liament,  he  threw  several  members  of  the 
House  of  Commons  into  prison.  Ship-money 
o  2 


162 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


was  exacted  more  rigorously  than  ever;  and 
the  mayor  and  sheriff's  of  London  were  prose 
cuted  before  the  Star-Chamber  for  slackness 
in  levying  it.  Weritworth,  it  is  said,  observed, 
•with  characteristic  insolence  and  cruelty,  that 
things  would  never  go  right  till  the  aldermen 
were  hanged.  Large  sums  were  raised  by 
force  on  those  counties  in  which  the  troops 
were  quartered.  All  the  wretched  shifts  of  a 
beggared  exchequer  were  tried.  Forced  loans 
were  raised.  Great  quantities  of  goods  were 
bought  on  long  credit  and  sold  for  ready  money. 
A  scheme  for  debasing  the  currency  was  under 
consideration.  At  length,  in  August,  the  king 
again  marched  northward. 

The  Scots  advanced  into  England  to  meet 
feim.  It  is  by  no  means  improbable  that  this 
bold  step  was  taken  by  the  advice  of  Hampden, 
and  uf  those  with  whom  he  acted ;  and  this  has 
been  made  matter  of  grave  accusation  against 
the  English  Opposition.  To  call  in  the  aid  of 
foreigners  in  a  domestic  quarrel,  it  is  said,  is 
the  worst  of  treasons;  and  that  the  Puritan 
leaders,  by  taking  this  course,  showed  that  they 
•were  regardless  of  the  honour  and  independ 
ence  of  the  nation,  and  anxious  only  for  the 
success  of  their  own  faction.  We  are  utterly 
unable  to  see  any  distinction  between  the  case 
of  the  Scotch  invasion  in  1640  and  the  case  of 
the  Dutch  invasion  in  1688,  or  rather  we  see 
distinctions  which  are  to  the  advantage  of 
Hampden  and  his  friends.  We  believe  Charles 
to  have  been,  beyond  all  comparison,  a  worse 
and  more  dangerous  king  than  his  son.  The 
Dutch  were  strangers  to  us ;  the  Scots  a  kin 
dred  people,  speaking  the  same  language,  sub 
jects  of  the  same  crown,  not  aliens  in  the  eye 
of  the  law.  If,  indeed,  it  had  been  possible 
that  a  Dutch  army  or  a  Scotch  army  could 
have  enslaved  England,  those  who  persuaded 
Lesley  to  cross  the  Tweed,  and  those  who 
signed  the  invitation  to  the  Prince  of  Orange, 
would  have  been  traitors  to  their  country.  But 
such  a  result  was  out  of  the  question.  All  that 
either  a  Scotch  or  a  Dutch  invasion  could  do 
was  to  give  the  public  feeling  of  England  an 
opportunity  to  show  itself.  Both  expeditions 
would  have  ended  in  complete  and  ludicrous 
discomfiture  had  Charles  and  James  been  sup 
ported  by  their  soldiers  and  their  people.  In 
neither  case,  therefore,  was  the  independence 
of  England  endangered  ;  in  neither  case  was 
her  honour  compromised:  in  both  cases  her 
liberties  were  preserved. 

The  second  campaign  of  Charles  against 
the  Scots  was  short  and  ignominious.  His 
soldiers,  as  soon  as  they  saw  the  enemy,  ran 
away  as  English  soldiers  have  never  run  either 
before  or  since.  It  can  scarcely  be  doubted 
that  their  flight  was  the  effect,  not  of  cowardice, 
but  of  disaffection.  The  four  northern  coun 
ties  of  England  were  occupied  by  the  Scotch 
army.  The  king  retired  to  York. 

The  game  of  tyranny  was  now  up.  Charles 
had  risked  and  lost  his  last  stake.  It  is  im 
possible  to  retrace  the  mortifications  and  humi 
liations  which  this  bad  man  now  had  to  endure 
without  a  feeling  of  vindictive  pleasure.  His 
army  was  mutinous ;  his  treasury  was  empty ; 
his  people  clamoured  for  a  Parliament;  ad- 
tlresses  and  petitions  against  the  government 


were  presented.  Straffcrd  was  for  shooting 
those  who  presented  them  by  martial  law;  bat 
the  king  could  not  trust  the  soldiers.  A  §,reat 
council  of  Peers  was  cJlHed  at  York,  but  the 
king  could  not  trust  even  the  Peers.  He 
struggled,  he  evaded,  he  hesitated,  he  tried 
every  shift  rather  than  again  face  the  repre 
sentatives  of  his  injured  people.  At  length  no 
shift  was  left.  He  made  a  truce  with  the  Scots, 
and  summoned  a  Parliament. 

The  leaders  of  the  popular  party  had,  after 
the  late  dissolution,  remained  in  London  for 
the  purpose  of  organizing  a  scheme  of  oppo 
sition  to  the  court.  They  now  exerted  them 
selves  to  the  utmost.  Hampden,  in  particular, 
rode  from  county  to  county  exhorting  the  elect 
ors  to  give  their  votes  to  men  worthy  of  their 
confidence.  The  great  majority  of  the  returns 
was  on  the  side  of  the  Opposition.  Hampden 
was  himself  chosen  member  for  both  Wend- 
over  and  for  Buckinghamshire.  He  made  his 
election  to  serve  for  the  county. 

On  the  3d  of  November,  1640 — a  day  to  be 
long  remembered — met  that  great  Parliament, 
destined  to  every  extreme  of  fortune — to  em 
pire  and  to  servitude,  to  glory  and  to  con 
tempt; — at  one  time  the  sovereign  of  its  sove 
reign,  at  another  time  the  servant  of  its  ser 
vants,  and  the  tool  of  its  tools  From  the  first 
day  of  its  meeting  the  attendance  was  great, 
and  the  aspect  of  the  members  was  that  of 
men  not  disposed  to  do  the  work  negligently. 
The  dissolution  of  the  late  Parliament  had 
convinced  most  of  them  that  half  measure* 
would  no  longer  suffice.  Clarendon  tells  us 
that  "the  same  men  who,  six  months  before, 
were  observed  to  be  of  very  moderate  tempers, 
and  to  wish  that  gentle  remedies  might  be  ap 
plied,  talked  now  in  another  dialect  both  of 
kings  and  persons ;  and  said  that  they  must 
now  be  of  another  temper  than  they  were  the 
last  Parliament."  The  debt  of  vengeance  was 
swollen  by  all  the  usury  which  had  been  accu 
mulating  during  many  years  ;  and  payment 
was  made  to  the  full. 

This  memorable  crisis  called  forth  parlia 
mentary  abilities,  such  as  England  had  never 
before  seen.  Among  the  most  distinguished 
members  of  the  House  of  Commons  v/ere 
Falkland,  Hyde,  Digby,  Young,  Harry  Vane, 
Oliver  St.  John,  Denzil  Hollis,  Nathaniel 
Fiennes.  But  two  men  exercised  a  paramount 
influence  over  the  legislature  and  the  country 
— Pym  and  Hampden ;  and,  by  the  universal 
consent  of  friends  and  enemies,  the  first  place 
belonged  to  Hampden. 

On  occasions  which  required  set  speeche.1*- 
Pym  generally  took  the  lead.  Hampden  very 
seldom  rose  till  late  in  a  debate.  His  speaking 
was  of  that  kind  which  has,  in  every  age,  been 
held  in  the  highest  estimation  by  English  Par 
liaments —  ready,  weighty,  perspicuous,  con 
densed.  His  perception  of  the  feeling  of  the 
House  was  exquisite,  his  temper  unalterably 
placid,  his  manner,  eminently  courteous  and 
gentlemanlike.  "Even  with  those,"  says  Cla 
rendon,  "who  were  able  to  preserve  them 
selves  from  his  infusions,  and  who  discerned 
these  opinions  to  be  fixed  in  him  with  which 
they  could  not  comply,  he  always  left  the  cha 
racter  of  an  ingenuous  and  conscientious  pe*" 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


163 


son."  His  talents  for  business  were  as  remark 
able  as  his  talents  for  debate.  "  He  was,"  says 
Clarendon,  "of  an  industry  and  vigilance  not 
to  be  tired  out  or  wearied  by  the  most  labo 
rious,  and  of  parts  not  to  be  imposed  upon  by 
the  most  subtle  and  sharp."  Yet  it  was  rather 
to  his  moral  than  to  his  intellectual  qualities 
that  he  was  indebted  for  the  vast  influence 
which  he  possessed.  "When  this  Parliament 
began,"  we  again  quote  Clarendon,  "the  eyes 
of  all  men  were  fixed  upon  him,  as  their  palrice 
paler,  and  the  pilot  that  must  steer  the  vessel 
through  the  tempests  and  rocks  which  threat 
ened  it.  And  I  am  persuaded  his  power  and 
imprest  at  that  time  were  greater  to  do  good  or 
hurt  than  any  man's  in  the  kingdom,  or  than 
any  man  of  his  rank  hath  had  in  any  time ;  for 
his  reputation  of  honesty  was  universal,  and 
his  affections  seemed  so  publicly  guided,  that 
no  corrupt  or  private  ends  could  bias  them. 

He  was,  indeed,  a  very  wise  man 

and  of  great  parts,  and  possessed  with  the 
most  absolute  spirit  of  popularity,  and  the 
most  absolute  faculties  to  govern  the  people, 
of  any  man  I  ever  knew." 

It  is  sufficient  to  recapitulate  shortly  the  acts 
of  the  Long  Parliament  during  its  first  session. 
Strafford  and  Laud  were  impeached  and  im 
prisoned.  Strafford  was  afterwards  attainted 
by  bill,  and  executed.  Lord  Keeper  Finch  fled 
to  Holland,  Secretary  Windebank  to  France. 
All  those  whom  the  king  had,  during  the  last 
twelve  years,  employed  for  the  oppression  of 
his  people — from  the  servile  judges  who  had 
pronounced  in  favour  of  the  crown  against 
Hampden,  down  to  the  sheriffs  who  had  dis 
trained  for  ship-money  and  the  custom-house 
officers  who  had  levied  tonnage  and  poundage 
— were  summoned  to  answer  for  their  conduct. 
The  Star-Chamber,  the  High  Commission 
Court,  the  Council  of  York,  were  abolished. 
Those  unfortunate  victims  of  Laud,  who,  after 
undergoing  ignominious  exposure  and  cruel 
manglings,  had  been  sent  to  languish  in  dis 
tant  prisons,  were  set  at  liberty,  and  conducted 
through  London  in  triumphant  procession. 
The  king  was  compelled  to  give  to  the  judges 
patents  for  life,  or  during  good  behaviour.  He 
was  deprived  of  those  oppressive  powers 
which  were  the  last  relics  of  the  old  feudal 
tenures.  The  Forest  Courts  and  the  Stannary 
Courts  were  reformed.  It  was  provided  that 
the  Parliament  then  sitting  should  not  be  pro 
rogued  or  dissolved  without  its  own  consent; 
and  that  a  Parliament  should  be  held  at  least 
once  every  three  years. 

Many  of  these  measures  Lord  Clarendon  al 
lows  to  have  been  most  salutary;  and  few  per 
sons  will,  in  our  times,  deny  that,  in  the  laws 
passed  during  this  session,  the  good  greatly 
preponderated  over  the  evil.  The  abolition  of 
those  three  hateful  courts — the  Northern  Coun 
cil,  the  Star-Ch amber,  and  the  High  Commis 
sion — would  alone  entitle  the  Long  Parliament 
to  the  lasting  gratitude  of  Englishmen. 

The  proceedings  against  Strafford  undoubt 
edly  seem  hard  to  people  living  in  our  days; 
and  would  probably  have  seemed  merciful 
and  moderate  to  people  living  in  the  sixteenth 
century.  It  is  curious  to  compare  the  trial  of 
Charles'?  minister  with  the  trial,  if  it  can  be 


|  so  called,  of  Lord  Sudley,  in  the  blessed  reign 
'  of  Edward  the  Sixth.  None  of  the  great  re 
formers  of  our  church  doubted  for  a  moment 
of  the  propriety  of  passing  an  act  of  Parlia 
ment  for  cutting  off  Lord  Sudley's  head  with 
out  a  legal  conviction.  The  pious  Cranmer 
voted  for  that  act;  the  pious  Latimer  preached 
for  it;  the  pious  Edward  returned  thanks  for 
it;  and  all  the  pious  Lords  of  the  Council 
together  exhorted  their  victim  in  what  they 
were  pleased  facetiously  to  call  "the  quiet  and 
patient  suffering  of  justice." 

But  it  is  not  necessary  to  defend  the  pro 
ceedings  against  Strafford  by  any  such  compa 
rison.  They  are  justified,  in  our  opinion,  by 
that  which  alone  justifies  capital  punishment, 
or  any  punishment,  by  that  which  alone  justi 
fies  war — by  the  public  danger.  That  there  is 
a  certain  amount  of  public  danger,  which  will 
justify  a  legislature  in  sentencing  a  man  to 
death  by  an  ex  post  faclo  law,  few  people,  we 
suppose,  will  deny.  Few  people,  for  example, 
will  deny  that  the  French  Convention  was  per 
fectly  justified  in  declaring  Robespierre,  St. 
Just, 'and  Couthon,  hors  la  lot,  without  a  trial. 
This  proceeding  differed  from  the  proceeding 
against  Strafford,  only  in  being  much  more 
rapid  and  violent.  Strafford  was  fully  heard. 
Robespierre  was  not  suffered  to  defend  him 
self.  Was  there,  then,  in  the  case  of  Strafford, 
a  danger  sufficient  to  justify  an  act  of  attain 
der  1  We  believe  that  there  was.  We  believe 
that  the  contest  in  which  the  Parliament  was 
engaged  against  the  king,  was  a  contest  for 
the  security  of  our  property,  for  the  liberty  of 
our  persons,  for  every  thing  which  makes  us 
to  differ  from  the  subjects  of  Don  Miguel.  We 
believe  that  the  cause  of  the  Commons  was 
such  as  justified  them  in  resisting  the  king,  in 
raising  an  army,  in  sending  thousands  of  brave 
men  to  kill  and  to  be  killed.  An  act  of  attain 
der  is  surely  not  more  a  departure  from  the 
ordinary  course  of  law  than  a  civil  war.  An 
act  of  attainder  produces  much  less  suffering 
than  a  civil  war;  and  we  are,  therefore,  UH- 
able  to  discover  on  what  principle  it  can  be 
maintained  that  a  cause  which  justifies  a  civil 
war,  will  not  justify  an  act  of  attainder. 

Many  specious  arguments  have  been  urged 
against  the  ex  post  facto  law  by  which  Strafford 
was  condemned  to  death.  But  all  these  argu 
ments  proceed  on  the  supposition  that  the 
crisis  was  an  ordinary  crisis.  The  attainder 
was,  in  truth,  a  revolutionary  measure.  It 
was  part  of  a  system  of  resistance  which  op 
pression  had  rendered  necessary.  It  is  as  un 
just  to  judge  of  the  conduct  pursued  by  the 
Long  Parliament  towards  Strafford  on  ordina 
ry  principles,  as  it  would  have  been  to  indict 
Fairfax  for  murder,  because  he  cut  down  a 
cornet  at  Naseby.  From  the  day  on  which  the 
Houses  met,  there  was  a  war  waged  by  them 
against  the  king — a  war  for  all  that  they  held 
dear — a  war  carried  on  at  first  by  means  of 
parliamentary  forms,  at  last  by  physical  force , 
and,  as  in  the  second  stage  of  that  war,  so  in  the 
first,  they  were  entitled  to  do  many  things  which, 
in  quiet  times,  would  have  been  culpable. 

We  must  not  omit  to  mention,  that  thosa 
men  who  were  afterwards  the  most  distin 
guished  ornaments  of  the  king's  party,  sup 


164 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ported  the  bill  of  attainder.  It  is  almost  cer 
tain  that  Hyde  voted  for  it.  It  is  quite  certain 
that  Falkland  both  voted  and  spoke  for  it.  The 
opinion  of  Hampden,  as  far  as  it  can  be  col 
lected  from  a  very  obscure  note  of  one  of  his 
speeches,  seems  to  have  been,  that  the  pro 
ceeding  by  bill  was  unnecessary,  and  that  it 
would  be  a  better  course  to  obtain  judgment 
on  the  impeachment. 

During  this  year  the  court  opened  a  nego 
tiation  with  the  leaders  of  the  Opposition.  The 
Earl  of  Bedford  was  invited  to  form  an  admi 
nistration  on  popular  principles.  St.  John  was 
made  solicitor-general.  Hollis  was  to  have 
been  secretary  of  state,  and  Pym  chancellor  of 
the  exchequer.  The  post  of  tutor  to  the  Prince 
of  Wales  was  designed  for  Hampden.  The 
death  of  the  Earl  of  Bedford  prevented  this 
arrangement  from  being  carried  into  effect; 
and  it  may  be  doubted  whether,  even  if  that 
nobleman's  life  had  been  prolonged,  Charles 
would  ever  have  consented  to  surround  him 
self  with  counsellors  whom  he  could  not  but 
hate  and  fear. 

Lord  Clarendon  admits  that  the  conduct  of 
Hampden  during  this  year  was  mild  and  tem 
perate  ;  that  he  seemed  disposed  rather  to 
soothe  than  to  excite  the  public  mind ;  and  that, 
when  violent  and  unreasonable  motions  were 
made  by  his  followers,  he  generally  left  the 
House  before  the  division,  lest  he  should  seem 
to  give  countenance  to  their  extravagance. 
His  temper  was  moderate.  He  sincerely  loved 
peace.  He  felt  also  great  fear  lest  too  precipi 
tate  a  movement  should  produce  a  reaction. 
The  events  which  took  place  early  in  the  next 
session  clearly  showed  that  this  fear  was  not 
unfounded. 

During  the  autumn  the  Parliament  adjourned 
for  a  few  weeks.  Before  the  recess,  Hampden 
was  despatched  to  Scotland  by  the  House  of 
Commons,  nominally  as  a  commissioner,  to 
obtain  security  for  a  debt  which  the  Scots  had 
contracted  during  the  late  invasion;  but  in 
truth  that  he  might  keep  watch  over  the  king, 
who  had  now  repaired  to  Edinburgh,  for  the 
purpose  of  finally  adjusting  the  points  of  dif 
ference  which  remained  between  him  and  his 
northern  subjects.  It  was  the  business  of 
Hampden  to  dissuade  the  Covenanters  from 
making  their  peace  with  the  court  at  the  ex 
pense  of  the  popular  party  in  England. 

While  the  king  was  in  Scotland,  the  Irish 
rebellion  broke  out.  The  suddenness  and  vio 
lence  of  this  terrible  explosion  excited  a 
strange  suspicion  in  the  public  mind.  The 
queen  was  a  professed  Papist.  The  king  and 
the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  had  not  indeed 
been  reconciled  to  the  See  of  Rome ;  but  they 
had,  while  acting  towards  the  Puritan  party 
with  the  utmost  rigour,  and  speaking  of  that 
party  with  the  utmost  contempt,  shown  great 
tenderness  and  respect  towards  the  Catholic  re 
ligion  and  its  professors.  In  spite  of  the  wishes 
of  successive  Parliaments,  the  Protestant  sepa 
ratists  had  been  cruelly  persecuted.  And  at  the 
same  time,  in  spite  of  the  wishes  of  those  very 
Parliaments,  the  laws — the  unjust  and  wicked 
law?, — which  were  in  force  against  the  Papists, 
had  not  been  carried  into  execution.  The 
Protestant  nonconformists  had  not  yet  learned 


toleration  in  the  school  of  suffering.  They 
reprobated  the  partial  lenity  which  the  govern* 
ment  showed  towards  idolaters ;  and,  with 
some  show  of  reason,  ascribed  to  bad  motives 
conduct  which,  in  such  a  king  as  Charles,  and 
such  a  prelate  as  Laud,  could  not  possibly  be 
ascribed  to  humanity  or  to  liberality  of  senti 
ment.  The  violent  Arminianism  of  the  arch 
bishop,  his  childish  attachment  to  ceremonies, 
his  superstitious  veneration  for  altars,  vest 
ments,  and  painted  windows, his  bigoted  zeal  for 
the  constit-ution  and  the  privileges  of  his  order, 
his  known  opinions  respecting  the  celibacy  of 
the  clergy,  had  excited  great  disgust  through 
out  that  large  party  which  was  every  day  be 
coming  more  and  more  hostile  to  Rome,  and 
more  and  more  inclined  to  the  doctrines  and 
the  discipline  of  Geneva.  It  was  believed 
by  many,  that  the  Irish  rebellion  had  been  se 
cretly  encouraged  by  the  court ;  and  when  ihe 
Parliament  met  again  in  November,  after  a 
short  recess,  the  Puritans  were  more  intracta 
ble  than  ever. 

But  that  which  Hampden  had  feared  had 
come  to  pass.  A  reaction  had  taken  place.  A 
large  body  of  moderate  and  well-meaning  men, 
who  had  heartily  concurred  in  the  strong  mea 
sures  adopted  during  the  preceding  year,  were 
inclined  to  pause.  Their  opinion  was,  that 
during  many  years,  the  country  had  been  griev 
ously  misgoverned,  and  that  a  great  reform 
had  been  necessary;  but,  that  a  great  reform 
had  been  made,  that  the  grievances  of  the  na 
tion  had  been  fully  redressed,  that  sufficient 
vengeance  had  been  exacted  for  the  past,  and 
sufficient  security  provided  for  the  future;  thai 
it  would,  therefore,  be  both  ungrateful  and  un 
wise  to  make  any  further  attacks  on  the  royal 
prerogative.  In  support  of  this  opinion  many 
plausible  arguments  have  been  used.  But  to 
all  these  arguments  there  is  one  short  answer: 
the  king  could  not  be  trusted. 

At  the  head  of  those  who  may  be  called  the 
Constitutional  Royalists,  were  Falkland,  Hyde, 
and  Culpeper.  All  these  eminent  men  had, 
during  the  former  year,  been  in  very  decided 
opposition  to  the  court.  In  some  of  those  very 
proceedings  with  which  their  admirers  re 
proach  Hampden,  they  had  taken  at  least  as 
great  a  part  as  Hampden.  They  had  all  been 
concerned  in  the  impeachment  of  Stratford. 
They  had  all,  there  is  reason  to  believe,  voted 
for  the  Bill  of  Attainder.  Certainly  none  of 
them  voted  against  it.  They  had  all  agreed  to 
the  act  which  made  the  consent  of  the  Parlia 
ment  necessary  to  its  own  dissolution  or  pro 
rogation.  Hyde  had  been  among  the  most  ac 
tive  of  those  who  attacked  the  Council  of 
York.  Falkland  had  voted  for  the  exclusion 
of  the  bishops  from  the  Upper  House.  They 
were  now  inclined  to  halt  in  the  path  of  reform; 
perhaps  to  retrace  a  few  of  their  steps. 

A  directcollision  soon  took  place  between  the 
two  parties,  into  which  the  House  of  Commons, 
lately  at  almost  perfect  unity  with  itself,  was 
now  divided.  The  opponents  of  the  govern 
ment  moved  that  celebrated  address  to  the 
king  which  is  known  by  the  name  of  tho 
Grand  Remonstrance.  In  this  address  all  the 
oppressive  acts  of  the  preceding  fifteen  years 
were  set  forth  with  great  energy  of  language 


LORD  NUGENTS  MEMORIALS  OF   HAMPDEN. 


165 


and,  in  conclusion,  the  king  was  entreated  to 
employ  no  ministers  in  whom  the  Parliament 
could  not  confide. 

The  debate  on  the  Remonstrance  was  long 
and  stormy.  It  commenced  at  nine  in  the 
morning  of  the  twenty-first  of  November,  and 
lasted  till  after  midnight.  The  division  showed 
that  a  great  change  had  taken  place  in  the 
temper  of  the  House.  Though  many  members 
had  retired  from  exhaustion,  three  hundred 
voted,  and  the  remonstrance  was  carried  by  a 
majority  of  only  nine.  A  violent  debate  fol 
lowed  on  the  question  whether  the  minority 
should  be  allowed  to  protest  against  this  deci 
sion.  The  excitement  was  so  great  that  seve 
ral  members  were  on  the  point  of  proceeding 
to  personal  violence.  "  We  had  sheathed  our 
swords  in  each  other's  bowels,"  says  an  eye 
witness,  "had  not  the  sagacity  and  great  calm 
ness  of  Mr.  Hampden,  by  a  short  speech,  pre 
vented  it."  The  House  did  not  rise  till  two  in 
the  morning. 

The  situation  of  the  Puritan  leaders  was  now 
difficult  and  full  of  peril.  The  small  majority 
which  they  still  had,  might  soon  become  a  mi 
nority.  Out  of  doors  their  supporters  in  the 
higher  and  middle  classes  were  beginning  to 
fall  off.  There  was  a  growing  opinion  that  the 
king  had  been  hardly  used.  The  English  are 
always  inclined  to  side  with  a  weak  party 
which  is  in  the  wrong,  rather  than  with  a 
strong  party  which  is  in  the  right.  Even  the 
idlers  in  the  street  will  not  suffer  a  man  to  be 
struck  when  he  is  down.  And  as  it  is  with  a 
boxing-match,  so  it  is  with  a  political  contest. 
Thus  it  was  that  a  violent  reaction  took  place 
in  favour  of  Charles  the  Second,  against  the 
Whigs,  in  1681.  Thus  it  was  that  an  equally 
violent  reaction  took  place  in  favour  of  George 
the  Third,  against  the  coalition,  in  1784.  A 
similar  reaction  was  beginning  to  take  place 
during  the  second  year  of  the  Long  Parliament. 
Some  members  of  the  Opposition  "  had  re 
sumed,"  says  Clarendon,  "  their  old  resolution 
of  leaving  the  kingdom."  Oliver  Cromwell 
openly  declared  that  he  and  many  others  would 
have  emigrated,  if  they  had  been  left  in  a  mi 
nority  on  the  question  of  the  Remonstrance. 

Charles  had  now  a  last  cnance  of  regaining 
the  afPotiori  of  his  people.  If  he  could  have 
resolved  to  give  his  confidence  to  the  leaders 
of  the  moderate  party  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  and  to  regulate  his  proceedings  by  their 
advice,  he  might  have  been,  not,  indeed  as  he 
had  been,  a  despot,  but  the  powerful  and  re 
spected  king  of  a  free  people.  The  nation 
might  have  enjoyed  liberty  and  repose  under  a 
government,  with  Falkland  at  its  head,  checked 
by  a  constitutional  Oooosition,  under  the  con 
duct  of  Hampden.  It  was  not  necessary  that, 
in  order  to  accomplish  this  happy  end,  the 
king  should  sacrifice  any  part  of  his  lawful 
prerogative,  or  submit  to  any  conditions  incon 
sistent  with  his  dignity.  It  was  necessary  only 
that  he  should  abstain  from  treachery,  from 
violence,  from  gross  breaches  of  the  law. 
This  was  al.l  that  the  nation  was  then  disposed 
to  require  of  him.  And  even  this  was  too  much. 

For  a  short  time  he  seemed  inclined  to  take 
a  wise  and  temperate  course.  He  resolved  to 
make  Falkland  secretary  of  state ;  and  Cul- 


peper  chancellor  of  the  exchequer.  He  de 
clared  his  intention  of  conferring  in  a  shoit 
time  some  important  office  on  Hyde.  He  as 
sured  these  three  persons  that  he  would  do 
nothing  relating  to  the  House  of  Commons 
without  their  joint  advice ;  and  that  he  would 
communicate  all  his  designs  to  them  in  the 
most  unreserved  manner.  This  resolution,  had 
he  adhered  to  it,  would  have  averted  many 
years  of  blood  and  mourning.  But  "  in  a  very 
few  days,"  says  Clarendon,  "  he  did  fatally 
swerve  from  it." 

On  the  3d  of  January,  1642,  without  giving  the 
slightest  hint  of  his  intention  to  those  advisers 
whom  he  had  solemnly  promised  to  consult, 
he  sent  down  the  attorney-general  to  impeach 
Lord  Kimbolton,  Hampden,  Pym,  Hollis,  and 
two  other  members  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
at  the  bar  of  the  Lords,  on  a  charge  of  high 
treason.  It  is  difficult  to  find  in  the  whole  his 
tory  of  England  such  an  instance  of  tyranny, 
perfidy,  and  folly.  The  most  precious  and  an 
cient  rights  of  the  subjects  were  violated  by 
this  act.  The  only  way  in  which  Hampden  and 
Pym  could  legally  be  tried  for  treason  at  the 
suit  of  the  king,  was  by  a  petty  jury  on  a  bill 
found  by  a  grand  jury.  The  attorney-general 
had  no  right  to  impeach  them.  The  House  of 
Lords  had  no  right  to  try  them. 

The  Commons  refused  to  surrender  their 
members.  The  Peers  showed  no  inclination 
to  usurp  the  unconstitutional  jurisdiction, 
which  the  king  attempted  to  force  on  them. 
A  contest  began,  in  which  violence  and  weak 
ness  were  on  the  one  side,  law  and  resolution 
on  the  other.  Charles  sent  an  officer  to  seal 
up  the  lodgings  and  trunks  of  the  accused 
members.  The  Commons  sent  their  sergeant 
to  break  the  seals.  The  tyrant  resolved  to  fol 
low  up  one  outrage  by  another.  In  making 
the  charge,  he  had  struck  at  the  institution  of 
juries.  In  executing  the  arrest,  he  struck  at 
the  privileges  of  Parliament.  He  resolved  to 
go  to  the  House  in  person,  with  an  armed 
force,  and  there  to  seize  the  leaders  of  the  Op 
position,  while  engaged  in  the  discharge  of 
their  parliamentary  duties. 

What  was  his  purpose?  Is  it  possible  to 
believe  that  he  had  no  definite  purpose — .hat 
he  took  the  most  important  step  of  his  whole 
reign  without  having  for  one  moment  consi 
dered  what  might  be  its  effects  ]  Is  it  possible 
to  believe,  that  he  went  merely  for  the  purpose 
of  making  himself  a  laughing-stock ;  that  he 
intended,  if  he  had  found  the  accused  mem 
bers,  and  if  they  had  refused,  as  it  was  their 
right  and  duty  to  refuse,  the  submission  which 
he  illegally  demanded,  to  leave  the  House 
without  bringing  them  away  ]  If  we  reject 
botn  these  suppositions,  we  must  believe — and 
we  certainly  do  believe — that  he  went  fully 
determined  to  carry  his  unlawful  design  into 
effect  by  violence;  and,  if  necessary,  to  shed 
the  blood  of  the  chiefs  of  the  Opposition  on  the 
very  floor  of  the  Parliament  House. 

Lady  Carlisle  conveyed  intelligence  of  this 
design  to  Pym.  The  five  members  had  timft 
to  withdraw  before  the  arrival  of  Charles. 
They  left  the  House  as  he  was  entering  New 
Palace  Yard.  He  was  accompanied  by  about 
two  hundred  halberdiers  of  his  guard,  and  bf 


160 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


many  gentlemen  of  the  court  armed  with 
swords.  He  walked  up  Westminster  Hall. 
At  the  southern  door  of  that  vast  building,  his 
attendants  divided  to  the  right  and  left,  and 
formed  a  lane  to  the  door  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  He  knocked,  entered,  darted  a  look  to 
wards  the  place  which  Pym  usually  occupied ; 
and  seeing  it  empty,  walked  up  to  the  table. 
The  speaker  fell  on  his  knee.  The  members 
rose  and  uncovered  their  heads  in  profound 
silence,  and  the  king  took  his  seat  in  the  chair. 
He  looked  round  the  house.  But  the  five 
members  were  nowhere  to  be  seen.  He  in 
terrogated  the  speaker.  The  speaker  answer 
ed,  that  he  was  merely  the  organ  of  the  House, 
and  had  neither  eyes  to  see,  nor  tongue  to 
speak,  but  according  to  their  direction.  The 
baffled  tyrant  muttered  a  few  feeble  sentences 
about  his  respect  for  the  laws  of  the  realm 
and  the  privileges  of  Parliament,  and  retired 
As  he  passed  along  the  benches,  several  reso 
lute  voices  called  out  audibly,  "  Privilege  !" 
He  returned  to  Whitehall  with  his  company 
of  bravoes,  who,  while  he  was  in  the  house, 
had  been  impatiently  waiting  in  the  lobby  for 
the  word,  cocking  their  pistols,  and  crying, 
"  Fall  on."  That  night  he  put  forth  a  procla 
mation,  directing  that  the  posts  should  be  stop 
ped,  and  that  no  person  should,  at  his  peril, 
venture  to  harbour  the  accused  members. 

Hampden  and  his  friends  had  taken  refuge 
in  Coleman  street.  The  city  of  London  was 
indeed  the  fastness  of  public  liberty ;  and  was, 
in  those  times,  a  place  of  at  least  as  much  im 
portance  as  Paris  during  the  French  revolution. 
The  city,  propeily  so  called,  now  consists  in  a 
great  measure  of  immense  warehouses  and 
counting-houses,  which  are  frequented  by  tra 
ders  and  their  clerks  during  the  day,  and  left  in 
almost  total  solitude  during  the  night.  It  was 
then  closely  inhabited  by  three  hundred  thou 
sand  persons,  to  whom  it  was  not  merely  a 
place  of  business,  but  a  place  of  constant  resi 
dence  This  great  body  had  as  complete  a 
civil  and  military  organization  as  if  it  had 
been  an  independent  republic.  Each  citizen 
had  his  company ;  and  the  companies,  -which 
now  seem  to  exist  only  for  the  delectation  of 
epicures  and  of  antiquaries,  were  then  for 
midable  brotherhoods;  the  members  of  which 
were  almost  as  closely  bound  together  as  the 
members  of  a  Highland  clan.  How  strong 
these  artificial  ties  were,  the  numerous  and 
valuable  legacies  anciently  bequeathed  by  citi 
zens  to  their  corporations  abundantly  prove. 
The  municipal  offices  were  filled  by  the  most 
opulent  and  respectable  merchants  of  the  king 
dom.  The  pomp  of  the  magistracy  of  the 
capital  was  second  only  to  that  which  sur 
rounded  the  person  of  the  sovereign.  The 
Londoners  loved  their  city  with  that  patriotic 
jove  unich  is  found  only  in  small  communities, 
like  those  of  ancient  Greece,  or  like  those 
which  arose  in  Italy  during  the  middle  ages. 
The  numbers,  the  intelligence,  the  wealth  of 
the  citizens,  the  democratic  form  of  their  local 
government,  arid  their  vicinity  to  the  court  and 
and  to  the  Parliament,  made  them  one  of  the 
most  formidable  bodies  in  the  kingdom.  Even 
as  soldiers,  they  were  not  to  be  despised.  In 
an  age  in  which  war  is  a  profession,  there  is 


something  ludicrous  in  the  idea  of  battalions 
composed  of  apprentices  and  shopkeepers,  and 
officered  by  aldermen.  But,  in  the  early  part  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  there  was  no  standing 
army  in  the  island;  and  the  militia  of  the  me 
tropolis  was  not  inferior  in  training  to  the 
militia  of  other  places.  A  city  which  could 
furnish  many  thousands  of  armed  men,  abound 
ing  in  natural  courage,  and  not  absolutely  un- 
tinctured  with  military  discipline,  was  a  formi 
dable  auxiliary  in  times  of  internal  dissension. 
On  several  occasions  during  the  civil  war,  the 
trainbands  of  London  distinguished  themselves 
highly;  and  at  the  battle  of  Newbury,  in  par 
ticular,  they  repelled  the  onset  of  fiery  Rupert, 
and  saved  the  army  of  the  Parliament  from 
destruction. 

The  people  of  this  great  city  had  long  been 
thoroughly  devoted  to  the  national  cause.  Great 
numbers  of  them  had  signed  a  protestation,  in 
which  they  declared  their  resolution  to  defend 
the  privileges  of  Parliament.  Their  enthu 
siasm  had  of  late  begun  to  cool.  The  im 
peachment  of  the  five  members,  and  the  insult 
offered  to  the  House  of  Commons,  inflamed  it 
to  fury.  Their  houses,  their  purses,  their 
pikes,  were  at  the  command  of  the  Commons. 
London  was  in  arms  all  night.  The  next  day 
the  shops  were  closed;  the  streets  were  filled 
with  immense  crowds.  The  multitude  pressed 
round  the  king's  coach,  and  insulted  him  with 
opprobrious  cries.  The  House  of  Commons, 
in  the  mean  time,  appointed  a  committee  to 
sit  in  the  city,  for  the  purpose  of  inquiring  into 
the  circumstances  of  the  late  outrage.  The 
members  of  the  committee  were  welcomed  by 
a  deputation  of  the  common  council.  Mer 
chant  Tailors'  Hall,  Goldsmiths'  Hall,  and 
Grocers'  Hall  were  fitted  up  for  their  sittings. 
A  guard  of  respectable  citizens,  duly  relieved 
twice  a  day,  was  posted  at  their  doors.  The 
sheriffs  were  charged  to  watch  over  the  safety 
of  the  accused  members,  and  to  escort  them  to 
and  from  the  committee  with  every  mark  of 
honour. 

A  violent  and  sudden  revulsion  of  feeling, 
both  in  the  House  and  out  of  it,  was  the  effect 
of  the  late  proceedings  of  the  king.  The  Op 
position  regained  in  a  few  hours  all  the  as 
cendency  which  it  had  lost.  The  constitutional 
royalists  were  filled  with  shame  and  sorrow. 
They  felt  that  they  had  been  cruelly  deceived 
by  Charles.  They  saw  that  they  were  unjustly, 
but  not  unreasonably,  suspected  by  the  nation. 
Clarendon  distinctly  says,  that  they  perfectly 
detested  the  councils  by  which  the  king  had 
been  guided,  and  were  so  much  displeased  and 
dejected  at  the  unfair  manner  in  which  he  had 
treated  them,  that  they  were  inclined  to  retire 
from  his  service.  During  the  debates  on  this 
subject,  they  preserved  a  melancholy  silence. 
To  this  day,  the  advocates  of  Charles  take  care 
to  say  as  little  as  they  can  about  his  vit.it  to  the 
House  of  Commons;  and,  when  they  cannot 
avoid  mention  of  it,  attribute  to  infatuation  an 
!  act,  which,  on  any  other  supposition,  they  must 
i  admit  to  have  been  a  frightful  crime. 

The  Commons,  in  a  few  days,  openly  defied 
the  king,  and  ordered  the  accused  members 
to  attend  in  their  places  at  Westminster,  and 
to  resume  their  parliamentary  duties.  The 


LORD  NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF    HAMPDEN. 


167 


citizens  resolved  to  bring  back  the  champions 
of  liberty  in  triumph  before  the  windows  of 
Whitehall.  Vast  preparations  were  made  both 
by  land  and  water  for  this  great  festival. 

The  king  had  remained  in  his  palace,  hum 
bled,  dismayed,  and  bewildered;  "feeling," 
says  Clarendon,  "  the  trouble  and  agony  which 
usually  attend  generous  and  magnanimous 
minds  upon  their  having  committed  errors;" 
feeling,  we  should  say,  the  despicable  repent 
ance  which  attends  the  bungling  villain,  who, 
having  attempted  to  commit  a  crime,  finds  that 
he  has  only  committed  a  folly.  The  populace 
hooted  and  shouted  all  day  before  the  gates  of 
the  royal  residence.  The  wretched  man  could 
not  bear  to  see  the  triumph  of  those  whom  he 
had  destined  to  the  gallows  and  the  quartering 
block.  On  the  day  preceding  that  which  was 
fixed  for  their  return,  he  fled,  with  a  few  at 
tendants,  from  that  palace,  which  he  was  never 
to  see  again  till  he  was  led  through  it  to  the 
scaffold. 

On  the  llth  of  January,  the  Thames  was 
covered  with  boats,  and  its  shores  with  a 
gazing  multitude.  Armed  vessels  decorated 
with  streamers  were  ranged  in  two  lines  from 
London  Bridge  to  Westminster  Hall.  The 
members  returned  by  water  in  a  ship  manned 
by  sailors  who  had  volunteered  their  services. 
The  trainbands  of  the  city,  under  the  command 
of  the  sheriffs,  marched  along  the  Strand,  at 
tended  by  a  vast  crowd  of  spectators,  to  guard 
the  avenues  to  the  House  of  Commons ;  and 
thus,  with  shouts  and  loud  discharges  of  ord 
nance,  the  accused  patriots  were  brought  back 
by  the  people  whom  they  had  served,  and  for 
whom  they  had  suffered.  The  restored  mem 
bers,  as  soon  as  they  had  entered  the  House, 
expressed,  in  the  warmest  terms,  their  grati 
tude  to  the  citizens  of  London.  The  sheriffs 
were  warmly  thanked  by  the  speaker  in  the 
name  of  the  Commons ;  and  orders  were  given 
that  a  guard,  selected  from  the  trainbands  of 
the  city,  should  attend  daily  to  watch  over  the 
safety  of  the  Parliament. 

The  excitement  had  not  been  confined  to 
London.  When  intelligence  of  the  danger  to 
which  Hampden  was  exposed  reached  Buck 
inghamshire,  it  excited  the  alarm  and  indigna 
tion  of  the  people.  Four  thousand  freeholders 
of  that  county,  each  of  them  wearing  in  his 
hat  a  copy  of  the  protestation  in  favour  of  the 
privileges  of  Parliament,  rode  up  to  London 
to  defend  the  person  of  their  beloved  repre 
sentative.  They  came  in  a  body  to  assure 
Parliament  of  their  full  resolution  to  defend 
its  privileges.  Their  petition  \vas  couched  in 
the  strongest  terms.  "  In  respect,"  said  they, 
«  of  that  latter  attempt  upon  the  honourable 
House  of  Commons,  we  are  now  come  to  offer 
our  service  to  that  end,  and  resolved,  in  their 
just  defence,  to  live  and  die." 

A  great  struggle  was  clearly  at  hand.  Hamp 
den  had  returned  to  Westminster  much  changed. 
His  influence  had  hitherto  been  exerted  rather 
to  restrain  than  to  moderate  the  zeal  of  his 
party.  But  the  treachery,  the  contempt  of  law, 
the  thirst  for  blood,  which  the  king  had  now 
shoT/n,  left  no  hope  of  a  peaceable  adjustment. 
It  was  clear  that  Charles  must  be  either  a 
puppet  or  a  tyrant,  that  no  obligation  of  love 


or  of  honour  could  bind  him,  and  that  the  only 
way  to  make  him  harmless  was  to  make  him 
powerless. 

The  attack  which  the  king  had  made  on 
the  five  members  was  not  merely  irregular  in 
manner.  Even  if  the  charges  had  been  pre 
ferred  legally,  if  the  grand  jury  of  Middlesex 
had  found  a  true  bill,  if  the  accused  persons 
had  been  arrested  under  a  proper  warrant,  and 
at  a  proper  time  and  place,  there  would  still 
have  been  in  the  proceeding  enough  of  perfidy 
and  injustice  to  vindicate  the  strongest  mea 
sures  which  the  Opposition  could  take.  To 
impeach  Pym  and  Hampden  was  to  impeach 
the  House  of  Commons.  It  was  notoriously 
on  account  of  what  they  had  done  as  mem 
bers  of  that  House  that  they  were  selected  as 
objects  of  vengeance ;  and  in  what  they  had 
done  as  members  of  that  House,  the  majority 
had  concurred.  Most  of  the  charges  brought 
against  them  were  common  between  them  and 
the  Parliament.  They  were  accused,  indeed, 
and  it  may  be  with  reason,  of  encouraging  the 
Scotch  army  to  invade  England.  In  doing 
this,  they  had  committed  \vhat  was,  in  strict 
ness  of  law,  a  high  offence  ;  the  same  offence 
which  Devonshire  and  Shrewsbury  committed 
in  1689.  But  the  king  had  promised  pardon 
and  oblivion  to  those  who  had  been  the  prin 
cipals  in  the  Scotch  insurrection.  Did  it  then 
consist  with  his  honour  to  punish  the  accessa 
ries  ?  He  had  bestowed  marks  of  his  favour 
on  the  leading  Covenanters.  He  had  given 
the  great  seal  of  Scotland  to  Lord  London,  the 
chief  of  the  rebels,  a  marquisate  to  the  Earl 
of  Argyle,  an  earldom  to  Lesley,  who  had 
brought  the  Presbyterian  army  across  the 
Tweed.  On  what  principle  was  Hampden  to 
be  attainted  for  advising  what  Lesley  was  en 
nobled  for  doing'!  In  a  court  of  law,  of  course, 
no  Englishman  could  plead  an  amnesty  grant 
ed  to  the  Scots.  But,  though  not  an  illegal,  it 
was  surely  an  inconsistent  and  a  most  unkingly 
course,  after  pardoning  the  heads  of  the  re 
bellion  in  one  kingdom,  to  hang,  draw,  and 
quarter  their  accomplices  in  another. 

The  proceedings  of  the  king  against  the 
five  members,  or  rather  against  that  Par 
liament  which  had  concurred  in  almost  all 
the  acts  of  the  five  members,  was  the  cause 
of  the  civil  war.  It  was  plain  that  either 
Charles  or  the  House  of  Commons  must  be 
stripped  of  all  real  power  in  the  state.  The 
best  course  which  the  Commons  could  have 
taken  would  perhaps  have  been  to  depose  the 
king  ;  as  their  ancestors  had  deposed  Ed  vvard 
the  Second  and  Richard  the  Second,  and  as 
their  children  afterwards  deposed  James. 
Had  they  done  this,  had  they  placed  on  tne 
throne  a  prince  whose  character  and  whose 
situation  would  have  been  a  pledge  for  his 
good  conduct,  they  might  safely  have  left  to 
that  prince  all  the  constitutional  prerogative* 
of  the  crown  ;  the  command  of  the  armies  of 
the  state;  the  power  of  making  peers;  th«r 
power  of  appointing  ministers;  a  veto  on  bills 
passed  by  the  two  Houses.  Such  a  prince, 
reigning  by  their  choice,  would  have  been 
under  the  necessity  of  acting  in  ccniormity 
with  their  wishes.  But  the  public  mind  wa* 
not  ripe  for  such  a  measure.  There  was  no 


1C8 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Duke  of  Lancaster,  no  Prince  of  Orange,  no 
great  and  eminent  person,  near  in  blood  to 
the  throne,  yet  attached  to  the  cause  of  the 
people.  Charles  was  then  to  remain  king; 
and  it  was  therefore  necessary  that  he  should 
be  king  only  in  name.  A  William  the  Third, 
or  a  George  the  First,  whose  title  to  the  crown 
was  identical  with  the  title  of  the  people  to 
their  liberty,  might  safely  be  trusted  with  ex 
tensive  powers.  But  new  freedom  could  not 
exist  in  safety  under  the  old  tyrant.  Since  he 
was  not  to  be  deprived  of  the  name  of  king, 
the  only  course  which  was  left  was  to  make 
him  a  mere  trustee,  nominally  seised  of  pre 
rogatives,  of  which  others  had  the  use,  a  Grand 
Lama,  a  Roi  Faineant,  a  phantom  resembling 
those  Dagoberts  and  Childeberts  who  wore  the 
badges  of  royalty,  while  Ebroin  and  Charles 
Martel  held  the  real  sovereignty  of  the  state. 

The  conditions  which  the  Parliament  pro 
pounded  were  hard;  but,  we  are  sure,  not 
harder  than  those  which  even  the  Tories  in 
the  Convention  of  1689  would  have  imposed 
on  James,  if  it  had  been  resolved  that  James 
should  continue  to  be  king.  The  chief  con 
dition  was,  that  the  command  of  the  militia 
and  the  conduct  of  the  war  in  Ireland  should 
be  left  to  the  Parliament.  On  this  point  was 
that  great  issue  joined  whereof  the  two  parties 
put  themselves  on  God  and  on  the  sword. 

We  think,  not  only  that  the  Commons  were 
justified  in  demanding  for  themselves  the 
piower  to  dispose  of  the  military  force,  but  that 
it  would  have  been  absolute  insanity  in  them 
to  leave  that  force  at  the  disposal  of  the  king. 
From  the  very  beginning  of  his  reign,  it  had 
evidently  been  his  object  to  govern  by  an 
army.  His  third  Parliament  had  complained, 
in  the  Petition  of  Right,  of  his  fondness  for 
martia.  law,  and  of  the  vexatious  manner  in 
which  he  billeted  his  soldiers  on  the  people. 
The  wish  nearest  the  heart  of  Strafford  was, 
as  his  letters  prove,  that  the  revenue  might  be 
brought  into  such  a  state  as  would  enable  the 
king  to  support  a  standing  military  establish 
ment.  In  1640,  Charles  had  supported  an  army 
in  the  northern  counties  by  lawless  exactions. 
In  1641,  he  had  engaged  in  an  intrigue,  the 
object  of  which  was  to  bring  that  army  into 
London,  for  the  purpose  of  overawing  the 
Parliament.  His  late  conduct  had  proved  that, 
if  he  were  suffered  to  retain  even  a  small  body 
guard  of  his  own  creatures  near  his  person, 
the  Commons  would  be  in  dansei  of  outrage, 
pernaps  01  massacre.  The  Houses  were  still 
deliberating  under  the  protection  of  the  militia 
of  London.  Could  the  command  of  the  whole 
armed  force  of  the  realm  have  been,  under 
these  circumstances,  safely  confided  to  the 
king?  Would  it  not  have  been  frenzy  in  the 
Parliament  to  raise  and  pay  an  army  of  fifteen 
or  twenty  thousand  men  for  the  Irish  war,  and 
to  give  >o  Charles  the  absolute  control  of  this 
h,tmy,  ant:  the  power  of  selecting,  promoting, 
and  dismissing  officers  at  his  pleasure  1  Was 
it  not  possible  that  this  army  might  become, 
what  il  is  the  nature  of  armies  to  become, 
what  so  many  armies  formed  under  much  more 
favourable  circumstances  have  become,  what 
the  army  of  the  English  Commonwealth  be 
came,  wnat  me  army  ol  me  French  Republic 


became — an  instrument  of  despotism  ?  Was 
it  not  possible  that  the  soldiers  might  forget 
that  they  were  also  citizens,  and  might  be  ready 
to  servo  their  general  against  their  country  1 
Was  it  not  Certain  that,  on  the  very  first  day 
on  which  Charles  could  venture  to  revoke  his 
concessions,  and  to  punish  his  opponents,  he 
would  establish  an  arbitrary  government,  and 
exact  a  bloody  revenge  ? 

Our  own  times  furnish  a  parallel  case.  Sup 
pose  that  a  revolution  should  take  place  in 
Spain,  that  the  Constitution  of  Cadiz  should 
be  re-established,  that  the  Cortes  should  meet 
again,  that  the  Spanish  Prynnes  and  Burtons, 
who  are  now  wandering  in  rags  round  Lei 
cester  Square,  should  be  restored  to  ther  coun 
try,  Ferdinand  the  Seventh  would,  in  that  case, 
of  course,  repeat  all  the  oaths  and  promises 
which  he  made  in  1820,  and  broke  in  1823. 
But  would  it  not  be  madness  in  the  Cortes, 
even  if  they  were  to  leave  him  the  name  of 
king,  to  leave  him  more  than  the  name] 
Would  not  all«  Europe  scoff  at  them,  if  they 
were  to  permit  him  to  assemble  a  large  army 
for  an  expedition  to  America,  to  model  that  army 
at  his  pleasure,  to  put  it  under  the  command 
of  officers  chosen  by  himself?  Should  we  not 
say,  that  every  member  of  the  constitutional 
party,  who  might  concur  in  such  a  measure, 
would  most  richly  deserve  the  fate  which  he 
would  probably  meet — the  fate  of  Riego  and 
of  the  Empecinado  ?  We  are  not  disposed  to 
pay  compliments  to  Ferdinand;  nor  do  we 
conceive  that  we  pay  him  any  compliment, 
when  we  say,  that,  of  all  sovereigns  in  history, 
he  seems  to  us  most  to  resemble  King  Charles 
the  First.  Like  Charles,  he  is  pious  after  a 
certain  fashion;  like  Charles,  he  has  made 
large  concessions  to  his  people  after  a  certain 
fashion.  It  is  well  for  him  that  he  has  had  to 
deal  with  men  who  bore  very  little  resem 
blance  to  the  English  Puritans. 

The  Commons  would  have  the  power  of  the 
sword,  the  king  would  not  part  with  it ;  and 
nothing  remained  but  to  try  the  chances  of  war. 
Charles  still  had  a  strong  party  irr  the  country. 
His  august  office,  his  dignified  manners,  his 
solemn  protestations  that  he  would  for  the 
time  to  come  respect  the  liberties  of  his  sub 
jects,  pity  for  fallen  greatness,  fear  of  violent 
innovation,  secured  to  him  many  adherents. 
He  had  the  Church,  the  Universities,  a  majority 
of  the  nobles  and  of  the  old  landed  gentry.  The 
austerity  of  the  Puritan  manners  drove  most 
of  the  gay  and  dissolute  youth  ot  that  age  to 
the  royal  standard.  Many  good,  brave,  and 
moderate  men,  who  disliked  his  former  corv« 
duct,  and  who  entertained  doubts  touching  his 
present  sincerity,  espoused  his  cause  unwill 
ingly,  and  with  many  painful  misgivings ; 
because,  though  they  dreaded  his  tyranny 
much,  they  dreaded  democratic  violence  more. 

On  the  other  side  was  the  great  body  of  the 
middle  orders  of  England— the  merchants,  the 
shopkeepers,  the  yeomanry,  headed  by  a  very 
large  and  formidable  minority  of  the  peerage 
and  of  the  landed  gentry.  The  Earl  of  Essex, 
a  man  of  respectable  abilities,  and  of  some 
military  experience,  was  appointed  to  the  com 
mand  of  the  parliamentary  army. 

Hampden  spared  neither  his  fortune  n;r  his 


LORD   NUGENT'S  MEMORIALS  OF  HAMPDEN. 


169 


person  in  the  cause.  He  subscribed  two  thou 
sand  pounds  to  the  public  service.  He  took  a 
colonel's  commission  in  the  army,  and  went 
into  Buckinghamshire  to  raise  a  regiment  of 
infantry.  His  neighbours  eagerly  enlisted 
under  his  command.  His  men  were  known 
by  their  green  uniform,  and  by  their  standard, 
which  bore  on  one  side  the  watchword  of  the 
Parliament,  "God  with  us,"  and  on  the  other 
the  device  of  Hampden, "  Vestigia  nulla  retror- 
sum."  This  motto  well  described  the  line  of 
conduct  which  he  pursued.  No  member  of 
his  party  had  been  so  temperate,  while  there 
remained  a  hope  that  legal  and  peaceable 
measures  might  save  the  country.  No  mem 
ber  of  his  party  showed  so  much  energy  and 
vigour  when  it  became  necessary  to  appeal  to 
arms.  He  made  himself  thoroughly  master  of 
his  military  duty,  and  "performed  it,"  to  use 
the  words  of  Clarendon,  "  upon  all  occasions 
most  punctually."  The  regiment  which  he  had 
raised  and  trained  was  considered  as  one  of 
the  best  in  the  service  of  the  Parliament.  He 
exposed  his  person  in  every  action,  with  an 
intrepidity  which  made  him  conspicuous  even 
among  thousands  of  brave  men.  "  He  was," 
says  Clarendon,  "of  a  personal  courage  equal 
to  his  best  parts  ;  so  that  he  was  an  enemy  not 
to  be  wished  wherever  he  might  have  been 
made  a  friend,  and  as  much  to  be  apprehended 
where  he  was  so  as  any  man  could  deserve  to 
be."  Though  his  military  career  was  short, 
and  his  military  situation  subordinate,  he  fully 
proved  that  he  possessed  the  talents  of  a  great 
general,  as  well  as  those  of  a  great  statesman. 

We  shall  not  attempt  to  give  a  history  of  the 
war.  Lord  Nugent's  account  of  the  military 
operations  is  very  animated  and  striking.  Our 
abstract  would  be  dull,  and  probably  unintel 
ligible.  There  was,  in  fact,  for  some  time,  no 
great  and  connected  system  of  operations  on 
either  side.  The  war  of  the  two  parties  was 
like  the  war  of  Arimanes  and  Oromazdes, 
neither  of  whom,  according  to  the  Eastern 
theologians,  has  any  exclusive  domain,  who 
are  equally  omnipresent,  who  equally  pervade 
all  space,  who  carry  on  their  eternal  strife 
within  every  particle  of  matter.  There  was  a 
petty  war  in  almost  every  county.  A  town 
furnished  troops  to  the  Parliament,  while  the 
manor-house  of  the  neighbouring  peer  was 
garrisoned  for  the  king.  The  combatants  were 
rarely  disposed  to  march  far  from  their  own 
homes.  It  was  reserved  for  Fairfax  and  Crom 
well  10  ierminate  this  desultory  •warfare,  by 
moving  one  overwhelming  force  successively 
against  all  the  scattered  fragments  of  the  royal 
party. 

It  is  a  remarkable  circumstance,  that  the 
officers  who  had  studied  tactics  in  what  were 
considered  as  the  best  schools — under  Vere  in 
the  Netherlands,  and  under  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus  in  Germany — displayed  far  less  skill  than 
those  commanders  who  had  been  bred  to 
peaceful  employments,  and  who  never  saw 
even  a  skirmish  till  the  civil  war  broke  out. 
An  unlearned  person  mlgnt  hence  be  inclined 
to  suspect  that  tne  military  art  is  no  very  pro 
found  ,/jystery ;  that  its  principles  are  the 
principles  of  plain  good  sense;  and  that  a 
quick  eye,  a  cool  head,  and  a  stout  heart  will 

VGL.  II.— 22 


do  more  to  make  a  general  than  all  the  dia 
grams  of  .Tomini.  This,  however,  is  certain, 
that  Hampden  showed  himself  a  far  better  ofii- 
cer  than  Essex,  and  Cromwell  than  Lesley. 

The  military  errors  of  Essex  were  probably 
in  some  degree  produced  by  political  timidity. 
j  HP  was  honestly,  but  not  warmly,  attached  to 
j  the  cause  of  the  Parliament ;  and  next  to  a 
great  defeat,  he  dreaded  a  great  victory.  Hamp- 
i  den,  on  the  other  hand,  was  for  vigorous  and 
decisive  measures.  When  he  drew  the  sword, 
as  Clarendon  has  well  said,  he  threw  away  the 
scabbard.  He  had  shown  that  he  knew  better 
than  any  public  man  of  his  time,  how  to  value 
and  how  to  practise  moderation.  But  he  knew 
that  the  essence  of  war  is  violence,  and  that 
moderation  in  war  is  imbecility.  On  several 
occasions  particularly  during  the  operations 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  Brentford,  he  remon 
strated  earnestly  w  Kssex.  Wherever  he 
commanded  separa^  ./,  'he  boldness  and  rapi 
dity  of  his  movements  presented  a  striking 
contrast  to  the  sluggishness  of  his  superior. 

In  the  Parliament  he  possessed  boundless 
influence.  His  employments  towards  the  close 
of  1642  have  been  described  by  Denham  in 
some  lines,  which,  though  intended  to  be  sar 
castic,  convey  in  truth  the  highest  eulogy. 
Hampden  is  described  in  this  satire,  as  per 
petually  passing  and  repassing  between  the 
military  station  at  Windsor  and  the  House  of 
Commons  at  Westminster ;  overawing  the 
general,  and  giving  law  to  that  Parliament 
which  knew  no  other  law.  It  \vas  at  this  time 
that  he  organized  that  celebrated  association 
of  counties,  to  which  his  party  was  principally 
indebted  for  its  victory  over  the  king. 

In  the  early  part  of  1643,  the  shires  lying  in 
the  neighbourhood  of  London,  which  were  de 
voted  to  the  cause  of  the  Parliament,  were  in 
cessantly  annoyed  by  Rupert  and  his  cavalry. 
Essex  had  extended  his  lines  so  far,  that 
almost  every  point  was  vulnerable.  The 
young  prince,  who,  though  not  a  great  general, 
was  an  active  and  enterprising  partisan,  fre 
quently  surprised  posts,  burned  villages,  swept 
away  cattle,  and  was  again  at  Oxford,  before  a 
force  sufficient  to  encounter  him  could  be  as 
sembled. 

The  languid  proceedings  of  Essex  were 
loudly  condemned  by  the  troops.  Ail  the  ar 
dent  and  daring  spirits  in  the  parliamentary 
parly  were  eager  to  have  Hampden  at  theii 
head.  Had  his  life  been  prolonged,  there  is 
everv  reason  to  believe  that  the  supreme  com 
mand  would  have  been  intrusted  to  him  But 
it  was  decreed  that,  at  this  conjuncture,  Eng 
land  should  lose  the  only  man  who  united  per 

feet  disinterestedness  to  eminent  talents the 

only  man  who,  being  capable  of  gaining  the 
victory  for  her,  was  incapable  of  abusing  thai 
victory  when  gained. 

In  the  evening  of  the  17th  of  June,  Rupert 

|  daried  out  of  Oxford  with   his  cavalry  on  a 

;  predatory  expedition.    At  three  in  the  morning 

of  the  following  day,  he  attacked  and  dispersed 

a  few  parliamentary  soldiers  who  were  quar 

tered  at  Postcombe.     He  then  flew  to  Chinnor, 

burned  the  village,  killed  or  took  all  the  troops 

who  were  posted  there,  and  prepared  to  hurry 

:  back  with  his  booty  and  his  prisoners  to  Oxford. 


170 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Hampden  had,  on  the  preceding  day,  strong 
ly  represented  to  Essex  the  danger  to  which 
this  pan  of  the  line  was  exposed.  As  soon 
as  he  received  intelligence  of  Rupert's  incur 
sions,  he  sent  off  a  horseman  with  a  mes 
sage  to  the  general.  The  Cavaliers,  he  said, 
could  return  only  by  Chiselhampton  Bridge. 
A  force  ought  to  be  instantly  despatched  in 
that  direction,  for  the  purpose  of  intercepting 
them.  In  the  mean  time,  he  resolved  to  set 
out  with  all  the  cavalry  that  he  could  muster, 
for  the  purpose  of  impeding  the  march  of  the 
enemy  till  Essex  could  take  measures  for  cut 
ting  off  their  retreat.  A  considerable  body  of 
horse  and  dragoons  volunteered  to  follow  him. 
He  was  not  their  commander.  He  did  not 
even  belong  to  their  branch  of  the  service. 
But  "he  was,"  says  Lord  Clarendon,  "second 
to  none  but  the  general  himself  in  the  obser 
vance  and  application  of  all  men."  On  the  field 
of  Chalgrove  he  came  up  with  Rupert.  A  fierce 
skirmish  ensued  In  the  first  charge,  Hampden 
was  struck  in  the  shoulder  by  two  bullets, 
which  broke  the  bone,  and  lodged  in  his  body. 
The  troops  of  the  Parliament  lost  heart  arid 
gave  way.  Rupert,  after  pursuing  them  for  a 
short  time,  hastened  to  cross  the  bridge,  and 
made  his  retreat  unmolested  to  Oxford. 

Hampden,  with  his  head  drooping,  and  his 
hands  leaning  on  his  horse's  neck,  moved 
feebly  out  of  the  battle.  The  mansion  which 
had  been  inhabited  by  his  father-in-law,  and 
from  which  in  his  youth  he  had  carried  home 
his  bride,  Elizabeth,  was  in  sight.  There  still 
remains  an  affecting  tradition,  that  he  looked 
for  a  moment  towards  that  beloved  house,  and 
made  an  effort  to  go  thither  to  die.  But  the 
enemy  lay  in  that  direction.  He  turned  his 
horse  towards  Thame,  where  he  arrived  almost 
fainting  with  agony.  The  surgeons  dressed  his 
wounds.  But  there  was  no  hope.  The  pain 
which  he  suffered  was  most  excruciating.  But 
he  endured  it  with  admirable  firmness  and  re 
signation.  His  first  care  was  for  his  country. 
He  wrote  from  his  bed  several  letters  to  Lon 
don  concerning  public  affairs,  and  sent  a  last 
pressing  message  to  the  head-quarters,  recom 
mending  that  the  dispersed  forces  should  be 
concentrated.  When  his  last  public  duties 
•were  performed,  he  calmly  prepared  himself 
to  die.  He  was  attended  by  a  clergyman  of  the 
Church  of  England,  with  whom  he  had  lived 
in  habits  of  intimacy,  and  by  the  chaplain  of 
the  Buckinghamshire  Green-coats,  Dr.  Spurton, 
whom  Baxter  describes  as  a  famous  and  excel 
lent  divine. 

A  short  time  before  his  death,  the  sacrament 
was  administered  to  him.  He  declared  that, 
though  he  disliked  the  government  of  the 
Church  of  England,  he  yet  agreed  with  that 
Church  as  to  all  essential  matters  of  doctrine. 
His  intellect  remained  unclouded.  When  all 
was  nearly  over,  he  lay  murmuring  faint 
prayers  for  himself  and  for  the  cause  in  which 
h?  died.  "  Lord  Jesus,"  he  exclaimed,  in  the 
Moment  of  the  last  agony,  "receive  my  soul — 


0  Lord,  save  my  country — 0  Lord  be  merci 

ful  to ."  In  that  broken  ejaculation  passed 

away  his  noble  and  fearless  spirit. 

He  was  buried  in  the  parish  church  of 
Hampden.  His  soldiers,  bareheaded,  with  re- 
versed  arms  and  muffled  drums  and  colours, 
escorted  his  body  to  the  grave,  singing,  as  they 
marched,  that  lofty  and  melancholy  psalm,  in 
which  the  fragility  of  human  life  is  contrasted 
with  the  immutability  of  Him,  in  whose  sight 
a  thousand  years  are  but  as  yesterday  when  it 
is  past,  and  as  a  watch  in  the  night. 

The  news  of  Hampden's  death  produced  as 
great  a  consternation  in  his  party,  according  to 
Clarendon,  as  if  their  whole  army  had  been 
cut  off.  The  journals  of  the  time  amply  prove 
that  the  Parliament  and  all  its  friends  were 
filled  with  grief  and  dismay.  Lord  Nugent  has 
quoted  a  remarkable  passage  from  the  next 
Weekly  Intelligencer.  "The  loss  of  Colonel 
Hampden  goeth  near  the  heart  of  every  man 
that  loves  the  good  of  his  king  and  country, 
and  makes  some  conceive  little  content  to  be 
at.  the  army  now  that  he  is  gone.  The  memory 
of  this  deceased  colonel  is  such,  that  in  no  age 
to  come  but  it  will  more  and  more  be  har1.  in 
honour  and  esteem; — a  man  so  religious,  and 
of  that  prudence,  judgment,  temper,  valour, 
and  integrity,  that  he  hath  left  few  his  like 
behind  him." 

He  had  indeed  left  none  his  like  behind  him. 
There  still  remained,  indeed,  in  his  party, 
many  acute  intellects,  many  eloquent  tongues, 
many  brave  and  honest  hearts.  There  still 
remained  a  rugged  and  clownish  soldier,  half- 
fanatic,  half-buffoon,  whose  talents,  discerned 
as  yet  only  by  one  penetrating  eye,  were  equal 
to  all  the  highest  duties  of  the  soldier  and  the 
prince.  But  in  Hampden,  and  in  Hampden 
alone,  were  united  all  the  qualities  which,  at 
such  a  crisis,  were  necessary  to  save  the  state 
— the  valour  and  energy  of  Cromwell,  the  dis 
cernment  and  eloquence  of  Vane,  the  humanity 
and  moderation  of  Manchester,  the  stern  inte 
grity  of  Hale,  the  ardent  public  spirit  of  Sidney. 
Others  might  possess  the  qualities  which  were 
necessary  to  save  the  popular  party  in  the 
crisis  of  danger;  he  alone  had  both  the  power 
and  the  inclination  to  restrain  its  excesses  in 
the  hour  of  triumph.  Others  could  conquer; 
he  alone  could  reconcile.  A  heart  as  bold  as 
his  brought  up  the  cuirassiers  who  turned  the 
tide  of  battle  on  Marston  Moor.  As  skilful  an 
eye  as  his  watched  the  Scotch  army  descending 
from  the  heights  overDunbar.  But  it  was  when, 
to  the  sullen  tyranny  of  Laud  and  Charles,  had 
succeeded  the  fierce  conflict  of  sects  and  fac 
tions,  ambitious  of  ascendency  and  burning 
for  revenge ;  it  was  when  the  vices  and  igno 
rance  which  the  old  tyranny  had  generated, 
threatened  the  new  freedom  with  destruction, 
that  England  missed  that  sobriety,  that  self- 
command,  that  perfect  soundness  of  judgment, 
that  perfect  rectitude  of  intention,  to  which  the 
history  of  revolutions  furnishes  no  parallel,  or 
furnishes  a  parallel  in  Washington  alone. 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD  BURGHLEY. 


m 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1832.] 


THE  work  of  Doctor  Nares  has  filled  us  with 
astonishment  similar  to  that  which  Captain 
Lemuel  Gulliver  felt,  when  first  he  landed  in 
Brobdignag,  and  saw  corn  as  high  as  the  oaks 
in  the  New  Forest,  thimbles  as  large  as 
buckets,  and  wrens  of  the  bulk  of  turkeys. 
The  whole  book,  and  every  component  part  of 
it,  is  on  a  gigantic  scale.  The  title  is  as  long 
as  an  ordinary  preface.  The  prefatory  matter 
would  furnish  out  an  ordinary  book  ;  and  the 
book  contains  as  much  reading  as  an  ordinary 
library.  We  cannot  sum  up  the  merits  of  the 
stupendous  mass  of  paper  which  lies  before  us, 
better  than  by  saying,  that  it  consists  of  about 
two  thousand  closely  printed  pages,  that  it 
occupies  fifteen  hundred  inches  cubic  measure, 
and  that  it  weighs  sixty  pounds  avoirdupois. 
Such  a  book  might,  before  the  deluge,  have 
been  considered  as  light  reading  by  Hilpa  and 
Shallurn.  But  unhappily  the  life  of  man  is  now 
threescore  years  and  ten ;  and  we  cannot  but 
think  it  somewhat  unfair  in  Doctor  Nares  to 
demand  from  us  so  large  a  portion  of  so  short 
an  existence. 

Compared  with  the  labour  of  reading  through 
these  volumes,  all  other  labour — the  labour  of 
thieves  on  the  tread-mill,  of  children  in  facto 
ries,  of  negroes  in  sugar  plantations — is  an 
agreeable  recreation.  There  was,  it  is  said,  a 
criminal  in  Italy,  who  was  suffered  to  make  his 
choice  between  Guicciardini  and  the  galleys. 
He  chose  the  history.  But  the  war  of  Pisa  was 
too  much  for  him.  He  changed  his  mind,  and 
went  to  the  oar.  Guicciardini,  though  certainly 
not  the  most  amusingof  writers,  is  an  Herodotus, 
or  a  Froissart,  when  compared  with  Doctor 
Nares.  It  is  not  merely  in  bulk,  but  in  specific 
gravity  also,  that  these  memoirs  exceed  all 
other  human  compositions.  On  every  subject 
which  the  professor  discusses,  he  produces 
three  times  as  many  pages  as  another  man ; 
and  one  of  his  pages  is  as  tedious  as  another 
man's  three.  His  book  is  swelled  to  its  vast 
dimensions  by  endless  repetitions,  by  episodes 
which  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  main  action, 
by  quotations  from  books  which  are  in  every 
circulating  library,  and  by  reflections  which, 
when  they  happen  to  be  just,  are  so  obvious 
that  they  must  necessarily  occur  to  the  mind 
of  every  reader.  He  employs  more  words  in 
expounding  and  defending  a  truism,  than  any 
other  writer  would  employ  in  supporting  a  pa- 


*  Memoirs  of  the  Life  and  Administration  of  the  Rig-ht 
Honourable  William  Cecil  Lord  Burghley,  Secretary  of 
State  in  the  Reifrn  of  King  Edward  the  Sixth,  and  Lord 
High  Trtasunr  of  England  in  the  Reifrn  of  Queen  Eliza 
beth.  Containing  an  Historical  View  of  the  Times  in  which 
he  lived,  and  of  the  many  eminent  and  illustrious  Persons 
with,  whom  he  was  connected;  with,  extracts  from  his  Pri 
vate  and  Official  Correspondence  and  other  Papers,  now  first 
published  from  the  Originals.  By  the  Reverend  EDWARD 
NlBKS,  D.D  ,  Repius  Professor  of  Modern  History  in  the 
University  of  Oxford.  3  vols.  4to.  London.  1828,"  1832. 


radox.  Of  the  rules  of  historical  perspective 
he  has  not  the  faintest  notion.  There  is  neither 
foreground  nor  background  in  his  delineation. 
The  wars  of  Charles  the  Fifth  in  Germany  are 
detailed  at  almost  as  much  length  as  in  Robert 
son's  Life  of  that  prince.  The  troubles  of 
Scotland  are  related  as  fully  as  in  M'Crie's 
Life  of  John  Knox.  It  would  be  most  unjust 
to  deny  that  Doctor  Nares  is  a  man  of  great 
industry  and  research  ;  but  he  is  so  utterly  in 
competent  to  arrange  the  materials  which  he 
has  collected,  that  he  might  as  well  have  left 
them  in  their  original  repositories. 

Neither  the  facts  which  Doctor  Nares  has 
discovered,  nor  the  arguments  which  he  urges, 
will,  we  apprehend,  materially  alter  the  opinion 
generally  entertained  by  judicious  readers  of 
history  concerning  his  hero.  Lord  Burghley 
can  hardly  be  called  a  great  man.  He  was  not 
one  of  those  whose  genius  and  energy  change 
the  fate  of  empires.  He  was  by  nature  and 
habit  one  of  those  who  follow,  not  one  of  those 
who  lead.  Nothing  that  is  recorded,  either  cf 
his  words  or  of  his  actions,  indicates  intellectual 
or  moral  elevation.  But  his  talents,  though 
not  brilliant,  were  of  an  eminently  useful 
kind  ;  and  his  principles,  though  not  inflexible, 
were  not  more  relaxed  than  those  of  his  asso 
ciates  and  competitors.  He  had  a  cool  temper, 
a  sound  judgment,  great  powers  of  application, 
and  a  constant  eye  to  the  main  chance.  In  his 
youth  he  was,  it  seems,  fond  of  practical  jokes. 
Yet  even  out  of  these  he  contrived  to  extract 
some  pecuniary  profit.  When  he  was  study 
ing  the  law  at  Gray's  Inn,  he  lost  all  his  fur 
niture  and  books  to  his  companion  at  the 
gaming-table.  He  accordingly  bored  a  hole 
in  the  wall  which  separated  his  chambers  from 
those  of  his  associate,  and  at  midnight  bellow 
ed  through  his  passage  threats  of  damnation 
and  calls  to  repentance  in  the  ears  of  the  victo 
rious  gambler,  who  lay  sweating  with  fear  all 
night,  and  refunded  his  winnings  on  his  knees 
next  day.  "  Many  other  the  like  merry  jests," 
says  his  old  biographer,  "  I  have  heard  him 
tell,  too  long  to  be  here  noted."  To  the  last, 
Burghley  was  somewhat  jocose  ;  and  some  of 
his  sportive  sayings  have  been  recorded  bj 
Bacon.  They  show  much  more  shrewdness 
than  generosity;  and  are,  indeed,  neatly  ex 
pressed  reasons  for  exacting  m«  ney  rigorously, 
and  for  keeping  it  carefully.  It  must,  however, 
be  acknowledged,  that  he  was  rigorous  and 
careful  for  the  public  advantage,  as  well  as  for 
his  own.  To  extol  his  moral  character,  as 
Doctor  Nares  has  extolled  it,  would  be  absurd. 
It  would  be  equally  absurd  to  represent  him  as 
a  corrupt,  rapacious,  and  bad-hearted  man.  He 
paid  great  attention  to  the  interest  of  the  state, 
and  great  attention  also  to  the  interest  of  his 
own  family.  He  never  deseited  his  friends  lill 


172 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


*t  was  very  inconvenient  to  stand  by  them; 
was  an  excellent  Protestant  when  it  was  not 
very  advantageous  to  be  a  Papist;  recommend 
ed  a  tolerant  policy  to  his  mistress  as  strongly 
as  he  could  recommend  it  without  hazarding 
her  favour  ;  never  put  to  the  rack  any  person 
from  whom  it  did  not  seem  probable  that  very 
useful  information  might  be  derived;  and  was 
so  moderate  in  his  desires,  that  he  left  only 
three  hundred  distinct  landed  estates,  though  he 
mierht,  as  his  honest  servant  assures  us,  have 
left  much  more,  "if  he  would  have  taken  money 
out  of  the  exchequer  for  his  own  use,  as  many 
treasurers  have  done." 

Burghley,  like  the  old  Marquess  of  Win 
chester,  who  preceded  him  in  the  custody  of 
the  White  Staff',  was  of  the  willow,  and  not  of 
the  oak.  He  first  rose  into  notice  by  defend 
ing  the  supremacy  of  Henry  the  Eighth.  He 
was  subsequently  favoured  and  promoted  by 
the  Duke  of  Somerset.  He  not  only  contrived 
to  escape  unhurt  when  his  patron  fell,  but 
became  an  important  member  of  the  adminis 
tration  of  Northumberland.  Doctor  Nares  as 
sures  us  over  and  over  again,  that  there  could 
have  been  nothing  base  in  Cecil's  conduct  on 
this  occasion  ;  for,  says  he,  Cecil  continued  to 
stand  well  with  Cranmer.  This,  we  confess, 
hardly  satisfies  us.  We  are  much  of  the  mind 
of  Falstaffs  tailor.  We  must  have  better  as 
surance  for  Sir  John  than  Bardolph's.  We 
like  not  the  security. 

Through  the  whole  course  of  that  miserable 
intrigue  which  was  carried  on  round  the  dying 
bed  of  Edward  the  Sixth,  Cecil  so  demeaned 
himself  as  to  avoid,  first,  the  displeasure  of 
Northumberland,  and  afterwards  the  displea 
sure  of  Mary.  He  was  prudently  unwilling  to 
put  his  hand  to  the  instrument  which  changed 
the  course  of  the  succession.  But  the  furious 
Dudley  was  master  of  the  palace.  Cecil,  there 
fore,  according  to  his  own  account,  excused 
himself  from  signing  as  a  party,  but  consented 
•o  sign  as  a  witness.  It  is  not  easy  to  describe 
his  dexterojs  conduct  at  this  most  perplexing 
crisis,  in  language  more  appropriate  than  that 
which  is  employed  by  old  Fuller:  "His  hand 
wrote  it  as  secretary  of  state,"  says  that  quaint 
writer;  "but  his  heart  consented  not  thereto. 
Yea,  he  openly  opposed  it;  though  at  last 
yielding  to  the  greatness  of  Northumberland, 
in  an  age  when  it  was  present  drowning  not 
to  swim  with  the  stream.  But  as  the  philoso 
pher  tells  us,  that,  though  the  planets  be  whirl 
ed  about  daily  from  east  to  west,  by  tne  motion 
of  th?  primum  moiile,  yet  have  they  also  a  con 
trary  proper  motion  of  tneir  own  from  west  to 
east,  which  they  slowly,  though  surely,  move 
at  their  leisure ;  so  Cecil  had  secret  counter- 
endeavours  against  the  strain  of  the  court 
herein,  and  privately  advanced  his  rightful  in 
tentions  against  the'foresaid  duke's  ambition." 

This  was  undoubtedly  the  most  perilous 
conjuncture  of  Cecil's  life.  Wherever  there 
was  a  safe  course,  h;  was  safe.  But  here 
every  course  was  full  of  danger.  His  situa 
tion  rendered  it  impossible  for  him  to  be  neu 
tral.  If  he  acted  on  either  side,  if  he  refused 
lo  act  at  all,  he  ran  a  fearful  risk.  He  saw 
alt  the  difficulties  of  his  position.  He  sent  his 

oney  and  plate  out  of  London,  made  over  his 


estates  to  his  son,  and  carried  arms  about  his 
person.  His  best  arms,  however,  were  his  sa 
gacity  and  his  self-command.  The  plot  in 
which  he  had  been  an  unwilling  accomplice, 
ended,  as  it  was  natural  that  so  odious  and 
absurd  a  plot  should  end,  in  the  ruin  of  its 
contrivers.  In  the  mean  time,  Cecil  jwietly 
extricated  himself,  and,  having  been  wfcces- 
sively  patronised  by  Henry,  Somerset,  and 
Northumberland,  continued  to  flourish  under 
the  protection  of  Mary. 

He  had  no  aspirations  after  the  crown  of 
martyrdom.  He  confessed  himself,  therefore, 
with  great  decorum,  heard  mass  in  Wimbledon 
church  at  Easter,  and,  for  the  better  ordering 
of  his  spiritual  concerns,  took  a  priest  into  his 
house.  Doctor  Nares,  whose  simplicity  passes 
that  of  any  casuist  with  whom  we  are  ac 
quainted,  vindicates  his  hero  by  assuring  us, 
that  this  was  not  superstition,  but  pure  un 
mixed  hypocrisy.  "That  he  did  in  some  man 
ner  conform,  we  shall  not  be  able,  in  the  face 
of  existing  documents,  to  deny;  while  we  feel 
in  our  own  minds  abundantly  satisfied,  that, 
during  this  very  trying  reign,  he  never  aban 
doned  the  prospect  of  another  revolution  in  fa 
vour  of  Protestantism."  In  another  place,  the 
doctor  tells  us,  that  Cecil  went  to  mass  "  with 
no  idolatrous  intention."  Nobody,  we  believe, 
ever  accused  him  of  idolatrous  intentions. 
The  very  ground  of  the  charge  against  him  is, 
that  he  had  no  idolatrous  intentions.  Nobody 
would  have  blamed  him  if  he  had  really  gone 
to  Wimbledon  church,  with  the  feelings  of  a 
good  Catholic,  to  worship  the  host.  Doctor 
Nares  speaks  in  several  places,  with  just  se 
verity,  of  the  sophistry  of  the  Jesuits,  and  with 
just  admiration  of  the  incomparable  letters  of 
Pascal.  It  is  somewhat  strange,  therefore,  that 
he  should  adopt,  to  the  full  extent,  the  Jesuiti 
cal  doctrine  of  the  direction  of  mentions. 

We  do  not  blame  Cecil  for  not  choosing  to 
be  burned.     The  deep  stain  upon  his  memory 
is,  that,  for  differences  of  opinion  for  which  he 
would  risk  nothing  himself,  he,  in  the  day  of 
his  power,  took  away  without  scruple  the  lives 
of  others.     One  of  the  excuses  suggested  in 
these  Memoirs  for  his  conforming,  during  the 
reign  of  Mary,  to  the  Church  of  Rome,  is,  that 
he  may  have  been  of  the   same  mind  with 
those  German  Protestants   who   were   called 
Adiaphorists,  and  who  consider^   the  popish 
rites  as  matters  indifferent.     Melancthon  was 
one  of  tnese  moderate  persons,  and  "appears," 
says   Doctor  Nares,   "  to  have   gone   greater 
lengths  than  any  imputed  to  Lord  Burghley." 
We  should  have  thought  this  not  only  an  ex 
cuse,  but  a  complete  vindication,  if  Burghl'jy 
had  been  an   Adiaphorist  for  the   benefit  of 
others,  as  well  as  for  his  own.    It  the  popish 
rites  were  matters  of  so  little  moment,  that  a 
good  Protestant  might  lawfully  practise  them 
for  his  safety,  how  could  it  be  just  or  humane 
that  a  Paptst  should  be  hanged,  drawn,  and 
quartered,  for  practising  them  from  a  sense  of 
duty.     Unhappily,  these   non-essentials    soon 
became  matters  of  life  and  death.    Just  at  the 
very  time  at  which  Burghley  artained  the  high 
est  point  of  power  and  favour,  an  act  of  Par 
liament  was  passed,  by  which  the  penalties  of 
high  treason  were  denounced  against  persons 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD  BURGHLEY. 


173 


who  should  do  in  sincerity  what  he  had  done 
from  cowardice. 

Early  in  the  reign  of  Mary,  Cecil  was  em 
ployed  in  a  mission  scarcely  consistent  with 
the  character  of  a  zealous  Protestant.  He 
was  sent  to  escort  the  Papal  legate,  Cardinal 
Pole,  from  Brussels  to  London.  That  great 
body  of  moderate  persons,  who  cared  more  for 
the  quiet  of  the  realm  than  for  the  controvert 
ed  points  which  were  in  issue  between  the 
churches,  seem  to  have  placed  their  chief 
hope  in  the  wisdom  and  humanity  of  the  gen 
tle  cardinal.  Cecil,  it  is  clear,  cultivated  the 
friendship  of  Pole  with  great  assiduity,  and  re 
ceived  great  advantage  from  his  protection. 

But  the  best  protection  of  Cecil,  during  the 
gloomy  and  disastrous  reign  of  Mary,  was  that 
which  he  derived  from  his  own  prudence  and 
from  his  own  temper ; — a  prudence  which 
could  never  be  lulled  into  carelessness,  a  tem 
per  which  could  never  be  irritated  into  rash 
ness.  The  Papists  could  find  no  occasion 
against  him.  Yet  he  did  not  lose  the  esteem 
even  of  those  sterner  Protestants  who  had 
preferred  exile  to  recantation.  He  attached 
himself  to  the  persecuted  heiress  of  the  throne, 
and  entitled  himself  to  her  gratitude  and  confi 
dence.  Yet  he  continued  to  receive  marks  of 
favour  from  the  queen.  In  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  he  put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  party 
opposed  to  the  court.  Yet  so  guarded  was  his 
language,  that  even  when  some  of  those  who 
acted  with  him  were  imprisoned  by  the  Privy 
Council,  he  escaped  with  impunity. 

At  length  Mary  died.  Elizabeth  succeeded, 
and  Cecil  rose  at  once  to  greatness.  He  was 
*worn  in  privy  counsellor  and  secretary  of 
«tate  to  the  new  sovereign  before  he  left  her 
prison  of  Hatfield;  and  he  continued  to  serve 
her  for  forty  years,  without  intermission,  in  the 
highest  employments.  His  abilities  were  pre 
cisely  those  which  keep  men  Ion;?  in  power. 
He  belonged  to  the  class  of  the  Walpoles,  the 
Pelhams,  and  the  Liverpools;  not  to  that  of 
the  St.  Johns,  the  Carterets,  the  Chathams,  and 
the  Cannings.  If  he  had  been  a  man  of  origi 
nal  genius,  and  of  a  commanding  mind,  it 
would  have  been  scarcely  possible  for  him  to 
keep  his  power,  or  even  his  head.  There  was 
not  room  in  one  government  for  an  Elizabeth 
and  a  Richelieu.  What  the  haughty  daughter 
of  Henry  needed,  was  a  moderate,  cautious, 
flexible  minister,  skilled  in  the  details  of  busi 
ness,  competent  to  advise,  but  not  aspiring  to 
command.  And  such  a  minister  she  found  in 
Burghley.  No  arts  could  shake  the  confidence 
which  she  reposed  in  her  old  and  trusty  ser 
vant.  The  courtly  graces  of  Leicester,  the 
brilliant  talents  and  accomplishments  of  Es 
sex,  touched  the  fancy,  perhaps  the  heart,  of 
the  woman ;  but  no  rival  could  deprive  the 
Treasurer  of  the  place  which  he  possessed  in 
the  favour  of  the  queen.  She  sometimes  chid 
him  sharply;  but  he  was  the  man  whom  she 
delighted  to  honour.  For  Burghley,  she  forgot 
her  usual  parsimony  both  of  wealth  and  of 
dignities.  For  Burghley,  she  relaxed  that  se 
vere  etiquette  to  which  she  was  unreasonably 
attached.  Every  other  person  to  whom  she 
addressed  her  speech,  or  on  whom  the  glance 
of  her  eagle  eye  fell,  instantly  sank  on  his 


knee.  For  Burghley  alone,  a  chair  was  set  in 
her  presence ;  and  there  the  old  minister,  by 
birth  only  a  plain  Lincolnshire  esquire,  took 
his  ease,  while  the  haughty  heirs  of  the  Fitz- 
alans  and  the  De  Veres  humbled  themselves  to 
the  dust  around  him.  At  length,  having  sur 
vived  all  his  early  coadjutors  and  rivals,  he 
died  full  of  years  and  honours.  His  royal 
mistress  visited  him  on  his  death-bed,  and 
cheered  him  with  assurances  of  her  affection 
and  esteem  ;  and  his  power  passed,  with  little 
diminution,  to  a  son  who  inherited  his  abili 
ties,  and  whose  mind  had  been  formed  by  his 
counsels. 

The  life  of  Burghley  was  commensurate 
with  one  of  the  most  important  periods  in  the 
history  of  the  world.  It  exactly  measures  the 
time  during  which  the  house  of  Austria  held 
unrivalled  superiority,  and  aspired  to  univer 
sal  dominion.  In  the  year  in  which  Burghley 
was  born,  Charles  the  Fifth  obtained  the  impe 
rial  crown.  In  the  year  in  which  Burghley 
died,  the  vast  designs  which  had  for  nearly  a 
century  kept  Europe  in  constant  agitation, 
were  buried  in  the  same  grave  with  the  proud 
and  sullen  Philip. 

The  life  of  Burghley  was  commensurate 
also  with  the  period  during  which  a  great  mo 
ral  revolution  was  effected ;  a  revolution,  the 
consequences  of  which  were  felt,  not  only  in 
the  cabinets  of  princes,  but  at  half  the  firesides 
in  Christendom.  He  was  born  when  the  great 
religious  schism  was  just  commencing.  He 
lived  to  see  the  schism  complete,  to  see  a  line 
of  demarcation,  which,  since  his  death,  has 
been  very  little  altered,  strongly  drawn  between 
Protestant  and  Catholic  Europe. 

The  only  event  of  modern  times  which  can 
be  properly  compared  with  the  Reformation,  is 
the  French  Revolution  ;  or,  to  speak  more  ac 
curately,  that  great  revolution  of  political  feel 
ing  which  took  place  in  almost  every  part  of 
the  civilized  world  during  the  eighteenth  cen 
tury,  and  which  obtained  in  France  its  most 
terrible  and  signal  triumph.  Each  of  these 
memorable  events  may  be  described  as  a  rising 
up  of  human  reason  against  a  caste.  The 
one  was  a  struggle  of  the  laity  against  the 
clergy  for  intellectual  liberty;  the  other  was  a 
struggle  of  the  people  against  the  privileged 
orders  for  political  liberty.  In  both  cases,  the 
spirit  of  innovation  was  at  first  encouraged  by 
the  class  to  \vhich  it  was  likely  to  be  most  pre 
judicial.  It  was  under  the  patronage  of  Fre 
derick,  of  Catharine,  of  Joseph,  and  of  the 
French  nobles,  that  the  philosophy  which 
afterwards  threatened  all  the  thrones  and  aris 
tocracies  of  Europe  with  destruction,  first  be 
came  formidable.  The  ardour  with  which  men 
betook  themselves  to  liberal  studies  at  the  close 
of  the  fifteenth  and  the  beginning  of  the  six 
teenth  century,  was  zealously  encouraged  by 
the  heads  of  that  very  church,  to  which  liberal 
studies  were  destined  to  be  fatal.  In  both  cases 
when  the  explosion  came,  it  came  with  a  vio 
lence  which  appalled  and  disgusted  many  of 
those  who  had  previously  been  distinguished 
by  the  freedom  of  their  opinions.  The  violence 
of  the  democratic  party  in  France  made  Burke 
j  a  tory,  and  Alfieri  a  courtier ;  the  violence  of 
the  chiefs  of  the  German  schism  made 
»  2 


174 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


mus  a  defender  of  abuses,  and  turned  the  au 
thor  of  Utopia  into  a  persecutor.  In  both  cases, 
the  convilsion  which  had  overthrown  deeply- 
seated  eirors,  shook  all  the  principles  on  which 
society  rests  to  their  very  foundations.  The 
minds  of  men  were  unsettled.  It  seemed  for  a 
time  that  all  order  ard  morality  were  about  to 
perish  with  the  prejudices  with  which  they  had 
been  long  and  intimately  associated.  Frightful 
cruelties  were  committed.  Immense  masses 
of  property  were  confiscated.  Every  part  of 
Europe  swarmed  with  exiles.  In  moody  and 
turbulent  spirits,  zeal  soured  into  malignity,  or 
foamed  into  madness.  From  the  political  agi 
tation  of  the  eighteenth  century  sprang  the  Ja 
cobins.  From  the  religious  agitation  of  the 
sixteenth  century  sprang  the  Anabaptists.  The 
partisans  01  iiobespierre  robbed  and  murdered 
in  the  name  of  fraternity  and  equality.  The 
followers  of  Cnipperdoling  robbed  and  mur 
dered  in  the  name  of  Christian  liberty.  The 
feeling  of  patriotism  was,  in  many  parts  of 
Europe,  almost  wholly  extinguished.  All  the 
old  maxims  of  foreign  policy  were  changed. 
Physical  boundaries  were  superseded  by  mo 
ral  boundaries.  Nations  made  war  on  each 
other  with  new  arms  ;  with  arms  which  no  for 
tifications,  however  strong  by  nature  or  by  art, 
could  resist;  with  arms  before  which  rivers 
parted  like  the  Jordan,  and  ramparts  fell  down 
like  the  wa.ls  of  Jericho.  Those  arms  were 
opinions,  reasons,  prejudices.  The  great  mas 
ters  of  fleets  and  armies  were  often  reduced  to 
confess,  like  Milton's  warlike  angel,  how  hard 
they  found  it 

"To  exclude 
Spiritual  substance  with  corporeal  bar." 

Europe  was  divided,  as  Greece  had  been  di 
vided  during  the  period  concerning  which  Thu- 
cydides  wrote.  The  conflict  was  not,  as  it  is 
in  ordinary  times,  between  state  and  state,  but 
between  two  omnipresent  factions,  each  of 
which  was  in  some  places  dominant,  and  in 
other  places  oppressed,  but  which,  openly  or 
covertly,  carried  on  their  strife  in  the  bosom  of 
every  society.  No  man  asked  whether  another 
belonged  to  the  same  country  with  himself,  but 
whether  he  belonged  to  the  same  sect.  Party 
spirit  seemed  to  justify  and  consecrate  acts 
which,  in  any  other  times,  would  have  been 
considered  as  the  foulest  of  treasons.  The 
French  emigrant  saw  nothing  disgraceful  in 
bringing  Austrian  and  Prussian  hussars  to 
Paris.  The  Irish  or  Italian  democrat  saw  no 
impropriety  in  serving  the  French  Directory 
against  his  own  native  government.  So,  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  the  fury  of  theological  fac 
tions  often  suspended  all  national  animosities 
and  jealousies.  The  Spaniards  were  invited 
into  France  by  the  League;  the  English  were 
invited  into  France  by  the  Huguenots. 

We  by  no  means  intend  to  underrate  or  to 
palliate  the  crimes  and  excesses  which,  during 
the  last  generation,  were  produced  by  the  spirit 
of  democracy.  But  when  we  find  that  men 
zealous  for  the  Protestant  religion,  constantly 
represent  the  French  Revolution  as  radically 
and  essentially  evil  on  account  of  those  crimes 
and  excesses,  we  cannot  but  remember,  that 
the  deli*  s ranee  of  our  ancestors  from  the  house  ' 


of  their  spiritual  bondage  was  effected  "by 
plagues  and  by  signs,  by  wonders  and  by  war." 
We  cannot  but  remember,  that,  as  in  the  case 
of  the  French  Revolution,  so  also  in  the  case 
of  the  Reformation,  those  who  rose  up  against 
tyranny  were  themselves  deeply  tainted  with 
the  vices  which  tyranny  engenders.  We  can 
not  but  remember,  that  libels  scarcely  less 
scandalous  than  those  of  Herbert,  mummeries 
scarcely  less  absurd  than  those  of  Clootz,  and 
crimes  scarcely  less  atrocious  than  those  of 
Marat,  disgrace  the  early  hiistory  of  Protest 
antism.  The  Reformation  is  an  event  long 
past.  The  volcano  has  spent  its  rage.  The 
wide  waste  produced  by  its  outbreak  is  forgot 
ten.  The  landmarks  which  were  swept  away 
have  been  replaced.  The  ruined  edifices  have 
been  repaired.  The  lava  has  covered  with  a 
rich  incrustation  the  fields  which  it  once  de 
vastated  ;  and  after  having  turned  a  garden 
into  a  desert,  has  again  turned  the  desert  into 
a  still  more  beautiful  and  fruitful  garden.  The 
second  great  eruption  is  not  yet  over.  The 
marks  of  its  ravages  are  still  all  around  us. 
The  ashes  are  still  hot  beneath  our  feet.  In  some 
directions,  the  deluge  of  fire  still  continues  to 
spread.  Yet  experience  surely  entitles  us  to 
believe  that  this  explosion,  like  that  which  pre 
ceded  it,  will  fertilize  the  soil  which  it  has  de 
vastated.  Already,  in  those  parts  which  have 
suffered  most  severely,  rich  cultivation  and 
secure  dwellings  have  begun  to  appear  amidst 
the  waste.  The  more  we  read  of  the  history 
of  past  ages,  the  more  we  observe  the  signs  of 
these  times,  the  more  do  we  feel  our  hearts 
filled  and  swelled  up  with  a  good  hope  for  the 
future  destinies  of  the  human  race. 

The  history  of  the  Reformation  in  England 
is  full  of  strange  problems.  The  most  promi 
nent  and  extraordinary  phenomenon  which  it 
presents  to  us,  is  the  gigantic  strength  of  the 
government  contrasted  with  the  feebleness  of 
the  religious  parties.  During  the  twelve  or 
thirteen  years  which  followed  the  death  of 
Henry  the  Eighth,  the  religion  of  the  state  was 
thrice  changed.  Protestantism  was  establish 
ed  by  Edward ;  the  Catholic  Church  was  re 
stored  by  Mary;  Protestantism  was  again  es 
tablished  by  Elizabeth.  The  faith  of  the  nation 
seemed  to  depend  on  the  personal  inclinations 
of  the  sovereign.  Nor  was  this  all.  An  estab 
lished  church  was  then,  as  a  matter  of  course,  a 
persecuting  church.  Edward  persecuted  Catho 
lics.  Mary  persecuted  Protestants.  Elizabeth 
persecuted  Catholics  again.  The  father  of  those 
three  sovereigns  had  enjoyed  the  pleasure  of 
persecuting  both  sects  at  once;  and  had  sent 
to  death,  on  the  same  hurdle,  the  heretic  whc 
denied  the  real  presence,  and  the  traitor  who 
denied  the  royal  supremacy.  There  was  no 
thing  in  England  like  that  fierce  and  bioody 
opposition,  which,  in  France,  each  of  thp  reli 
gious  factions  in  its  turn  offered  to  the  govern 
ment.  We  had  neither  a  Coligni  nor  a  May- 
enne  ;  neither  a  Moncontour  nor  an  Ivry.  No 
English  city  braved  sword  and  famine  for  the 
reformed  doctrines  with  the  spirit  of  Rochelle; 
nor  for  the  Catholic  doctrines  with  the  spirit 
of  Paris.  Neither  sect  in  England  formed  a 
league.  Neither  sect  extorted  a  recantatio 
from  the  sovereign.  Neither  sect  could  obra— 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD   BURGHLEY. 


176 


from  an  adverse  sovereign  even  a  toleration. 
The  English  Protestants,  after  several  years  of 
domination,  sank  down  with  scarcely  a  strug 
gle  under  the  tyranny  of  Mary.  The  Catholics, 
after  having  regained  and  abused  their  old  as 
cendency,  submitted  patiently  to  the  severe 
rule  of  Elizabeth.  Neither  Protestants  nor 
Catholics  engaged  in  any  great  and  well-orga 
nized  scheme  of  resistance.  A  few  wild  and 
tumultuous  risings,  suppressed  as  soon  as  they 
appeared,  a  few  dark  conspiracies,  in  which 
only  a  small  number  of  desperate  men  en 
gaged — such  were  the  utmost  efforts  made  by 
these  iwo  parties  to  assert  the  most  sacred  of 
human  rights,  attacked  by  the  most  odious 
tyranny. 

The  explanation  of  these  circumstances 
which  has  generally  been  given,  is  very  sim 
ple,  but  by  no  means  satisfactory.  The  power 
of  the  crown,  it  is  said,  was  then  at  its  height, 
and  w$s,  in  fact,  despotic.  This  solution,  we 
own,  seems  to  us  to  be  no  solution  at  all. 

It  has  long  been  the  fashion,  a  fashion  intro 
duced  by  Mr.  Hume,  to  describe  the  English 
monarchy  in  the  sixteenth  century  as  an  abso 
lute  monarchy.  And  such  undoubtedly  it  ap 
pears  to  a  superficial  observer.  Elizabeth,  it 
is  true,  often  spoke  to  her  Parliaments  in  lan 
guage  as  haughty  and  imperious  as  that  which 
the  Great  Turk  would  use  to  his  divan.  She 
punished  with  great  seventy  members  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  who,  in  her  opinion,  car 
ried  the  freedom  of  debate  too  far.  She  as 
sumed  the  power  of  legislating  by  means  of 
proclamation.  She  imprisoned  her  subjects 
without  bringing  them  to  a  legal  trial.  Torture 
was  often  employed,  in  defiance  of  the  laws  of 
England,  for  the  purpose  of  extorting  confes 
sions  from  those  who  were  shut  up  in  her 
dungeons.  The  authority  of  the  Star-Chamber 
and  the  Ecclesiastical  Commission  was  at  its 
highest  point.  Severe  restraints  were  imposed 
on  political  and  religious  discussion.  The 
number  of  presses  was  at  one  time  limited. 
No  man  could  print  without  a  license;  and 
every  work  had  to  undergo  the  scrutiny  of  the 
primate  or  the  Bishop  of  London.  Persons 
whose  writings  were  displeasing  to  the  court 
were  cruelly  mutilated,  'ike  Stubbs,  or  put  to 
death, like  Penry.  Non-  .fortuity  was  severely 
punished.  The  queen  prescribed  the  exact 
rule  of  religious  faith  and  discipline  ;  and  who 
ever  departed  from  that  rule,  either  to  the  right 
or  to  the  left,  was  in  danger  of  severe  penal 
ties. 

Such  was  this  government.  Yet  we  know 
that  it  was  loved  by  the  great  body  of  those 
who  lived  under  it.  We  know  that,  during  the 
fierce  contests  of  the  sixteenth  century,  both 
the  hostile  parties  spoke  of  the  time  of  Eliza 
beth  as  of  a  golden  age.  The  great  queen  has 
now  been  lying  two  hundred  and  thirty  years 
in  Henry  the  Seventh's  chapel.  Yet  her  me 
mory  is  still  dear  to  the  hearts  of  a  free 
people. 

The  truth  seems  to  be,  that  the  government 
of  the  Tudors  was,  with  a  few  occasional  de 
viations,  a  popular  government  under  the  forms 
of  despotism.  At  first  sight,  it  may  seem  that  the 
prerogatives  of  Elizabeth  were  not  less  ample 
than  those  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  that  her  Par 


liaments  were  as  obsequious  as  his  Parlia 
ments,  that  her  warrant  had  as  much  authority 
as  his  lcltre-de-cachet.  The  extravagance  with 
which  her  courtiers  eulogized  her  personal  and 
mental  charms,  went  beyond  the  adulation  of 
Boileau  and  Moliere.  Louis  would  have  blushed 
to  receive  from  those  who  composed  the  gor 
geous  circles  of  Marli  and  Versailles,  the  out 
ward  marks  of  servitude  which  the  haughty 
Britoness  exacted  of  all  who  approached  her. 
But  the  power  of  Louis  rested  on  the  support 
of  his  army.  The  power  of  Elizabeth  rested 
solely  on  the  support  of  her  people.  Those 
who  say  that  her  power  was  absolute  do  not 
sufficiently  consider  in  what  her  power  con 
sisted.  Her  power  consisted  in  the  willing 
obedience  of  her  subjects,  in  their  attachment 
to  her  person  and  to  her  office,  in  their  respect 
for  the  old  line  from  which  she  sprang,  in  their 
sense  of  the  general  security  which  they  en 
joyed  under  her  government.  These  were  the 
means,  and  the  only  means,  which  she  had  at 
her  command  for  carrying  her  decrees  into 
execution,  for  resisting  foreign  enemies,  arid 
for  crushing  domestic  treason.  There  was  not 
a  ward  in  the  city,  there  was  not  a  hundred  in 
any  shire  in  England,  which  could  not  have 
overpowered  the  handful  of  armed  men  who 
composed  her  household.  If  a  hostile  sove 
reign  threatened  invasion,  if  an  ambitious  no 
ble  raised  the  standard  of  revolt,  she  could 
have  recourse  only  to  the  trainbands  of  her 
capital,  and  the  array  of  her  counties,  to  the 
citizens  and  yeomen  of  England,  commanded 
by  the  merchants  and  esquires  of  England. 

Thus,  when  intelligence  arrived  of  the  va?>t 
preparations  which  Philip  was  making  for  the 
subjugation  of  the  realm,  the  first  peioon  to 
whom  the  government  thought  of  applying 
for  assistance  was  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London. 
They  sent  to  ask  him  what  force  the  city  woula 
engage  to  furnish  for  the  defence  of  the  king 
dom  against  the  Spaniards.  The  mayor  and 
common  council,  in  return,  desired  to  know 
what  force  the  queen's  highness  desired  them, 
to  furnish.  The  answer  was — fifteen  ships 
and  five  thousand  men.  The  Londoners  deli 
berated  on  the  matter,  and  two  days  after 
"humbly  entreated  the  council,  in  sign  of  their 
perfect  love  and  loyalty  to  prince  and  coantry, 
to  accept  ten  thousand  men,  and  thirty  ships 
amply  furnished." 

People  who  could  give  such  signs  as  these 
of  their  loyalty  were  by  no  means  to  be  misgo 
verned  with  impunity.  The  English  in  the 
sixteenth  century  were,  beyond  all  doubt,  a  free 
people.  They  had  not,  indeed,  the  outward 
show  of  freedom ;  but  they  had  the  reality. 
They  had  not  a  good  constitution,  but  they  had 
that  without  which  the  best  constitution  is  as 
useless  as  the  king's  proclamation  against  vice 
and  immorality,  that  which,  without  any  con 
stitution,  keeps  rulers  in  awe — force,  and  the 
spirit  to  use  it.  Parliaments,  it  is  true,  were 
rarely  held ;  and  were  not  very  respectfully 
treated.  The  Great  Charter  was  often  violated. 
i  But  the  people  had  a  security  against  gross 
and  systematic  misgovernment,  far  stTen«ri;r 
than  all  the  parchment  that  was  ever  ir.irked 
with  the  sign  manual,  and  than  all  tr  <;  wax 
that  was  ever  pressed  by  the  great 


176 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


It  is  a  common  error  in  politics  to  confound 
means  with  ends.  Constitutions,  charters,  pe 
titions  of  right,  declarations  of  right,  repre 
sentative  assemblies,  electoral  colleges,  are  not 
good  government;  nor  do  they,  even  when 
/nost  elaborately  constructed,  necessarily  pro 
duce  good  government.  Laws  exist  in  vain 
for  those  who  have  not  the  courage  and  the 
means  to  defend  them.  Electors  meet  in  vain 
where  want  renders  them  the  slaves  of  the  land 
lord  ;  or  where  superstition  renders  them  the 
slaves  of  the  priest.  Representative  assem 
blies  sit  in  vain  unless  they  have  at  their  com 
mand,  in  the  last  resort,  the  physical  power 
which  is  necessary  to  make  their  deliberations 
free,  and  their  votes  effectual. 

The  Irish  are  better  represented  in  Parlia 
ment  than  the  Scotch,  who  indeed  are  not  re 
presented  at  all.  But  are  the  Irish  better  go 
verned  than  the  Scotch  ?  Surely  not.  This 
circumstance  has  of  late  been  used  as  an  ar 
gument  against  reform.  It  proves  nothing 
against  reform.  It  proves  only  this  ;  that  laws 
have  no  magical,  no  supernatural  virtue ;  that 
laws  do  not  act  like  Aladdin's  lamp  or  Prince 
Ahmed's  apple;  that  priestcraft,  that  ignorance, 
that  the  rage  of  contending  factions  may  make 
good  institutions  useless  ;  that  intelligence,  so 
briety,  industry,  moral  freedom,  firm  union, 
may  supply  in  a  great  measure  the  defects  of 
the  worst  representative  system.  A  people 
whose  education  and  habits  are  such,  that,  in 
every  quarter  of  the  world,  they  rise  above  the 
mass  of  those  with  whom  they  mix,  as  surely 
as  oil  rises  to  the  top  of  water ;  a  people  of 
such  temper  and  self-government,  that  the 
wildest  popular  excesses  recorded  in  their  his 
tory  partake  of  the  gravity  of  judicial  pro 
ceedings,  and  of  the  solemnity  of  religious 
rites;  a  people  whose  national  pride  and  mu 
tual  attachment  have  passed  into  a  proverb  ; 
a  people  whose  high  and  fierce  spirit,  so  forci 
bly  described  in  the  haughty  motto  which  en 
circles  their  thistle,  preserved  their  independ 
ence,  during  a  struggle  of  centuries,  from  the 
encroachments  of  wealthier  and  more  power 
ful  neighbours, — such  a  people  cannot  be 
long  oppressed.  Any  government,  however 
constituted,  must  respect  their  wishes,  and 
tremble  at  their  discontents.  It  is  indeed  most 
desirable  that  such  a  people  should  exercise  a 
direct  influence  on  the  conduct  of  affairs,  and 
should  make  their  wishes  known  through  con 
stitutional  organs.  But  some  influence,  direct 
or  indirect,  they  will  assuredly  possess.  Some 
organ,  constitutional  or  unconstitutional,  they 
will  assuredly  find.  They  will  be  better  go 
verned  under  a  good  constitution  than  under  a 
bad  constitution.  But  they  will  be  better  go 
verned  under  the  worst  constitution  than  some 
other  nations  under  the  best.  In  any  general 
classification  of  constitutions,  the  constitution 
of  Scotland  must  be  reckoned  as  one  of  the 
worst,  perhaps  as  the  worst  in  Christian  Eu- 
iope.  Yet  the  Scotch  are  not  ill  governed. 
And  the  ^eason  is  simply  that  they  will  not 
bear  to  on  ill  governed. 

Jn  som?  of  the  Oriental  monarchies,  in  Af- 

ghanis'an,  for  example,  though   there   exists 

nothing  which   a   European    publicist  would 

ail   a  constitution,  the   sovereign   generally 


governs  in  conformity  with  certain  rnles  «»- 
tablished  for  the  public  benefit;  and  the  sanc 
tion  of  those  rules  is,  that  every  Afghan  ap- 
|  proves  them,  and  that  every  Afghan  is  a  soU 
dier. 

The  monarchy  of  England  in  the  sixteenth 
century  was  a  monarchy  of  this  kind.  It  is 
called  an  absolute  monarchy,  because  little 
respect  was  paid  by  the  Tudors  to  those  insti 
tutions  which  we  have  been  accustomed  to 
consider  as  the  sole  checks  on  the  power  of 
the  sovereign.  A  modern  Englishman  can 
hardly  understand  how  the  people  can  havn 
had  any  real  security  for  good  government  un 
der  kings  who  levied  benevolences  and  chiij 
the  House  of  Commons  as  they  would  hava 
chid  a  pack  of  dogs.  People  do  not  sufficiently 
consider  that,  though  the  legal  checks  were 
feeble,  the  natural  checks  were  strong.  There 
was  one  great  and  effectual  limitation  on  the 
royal  authority — the  knowledge  that  if  Jhe  pa 
tience  of  the  nation  were  severely  tried,  the 
nation  would  put  forth  its  strength,  and  that 
its  strength  would  be  found  irresistible.  If  a 
large  body  of  Englishmen  became  thoroughly 
discontented,  instead  of  presenting  requisitions, 
holding  large  meetings,  passing  resolutions, 
signing  petitions,  forming  associations  and 
unions,  they  rose  up ;  they  took  their  halberds 
and  their  bows  ;  and  if  the  sovereign  was  not 
sufficiently  popular  to  find  among  his  subjects 
other  halberds  and  other  bows  to  oppose  to  the 
rebels,  nothing  remained  for  him  but  a  repeti 
tion  of  the  horrible  scenes  of  Berkeley  arid  Pom- 
fret.  He  had  no  regular  army  which  could  by  its 
superior  arms  and  its  superior  skill  overawe 
or  vanquish  the  sturdy  commons  of  his  realm, 
abounding  in  the  native  hardihood  of  English 
men,  and  trained  in  the  simple  discipline  of  the 
militia. 

It  has  been  said  that  the  Tudors  were  as  ab 
solute  as  the  Caesars.  Never  was  parallel  so 
unfortunate.  The  government  of  the  Tudors 
was  the  direct  opposite  to  the  government  of 
Augustus  and  his  successors.  The  Caesars 
ruled  despotically,  by  means  of  a  great  stand 
ing  army,  under  the  decent  forms  of  a  republi 
can  constitution.  They  called  themselves  citi 
zens.  They  mixed  unceremoniously  with  other 
citizens.  In  theory  they  were  only  the  electiv** 
magistrates  of  a  free  commonwealth.  Instead 
of  arrogating  to  themselves  despotic  power, 
they  acknowledged  obedience  to  the  senate. 
They  were  merely  the  lieutenants  of  that  ve 
nerable  body.  They  mixed  in  debate.  They 
even  appeared  as  advocates  before  the  courts 
of  law.  Yet  they  could  safely  indulge  in  the 
wildest  freaks  of  cruelty  and  rapacity  whil* 
their  legions  remained  faithful.  Our  Tudor*, 
on  the  other  hand,  under  the  titles  and  forms 
of  monarchical  supremacy,  were  essentially 
popular  magistrates.  They  had  no  means  of 
protecting  themselves  against  the  public  ha 
tred;  and  they  were  therefore  compelled  to 
court  the  public  favour.  To  enjoy  all  the  stato 
and  all  the  personal  indulgences  of  absolute 
power,  to  be  adored  with  Oriental  prostrations, 
to  dispose  at  will  of  the  liberty  and  even  of  the 
life  of  ministers  and  courtiers — this  the  nation 
granted  to  the  Tudors.  But  the  condition  on 
which  they  were  suffered  »o  be  the  tyrants  of 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF  LORD  BURGHLEY. 


177 


Whitehall  was,  that  they  should  be  the  mild 
and  paternal  sovereigns  of  England.  They 
were  under  the  same  restraints  with  regard  to 
their  people  under  which  a  military  despot  is 
placed  with  regard  to  his  army.  They  would 
have  found  it  as  dangerous  to  grind  their  sub 
jects  with  cruel  taxation  as  Nero  would  have 
found  it  to  leave  his  prcetorians  unpaid.  Those 
who  immediately  surrounded  the  royal  person, 
and  engaged  in  the  hazardous  game  of  ambi 
tion,  were  exposed  to  the  most  fearful  dangers 
Buckingham,  Cromwell,  Surrey,  Sudley,  So 
merset,  Suffolk,  Norfolk,  Percy :  Essex,  perish 
ed  on  the  scaffold.  But  in  general  the  country 
gentleman  hunted  and  the  merchant  traded  in 
peace.  Even  Henry,  as  cruel  as  Domitian  but 
far  more  politic,  contrived,  while  reeking  with 
the  blood  of  the  Lamise,  to  be  the  favourite 
with  the  cobblers. 

The  Tudors  committed  very  tyrannical  acts. 
"But  in  their  ordinary  dealings  with  the  people 
they  were  not,  and  could  not  safely  be  tyrants. 
Some  excesses  were  easily  pardoned.  For  the 
nation  was  proud  of  the  high  and  fiery  blood 
of  its  magnificent  princes ;  and  saw,  in  many 
proceedings  which  a  lawyer  would  even  then 
have  condemned,  the  outbreak  of  the  same 
noble  spirit  which  so  manfully  hurled  foul 
scorn  at  Parma  and  at  Spain.  But  to  this  en 
durance  there  was  a  limit.  If  the  government 
ventured  to  adopt  measures  which  the  great 
body  of  the  people  really  felt  to  be  oppressive, 
it  was  soon  compelled  to  change  its  course. 
When  Henry  the  Eighth  attempted  to  raise  a 
forced  loan  of  unusual  amount  by  proceedings 
Of  unusual  rigour,  the  opposition  which  he  en 
countered  was  such  as  appalled  even  his  stub 
born  and  imperious  spirit.  The  people,  we  are 
told,  said  that  if  they  were  to  be  taxed  thus, 
"  then  were  it  worse  than  the  taxes  of  France, 
and  England  should  be  bond,  and  not  free." 
The  county  of  Suffolk  rose  in  arms.  The  king 
prudently  yielded  to  an  opposition  which,  if  he 
had  persisted,  would  in  all  probability  have 
taken  the  form  of  a  general  rebellion.  To 
wards  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  the 
people  felt  themselves  aggrieved  by  the  mono 
polies.  The  queen,  proud  and  courageous  as 
she  was,  shrunk  from  a  contest  with  the  na 
tion,  and,  with  admirable  sagacity,  conceded 
all  that  her  subjects  had  demanded,  while  it 
was  yet  in  her  power  to  concede  with  dignity 
and  grace. 

It  cannot  be  supposed  that  a  people  who  had 
in  their  own  hands  the  means  of  checking  their 
princes,  would  suffer  any  prince  to  impose 
upon  them  a  religion  generally  detested.  It  is 
absurd  to  suppose  that,  if  the  nation  had  been 
decidedly  attached  to  the  Protestant  faith,  Mary 
could  have  re-established  the  Papal  supremacy. 
It  is  equally  absurd  to  suppose  that,  if  the  na 
tion  had  been  zealous  for  the  ancient  religion, 
Elizabeth  could  have  restored  the  Protestant 
Church.  The  truth  is,  that  the  people  were 
not  disposed  to  engage  in  a  struggle  either  for 
the  new  or  for  the  old  doctrines.  Abundance 
of  spirit  was  shown  when  it  seemed  likely  that 
Mary  would  resume  her  father's  grants  of 
church  property,  or  that  she  would  sacrifice 
the  interests  of  England  to  the  husband  whom 
she  regarded  with  unmerited  tenderness.  That 

VOL.  II.— 23 


I  queen  found  that  it  would  be  madness  to  at- 
,  tempt  the  restoration  of  the  abbey  lands.  She 
,  found  that  her  subjects  would  never  suffer  her 
i  to  make  her  hereditary  kingdom  a  fief  of  Cas- 
'  tile.  On  these  points  she  encountered  a  steady 
resistance,  and  was  compelled  to  give  way.  If 
she  was  able  to  establish  the  Catholic  worship 
and  to  persecute  those  who  would  not  conform 
to  it,  it  was  evidently  because  the  people  cared 
far  less  for  the  Protestant  religion  than  for  the 
rights  of  property  and  for  the  independence  of 
the  English  crown.  In  plain  words,  they  did 
not  think  the  difference  between  the  hostile 
sects  worth  a  struggle.  There  was  undoubted 
ly  a  zealous  Protestant  party  and  a  zealous 
Catholic  party.  But  both  these  parties  were, 
we  believe,  very  small.  We  doubt  whether 
both  together  made  up,  at  the  time  of  Mary's 
death,  the  twentieth  part  of  the  nation.  The 
remaining  nineteen-twentieths  halted  between 
the  two  opinions,  and  were  not  disposed  to 
risk  a  revolution  in  the  government  for  the 
purpose  of  giving  to  either  of  the  exuvme  fac 
tions  an  advantage  over  the  other. 

We  possess  no  data  which  will  enable  us  t« 
compare  with  exactness  the  force  of  the  twe 
sects.  Mr.  Butler  asserts  that,  even  at  the  ac 
cession  of  James  the  First,  a  majority  of  tht 
population  of  England  were  Catholics.  Thi? 
is  pure  assertion,  and  is  not  only  unsupportet 
by  evidence,  but,  we  think,  completely  dis 
proved  by  vhe  strongest  evidence.  I)r.  Lingari . 
is  of  opinion  that  the  Catholics  were  one-hair" 
of  the  nation  in  the  middle  of  the  reign  of  Eliza* 
beth.  Richton  says,  that  when  Elizabeth  cama 
to  the  throne,  the  Catholics  were  two-third* 
of  the  nation,  and  the  Protestants  only  onr- 
third.  The  most  judicious  and  impartial  of 
English  historians,  Mr.  Hallam,  is,  on  the  con 
trary,  of  opinion  that  two-thirds  were  Protest 
ants,  and  only  one-third  Catholics.  To  us,  \r* 
must  confess,  it  seems  altogether  inconceivab! .3 
that,  if  the  Protestants  were  really  two  to  ona, 
they  should  have  borne  the  government  of 
Mary;  or  that,  if  the  Catholics  were  really  tw3 
to  one,  they  should  have  borne  the  government 
of  Elizabeth.  It  is  absolutely  incredible  thr.fi 
a  sovereign  who  has  no  standing  army,  and 
whose  power  rests  solely  on  the  loyalty  of  his 
subjects,  can  continue  for  years  to  persecute 
a  religion  to  which  the  majority  of  his  subject* 
are  sincerely  attached.  In  fact,  the  Protest 
ants  did  rise  up  against  one  sister,  and  ths 
Catholics  against  the  other.  Those  risings 
clearly  showed  how  small  and  feeble  both  the 
parties  were.  Both  in  the  one  case  and  in  the 
other  the  nation  ranged  itself  on  the  side  of  the 
government,  and  the  insurgents  were  speedily 
put  down  and  punished.  The  Kentish  gentle 
men  who  took  up  arms  for  the  reformed  doc 
trines  against  Mary,  and  the  Great  Northern 
Earls  who  displayed  the  banner  of  the  Five 
Wounds  against  Elizabeth,  were  alike  consi 
dered  by  the  great  body  of  their  countrymen  as 
wicked  disturbers  of  the  public  peace. 

The  account  which  Cardinal  Bentivoglio  • 
gave  of  the  state  of  religion  in  England  well 
deserves  consideration.  The  zealous  Catho- 
ics  he  reckoned  at  one-thirtieth  p?irt  of  the 
nation.  The  people  who  would  witnout  the 
"east  scruple  become  Catholics  if  the  Cath:'i? 


178 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


religion  were  established  he  estimated  at  four- 
fifths  of  the  nation.  We  believe  this  account 
to  have  been  very  near  the  truth.  We  believe 
that  the  people  whose  minds  were  made  up  on 
either  side,  who  were  inclined  to  make  any 
sacrifice  or  run  any  risk  for  either  religion, 
were  very  few.  Each  side  had  a  few  enter 
prising  champions  and  a  few  stout-hearted 
martyrs;  but  the  nation,  undetermined  in  its 
opinions  and  feelings,  resigned  itself  implicitly 
to  the  guidance  of  the  government,  and  lent  to 
the  sovereign  for  the  time  being  an  equally 
ready  aid  against  either  of  the  extreme  parties. 
We  are  very  far  from  saying  that  the  Eng 
lish  of  that  generation  were  irreligious.  They 
held  firmly  those  doctrines  which  are  common 
to  the  Catholic  and  to  the  Protestant  theology. 
But  they  had  no  fixed  opinion  as  to  the  matters 
in  dispute  between  the  churches.  They  were 
in  a  situation  resembling  that  of  those  Bor 
derers  whom  Sir  Walter  Scott  has  described 
with  so  much  spirit ; 

"  Who  sought  the  beeves  that  made  their  broth 
In  England  and  in  Scotland  both;" 

And  who 

"  Nine  times  outlawed  had  been 
By  England's  king  and  Scotland's  queen." 

They  were  sometimes  Protestants,  sometimes 
Catholics ;  sometimes  half  Protestants,  half 
Catholics. 

The  English  had  not,  for  ages,  been  bigoted 
Papists.  In  the  fourteenth  century,  the  first, 
and  perhaps  the  greatest  of  the  reformers,  John 
Wicklifte,  had  stirred  the  public  mind  to  its  in 
most  depths.  During  the  same  century,  a 
scandalous  schism  in  the  Catholic  church  had 
diminished,  in  many  parts  of  Europe,  the  re 
verence  in  which  the  Roman  pontiffs  were 
held.  It  is  clear  that  a  hundred  years  before 
the  time  of  Luther,  a  great  party  in  this  king 
dom  was  eager  for  a  change,  at  least  as  exten 
sive  as  that  which  was  subsequently  effected 
by  Henry  the  Eighth.  The  House  of  Com 
mons,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Fourth,  pro 
posed  a  confiscation  of  ecclesiastical  property, 
more  sweeping  and  violent  even  than  that 
which  took  place  under  the  administration  of 
Thomas  Cromwell;  and,  though  defeated  in 
this  attempt,  they  succeeded  in  depriving  the 
clerical  order  of  some  of  its  most  oppressive 
privileges.  The  splendid  conquests  of  Henry 
the  Fifth  turned  the  attention  of  the  nation 
from  domestic  reform.  The  Council  of  Con 
stance  removed  some  of  the  grossest  of  those 
scandals  which  had  deprived  the  Church  of 
the  public  respect.  The  authority  of  that 
venerable  synod  propped  up  the  sinking  au 
thority  of  the  Popedom.  A  considerable  reac 
tion  took  place.  It  cannot,  however,  be  doubted, 
that  there  was  still  much  concealed  Lollardism 
in  England ;  or  that  many  who  did  not  abso 
lutely  dissent  from  any  doctrine  held  by  the 
Church  of  Rome,  were  jealous  of  the  wea'.th 
and  power  enjoyed  by  her  ministers.  At  the 
very  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Henry  the 
Eighth,  a  struggle  took  place  between  the 
clergy  and  the  courts  of  law,  in  which  the 
courts,  of  law  remained  victorious.  One  of  the 
bishops  on  that  occasion  declared,  that  the 


common  people  entertained  the  strongest  pre 
judices  against  his  order,  and  that  a  clergy 
man  had  no  chance  of  fair  play  before  a  lay 
tribunal.  The  London  juries,  he  said,  enter 
tained  such  a  spite  to  the  Church,  that  they 
would  find  Abel  guilty  of  the  murder  of  Cain. 
This  was  said  a  few  months  before  the  time 
when  Martin  Luther  began  to  preach  at  Wit- 
temberg  against  indulgences. 

As  the  Reformation  did  not  find  the  English 
bigoted  Papists,  so  neither  was  it  conducted  in 
such  a  manner  as  to  make  them  zealous  Pro 
testants.  It  was  not  under  the  direction  of 
men  like  that  fiery  Saxon,  who  swore  that  he 
would  go  to  Worms,  though  he  had  to  face  as 
many  devils  as  there  were  tiles  on  the  houses, 
or  like  that  brave  Switzer,  who  was  struck 
down  while  praying  in  front  of  the  ranks  of 
Zurich.  No  preacher  of  religion  had  the  same 
power  here  which  Calvin  had  at  Geneva,  and 
Knox  in  Scotland.  The  government  put  itself 
early  at  the  head  of  the  movement,  and  thus 
acquired  power  to  regulate,  and  occasionally 
to  arrest,  the  movement. 

To  many  persons  it  appears  extraordinary 
that  Henry  the  Eighth  should  have  been  able 
to  maintain  himself  so  long  in  an  intermediate 
position  between  the  Catholic  and  Protestant 
parties.  Most  extraordinary,  it  woiild  indeed 
be,  if  we  were  to  suppose  that  the  nation  con 
sisted  of  none  but  decided  Catholics  and  de 
cided  Protestants.  The  fact  is,  that  the  great 
mass  of  the  people  were  neither  Catholic  nor 
Protestant;  but  was,  4ike  its  sovereign,  mid 
way  between  the  two  sects.  Henry,  in  tha: 
very  part  of  his  conduct  which  has  been  repre 
sented  as  most  capricious  and  inconsistent, 
was  probably  following  a  policy  far  more 
pleasing  to  the  majority  of  his  subjects,  than 
a  policy  like  that  of  Edward  or  a  policy  like 
that  of  Mary  would  have  been.  Down  even 
to  the  very  close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  the 
people  were  in  a  state  somewhat  resembling 
that  in  which,  as  Machiavelli  says,  the  inha 
bitants  of  the  Roman  empire  were,  during  the 
transition  from  Heathenism  to  Christianity ; 
"  sendo  la  maggior  parte  di  loro  incerti  a  quale 
Dio  dovessero  ricorrere."  They  were  gene 
rally,  we  think,  favourable  to  the  royal  supre 
macy.  They  disliked  the  policy  of  the  court 
of  Rome.  Their  spirit  rose  against  the  inter 
ference  of  a  foreign  priest  with  their  national 
concerns.  The  bull  which  pronounced  sen 
tence  of  deposition  against  Elizabeth,  the  plots 
which  were  formed  against  her  life,  the  usurpa 
tion  of  her  titles  by  the  Queen  of  Scotland,  the 
hostility  of  Philip,  excited  their  strongest  in 
dignation.  The  cruelties  of  Bonner  were  re 
membered  with  disgust.  Some  parts  of  the 
new  system,  the  use  of  the  English  language, 
for  example,  in  public  worship,  and  the  com 
munion  in  both  kinds,  were  undoubtedly  popu 
lar.  On  the  other  hand,  the  early  lessons  of 
the  nurse  and  the  priest  were  not  forgotten. 
The  ancient  ceremonies  were  long  remember 
ed  with  affectionate  reverence.  A  large  por 
tion  of  the  ancient  theology  lingered  to  the 
last  in  the  minds  which  had  been  imbued  with 
it  in  childhood. 

The  best  proof  that  the  religion  of  the  people 


NARES'S  MEMOIRS  OF    LORD    BURGHLEY. 


179 


vas  of  this  mixed  kind,  is  furnished  by  the 
drama  of  that  age.  No  man  would  bring  un 
popular  opinions  prominently  forward  in  a 
play  intended  for  representation.  And  we  may 
safely  conclude,  that  feelings  and  opinions 
which  pervade  the  whole  dramatic  literature 
of  an  age,  are  feelings  and  opinions  of  which 
the  mon  of  that  age  generally  partook. 

The  greatest  and  most  popular  dramatists  of 
the  Elizabethan  age  treat  religious  subjects  in  a 
very  remarkable  manner.  They  speak  respect 
fully  of  the  fundamental  doctrines  of  Chris 
tianity.  But  they  speak  neither  like  Catholics 
nor  like  Protestants,  but  like  persons  who  are 
wavering  between  the  two  systems ;  or  who 
have  made  a  system  for  themselves  out  of 
parts  selected  from  both.  They  seem  to  hold 
some  of  the  Romish  rites  and  doctrines  in  high 
respect.  They  treat  the  vow  of  celibacy,  for 
example,  so  tempting,  and,  in  after  times,  so 
common  a  subject  for  ribaldry,  with  mysterious 
reverence.  The  members  of  religious  orders 
whom  they  introduce  are  almost  always  holy 
and  venerable  men.  We  remember  in  their 
plays  nothing  resembling  the  coarse  ridicule 
with  which  the  Catholic  religion  and  its  minis 
ters  were  assailed,  two  generations  later,  by 
dramatists  who  wished  to  please  the  multitude. 
We  remember  no  Friar  Dominic,  no  Father 
Foigard,  among  the  characters  drawn  by  those 
great  poets.  The  scene  at  the  close  of  the 
Knight  of  Malta  might  have  been  written  by  a 
fervent  Catholic.  Massinger  shows  a  great  fond 
ness  for  ecclesiastics  of  the  Romish  church; 
and  has  even  gone  so  far  as  to  bring  a  virtuous 
and  interesting  Jesuit  on  the  stage.  Ford,  in 
that  fine  play,  which  it  is  painful  to  read,  and 
scarcely  decent  to  name,  assigns  a  highly 
creditable  part  to  the  Friar.  The  partiality  of 
Shakspeare  for  Friars  is  well  known.  In  Ham 
let,  the  Ghost  complains  that  he  died  without 
extreme  unction,  and,  in  defiance  of  the  article 
which  condemns  the  doctrine  of  purgatory,  de 
clares  that  he  is 

"  Confined  to  fast  in  fires, 
Till  the  foul  crimes,  done  in  his  days  of  nature, 
Are  burnt  and  purged  away." 

These  lines,  we  suspect,  would  have  raised 
a  tremendous  storm  in  the  theatre  at  any  time 
during  the  reign  of  Charles  the  Second.  They 
were  clearly  not  written  by  a  zealous  Protest 
ant,  or  for  zealous  Protestants.  Yet  the  author 
of  King  John  and  Henry  the  Eighth  was  surely 
no  friend  to  papal  supremacy. 

There  is,  we  think,  only  one  solution  of  the 
phenomena  which  we  find  in  the  history  and 
in  the  drama  of  that  age.  The  religion  of 
England  was  a  mixed  religion,  like  that  of  the 
Samaritan  settlers,  described  in  the  second 
book  of  Kings,  who  "feared  the  Lord,  and 
served  their  graven  images;"  like  that  of  the 
Judaizing  Christians,  who  blended  the  ceremo 
nies  and  doctrines  of  the  synagogue  with  those 
of  the  church;  like  that  of  the  Mexican  In 
dians,  who,  for  many  generations  after  the  sub 
jugation  of  their  race,  continued  to  unite  with 
the  rites  learned  from  their  conquerors,  the 
worship  of  the  grotesque  idols  which  had  been 
adored  by  Montezuma  and  Guatemozin. 

These  feelings   were  not  confined   to  the 


i  populace,     Elizabeth  herself  was  not  exempt 
|  from  them.     A  crucifix,  with  wax-lights  burn- 
!  ing  round  it,  stood  in  her  private  chapel.    She 
i  always  spoke  with  disgust  and  anger  of  the 
!  marriage  of  priests.     "I  was  in  horror,"  says 
!  Archbishop  Parker,    "to  hear  such  words  to 
come   from  her   mild    nature   and   Christian 
learned  conscience,  as  she  spake  concerning 
God's  holy  ordinance  arid  institution  of  matri 
mony."     B urghley  prevailed  on  her  to  connive 
at  the  marriages  of  churchmen.  But  she  \vould 
only  connive;  and  the  children  sprung  from 
such  marriages  were  illegitimate  till  the  ac 
cession  of  James  the  First. 

That  which  is,  as  we  have  said,  the  great 
stain  on  the  character  of  Burghley,  is  also  tb£ 
great  stain  on  the  character  of  Elizabetn 
Being  herself  an  Adiaphorist,  having  no  scru 
ple  about  conforming  to  the  Romish  churcn. 
when  conformity  was  necessary  to  her  own 
safety,  retaining  to  the  last  moment  of  her  life 
a  fondness  for  much  of  the  doctrine  and  much 
of  the  ceremonial  of  that  church,  she  yet  sub 
jected  that  church  to  a  persecution  even  more 
odious  than  the  persecution  with  which  her 
sister  had  harassed  the  Protestants.  We  say 
more  odious.  For  Mary  had  at  least  the  plea 
of  fanaticism.  She  did  nothing  for  her  reli 
gion  which  she  was  not  prepared  to  suffer  for 
it.  She  had  held  it  firmly  under  persecution. 
She  fully  believed  it  to  be  essential  to  salva 
tion.  If  she  burned  the  bodies  of  her  subjects, 
it  was  in  order  to  rescue  their  souls.  Eliza 
beth  had  no  .such  pretext.  In  opinion,  she  was 
little  more  than  half  a  Protestant.  She  had 
professed,  when  it  suited  her,  to  be  wholly  a 
Catholic.  There  is  an  excuse,  a  wretched  ex 
cuse,  for  the  massacre  of  Piedmont  and  the 
autos-da-fe  of  Spain.  But  what  can  be  said  in 
defence  of  a  ruler  who  is  at  once  indifferent 
and  intolerant  ? 

If  the  great  queen,  whose  memory  is  still 
held  in  just  veneration  by  Englishmen,  had 
possessed  sufficient  virtue  and  sufficient  en 
largement  of  mind  to  adopt  those  principles 
which  More,  wiser  in  speculation  than  in  ac 
tion,  had  avowed  in  the  preceding  generation, 
and  by  which  the  excellent  1'Hospital  regu 
lated  his  conduct  in  her  own  time,  how  dif 
ferent  would  be  the  colour  of  the  whole  history 
of  the  last  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  !  She 
had  the  happiest  opportunity  ever  vouchsafed 
to  any  sovereign,  of  establishing  perfect  free 
dom  of  conscience  throughout  her  dominions, 
without  danger  to  her  government,  or  scandal 
to  any  large  party  among  her  subjects.  The 
nation,  as  it  was  clearly  ready  to  profess  either 
religion,  would,  beyond  all  doubt,  have  been 
ready  to  tolerate  both.  Unhappily  for  her  own 
glory  and  for  the  public  peace,  she  adopted  a 
policy,  from  the  effects  of  which  the  empire  is 
still  suffering.  The  yoke  of  the  Established 
Church  was  pressed  down  on.  the  people  till 
they  would  bear  it  no  longer.  Then  a  reaction 
came.  Another  reaction  folio wtJ.  To  the 
tyranny  of  the  establishment  succeeded  the  tu 
multuous  conflict  of  sects,  infuriated  bv  mam 
fold  wrongs,  and  drunk  with  unwonted  freedom. 
To  the  conflict  of  sects  succeeded  again  he 
cruel  domination  of  one  persecuting 


180 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


At  length  oppression  put  off  its  most  horrible 
form,  and  took  a  milder  aspect.  The  penal 
laws  against  dissenters  were  abolished.  But 
exclusions  and  disabilities  still  remained. 
These  exclusions  and  disabilities,  after  having 
generated  the  most  fearful  discontents,  after 
having  rendered  all  government  in  one  part 
of  the  kingdom  impossible,  after  having 
brought  the  state  to  the  very  brink  of  ruin, 
have,  in  our  times,  been  removed  ;  but,  though 
removed,  have  left  behind  them  a  rankling 
which  may  last  for  many  years.  It  is  melan 
choly  to  think  with  what  ease  Elizabeth  might 
have  united  all  the  conflicting  sects  under  the 
shelter  of  the  same  impartial  laws  and  the 
same  paternal  throne ;  and  thus  have  placed 
the  nation  in  the  same  situation,  as  far  as  the 
rights  of  conscience  are  concerned,  in  which 
we  at  length  stand,  after  all  the  heart-burnings, 
the  persecutions,  the  conspiracies,  the  sedi 
tions,  the  revolutions,  the  judicial  murders, 
the  civil  wars,  of  ten  generations. 

This  is  the  dark  side  of  her  character.  Yet 
she  surely  was  a  great  woman.  Of  all  the 
sovereigns  who  exercised  a  power  which  was 
seemingly  absolute,  but  which  in  fact  depend 
ed  for  support  on  the  love  and  confidence  of 
their  subjects,  she  was  by  far  the  most  illus 
trious.  It  has  often  been  alleged,  as  an  excuse 
for  the  misgovernment  of  her  successors,  that 
they  only  followed  her  example ; — that  prece 
dents  might  be  found  in  the  transactions  of 
her  reign  for  persecuting  the  Puritans,  for 
levying  money  without  the  sanction  of  the 
House  of  Commons,  for  confining  men  with 
out  bringing  them  to  trial,  for  interfering  with 
the  liberty  of  parliamentary  debate.  All  this 
may  be  true.  But  it  is  no  good  plea  for  her 
successors,  and  for  this  plain  reason,  that  they 
were  her  successors.  She  governed  one  gene 
ration,  they  governed  another;  and  between 
the  two  generations  there  was  almost  as  little 
in  common  as  between  the  people  of  two  dif 
ferent  countries.  It  was  not  by  looking  at  the 
particular  measures  which  Elizabeth  had 
adopted,  but  by  looking  at  the  great  general 
principles  of  her  government,  that  those  who 
followed  her  were  likely  to  learn  the  art  of 
managing  untractable  subjects.  If,  instead  of 
searching  the  records  of  her  reign  for  prece 
dents  which  might  seem  to  vindicate  the  muti 
lation  of  Prynne  and  the  imprisonment  of 
Eliot,  the  Stuarts  had  attempted  to  discover 
the  fundamental  rules  which  guided  her  con 
duct  in  all  her  dealings  with  her  people,  they 
would  have  perceived  that  their  policy  was 
then  most  unlike  to  hers  when,  to  a  superficial 
observer,  it  would  have  seemed  most  to  resem 
ble  hers.  Firm,  haughty,  sometimes  unjust  and 
cruel  in  her  proceedings  towards  individuals 
or  towards  small  parties,  she  avoided  with 
care,  or  retracted  with  speed,  every  measure 
which  seemed  likely  to  alienate  the  great  mass 
of  the  people.  She  gained  more  honour  and 
ui^re  love  by  the  manner  in  which  she  repair 
ed  her  errors,  than  she  would  have  gained  by 
xiever  committing  errors.  If  such  a  man  as 
-har.es  the  First  had  been  in  her  place  when 

«  whole  nation  was  crying  out  against  the 
monooolies,  he  would  have  refused  all  redress : 


he  would  have  dissolved  the  Parliament,  and 
imprisoned  the  most  popular  members  Ke 
would  have  called  another  Parliament.  He 
would  have  given  some  vague  and  delusive 
promises  of  relief  in  return  for  subsidies. 
When  entreated  to  fulfil  his  promises,  he 
would  have  again  dissolved  the  Parliament, 
and  again  imprisoned  his  leading  opponents. 
The  country  would  have  become  more  agi 
tated  than  before.  The  next  House  of  Com 
mons  would  have  been  more  unmanageable 
than  that  which  preceded  it.  The  tyrant 
would  have  agreed  to  all  that  the  nation  de 
manded.  He  would  have  solemnly  ratified  an 
act  abolishing  monopolies  forever.  He  would 
have  received  a  large  supply  in  return  for  this 
concession;  and  within  half  a  year  new  pa 
tents,  more  oppressive  than  those  which  had 
been  cancelled,  would  have  been  issued  by 
scores.  Such  was  the  policy  which  brought 
the  heir  of  a  long  line  of  kings,  in  early  youth 
the  darling  of  his  countrymen,  to  a  prison  and 
a  scaffold. 

Elizabeth,  before  the  House  of  Commons 
could  address  her,  took  out  of  their  mouths  the 
words  which  they  were  about  to  utter  in  the 
name  of  the  nation.  Her  promises  went  be 
yond  their  desires.  Her  performance  followed 
close  upon  her  promise.  She  did  not  treat  the 
nation  as  an  adverse  party  ;  as  a  party  which 
had  an  interest  opposed  to  hers  ;  as  a  party  to 
which  she  was  to  grant  as  few  advantages  as 
possible,  and  from  which  she  was  to  extort  as 
much  money  as  possible.  Her  benefits  were 
given,  not  sold ;  and  when  once  given,  they 
were  not  withdrawn.  She  gave  them,  too, 
with  a  frankness,  an  effusion  of  heart,  a 
princely  dignity,  a  motherly  tenderness,  which 
enhanced  their  value.  They  were  received  by 
the  sturdy  country  gentleman,  who  had  come 
up  to  Westminster  full  of  resentment,  with 
tears  of  joy  and  shouts  of  God  save  the  Queen. 
Charles  the  First  gave  up  half  the  preroga 
tives  of  his  crown  to  the  Commons;  and  the 
Commons  sent  him  in  return  the  Grand  Re 
monstrance. 

We  had  intended  to  say  something  concern 
ing  that  illustrious  group  of  which  Elizabeth 
is  the  central  figure — that  group  which  the 
last  of  the  bards  saw  in  vision  from  the  top  of 
Snowdon,  encircling  the  Virgin  Queen — 

"Many  a  baron  bold, 
And  gorgeous  darnes,  and  statesmen  old 
In  bearded  majesty." 

We  had  intended  to  say  something  concerning 
the  dexterous  Walsingham,  the  impetuous  Ox 
ford,  the  elegant  Sackville,  the  all-accomplish 
ed  Sidney;  concerning  Essex, the  ornament  of 
the  court  and  of  the  camp,  the  model  of  chival 
ry,  the  munificent  patron  of  genius,  whom  great 
virtues,  great  courage,  great  talents,  the  favour 
of  his  sovereign,  the  love  of  hi:-  countrymen — 
all  that  seemed  to  insure  a  happy  and  glorious 
life,  led  to  an  early  and  an  ignominious  death' 
concerning  Raleigh,  the  soldier,  the  sailor,  the 
scholar,  the  courtier,  the  orator,  the  poet,  the 
historian,  the  philosopher,  sometimes  review 
ing  the  queen's  guards  sometimes  givin* 


DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS  OF   MIRABEAU. 


181 


chase  to  a  Spanish  galleon,  then  answering  Prince  of  Philosophers,  who  have  made  the 

the  chiefs  of  the  country  party  in  the  House  of  Elizabethan  age  a  more  glorious  and  important 

Commons,  then  again  murmuring  one  of  his  era  in  the  history  of  the  human  mind,  than  the 

sweet  love-songs  too  near  the  ears  of  her  high-  age  of  Pericles,  of  Augustus,  or  of  Leo.     But 

ness's  maids  of  honour,  and  soon  after  poring  subjects  so   vast  require  a  space  far  larger 


over  the  Talmud,  or  collating  Polybius  with 
Livy.  We  had  intended  also  to  say  something 
concerning  the  literature  of  that  splendid  pe 
riod,  and  especially  concerning  those  two  in 
comparable  men,  the  Prince  of  Poets  and  the 


than  we  can  at  present  afford.  We  therefore 
stop  here,  fearing  that,  if  we  proceed,  our  arti 
cle  may  swell  to  a  bulk  exceeding  that  of  all 
other  reviews,  as  much  as  Doctor  Nares's  took 
exceeds  the  bulk  of  all  other  histories. 


DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS  OF  MIRABEAU.' 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1832.] 


THIS  is  a  very  amusing  and  a  very  in 
structive  book  ;  but,  even  if  it  were  less  amus 
ing  and  less  instructive,  it  would  still  be  inte 
resting  as  a  relic  of  a  wise  and  virtuous  man. 
M.  Dumont  was  one  of  those  persons,  the  care 
of  whose  fame  belongs  in  an  especial  manner 
to  mankind,  for  he  was  one  of  those  persons 
who  have,  for  the  sake  of  mankind,  neglected 
the  care  of  their  own  fame.  In  his  walk 
through  life  there  was  no  obtrusiveness,  no 
pushing,  no  elbowing,  none  of  the  little  arts 
which  bring  forward  little  men.  With  every 
right  to  the  head  of  the  board,  he  took  the  low 
est  room,  and  well  deserved  to  be  greeted  with — 
Friend,  go  up  higher.  Though  no  man  was 
more  capable  of  achieving  for  himself  a  sepa 
rate  and  independent  renown,  he  attached  him 
self  to  others;  he  laboured  to  raise  their  fame; 
he  was  content  to  receive,  as  his  share  of  the 
reward,  the  mere  overflowings  which  redound 
ed  from  the  full  measure  of  their  glory.  Not 
that  he  was  of  a  servile  and  idolatrous  habit 
of  mind ;  not  that  he  was  one  of  the  tribe  of 
Boswells,  those  literary  Gibeonites,  born  to  be 
hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water  to  the 
higher  intellectual  castes.  Possessed  of  talents 
and  acquirements  which  made  him  great,  he 
wished  only  to  be  useful.  In  the  prime  of 
manhood,  at  the  very  time  of  life  at  which  am 
bitious  men  are  most  ambitious,  he  was  not 
solicitous  to  proclaim  that  he  furnished  infor 
mation,  arguments,  and  eloquence  to  Mirabeau. 
In  his  later  years  he  was  perfectly  willing  that 
his  renown  should  merge  in  that  of  Mr.  Ben- 
tham. 

The  services  which  M.  Dumont  has  rendered 
to  society  can  be  fully  appreciated  only  by 
those  who  have  studied  Mr.  Bentham's  works, 
both  in  their  rude  and  in  their  finished  state. 
The  difference  both  for  show  and  for  use  is  as 
great  as  the  difference  between  a  lump  of  golden 
ore  and  a  rouieau  of  sovereigns  fresh  from  the 
mint.  Of  Mr.  Bentham  we  would  at  all  times 
speak  with  the  reverence  which  is  due  to  a 


*  Souvenirs  sur  Miraleau,  et  sur  les  deux  Premieres 
rfssemblees  Legislatives.  Par  ETIENNE  DUMONT,  de  Ge- 
nAve  :  ouvrage  posthume  puhlii-  par  M.  J.  L.  Duval, 
Meinbre  du  ConseilRepresentatif  du  Canton  du  Geneve. 
8vo.  Paiis.  1832. 


great  original  thinker,  and  to  a  sincere  and 
ardent  friend  of  the  human  race.  If  a  few 
weaknesses  were  mingled  with  his  eminent 
virtues,  if  a  few  errors  insinuated  themselves 
among  the  many  valuable  truths  which  he 
taught,  this  is  assuredly  no  time  for  noticing 
those  weaknesses  or  those  errors  in  an  unkind 
or  sarcastic  spirit.  A  great  man  has  gone 
from  among  us,  full  of  years,  of  good  works, 
and  of  deserved  honours.  In  some  of  the  high 
est  departments  in  which  the  human  intellect 
can  exert  itself,  he  has  not  left  his  equal  or  his 
second  behind  him.  From  his  con'ernporaries 
he  has  had,  according  to  the  usuti  lot,  more  or 
less  than  justice.  He  has  had  bl'.nd.  flatterers 
and  blind  detractors  ;  flatterers  wlio  could  see 
nothing  but  perfection  in  his  style,  detractors 
who  could  see  nothing  but  nonsense  in  his 
matter.  He  will  now  have  judges.  Posterity 
will  pronounce  its  calm  and  impartial  decision, 
and  that  decision  will,  we  firmly  believe,  place 
in  the  same  rank  with  Galileo  a*id  with  Locke 
the  man  who  found  jurisprudence  a  gibberish 
and  left  it  a  science.  Never  was  there  a  lite 
rary  partnership  so  fortunate  as  that  of  Mr 
Bentham  and  M.  Dumont.  The  raw  material 
which  Mr.  Bentham  furnished  was  most  pre 
cious,  but  it  was  unmarketable.  He  was,  assu 
redly,  at  once  a  great  logician  and  a  great 
rhetorician.  But  the  effect  of  his  logic  was 
injured  by  a  vicious  arrangement,  and  the 
effect  of  his  rhetoric  by  a  vicious  style.  His 
mind  was  vigorous,  comprehensive,  subtile, 
fertile  of  arguments,  fertile  of  illustrations. 
But  he  spoke  in  an  unknown  tongue;  and,  that 
the  congregation  might  be  edified,  it  was  neces 
sary  that  some  brother  having  the  gift  of  inter 
pretation  should  expound  the  invaluable  jargon. 
His  oracles  were  of  high  import,  but  they  were 
traced  on  leaves  and  flung  loose  to  the  wind. 
So  negligent  was  he  of  the  arts  of  selection, 
distribution,  and  compression,  that  to  persons 
who  formed  their  judgment  of  him  from  his 
works  in  their  undigested  state,  he  seemed  to 
be  the  least  systematic  of  all  philosophers. 
The  truth  is,  that  his  opinions  formed  a  sys 
tem  which,  whether  sound  or  unsound,  is  more 
exact,  more  entire,  and  more  consistent  with 
itself  than  any  other.  Yet,  to  superficial  rea  .  • 


182 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


crs  of  his  works  in  their  original  form,  and 
indeed  to  all  readers  of  those  works  who  did 
not  bring  great  industry  and  great  acuteness 
to  the  study,  he  seemed  to  be  a  man  of  a  quick 
and  ingenious  but  ill-regulated  mind,  who  saw 
truth  only  by  glimpses,  who  threw  out  many 
striking  hints,  but  who  had  never  thought  of 
combining  his  doctrines  in  one  harmonious 
whole. 

M.  Dumont  was  admirably  qualified  to  sup 
ply  what  was  wanting  in  Mr.  Bentham.  In  the 
qualities  in  which  the  French  writers  surpass 
those  of  all  other  nations — neatness,  clearness, 
precision,  condensation  —  he  surpassed  all 
French  writers.  If  M.  Dumont  had  never  been 
born,  Mr.  Bentham  would  still  have  been  a 
very  great  man.  But  he  would  have  been 
great  to  himself  alone.  The  fertility  of  his 
mind  would  have  resembled  the  fertility  of 
those  vast  American  wildernesses,  in  which 
blossoms  and  decays  a  rich  but  unprofitable 
vegetation,  "  wherewith  the  reaper  filleth  not 
his  hand,  neither  he  that  bindeth  up  the  sheaves 
his  bosom."  It  would  have  been  with  his  dis 
coveries  as  it  has  been  with  the  "  Century  of 
Inventions."  His  speculations  on  laws  would 
have  been  of  no  more  practical  use  than  Lord 
Worcester's  speculations  on  steam-engines. 
Some  generations  hence,  perhaps,  when  legis 
lation  has  found  its  Watt,  an  antiquary  might 
have  published  to  the  world  the  curious  fact, 
that  in  the  reign  of  George  the  Third  there  had 
been  a  man  called  Bentham,  who  had  given 
hints  of  many  discoveries  made  since  his  time, 
and  who  had  really,  for  his  age,  taken  a  most 
philosophical  view  of  the  principles  of  juris 
prudence. 

Many  persons  have  attempted  to  interpret 
between  this  powerful  mind  and  the  public. 
But.  in  our  opinion,  M,  Dumont  alone  has  suc 
ceeded.  It  is  remarkable  that,  in  foreign  coun 
tries,  where  Mr.  Bentham's  works  are  known 
solely  through  the  medium  of  the  French  ver 
sion,  his  merit  is  almost  universally  acknow 
ledged.  Even  those  who  are  most  decidedly 
opposed  to  his  political  opinions,  the  very 
chiefs  of  the  Holy  Alliance,  have  publicly  tes 
tified  their  respect  for  him.  In  England,  on 
the  contrary,  many  persons  who  certainly  en 
tertained  no  prejudice  against  him  on  political 
grounds,  were  long  in  the  habit  of  mentioning 
him  contemptuously.  Indeed,  what  was  said 
of  Bacon's  philosophy  may  be  said  of  Ben 
tham's.  It  was  of  little  repute  among  us  till 
judgments  in  its  favour  came  from  beyond  sea, 
and  convinced  us,  to  our  shame,  that  we  had 
been  abusing  and  laughing  at  one  of  the  great 
est  men  of  the  age. 

M.  Dumont  might  easily  have  found  employ 
ments  more  gratifying  to  personal  vanity,  than 
that  of  arranging  works  not  his  own.  But  he 
could  have  found  no  employment  more  useful 
or  more  truly  honourable.  The  book  before 
us,  hastily  written  as  it  is,  contains  abundant 
proof,  if  proof  were  needed,  that  he  did  not  be 
come  an  editor  because  hf  wanted  the  talents 
which  would  have  made  him  eminent  as  a 
writer. 

Persons  who  hold  democratical  opinions 
and  who  have  been  accustomed  to  consider 
M.  Dumont  as  one  of  their  party,  have  been 


surprised  and  mortified  to  learn,  that  he  speak* 
,vith  very  little  respect  of  the  French  Revolu 
ion,  and  of  its  authors.  Some  zealous  Tories 
lave  naturally  expressed  great  satisfaction  at 
inding  their  doctrines,  in  some  respects,  con 
firmed  by  the  testimony  of  an  unwilling  wit 
ness.  The  date  of  the  work,  we  think,  explains 
every  thing.  If  it  had  been  written  ten  years 
earlier,  or  twenty  years  later,  it  would  have 
seen  very  different  from  what  it  is.  It  was 
written,  neither  during  the  first  excitement  of 
he  Revolution,  nor  at  that  later  period,  when 
the  practical  good  produced  by  the  Revolution 
lad  become  manifest  to  the  most  prejudiced 
observers ;  but  in  those  wretched  times,  when 
the  enthusiasm  had  abated,  and  the  solid  ad 
vantages  were  not  yet  fully  seen.  It  was  writ 
ten  in  the  year  1799,  a  year  in  which  the  most 
sanguine  friend  of  liberty  might  well  feel  some 
misgivings  as  to  the  effects  of  what  the  National 
Assembly  had  done.  The  evils  which  attend 
every  great  change  had  been  severely  felt. 
The  benefit  was  still  to  come.  The  price,  a 
heavy  price,  had  been  paid.  The  thing  pur 
chased  had  not  yet  been  delivered.  Europe 
was  swarming  with  French  exiles.  The  fleets 
and  armies  of  the  second  coalition  were  victo 
rious.  Within  France,  the  reign  of  terror  was 
over;  but  the  reign  of  law  had  not  commenced. 
There  had  been,  indeed,  during  three  or  four 
years,  a  written  constitution,  by  which  rights 
were  defined,  and  checks  provided.  But  these 
rights  had  been  repeatedly  violated,  and  those 
checks  had  proved  utterly  inefficient.  The 
laws  which  had  been  framed  to  secure  the  dis 
tinct  authority  of  the  executive  magistrates 
and  of  the  legislative  assemblies — the  freedom 
of  election,  the  freedom  of  debate,  the  freedom 
of  the  press,  the  personal  freedom  of  citizens 
— were  a  dead  letter.  The  ordinary  mode  iu 
which  the  republic  was  governed,  was  by 
coups  ffetat.  On  one  occasion,  the  legislative 
councils  were  placed  under  military  restraint 
by  the  directors.  Then  again,  directors  were 
deposed  by  the  legislative  councils.  Elections 
were  set  aside  by  the  executive  authority. 
Ship  loads  of  writers  and  speakers  were  sent, 
without  a  legal  trial,  to  die  of  fever  in  Guiana. 
France,  in  short,  was  in  that  state  in  which  re 
volutions,  effected  by  violence,  almost  always 
leave  a  nation.  The  habit  of  obedience  had 
been  lost.  The  spell  of  proscription  had  been 
broken.  Those  associations  on  which,  far 
more  than  on  any  arguments  about  property 
and  order,  the  authority  of  magistrates  rests, 
had  completely  passed  away.  The  power  of 
the  government  consisted  merely  in  the  physi 
cal  force  which  it  could  bring  to  its  support. 
Moral  force  it  had  none.  It  was  itself  ?  go 
vernment  sprung  from  a  recent  convulsion.  Its 
own  fundamental  maxim  was,  that  rebellion 
might  be  justifiable.  Its  own  existence  proved 
that  rebellion  might  be  successful.  The  people 
had  been  accustomed,  during  several  years,  to 
offer  resistance  to  the  constituted  authorities  on 
the  slightest  provocation,  and  to  see  the  con 
stituted  authorities  yield  to  that  resistance 
The  whole  political  world  was  "without  form 
and  void"  —  an  incessant  whirl  of  hostile 
atoms,  which  everv  moment  formed  some  new 
combination.  The  only  man  who  could  fix  the 


DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS  OF  MIRABEAU. 


183 


agitated  elements  of  society  in  a  stable  form, 
was  following  a  wild  vision  of  glory  and  em 
pire  through  the  Syrian  deserts.  The  time  was 
not  yet  come,  when 

44  Confusion  heard  his  voice,  and  wild  uproar  stood 
ruled;" 

when,  out  of  the  chaos  into  which  the  old  so 
ciety  had  been  resolved,  were  to  rise  a  new 
dynasty,  a  new  peerage,  a  new  church,  and  a 
new  code. 

The  dying  words  of  Madame  Roland,  "  Oh 
Liberty  !  how  many  crimes  are  committed  in 
thy  name  !"  were  at  that  time  echoed  by  many 
of  the  most  upright  and  benevolent  of  mankind. 
M.  Guizot  has,  in  one  of  his  admirable  pam 
phlets,  happily  and  justly  described  M.  Laine 
as  "an  honest  and  liberal  man,  discouraged  by 
the  Revolution."  This  description,  at  the  time 
when  M.  Dumont's  Memoirs  were  written, 
would  hav^e  applied  to  almost  every  honest  and 
liberal  man  in  Europe  ;  and  would,  beyond  all 
doubt,  have  applied  to  M.  Dumont  himself.  To 
that  fanatical  worship  of  the  all-wise  and  all- 
good  people,  which  had  been  common  a  few 
years  before,  had  succeeded  an  uneasy  suspi 
cion  that  the  follies  and  vices  of  the  people 
would  frustrate  all  attempts  to  serve  them. 
The  wild  and  joyous  exultation  with  which  the 
meeting  of  the  States-General  and  the  fall  of 
the  Bastile  had  been  hailed,  had  passed  away. 
In  its  place  was  dejection,  and  a  gloomy  dis 
trust  of  specious  appearances.  The  philoso 
phers  and  philanthropists  had  reigned.  And 
what  had  their  reign  produced  1  Philosophy 
hail  brought  with  it  mummeries  as  absurd  as 
any  which  had  been  practised  by  the  most  su 
perstitious  zealot  of  the  darkest  age.  Philan 
thropy  had  brought  with  it  crimes  as  horrible 
as  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew.  This 
was  the  emancipation  of  the  human  mind. 
These  were  the  fruits  of  the  great  victory  of 
reason  over  prejudice.  France  had  rejected 
the  faith  of  Pascal  and  Descartes  as  a  nursery 
fable,  that  a  courtesan  might  be  her  idol,  and  a 
madman  her  priest.  She  had  asserted  her  free 
dom  against  Louis,  that  she  might  bow  down 
before  Robespierre.  For  a  time  men  thought, 
that  all  the  boasted  wisdom  of  the  eighteenth 
century  was  folly;  and  that  those  hopes  of 
great  political  and  social  ameliorations,  which 
had  been  cherished  by  Voltaire  and  Cordorcet, 
were  utterly  delusive. 

Under  the  influence  of  these  feelings,  M. 
Dumont  has  gone  so  far  as  to  say,  that  the 
writings  of  Mr.  Burke  on  the  French  Revolu 
tion,  though  disfigured  by  exaggeration,  and 
though  containing  doctrines  subversive  of  all 
public  liberty,  had  been,  on  the  whole,  justified 
by  events,  and  had  probably  saved  Europe  from 
great  disasters.  That  such  a  man  as  the  friend 
and  fellow-labourer  of  Mr.  Bentham,  should 
have  expressed  such  an  opinion,  is  a  circum 
stance  which  well  deserves  the  consideration 
of  uncharitable  politicians.  These  Memoirs 
have  not  convinced  us  that  the  French  Revo 
lution  was  not  a  great  blessing  to  mankind 
But  they  have  convinced  us  that  very  greai 
indulgence  is  due  to  those,  who,  while  the  Re 
volution  was  actually  taking  place,  regarded  il 
with  unmixed  aversion  and  horror.  We  can 


erceive  where  their  error  lay.  We  can  per- 
^eive  that  the  evil  was  temporary,  and  the 
good  durable.  But  we  cannot  be  sure,  that,  if 
ur  lot  had  been  cast  in  their  times,  we  should 
not,  like  them,  have  been  discouraged  and  dis 
gusted;  that  we  should  not,  like  them,  have 
seen,  in  that  great  victory  of  the  French  peo- 
>le,  only  insanity  and  crime. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  how  some  men  are 
applauded,  and  others  reviled,  for  merely  being 
what  all  their  neighbours  are,  for  merely  going 
positively  down  the  stream  of  events,  for  merely 
representing  the  opinions  and  passions  of  a 
\vhole  generation.  The  friends  of  popular 
government  ordinarily  speak  with  extreme 
severity  of  Mr.  PiW,  and  with  respect  and  ten 
derness  of  Mr.  Canning.  Yet  the  whole  dif- 
'erence,  we  suspect,  consisted  merely  in  this : 
that  Mr.  Pitt  died  in  1806,  and  Mr.  Canning  ia 
1827.  During  the  years  which  were  common 
to  the  public  life  of  both,  Mr.  Canning  was 
assuredly  not  a  more  illiberal  statesman  than 
ais  patron.  The  truth  is,  that  Mr.  Pitt  began 
tiis  political  life  at  the  end  of  the  American 
War,  when  the  nation  was  suffering  from  the 
effects  of  corruption.  He  closed  it  in  the  midst 
of  the  calamities  produced  by  the  French  Re 
volution,  when  the  nation  was  strongly  im 
pressed  with  the  horrors  of  anarchy.  He 
hanged,  undoubtedly.  In  his  youth  he  had 
brought  in  reform  bills.  In  his  manhood  he 
brought  in  gagging  bills.  But  the  change, 
though  lamentable,  was,  in  our  opinion,  per 
fectly  natural,  and  might  have  been  perfect 
ly  honest.  He  changed  with  the  great  body 
of  his  countrymen.  Mr.  Canning,  on  the 
other  hand,  entered  into  public  life  when 
Europe  was  in  dread  of  the  Jacobins.  He 
closed  his  public  life  when  Europe  was  suffer 
ing  under  the  tyranny  of  the  Holy  Alliance. 
He,  too,  changed  with  the  nation.  As  the 
crimes  of  the  Jacobins  had  turned  the  master 
into  something  very  like  a  Tory,  the  events 
which  followed  the  Congress  of  Vienna  turned 
the  pupil  into  something  very  like  a  Whig. 

So  much  are  men  the  creatures  of  circum 
stances.  We  see  that,  if  M.  Dumont  had  died 
in  1799,  he  would  have  died,  to  use  the  nevr 
cant  word,  a  decided  "  conservative."  If  Mr. 
Pitt  had  lived  to  1832,  it  is  our  firm  belief  that 
he  would  have  been  a  decided  reformer. 

The  judgment  passed  by  M.  Dumont  iu  this 
work  on  the  French  Revolution  must  be  takea 
with  considerable  allowances.  It  resembles  a 
criticism  on  a  play,  of  which  only  the  first  act 
has  been  performed,  or  on  a  building  from 
which  the  scaffolding  has  not  yet  been  taken 
down.  We  have  no  doubt,  that  if  the  excellent 
author  had  revised  these  memoirs  thirty  years 
after  the  time  at  which  they  were  written,  he 
would  hav°  seen  reason  to  omit  a  few  pas 
sages,  and  to  add  many  qualifications  and  ex 
planations. 

He  would  not  probably  have  been  incline 
to   retract  the    censures,  just,  though  seven 
which  he  has  passed  on  the  ignorance,  the  pre 
sumption,  and  the  pedantry  of  the  National  As 
sembly.     But  he  would  have  admitted  that,  in 
spite  of  those  faults,  perhaps  even  by  reason 
of  those  faults,  that  Assembly  had  conferred 
inestimable  benefits  on  mankind.    It  is  clear 


184 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


that  among  the  French  of  that  day,  political 
knowledge  was  absolutely  in  its  infancy.  It 
would  indeed  have  been  strange  if  it  had  at 
tained  maturity  in  the  time  of  censors,  of  let- 
tres-de-cachet,  and  of  beds  of  justice.  The  elect 
ors  did  not  know  how  to  elect.  The  repre 
sentatives  did  not  know  how  to  deliberate. 
M.  Dumont  taught  the  constituent  body  of 
Montreuil  how  to  perform  their  functions,  and 
found  them  apt  to  learn.  He  afterwards  tried 
in  concert  with  Mirabeau,  to  instruct  the  Na 
tional  Assembly  in  that  admirable  system  of 
parliamentary  tactics  which  has  been  long 
established  in  the  English  House  of  Commons, 
and  which  has  made  the  House  of  Commons, 
in  spite  of  all  the  defects  in  its  composition, 
the  best  and  fairest  debating  society  in  the 
world.  But  these  accomplished  legislators, 
though  quite  as  ignorant  as  the  mob  of  Mon 
treuil,  proved  much  less  docile,  and  cried  out 
that  they  did  not  want  to  go  to  school  to  the 
English.  Their  debates  consisted  of  endless 
successions  of  trashy  pamphlets,  all  beginning 
with  something  about  the  original  compact  of 
society,  man  in  the  hunting  state,  and  other 
such  foolery.  They  sometimes  diversified  and 
enlivened  these  long  readings  by  a  little  riot 
ing.  They  bawled ;  they  hooted ;  they  shook 
their  fists.  They  kept  no  order  among  them 
selves.  They  were  insulted  with  impunity  by 
the  crowd  which  filled  their  galleries.  They 
gave  long  and  solemn  consideration  to  trifles. 
They  hurried  through  the  most  important  re 
solutions  with  fearful  expedition.  They  wast 
ed  months  in  quibbling  about  the  words  of  that 
false  and  childish  Declaration  of  Rights  on 
which  they  professed  to  found  their  new  con 
stitution,  and  which  was  at  irreconcilable 
variance  with  every  clause  of  that  constitu 
tion.  They  annihilated  in  a  single  night  pri 
vileges,  many  of  which  partook  of  the  nature 
of  property,  and  ought  therefore  to  have  been 
most  delicately  handled. 

They  are  called  the  Constituent  Assembly. 
Never  was  a  name  less  appropriate.  They 
were  not  constituent,  but  the  very  reverse  of 
constituent.  They  constituted  nothing  that 
stood,  or  that  deserved  to  last.  They  had  not, 
and  they  could  not  possibly  have,  the  informa 
tion  or  the  habits  of  mind  which  are  necessary 
for  the  framing  of  that  most  exquisite  of  all 
machines,  a  government.  The  metaphysical 
cant  with  which  they  prefaced  their  constitu 
tion  has  long  been  the  scoff  of  all  parties. 
Their  constitution  itself,  that  constitution  which 
they  described  as  absolutely  perfect,  and  to 
which  they  predicted  immortality,  disappeared 
in  a  few  months,  and  left  no  trace  behind  it. 
They  were  great  only  in  the  work  of  destruc 
lion. 

The  glory  of  the  National  Assembly  is  this, 
that  they  were  in  truth,  what  Mr.  Burke  called 
them  in  austere  irony,  the  ablest  architects  of 
ruin  that  ever  the  world  saw.  They  were 
utterly  incompetent  to  perform  any  work  which 
required  a  discriminating  eye  and  a  skilful 
hand.  But  the  work  which  was  then  to  be 
done  was  a  work  of  devastation.  They  had  to 
deal  with  abuses  so  horrible  and  so  deeply 
fooled,  that  the  highest  political  wisdom  could 
scarcely  ha\re  uroduced  greater  good  to  man- 


'  kind  than  was  produced  by  their  fierce  and 

senseless  temerity.    Demolition  is  undoubtedly 

a  vulgar  task  ;  the  highest  glory  of  the  states- 

!  man  is  to  construct.    But  there  is  a  time  for 

every  thing,  a  time  to  set  up,  and  a  time  to  pull 

j  down.     The  talents  of  revolutionary  leaders, 

j  and  those  of  the  legislator,  have  equally  their 

j  use  and  their  season.    It  is  the  natural/the  al- 

,  most  universal  law,  that  the  age  of  insurrec- 

j  tions  and  proscriptions  shall  precede  the  age 

j  of  good  government,  of  temperate  liberty,  and 

liberal  order. 

And  how  should  it  be  otherwise  1  It  is  not 
in  swaddling-bands  that  we  learn  to  walk.  It 
is  not  in  the  dark  that  we  learn  to  distinguish 
colours.  It  is  not  under  oppression  that  we 
learn  how  to  use  freedom.  The  ordinary 
sophism  by  which  misrule  is  defended  is, 
when  truly  stated,  this :  The  people  must  con 
tinue  in  slavery,  because  slavery  has  gene 
rated  in  them  all  the  vices  of  slaves.  ^Because 
they  are  ignorant,  they  must  remain  under  a 
power  which  has  made  and  which  keeps  them 
ignorant.  Because  they  have  been  made  fero 
cious  by  misgovernment,  they  must  be  mis 
governed  forever.  If  the  system  under  which 
they  live  were  so  mild  and  liberal,  that  under 
its  operation  they  had  become  humane  and 
enlightened,  it  would  be  safe  to  venture  on  a 
change.  But  as  this  system  has  destroyed 
morality,  and  prevented  the  development  of 
the  intellect;  as  it  has  turned  men  who  might, 
under  different  training,  have  formed  a  virtu 
ous  and  happy  community,  into  savage  and 
stupid  wild  beasts,  therefore  it  ought  to  last  for 
ever.  The  English  Revolution,  it  is  said,  was 
truly  a  glorious  revolution.  Practical  evils 
were  redressed;  no  excesses  were  committed; 
no  sweeping  confiscations  took  place  ;  the  au 
thority  of  the  laws  was  scarcely  for  a  moment 
suspended ;  the  fullest  and  freest  discussion 
was  tolerated  in  Parliament ;  the  nation  show 
ed  by  the  calm  and  temperate  manner  in  which 
it  asserted  its  liberty,  that  it  was  fit  to  enjoy 
liberty.  The  French  Revolution  was,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  most  horrible  event  recorded 
in  history,  all  madness  and  wickedness,  ab 
surdity  in  theory,  and  atrocity  in  practice. 
What  folly  and  injustice  in  the  revolutionary 
laws !  What  grotesque  affectation  in  the 
revolutionary  ceremonies  !  What  fanaticism  ! 
What  licentiousness  !  What  cruelty  !  Ana- 
charsis  Clootz  and  Marat,  feasts  of  the  Su 
preme  Being,  and  marriages  of  the  Loire,  trees 
of  liberty,  and  heads  dancing  on  pikes — the 
whole  forms  a  kind  of  infernal  farce,  made  up 
of  every  thing  ridiculous  and  every  thing 
frightful.  This  it  is  to  give  freedom  to  those 
who  have  neither  wisdom  nor  virtue.  It  is 
not  only  by  bad  men  interested  in  the  defence 
of  abuses,  that  arguments  like  these  have  been 
urged  against  all  schemes  of  political  improve 
ment.  Some  of  the  highest  and  purest  of  hu 
man  beings  conceived  such  scorn  and  aver 
sion  for  the  follies  and  crimes  of  the  French 
j  Revolution,  that  they  recanted,  in  the  moment 
I  of  triumph,  those  liberal  opinions  to  which 
|  they  had  clung  in  defiance  of  persecution 
j  And  if  we  inquire  why  it  was  that  they  began 
i  to  doubt  whether  liberty  were  a  blessing,  we 
I  shall  find  that  it  was  only  because  events  Sad 


DUMUNT'S  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   MIRABEAU. 


185 


proved,  in  the  clearest  manner,  that  liberty  is  \ 
the  parent  of  virtue  and  of  order.  They  ceased  | 
to  abhor  tyranny  merely  because  it  had  been 
signally  shown,  that  the  effect  of  tyranny  on  the 
hearts  and  understandings  of  men  is  more  de- 
moralizing  and  more  stupefying  than  had  ever 
been  imagined  by  the  most  zealous  friend  of 
popular  rights.  The  truth  is,  that  a  stronger 
argument  against  the  old  monarchy  of  France 
may  be  drawn  from  the  noyades  and  the  fusi- 
ladcs,  than  from  the  Bastille  and  the  Parc-aux- 
cerfs.  We  believe  it  to  be  a  rule  without  an 
exception,  that  the  violence  of  a  revolution 
corresponds  to  the  degree  of  misgovernment 
which  has  produced  that  revolution.  Why  was 
the  French  Revolution  so  bloody  and  destruc 
tive  1  Why  was  our  revolution  of  1641  com 
paratively  mild  1  Why  was  our  revolution  of 
1688  milder  still?  Why  was  the  American 
Revolution,  considered  as  an  internal  move 
ment,  the  mildest  of  all  1  There  is  an  obvious 
and  complete  solution  of  the  problem.  The 
English  under  James  the  First  and  Charles  the 
First  were  less  oppressed  than  the  French 
under  Louis  the  Fifteenth  and  Louis  the  Six 
teenth.  The  English  were  less  oppressed 
after  the  Restoration  than  before  the  great  Re 
bellion.  And  America,  under  George  the  Third, 
was  less  oppressed  than  England  under  the 
Stuarts.  The  reaction  was  exactly  proportion 
ed  to  the  pressure — the  vengeance  to  the  pro 
vocation. 

When  Mr.  Burke  was  reminded  in  his  later 
years  of  the  zeal  which  he  had  displayed  in 
the  cause  of  the  Americans,  he  vindicated  him 
self  from  the  charge  of  inconsistency,  by  con 
trasting  the  wisdom  and  moderation  of  the 
colonial  insurgents  of  1776,  with  the  fanaticism 
and  wickedness  of  the  Jacobins  of  1792.  He 
was  in  fact  bringing  an  argument  a  fortiori 
against  himself.  The  circumstances  on  which 
he  rested  his  vindication  fully  proved  that  the 
old  governmentof  France  stood  m  far  more  need 
of  a  complete  change  than  the  old  government 
of  America.  The  difference  between  Wash 
ington  and  Robespierre,  the  difference  between 
Franklin  and  Barrere,  the  difference  between 
the  destruction  of  a  few  barrels  of  tea  and  the 
confiscation  of  thousands  of  square  miles,  the 
difference  between  the  tarring  and  feathering 
of  a  tax-gatherer  and  the  massacres  of  Sep 
tember,  measure  the  difference  between  the 
government  of  America  under  the  rule  of  Eng 
land,  and  the  government  of  France  under  the 
rule  of  the  Bourbons. 

Louis  the  Sixteenth  made  great  voluntary 
concessions  to  his  people;  and  they  sent  him 
to  the  scaffold.  Charles  the  Tenth  violated  the 
fundamental  laws  of  the  state,  established  a 
despotism,  and  butchered  his  subjects  for  not 
submitting  quietly  to  that  despotism.  He  fail 
ed  in  his  wicked  attempt.  He  was  at  the 
mercy  of  those  whom  he  had  injured.  The 
pavements  of  Paris  were  still  heaped  up  in 
barricades ;  the  hospitals  were  still  full  of  the 
wounded;  the  dead  were  still  unburied;  a 
thousand  families  were  in  mourning;  a  hun 
dred  thousand  citizens  were  in  arms.  The 
crime  was  recent;  the  life  of  the  criminal  was 
in  the  hands  of  the  sufferers ;  and  they  touched 
not  one  hair  ot  his  head.  In  the  first  revolu- 

Yoi-II—  24 


tion,  victims  were  sent  to  death  by  scores  for 
the  most  trifling  acts  proved  by  the  lowest  tes 
timony,  before  the  most  partial  tribunals.  Af 
ter  the  second  revolution,  those  ministers  who 
had  signed  the  ordinances — those  ministers, 
whose  guilt,  as  it  was  of  the  foulest  kind,  was 
proved  by  the  clearest  evidence — were  punish 
ed  only  with  imprisonment.  In  the  first  revo 
lution,  property  was  attacked.  In  the  second, 
it  was  held  sacred.  Both  revolutions,  it  is 
true,  left  the  public  mind  of  France  in  an  un 
settled  state.  Both  revolutions  were  followed 
by  insurrectionary  movements.  But  after  the 
first  revolution,  the  insurgents  were  almost 
always  stronger  than  the  law;  and  since  the 
second  revolution,  the  law  has  invariably  been 
found  stronger  than  the  insurgents.  There  is, 
indeed,  much  in  the  present  state  of  France 
which  may  well  excite  the  uneasiness  of  those 
who  desire  to  see  her  free,  happy,  powerful, 
and  secure.  Yet  if  we  compare  the  present 
state  of  France  with  the  state  in  which  she 
was  forty  years  ago,  how  vast  a  change  for 
the  better  has  taken  place  !  How  little  effect, 
for  example,  during  the  first  revolution,  would 
the  sentence  of  a  judicial  body  have  produced 
on  an  armed  and  victorious  party !  If,  after 
the  tenth  of  August,  or  after  the  proscription 
of  the  Gironde,  or  after  the  ninth  of  Thermidor, 
or  after  the  carnage  of  Vendemiaire,  or  after 
the  arrests  of  Fructidor,  any  tribunal  had  de 
cided  against  the  conquerors  in  favour  of  the 
conquered,  with  what  contempt,  with  what  de 
rision,  would  its  award  have  been  received! 
The  judges  would  have  lost  their  heads,  or 
would  have  been  sent  to  die  in  some  unwhole 
some  colony.  The  fate  of  the  victim  whom 
they  had  endeavoured  to  save  would  only 
have  been  made  darker  and  more  hopeless  by 
their  interference.  We  have  lately  seen  a  sig 
nal  proof  that  in  France,  the  law  is  now  strong 
er  than  the  sword.  We  have  seen  a  govern 
ment,  in  the  very  moment  of  triumph  and 
revenge,  submitting  itself  to  the  authority  of  a 
court  of  law.  A  just  and  independent  sentence 
has  been  pronounced; — a  sentence  worthy  of 
the  ancient  renown  of  that  magistracy,  to 
which  belong  the  noblest  recollections  of 
French  history;  which,  in  an  age  of  persecu 
tors,  produced  L'Hopital ;  which,  in  an  age  of 
courtiers,  produced  D'Aguesseau ;  which,  in 
an  age  of  wickedness  and  madness,  exhibited 
to  mankind  a  pattern  of  every  virtue  in  the 
life  and  in  the  death  of  Malesherbes.  The  re 
spectful  manner  in  which  that  sentence  has 
been  received,  is  alone  sufficient  to  show  how 
widely  the  French  of  this  generation  differ 
from  their  fathers.  And  how  is  the  difference 
to  be  explained?  The  race,  the  soil,  the  cli 
mate,  are  the  same.  If  those  dull,  honest  Eng 
lishmen,  who  explain  the  er°nts  of  1793  and 
1794,  by  saying  that  the  French  are  naturally 
frivolous  and  cruel,  were  in  the  right,  why  is 
the  guillotine  now  standing  idle  ?  Not  surely 
for  want  of  Carlists,  of  aristocrats,  of  people 
guilty  of  incivism,  of  people  suspected  of 
being  suspicious  characters.  Is  not  the  true 
explanation  this,  that  the  Frenchman  of  1832 
has  been  far  better  governed  than  the  French 
man  of  1789,  that  his  soul  has  never  bees 
galled  by  the  oppressive  privileges  of  a  sepa 
0.2 


186 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


rate  caste,  that  he  has  been  in  some  degree 
accustomed  to  discuss  political  questions,  and 
to  perform  political  functions,  that  he  has 
lived  for  seventeen  or  eighteen  years  under  in 
stitutions  which,  however  defective,  have  yet 
been  far  superior  to  any  institutions  that  had 
before  existed  in  France  ? 

As  the  second  French  Revolution  has  been 
far  milder  than  the  first,  so  that  great  change 
which  has  just  been  effected  in  England,  has 
been  milder  even  than  the  second  French  Re 
volution  ;  milder  than  any  revolution  recorded 
in  history.  Some  orators  have  described  the 
reform  of  the  House  of  Commons  as  a  revolu 
tion.  Others  have  denied  the  propriety  of  the 
term.  The  question,  though  in  seeming  mere 
ly  a  question  of  definition,  suggests  much  cu 
rious  and  interesting  matter  for  reflection.  If 
we  look  at  the  magnitude  of  the  reform,  it  may 
well  be  called  a  revolution.  If  we  look  at  the 
means  by  which  it  has  been  effected,  it  is 
merely  an  act  of  Parliament,  regularly  brought 
in,  read,  committed,  and  passed.  In  the  whole 
history  of  England,  there  is  no  prouder  cir 
cumstance  than  this;  that  a  change  which 
could  not,  in  any  other  age,  or  in  any  other 
country,  have  been  effected  without  physical 
violence,  should  here  have  been  effected  by 
the  force  of  reason,  and  under  the  forms  of 
law.  The  work  of  three  civil  wars  has  been 
accomplished  by  three  sessions  of  Parliament. 
An  ancient  and  deeply  rooted  system  of  abuses 
has  been  fiercely  attacked  and  stubbornly  de 
fended.  It  has  fallen  ;  and  not  one  sword  has 
been  drawn;  not  one  estate  has  been  confis 
cated  ;  not  one  family  has  been  forced  to  emi 
grate.  The  bank  has  kept  its  credit.  The 
funds  have  kept  their  price.  Every  man  has 
gone  forth  to  his  work  and  to  his  labour  till  the 
evening.  During  the  fiercest  excitement  of 
the  contest,  during  the  first  fortnight  of  that 
immortal  May,  there  was  not  one  moment  at 
which  any  sanguinary  act  committed  on  the 
person  of  any  of  the  most  unpopular  men  in 
England,  would  not  have  filled  the  country 
with  horror  and  indignation. 

And  now  that  the  victory  is  won,  has  it  been 
abused  1  An  immense  mass  of  power  has 
been  transferred  from  an  oligarchy  to  the  na 
tion.  Are  the  members  of  the  vanquished 
oligarchy  insecure  1  Does  the  nation  seem 
disposed  to  play  the  tyrant?  Are  not  those 
who,  in  any  other  state  of  society,  would  have 
been  visited  with  the  severest  vengeance  of 
the  triumphant  party — would  have  been  pining 
in  dungeons,  or  Hying  to  foreign  countries — 
still  enjoying  their  possessions  and  their  ho 
nours,  still  taking  part  as  freely  as  ever  in 
public  affairs'?  Two  years  ago  they  were 
dominant.  They  are  now  vanquished.  Yet 
the  whole  people  would  regard  with  horror 
any  man  who  should  dare  to  propose  any  vin 
dictive  measure.  So  common  is  this  feeling, 
to  much  is  it  a  matter  of  course  among  us, 
that  many  of  our  readers  will  scarcely  under 
stand  what  we  see  to  admire  in  it. 

To  what  are  we  to  attribute  the  unparalleled 
moderation  and  humanity  which  the  English 
people  have  displayed  at  this  great  conjunc 
ture  !  The  answer  is  plain.  This  moderation, 
•his  humanity,  are  the  fruits  of  a  hundred  and 


fifty  years  of  liberty.  During  many  genera 
tions  we  have  had  legislative  assemblies  which, 
however  defective  their  constitution  might  be, 
have  always  contained  many  members  chosen 
by  the  people,  and  many  others  eager  to  obtain 
the  approbation  of  the  people ;  assemblies  in 
which  perfect  freedom  of  debate  was  allowed  ; 
assemblies  in  which  the  smallest  minority  had 
a  fair  hearing;  assemblies  in  which  abuses, 
even  when  they  were  not  redressed,  were  at 
least  exposed.  For  many  generations  we  have 
had  the  trial  by  jury,  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act, 
the  freedom  of  the  press,  the  right  of  meeting 
to  discuss  public  affairs,  the  right  of  petition 
ing  the  legislature.  A  vast  portion  of  the  po 
pulation  has  long  been  accustomed  to  the 
exercise  of  political  functions,  and  has  been 
thoroughly  seasoned  to  political  excitement. 
In  most  other  countries  there  is  no  middle 
course  between  absolute  submission  and  open 
rebellion.  In  England  there  has  always  been 
for  centuries  a  constitutional  opposition.  Thus 
our  institutions  had  been  so  good,  that  they 
had  educated  us  into  a  capacity  for  better  insti 
tutions.  There  is  not  a  large  town  in  the  king 
dom  which  does  not  contain  better  materials 
for  a  legislature  than  all  France  could  furnish 
in  1789.  There  is  not  a  spouting-club  at  any 
pothouse  in  London  in  which  the  rules  of  de 
bate  are  not  better  understood,  and  more 
strictly  observed,  than  in  the  Constituent  As 
sembly.  There  is  scarcely  a  Political  Union 
which  could  not  frame  in  half  an  hour  a  de 
claration  of  rights  superior  to  that  which  occu 
pied  the  collective  wisdom  of  France  for  seve 
ral  months. 

It  would  be  impossible  even  to  glance  at  all 
the  causes  of  the  French  Revolution  within  the 
limits  to  which  we  must  confine  ourselves. 
One  thing  is  clear.  The  government,  the 
aristocracy,  and  the  church,  were  rewarded 
after  their  works.  They  reaped  that  which 
they  had  sown.  They  found  the  nation  such 
as  they  had  made  it.  That  the  people  had 
become  possessed  of  irresistible  power  before 
they  had  attained  the  slightest  knowledge  of 
the  art  of  government;  that  practical  questions 
of  vast  moment  were  left  to  be  solved  by  men 
to  whom  politics  had  been  only  matter  of 
theory ;  that  a  legislature  was  composed  of 
persons  who  were  scarcely  fit  to  compose  a 
debating  society ;  that  the  whole  nation  was 
ready  to  lend  an  ear  to  any  flatterer  who  ap 
pealed  to  its  cupidity,  to  its  fears,  or  to  its 
thirst  for  vengeance — all  this  was  the  effect 
of  misrule,  obstinately  continued,  in  defiance 
of  solemn  warnings  and  of  the  visible  signs 
of  an  approaching  retribution. 

Even  while  the  monarchy  seemed  to  be 
in  its  highest  and  most  palmy  state,  the 
causes  of  that  great  destruction  had  already 
begun  to  operate.  They  may  be  distinctly 
traced  even  under  the  reign  of  Louis  the 
Fourteenth.  That  reign  is  the  time  to  which 
the  Ultra-Royalists  refer  as  the  Golden  Age 
of  France.  It  was  in  truth  one  of  those 
periods  which  shine  with  an  unnatural  and 
delusive  splendour,  and  which  are  rapidly 
followed  by  gloom  and  decay. 

Concerning  Louis  the  Fourteenth  himself, 
the  world  seems  at  last  to  have  formed  a  cor- 


DUMONTS  RECOLLECTIONS   OF  MIRABEAU. 


18? 


rect  judgment.  He  was  not  a  great  general ; 
he  was  not  a  great  statesman ;  but  he  was,  in 
one  sense  of  the  words,  a  great  king.  Never 
was  there  so  consummate  a  master  of  what 
our  James  the  First  would  have  called  king 
craft — of  all  those  arts  which  most  advantage 
ously  display  the  merits  of  a  prince,  and  most 
completely  hide  his  defects.  Though  his  in 
ternal  administration  was  bad,  though  the  mi 
litary  triumphs  which  gave  splendour  to  the 
early  part  of  his  reign  were  not  achieved  by 
himself,  though  his  later  years  were  crowded 
with  defeats  and  humiliations,  though  he  was 
so  ignorant  that  he  scarcely  understood  the 
Latin  of  his  massbook,  though  he  fell  under 
the  control  of  a  cunning  Jesuit  and  of  a  more 
cunning  old  woman,  he  succeeded  in  passing 
himself  off  on  his  people  as  a  being  above 
humanity.  And  this  is  the  more  extraordinary, 
because  he  did  not  seclude  himself  from  the 
public  gaze  like  those  Oriental  despots  whose 
faces  are  never  seen,  and  whose  very  names 
it  is  a  crime  to  pronounce  lightly.  It  has  been 
said  that  no  man  is  a  hero  to  his  valet ;  and 
all  the  world  saw  as  much  of  Louis  the  Four 
teenth  as  his  valet  could  see.  Five  hundred 
people  assembled  to  see  him  shave  and  put  on 
his  breeches  in  the  morning.  He  then  kneeled 
down  at  the  side  of  his  bed,  and  said  his  prayer, 
while  the  whole  assembly  awaited  the  end  in 
solemn  silence,  the  ecclesiastics  on  their  knees, 
and  ihe  laymen  with  their  hats  before  their 
faces.  He  walked  about  his  gardens  with  a 
train  of  two  hundred  courtiers  at  his  heels. 
All  Versailles  came  to  see  him  dine  and  sup. 
He  was  put  to  bed  at  night  in  the  midst  of  a 
crowd  as  great  as  that  which  had  met  to  see 
him  rise  in  the  morning.  He  took  his  very 
emetics  in  state,  and  vomited  majestically  in 
the  presence  of  all  the  grandes  and  petites  en 
trees.  Yet  though  he  constantly  exposed  him 
self  to  the  public  gaze  in  situations  in  which 
it  is  scarcely  possible  for  any  man  to  preserve 
much  personal  dignity,  he  to  the  last  impress 
ed  those  who  surrounded  him  with  the  deepest 
awe  and  reverence.  The  illusion  which  he 
produced  on  his  worshippers  can  be  compared 
only  to  those  illusions  to  which  lovers  are 
proverbially  subject  during  the  season  of 
courtship.  It  was  an  illusion  which  affected 
even  the  senses.  The  contemporaries  of 
Louis  thought  him  tall.  Voltaire,  who  might 
have  seen  him,  and  who  had  lived  with  some 
of  the  most  distinguished  members  of  his 
court,  speaks  repedtedly  of  his  majestic  sta 
ture.  Yet  it  is  as  certain  as  any  fact  can  be, 
that  he  was  rather  below  than  above  the  middle 
size.  He  had,  it  seems,  a  way  of  holding  him 
self,  a  way  of  walking,  a  way  of  swelling  his 
chest  and  rearing  his  head,  which  deceived 
the  eyes  of  the  multitude.  Eighty  years  after 
his  death,  the  royal  cemetery  was  violated  by 
the  revolutionists  ;  his  coffin  was  opened ;  his 
body  was  dragged  out ;  and  it  appeared  that 
the  prince,  whose  majestic  figure  had  been  so 
long  and  loudly  extolled,  was  in  truth  a  little 
man.*  That  fine  expression  of  Juvenal  is 


*  Even  M.  de  Chateaubriand,  to  whom,  we  should 
have  thought,  all  the  Bourbons  would  have  seemed  at 
leart  six  feet  high,  admits  this  fact.  "  C'est  une  er- 
»eur,"  says  he  in  his  strange  memoirs  of  the  Duke  of 


singularly  applicable,  both  in  its  literal  and  m 
its  metaphorical  sense,  to  Louis  the  Four 
teenth  : 

"  Mors  sola  fatetur 
Quantula  sint  hominum  corpuscula." 

His  person  and  his  government  have  had 
the  same  fate.  He  had  the  art  of  making 
both  appear  grand  and  august,  in  spite  of  the 
clearest  evidence  that  both  were  below  the 
ordinary  standard.  Death  and  time  have  ex 
posed  both  the  deceptions.  The  body  of  the 
great  king  has  been  measured  more  justly  than 
it  was  measured  by  the  courtiers  who  were 
afraid  to  look  above  his  shoe-tie.  His  public 
character  has  been  scrutinized  by  men  free 
from  the  hopes  and  fears  of  Boileau  and 
Moliere.  In  the  grave,  the  most  majestic  of 
princes  is  only  five  feet  eight.  In  history,  the 
hero  and  the  politician  dwindles  into  a  vain  and 
feeble  tyrant,  the  slave  of  priests  and  women, 
little  in  war,  little  in  government,  little  in 
every  thing  but  the  art  of  simulating  great 
ness. 

He  left  to  his  infant  successor  a  famished 
and  miserable  people,  a  beaten  and  humbled 
army,  provinces  turned  into  deserts  by  misgo- 
vernment  and  persecution,  factions  dividing 
the  court,  a  schism  raging  in  the  church,  an 
immense  debt,  an  empty  treasury,  immeasura 
ble  palaces,  an  innumerable  household,  ines 
timable  jewels  and  furniture.  All  the  sap  and 
nutriment  of  the  state  seemed  to  have  been 
drawn  to  feed  one  bloated  and  unwholesome 
excrescence.  The  nation  was  withered.  The 
court  was  morbidly  flourishing.  Yet  it  does 
not  appear  that  the  associations  which  attach 
ed  the  people  to  the  monarchy  had  lost  strength 
during  his  reign.  He  had  neglected  or  sacri 
ficed  their  dearest  interests ;  but  he  had  struck 
their  imaginations.  The  very  things  which 
ought  to  have  made  him  most  unpopular — the 
prodigies  of  luxury  and  magnificence  with 
which  his  person  was  surrounded,  while,  be 
yond  the  enclosure  of  his  parks,  nothing  was 
to  be  seen  but  starvation  and  despair — seemed 
to  increase  the  respectful  attachment  which 
his  subjects  felt  for  him.  That  governments 
exist  only  for  the  good  of  the  people,  appears 
to  be  the  most  obvious  and  simple  of  all 
truths.  Yet  history  proves  that  it  is  one  of 
the  most  recondite.  We  can  scarcely  wonder 
that  it  should  be  so  seldom  present  to  the 
minds  of  rulers,  when  we  see  how  slowly,  and 
through  how  much  suffering,  nations  arrive  at 
the  knowledge  of  it. 

There  was  indeed  one  Frenchman  who  hid 
discovered  those  principles  which  it  now 
seems  impossible  to  miss — that  the  many  are 
not  made  for  the  use  of  one;  that  the  truly 
good  government  is  not  that  which  concen 
trates  magnificence  in  a  court,  but  that  which 
diffuses  happiness  among  a  people ;  that  a 
king  who  gains  victory  after  victory,  and  adds 
province  to  province,  may  deserve,  not  the 
admiration,  but  the  abhorrence  and  contempl 
of  mankind.  These  were  the  doctrines  which 
Fenelon  taught.  Considered  as  an  Epic  Poem, 


Berri,  "de  croire  que  Louis  XIV.  etoit  d'une  name  sta 
tuie.  Une  cuirasse  qui  nous  reste  de  lui,  et  les  exhnma 
tions  de  St.  Denys,  n'ont  laisse  sur  ce  point  aur.im 
d»ute." 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Felemachus  can  scarcely  be  placed  above 
Glover's  Leonidas  or  Wilkie's  Epigoniad. 
Considered  as  a  treatise  on  politics  and  mo 
rals,  it  abounds  with  errors  of  detail,  and  the 
truths  which  it  inculcates  seem  trite  to  a 
modern  reader.  But  if  we  compare  the  spirit 
in  which  it  is  written  with  the  spirit  which 
pervades  the  rest  of  the  French  literature  of 
that  age,  we  shall  perceive  that,  though  in  ap 
pearance  trite,  it  was  in  truth  one  of  the  most 
original  works  that  have  ever  appeared.  The 
fundamental  principles  of  Fenelon's  political 
morality,  the  tests  by  which  he  judged  of  in 
stitutions  and  of  men,  were  absolutely  new  to 
his  countrymen.  He  had  taught  them,  indeed, 
with  the  happiest  effect,  to  his  royal  pupil. 
But  how  incomprehensible  they  were  to  most 
people,  we  learn  from  Saint  Simon.  That 
amusing  writer  tells  us,  as  a  thing  almost  in 
credible,  that  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  declared 
it  to  be  his  opinion,  that  kings  existed  for  the 
good  of  the  people,  and  not  the  people  for  the 
good  of  kings.  Saint  Simon  is  delighted  with 
the  benevolence  of  this  saying;  but  startled 
by  its  novelty  and  terrified  by  its  boldness. 
Indeed  he  distinctly  says,  that  it  was  not  safe 
to  repeat  the  sentiment  in  the  court  of  Louis. 
Saint  Simon  was,  of  all  the  members  of  that 
court,  the  least  courtly.  He  was  as  nearly  an 
oppositionist  as  any  man  of  his  time.  His 
disposition  was  proud,  bitter,  and  cynical.  In 
religion  he  was  a  Jansenist ;  in  politics,  a  less 
hearty  royalist  than  most  of  his  neighbours. 
His  opinions  and  his  temper  had  preserved 
him  from  the  illusions  which  the  demeanour 
of  Louis  produced  on  others.  He  neither 
loved  nor  respected  the  king.  Yet  even  this 
man,  one  of  the  most  liberal  men  in  France, 
was  struck  dumb  with  astonishment  at  hear 
ing  the  fundamental  axiom  of  all  government 
propounded — an  axiom  which,  in  our  time, 
nobody  in  England  or  France  would  dispute — 
which  the  stoutest  Tory  takes  for  granted  as 
much  as  the  fiercest  Radical,  and  concerning 
which  the  Carlist  would  agree  with  the  most 
republican  deputy  of  the  "extreme  left."  No 
person  will  do  justice  to  Fenelon,  who  does 
not  '^istantly  keep  in  mind  that  Telemachus 
Wets  written  in  an  age  and  nation  in  which 
bold  and  independent  thinkers  stared  to  hear 
that  twenty  millions  of  human  beings  did  not 
exist  for  the  gratification  of  one.  That  work 
is  commonly  considered  as  a  school-book, 
/ery  fit  for  children,  because  its  style  is  easy 
and  its  morality  blameless ;  but  unworthy  of 
the  attention  of  statesmen  and  philosophers. 
We  can  distinguish  in  it,  if  we  are  not  greatly 
mistaken,  the  first  faint  dawn  of  a  long  and 
splendid  day  of  intellectual  light,  the  dim  pro 
mise  of  a  great  deliverance,  the  undeveloped 
gt-rm  of  the  charter  and  of  the  code. 

What  mighty  interests  were  staked  on  the 
life  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy!  and  how  dif 
ferent  an  aspect  might  the  history  of  France 
haw  lorne,  if  he  had  attained  the  age  of  his 
grandfather  or  of  his  son;  if  he  had  been 
permitted  to  show  how  much  could  be  done 
for  hu  -nanity  by  the  highest  virtue  in  the  highest 
fortune !  There  is  scarcely  any  thing  in  history 
moie  remarkable,  than  the  descriptions  which 


remain  to  us  of  that  extraordinary  man.  The 
|  fierce  and  impetuous  temper  which  he  showed 
:  in  early  youth,  the  complete  change  which  a 
judicious  education  produced  in  his  character, 
his  fervid  piety,  his  large  benevolence,  the 
strictness  with  which  he  judged  himself,  the 
liberality  with  which  he  judged  others,  the 
fortitude  with  which  alone,  in  the  whole  court, 
he  stood  up  against  the  commands  of  Louis, 
when  a  religious  scruple  was  concerned,  the 
charity  with  which  alone,  in  the  whole  court, 
he  defended  the  profligate  Orleans  against 
calumniators,  his  great  projects  for  the  good 
of  the  people,  his  activity  in  business,  his  taste 
for  letters,  his  strongdomesticattachments,even 
the  ungraceful  person  and  the  shy  and  awk 
ward  manner,  which  concealed  from  the  eyes 
of  the  sneering  courtiers  of  his  grandfather  so 
many  rare  endowments — make  his  character 
the  most  interesting  that  is  to  be  found  in  the 
annals  of  his  house.  He  had  resolved,  if  he 
came  to  the  throne,  to  disperse  that  ostenta 
tious  court,  which  was  supported  at  an  ex 
pense  ruinous  to  the  nation ;  to  preserve  peace ; 
to  correct  the  abuses  which  were  found  in 
every  part  of  the  system  of  revenue ;  to  abo 
lish  or  modify  oppressive  privileges ;  to  reform 
the  administration  of  justice;  to  revive  the 
institution  of  the  States-General.  If  he  had 
ruled  over  France  during  forty  or  fifty  years, 
that  great  movement  of  the  human  minrt, 
which  no  government  could  have  arrested, 
which  bad  government  only  rendered  more 
violent,  would,  we  are  inclined  to  think,  have 
been  conducted,  by  peaceable  means,  to  a 
happy  termination. 

Disease  and  sorrow  removed  from  the  world 
that  wisdom  and  virtue  of  which  it  was  not 
worthy.  During  two  generations  France  was 
ruled  by  men  who,  with  all  the  vices  of  Louis 
the  Fourteenth,  had  none  of  the  art  by  whicia 
that  magnificent  prince  passed  off  his  vices  for 
virtues.  The  people  had  now  to  see  tyranny 
naked.  That  foul  Ducssa  was  stripped  of  her 
gorgeous  ornaments.  She  had  always  been 
hideous;  but  a  strange  enchantment  had  made 
her  seem  fair  and  glorious  in  the  eyes  of  her 
willing  slaves.  The  spell  was  now  broken; 
the  deformity  was  made  manifest;  and  the 
lovers,  lately  so  happy  and  so  proud,  turned 
away  loathing  and  horror-struck. 

First  came  the  regency.  Tne  strictness  with 
which  Louis  had,  towards  the  close  of  his  life, 
exacted  from  those  around  him  an  outward 
attention  to  religious  duties,  produced  an  effect 
similar  to  that  which  the  rigour  of  the  Puritans 
had  produced  in  England.  It  was  the  boast  of 
Madame  de  Maintenon,  in  the  time  of  her  great 
ness,  that  devotion  had  become  the  fashion.  A 
fashion  indeed  it  was,  and,  like  a  fashion,  it 
passed  away.  The  austerity  of  the  tyrant's  old 
age  had  injured  the  morality  of  the  higher 
orders  more  than  even  the  licentiousness  of  his 
youth.  Not  only  had  he  not  reformed  their 
vices,  but,  by  forcing  them  to  be  hypocrites,  he 
had  shaken  their  belief  in  virtue.  They  had 
found  it  so  easy  to  perform  the  grimace  of 
piety,  that  it  was  natural  for  tnem  to  consider 
all  piety  as  grimace.  The  times  were  changed. 
Pensions,  regiments,  and  abbeys  were  n« 


DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   MIRABEAU. 


189 


longer  to  be  obtained  by  regular  confession  and 
severe  penance ;  and  the  obsequious  courtiers, 
who  had  kept  Lent  like  monks  of  La  Trappe, 
and  who  had  turned  up  the  whites  of  their  eyes 
at  the  edifying  parts  of  sermons  preached  be 
fore  the  king,  aspired  to  the  title  of  roue  as 
ardently  as  they  had  aspired  to  that  of  dcvot ; 
and  went,  during  Passion  Week,  to  the  revels 
of  the  Palais  Royal  as  readily  as  they  had 
formerly  repaired  to  the  sermons  of  Massil- 
lon. 

The  Regent  was  in  many  respects  the  fac 
simile  of  our  Charles  the  Second.  Like  Charles, 
he  was  a  good-natured  man,  utterly  destitute 
of  sensibility.  Like  Charles,  he  had  good  na 
tural  talents,  which  a  deplorable  indolence 
rendered  useless  to  the  state.  Like  Charles, 
he  thought  all  men  corrupt  and  interested,  and 
yet  did  not  dislike  them  for  being  so.  His  opi 
nion  of  human  nature  was  Gulliver's;  but  he 
did  not  regard  human  nature  with  Gulliver's 
horror.  He  thought  that  he  and  his  fellow- 
creatures  were  Yahoos ;  and  he  thought  a 
Yahoo  a  very  agreeable  kind  of  animal.  No 
princes  were  ever  more  social  than  Charles 
and  Philip  of  Orleans ;  yet  no  princes  ever  had 
less  capacity  for  friendship.  The  tempers  of 
these  clever  cynics  were  so  easy  and  their 
minds  so  languid,  that  habit  supplied  in  them 
the  place  of  affection,  and  made  them  the 
tools  of  people  for  whom  they  cared  not  one 
straw.  In  love,  both  were  mere  sensualists, 
without  delicacy  or  tenderness.  In  politics, 
both  were  utterly  careless  of  faith  and  of  na 
tional  honour.  Charles  shut  up  the  Exchequer. 
Philip  patronised  the  System.  The  councils 
of  Charles  were  swayed  by  the  gold  of  Baril- 
lon  ;  the  councils  of  Philip  by  the  gold  of  Wai- 
pole.  Charles  for  private  objects  made  war 
on  Holland,  the  natural  ally  of  England.  Philip 
for  private  objects  made  war  on  the  Spanish 
branch  of  the  house  of  Bourbon,  the  natural 
ally,  indeed  the  creature  of  France.  Even  in 
trifling  circumstances  the  parallel  might  be 
carried  on.  Both  these  princes  were  fond  of 
experimental  philosophy ;  and  passed  in  the 
laboratory  much  time  which  would  have  been 
more  advantageously  passed  at  the  council- 
table.  Both  were  more  strongly  attached  to 
their  female  relatives  than  to  any  other  human 
being;  and  in  both  cases  it  was  suspected  that 
this  attachment  was  not  perfectly  innocent.  In 
personal  courage,  and  in  r.ll  the  virtues  which 
are  connected  with  personal  courage,  the 
Regent  was  indisputably  superior  to  Charles. 
Indeed  Charles  but  narrowly  escaped  the  stain 
of  cowardice.  Philip  was  eminently  brave, 
and,  like  most  brave  men,  was  generally  open 
and  sincere.  Charles  added  dissimulation  to 
his  other  vices. 

The  administration  of  the  Regent  was 
scarcely  less  pernicious,  and  infinitely  more 
scandalous,  than  that  of  the  deceased  monarch. 
It  was  by  magnificent  public  works,  and  by 
wars  conducted  on  a  gigantic  scale,  that  Louis 
had  brought  distress  on  his  people.  The  Re 
gent  aggravated  that  distress  by  frauds,  of 
which  a  lame  duck  on  the  stock-exchange 
would  have  been  ashamed.  France,  even 
while  suffering  under  the  most  severe  calami 


ties,  had  reverenced  the  co».     .eror.     She  de  • 
!  spised  the  swindler. 

When  Orleans  and  the  wretched  Dubois  had 

|  disappeared,  the  power  passed  to  the  Duke  ot 

!  Bourbon  ;  a  prince  degraded  in  the  public  eye 

|  by  the  infamously  lucrative  part  which  he  had 

|  taken  in  the  juggles  of  the  System,  and  by  the 

|  humility  with  which  he  bore  the  caprices  of  a 

:  loose  and  imperious  woman.     It  seemed  to  be 

decreed  that  every  branch  of  the  royal  family 

should  successively  incur  the  abhorrence  and 

contempt  of  the  nation. 

Between  the  fall  of  the  Duke  of  Bourbon  and 
the  death  of  Fleury,  a  few  years  of  frugal  arid 
moderate  government  intervened.  Then  re 
commenced  the  downward  progress  of  the 
monarchy.  Profligacy  in  the  court,  extrava 
gance  in  the  finances,  schism  in  the  church, 
faction  in  the  Parliaments,  unjust  \var  termi 
nated  by  ignominious  peace — all  that  indicates 
and  all  that  produces  the  ruin  of  great  empires, 
make  up  the  history  of  that  miserable  period. 
Abroad,  the  French  were  beaten  and  humbled 
everywhere,  by  land  and  by  sea,  on  the  Elbe 
and  on  the  Rhine,  in  Asia  and  in  America.  At 
j  home,  they  were  turned  over  from  vizier  to 
j  vizier,  and  from  sultan  to  sultan,  till  they  had 
reached  that  point  beneath  which  there  was  no 
lower  abyss  of  infamy,  till  the  yoke  of  Maupeou 
had  made  them  pine  for  Choiseul,  till  Madame 
du  Barri  had  taught  them  to  regret  Madame  de 
Pompadour. 

But  unpopular  as  the  monarchy  had  become, 
the  aristocracy  was  more  unpopular  still ;  and 
not  without  reason.  The  tyranny  of  an  indi 
vidual  is  far  more  supportable  than  the  tyranny 
of  a  caste.  The  old  privileges  were  galling 
and  hateful  to  the  new  wealth  and  the  new 
knowledge.  Every  thing  indicated  the  ap 
proach  of  no  common  revolution  ;  of  a  revolu 
tion  destined  to  change,  not  merely  the  form 
of  government,  but  the  distribution  of  property 
and  the  whole  social  system;  of  a  revolution, 
the  effects  of  which  were  to  be  felt  at  every 
fireside  in  France  ;  of  a  new  Jaquerie,  in  which 
the  victory  was  to  remain  with  Jcques  honfiomme. 
In  the  van  of  the  movement  were  the  moneyed 
men  and  the  men  of  letters — the  wounded 
pride  of  wealth  and  the  wounded  pride  of  in 
tellect.  An  immense  multitude,  made  ignorant 
and  cruel  by  oppression,  was  raging  in  the 
rear. 

We  greatly  doubt  whether  any  course  which 
could  have  been  pursued  by  Louis  the  Six 
teenth  could  have  averted  a  great  convulsion. 
But  we  are  sure  that,  if  there  was  such  a 
course,  it  was  the  course  recommended  by  M. 
Turgot.  The  church  and  the  aristocracy,  with 
that  blindness  to  danger,  that  incapacity  of 
believing  that  any  thing  can  be  except  what 
has  been,  which  the  long  possession  of  power 
seldom  fails  to  generate,  mocked  at  the  counsel 
which  might  have  saved  them.  They  would 
not  have  reform  ;  and  they  had  revolution. 
They  would  not  pay  a  small  contribution  n< 
place  of  the  odious  corvees;  and  they  lived  to 
see  their  castles  demolished,  and  their  lands 
sold  to  strangers.  They  vould  not  endure 
Turgot;  and  they  were  forced  to  endure  Ro 
I  bespierre. 


.90 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Then  the  rulers  of  France,  as  if  smitten  with 
judicial  blindness,  plunged  headlong  into  the 
American  war.  They  thus  committed  at  once 
two  great  errors.  They  encouraged  the  spirit 
of  revolution.  They  augmented  at  the  same 
time  those  public  burdens,  the  pressure  of 
which  is  generally  the  immediate  cause  of 
revolutions.  The  event  of  the  war  carried  to 
the  height  the  enthusiasm  of  speculative  demo 
crats.  The  financial  difficulties  produced  by 
the  war  carried  to  the  height  the  discontent 
of  that  larger  body  of  people  who  cared  little 
about  theories,  and  much  about  taxes. 

The  meeting  of  the  States-General  was  the 
signal  for  the  explosion  of  all  the  hoarded  pas 
sions  of  a  century.  In  that  assembly  there 
were  undoubtedly  very  able  men.  But  they 
had  no  practical  knowledge  of  the  art  of  go 
vernment.  All  the  great  English  revolutions 
have  been  conducted  by  practical  statesmen. 
The  French  Revolution  was  conducted  by 
mere  speculators.  Our  constitution  has  never 
been  so  far  behind  the  age  as  to  have  become 
an  object  of  aversion  to  the  people.  The  Eng 
lish  re  volution  shave  therefore  been  undertaken 
for  the  purpose  of  correcting,  defending,  and 
restoring;  never  for  the  mere  purpose  of  de 
stroying.  Our  countrymen  have  always,  even 
in  times  of  the  greatest  excitement,  spoken 
reverently  of  the  form  of  government  under 
Which  they  lived,  and  attacked  only  what  they 
regarded  as  its  corruptions.  In  the  very  act 
of  innovating  they  have  constantly  appealed 
to  ancient  prescription ;  they  have  seldom 
looked  abroad  for  models ;  they  have  seldom 
troubled  themselves  with  Utopian  theories ; 
they  have  not  been  anxious  to  prove  that  li 
berty  is  a  natural  right  of  men ;  they  have  been 
content  to  regard  it  as  the  lawful  birthright  of 
Englishmen.  Their  social  contract  is  no  fic 
tion.  It  is  still  extant  on  the  original  parch 
ment,  sealed  with  wax  which  was  affixed  at 
Rimnymede,  and  attested  by  the  lordly  names 
of  the  Marischals  and  Fitzherberts.  No  gene 
ral  arguments  about  the  original  equality  of 
men,  no  fine  stories  out  of  Plutarch  and  Cor 
nelius  Nepos,  have  ever  affected  them  so  much 
as  their  own  familiar  words,  Magna  Charta, 
Habeas  Corpus,  Trial  by  Jury,  Bill  of  Rights. 
This  part  of  our  national  character  has  un 
doubtedly  its  disadvantages.  An  Englishman 
too  often  reasons  on  politics  in  the  spirit  rather 
of  a  lawyer  than  of  a  philosopher.  There  is 
too  often  something  narrow,  something  exclu 
sive,  something  Jewish,  if  we  may  use  the 
word,  in  his  love  of  freedom.  He  is  disposed 
to  consider  popular  rights  as  the  special  heri 
tage  of  the  chosen  race  to  which  he  belongs. 
He  is  inclined  rather  to  repel  than  to  encou 
rage  the  alien  proselyte  who  aspires  to  a  share 
of  his  privileges.  Very  different  was  the  spirit 
<if  the  Constituent  Assembly.  They  had  none 
of  our  narrowness ;  but  they  had  none  of  our 
practical  skill  in  the  management  of  affairs 
They  did  rot  understand  how  to  regulate  the 
order  of  their  own  debates ;  and  they  thought 
themselves  able  to  legislate  for  the  whole  world. 
All  the  past  was  loathsome  to  them.  All  their 
agreeable  associations  were  connected  with 
me  future.  Hopes  were  to  them  all  that  recol- 
cctions  are  lo  us.  In.  the  institutions  of  their 


country  they  found  nothing  to  love  or  to  ad 
mire.  As  far  back  as  they  could  look,  they 
saw  only  the  tyranny  of  one  class  and  the  de 
gradation  of  another — Frank  and  Gaul,  knight 
and  villein,  gentleman  and  roturier.  They  hated 
the  monarchy,  the  church,  the  nobility.  They 
cared  nothing  for  the  States  or  the  Parliament. 
It  was  long  the  fashion  to  ascribe  all  the  follies 
which  they  committed  to  the  writings  of  the 
philosophers.  We  believe  that  it  was  misrule, 
and  nothing  but  misrule,  that  put  the  sting  into 
those  writings.  It  is  not  true  that  the  French 
abandoned  experience  for  theories.  They  took 
up  with  theories  because  they  had  no  expe 
rience  of  good  government.  It  was  because 
they  had  no  charter  that  they  ranted  about  the 
original  contract.  As  soon  as  tolerable  insti 
tutions  were  given  to  them,  they  began  to  look 
to  those  institutions.  In  1830  their  rally  ing- 
cry  was  Vive  la  Charte.  In  1789  they  had  no 
thing  but  theories  round  which  to  rally.  They 
had  seen  social  distinctions  only  in  a  bad  form; 
and  it  was  therefore  natural  that  they  should 
be  deluded  by  sophisms  about  the  equality  of 
men.  They  had  experienced  so  much  evil 
from  the  sovereignty  of  kings,  that  they  might 
be  excused  for  lending  a  ready  ear  to  those 
who  preached,  in  an  exaggerated  form,  the 
doctrine  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  people. 

The  English,  content  with  their  own  nation 
al  recollections  and  names,  have  never  sought 
for  models  in  the  institutions  of  Greece  or 
Rome.  The  French,  having  nothing  in  their 
own  history  to  which  they  could  look  back 
with  pleasure,  had  recourse  to  the  history  of 
the  great  ancient  commonwealths :  they  drew 
their  notions  of  those  commonwealths,  not 
from  contemporary  writers,  but  from  romances 
written  by  pedantic  moralists  long  after  the 
extinction  of  public  liberty.  They  neglected 
Thucydides  for  Plutarch.  Blind  themselves, 
they  took  blind  guides.  They  had  no  expe 
rience  of  freedom,  and  they  took  their  opinions 
concerning  it  from  men  who  had  no  more  ex 
perience  of  it  than  themselves,  and  whose  ima- 
inations,  inflamed  by  mystery  and  privation, 
exaggerated  the  unknown  enjoyment;  from 
men  who  raved  about  patriotism  without  hav 
ing  ever  had  a  country,  and  eulogized  tyranni 
cide  while  crouching  before  tyrants.  The 
maxims  which  the  French  legislators  learned 
in  this  school  were,  that  political  liberty  is  an 
end,  and  not  a  means ;  that  it  is  not  merely 
valuable  as  the  great  safeguard  of  order,  of 
property,  and  of  morality,  but  that  it  is  in  itself 
a  high  and  exquisite  happiness,  to  which  order, 
property,  and  morality  ought  without  one  scru 
ple  to  be  sacrificed.  The  lessons  which  may 
be  learned  from  ancient  history  are  indeed 
most  useful  and  important;  but  they  were  not 
likely  to  be  learned  by  men  who,  in  all  their 
rhapsodies  about  the  Athenian  democracy, 
seemed  utterly  to  forget  that  in  that  democracy 
there  were  ten  slaves  to  one  citizen  ;  and  who 
constantly  decorated  their  invectives  against 
the  aristocrats  with  panegyrics  on  Brutus  and 
Cato,  two  aristocrats,  fiercer,  prouder,  and 
more  exclusive  than  any  that  emigrated  with 
the  Count  of  Artois. 

We  have  never  met  with  so  vivid  and  inte 
resting  a  picture  of  the  National  Assembly  as 


DUMONT'S  RECOLLECTIONS  OF   MIRABEAU. 


191 


that  which  M.  Dumont  has  set  before  us.  His 
Mirabeau,  in  particular,  is  incomparable.  All 
the  former  Mirabeaus  were  daubs  in  compari 
son.  Some  were  merely  painted  from  the  ima 
gination,  others  were  gross  caricatures;  this 
is  the  very  individual,  neither  god  nor  demon, 
but  a  man,  a  Frenchman,  a  Frenchman  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  with  great  talents,  with 
strong  passions,  depraved  by  bad  education, 
surrounded  by  temptations  of  every  kind,  made 
desperate  at  one  time  by  disgrace,  and  then 
again  intoxicated  by  fame.  All  his  opposite 
and  seemingly  inconsistent  qualities  are  in  this 
representation  so  blended  together  as  to  make 
up  a  harmonious  and  natural  whole.  Till  now, 
Mirabeau  was  to  us,  and,  we  believe,  to  most 
readers  of  history,  not  a  man,  but  a  string  of 
antitheses.  Henceforth  he  will  be  a  real  hu 
man  being,  a  remarkable  and  eccentric  being 
indeed,  but  perfectly  conceivable. 

He  was  fond,  M.  Dumont  tells  us,  of  giving 
odd  compound  nicknames.  Thus,  M.  de  La 
fayette  was  Grandison-Cromwell ;  the  King  of 
Prussia  was  Alaric-Cottin ;  D'Espremenil  was 
Crispin-Catiline.  We  think  that  Mirabeau 
himself  might  be  described,  after  his  own 
fashion,  as  a  Wilkes-Chatham.  He  had 
Wilkes's  sensuality,  Wilkes's  levity,  Wilkes's 
insensibility  to  shame.  Like  Wilkes,  he  had 
brought  on  himself  the  censure  even  of  men 
of  pleasure  by  the  peculiar  grossness  of  his 
immorality,  and  by  the  obscenity  of  his  writ 
ings.  Like  Wilkes,  he  was  heedless,  not  only 
of  the  laws  of  morality,  but  of  the  laws  of  ho 
nour.  Yet  he  affected,  like  Wilkes,  to  unite 
the  character  of  the  demagogue  to  that  of  the 
fine  gentleman.  Like  Wilkes,  he  conciliated, 
by  his  good-humour  and  his  high  spirits,  the 
regard  of  many  who  despised  his  character. 
Like  Wilkes,  he  was  hideously  ugly;  like 
Wilkes,  he  made  a  jest  of  his  own  ugliness ; 
and,  like  Wilkes,  he  was,  in  spite  of  his  ugli 
ness,  very  attentive  to  his  dress,  and  very  suc 
cessful  in  affairs  of  gallantry. 

Resembling  Wilkes  in  the  lower  and  grosser 
parts  of  his  character,  he  had,  in  his  higher 
qualitits,  some  affinities  to  Chatham.  His  elo 
quence,  as  far  as  we  can  judge  of  it,  bore  no 
inconsiderable  resemblance  to  that  of  the  great 
English  minister.  He  was  not  eminently  suc 
cessful  in  long  set  speeches.  He  was  not,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  close  and  ready  debater. 
Sudden  bursts,  which  seemed  to  be  the  effect 
of  inspiration  ;  short  sentences,  which  came 
like  iighirviiig,  dazzling,  burning,  striking  down 
every  thing  before  them;  sentences  which, 
spoken  at  critical  moments,  decided  the  fate 
of  great  questions;  sentences  which  at  once 
became  proverbs ;  sentences  which  everybody 
sti/k  Irnows  by  heart;  in  these  chiefly  lay  the 


oratorical  power  both  of  Chatham'and  of  Mira 
beau.  There  have  been  far  greater  speakers 
and  far  greater  statesmen  than  either  of  them; 
but  we  doubt  whether  any  men  have,  in  mo 
dern  times,  exercised  such  vast  personal  in, 
fluence  over  stormy  and  divided  assemblies 
The  power  of  both  was  as  much  moral  as  in. 
tellectual.  In  true  dignity  of  character,  in 
private  and  public  virtue,  it  may  seem  absurd 
to  institute  any  comparison  between  them;  but 
they  had  the  same  haughtiness  and  vehemence 
of  temper.  In  their  language  and  manner 
there  was  a  disdainful  self-confidence,  an  im- 
periousness,  a  fierceness  of  passion,  before 
which  all  common  minds  quailed.  Even  Mur 
ray  and  Charles  Townshend,  though  intellec 
tually  not  inferior  to  Chatham,  were  always 
cowed  by  him.  Barnave,  in  the  same  manner, 
though  the  best  debater  in  the  National  Assem 
bly,  flinched  before  the  energy  of  Mirabeau. 
Men,  except  in  bad  novels,  are  not  all  good  or 
all  evil.  It  can  scarcely  be  denied  that  the 
virtue  of  Lord  Chatham  was  a  little  theatrical. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  was  in  Mirabeau,  not 
indeed  any  thing  deserving  the  name  of  virtue, 
but  that  imperfect  substitute  for  virtue  which 
is  found  in  almost  all  superior  minds,  a  sensi 
bility  to  the  beautiful  and  the  good,  which 
sometimes  amounted  to  sincere  enthusiasm, 
and  which,  mingled  with  the  desire  of  admira 
tion,  sometimes  gave  to  his  character  a  lustre 
resembling  the  lustre  of  true  goodness;  as  the 
"faded  splendour  wan"  which  lingered  round 
the  fallen  archangel,  resembled  the  exceeding 
brightness  of  those  spirits  who  had  kept  therr 
first  estate. 

There  are  several  other  admirable  p  Ttraits 
of  eminent  men  in  these  Memoirs.  That  of 
Sieyes  in  particular,  and  that  of  Talleyrand, 
are  masterpieces,  full  of  life  and  expa  ssion. 
But  nothing  in  the  book  has  interested  us  more 
than  the  view  which  M.  Dumont  has  presented 
to  us,  unostentatiously,  and,  we  may  say,  un 
consciously,  of  his  own  character.  The  sturdy 
rectitude,  the  large  charity,  the  good-nature, 
the  modesty,  the  independent  spirit,  the  ardent 
philanthropy,  the  unaffected  indifference  to 
money  and  to  fame,  make  up  a  character 
which,  while  it  has  nothing  unnatural,  seems 
to  us  to  approach  nearer  to  perfection  than 
any  of  the  Grandisons  and  Allworthys  of  fic 
tion.  The  work  is  not  indeed  precisely  such 
a  work  as  we  had  anticipated;  it  is  more  lively, 
more  picturesque,  more  amusing  than  we  had 
promised  ourselves,  and  it  is,  on  the  other 
hand,  less  profound  and  philosophic.  But  if 
it  is  not,  in  all  respects,  such  as  mi^ht  have 
been  expected  from  the  intellect  of  M.  Dumont, 
it  is  assuredly  such  a«-  might  have  been  ear 
pected  from  his 


192 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION.' 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1833.] 


THE  days  when  Miscellanies  in  Prose  and 
Verse,  by  a  Person  of  Honour,  and  Romances 
of  M.  Scuderi,  done  into  English  by  a  Person 
of  Quality,  were  attractive  to  readers  and  pro 
fitable  to  booksellers,  have  long  gone  by.  The 
literary  privileges  once  enjoyed  by  lords  are 
as  obsolete  as  their  right  to  kill  the  king's  deer 
on  their  way  to  Parliament,  or  as  their  old  re 
medy  of  scundalum  nmgnatum.  Yet  we  must 
acknowledge  that,  though  our  political  opi 
nions  are  by  no  means  aristocratical,  we 
always  feel  kindly  disposed  towards  noble 
authors.  Industry  and  a  taste  for  intellectual 
pleasures  are  peculiarly  respectable  in  those 
who  can  afford  to  be  idle,  and  who  have  every 
temptation  to  be  dissipated.  It  is  impossible 
not  to  wish  success  to  a  man  who,  finding 
himself  placed,  without  any  exertion  or  any 
merit  on  his  part,  above  the  mass  of  society, 
voluntarily  descends  from  his  eminence  in 
search  of  distinctions  which  he  may  justly 
call  his  own. 

This  is,  we  think,  the  second  appearance  of 
Lord  Mahon  in  the  character  of  an  author. 
His  first  book  was  creditable  to  him,  but  was 
in  every  respect  inferior  to  the  work  which 
now  lies  before  us.  He  has  undoubtedly  some 
of  the  most  valuable  qualities  of  an  historian — 
great  diligence  in  examining  authorities,  great 
judgment  in  weighing  testimony,  and  great 
impartiality  in  estimating  characters.  We 
are  not  aware  that  he  has  in  any  instance 
forgotten  the  duties  belonging  to  his  literary 
functions  in  the  feelings  of  a  kinsman.  He 
does  no  more  than  justice  to  his  ancestor 
Stanhope :  he  does  full  justice  to  Stanhope's 
enemies  and  rivals.  His  narrative  is  very 
perspicuous,  and  is  also  entitled  to  the  praise, 
seldom,  we  grieve  to  say,  deserved  by  modern 
writers,  of  being  very  concise.  It  must  be 
admitted,  however,  that,  with  many  of  the  best 
qualities  of  a  literary  veteran,  he  has  some  of 
the  faults  of  a  literary  novice.  He  has  no 
great  command  of  words.  His  style  is  seldom 
easy,  and  is  sometimes  unpleasantly  stiff.  He 
is  so  bigoted  a  purist,  that  he  transforms  the 
Abbe  d'Estrees  into  an  Abbot.  We  do  not  like 
to  see  French  words  introduced  into  English 
composition ;  but,  after  all,  the  first  law  of 
writing,  that  law  to  which  all  other  laws  are 
fcuoorclinate,  is  this — that  the  words  employed 
shall  be  such  as  convey  to  the  reader  the 
meaning  of  the  writer.  Now  an  Abbot  is  the 
head  of  a  religious  house;  an  Abbe  is  quite  a 
different  sort  of  person.  It  is  better  undoubt 
edly  to  use  an  English  word  than  a  French 
word ;  but  it  is  better  to  use  a  French  word 
than  to  misuse  an  English  word. 

*  History  of  the  War  cf  the  Succession  in  Spain.  By 
LORD  MAHON.  London:  1832. 


Lord  Mahon  is  also  a  little  too  fond  of  utter 
ing  moral  reflections,  in  a  style  too  sententious 
and  oracular.  We  will  give  one  instance : 
"  Strange  as  it  seems,  experience  shows  that 
we  usually  feel  far  more  animosity  against 
those  whom  we  have  injured,  than  against 
those  who  injure  us :  and  this  remark  holds 
good  with  every  degree  of  intellect,  with  every 
class  of  fortune,  with  a  prince  or  a  peasant, 
a  stripling  or  an  elder,  a  hero  or  a  prince." 
This  remark  might  have  seemed  strange  at 
the  court  of  Nimrod  or  Chedorlaomer  ;  but  it 
has  now  been  for  many  generations  consider 
ed  as  a  truism  rather  than  a  paradox.  Every 
man  has  written  on  the  thesis  "  Odisse  quern 
Iceseris"  Scarcely  any  lines  in  English  poetry 
are  better  known  than  that  vigorous  couplet: 

"Forgiveness  to  the  injured  does  belong  ; 
But  they  ne'er  pardon  who  have  done  the  wrong." 

The  historians  and  philosophers  have  quito 
done  with  this  maxim,  and  have  abandoned  it, 
like  other  maxims  which  have  lost  their  gloss, 
to  bad  novelists,  by  whom  it  will  very  soon  be 
worn  to  rags. 

It  is  no  more  than  justice  to  say,  that  the 
faults  of  Lord  Mahon's  book  are  precisely 
those  faults  which  time  seldom  fails  to  cure; 
and  that  the  book,  in  spite  of  its  faults,  is  a 
valuable  addition  to  our  historical  literature. 

Whoever  wishes  to  be  well  acquainted  with 
the  morbid  anatomy  of  governments,  whoever 
wishes  to  know  how  great  states  may  be  made 
feeble  and  wretched,  should  study  the  history 
of  Spain.  The  empire  of  Philip  the  Second 
was  undoubtedly  one  of  the  most  powerful  and 
splendid  that  ever  existed  in  the  world.  In 
Europe  he  ruled  Spain,  Portugal,  the  Nether 
lands  on  both  sides  of  the  Rhine,  Franche 
Comte,  Roussillon,  the  Milanese,  and  the  Two 
Sicilies.  Tuscany,  Parma,  and  the  other  small 
states  of  Italy  were  as  completely  dependent 
on  him  as  the  Nizam  and  the  Rajah  of  Berar 
now  are  on  the  East  India  Company.  In  Asia, 
the  King  of  Spain  was  master  of  the  Philip 
pines,  and  of  all  those  rich  settlements  which 
the  Portuguese  had  made  on  the  coasts  of 
Malabar  and  Coromandel,  in  the  Peninsula  of 
Malacca,  and  in  the  Spice  Islands  of  the  East 
ern  Archipelago.  In  America,  his  dominions 
extended  on  each  side  of  the  equator  into  the 
temperate  zone.  There  is  reason  to  believe 
that  his  annual  revenue  amounted,  in  the  sea 
son  of  his  greatest  power,  to  four  millions  ster 
ling  ;  a  sum  eight  times  as  large  as  that  which 
England  yielded  to  Elizabeth.  He  had  a  stand 
ing  army  of  fifty  thousand  excellent  troops,  at 
a  time  when  England  had  not  a  single  battalion 
in  constant  pay.  His  ordinary  naval  force 
consisted  of  a  hundred  and  forty  galleys.  He 
held,  what  no  other  prince  in  modern  times 
has  held,  the  dominion  both  of  the  land  and  of 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION. 


193 


(he  sea.  Darin*  the  greater  part  of  his  reign 
he  was  supreme  on  both  elements.  His  sol 
diers  marched  up  to  the  capital  of  France  ;  his 
ships  menaced  the  shores  of  England. 

It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say,  that  during  se 
veral  years,  his  power  over  Europe  was  greater 
than  even  that  of  Napoleon.  The  influence 
of  the  French  conqueror  never  extended  be 
yond  low- water  mark.  The  narrowest  strait 
was  to  his  power  what  it  was  of  old  believed 
that  a  running  stream  was  to  the  sorceries  of 
,  a  witch.  While  his  army  entered  every  me 
tropolis,  from  Moscow  to  Lisbon,  the  English 
fleets  blockaded  every  port,  from  Dantzic  to 
Trieste.  Sicily,  Sardinia,  Majorca,  Guernsey, 
enjoyed  security  through  the  whole  course  of 
a  war  which  endangered  every  throne  on  the 
continent.  The  victorious  and  imperial  na 
tion,  which  had  filled  its  museums  with  the 
spoils  of  Antwerp,  of  Florence,  and  of  Rome, 
was  suffering  painfully  from  the  want  of 
luxuries  which  use  had  rendered  necessaries. 
While  pillars  and  arches  were  rising  to  com 
memorate  the  French  conquests,  the  conquer 
ors  were  trying  to  make  coffee  out  of  succory, 
and  sugar  out  of  beet-root.  The  influence  of 
Philip  on  the  continent  was  as  great  as  that 
of  Napoleon.  The  Emperor  of  Germany  was 
his  kinsman.  France,  torn  by  religious  dis 
sensions,  was  never  a  formidable  opponent, 
and  was  sometimes  a  dependent  ally.  At  the 
same  time,  Spain  had  what  Napoleon  desired 
in  vain— ships,  colonies,  and  commerce.  She 
long  monopolized  the  trade  of  America  and  of 
the  Indian  Ocean.  All  the  gold  of  the  West, 
and  all  the  spices  of  the  East,  were  received 
and  distributed  by  her.  During  many  years 
of  Avar,  her  commerce  was  interrupted  only 
by  the  predatory  enterprises  of  a  few  roving 
privateers.  Even  after  the  defeat  of  the  Ar 
mada,  English  statesmen  continued  to  look 
with  great  dread  on  the  maritime  power  of 
Philip.  "  The  King  of  Spain,"  said  the  Lord 
Keeper  to  the  two  Houses  in  1593,  "since  he 
hath  usurped  upon  the  kingdom  of  Portugal, 
hath  thereby  grown  mighty  by  gaining  the 
East  Indies ;  so  as,  how  great  soever  he  was 
before,  he  is  now  thereby  manifestly  more  great. 
....  He  keepeth  a  navy  armed  to  impeach  all 
trade  of  merchandise  from  England  to  Gas- 
coigne  and  Guienne,  which  he  attempted  to  do 
this  last  vintage ;  so  as  he  is  now  become  as 
a  frontier  enemy  to  all  the  west  of  England,  as 
well  as  all  the  south  parts,  as  Sussex,  Hamp 
shire,  and  the  Isle  of  Wight.  Yea,  by  means 
of  his  interest  in  St.  Maloes,  a  port  full  of  ship- 
pins:  for  the  war,  he  is  a  dangerous  neighbour 
to  the  queen's  isles  of  Jersey  and  Guernsey, 
ancient  possessions  of  this  crown,  and  never 
conquered  in  the  greatest  wars  with  France." 

The  ascendency  which  Spain  then  had  in 
Europe,  was,  in  one  sense,  well  deserved.    It 
was  an  ascendency  which  had  been  gained  by 
unquestioned   superiority  in    all  the   arts   of 
policy  and  of  war.    In  the  sixteenth  century, 
Italy  was  not  more  decidedly  the  land  of  the  j 
fine  arts,  Germany  was    not  more  decidedly  ' 
the  land  of  bold  theological  speculation,  than  j 
Spain  was  the  land  of  statesmen  and  of  sol-  | 
diers.     The  character  which  Virgil   has  as-  j 
cribed  to  his  countrymen    might  have   been  i 

VOL.  II.— 25 


claimed  by  the  grave  and  haughty  chiefs  who 
surrounded  the  throne  of  Ferdinand  the  Catho 
lic,  and  of  his  immediate  successors.  That 
majestic  art,  "premere  imperio  populos"  was  not 
better  understood  by  the  Romans  in  the  proud 
est  days  of  their  republic,  than  by  Gonsalvo 
and  Ximenes,  Cortes  and  Alva.  The  skill 
of  the  Spanish  diplomatists  was  renowned 
throughout  Europe.  In  England  the  name  of 
Gondomar  is  still  remembered.  The  sovereign 
nation  was  unrivalled  both  in  regular  and  ir 
regular  warfare.  The  impetuous  chivalry  of 
France,  the  serried  phalanx  of  Switzerland, 
were  alike  found  wanting  when  brought  face 
to  face  with  the  Spanish  infantry.  In  the  wars 
of  the  New  World  where  something  different 
from  ordinary  strategy  was  required  in  the 
general,  and  something  different  from  ordinary 
discipline  in  the  soldier — where  it  was  every 
day  necessary  to  meet  by  some  new  expedient 
the  varying  tactics  of  a  barbarous  enemy,  the 
Spanish  adventurers,  sprung  from  the  common 
people,  displayed  a  fertility  of  resource,  and  a 
talent  for  negotiation  and  command,  to  which 
history  scarcely  affords  a  parallel. 

The  Castilian  of  those  times  was  to  tho 
Italian  what  the  Roman,  in  the  days  of  the 
greatness  of  Rome,  was  to  the  Greek.  The 
conqueror  had  less  ingenuity,  less  taste,  less 
delicacy  of  perception  than  the  conquered ;  but 
far  more  pride,  firmness,  and  courage ;  a  more- 
solemn  demeanour,  a  stronger  sense  of  honour. 
The  one  had  more  subtilty  in  speculation,  the 
other  more  energy  in  action.  The  vices  of  the 
one  were  those  of  a  coward ;  the  vices  of  the 
other  were  those  of  a  tyrant.  It  may  be  added, 
that  the  Spaniard,  like  the  Roman,  did  not  dis 
dain  to  study  the  arts  and  the  language  of  those 
whom  he  oppressed.  A  revolution  took  place 
in  the  literature  of  Spain,  not  unlike  to  that 
revolution  which,  as  Horace  tells  us,  took 
place  in  the  poetry  of  Latium;  "  Capta  fenvm 
victorem  cepit"  The  slave  took  prisoner  the 
enslaver.  The  old  Castilian  ballads  gave 
place  to  sonnets  in  the  style  of  Petrarch,  and 
to  heroic  poems  in  the  stanza  of  Ariosto;  as 
the  national  songs  of  Rome  were  driven  out 
by  imitations  of  Theocritus  and  translations 
from  Menander. 

In  no  modern  society,  not  even  in  England; 
during  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  has  there  been 
so  great  a  number  of  men  eminent  at  once  in 
literature  and  in  the  pursuits  of  active  life,  as 
Spain  produced  during  the  sixteenth  century. 
Almost  every  distinguished  writer  was  also, 
distinguished  as  a  soldier  and  a  politician. 
Boscan  bore  arms  with  high  reputation.  Gar- 
cilasso  de  Vega,  the  author  of  the  sweetest  and 
most  graceful  pastoral  poem  of  modern  times, 
after  a  short  but  splendid  military  career,  fell 
sword  in  hand  at  the  head  of  a  storming  party , 
Alonzo  de  Ercilla  bore  a  conspicuous  pait  in, 
that  war  of  Arauco,  which  he  afterwards  cele 
brated  in  the  best  heroic  poem  *hat  Spain  has 
produced.  Hurtado  de  Mendo/a.  whose  poems 
have  been  compared  to  those  of  Horace,  ana 
whose  charming  little  novel  i?  evidently  the  mo 
del  of  Gil  Bias,  has  been  handed  down  to  us  by 
history  as  one  of  the  sternest  of  those  iron  pro 
consuls,  who  were  employed  by  the  house  of 
Austria  to  crush  the  lingering  public  spirit  of 
R 


194 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Italy.     Lope  sailed  in  the  Armada ;  Cervantes 
was  wounded  at  Lepanto. 

It  is  curious  to  consider  with  how  much  awe 
our  ancestors  in  those  times  regarded  a  Spa 
niard.  He  was,  in  their  apprehension,  a  kind 
of  demon,  horribly  malevolent,  but  withal  most 
sagacious  and  powerful.  "They  be  verye 
wyse  and  politicke,"  says  an  honest  English 
man,  in  a  memorial  addressed  to  Mary,  "and 
can,  thorowe  ther  wysdome,  reform  and  bry- 
dell  theyr  owne  natures  for  a  tyme,  and  applye 
their  conditions  to  the  maners  of  those  men 
with  whom  they  meddell  gladlye  by  friend- 
shippe;  whose  mischievous  maners  a  man 
shall  never  knowe  untyll  he  come  under  ther 
subjection:  but  then  shall  he  parfectlye  par- 
ceyve  and  fele  them :  which  thynge  I  praye 
God  England  never  do;  for  in  dissimulations 
untyll  they  have  ther  purposes,  and  afterwards 
in  oppression  and  tyrannye,  when  they  can  ob- 
tayne  them,  they  do  exceed  all  other  nations 
upon  the  earthe."  This  is  just  such  language 
as  Arrninius  would  have  used  about  the  Ro 
mans,  or  as  an  Indian  statesman  of  our  times 
would  use  about  the  English.  It  is  the  lan 
guage  of  a  man  burning  with  hatred,  but  cowed 
by  those  wnom  he  hates  ;  and  painfully  sensi 
ble  of  their  superiority,  not  only  in  power,  but 
in  intelligence. 

But  how  art  thou  fallen  from  heaven,  oh 
Lucifer,  son  of  the  morning!  How  art  thou 
cut  down  to  the  ground,  that  didst  weaken  the 
nations  !  If  we  overleap  a  hundred  years,  and 
look  at  Spain  towards  the  close  of  the  seven 
teenth  century,  what  a  change  do  we  find! 
The  contrast  is  as  great  as  that  which  the 
Rome  of  Gallienus  and  Honorius  presents  to 
the  Rome  of  Marius  and  Caesar.  Foreign  con 
quests  had  begun  to  eat  into  every  part  of  that 
gigantic  monarchy  on  which  the  sun  never 
set.  Holland  was  gone,  and  Portugal,  and 
Artois,  and  Roussillon,  and  Tranche  Comte. 
In  the  East,  the  empire  founded  by  the  Dutch 
far  surpassed  in  wealth  and  splendour  that 
which  their  old  tyrants  still  retained.  In  the 
West,  England  had  seized,  and  still  held,  settle- 
tlements  in  the  midst  of  the  Mexican  sea.  The 
mere  loss  of  territory  was,  however,  of  little 
moment.  The  reluctant  obedience  of  distant 
provinces  generally  costs  more  than  it  is 
worth. 

Empires  which  branch  out  widely  are  often 
more  nourishing  for  a  little  timely  pruning. 
Adrian  acted  judiciously  when  he  abandoned 
the  conquests  of  Trajan.  England  was  never 
so  rich,  so  great,  so  formidable  to  foreign 
princes,  so  absolutely  mistress  of  the  sea,  as 
after  the  loss  of  her  American  colonies.  The 
Spanish  empire  was  still,  in  outward  appear 
ance,  great  and  magnificent.  The  European 
dominions  subject  to  the  last  feeble  prince  of 
the  house  of  Austria  were  far  more  extensive 
than  those  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth.  The 
American  dependencies  of  the  Castilian  crown 
still  extended  to  the  north  of  Cancer  and  to  the 
south  of  Capricorn.  But  within  this  immense 
body  there  was  an  incurable  decay,  an  utter 
want  of  tone,  an  utter  prostration  of  strength. 
An  ingenious  and  diligent  population,  emi 
nently  skilled  in  arts  and  manufactures  had 
teen  driven  into  exile  by  stupid  and  remorse 


less  bigots.  The  glory  of  the  Spanish  pencil 
had  departed  with  Velasquez  and  Murillo. 
The  splendid  age  of  Spanish  literature  had 
closed  with  Solis  and  Calderon.  During  the 
seventeenth  century  many  states  had  formed 
great  military  establishments.  But  the  Spa 
nish  army,  so  formidable  under  the  command 
of  Alva  and  Farnese,  had  dwindled  away  to  a 
few  thousand  men,  ill  paid  and  ill  disciplined. 
England,  Holland,  and  France  had  great  navies. 
But  the  Spanish  navy  was  scarcely  equal  to 
the  tenth  part  of  that  mighty  force  which,  in  the 
time  of  Philip  the  Second,  had  been  the  terror 
of  the  Atlantic  and  the  Mediterranean.  The 
arsenals  were  deserted.  The  magazines  were 
unprovided.  The  frontier  fortresses  were  un- 
garrisoned.  The  police  was  utterly  inefficient 
for  the  protection  of  the  people.  Murders  were 
committed  in  the  face  of  day  with  perfect  im 
punity.  Bravoes  and  discarded  serving-men, 
with  swords  at  their  sides,  swaggered  every 
day  through  the  most  public  street  and  squares 
of  the  capital,  disturbing  the  public  peace,  and 
setting  at  defiance  the  ministers  of  justice. 
The  finances  were  in  frightful  disorder.  The 
people  paid  much.  The  government  received 
little.  The  American  viceroys  and  the  farmers 
of  the  revenue  became  rich,  while  the  mer 
chants  broke,  while  the  peasantry  starved, 
while  the  body-servants  of  the  sovereign  re 
mained  unpaid,  while  the  soldiers  of  the  royal 
guard  repaired  daily  to  the  doors  of  convents, 
and  battled  there  with  the  crowd  of  beggars 
for  a  porringer  of  broth  and  a  morsel  of  brpad. 
Every  remedy  which  was  tried  aggravated  the 
disease.  The  currency  was  altered;  and  this 
frantic  measure  produced  its  never-failing 
effects.  It  destroyed  all  credit,  and  increased 
the  misery  which  it  was  intended  to  relieve. 
The  American  gold,  to  use  the  words  of  Ortiz, 
was  to  the  necessities  of  the  state  but  as  a 
drop  of  water  to  the  lips  of  a  man  raging  with 
thirst.  Heaps  of  unopened  despatches  accu 
mulated  in  the  offices,  while  the  ministers  were 
concerting  with  the  bedchamber-women  and 
Jesuits  the  means  of  tripping  up  each  other. 
Every  foreign  power  could  plunder  and  insult 
with 'impunity  the  heir  of  Charles  the  Fifths 
Into  such  a  state  had  the  mighty  kingdom  of 
Spain  fallen,  while  one  of  its  smallest  depend 
encies — a  country  not  so  large  as  the  pro 
vince  of  Estremadura  or  Andalusia,  situated 
under  an  inclement  sky,  and  preserved  only  by 
artificial  means  from  the  inroads  of  the  ccean 
— had  become  a  power  of  the  first  class,  and 
treated  on  terms  of  equality  with  the  courts  of 
London  and  Versailles. 

The  manner  in  which  Lord  Mahon  explains 
the  financial  situation  of  Spain  by  no  means 
satisfies  us.  " It  will  be  found,"  says  he,  "that 
those  individuals  deriving  their  chief  income 
from  mines  whose  yearly  produce  is  uncertain 
and  varying,  and  seems  to  spring  rather  from 
fortune  than  to  follow  industry,  are  usually 
careless,  unthrifty,  and  irregular  in  their  ex 
penditure.  The  example  of  Spain  might  tempt 
us  to  apply  the  same  remark  to  states."  Lord 
Mahon  would  find  it  difficult,  we  suspect,  to 
make  out  his  analogy.  Nothing  could  be  more 
uncertain  and  varying  than  the  gains  and  losses 
of  those  who  were  in  the  habit  of  putting  into 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE   SUCCESSION. 


195 


the  state  lotteries.  But  no  part  of  the  public 
income  was  more  certain  than  that  which  was 
derived  from  the  lotteries.  We  believe  that 
this  case  is  very  similar  to  thai  of  the  Ameri 
can  mines.  Some  veins  of  ore  exceeded  ex 
pectation,  some  fell  below  it.  Some  of  the 
r  private  speculators  drew  blanks,  and  others 
'  gained  prizes.  But  the  revenue  of  the  state 
depended  not  on  any  particular  vein,  but  on 
the  whole  annual 'produce  of  two  great  conti 
nents.  This  annual  produce  seems  to  have 
been  almost  constantly  on  the  increase  during 
the  seventeenth  century.  The  Mexican  mines 
were,  through  the  reigns  of  Philip  the  Fourth 
and  Charles  the  Second,  in  a  steady  course  of 
improvement;  and  in  South  America,  though 
the  district  of  Potosi  was  not  so  productive  as 
formerly,  other  places  more  than  made  up  for 
the  def  ciency.  We  very  much  doubt  whether 
Lord  Mahon  can  prove  that  the  income  which 
the  Spanish  government  derived  from  the  mines 
of  America  fluctuated  more  than  the  income 
derived  from  the  internal  taxes  of  Spain  itself. 
All  the  causes  of  the  decay  of  Spain  resolve 
themselves  into  one  cause — bad  government. 
The  valour,  the  intelligence,  the  energy,  which 
at  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  and  the  beginning 
of  the  sixteenth  century  made  the  Spaniards 
the  first  nation  in  the  world,  were  the  fruits  of 
the  old  institutions  of  Castile  and  Arragon — 
institutions  which  were  eminently  favourable 
to  public  liberty.  Those  institutions  the  first 
princes  of  the  house  of  Austria  attacked  and 
almost  wholly  destroyed.  Their  successors  ex 
piated  the  crime.  The  effects  of  a  change  from 
good  government  to  bad  government  is  not 
fully  felt  for  some  time  after  the  change  has 
taken  place.  The  talents  and  the  virtues  which 
a  good  constitution  generates  may  for  a  time 
survive  that  constitution.  Thus  the  reigns  of 
princes  who  have  established  absolute  mo 
narchy  on  the  ruins  of  popular  forms  of  go 
vernment  often  shine  in  history  with  a  peculiar 
brilliancy.  But  when  a  generation  or  two  has 
passed  away,  then  comes  signally  to  pass  that 
which  was  written  by  Montesquieu,  that  des 
potic  governments  resemble  those  savages  who 
cut  down  the  tree  in  order  to  get  at  the  fruit. 
During  the  first  years  of  tyranny  is  reaped  the 
harvest  sown  during  the  last  years  of  liberty. 
Thus  the  Augustan  age  was  rich  in  great  minds 
formed  in  the  generation  of  Cicero  and  Ccesar. 
The  fruits  of  the  policy  of  Augustus  were  re- 
,  served  for  posterity.  Philip  the  Second  was 
the  heir  of  the  Cortes  and  of  the  Justiza  Mayor, 
and  they  left  him  a  nation  which  seemed  able 
to  conquer  all  the  world.  What  Philip  left  to 
his  successors  is  well  known. 

The  shock  which  the  great  religious  tchism 
of  the  sixteenth  century  gave  to  Europe  was 
scarcely  felt  in  Spain.  In  England,  Germany, 
Holland,  France,  Denmark,  Switzerland,  Swe 
den,  that  shock  had  produced,  with  some  tem 
porary  evil,  much  durable  good.  The  princi 
ples  of  the  Reformation  had  triumphed  in  some 
of  those  countries.  The  Catholic  Church  had 
maintained  its  ascendency  in  others.  But 
though  the  event  had  not  been  the  same  in  all, 
all  had  been  agitated  by  the  conflict.  Even  in 
France,  in  Southern  Germany,  and  in  the  Ca 
tholic  cantons  of  Switzerland,  the  public  mind 


had  been  stirred  to  its  inmost  depths.  The 
hold  of  ancient  prejudice  had  been  somewhat 
loosened.  The  Church  of  Rome,  warned  by 
the  danger  which  she  had  narrowly  escaped, 
had,  in  those  parts  of  her  dominion,  assumed 
a  milder  and  more  liberal  character.  She 
sometimes  condescended  to  submit  her  high 
pretensions  to  the  scrutiny  of  reason,  and 
availed  herself  more  sparingly  than  in  former 
times  of  the  aid  of  the  secular  arm.  Even 
when  persecution  was  employed,  it  was  not 
persecution  in  the  worst  and  most  frightful 
shape.  The  severities  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth, 
odious  as  they  were,  connot  be  compared  with 
those  which,  at  the  first  dawn  of  the  Reforma 
tion,  had  been  inflicted  on  the  heretics  in  many 
parts  of  Europe. 

The  only  effect  which  the  Reformation  had 
produced  in  Spain  had  been  to  make  the  In 
quisition  more  vigilant  and  the  commonalty 
more  bigoted.  The  times  of  refreshing  came 
to  all  neighbouring  countries.  One  people 
remained,  like  the  fleece  of  the  Hebrew  war 
rior,  dry  in  the  midst  of  that  benignant  and 
fertilizing  dew.  While  other  nations  were  put 
ting  away  childish  things,  the  Spaniard  still 
thought  as  a  child  and  understood  as  a  child. 
Among  the  men  of  the  seventeenth  century  he 
was  the  man  of  the  fifteenth  century,  or  of  a 
still  darker  period — delighted  to  behold  an  auto 
da-fe,  and  ready  to  volunteer  on  a  crusade. 

The  evils  produced  by  a  bad  governme^ 
and  a  bad  religion  seemed  to  have  attain*,  i 
their  greatest  height  during  the  last  years  o 
the  seventeenth  century.  While  the  kingdom 
was  in  this  deplorable  state,  the  king  was 
hastening  to  an  early  grave.  His  days  had 
been  few  and  evil.  He  had  been  unfortunate 
in  all  his  wars,  in  every  part  of  his  internal 
administration,  and  in  all  his  domestic  rela 
tions.  His  first  wife,  whom  he  tenderly  loved, 
died  very  young.  His  second  wife  exercised 
great  influence  over  him,  but  seems  to  have 
been  regarded  by  him  rather  with  fear  than 
with  love.  He  was  childless;  and  his  consti 
tution  was  so  completely  shattered,  that  at  little 
more  than  thirty  years  of  age  he  had  given  up 
all  hopes  of  posterity.  His  mind  was  even 
more  distempered  than  his  body.  He  was 
sometimes  sunk  in  listless  melancholy,  and 
sometimes  harassed  by  the  wildest  and  most 
extravagant  fancies.  He  was  not,  however, 
wholly  destitute  of  the  feelings  which  became 
his  station.  His  sufferings  were  aggravated 
by  the  thought  that  his  own  dissolution  might 
not  improbably  be  followed  by  the  dissolution 
of  his  empire. 

Several  princes  laid  claim  to  the  succession. 
The  king's  eldest  sister  had  married  Louis  the 
Fourteenth.  The  Dauphin  would,  therefore,  iu 
the  common  course  of  inheritance,  have  suc 
ceeded  to  the  crown.  But  the  Infanta  had,  at 
the  time  of  her  espousals,  solemnly  renounced, 
in  her  own  name  and  in  that  of  her  posterity, 
all  claim  to  the  succession.  This  renunciation 
had  been  confirmed  in  due  form  by  the  Cortex. 
A  younger  sister  of  the  king  had  been  the  first 
wife  of  Leopold,  Emperor  of  Germany.  She, 
too,  had  at  her  marriage  renounced  her  claims 
to  the  Spanish  crown,  *.<u  the  Ccrtes  had  not 
sanctioned  the  renunciation,  and  it  was  tnerr 


196 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


fore  considered  as  invalid  by  the  Spanish  ju 
rists.  The  fruit  of  this  marriage  was  a  daugh 
ter,  who  had  espoused  the  Elector  of  Bavaria. 
The  Electoral  Prince  of  Bavaria  inherited  her 
claim  to  the  throne  of  Spain.  The  Emperor 
Leopold  was  son  of  a  daughter  of  Philip  the 
Third,  and  was  therefore  first  cousin  to  Charles. 
No  renunciation  whatever  had  been  exacted 
from  his  mother  at  the  time  of  her  marriage. 

The  question  was  certainly  very  complicated. 
That  claim  which,  according  to  the  ordinary 
rules  of  inheritance,  was  the  strongest,  had 
been  barred  by  a  contract  executed  in  the  most 
binding  form.  The  claim  of  the  Electoral 
Prince  of  Bavaria  was  weaker.  But  so  also 
was  the  contract  which  bound  him  not  to  pro 
secute  his  claim.  The  only  party  against  whom 
no  instrument  of  renunciation  could  be  pro 
duced  was  the  party  who,  in  respect  of  blood, 
had  the  weakest  claim  of  all. 

As  it  was  clear  that  great  alarm  would  be 
excited  throughout  Europe  if  either  the  Em 
peror  or  the  Dauphin  should  become  King  of 
Spain,  each  of  those  princes  offered  to  waive 
his  pretensions  in  favour  of  his  second  son ; 
the  Emperor  in  favourof  the  Archduke  Charles, 
the  Dauphin  in  favour  of  Philip,  Duke  of  An- 
jou. 

Soon  after  the  peace  of  Ryswick,  William 
the  Third  and  Louis  the  Fourteenth  determined 
to  settle  the  question  of  the  succession  without 
consulting  either  Charles  or  the  Emperor. 
France,  England,  and  Holland  became  parties 
to  a  treaty  by  which  it  was  stipulated  that  the 
Electoral  Prince  of  Bavaria  should  succeed  to 
Spain,  the  Indies,  and  the  Netherlands.  The 
imperial  family  were  to  be  bought  off  with  the 
Milanese,  and  the  Dauphin  was  to  have  the  two 
Sicilies. 

The  great  object  of  the  King  of  Spain,  and 
of  all  his  counsellors,  was  to  avert  the  dis 
memberment  of  the  monarchy.  In  the  hope 
of  attaining  this  end,  Charles  determined  to 
name  a  successor.  A  will  was  accordingly 
framed,  by  which  the  ciown  was  bequeathed 
to  the  Bavarian  prince.  Unhappily,  this  will 
had  scarcely  been  signed  when  the  prince 
died.  The  question  was  again  unsettled,  and 
presented  greater  difficulties  than  before. 

A  new  Treaty  of  Partition  was  concluded 
between  France,  England,  and  Holland.  It 
was  agreed  that  Spain,  the  Indies,  and  the  Ne 
therlands  should  descend  to  the  Archduke 
Charles.  In  return  for  this  great  concession 
made  by  the  Bourbons  to  a  rival  house,  it  was 
agreed  that  France  should  have  the  Milanese, 
or  an  equivalent  in  a  more  commodious  situa 
tion  ;  if  possible,  the  province  of  Lorraine. 

Arbuthnot,  some  years,  later,  ridiculed  the 
Partition  Treaty  with  exquisite  humour  and 
ingenuity.  Everybody  must  remember  his 
description  of  the  paroxysm  of  rage  into 
which  poor  old  Lord  Strutt  fell,  on  hearing  that 
his  i una way  servant,  Nick  Frog,  his  clothier, 
John  Bull,  and  his  old  enemy,  Lewis  Baboon, 
had  come  with  quadrants,  poles,  and  inkhorns, 
to  survey  his  estate,  and  to  draw  his  will  for 
him.  Lord  Mahon  speaks  of  the  arrangement 
with  grave  severity.  He  calls  it  "an  iniqui 
tous  compact,  concluded  without  the  slightest 
Tciereuce  to  the  welfare  of  the  states  so  readily 


parcelled  and  allotted ;  insulting  to  the  prida 
of  Spain,  and  tending  to  strip  that  country  of 
its  hard-won  conquests."  The  most  serious 
part  of  this  charge  would  apply  to  half  th«j 
treaties  which  have  been  concluded  in  Europe 
quite  as  strongly  as  to  the  Partition  Treaty. 
What  regard  was  shown  in  the  treaty  of  the 
Pyrenees  to  the  welfare  of  the  people  of  Dunkirk 
and  Roussillon ;  in  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen  to 
the  welfare  of  the  people  of  Franche  Comte ;  in. 
the  treaty  of  Utrecht  to  the  welfare  of  the  peo 
ple  of  Flanders;  in  the  treaty  of  1735  to  the 
welfare  of  the  people  of  Tuscany  1  All  Eu 
rope  remembers,  and  our  latest  posterity  will, 
we  fear,  have  reason  to  remember,  how  coolly, 
at  the  last  great  pacification  of  Christendom, 
the  people  of  Poland,  of  Norway,  of  Belgium, 
and  of  Lombardy,  were  allotted  to  masters 
whom  they  abhorred.  The  statesmen  who  ne 
gotiated  the  Partition  Treaty  were  not  so  far 
beyond  their  age  and  hours  in  wisdom  and  vir 
tue,  as  to  trouble  themselves  much  about  the 
happiness  of  the  people  whom  they  were  ap 
portioning  among  foreign  masters.  But  it  will 
be  difficult  to  prove  that  the  stipulations  which 
Lord  Mahon  condemns,  were  in  any  respect 
unfavourable  to  the  happiness  of  those  who 
were  to  be  transferred  to  new  rulers.  The 
Neapolitans  would  certainly  have  lost  nothing 
by  being  given  to  the  Dauphin,  or  to  the  Great 
Turk.  Addison,  who  visited  Naples  abou-t  the 
time  at  which  the  Partition  Treaty  was  signed, 
has  left  us  a  frightful  description  of  the  mis- 
government  under  which  that  part  of  the 
Spanish  empire  groaned.  As  to  the  people  of 
Lorraine,  a  union  with  France  would  have 
been  the  happiest  event  which  could  have  be 
fallen  them.  Louis  was  already  their  sove 
reign  for  all  purposes  of  cruelty  and  exaction. 
He  had  kept  the  province  during  many  years 
in  his  own  hands.  At  the  peace  of  Ryswick, 
indeed,  the  duke  had  been  allowed  to  return. 
But  the  conditions  which  had  been  imposed  on 
him  made  him  a  mere  vassal  of  France. 

We  cannot  admit  that  the  Treaty  of  Parti 
tion  was  objectionable  because  it  "tended  to 
strip  Spain  of  hard-won  conquests.'**  The  in 
heritance  was  so  vast,  and  the  claimants  so 
mighty,  that  without  some  dismemberment,  it 
was  scarcely  possible  to  make  a  peaceable  ar 
rangement.  If  any  dismemberment  Avas  to 
take  place,  the  best  way  of  effecting  it  surely, 
was  to  separate  from  the  monarchy  those  na 
tions  which  were  at  a  great  distance  from 
Spain  :  which  were  not  Spanish  in  manners,  in 
language,  or  in  feelings;  which  were  both 
worse  governed  and  less  valuable  than  the  old 
provinces  of  Castile  and  Arragon  ;  and  which, 
having  always  been  governed  by  foreigners, 
would  not  be  likely  to  feel  acutely  the  humili 
ation  of  being  turned  over  from  one  master  to 
another. 

That  England  and  Holland  had  a  right  to  in 
terfere,  is  plain.  The  question  of  the  Spanish 
succession  was  not  an  internal  question,  but 
a  European  question.  And  this  Lord  Mahon 
would  admit.  He  thinks,  that  when  the  evil 
had  been  done,  and  a  French  prince  was 
reigning  at  the  Escurial,  England  and  Holland 
would  be  justified  in  attempting,  not  merely  to 
strip  Spain  of  its  remote  dependencies,  but  tc 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION. 


197 


conquer  Spain  itself;  that  they  would  be  justi 
fied  in  attempting  to  put,  not  merely  the  pas 
sive  Flemings  and  Italians,  but  the  reluctant 
Castilians  and  Asturians,  under  the  dominion 
of  a  stranger.  The  danger  against  which  the 
Partition  Treaty  was  intended  to  guard  was 
precisely  the  same  danger  which  afterwards 
was  made  the  ground  of  war.  It  will  be  diffi 
cult  to  prove,  that  a  danger  which  was  suffi 
cient  to  justify  the  war,  was  insufficient  to 
justify  the  provisions  of  the  treaty.  If,  as 
Lord  Mahon  contends,  it  was  better  that  Spain 
should  be  subjugated  by  main  force  than  that 
she  should  be  governed  by  a  Bourbon,  it  was 
surely  better  that  she  should  be  deprived  of 
Lornbardy  and  the  Milanese  than  that  she 
should  be  governed  by  a  Bourbon. 

Whether  the  treaty  was  judiciously  framed,  is 
quite  another  question.  We  disapprove  of  the 
stipulations.  But  we  disapprove  of  them,  riot 
because  we  think  them  bad,  but  because  we 
think  that  there  was  no  chance  of  their  being 
executed.  Louis  was  the  most  faithless  of 
politicians.  He  hated  the  Dutch.  He  hated 
the  government  which  the  Revolution  had  es 
tablished  in  England.  He  had  every  disposi 
tion  to  quarrel  with  his  new  allies.  It  was 
quite  certain  that  he  would  not  observe  his  en 
gagements,  if  it  should  be  for  his  interest  to 
violate  them.  Even  if  it  should  be  for  his  in 
terest  to  observe  them,  it  might  well  be  doubt 
ed  whether  the  strongest  and  clearest  interest 
would  induce  a  man  so  haughty  and  self-willed 
to  co-operate  heartily  with  two  governments 
which  had  always  been  the  objects  of  his  scorn 
and  a  version. 

When  intelligence  of  the  second  Partition 
Treaty  arrived  at  Madrid,  it  roused  to  mo 
mentary  energy  the  languishing  ruler  of  a 
languishing  state.  The  Spanish  ambassador 
at  the  court  of  London  was  directed  to  remon 
strate  with  the  government  of  William ;  and 
his  remonstrances  were  so  insolent  that  he  was 
commanded  to  leave  England.  Charles  retali 
ated  by  dismissing  the  English  and  Dutch  am 
bassadors.  The  French  king,  though  the  chief 
author  of  the  Partition  Treaty,  succeeded  in 
turning  the  whole  wrath  of  Charles  and  of  the 
Spanish  people  from  himself,  and  in  directing 
it  against  the  maritime  powers.  Those  powers 
had  now  no  agent  at  Madrid.  Their  perfidious 
ally  was  at  liberty  to  carry  on  his  intrigues 
unchecked :  and  he  fully  availed  himself  of 
this  advantage. 

A  long  contest  was  maintained  with  varying 
success  by  the  factions  which  surrounded  the 
miserable  king.  On  the  side  of  the  imperial 
family  was  the  queen,  herself  a  princess  of 
that  family ;  with  her  were  allied  the  confessor 
of  the  king,  and  most  of  the  ministers.  On 
the  other  side,  were  two  of  the  most  dexterous 
politicians  of  that  age,  Cardinal  Porto  Carrero, 
Archbishop  of  Toledo,  and  Harcourt,  the  am 
bassador  of  Louis. 

Harcourt  was  a  noble  specimen  of  the  French 
aristocracy  in  the  days  of  its  highest  splendour 

a  finished  gentleman,  a  brave  soldier,  and  a 
skilful  diplomatist.  His  courteous  and  insinu 
ating  manners,  his  Parisian  vivacity  tempered 
with  Caslilian  gravity,  made  him  the  favourite 
of  the  whole  court.  He  became  intimate  with 


the  grandees.  He  caressed  the  clergy.  He 
dazzled  the  multitude  by  his  magnificent  style 
of  living.  The  prejudices  which  the  people  of 
Madrid  had  conceived  against  the  French  cha 
racter,  the  vindictive  feelings  generated  durinjr 
centuries  of  national  rivalry,  gradually  yielded 
to  his  arts;  while  the  Austrian  ambassador,  a 
surly,  pompous,  niggardly  German,  made  him 
self  and  his  country  more  and  more  unpopular 
every  day. 

Harcourt  won  over  the  court  and  city :  Porto 
Carrero  managed  the  king.  Never  were  knave 
and  dupe  better  suited  to  each  other.  Charles 
was  sick,  nervous,  and  extravagantly  supersti 
tious.  Porto  Carrero  had  learned  in  the  exer 
cise  of  his  profession  the  art  of  exciting  and 
soothing  such  minds,  and  he  employed  that  art 
with  the  calm  and  demure  cruelty  which  is  the 
characteristic  of  wicked  and  ambitious  priests. 

He  first  supplanted  the  confessor.  The  state 
of  the  poor  king,  during  the  conflict  between 
his  two  spiritual  advisers,  was  horrible.  At 
one  time  he  was  induced  to  believe  that  his 
malady  was  the  same  with  that  of  the  wretches 
described  in  the  New  Testament,  who  dwelt 
among  the  tombs ;  whom  no  chains  could  bind, 
and  whom  no  man  dared  to  approach.  At  an 
other  time,  a  sorceress  who  lived  in  the  moun 
tains  of  the  Asturias  was  consulted  about  his 
malady.  Several  persons  were  accused  of 
having  bewitched  him.  Porto  Carrero  recom 
mended  the  appalling  rite  of  exorcism,  which 
was  actually  performed.  The  ceremony  made 
the  poor  king  more  nervous  and  miserable  than 
ever.  But  it  served  the  turn  of  the  Cardinal, 
who,  after  much  secret  trickery,  succeeded  in 
casting  out,  not  the  devil,  but  the  confessor. 

The  next  object  was  to  get  rid  of  the  minis 
ters.  Madrid  was  supplied  with  provisions  by 
a  monopoly.  The  government  looked  after  this 
most  delicate  concern,  as  it  looked  after  every 
thing  else.  The  partisans  of  the  house  of 
Bourbon  took  advantage  of  the  negligence  of 
the  administration.  On  a  sudden  the  supply 
of  food  failed.  Exorbitant  prices  were  de 
manded.  The  people  rose.  The  royal  resi 
dence  was  surrounded  by  an  immense  multi 
tude.  The  queen  harangued  them.  The 
priests  exhibited  the  host.  All  was  in  vain. 
It  was  necessary  to  awaken  the  Iring  from  his 
uneasy  sleep,  and  to  carry  him  to  the  balcony. 
There  a  solemn  promise  'was  given  that  the 
unpopular  advisers  of  the  crown  should  be 
forthwith  dismissed.  The  mob  left  the  palace, 
and  proceeded  to  pull  down  the  houses  of  the 
ministers.  The  adherents  of  the  Austrian  line 
were  thus  driven  from  power,  and  the  govern 
ment  was  intrusted  to  the  creatures  of  Porto 
Carrero.  The  king  left  the  city  in  which  he 
had  suffered  so  cruel  an  insult,  for  the  magni 
ficent  retreat  of  the  Escurial.  Here  his  hypo 
chondriac  fancy  took  a  new  turn.  Like  hij* 
ancestor,  Charles  the  Fifth,  he  was  haunted 
by  a  strange  curiosity  to  pry  into  the  secrets 
of  that  grave  to  which  he  was  hastening  hi 
the  cemetery  which  Philip  the  Second  had 
formed  beneath  the  pavement  of  the  church 
of  St.  Lawrence,  reposed  three  generations  of 
Castilian  princes.  Into  *hese  dark  vaults  the 
unhappy  monarch  descended  by  torchlight,  ana 
penetrated  to  that  superb  and  gloomy  chamber 
B  2 


108 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


where,  round  the  great  black  crucifix,  are 
ranged  the  coffins  of  the  kings  and  queens  of 
Spain.  There  he  commanded  his  attendants  to 
open  the  massy  chests  of  bronze  in  which  the 
relics  of  his  predecessors  decayed.  He  looked 
on  the  ghastly  spectacle  with  little  emotion  till 
the  coffin  of  his  first  w;fe  was  unclosed,  and 
she  appeared  before  him — such  was  the  skill 
of  the  embalmer — in  all  her  well-remembered 
beauty.  He  cast  one  glance  on  those  beloved 
features  unseen  for  eighteen  years,  those  fea 
tures  over  which  corruption  seemed  to  have  no 
power,  and  rushed  from  the  vault,  exclaiming, 
"  She  is  with  God,  and  I  shall  soon  be  with 
her."  The  awful  sight  completed  the  ruin  of  his 
body  and  mind.  The  Escurial  became  hateful 
to  him,  and  he  hastened  to  Aranjuez.  But  the 
shades  and  waters  of  that  delicious  island- 
garden,  so  fondly  celebrated  in  the  sparkling 
verse  of  Calderon,  brought  no  solace  to  their 
unfortunate  master.  Having  tried  medicine, 
exercise,  and  amusement  in  vain,  he  returned 
to  Madrid  to  die. 

He  was  now  beset  on  every  side  by  the  bold 
and  skilful  agents  of  the  house  of  Bourbon. 
The  leading  politicians  of  his  court  assured 
him,  that  Louis,  and  Louis  alone,  was  suffi 
ciently  powerful  to  preserve  the  Spanish  mo 
narchy  undivided  ;  and  that  Austria  would  be 
utterly  unable  to  prevent  the  Treaty  of  Parti 
tion  from  being  carried  into  effect.  Some 
celebrated  lawyers  gave  it  as  their  opinion, 
that  the  act  of  renunciation  executed  by  the 
late  Queen  of  France  ought  to  be  construed 
according  to  the  spirit,  and  not  according  to 
the  letter.  The  letter  undoubtedly  excluded  the 
French  prince.  The  spirit  was  merely  this ; 
that  ample  security  shou'd  be  taken  against 
the  union  of  the  French  and  Spanish  crowns 
on  one  head. 

In  all  probability,  neither  political  nor  legal 
reasonings  would  have  sufficed  to  overcome 
the  partiality  which  Charles  felt  for  the  house 
of  Austria.  There  had  always  been  a  close 
connection  between  the  two  great  royal  lines 
which  sprung  from  the  marriage  of  Philip  and 
Juana.  Both  had  always  regarded  the  French 
as  their  natural  enemies.  It  was  necessary  to 
have  recourse  to  religious  terrors  ;  and  Porto 
Carrero  employed  those  terrors  with  true  pro 
fessional  skill.  The  king's  life  was  drawing 
to  a  close.  Would  the  most  Catholic  prince 
commit  a  great  sin  on  the  brink  of  the  grave  1 
And  what  would  be  a  greater  sin  than,  from  an 
unreasonable  attachment  to  a  family  name, 
from  a"n  unchristian  antipathy  to  a  rival  house, 
to  set  aside  the  rightful  heir  of  an  immense 
heritage1?  The  tender  conscience  and  the 
feeble  intellectof  Charles  were  strongly  wrought 
upon  by  these  appeals.  At  length  Porto  Car 
rero  ventured  on  a  master-stroke.  He  advised 
Charles  to  apply  for  counsel  to  the  Pope.  The 
king,  who,  in  the  simplicity  of  his  heart,  con 
sidered  the  successor  of  St.  Peter  as  an  infal 
lible  guide  in  spiritual  matters,  adopted  the 
suggestion  ;  and  Porto  Carrero,  who  knew  that 
his  holiness  was  a  mere  tool  of  France,  awaited 
with  perfect  confidence  the  result  of  the  appli 
cation.  In  thj  answer  which  arrived  from 
Koine,  the  king  was  solemnly  reminded  of  the 
account  which  he  was  soon  to  render, 


and  cautioned  against  the  flagrant  injustice 
which  he  was  tempted  to  commit.  He  was 
assured  that  the  right  was  with  the  house  of 
j  Bourbon  ;  and  reminded  that  his  own  salvation 
ought  to  be  dearer  to  him  than  the  house  of 
Austria.  Yet  he  still  continued  irresolute. 
His  attachment  to  his  family,  his  aversion  to 
France,  were  not  to  be  overcome  even  by 
papal  authority.  At  length  he  thought  him 
self  actually  dying,  when  the  cardinal  redou 
bled  his  efforts.  Divine  after  divine,  well-tu 
tored  for  the  occasion,  was  brought  to  the  bed 
of  the  trembling  penitent.  He  was  dying  in 
the  commission  of  known  sin.  He  was  de 
frauding  his  relatives.  He  was  bequeathing 
civil  war  to  his  people.  He  yielded,  arid  signed 
that  memorable  testament,  the  cause  of  many 
calamities  to  Europe.  As  he  affixed  his  name 
to  the  instrument,  he  burst  into  tears.  "  God," 
he  said,  "gives  kingdoms  and  takes  them 
away.  I  am  already  as  good  as  dead." 

The  will  was  kept  secret  during  the  short 
remainder  of  his  life.  On  the  3d  of  November, 
1700,  he  expired.  All  Madrid  crowded  to  the. 
palace.  The  gates  were  thronged.  The  ante 
chamber  was  filled  with  ambassadors  and 
grandees,  eager  to  learn  what  dispositions  the 
deceased  sovereign  had  made.  At  length  fold 
ing  doors  were  flung  open.  The  Duke  of 
Abrantes  came  forth,  and  announced  that  the 
whole  Spanish  monarchy  was  bequeathed  to 
Philip,  Duke  of  Anjou.  Charles  had  directed 
that,  during  the  interval  which  might  elapse 
between  his  death  and  the  arrival  of  his  suc 
cessor,  the  government  should  be  administered 
by  a  council,  of  which  Porto  Carrero  was  the 
chief  member. 

Louis  acted  as  the  English  ministers  might 
have  guessed  that  he  would  act.  With  scarcely 
the  show  of  hesitation,  he  broke  through  all 
the  obligations  of  the  Partition  Treaty,  and  ac 
cepted  for  his  grandson  the  splendid  legacy  of 
Charles.  The  new  sovereign  hastened  to  take 
possession  of  his  dominions.  The  whole  court 
of  France  accompanied  him  to  Sceaux.  His 
brothers  escorted  him  to  that  frontier,  which, 
as  they  weakly  imagined,  was  to  be  a  frontier 
no  longer.  "The  Pyrenees,"  said  Louis,  "have 
ceased  to  exist."  Those  very  Pyrenees,  a  few 
years  later,  were  the  theatre  of  a  war  between 
the  heir  of  Louis  and  the  prince  whom  France 
was  now  sending  to  govern  Spain. 

If  Charles  had  ransacked  Europe  to  find  a 
successor  whose  moral  and  intellectual  cha 
racter  resembled  his  own,  he  could  not  have 
chosen  better.  Philip  was  not  so  sickly  as  his 
predecessor;  but  he  was  quite  as  weak,  as  in 
dolent,  and  as  superstitious;  he  very  soon  be 
came  quite  as  hypochondriacal  and  eccentric; 
and  he  was  even  more  uxorious.  He  was  in 
deed  a  husband  of  ten  thousand.  His  first 
object,  when  he  became  King  of  Spain,  was  to 
procure  a  wife.  From  the  day  of  his  marriage 
to  the  day  of  her  death,  his  first  object  was  to 
have  her  near  him,  and  to  do  what  she  wished. 
As  soon  as  his  wife  died,  his  first  object  was 
to  procure  another.  Another  was  found,  as 
unlike  the  former  as  possible.  But  she  was  a 
wife,  and  Philip  was  content.  Neither  by  day 
nor  by  night,  neither  in  sickness  nor  in  health, 
neither  in  time  of  business  nor  in  time  of  re- 


LORD  MAKON'S   WAR  OF   THE   SUCCESSION. 


199 


taxation,  did  he  ever  suffer  her  to  be  absent 
from  him  for  half  an  hour.  His  mind  was  na 
turally  feeble ;  and  he  had  received  an  enfee 
bling  education.  He  had  been  brought  up 
amidst  the  dull  magnificence  of  Versailles.  His 
grandfather  was  as  imperious  and  as  ostenta 
tious  in  his  intercourse  with  the  royal  family 
as  in  public  acts.  All  those  who  grew  up  im 
mediately  under  the  eye  of  Louis,  had  the 
manners  of  persons  who  had  never  known 
what  it  was  to  be  at  ease.  They  were  all 
taciturn,  shy,  and  awkward.  In  all  of  them, 
except  the  Duke  of  Burgundy,  the  evil  went 
further  than  the  manners.  The  Dauphin,  the 
Duke  of  Berri,  Philip  of  Anjou,  were  men  of 
insignificant  characters.  They  had  no  energy, 
no  force  of  will.  They  had  been  so  little  ac 
customed  to  judge  or  to  act  for  themselves, 
that  implicif  dependence  had  become  neces 
sary  to  their  comfort.  The  new  King  of  Spain, 
emancipated  from  control,  resembled  that 
wretched  German  captive,  who,  when  the  irons 
which  he  had  worn  for  years  were  knocked 
off,  fell  prostrate  on  the  floor  of  his  prison. 
The  restraints  which  had  enfeebled  the  mind 
of  the  young  prince  were  required  to  support 
it.  Till  he  had  a  wife  he  could  do  nothing ; 
and  when  he  had  a  wife  he  did  whatever  she 
chose. 

While  this  lounging,  moping  boy  was  on  his 
way  to  Madrid,  his  grandfather  was  all  acti 
vity.  Louis  had  no  reason  to  fear  a  contest 
with  the  empire  single-handed.  He  made 
Vigorous  preparations  to  encounter  Leopold. 
He  overawed  the  States-General  by  means  of  a 
great  army.  He  attempted  to  soothe  the  Eng- 
Jish  government  by  fair  professions.  William 
was  not  deceived.  He  fully  returned  the  hatred 
of  Louis;  and,  if  he  had  been  free  to  act  ac 
cording  to  his  own  inclinations,  he  would  have 
declared  war  as  soon  as  the  contents  of  the 
will  were  known.  But  he  was  bound  by  con 
stitutional  restraints.  Both  his  person  and  his 
measures  were  unpopular  in  England.  His 
secluded  life  and  his  cold  manners  disgusted  a 
people  accustomed  to  the  graceful  affability  of 
Charles  the  Second.  His  foreign  accent  and 
his  foreign  attachments  were  offensive  to  the 
national  prejudices.  His  reign  had  been  a 
season  of  distress,  following  a  season  of  ra 
pidly-increasing  prosperity.  The  burdens  of 
the  war,  and  the  expense  of  restoring  the  cur 
rency,  had  been  severely  felt.  Nine  clergymen 
out  of  ten  were  Jacobites  at  heart,  and  had 
sworn  allegiance  to  the  new  dynasty  only  in 
order  to  save  their  benefices.  A  large  propor 
tion  of  the  country  gentlemen  belonged  to  the 
same  party.  The  whole  body  of  agricultural 
proprietors  was  hostile  to  that  interest,  which 
the  creation  of  the  national  debt  had  brought 
into  notice,  and  which  was  believed  to  be  pe 
culiarly  favoured  by  the  court — the  moneyed 
interest.  The  middle  classes  were  fully  deter 
mined  to  keep  out  James  and  his  family.  But 
they  regarded  William  only  as  the  less  of  two 
evils  ;  and,  as  long  as  there  was  no  imminent 
danger  of  a  counter-revolution,  were  disposed 
to  thwart  and  mortify  the  sovereign  by  whom 
they  were,  nevertheless,  ready  to  stand,  in  case 
of  necessity,  with  their  lives  and  fortunes. 
They  were  sullen  and  dissatisfied.  "  There  1 


was,"  as  Somers  expressed  it  in  a  remarkable 
letter  to  William,  "a  deadness  and  want  ot 
spirit  in  the  nation  universally." 

Every  thing  in  England  was  going  on  as 
Louis  could  have  wished.  The  leaders  of  the 
Whig  party  had  retired  from  poAver,  and  were 
extremely  unpopular  on  account  of  the  unfor 
tunate  issue  of  the  Partition  Treaty.  The  To 
ries,  some  of  whom  still  cast  a  lingering  look 
towards  St.  Cermains,  were  in  office,  and  had 
a  decided  majority  in  the  House  of  Commons. 
William  was  so  much  embarrassed  by  the 
state  of  parties  in  England,  that  he  could  not 
venture  to  make  war  on  the  house  of  Bourbon. 
He  was  suffering  under  a  complication  of  se 
vere  and  incurable  diseases.  There  was  every 
reason  to  believe  that  a  few  months  would 
dissolve  the  fragile  tie.  which  bound  up  that 
feeble  body  with  that  ardent  and  unconquera 
ble  soul.  If  Louis  could  succeed  in  preserving 
peace  for  a  short  time,  it  was  probable  that 
all  his  vast  designs  would  be  securely  accom 
plished.  Just  at  this  crisis,  the  most  import 
ant  crisis  of  his  life,  his  pride  and  his  passions 
hurried  him  into  an  error,  which  undid  all  that 
forty  years  of  victory  and  intrigue  had  done ; 
which  produced  the  dismemberment  of  the 
kingdom  of  his  grandson,  and  brrmght  inva 
sion,  bankruptcy,  and  famine  on  his  own. 

James  the  second  died  at  St.  Germains. 
Louis  paid  him  a  farewell  visit,  and  was  so 
much  moved  by  the  solemn  parting,  and  by 
the  grief  of  the  exiled  queen,  that,  losing  sight 
of  all  considerations  of  policy,  and  actuated., 
as  it  should  seem,  merely  by  compassion,  and 
by  a  not  ungenerous  vanity,  he  acknowledged 
the  Prince  of  Wales  as  King  cf  England. 

The  indignation  which  the  Castilians  had 
felt  when  they  heard  that  three  foreign  powers 
had  undertaken  to  regulate  the  Spanish  suc 
cession,  was  nothing  to  the  rage  with  which 
the  English  learned  that  their  good  neighbour 
bad  taken  the  trouble  to  provide  them  with  a 
king.  Whigs  and  Tories  joined  in  condemn 
ing  the  proceedings  of  the  French  court.  The 
cry  for  war  was  raised  by  the  city  of  London, 
and  echoed  and  re-echoed  from  every  corner 
of  the  realm.  William  saw  that  his  time  was 
come.  Though  his  wasted  and  suffering  bod/ 
could  hardly  move  without  support,  his  spirit 
was  as  energetic  and  resolute  as  when,  at 
twenty-three,  he  bade  defiance  to  the  combined 
orce  of  England  and  France.  He  left  the 
Hague,  where  he  had  been  engaged  in  nego- 
iating  with  the  states  and  the  emperor  a  de- 
ensive  treaty  against  the  ambitious  designs 
of  the  Bourbons.  He  flew  to  London.  He  re« 
modelled  the  ministry.  He  dissolved  the  Par- 
iament.  The  majority  of  the  new  House  of 
Commons  was  with  the  king,  and  the  most 
vigorous  preparations  were  made  for  war. 

Before  the  commencement  of  active  hostih- 
ies,  William  was  no  more.  But  the  Grand 
Alliance  of  the  European  Princes  against  th« 
Bourbons  was  already  constructed.  "The 
master  workman  died."  says  Mr.  Burke,  "but 
the  work  was  formed  on  true  mechanical  prin* 
ciples,  and  it  was  as  truly  wrought.''  On  th« 
15th  of  May,  1702,  war  was  proclaimed  by 
concert  at  Vienna,  at  London,  and  at  the 
Hague, 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Thus  commenced  that  great  struggle  by 
which  Europe,  from  the  Vistula  to  the  Atlantic 
Ocean,  was  agitated  during  twelve  years.  The 
two  hostile  coalitions  were,  in  respect  of  ter 
ritory,  wealth,  and  population,  not  unequally 
matched.  On  the  one  side  were  France, 
Spain,  and  Bavaria;  on  the  other,  England, 
Holland,  the  Empire,  and  a  crowd  of  inferior 
powers. 

That  part  of  the  war  which  Lord  Mahon 
has  undertaken  to  relate,  though  not  the  least 
important,  is  certainly  the  least  attractive.  In 
Italy,  in  Germany,  and  in  the  Netherlands, 
great  means  were  at  the  disposal  of  great 
generals.  Mighty  battles  were  fought.  Fort 
ress  after  fortress  was  subdued.  The  iron 
chain  of  the  Belgian  strongholds  was  broken. 
By  a  regular  and  connected  series  of  opera 
tions  extending  through  several  years,  the 
French  were  driven  back  from  the  Danube 
and  the  Po  into  their  own  provinces.  The 
war  in  Spain,  on  the  contrary,  is  made  of 
events  which  seem  to  have  no  dependence  on 
each  other.  The  turns  of  fortune  resemble 
those  which  take  place  in  a  dream.  Victory 
and  defeat  are  not  followed  by  their  usual  con 
sequences.  Armies  spring  out  of  nothing,  and 
melt  into  nothing.  Yet,  to  judicious  readers 
of  history,  the  Spanish  conflict  is  perhaps 
more  interesting  than  the  campaigns  of  Marl- 
borough  and  Eugene.  The  fate  of  the  Milan 
ese,  and  of  the  Low  Countries,  was  decided 
by  military  skill.  The  fate  of  Spain  was  de 
cided  by  the  peculiarities  of  the  national  cha 
racter. 

"When  the  war  commenced,  the  young  king 
was  in  a  most  deplorable  situation.  On  his 
arrival  at  Madrid,  he  found  Porto  Carrero  at 
the  head  of  affairs,  and  he  did  not  think  it  fit 
to  displace  the  man  to  whom  he  owed  his 
crown.  The  cardinal  was  a  mere  intriguer, 
and  in  no  sense  a  statesman.  He  had  ac 
quired  in  the  court  and  in  the  confessional,  a 
rare  degree  of  skill  in  all  the  tricks  by  which 
weak  minds  are  managed.  But  of  the  noble 
science  of  government,  of  the  sources  of  na 
tional  prosperity,  of  the  causes  of  national  de 
cay,  he  knew  no  more  than  his  master.  It  is 
curious  to  observe  the  contrast  between  the 
dexterity  with  which  he  ruled  the  conscience 
of  a  foolish  valetudinarian,  and  the  imbecility 
which  he  showed  when  placed  at  the  head  of 
an  empire.  On  what  grounds  Lord  Mahon 
represents  the  cardinal  as  a  man  "of  splendid 
genius,"  "of  vast  abilities,"  we  are  unable  to 
discover.  Louis  was  of  a  very  different  opi 
nion,  and  Louis  was  very  seldom  mistaken 
in  his  judgment  of  character.  "  Everybody," 
says  he,  in  a  letter  to  his  ambassador,  "  knows 
how  incapable  the  cardinal  is.  He  is  an  ob 
ject  of  contempt  to  his  countrymen." 

A  few  miserable  savings  were  made,  which 
ruined  individuals,  without  producing  any  per 
ceptible  benefit  to  the  state.  The  police  became 
more  and  more  inefficient.  The  disorders  of 
Mic  capital  were  increased  by  the  arrival  of 
French  adventurers — the  refuse  of  Parisian 
brothels  and  gaming-houses.  These  wretches 
considered  the  Spaniards  as  a  subjugated  race, 

horn  the  countrymen  of  the  new  sovereign 
b/  cheat  and  insult  with  impunity.  The 


king  sate  eating  and  drinking  all  night,  and 
lay  in  bed  all  day ;  yawned  at  the  council 
table,  and  suffered  the  most  important  papers 
to  lie  unopened  for  weeks.  At  length  he  was 
roused  by  the  only  excitement  of  which  his 
sluggish  nature  was  susceptible.  His  grand 
father  consented  to  let  him  have  a  wife.  The 
choice  was  fortunate.  Maria  Louisa,  Princess 
of  Savoy,  a  beautiful  and  graceful  girl  of  thir 
teen,  already  a  woman  in  person  and  mind,  at 
an  age  when  the  females  of  colder  climates 
are  still  children,  was  the  person  selected. 
The  king  resolved  to  give  her  the  meeting  in, 
Catalonia.  He  left  his  capital,  of  which  he 
was  already  thoroughly  tired.  At  setting  out, 
he  was  mobbed  by  a  gang  of  beggars.  He, 
however,  made  his  way  through  them,  and 
repaired  to  Barcelona. 

Louis  was  perfectly  aware  that  the  queen, 
would  govern  Philip.  He,  accordingly,  looked 
about  for  somebody  to  govern  the  queen.  He 
selected  the  Princess  Orsini  to  be  first  lady  of 
the  bedchamber — no  insignificant  post  in  the 
household  of  a  very  young  wife  and  a  very 
uxorious  husband.  This  lady  was  the  daugh 
ter  of  a  French  peer,  and  the  widow  of  a  Spa 
nish  grandee.  She  was,  therefore,  admirably 
fitted  by  her  position  to  be  the  instrument  of 
the  court  of  Versailles  at  the  court  of  Madrid. 
The  Duke  of  Orleans  called  her,  in  words  too 
coarse  for  translation,  the  Lieutenant  of  Cap 
tain  Maintenon ;  and  the  appellation  was  well 
deserved.  She  aspired  to  play  in  Spain  the 
part  which  Madame  de  Maintenon  had  played 
in  France.  But,  though  at  least  equal  to  her 
model  in  wit,  information,  and  talents  for  in 
trigue,  she  had  not  that  self-command,  that  pa 
tience,  that  imperturbable  evenness  of  temper, 
which  had  raised  the  widow  of  a  buffoon  to 
be  the  consort  of  the  proudest  of  kings.  The 
princess  was  more  than  fifty  years  old ;  but 
was  still  vain  of  her  fine  eyes  and  her  fine 
shape ;  she  still  dressed  in  the  style  of  a  girl; 
and  she  still  carried  her  flirtations  so  far  as  to 
give  occasion  for  scandal.  She  was,  however, 
polite,  eloquent,  and  not  deficient  in  strength 
of  mind.  The  bitter  Saint  Simon  owns  that 
no  person  whom  she  wished  to  attach,  could 
long  resist  the  graces  of  her  manners  and  of 
her  conversation. 

We  have  not  time  to  relate  how  she  obtain 
ed,  and  how  she  preserved  her  empire  over 
the  young  couple  in  whose  household  she  was 
placed ;  how  she  became  so  powerful,  that 
neither  minister  of  Spain  nor  ambassador 
from  France  could  stand  against  her;  how 
Louis  himself  was  compelled  to  court  her; 
how  she  received  orders  from  Versailles  to 
retire ;  how  the  queen  took  part  with  the  fa 
vourite  attendant ;  how  the  king  took  part  with 
the  queen;  and  how,  after  much  squabbling, 
lying,  shuffling,  bullying,  and  coaxing,  the  dis 
pute  was  adjusted.  We  turn  to  the  events  of 
the  war. 

When  hostilities  were  proclaimed  at  Lon 
don,  Vienna,  and  the  Hague,  Philip  was  at 
Naples.  He  had  been  with  great  difficulty 
prevailed  upon,  by  the  most  urgent  representa 
tions  from  Versailles,  to  separate  himself  from 
his  wife,  and  to  repair  without  her  to  his  Ita 
lian  dominions,  which  were  then  menaced  by 


LORD   MAHON'S   WAR  OF  THE   SUCCESSION. 


201 


the  emperor.  The  queen  acted  as  regent,  and, 
child  as  she  was,  seems  to  have  been  quite  as 
competent  to  govern  the  kingdom  as  her  hus 
band,  or  any  of  his  ministers. 

In  August,  1702,  an  armament,  under  the 
command  of  the  Duke  of  Ormond,  appeared 
off  Calais.  The  Spanish  authorities  had  no 
guards  and  no  regular  troops.  The  national 
spirit,  however,  supplied  in  some  degree  what 
was  wanting.  The  nobles  and  peasantry  ad 
vanced  money.  The  peasantry  were  formed 
into  what  the  Spanish  writers  call  bands  of 
heroic  patriots,  and  what  General  Stanhope 
calls  a  "  rascally  foot  militia."  If  the  invaders 
had  acted  with  vigour  and  judgment,  Cadiz 
would  probably  have  fallen.  But  the  chiefs 
of  the  expedition  were  divided  by  national  and 
professional  feelings — Dutch  against  English, 
and  lard  against  sea.  Sparre,  the  Dutch  ge 
neral,  was  sulky  and  perverse ;  according  to 
Lord  Mahon,  because  he  was  a  citizen  of  a 
republic.  Bellasys,  the  English  general,  em 
bezzled  the  stores ;  we  suppose,  because  he 
was  the  subject  of  a  monarchy.  The  Duke 
of  Ormond,  who  had  the  command  of  the 
whole  expedition,  proved  on  this  occasion,  as 
on  every  other,  destitute  of  the  qualities  which 
great  emergencies  require.  No  discipline 
was  kept;  the  soldiers  were  suffered  to  rob 
and  insult  those  whom  it  was  most  desirable 
to  conciliate.  Churches  were  robbed,  images 
were  pulled  down,  nuns  were  violated.  The 
officers  shared  the  spoil,  instead  of  punishing 
the  spoilers ;  and  at  last  the  armament,  loaded, 
to  use  the  words  of  Stanhope,  "  with  a  great 
deal  of  plunder  and  infamy,"  quitted  the  scene 
of  Essex's  glory,  leaving  the  only  Spaniard  of 
note  who  had  declared  for  them  to  be  hanged 
by  his  countrymen. 

The  fleet  was  off  the  coast  of  Portugal,  on 
the  way  back  to  England,  when  the  Duke  of 
Ormond  received  intelligence  that  the  treasure- 
ships  from  America  had  just  arrived  in  Eu 
rope,  and  had,  in  order  to  avoid  his  armament, 
repaired  to  the  harbour  of  Vigo.  The  cargo 
consisted,  it  was  said,  of  more  than  three 
millions  sterling  in  gold  and  silver,  besides 
much  valuable  merchandise.  The  prospect 
of  plunder  reconciled  all  disputes.  Dutch  and 
English,  admirals  and  generals,  were  equally 
eager  for  action.  The  Spaniards  might,  with 
the  greatest  ease,  have  secured  the  treasure, 
by  simply  landing  it;  but  it  was  a  fundamental 
law  of  Spanish  trade  that  the  galleons  should 
unload  at  Cadiz,  and  at  Cadiz  only.  The 
Chamber  of  Commerce  at  Cadiz,  in  the  true 
spirit  of  monopoly,  refused,  even  at  this  con 
juncture,  to  bate  one  jot  of  its  privilege.  The 
matter  was  referred  to  the  Council  of  the  In 
dies:  that  body  deliberated  and  hesitated  just 
a  day  too  long.  Some  feeble  preparations  for 
deience  were  made.  Two  ruined  towers  at 
the  mouth  of  the  bay  were  garrisoned  by  a 
few  ill-armed  and  untrained* rustics;  a  boom 
was  thrown  across  the  entrance  of  the  bay; 
and  some  French  ships  of  war,  which  had 
convoyed  the  galleons  from  America,  were 
moored  in  the  basin  within.  Bui  all  was  to 
no  purpose.  The  English  ships  broke  the 
boom;  Ormond  and  his  soldiers  scaled  the 
forts;  the  French  burned  their  ships,  and 

VOL.  II.— 2 


escaped  to  the  shore.  The  conquerors  shared 
|  some  millions  of  dollars ;  some  millions  more 
were  sunk.  When  all  the  galleons  had  been 
captured  or  destroyed,  there  came  an  order  in 
due  form  allowing  them  to  unload. 

When  Philip  returned  to  Madrid  in  the  be 
ginning  of  1703,  he  found  the  finances  more 
embarrassed,  the  people  more  discontented, 
and  the  hostile  coalition  more  formidable  than 
ever.  The  loss  of  the  galleons  had  occasioned 
a  great  deficiency  in  the  revenue.  The  Ad 
miral  of  Castile,  one  of  the  greatest  snbjecti 
in  Europe,  had  fied  to  Lisbon,  and  swoin 
allegiance  to  the  archduke.  The  King  of 
Portugal  soon  after  acknowledged  Charles  as 
King  of  Spain,  and  prepared  to  support  the 
title  of  the  house  of  Austria  by  arms. 

On  the  other  side,  Louis  sent  to  the  assist 
ance  of  his  grandson  an  army  of  12,000  men, 
commanded  by  the  Duke  of  Berwick.  Ber 
wick  was  the  son  of  James  the  Second  and 
Arabella  Churchill.  He  had  been  brought  up 
to  expect  the  highest  honours  which  an  Eng 
lish  subject  could  enjoy;  but  the  whole  course 
of  his  life  was  changed  by  the  revolution 
which  overthrew  his  infatuated  father.  Ber 
wick  became  an  exile,  a  man  without  a  coun 
try  ;  and  from  that  time  forward  his  camp  was 
to  him  in  the  place  of  a  country,  and  profes 
sional  honour  was  his  patriotism.  He  en 
nobled  his  wretched  calling.  There  was  a 
stern,  cold,  Brutus-like  virtue,  in  the  manner 
in  which  he  discharged  the  duties  of  a  soldier 
of  fortune.  His  military  fidelity  was  tried  by 
the  strongest  temptations,  and  was  found  in 
vincible.  At  one  time  he  fought  against  his 
uncle;  at  another  time  he  fought  against  the 
cause  of  his  brother ;  yet  he  was  never  sus 
pected  of  treachery,  or  even  of  slackness. 

Early  in  1704,  an  army,  composed  of  Eng 
lish,  Dutch,  and  Portuguese,  was  assembled 
on  the  western  frontier  of  Spain.  The  Arch 
duke  Charles  had  arrived  at  Lisbon,  and  ap 
peared  in  person  at  the  head  of  his  troops. 
The  military  skill  of  Berwick  held  the  allies 
in  check  through  the  whole  campaign.  On. 
the  south,  however,  a  great  blow  was  struck. 
An  English  fleet,  under  Sir  George  Rooke, 
having  on  board  several  regiments,  com 
manded  by  the  Prince  of  Hesse  Darmstadt, 
appeared  before  the  rock  of  Gibraltar.  That 
celebrated  stronghold,  which  nature  has  made 
all  but  impregnable,  and  against  which  all  the 
resources  of  the  military  art  have  been  em 
ployed  in  vain,  was  taken  as  easily  as  if  it  had 
been  an  open  village  in  a  plain.  The  garrison 
went  to  say  their  prayers  instead  of  standing 
on  their  guard.  A  few  English  sailors  climbed 
the  rock.  The  Spaniards  capitulated  ;  and  the 
British  flag  was  placed  on  those  ramparts, 
from  which  the  combined  armies  and  navies 
of  France  and  Spain  have  never  been  able  to 
pull  it  down.  Rooke  proceeded  to  Malaga, 
gave  battle  in  the  neighbourhood  of  that  port 
to  a  French  squadron,  and  after  a  doubtful 
action  returned  to  England. 

But  greater  events  were  at  hand.     The  Ei.g- 

j  lish  government  had  determined  to   sen-i  an 

j  expedition  to  Spain,  under  the  command  of 

|  Charles  Mordaunt,  Earl  of  Peterborough.  Tais 

man  was.  if  not  the  greatest,  yet  assuredly  fli 


202 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


most  extraordinary  character  of  that  age,  the 
King  of  Sweden  himself  not  excepted.  In 
deed,  Peterborough  may  be  described  as  a 
polite,  learned,  and  amorous  Charles  the 
Twelfth.  His  courage  had  all  the  French  im 
petuosity  and  all  the  English  steadiness.  His 
fertility  and  activity  of  mind  were  almost  be 
yond  belief.  They  appeared  in  every  thing 
that  he  did — in  his  campaigns,  in  his  nego 
tiations,  in  his  familiar  correspondence,  in  his 
lightest  and  most  unstudied  conversation.  He 
was  a  kind  friend,  a  generous  enemy,  and  a 
thorough  gentleman.  But  his  splendid  talents 
and  virtues  were  rendered  almost  useless  to 
his  country,  by  his  levity,  his  restlessness,  his 
irritability,  his  morbid  craving  for  novelty  and 
for  excitement.  He  loved  to  fly  round  Eu 
rope  faster  than  a  travelling  courier.  He  was 
at  the  Hague  one  week,  at  Vienna  the  next. 
Then  he  took  a  fancy  to  see  Madrid ;  and  he 
had  scarcely  reached  Madrid,  when  he  ordered 
horses  and  set  off  for  Copenhagen.  No  at 
tendants  could  keep  up  with  his  speed.  No 
bodily  infirmities  could  confine  him.  Old  age, 
disease,  imminent  death,  produced  scarcely 
any  effect  on  his  intrepid  spirit.  Just  before 
he  underwent  the  most  horrible  of  surgical 
operations,  his  conversation  was  as  sprightly 
as  that  of  a  young  man  in  the  full  vigour  of 
health.  On  the  day  after  the  operation,  in 
spite  of  the  entreaties  of  his  medical  advisers, 
he  would  set  out  on  a  journey.  His  figure 
was  that  of  a  skeleton.  But  his  elastic  mind 
supported  him  under  fatigues  and  sufferings 
which  seemed  sufficient  to  bring  the  most 
robust  man  to  the  grave.  Change  of  employ 
ment  was  as  necessary  to  him  as  change  of 
place.  He  loved  to  dictate  six  or  seven  letters 
at  once.  Those  who  had  to  transact  business 
wiih  him,  complained,  that  though  he  talked 
with  great  ability  on  every  subject,  he  could 
never  be  kept  to  the  point.  "Lord  Peterbo 
rough,"  said  Pope,  "  would  say  very  pretty  and 
lively  things  in  his  letters,  but  they  would  be 
rather  too  gay  and  wandering;  whereas,  were 
Lord  Bolingbroke  to  write  to  an  emperor,  or  to 
a  statesmen,  he  would  fix  on  that  point  which 
was  the  most  material,  would  set  it  in  the 
strongest  and  finest  light,  and  manage  it  so  as 
to  make  it  the  most  serviceable  to  his  purpose." 
"What  Peterborough  was  to  Bolingbroke  as  a 
writer,  he  was  to  Maryborough  as  a  general. 
He  was,  in  truth,  the  last  of  the  knights-errant ; 
brave  to  temerity,  liberal  to  profusion,  cour 
teous  in  all  his  dealings  with  enemies,  the 
protector  of  the  oppressed,  the  adorer  of  wo 
men.  His  virtues  and  vices  were  those  of 
the  Round  Tables.  Indeed,  his  character  can 
hardly  be  better  summed  up,  than  in  the  lines 
in  which  the  author  of  that  clever  little 
poem,  Monks  and  Giants,  has  described  Sir 
Tristram, 

"His  cirth,  it  seems,  by  Merlin's  calculation, 
Was  under  Venus,  Mercury,  and  Mars; 
His  mind  with  all  their  attributes  was  mixed, 
And,  like  those  planets,  wandering  and  unfixed. 

"  From  realm  to  realm  he  ran,  and  never  stayed : 
Kingdoms  and  crowns  he  won,  and  gave  away ; 
It  seemed  as  if  his  labours  were  repaid 
By  the  mere  noise  and  movement  of  the  fray  ; 


No  conquests  nor  acquirements  had  he  made; 

His  chief  delight  wan,  on  some  festive  day 

To  ride  triumphant,  prodigal,  and  proud, 

And  shower  his  wealth  amidst  the  shouting  crowd. 

"His  schemes  of  war  were  sudden,  unforeseen. 
Inexplicable  both  to  friend  and  foe  ; 
It  seemed  as  if  some  momentary  spleen 
Inspired  the  project,  and  impelled  the  blow; 
And  most  his  fortune  and  success  were  seen 
With  means  the  most  inadequate  and  low  ; 
Most  master  of  himself  and  least  encumbered, 
When  overmatched,  entangled,  and  outnumbered." 

In  June,  1705,  this  remarkable  man  arrived 
at  Lisbon  with  five  thousand  Dutch  and  English 
soldiers.  There  the  archduke  embarked  with 
a  large  train  of  attendants,  whom  Peterborough 
entertained  magnificently  during  the  voynge  at 
his  own  expense.  From  Lisbon  the  armament 
proceeded  to  Gibraltar,  and  having  taken  the 
Prince  of  Hesse  Darmstadt  on  board,  steered  to 
the  northeast,  along  the  coast  of  Spain. 

The  first  place  at  which  the  expedition 
touched,  after  leaving  Gibraltar,  was  Altea,  in 
Valencia.  The  wretched  misgovernment  of 
Philip  had  excited  great  discontent  throughout 
the  province.  The  invaders  were  eagerly  wel 
comed.  The  peasantry  flocked  to  the  shore, 
bearing  provisions,  and  shouting,  "Long  live 
Charles  the  Third."  The  neighbouring  fortress 
of  Denia  surrendered  without  a  blow. 

The  imagination  of  Peterborough  took  fire. 
He  conceived  the  hope  of  finishing  the  war  at 
one  blow.  Madrid  was  but  one  hundred  and 
fifty  miles  distant.  There  was  scarcely  one 
fortified  place  on  the  road.  The  troops  of 
Philip  were  either  on  the  frontiers  of  Portugal 
or  on  the  coast  of  Catalonia.  At  the  capital 
there  was  no  military  force,  except  a  few 
horse,  who  formed  a  guard  of  honour  round 
the  person  of  Philip.  But  the  scheme  of  push 
ing  into  the  heart  of  a  great  kingdom  with  an 
army  of  only  seven  thousand  men,  was  too 
daring  to  please  the  archduke.  The  Prince  of 
Hesse  Darmstadt,  who,  in  the  reign  of  the  late 
King  of  Spain,  had  been  governor  of  Catalonia, 
and  who  overrated  his  own  influence  in  that 
province,  was  of  opinion  that  they  ought  in 
stantly  to  proceed  thither,  and  to  attack  Barce 
lona.  Peterborough  was  hampered  by  his  in 
structions,  and  found  it  necessary  to  submit. 

On  the  16th  of  August  the  fleet  arrived  be 
fore  Barcelona;  and  Peterborough  found,  that 
the  task  assigned  to  him  by  the  archduke  and 
the  prince  was  one  of  almost  insuperable  dif 
ficulty.  One  side  of  the  city  was  protected  by 
the  sea;  the  other  by  the  strong  fortifications 
of  Monjuich.  The  walls  were  so  extensive, 
that  thirty  thousand  men  would  scarcely  have 
been  sufficient  to  invest  them.  The  garrison 
was  as  numerous  as  the  besieging  army.  The 
best  officers  in  the  Spanish  service  were  in  the 
town.  The  hopes  which  the  Prince  of  Darm 
stadt  had  formed  of  a  general  rising  in  Cata 
lonia,  were  grievously  disappointed.  The  in 
vaders  were  joined  only  by  about  fifteen  hun 
dred  armed  peasants,  whose  services  cost  more 
than  they  were  worth. 

No  general  was  ever  in  a  more  deplorable 
situation  than  that  in  which  Peterborough  was 
now  placed.  He  had  always  objected  to  the 
scheme  of  besieging  Barcelona.  His  objeo 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION. 


203 


tions  had  been  overruled.  He  had  to  execute 
a  project  which  he  had  constantly  represented 
as  impracticable.  His  camp  was  divided  into 
hostile  factions,  and  he  was  censured  by  all. 
The  archduke  and  the  prince  blamed  him  for 
not  proceeding  instantly  to  take  the  town ;  but 
suggested  no  plan  by  which  seven  thousand 
men  could  be  enabled  to  do  the  work  of  tVirty 
thousand.  Others  blamed  their  general  for 
giving  up  his  own  opinions  to  the  childish 
whims  of  Charles,  and  for  sacrificing  his  men 
in  an  attempt  to  perform  what  was  impossible. 
The  Dutch  commander  positively  declared 
that  his  soldiers  should  not  stir:  Lord  Peter 
borough  might  give  what  orders  he  chose,  but 
to  engage  in  such  a  siege  was  madness ;  and 
the  men  should  not  be  sent  to  certain  death, 
where  there  was  no  chance  of  obtaining  any 
advantage. 

At  length,  after  three  weeks  of  inaction,  Pe 
terborough  announced  his  fixed  determination 
to  raise  the  siege.  The  heavy  cannon  were 
sent  on  board.  Preparations  were  made  for 
re-embarking  the  troops.  Charles  and  the 
Prince  of  Hesse  were  furious  ;  and  most  of  the 
officers  blamed  their  general  for  having  delayed 
so  long  the  measure  which  he  had  at  last  found 
necessary  to  take.  On  the  12th  of  Septem 
ber  there  were  rejoicings  and  public  entertain 
ments  in  Barcelona  for  this  great  deliverance. 
On  the  following  morning  the  English  flag  was 
flying  on  the  ramparts  of  Monjuich.  The  genius 
and  energy  of  one  man  had  supplied  the  place 
of  forty  battalions. 

At  midnight  Peterborough  had  called  on  the 
Prince  of  Hesse,  with  whom  he  had  not  for 
some  time  been  on  speaking  terms.  "I  have 
resolved,  sir,"  said  the  earl,  "  to  attempt  an 
assault ;  you  may  accompany  us,  if  you  think 
fit,  and  see  whether  I  and  my  men  deserve 
what  you  have  been  pleased  to  say  of  us." 
The  prince  was  startled.  The  attempt,  he 
said,  was  hopeless ;  but  he  was  ready  to  take 
his  share  ;  and  without  further  discussion,  he 
called  for  his  horse. 

Fifteen  hundred  English  soldiers  were  as 
sembled  under  the  earl.  A  thousand  more 
had  been  posted  as  a  body  of  reserve,  at  a 
neighbouring  convent,  under  the  command  of 
Stanhope.  After  a  winding  march  along  the 
foot  of  the  hills,  Peterborough  and  his  little 
army  reached  the  walls  of  Monjuich.  There 
they  halted  till  daybreak.  As  soon  as  they 
were  descried,  the  enemy  advanced  into  the 
outer  ditch  to  meet  them.  This  was  the  event 
on  which  Peterborough  had  reckoned,  and  for 
which  his  men  were  prepared.  The  English 
received  the  fire,  rushed  forward,  leaped  into 
the  ditch,  put  the  Spaniards  to  flight,  and  en 
tered  the  works  together  with  the  fugitives. 
Before  the  garrison  had  recovered  from  their 
first  surprise,  the  earl  was  master  of  the  out 
works,  had  taken  several  pieces  of  cannon, 
and  had  thrown  up  a  breastwork  to  defend  his 
men.  He  then  sent  off  for  Stanhope's  reserve 
While  he  was  waiting  for  this  reinforcement, 
news  arrived  that  three  thousand  men  were 
marching  from  Barcelona  towards  Monjnich. 
He  instantly  rode  out  to  take  a  view  of  them; 
but  no  sooner  had  he  left  his  troops  than  they 
were  sei/ed  with  a  panic.  Their  situation 


was  indeed  full  of  danger;  they  had  been 
brought  into  Monjuich,  they  scarcely  knew 
how  ;  their  numbers  were  small;  their  general 
was  gone  :  their  hearts  failed  them,  and  they 
were  proceeding  to  evacuate  the  fort.  Peter 
borough  received  information  of  these  occur 
rences  in  time  to  stop  the  retreat;  he  galloped 
up  to  the  fugitives,  addressed  a  few  words  to 
them,  and  put  himself  at  their  head.  The  sound 
of  his  voice  and  the  sight  of  his  face  restored 
all  their  courage,  and  they  marched  back  to 
their  former  position. 

The  Prince  of  Hesse  had  fallen  in  the  confu 
sion  of  the  assault,  b"t  every  thing  else  went  well. 
Stanhope  arrived  ,  the  detachment  which  had 
marched  out  of  Barcelona  retreated  ;  the  heavy 
cannon  were  disembarked,  and  brought  to  bear 
on  the  inner  fortifications  of  Monjuich,  which 
speedily  fell.  Peterborough,  with  his  usual 
generosity,  rescued  the  Spanish  soldiers  from 
the  ferocity  of  the  victorious  army,  and  paid 
the  last  honours  with  great  pomp  to  his  rival 
the  Prince  of  Hesse. 

The  reduction  of  Monjuich  was  the  first  of  a 
series  of  brilliant  exploits.  Barcelona  fell,  and 
Peterborough  had  the  glory  of  taking,  with  a 
handful  of  men,  one  of  the  largest  and  strongest 
towns  of  Europe.  He  had  also  the  glory,  not 
less  dear  to  his  chivalrous  temper,  of  saving 
the  life  and  honour  of  the  beautiful  Duchess  of 
Popoli,  whom  he  met  flying  with  dishevelled 
hair  from  the  fury  of  her  pursuers.  He  availed 
himself  dexterously  of  the  jealousy  with  which 
the  Catalonians  regarded  the  inhabitants  of 
Castile.  He  guarantied  to  the  province,  in  the 
capital  of  which  he  was  quartered,  all  its  an 
cient  rights  and  liberties;  and  thus  succeeded 
in  attaching  the  population  to  the  Austrian 
cause. 

The  open  country  declared  in  favour  of 
Charles.  Tarragona,  Tortosa,  Gerona,  Leri- 
da,  San  Mateo,  threw  open  their  gates.  The 
Spanish  government  sent  the  Count  of  Las 
Torres  with  seven  thousand  men  to  reduce 
San  Mateo.  The  Earl  of  Peterborough,  with 
only  twelve  hundred  men,  raised  the  siege. 
His  officers  advised  him  to  be  content  with  this 
extraordinary  success.  Charles  urged  him  to 
return  to  Barcelona;  but  no  remonstrances 
could  stop  such  a  spirit  in  the  midst  of  such  a 
career.  It  was  the  depth  of  winter.  The 
country  was  mountainous.  The  roads  were 
almost  impassable.  The  men  were  ill-clothed. 
The  horses  were  knocked  up.  The  retreating 
army  was  far  more  numerous  than  the  pur 
suing  army.  But  difficulties  and  dangers 
vanished  before  the  energy  of  Peterborough. 
He  pushed  on,  driving  Las  Torres  before  him. 
Nules  surrendered  to  the  mere  terror  of  his 
name;  and,  on  the  4th  of  February,  1700,  he 
arrived  in  triumph  at  Valencia.  1  here  he 
learned,  that  a  body  of  four  thousand  men  was 
on  the  march  to  join  Las  Torres.  He  set  out 
at  dead  of  night  from  Valencia,  passed  the 
Xucar,  came  unexpectedly  on  the  encampment 
of  the  enemy,  and  slaughtered,  dispersed,  or 
took  the  whole  reinforcement.  The  Valencians, 
as  we  are  told  by  a  person  who  was  present, 
could  scarcely  believe  their  eyes  when  they 
saw  the  prisoners  brought  in. 

In  the  mean  fime  the  courts  of  Madrid  and 


204 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


Versailles,  exasperated  and  alarmed  by  the  fall 
sf  Barcelona,  and  by  the  revolt  of  the  surround- 
U.g  country,  determined  to  make  a  great  effort, 
A  large  army,  nominally  commanded  by  Philip, 
out  really  under  the  orders  of  Marshal  Tesse, 
entered  Catalonia.  A  fleet,  under  the  Count 
of  Toulouse,  one  of  the  natural  children  of 
Louis  the  Fourteenth,  appeared  before  the 
port  of  Barcelona.  The  city  was  attacked  at 
«*ice  by  sea  and  land.  The  person  of  the  arch 
duke  was  in  considerable  danger.  Peterbo 
rough,  at  the  head  of  about  three  thousand  men, 
inarched  with  great  rapidity  from  Valencia. 
To  give  battle  with  so  small  a  force  to  a  great 
regular  army,  under  the  conduct  of  a  marshal 
of  France,  would  have  been  madness.  The 
earl  therefore  took  his  post  on  the  neighbour 
ing  mountains,  harassed  the  enemy  with  in 
cessant  alarms,  cut  off  their  stragglers,  inter 
cepted  their  communications  with  the  interior, 
and  introduced  supplies,  both  of  men  and  pro 
visions,  into  the  town.  He  saw,  however,  that 
the  only  hope  of  the  besieged  was  on  the  side 
of  the  sea.  His  commission  from  the  British 
government  gave  him  supreme  power,  not  only 
over  the  army,  but,  whenever  he  should  be  ac 
tually  on  board,  over  the  navy  also.  He  put 
out  to  sea  at  night  in  an  open  boat,  without 
communicating  his  design  to  any  person.  He 
was  picked  up,  several  leagues  from  the  shore, 
by  one  of  the  ships  of  the  English  squadron. 
As  soon  as  he  was  on  board,  he  announced 
himself  as  first  in  command,  and  sent  a  pin 
nace  with  his  orders  to  the  admiral.  Had 
these  orders  been  given  a  few  hours  earlier,  it 
is  probable  that  the  whole  French  fleet  would 
have  been  taken.  As  it  was,  the  Count  of 
Toulouse  stood  out  to  sea.  The  port  was  open. 
The  town  was  relieved.  On  the  following 
night  the  enemy  raised  the  siege, and  retreated 
to  Roussillon.  Peterborough  returned  to  Va 
lencia;  and  Philip,  who  had  been  some  weeks 
absent  from  his  wife,  could  endure  the  misery 
of  separation  no  longer,  and  flew  to  rejoin  her 
at  Madrid. 

At  Madrid,  however,  it  was  impossible  for 
him  or  for  her  to  remain.  The  splendid  suc 
cess  which  Peterborough  had  obtained  on  the 
eastern  coast  of  the  Peninsula,  had  inspired 
the  sluggish  Galway  with  emulation.  He  ad 
vanced  into  the  heart  of  Spain.  Berwick 
retreated.  Alcantara,  Ciudad  Rodrigo,  and 
Salamanca  fell,  and  the  conquerors  marched 
towards  the  capital. 

Philip  was  earnestly  pressed  by  his  advisers 
to  remove  the  seat  of  government  to  Burgos. 
The  advanced  guard  of  the  allied  army  was 
already  seen  on  the  heights  above  Madrid.  It 
was  known  that  the  main  body  was  at  hand. 
The  unfortunate  prince  fled  with  his  queen  and 
the  household.  The  royal  wanderers,  after 
travelling  eight  days  on  bad  roads,  under  a 
burning  sun,  and  sleeping  eight  nights  in 
miserable  hovels,  one  of  which  fell  down  and 
nearly  crashed  them  both  to  death,  reached 
»lie  metropolis  of  Old  Castile.  In  the  mean 
time  the  invaders  had  entered  Madrid  in 
triumph,  and  haa  proclaimed  the  archduke  in 
the  streets  of  the  imperial  city.  Arragon,  ever 
jealous  of  the  Castilian  ascendency,  followed 
lilt  example  of  Catalonia.  Saragossa  revolted 


without  seeing  an  enemy.  The  gevemor, 
whom  Philip  had  set  over  Carthagena,  be 
trayed  his  trust,  and  surrendered  to  the  allies 
the  best  arsenal  and  the  last  ships  which  Spain 
possessed. 

Toledo  had  been  for  some  time  the  retreat 
of  two  ambitious,  turbulent,  and  vindictive 
intriguers — the  qneen-dowagcr  and  Cardinal 
Porto  Carrero.  They  had  long  been  deadly 
enemies.  They  had  led  the  adverse  factions 
of  Austria  and  France.  Each  had  in  turn  do 
mineered  over  the  weak  and  disordered  mind 
of  the  late  king.  At  length  the  impostures  of 
the  priest  had  triumphed  over  the  blandish 
ments  of  the  woman ;  Porto  Carrero  had  re 
mained  victorious,  and  the  queen  had  fled,  in 
shame  and  mortification,  from  the  court,  where 
she  had  once  been  supreme.  In  her  retire 
ment  she  was  soon  joined  by  him  whose  arts 
had  destroyed  her  influence.  The  cardinal, 
having  held  power  just  long  enough  to  con 
vince  all  parties  of  his  incompetency,  had 
been  dismissed  to  his  see,  cursing  his  own 
folly  and  the  ingratitude  of  the  house  which  he 
had  served  too  well.  Common  interests  and 
common  enmities  reconciled  the  fallen  rivals. 
The  Austrian  troops  were  admitted  into  Tole 
do  without  opposition.  The  queen-dowager 
flung  off  that  mourning  garb  which  the  widow 
of  a  King  of  Spain  wears  through  her  whole 
life,  and  blazed  forth  in  jewels.  The  cardinal 
blessed  the  standards  of  the  invaders  in  his 
magnificent  cathedral,  and  lighted  up  his  pa 
lace  in  honour  of  the  great  event.  It  seemed 
that  the  struggle  had  terminated  in  favour  of 
the  archduke,  and  that  nothing  remained  for 
Philip  but  a  prompt  flight  into  the  dominions  of 
his  grandfather. 

So  judged  those  who  were  ignorant  of  the 
character  and  habits  of  the  Spanish  people. 
There  is  no  country  in  Europe  which  it  is  so 
easy  to  overrun  as  Spain;  there  is  no  country 
in  Europe  which  is  more  difficult  to  conquer. 
Nothing  can  be  more  contemptible  than  the 
regular  military  resistance  which  it  offers  to 
an  invader;  nothing  more  formidable  than  the 
energy  which  it  puts  forth  when  its  regular 
military  resistance  has  been  beaten  doAvn.  Its 
armies  have  long  borne  too  much  resemblance 
to  mobs;  but  its  mobs  have  had,  in  an  unusual 
degree,  the  spirit  of  armies.  The  soldier,  as 
compared  with  other  soldiers,  is  deficient  in 
military  qualities ;  but  the  peasant  has  as 
much  of  those  qualities  as  the  soldier.  In  fto 
country  have  such  strong  fortresses  been  taken 
by  a  mere  conp-de-main  •  in  no  country  have 
unfortified  towns  made  so  furious  and  obsti 
nate  a  resistance  to  great  armies.  War  in 
Spain  has,  from  the  days  of  the  Romans,  had 
a  character  of  its  own  ;  it  is  a  fire  which  can 
not  be  raked  out ;  it  burns  fiercely  under  the 
embers  ;  and  long  after  it  has,  to  all  seeming, 
been  extinguished,  bursts  forth  more  violently 
than  ever.  This  was  seen  in  the  last  war. 
Spain  had  no  army  which  could  have  looked 
in  the  face  an  equal  number  of  French  or 
Prussian  soldiers  ;  but  one  day  laid  the  Prus 
sian,  monarchy  in  the  dust;  one  day  put  the 
crown  of  France  at  the  disposal  of  invaders. 
jNo  Jena,  no  Waterloo,  would  have  enabled 
i  Joseph  to  reign  in  quiet  at  Madrid. 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE   SUCCESSION. 


,305 


The  conduct  of  the  Castilians  throughout 
fiie  War  of  the  Succession  was  most  charac 
teristic.  With  all  the  odds  of  number  and 
situation  on  their  side,  they  had  been  ignomi- 
niously  beaten.  All  the  European  dependen 
cies  of  the  Spanish  crown  were  lost.  Catalo 
nia,  Arragon,  and  Valencia  had  acknowledged 
the  Austrian  prince.  Gibraltar  had  been  taken 
by  a  few  sailors ;  Barcelona  stormed  by  a  few 
dismounted  dragoons  ;  the  invaders  had  pene 
trated  into  the  centre  of  the  Peninsula,  and 
were  quartered  at  Madrid  and  Toledo.  While 
these  events  had  been  in  progress,  the  nation 
had  scarcely  given  a  sign  of  life.  The  rich 
could  not  be  prevailed  on  to  give  or  to  lend 
for  the  support  of  war;  the  troops  had  shown 
neither  discipline  nor  courage ;  and  now  at 
last,  when  it  seemed  that  all  was  lost,  when  it 
seemed  that  the  most  sanguine  must  relinquish 
all  hope,  the  national  spirit  awoke,  fierce, 
proud,  and  unconquerable.  The  people  had 
been  sluggish,  when  the  circumstances  might 
well  have  inspired  hope ;  they  reserved  all 
their  energy  for  what  appeared  to  te  a  season 
of  despair.  Castile,  Leon,  Andalusia,  Estre- 
m ad ura,  rose  at  once  ;  every  peasant  procured 
a  firelock  or  a  pike ;  the  allies  were  masters 
only  of  the  ground  on  which  they  trode.  No 
soldier  could  wander  a  hundred  yards  from 
the  main  body  of  the  army  without  the  most 
imminent  risk  of  being  poniarded;  the  coun 
try  through  which  the  conquerors  had  passed 
to  Madrid,  and  which,  as  they  thought,  they 
had  sub-lued,  was  all  in  arms  behind  them; 
their  communications  with  Portugal  were  cut 
off.  In  the  mean  time,  money  began,  for  the 
first  time,  to  flow  rapidly  into  the  treasury  of 
the  fugitive  king.  "The  day  before  yester 
day,"  says  the  Princess  Orsini,  in  a  letter 
written  at  this  time,  "the  priests  of  a  village, 
which  contains  only  a  hundred  and  twenty 
houses,  brought  a  hundred  and  twenty  pistoles 
to  the  queen.  '  My  flock,'  said  he,  '  are  ashamed 
to  send  you  so  little;  but  they  beg  you  to  te- 
lieve,  that  in  this  purse  there  are  a  hundred 
and  twenty  hearts  faithful  even  to  the  death.' 
The  good  man  wept  as  he  spoke,  and  indeed 
we  wept  too.  Yesterday  another  small  village, 
in  which  there  are  only  twenty  houses,  sent  us 
fifty  pistoles." 

While  the  Castilians  were  everywhere  arm 
ing  in  the  cause  of  Philip,  the  allies  were  serv 
ing  that  cause  as  effectually  by  their  misma 
nagement.  Gal  way  stayed  at  Madrid,  where  his 
soldiers  indulged  in  such  boundless  licentious 
ness,  that  one-half  of  them  were  in  the  hospi 
tals.  Charles  remained  dawdling  in  Catalonia. 
Peterborough  had  taken  Requena,  and  wished 
to  march  toward  Madrid,  and  to  effect  a  junc 
tion  with  Galway;  but  the  archduke  refused 
his  consent  to  the  plan.  The  indignant  gene 
ral  remained  accordingly  in  his  favourite  city, 
on  the  beautiful  shores  of  the  Mediterranean, 
reading  Don  Quixote,  giving  balls  and  sup 
pers,  trying  in  vain  to  get  some  good  sport  out 
of  the  Valencian  bulls,  and  making  love,  not 
in  vain,  to  the  Valencian  women. 

At  length  the  archduke  advanced  into  Cas 
tile,  and  ordered  Peterborough  to  join  him. 
But  it  was  too  late.  Berwick  had  already 
compelled  Galway  to  evacuate  Madrid;  and 


when  the  whole  force  of  the  allies  •<  as  collect 
ed  at  Guadalaxara,  it  was  found  to  bn  decided 
ly  inferior  in  numbers  to  that  of  the  enemy. 

Peterborough  formed  a  plan  for  regaining 
possession  of  the  capital.  His  plan  was  re 
jected  by  Charles.  The  patience  of  the  sensi 
tive  and  vainglorious  hero  was  worn  out.  He 
had  none  of  that  serenity  of  temper  which  ena 
bled  Marlborough  to  act  in  perfect  harmony 
with  Eugene,  and  to  endure  the  vexatious  in 
terference  of  the  Dutch  deputies.  He  demand 
ed  permission  to  leave  the  army.  Permission 
was  readily  granted,  and  he  set  out  for  Italy. 
That  there  might  be  some  pretext  for  his  de 
parture,  he  was  commissioned  by  the  archduke 
to  raise  a  loan  at  Genoa,  on  the  credit  of  the 
revenues  of  Spain. 

From  that  moment  to  the  end  of  the  cam 
paign,  the  tide  of  fortune  ran  strong  against  the 
Austrian  cause.  Berwick  had  placed  his  army 
between  the  allies  and  the  frontiers  of  Portu 
gal.  They  retreated  on  Valencia,  and  arrived 
in  that  province,  leaving  about  ten  thousand 
prisoners  in  the  hands  of  the  enemy. 

In  January,  1707,  Peterborough  arrived  at 
Valencia  from  Italy,  no  longer  bearing  a  pub 
lic  character,  but  merely  as  a  volunteer.  His 
advice  was  asked,  and  it  seems  to  have  been 
most  judicious.  He  gave  it  as  his  decided 
opinion,  that  no  offensive  operation  against 
Castile  ought  to  be  undertaken.  It  would  be 
easy,  he  said,  to  defend  Arragon,  Catalonia, 
and  Valencia  against  Philip.  The  inhabitants 
of  those  parts  of  Spain  were  attached  to  the 
cause  of  the  archduke  ;  and  the  armies  of  the 
house  of  Bourbon  would  be  resisted  by  the 
whole  population.  In  a  short  time,  the  enthu 
siasm  of  the  Castilians  might  abate.  The  go 
vernment  of  Philip  might  commit  unpopular 
acts.  Defeats  in  the  Netherlands  might  com 
pel  Louis  to  withdraw  the  succours  which  he 
had  furnished  to  his  grandson.  Then  would 
be  the  time  to  strike  a  decisive  blow.  This 
excellent  advice  was  rejected.  Peterborough, 
who  had  now  received  formal  letters  of  recall 
from  England,  departed  before  the  opening  of 
the  campaign  ;  and  with  him  departed  the  good 
fortune  of  the  allies.  Scarcely  any  geneial 
had  ever  done  so  much  with  means  so  small. 
Scarcely  any  general  had  ever  displayed  equal 
originality  and  boldness.  He  possessed,  in  the 
highest  degree,  the  art  of  conciliating  those 
whom  he  had  subdued.  But  he  was  not  equally 
successful  in  winning  the  attachment  of  those 
with  whom  he  acted.  He  was  adored  by  the 
Catalonians  and  Valencians  ;  but  he  was  haled 
by  the  prince,  whom  he  had  all  but  made  a 
great  king ;  and  by  the  generals,  whose  fortune 
and  reputation  were  staked  on  the  same  ven 
ture  with  his  own.  The  English  government 
could  not  understand  him.  He  was  so  eccen 
tric,  that  they  gave,  him  no  credit  for  the  judg 
ment  which  he  really  possessed.  One  day  hi>. 
took  towns  with  horse-soldiers  ;  then  again  he 
turned  some  hundreds  of  infantry  into  cavalry 
at  a  minute's  notice.  He  obtained  his  politi 
cal  intelligence  chiefly  by  means  of  !o're  afiairr. 
and  filled  his  despatches  with  -epigram.1:.  Tho 
ministers  thought  that  it  would  be  highly  im 
politic  to  intrust  the  conduct  of  the  Spanish 
war  to  so  volatile  and  romantic  a  perse  o. 


206 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


They  therefore  gave  the  command  to  Lord 
Galway,  an  experienced  veteran — a  man  who 
was  in  war  what  Moliere's  doctors  were  in 
medicine  ;  who  thought  it  much  more  honour- 
Abie  to  fail  according  to  rule,  than  to  succeed 
by  innovation  ;  and  who  would  have  been  very 
much  ashamed  of  himself  if  he  had  taken 
Monjuich  by  means  so  strange  as  those  which 
Peterborough  employed.  This  great  command 
er  conducted  the  campaign  of  1707  in  the  most 
scientific  manner.  On  the  plain  of  Almanza 
he  encountered  the  army  of  the  Bourbons.  He 
drew  up  his  troops  according  to  the  methods 
prescribed  by  the  best  writers;  and  in  a  few 
hours  lost  eighteen  thousand  men,  a  hundred 
and  twenty  standards,  all  his  baggage  and  all 
his  artillery.  Valencia  and  Arragon  were  in 
stantly  conquered  by  the  French,  and  at  the 
close  of  the  year,  the  mountainous  province  of 
Catalonia  was  the  only  part  of  Spain  which 
still  adhered  to  Charles. 

"  Do  you  remember,  child,"  says  the  foolish 
woman  in  the  Spectator  to  her  husband,  "  that 
the  pigeon-house  fell  the  very  afternoon  that 
our  careless  wench  spilt  the  salt  upon  the  ta 
ble  !"  "  Yes,  my  dear,"  replies  the  gentleman, 
"  and  the  next  post  brought  us  an  account  of 
the  battle  of  Almanza."  The  approach  of  dis 
aster  in  Spain  had  been  for  some  time  indi 
cated  by  omens  much  clearer  than  the  mishap 
of  the  saltcellar; — an  ungrateful  prince,  an 
undisciplined  army,  a  divided  council,  envy 
triumphant  over  merit,  a  man  of  genius  re 
called,  a  pedant  and  a  sluggard  intrusted  with 
supreme  command.  The  battle  of  Almanza 
decided  the  fate  of  Spain.  The  loss  was  such 
as  Marlborough  or  Eugene  could  scarcely 
have  retrieved,  and  was  certainly  not  to  be  re 
trieved  by  Stanhope  and  Staremberg. 

Stanhope,  who  took  the  command  of  the 
English  army  in  Catalonia,  was  a  man  of  re 
spectable  abilities,  both  in  military  and  civil 
art'airs;  but  fitter,  we  conceive,  for  a  second 
lhan  for  a  first  place.  Lord  Mahon,  with  his 
usual  candour,  tells  us,  what  we  believe  was 
not  known  before,  that  his  ancestor's  most 
distinguished  exploit,  the  conquest  of  Minorca, 
yas  suggested  by  Marlborough.  Staremberg, 
a  cold  and  methodical  tactician  of  the  German 
scnool,  was  sent  by  the  emperor  to  command 
in  Catalonia.  Two  languid  campaigns  fol 
lowed,  during  which  neither  of  the  hostile 
armies  did  any  thing  memorable;  but,  during 
which,  both  were  nearly  starved. 

At  length,  in  1710,  the  chiefs  of  the  allied 
forces  resolved  to  venture  on  bolder  measures. 
They  began  the  campaign  with  a  daring  move  ; 
pushed  into  Arragon,  defeated  the  troops  of 
Philip  at  Almenara,  defeated  them  again  at 
Saragossa,  and  advanced  to  Madrid.  The  king 
was  again  a  fugitive  The  Castilians  sprang 
to  arms  with  the  same  enthusiasm  which  they 
had  displayed  in  1706.  The  conquerors  found 
the  capital  a  desert.  The  people  shut  them 
selves  up  in  their  houses,  and  refused  to  pay 
any  mark  of  respect  to  the  Austrian  prince.  It 
was  necessary  to  hire  a  few  children  to  shout 
before  him  in  the  streets.  Meanwhile,  the 
court  of  Philip  at  Valladolid  was  thronged  by 
nobles  and  prelates.  Thirty  thousand  people 
followed  their  king  from  Madrid  to  his  new 


residence.  Women  of  rank,  rather  than  re 
main  behind,  performed  the  journey  on  foot. 
The  peasants  enlisted  by  thousands.  Money, 
arms,  and  provisions  were  supplied  in  abun 
dance  by  the  zeal  of  the  people.  The  country 
round  Madrid  was  infested  by  small  parties  of 
irregular  horse.  The  allies  could  not  send 
off  a  despatch  to  Arragon,  or  introduce  a  sup 
ply  of  provisions  into  the  capital.  It  was  un 
safe  for  the  archduke  to  hunt  in  the  immediate 
vicinity  of  the  palace  which  he  occupied. 

The  wish  of  Stanhope  was  to  winter  in  Cas 
tile.  But  he  stood  alone  in  the  council  of  war; 
and,  indeed,  it  is  not  easy  to  understand  how 
the  allies  could  have  maintained  themselves 
through  so  unpropitious  a  season,  in  the  midst 
of  so  hostile  a  population.  Charles,  whose 
personal  safety  was  the  first  object  of  the 
generals,  was  sent  with  an  escort  of  cavalry  to 
Catalonia,  in  November;  and,  in  December, 
the  army  commenced  its  retreat  towards  Ar 
ragon. 

But  the  allies  had  to  do  with  a  master-spirit 
The  King  of  France  had  lately  sent  the  Duke 
of  Vendome  to  command  in  Spain.  This  man 
was  distinguished  by  the  filthiness  of  his  per 
son,  by  the  brutality  of  his  demeanour,  by  the 
gross  buffoonery  of  his  conversation,  and  by 
the  impudence  with  which  he  abandoned  him 
self  to  the  most  nauseous  of  all  vices.  His 
sluggishness  was  almost  incredible.  Even 
when  engaged  in  a  campaign,  he  often  passed 
whole  days  in  his  bed.  His  strange  torpidity 
had  been  the  cause  of  some  of  the  most  severe 
defeats  which  the  French  had  sustained  in 
Italy  and  Flanders.  But  when  he  was  roused 
by  any  great  emergency,  his  resources,  his 
energy,  and  his  presence  of  mind  were  such 
as  had  been  found  in  no  French  general  since 
the  days  of  Luxembourg. 

At  this  crisis,  Vendome  was  all  himself. 
He  set  out  from  Talavera  with  his  troops  ;  and 
pursued  the  retreating  army  of  the  allies  with 
a  speed,  perhaps  never  equalled,  in  such  a 
season  and  in  such  a  country.  He  marched 
night  and  day.  He  swam,  at  the  head  of  his 
cavalry,  the  flooded  stream  of  Henares  ;  and, 
in  a  few  days,  overtook  Stanhope,  who  was  at 
Brihuega  with  the  left  wing  of  the  allied  army. 
"  Nobody  with  me,"  says  the  English  general, 
"  imagined  that  they  had  any  foot  within  some 
days'  march  of  us :  and  our  misfortune  is 
owing  to  the  incredible  diligence  which  their 
army  made."  Stanhope  had  but  just  time  to 
send  off  a  messenger  to  the  centre  of  the  army, 
which  was  some  leagues  from  Brihuega,  be 
fore  Vendome  was  upon  him.  The  town  was 
invested  on  every  side.  The  walls  were  bat 
tered  with  cannon.  A  mine  was  sprung  under 
one  of  the  gates.  The  English  kept  up  a  ter 
rible  fire  till  their  powder  was  spent.  They 
then  fought  desperately  with  the  bayonet 
against  overwhelming  "odds.  They  burned 
the  houses  which  the  assailants  had  taken. 

j  But  all  was  to  no  purpose.  The  British  ge 
neral  saw  that  resistance  could  produce  only 
a  useless  carnage.  He  concluded  a  capitula 
tion,  and  his  gallant  little  army  became  pri- 

j  soners  of  war  on  honourable  terms. 

Scarcely  had  Vendome  signed  the  capitula- 

jtion,  when  he  learned  that  Staremberg  was 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION. 


SOT 


Biirching  to  the  relief  of  Stanhope.  Prepara 
tions  were  instantly  made  for  a  general  action. 
On  the  <ky  following  that  on  which  the  Eng 
lish  had  delivered  their  arms,  was  fought  the 
obstinate  and  bloody  battle  of  Villa  Viciosa. 
Staremberg  remained  master  of  the  field.  Ven- 
dorne  reaped  all  the  fruits  of  the  engagement. 
The  allies  spiked  their  cannon,  and  retired  to 
wards  An  agon.  But  even  in  Arragon  they 
found  AO  place  of  rest.  Vendome  was  behind 
them.  The  guerilla  parties  were  around  them. 
They  fled  to  Catalonia;  but  Catalonia  was  in 
vaded  by  a  French  army  from  Roussillon.  At 
length  the  Austrian  general  with  six  thousand 
harassed  and  dispirited  men,  the  remains  of  a 
great  and  victorious  army,  took  refuge  in  Bar 
celona;  almost  the  only  place  in  Spain  which 
recognised  the  authority  of  Charles. 

Philip  was  now  much  safer  at  Madrid  than 
his  grandfather  at  Paris.  All  hope  of  conquer 
ing  Spain  in  Spain  was  at  an  end.  But  in 
other  quarters  the  house  of  Bourbon  was  re 
duced  to  the  last  extremity.  The  French 
armies  had  undergone  a  series  of  defeats  in 
Germany,  in  Italy,  and  in  the  Netherlands.  An 
immense  force,  flushed  with  victory,  and  com 
manded  by  the  greatest  generals  of  the  age, 
was  on  the  borders  of  France.  Louis  had 
been  forced  to  humble  himself  before  the  con 
querors.  He  had  even  offered  to  abandon  the 
cause  of  his  grandson ;  and  his  offer  had  been 
rejected.  But  a  great  turn  in  affairs  was  ap 
proaching. 

The  English  administration,  which  had  com 
menced  the  war  against  the  house  of  Bourbon, 
was  an  administration  composed  of  Tories. 
But  the  war  was  a  Whig  war.  It  was  the 
favourite  scheme  of  William,  the  Whig  king. 
Louis  had  provoked  it,  by  recognising,  as 
sovereign  of  England,  a  prince  peculiarly  hate 
ful  to  the  Whigs.  It  had  placed  England  in  a 
position  of  marked  hostility  to  that  power, 
from  which  alone  the  Pretender  could  expect 
sufficient  succour.  It  had  joined  England  in 
the  closest  union  to  a  Protestant  and  republi 
can  state;  a  state  which  had  assisted  in  bring 
ing  about  the  Revolution,  and  which  was 
willing  to  guaranty  the  execution  of  the  Act  of 
Settlement.  Marlborough  and  Godolphin  found 
that  they  were  more  zealously  supported  by 
their  old  opponents  than  by  their  old  associ 
ates.  Those  ministers  who  were  zealous  for 
the  war  were  gradually  converted  to  Whigism. 
The  rest  dropped  off,  and  were  succeeded  by 
Whigs.  Cowper  became  Chancellor.  Sun- 
derland,  in  spite  of  the  very  just  antipathy  of 
Anne,  was  made  Secretary  of  State.  On  the 
death  of  the  Prince  of  Denmark,  a  more  exten 
sive  change  took  place.  Wharton  became 
Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  and  Somers  Presi 
dent  of  the  Council.  At  length  the  administra 
tion  was  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  Low 
Church  party. 

In  the  year  1710,  a  violent  change  took 
place.  The  queen  had  always  been  a  Tory  at 
heart.  Her  religious  feelings  were  all  on  the 
side  of  the  Established  Church.  Her  family 
feelings  pleaded  in  favour  of  her  exiled  bro 
ther.  Her  interest  disposed  her  to  favour  the 
zealots  of  prerogative.  The  affection  which 
she  felt  for  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough  was 


the  greatest  security  of  the  Whigs.  That, 
affection  had  at  length  turned  to  deadly  aver 
sion.  While  the  great  party  which  had  long 
swayed  the  destinies  of  Europe  was  under 
mined  by  bedchamber-women  at  St.  James's,  a 
violent  storm  gathered  in  the  country.  A  fool 
ish  parson  had  preached  a  foolish  sermon 
against  the  principles  of  the  Revolution.  The 
wisest  members  of  the  government  were  for 
letting  the  man  alone.  But  Godolphin,  in* 
flamed  with  all  the  zeal  of  a  new-made  Whig, 
and  exasperated  by  a  nickname  which  was 
applied  to  him  in  this  unfortunate  discourse, 
insisted  that  the  preacher  should  be  impeached. 
The  exhortations  of  the  mild  and  sagacious 
Somers  were  disregarded.  The  impeachment 
was  brought;  the  doctor  was  convicted;  and 
the  accusers  were  ruined.  The  clergy  came 
to  the  rescue  of  the  persecuted  clergyman. 
The  country  gentlemen  came  to  the  rescue  of 
the  clergy.  A  display  of  Tory  feelings,  such 
as  England  had  not  witnessed  since  the  closing 
days  of  Charles  the  Second's  reign,  appalled 
the  ministers,  and  gave  boldness  to  the  queen. 
She  turned  out  the  Whigs,  called  Harley  and 
St.  John  to  power,  and  dissolved  the  Parlia 
ment.  The  elections  went  strongly  against 
the  late  government.  Stanhope,  who  had  in 
his  absence  been  put  in  nomination  for  West 
minster,  was  defeated  by  a  Tory  candidate. 
The  new  ministers,  finding  themselves  masters 
of  the  new  Parliament,  were  induced  by  the 
strongest  motives  to  conclude  a  peace  with 
France.  The  whole  system  of  alliance  in 
which  the  country  was  engaged  was  a  Whig 
system.  The  general  by  whom  the  English 
armies  had  constantly  been  led  to  victory,  and 
for  whom  it  was  impossible  to  find  a  substi 
tute,  was  now,  whatever  he  might  formerly 
have  been,  a  Whig  general.  If  Marlborough 
were  discarded,  it  was  probable  that  some 
great  disaster  would  follow.  Yet,  if  he  were 
to  retain  his  command,  everjr  great  action 
which  he  might  perform  would  raise  the  credit 
of  the  party  in  opposition. 

A  peace  was  therefore  concluded  between 
England  and  the  princes  of  the  house  of  Bour 
bon.  Of  that  peace  Lord  Mahon  speaks  in 
terms  of  the  severest  reprehension.  He  is, 
indeed,  an  excellent  Whig  of  the  time  of  the 
first  Lord  Stanhope.  "I  cannot  but  pause  for 
a  moment,"  says  he,  "to  observe  how  much 
the  course  of  a  century  has  inverted  the  mean 
ing  of  our  party  nicknames;  how  much  a  mo 
dern  Tory  resembles  a  Whig  of  Queen  Anms's 
reign,  and  a  Tory  of  Queen  Anne's  reign  u 
modern  Whig." 

We  grant  one-half  of  Lord  Mahon's  propost 
tion  ;  from  the  other  half  we  altogether  dissent. 
We  allow  that  a  modern  Tory  resembles,  in 
many  things,  a  Whig  of  Queen  Anne's  reign. 
It  is  natural  that  such  should  be  the  case.  The 
worst  things  of  one  age  or  nation  often  resem 
ble  the  best  things  of  another.  The  livery  of 
an  English  footman  outshines  the  royal  robes 
of  King  Pomarre.  A  modern  shopkeeper's 
house  is  as  well  furnished  as  the  house  of  a 
considerable  merchant  in  Anne's  reign.  Very 
plain  people  now  wear  finer  cloth  than  Beau 
Fielding  or  Beau  Edgworth  could  have  pro 
cured  in  Queea  Anne's  reign.  We  woa.J 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


rathrr  trust  to  the  apothecary  of  a  modern  vil-  j  fully  qualified  to  sit  with  Halifax  and  Somers 

lage  than  to  the  physician  of  a  large  town  in  j  at  the  Kit-Cat. 

Anne's  reign.   A  modern  boarding-school  miss  i      Though,  therefore,  we  admit  that  a  modern 

could  tell  the  most  learned  professor  of  Anne's  |  Tory  bears  some  resemblance  to  a  Whig  of 

1  Queen  Anne's  reign,  we  can  by  no  means  ad 
mit  that  a  Tory  of  Anne's  reign  resembled 
a  modern  Whig.  Have  the  modern  Whigs 
passed  laws  for  the  purpose  of  closing  the  en 
trance  of  the  House  of  Commons  against  the 
new  interests  created  by  trade  ?  Do  the  mo* 
dern  Whigs  hold  the  doctrine  of  divine  right  1 
Have  the  modern  Whigs  laboured  to  exclude 
all  dissenters  from  office  and  power?  Tho 
modern  Whigs  are,  indeed,  like  the  Tories  of 
1712,  desirous  of  peace  and  of  close  union 
with  France.  But  is  there  no  difference  be*, 
tween  the  France  of  1712  and  the  France  of 
1832]  Is  France  now  the  stronghold  of  the 
"Popish  tyranny"  and  the  "arbitrary  power" 
against  which  our  ancestors  fought  and  pray- 


reign  some  things  in  geography,  astronomy, 
and  chemistry,  which  would  surprise  him. 

The  science  of  government  is  an  experi 
mental  science ;  and  therefore  it  is,  like  all 
other  experimental  sciences,  a  progressive 
science.  Lord  Mahon  would  have  been  a 
very  good  Whig  in  the  days  of  Harley.  But 
Harley,  whom  Lord  Mahon  censures  so  se 
verely,  was  very  Whigish  when  compared 
even  with  Clarendon;  and  Clarendon  was 
quite  a  democrat,  when  compared  with  Lord 
Burleigh.  If  Lord  Mahon  lives,  as  we  hope 
he  will,  fifty  years  longer,  we  have  no  doubt 
that,  as  he  now  boasts  of  the  resemblance 
which  the  Tories  of  our  time  bear  to  the 
Whigs  of  the  Revolution,  he  will  then  boast  of 
the  resemblance  borne  by  the  Tories  of  1882, 
to  those  immortal  patriots,  the  Whigs  of  the 
Reform  Bill. 

Society,  we  believe,  is  constantly  advancing 
in  knowledge.  The  tail  is  now  where  the 
head  was  some  generations  ago.  But  the  head 
and  the  tail  still  keep  their  distance.  A  nurse 
of  this  century  is  as  wise  as  a  justice  of  the 
quorum  and  cust-alorum  in  Shallow's  time. 
The  wooden  spoon  of  this  year  would  puzzle 
a  senior  wrangler  of  the  reign  of  George  the 
Second.  A  boy  from  the  National  School 
reads  and  spells  better  than  half  the  knights 
of  the  shire  in  the  October  Club.  But  there  is 
still  as  wide  a  difference  as  ever  between  jus 
tices  and  nurses,  senior  wranglers  and  wooden 
spoons,  members  of  Parliament  and  children 
at  charity  schools.  In  the  same  way,  though 
a  Tory  may  now  be  very  like  what  a  Whig 
was  one  hundred  and  twenty  years,  the  Whig 
is  as  much  in  advance  of  the  Tory  as  ever. 
The  stag,  in  the  Treatise  on  the  Bathos,  who 
"feared  his  hind  feet  would  overtake  the  fore," 
was  not  more  mistaken  than  Lord  Mahon,  if 
he  thinks  that  he  has  really  come  up  with  the 
Whigs.  The  absolute  position  of  the  parties 
has  been  altered;  the  relative  position  remains 
unchanged.  Through  the  whole  of  that  great 
movement,  which  began  before  these  party 
names  existed,  and  which  will  continue  after 
they  have  become  obsolete  ;  through  the  whole 
of  that  great  movement,  of  which  the  char 
ter  of  John,  the  institution  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  the  extinction  of  villanage,  the 
separation  from  the  See  of  Rome,  the  expul 
sion  of  the  Stuarts,  the  reform  of  the  repre 
sentative  system,  are  succp.ssive  stages,  there 
have  been,  under  some  name  or  other,  two  sets 
of  men  ;  those  who  were  before  their  age,  and 
those  who  were  behind  it;  those  who  were  the 
wisest  among  their  contemporaries,  and  those 
who  gloried  in  being  no  wiser  than  their  great 
grandfathers.  It  is  delightful  to  think,  that  in 
due  time  the  last  of  those  who  struggle  in  the 
rear  of  the  great  march,  will  occupy  the  place 
now  occupied  by  the  advanced  guard.  The 
Tory  Parliament  of  1710  would  have  passed 
for  a  most  liberal  Parliament  in  the  days  of 
Eli/abeth;  and  there  are  few  members  of  the 
(,••.»!»  sprvative  Club,  who  would  not  have  been 


ed?  Lord  Mahon  will  find,  we  think,  that  his 
parallel  is,  in  all  essential  circumstances,  as 
incorrect  as  that  which  Fluellen  drew  between 
Macedon  and  Monmouih ;  or  as  that  which 
an  ingenious  Tory  lately  discovered  between 
Archbishop  Williams  and  Archbishop  Vcr 
non. 

We  agree  with  Lord  Mahon  in  thinking 
highly  of  the  Whigs  of  Queen  Anne's  reign. 
But  that  part  of  their  conduct  which  he  selects 
for  especial  praise,  is  precisely  the  part  which 
we  think  most  objectionable.  We  revere  them 
as  the  great  champions  of  political  and  intel 
lectual  liberty.  It  is  true,  that,  when  raised  to 
power,  they  were  not  exempt  from  the  faults 
which  power  naturally  engenders.  It  is  true, 
that  they  were  men  born  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  and  that  they  were  therefore  ignorant 
of  many  truths  which  are  familiar  to  the  men 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  But  they  were, 
what  the  reformers  of  the  Church  were  before 
them,  and  what  the  reformers  of  the  House  of 
Commons  have  been  since — the  leaders  of 
their  species  in  a  right  direction.  It  is  true, 
that  they  did  not  allow  to  political  discussion 
that  latitude  which  to  us  appears  reasonable 
and  safe;  but  to  them  we  owe  the  removal  of 
the  Censorship.  It  is  true  that  ihey  did  not 
carry  the  principle  of  religious  liberty  to  its 
full  extent;  but  to  them  we  owe  the  Tolera 
tion  Act. 

Though,  however,  we  think  that  the  Whigs 
of  Anne's  reign  were,  as  a  body,  far  superior 
in  wisdom  and  public  virtue  to  their  contempo 
raries  the  Tories,  we  by  no  means  hold  our 
selves  bound  to  defend  all  the  measures  of  our 
favourite  party.  A  life  of  action,  if  it  is  to  be 
useful,  must  be  a  life  of  compromise.  But 
speculation  admits  of  no  compromise.  A  pub 
lic  man  is  often  under  the  necessity  of  con 
senting  to  measures  which  he  dislikes,  lest  he 
should  endanger  the  success  of  measures  which 


he  thinks  of  vital  importance. 


Bat  the  histo 


rian  lies  under  no  such  necessity.  On  the  con 
trary,  it  is  one  of  his  most  sacred  duties  to 
point  out  clearly  the  errors  of  those  whoso 
general  conduct  he  admires. 

It  seems  to  us,  then,  that  on  the  great  ques 
tion  which  divided  England  during  the  last  four 
years  of  Anne's  reign,  the  Tories  were  in  the 


LORD  MAHON'S  WAR  OF  THE  SUCCESSION. 


209 


right  and  the  Whigs  in  the  wrong.   That  ques-  j 
tion  was,  whether  England  ought  to  conclude  j 
peace  without  exacting  from  Philip  a  resigna 
tion  of  the  Spanish  crown. 

No  parliamentary  struggle  from  the  time  of 
the  Exclusion  Bill  to  the  time  of  the  Reform 
Bill,  has  been  so  violent  as  that  which  took 
place  between  the  authors  of  the  Treaty  of 
Utrecht  and  the  War  Party.  The  Commons 
were  lor  peace ;  the  Lords  were  for  vigorous 
hostilities.  The  queen  was  compelled  to 
.choose  which  of  her  two  highest  prerogatives 
she  would  exercise:  whether  she  would  create 
Peers  or  dissolve  the  Parliament.  The  ties 
of  party  superseded  the  ties  of  neighbourhood 
and  of  blood ;  the  members  of  the  hostile  fac 
tions  would  scarcely  speak  to  each  other  or 
bow  to  each  other;  the  women  appeared  at  the 
theatres  bearing  the  badges  of  their  political 
sect.  The  schism  extended  to  the  most  remote 
counties  of  England.  Talents  such  as  had 
never  before  been  displayed  in  political  con- 
trovery  were  enlisted  in  the  service  of  the  hos 
tile  parlies.  On  the  one  side  was  Steele,  gay, 
lively,  drunk  with  animal  spirits  and  with  fac 
tious  animosity;  and  Addison,  with  his  polished 
satire,  his  inexhaustible  fertility  of  fancy,  and 
his  graceful  simplicity  of  style.  In  the  front 
of  the  opposite  ranks  appeared  a  darker  and 
fiercer  spirit — the  apostate  politician,  the  ribald 
priest,  the  perjured  lover — a  heart  burning  with 
hatred  against  the  whole  human  race — a  mind 
richly  stored  with  images  from  the  dunghill 
and  the  lazar-house.  The  ministers  triumphed, 
and  the  peace  was  concluded.  Then  came  the 
reaction.  A  new  sovereign  ascended  the  throne. 
The  Whigs  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  the  king 
and  of  the  Parliament.  The  unjust  severity 
with  which  the  Tories  had  treated  Marlborough 
and  Walpole  was  more  than  retaliated.  Har- 
ley  and  Prior  were  thrown  into  prison;  Boling- 
broke  and  Orrnond  were  compelled  to  take  re 
fuge  in  a  foreign  land.  The  wounds  inflicted 
in  this  desperate  conflict  continued  to  rankle 
for  many  years.  It  was  long  before  the  mem 
bers  of  either  party  could  discuss  the  question 
of  the  peace  of  Utrecht  with  calmness  and  im 
partiality.  That  the  Whig  ministers  had  sold 
us  to  the  Dutch,  and  the  Tory  ministers  had 
sold  us  to  the  French ;  that  the  war  had  been 
carried  on  only  to  fill  the  pockets  of  Marlbo- 
rough;  that  the  peace  had  been  concluded  only 
to  facilitate  the  bringing  over  the  Pretender; 
these  imputations  and  many  others,  utterly  un 
founded  or  grossly  exaggerated,  were  hurled 
backward  and  forward  by  the  political  dis 
putants  of  the  last  century.  In  our  time  the 
question  may  be  discussed  without  irritation. 
We  will  state,  as  concisely  as  possible,  the 
reasons  which  have  led  us  to  the  conclusion 
at  which  we  have  arrived. 

The  dangers  which  were  to  be  apprehended 
from  the  peace  were  two;  first,  the  danger  that 
Philip  might  be  induced,  by  feelings  of  private 
affection,  to  act  in  strict  concert  with  the  elder 
branch  of  his  house,  to  favour  the  French  trade 
at  the  expense  of  England,  and  to  side  with  the 
French  government  in  future  wars;  secondly, 
the  danger  that  the  posterity  of  the  Duke  of 
Burgundy  might  become  extinct,  that  Philip 
VOL.  II.— 27 


nr.ght  become  heir  by  blood  to  the  French 
crown,  and  that  thus  two  great  monarchies 
might  be  united  under  one  sovereign. 

The  first  danger  appears  to  us  altogether 
chimerical.  Family  affection  has  seldom  pro 
duced  much  effect  on  the  policy  of  princes. 
The  state  of  Europe  at  the  time  of  the  peace 
of  Utrecht  proved  that  in  politics  the  ties  of 
interest  are  much  stronger  than  those  of  con 
sanguinity.  The  Elector  of  Bavaria  had  been, 
driven  from  his  dominions  by  his  father-in- 
law;  Victor  Amadeus  was  in  arms  against  his 
sons-in-law;  Anne  was  seated  on  a  throne 
from  which  she  had  assisted  to  push  a  most 
indulgent  father.  It  is  true  that  Philip  had 
been  accustomed  from  childhood  to  regard 
his  grandfather  with  profound  veneration.  It 
was  probable,  therefore,  that  the  influence  of 
Louis  at  Madrid  would  be  very  great;  but 
Louis  was  more  than  seventy  years  old;  he 
could  not  live  long;  his  heir  was  an  infant 
in  the  cradle.  There  was  surely  no  reason  to 
think  that  the  policy  of  the  King  of  Spain 
would  be  swayed  by  his  regard  for  a  nephew 
whom  he  had  never  seen. 

In  fact,  soon  after  the  peace  the  two  branches 
of  the  house  of  Bourbon  began  to  quarrel.  A 
close  alliance  was  formed  between  Philip  and 
Charles,  lately  competitors  for  the  Castilian 
crown.  A  Spanish  princess,  betrothed  to  th» 
King  of  France,  was  sent  back  in  the  most  in 
sulting  manner  to  her  native  country,  and  a 
decree  was  put  forth  by  the  court  of  Madrid 
commanding  every  Frenchman  to  leave  Spain. 
It  is  true  that,  fifty  years  after  the  peace  of 
Utrecht,  an  alliance  of  peculiar  strictness  was 
formed  between  the  French  and  Spanish  go* 
vernmei  "s.  But  it  is  certain  that  both  govern 
ments  were  actuated  on  that  occasion,  not  by 
domestic  affection,  but  by  common  interests 
and  common  enmities.  Their  compact,  though 
called  the  Family  Compact,  was  as  purely  a 
political  compact  as  the  league  of  Cambrai  or 
the  league  of  Pilnitz. 

The  second  danger  was,  that  Philip  might 
have  succeeded  to  the  crown  of  his  native 
country.  This  did  not  happen.  But  it  might 
have  happened ;  and  at  one  time  it  seemed 
very  likely  to  happen.  A  sickly  child  alone 
stood  between  the  King  of  Spain  and  the  heri 
tage  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth.  Philip,  it  is  true, 
solemnly  renounced  his  claims  to  the  French 
crown.  But  the  manner  in  which  he  had  ob 
tained  possession  of  the  Spanish  crown  had 
lately  proved  the  inemcacy  of  such  renuncia 
tions.  The  French  lawyers  declared  the  re 
nunciation  null,  as  being  inconsistent  with 
the  fundamental  law  of  the  monarchy.  The 
French  people  would  probably  have  sided  with 
him  whom  they  would  have  considered  as  the 
rightful  heir.  Saint  Simon,  though  much  less 
the  slave  of  prejudice  than  most  of  his  coun 
trymen,  and  though  strongly  attached  to  the 
regent,  declared,  in  the  presence  of  that  prince, 
that  he  never  would  support  the  claims  of  tht 
house  of  Orleans  against  those  of  the  King 
of  Spain.  "If  such,"  he  said,  "be  my  feel 
ings,  what  must  be  the  feelings  of  others  1" 
Bolingbroke,  it  is  certain,  was  fully  convinced 
that  the  renunciation  was  worth  no  more  than 

•  a 


210 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  papsr  on  which  it  was  written,  and  de 
manded  i*  only  for  the  purpose  of  blinding  the 
English  Parliament  and  people. 

Yet,  though  it  was  at  one  time  probable  that 
the  posterity  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy  would 
become  extinct,  and  though  it  is  almost  certain 
that  if  the  posterity  of  the  Duke  of  Burgundy 
had  become  extinct,  Philip  would  have  suc 
cessfully  preferred  his  claim  to  the  crown  of 
France,  we  still  defend  the  principle  of  the 
Treaty  of  Utrecht.  In  the  first  place,  Charles 
had,  soon  after  the  battle  of  Villa  Viciosa,  in 
herited,  by  the  death  of  his  elder  brother,  all 
the  dominions  of  the  house  of  Austria.  It 
might  be  argued,  that  if  to  these  dominions  he 
had  added  the  whole  monarchy  of  Spain,  the 
balance  of  power  would  be  seriously  endan 
gered.  The  union  of  the  Austrian  dominions 
and  Spain  would  not,  it  is  true,  have  been  so 
alarming  an  event  as  the  union  of  France  and 
Spain.  But  Charles  was  actually  emperor. 
Philip  was  not,  and  never  might  be,  King  of 
France.  The  certainty  of  the  less  evil  might 
well  be  set  against  the  chance  of  the  greater 
evil. 

But,  in  fact,  we  do  not  believe  that  Spain 
would  long  have  remained  under  the  govern 
ment  either  of  the  emperor  or  of  the  King  of 
France.  The  character  of  the  Spanish  people 
was  a  better  security  to  the  nations  of  Europe 
than  any  will,  any  instrument  of  renunciation, 
or  any  treaty.  The  same  energy  which  the 
people  of  Castile  had  put  forth  when  Madrid 
was  occupied  by  the  allied  armies,  they  would 
have  again  put  forth  as  soon  as  it  appeared 
that  their  country  was  about  to  become  a  pro 
vince  of  France.  Though  they  were  no  longer 
masters  abroad,  they  were  by  no  means  dis 
posed  to  see  foreigners  set  over  them  at  home. 
If  Philip  had  become  King  of  France,  and  had 
attempted  to  govern  Spain  by  mandates  from 
Versailles,  a  second  Grand  Alliance  would 
easily  have  effected  what  the  first  had  failed  to 
accomplish.  The  Spanish  nation  would  have 
rallied  against  him  as  zealously  as  it  had  be 
fore  rallied  round  him.  And  of  this  he  seems 
to  have  been  fully  aware.  For  many  years  the 
favourite  hope  of  his  heart  was  that  he  might 
ascend  the  throne  of  his  grandfather;  but  he 
eeems  never  to  have  thought  it  possible  that 
he  could  reign  at  once  in  the  country  of  his 
adoption  and  in  the  country  of  his  birth. 

These  were  the  dangers  of  the  peace;  and 
they  seem  to  us  to  be  of  no  very  formidable 
kind.  Against  these  dangers  are  to  be  set  off 
the  evils  of  war  and  ths  risk  of  failure.  The 
evils  of  the  war — the  waste  of  life,  the  suspen 
sion  of  trade,  the  expenditure  of  wealth,  the 
accumulation  of  debt — require  no  illustration. 
The  chances  of  failure  it  is  difficult  at  this  dis 
tance  of  rime  to  calculate  with  accuracy.  But 


we  think  that  an  estimate  approximating  to 
the  truth,  may,  without  much  difficulty,  be 
formed.  The  allies  had  been  victorious  in 
Germany,  Italy,  and  Flanders.  It  was  by  no 
means  improbable  that  they  might  fight  their 
way  into  the  very  heart  of  France.  But  at  no 
time  since  the  commencement  of  the  war  had 
their  prospects  been  so  dark  in  that  country 
which  was  the  very  object  of  the  struggle.  In 
Spain  they  held  only  a  few  square  leagues. 
The  temper  of  the  great  majority  of  the  nation 
was  decidedly  hostile  to  them.  If  they  had 
persisted,  if  they  had  obtained  success  equal  to 
their  highest  expectations,  if  they  had  gained  a 
series  of  victories  as  splendid  as  those  of 
Blenheim  and  Ramilies,  if  Paris  had  fallen,  if 
Louis  had  been  a  prisoner,  we  still  doubt 
whether  they  would  have  accomplished  their 
object.  They  would  still  have  had  to  carry  on 
interminable  hostilities  agamst  the  whole  po 
pulation  of  a  country  which  affords  peculiar 
facilities  to  irregular  warfare;  and  in  which 
invading  armies  suffer  more  from  famine  than 
from  the  sword. 

We  are,  therefore,  for  the  peace  of  Utrecht. 
It  is  true,  that  we  by  no  means  admire  the 
statesmen  who  concluded  that  peace.  Hariey, 
we  believe,  was  a  solemn  trifler.  St.  John  a 
brilliant  knave.  The  great  body  of  their  fol 
lowers  consisted  of  the  country  clergy  and  the 
country  gentry;  two  classes  of  men  who  were 
then  immeasurably  inferior  in  respectability 
and  intelligence  to  decent  shopkeepers  or 
farmers  of  our  time.  Parson  Barnabas,  Par 
son  Trulliber,  Sir  Wilful  Witwould,  Sir  Fran- 
cis  Wronghead,  Squire  Western,  Squire  Sul 
len — such  were  the  people  who  composed  the 
main  strength  of  the  Tory  party  for  sixty  years 
after  the  Revolution.  It  is  true,  that  the  means 
by  which  the  Tories  came  into  power  in  1710 
were  most  disreputable.  It  is  true,  that  the 
manner  in  which  they  used  their  power  was 
often  unjust  and  cruel.  It  is  true,  that  in  order 
to  bring  about  their  favourite  project  of  peace, 
they  resorted  to  slander  and  deception,  without 
the  slightest  scruple.  It  is  true,  that  they 
passed  off  on  the  British  nation  a  renunciation 
which  they  knew  to  be  invalid.  It  is  true,  that 
they  gave  up  the  Catalans  to  the  vengeance  of 
Philip,  in  a  manner  inconsistent  with  huma 
nity  and  national  honour.  But  on  the  great 
question  of  Peace  or  War,  we  cannot  but  think 
that,  though  their  motives  may  have  been 
selfish  and  malevolent,  their  decision  was 
beneficial  to  the  state. 

But  we  have  already  exceeded  our  limits.  It 
remains  only  for  us  to  bid  Lord  Mahon  heartily 
farewell,  and  to  assure  him,  that  whatever  dis 
like  we  may  feel  for  his  political  opinions,  w* 
shall  always  meet  him  with  pleasure  on  th« 
neutral  ground  of  literature. 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN. 


211 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN.' 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1833.] 


/  WE  cannot  transcribe  this  title-page  without  i 
strong  feelings  of  regret.  The  editing  of  these  I 
volumes  was  the  last  of  the  useful  and  modest  i 
services  rendered  to  literature  by  a  nobleman 
of  amiable  manners,  of  untarnished  public  and 
private  character,  arid  of  cultivated  mind.  On 
this,  as  on  other  occasions,  Lord  Dover  per 
formed  his  part  diligently,  judiciously,  and 
without  the  slightest  ostentation.  He  had  two 
merits,  both  of  which  are  rarely  found  together 
in  a  commentator.  He  was  content  to  be 
merely  a  commentator — to  keep  in  the  back 
ground,  and  to  leave  the  foreground  to  the 
author  whom  he  had  undertaken  to  illustrate. 
Yet,  though  willing  to  be  an  attendant,  he  was 
by  no  means  a  slave;  nor  did  he  consider  it  as 
part  of  his  editorial  duty  to  see  no  faults  in  the 
writer  to  whom  he  faithfully  and  assiduously 
rendered  the  humblest  literary  offices. 

The  faults  of  Horace  Walpole's  head  and 
heart  are  indeed  sufficiently  glaring.  His 
writings,  it  is  true,  rank  as  high  among  the 
delicacies  of  intellectual  epicures  as  the  Stras- 
burgh  pies  among  the  dishes  described  in  the 
Almanack  des  Gourmands.  But,  as  the  pate-de- 
foie-gras  owes  its  excellence  to  the  diseases  of 
the  wretched  animal  which  furnishes  it,  and 
would  be  good  for  nothing  if  it  were  not  made 
of  livers  preternaturally  swollen,  so  none  but 
an  unhealthy  and  disorganized  mind  could 
have  produced  such  literary  luxuries  as  the 
works  of  Wai  pole. 

He  was,  unless  we  have  formed  a  very  erro 
neous  judgment  of  his  character,  the  most 
eccentric,  the  most  artificial,  the  most  fastidi 
ous,  the  most  capricious  of  men.  His  mind 
was  a  bundle  of  inconsistent  whims  and  affecta 
tions.  His  features  were  covered  by  mask 
within  mask.  When  the  outer  disguise  of 
obvious  affectation  was  removed,  you  were 
still  as  far  as  ever  from  seeing  the  real  man. 
He  played  innumerable  parts,  and  overacted 
them  all.  When  he  talked  misanthropy,  he 
out-Timoned  TLnon.  When  he  talked  philan 
thropy,  he  left  Howard  at  an  immeasurable 
distance.  He  scoffed  at  courts,  and  kept  a 
chronicle  of  their  most  trifling  scandal;  at 
society,  and  was  blown  about  by  its  slightest 
veerings  of  opinion  ;  at  literary  fame,  and  left 
fair  copies  of  his  private  letters,  with  copious 
notes,  to  be  published  after  his  decease;  at 
rank,  and  never  for  a  moment  forgot  that  he 
was  an  honourable;  at  the  practice  of  entail, 
and  tasked  the  ingenuity  of  conveyancers  to  tie 
up  his  villa  in  the  strictest  settlement. 


*  Letters  of  Horace  Walpole,  Karl  of  Orford,  to  Sir  Ho. 
rare  Ma»it,  British  Envoy  at  the  Court  of  Tuscany.  Now 
first  published  from  the  Originals  in  the  possession  of  the 
EARL  nf  W  AI.JHJKAVE.  Edited  by  LORD  DOVER.  3  vol«. 
6vo.  London.  1833. 


The  conformation  of  his  mind  was  such, 
that  whatever  was  little,  seemed  to  him  great, 
and  whatever  was  great,  seemed  to  him  little. 
Serious  business  was  a  trifle  to  him,  and  trifles 
were  his  serious  business.  To  chat  with  blue 
stockings;  to  write  little  copies  of  compliment 
ary  verses  on  little  occasions  ;  to  superintend 
a  private  press;  to  preserve  from  natural  decay 
the  perishable  topics  of  Ranelagh  and  White's; 
to  record  divorces  and  bets,  Miss  Chudleigh's 
absurdities  and  George  Selwyn's  good  say 
ings;  to  decorate  a  grotesque  house  with  pie 
crust  battlements  ;  to  procure  rare  engravings 
and  antique  chimney-boards ;  to  match  odd 
gauntlets;  to  lay  out  a  maze  of  walks  within 
five  acres  of  ground — these  were  the  grave 
employments  of  his  long  life.  From  these  he 
turned  to  politics  as  to  an  amusement.  After 
the  labours  of  the  print-shop  and  the  auction- 
room,  he  unbent  his  mind  in  the  House  of 
Commons.  And,  having  indulged  in  the  re 
creation  of  making  laws  and  voting  millions 
he  returned  to  more  important  pursuits — to 
researches  after  Queen  Mary's  comb,  Wolsey's 
red  hat,  the  pipe  which  Van  Tromp  smoked 
during  his  last  seafight,  and  the  spur  which 
King  William  struck  into  the  flank  of  Sorrel. 

In  every  thing  in  which  he  busied  himself — 
in  the  fine  arts,  in  literature,  in  public  affairs 
— he  was  drawn  by  some  strange  attraction 
from  the  great  to  the  little,  and  from  the  useful 
to  the  odd.  The  politics  in  which  he  took  the 
keenest  interest  were  politics  scarcely  deserv 
ing  of  the  name.  The  growlings  of  George  the 
Second,  the  flirtations  of  Princess  Emily  with 
the  Duke  of  Grafton,  the  amours  of  Prince 
Frederic  with  Lady  Middlesex,  the  squabbles 
between  Gold  Stick  and  the  Master  of  the  Buck- 
hounds,  the  disagreements  between  the  tutors 
of  Prince  George — these  matters  engaged 
almost  all  the  attention  which  Walpole  could 
spare  from  matters  more  important  still; — from 
bidding  for  Zinckes  and  Petitots,  from  cheap 
ening  fragments  of  tapestry,  and  handles  of  old 
lances,  from  joining  bits  of  painted  glass,  and 
from  setting  up  memorials  of  departed  cats  and 
dogs.  While  he  was  fetching  and  carrying 
the  gossip  of  Kensington  Palace  and  Carlton 
House,  he  fancied  that  he  was  engaged  in 
politics,  and  when  he  recorded  that  gossip,  he 
fancied  that  he  was  writing  history. 

He  was,  as  he  has  himself  told  us,  fond  of 
faction  as  an  amusement.  He  loved  mischief- 
but  he  loved  quiet ;  and  he  was  constantly  on 
the  watch  for  opportunities  of  gratifying  both 
his  tastes  at  once.  He  sometimes  contrived, 
without  showing  himself,  to  disturb  the  course 
of  ministerial  negotiations,  and  to  spread  con 
fusion  through  the  political  circles.  He  dees 
not  himself  pretend  that,  on  these  occasions, 


212 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


he  was  actuated  by  public  spirit ;  nor  does  he  j 
appear  to  have  had  any  private  advantage  in  ' 
view.     He  thought  it  a  good  practical  joke  to 
set  public  men  together  by  the  ears;  and  he 
enjoyed  their  perplexities,  their  accusations,  i 
and  their  recriminations,  as  a  malicious  boy  j 
enjoys  the  embarrassment  of  a  misdirected  j 
traveller. 

About  politics,  in  the  high  sense  of  the  word, 
he  knew  nothing  and  cared  nothing.  He  called 
himself  a  Whig.  His  father's  son  could  scarce 
ly  assume  any  other  name.  It  pleased  him 
also  to  affect  a  foolish  aversion  to  kings  as 
kings,  and  a  foolish  love  and  admiration  of 
rebels  as  rebels ;  and,  perhaps,  while  kings 
were  not  in  danger,  and  while  rebels  were  not 
in  being,  he  really  believed  that  he  held  the 
doctrines  which  he  professed.  To  go  no  far 
ther  than  the  letters  now  before  us,  he  is  per 
petually  boasting  to  his  friend  Mann  of  his 
aversion  to  royalty  and  to  royal  persons.  He 
calls  the  crime  of  Damien  "that  least  bad  of 
murders,  the  murder  of  a  king."  He  hung  up 
in  his  villa  a  fac-simile  of  the  death-warrant 
of  Charles,  with  the  inscription, "Mo/or  Charta" 
Yet,  the  most  superficial  knowledge  of  history 
might  have  taught  him  that  the  Restoration, 
and  the  crimes  arid  follies  of  the  twenty-eight 
years  which  followed  the  Restoration,  were  the 
effects  of  this  "  Greater  Charter."  Nor  was 
there  much  in  the  means  by  which  the  instru 
ment  \vas  obtained  which  could  gratify  a  judi 
cious  lover  of  liberty.  A  man  must  hate  kings 
very  bitterly,  before  he  can  think  it  desirable 
that  the  representatives  of  the  people  should 
be  turned  out  of  doors  by  dragoons,  in  order 
to  get  at  a  king's  head.  Walpole's  Whigism, 
however,  was  of  a  very  harmless  kind.  He 
kept  it,  as  he  kept  the  old  spears  and  helmets 
at  Strawberry  Hill,  merely  for  show.  He 
would  just  as  soon  have  thought  of  taking 
down  the  arms  of  the  ancient  Templars  and 
Hospitallers  from  the  walls  of  his  hall,  and 
setting  off  on  a  crusade  to  the  Holy  Land,  as 
of  acting  in  the  spirit  of  those  daring  warriors 
and  statesmen,  great  even  in  their  errors,  whose 
names  and  seals  were  affixed  to  the  warrant 
which  he  prized  so  highly.  He  liked  revolu 
tion  and  regicide  only  when  they  were  a  hun 
dred  years  old.  His  republicanism,  like  the 
courage  of  a  bully  or  the  love  of  a  fribble,  was 
strong  and  ardent  when  there  was  no  occasion 
for  it,  and  subsided  when  he  had  an  opportu 
nity  of  bringing  it  to  the  proof.  As  soon  as 
the  revolutionary  spirit  really  began  to  stir  in 
Europe,  as  soon  as  the  hatred  of  kings  became 
bomething  more  than  a  sonorous  phrase,  he 
was  frightened  into  a  fanatical  royalist,  and 
became  one  of  the  most  extravagant  alarmists 
of  those  wretched  times.  In  truth,  his  talk 
about  liberty,  whether  he  knew  it  or  not,  was 
from  the  beginning  a  mere  cant,  the  remains 
of  a  phraseology  which  had  meant  something 
in  the  mouths  of  those  from  whom  he  had 
learned  it,  but  which,  in  his  mouth,  meant 
about  as  much  as  the  oath  by  which  the 
Knights  of  the  Bath  bind  themselves  to  redress 
the  wrongs  of  all  injured  ladies.  He  had  been 
fed  in  his  boyhood  with  Whig  speculations  on 
government.  He  must  often  have  seen,  at 


Houghton  or  in  Downing  street,  men  who  had 
been  Whigs  when  it  was  as  dangerous  to  be  a 
Whig  as  to  be  a  highwayman ;  men  who  had 
voted  for  the  exclusion  bill,  who  had  been  con 
cealed  in  garrets  and  cellars  after  the  battle  of 
Sedgmoor,  and  vho  had  set  their  names  to  the 
declaration  that  *hey  would  live  and  die  with 
the  Prince  of  Orange.  He  had  acquired  the 
language  of  these  men,  and  he  repeated  it  by 
rote,  though  it  was  at  variance  with  all  his 
tastes  and  feelings;  just  as  some  old  Jacobite 
families  persisted  in  praying  for  the  Pretender, 
and  passing  their  g'asses  over  the  water-de 
canter  when  they  drank  the  king's  health,  long 
after  they  had  become  realous  supporters  of 
the  government  of  George  the  Third.  He  was 
a  Whig  by  the  accident  of  hereditary  connec 
tion;  but  he  was  essentially  a  courtier,  and 
not  the  less  a  courtier  because  he  pretended  to 
sneer  at  the  object  which  excited  his  admira 
tion  and  envy.  His  real  tastes  perpetually 
show  themselves  through  the  thin  disguise. 
While  professing  all  the  contempt  of  Bradshaw 
or  Ludlow  for  crowned  heads,  he  took  the 
trouble  to  write  a  book  concerning  Royal  Au 
thors.  He  pried  with  the  utmost  anxiety  into 
the  most  minute  particulars  relating  to  the 
royal  family.  When  he  was  a  child,  he  was 
haunted  with  a  longing  to  see  George  the  First, 
and  gave  his  mother  no  peace  till  she  had 
found  a  way  of  gratifying  his  curiosity.  The 
same  feeling,  covered  with  a  thousand  dis 
guises,  attended  him  to  the  grave.  No  obser 
vation  that  dropped  from  the  lips  of  majesty 
seemed  to  him  too  trifling  to  be  recorded.  The 
French  songs  of  Prince  Frederic,  compositions 
certainly  not  deserving  of  preservation  on  ac 
count  of  their  intrinsic  merit,  have  been  care 
fully  preserved  for  us  by  this  contemner  of 
royalty.  In  truth,  every  page  of  Walpole's 
works  betrayed  him.  This  Diogenes,  who 
would  be  thought  to  prefer  his  tub  to  a  palace, 
and  who  has  nothing  to  ask  of  the  masters  of 
Windsor  and  Versailles  but  that  they  will 
stand  out  of  his  light,  is  a  gentleman-usher  at 
heart. 

He  had,  it  is  plain,  an  uneasy  consciousness 
of  the  frivolity  of  his  favourite  pursuits ;  and 
this  consciousness  produced  one  of  the  most 
diverting  of  his  ten  thousand  affectations.  His 
busy  idleness,  his  indifference  to  matters  which 
the  world  generally  regards  as  important,  his 
passion  for  trifles,  he  thought  fit  to  dignify  with 
the  name  of  philosophy.  He  spoke  of  himself 
as  of  a  man  whose  equanimity  was  proof  to 
ambitious  hopes  and  fears ;  who  had  learned 
to  rate  power,  wealth,  and  fame  at  their  true 
value,  and  whom  the  conflict  of  parties,  the 
rise  and  fall  of  statesmen,  the  ebbs  and  flows 
of  public  opinion,  moved  only  to  a  smile  of 
mingled  compassion  and  disdain.  It  was  owing 
to  the  peculiar  elevation  of  his  character,  that 
he  cared  about  a  lath  and  plaster  pinnacle 
more  than  about  the  Middlesex  election,  and 
about  a  miniature  of  Grammont  more  than 
about  the  American  Revolution.  Pitt  and 
Murray  might  talk  themselves  hoarse  about 
trifles.  But  questions  of  government  and  wa: 
were  too  insignificant  to  detain  a  mind  which 
was  occupied  in  recording  the  scandal  of  club 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS   TO   SIR  HORACE   MANN. 


fj.'ims  and  the  whispers  of  the  backstairs,  and  : 
which  was  even  capable  of  selecting  and  dis 
posing  chairs  of  ebony  and  shields  of  rhinoce 
ros-skin. 

One  of  his  innumerable  whims  was  an  ex 
treme  dislike  to  be  considered  as  a  man  of  let 
ters.  Not  that  he  was  indifferent  to  literary 
fame.  Far  from  it.  Scarcely  any  writer  has 
ever  troubled  himself  so  much  about  the  ap 
pearance  which  his  works  were  to  make  before 
posterity.  But  he  had  set  his  heart  on  incom 
patible  objects.  He  wished  to  be  a  celebrated 
author,  and  yet  to  be  a  mere  idle  gentleman — 
one  of  those  epicurean  gods  of  the  earth  who 
do  nothing  at  all,  and  who  pass  their  existence 
in  the  contemplation  of  their  own  perfections. 
He  did  not  like  to  have  any  thing  in  common 
with  the  wretches  who  lodged  in  the  little 
courts  behind  St.  Martin's  Church,  and  stole 
out  on  Sundays  to  dine  with  their  bookseller. 
He  avoided  the  society  of  authors.  He  spoke 
with  lordly  contempt  of  the  most  distinguished 
among  them.  He  tried  to  find  out  some  way 
t>f  writing  books,  as  M.  Jourdain's  father  sold 
cloth,  without  derogating  from  his  character 
of  genlilhomme.  "  Lui,  marchand  1  C'est  pure 
medisance:  il  ne  I'a  jamais  ete.  Tout  ce  qu'il 
faisait,  c'est  qu'il  etait  fort  obligeant,  fort  offi- 
cieux ;  °t  comme  il  se  connaissait,  fort  bien 
en  fctoffes,  il  en  allait  choisir  de  tous  les  cotes, 
les  faisait  aj.  sorter  chez  lui,  et  en  donnait  a 
ses  amis  pour  de  Sargent."  There  are  several 
amusing  instances  of  Lis  feeling  on  this  sub 
ject  in  the  letters  now  before  us.  Mann  had 
complimented  him  on  the  learning  which  ap 
peared  in  the  "  Catalogue  of  Royal  and  Noble 
Authors;"  and  it  is  curious  to  see  how  impa 
tiently  Walpole  bore  the  imputation  of  having 
attended  to  any  thing  so  unfashionable  as  the 
improvement  of  his  mind.  "I  know  nothing. 
How  should  II  I  who  have  always  lived  in 
the  big  busy  world;  who  lie  a-bed  all  the  morn 
ing,  calling  it  morning  as  long  as  you  please; 
who  sup  in  company  ;  who  have  played  at  faro 
half  my  life,  and  now  at  loo  till  two  and  three 
in  the  morning;  who  have  always  loved  plea 
sure,  haunted  auctions. . .  How  I  have  laughed 
when  some  of  the  Magazines  have  called  me 
the  learned  gentleman.  Pray  don't  be  like  the 
Magazines."  This  folly  might  be  pardoned  in 
a  boy.  But  a  man  of  forty-three,  as  Walpole 
then  was,  ought  to  be  quite  as  much  ashamed 
of  playing  at  loo  till  three  every  morning,  as 
of  being  so  vulgar  a  thing  as  a  learned  gen 
tleman. 

The  literary  character  has  undoubtedly  its 
full  share  of  faults,  and  of  very  serious  and 
offensive  faults.  If  Walpole  had  avoided  those 
faults,  we  could  have  pardoned  the  fastidious 
ness  with  which  he  declined  all  fellowship 
with  men  of  learning.  But  from  those  faults 
Walpole  was  not  one  jot  more  free  than  the 
garreteers  from  whose  contact  he  shrank.  OX 
literary  meannesses  and  literary  vices,  his  life 
and  his  works  contain  as  many  instances  as 
the  life  and  the  works  of  any  member  of 
Johnson's  club.  The  fact  is,  that  Walpole  had 
the  faults  of  Grub  street,  with  a  large  addition 
from  St.  James's  street,  the  vanity,  the  jea 
lousy,  the  irritability  of  a  man  of  letters,  the 


affected  superciliousness  and  apathy  of  a  man 
of  ton. 

His  judgment  of  literature,  of  contemporary 
literature  especially,  was  altogether  perverted 
by  his  aristocratical  feelings.  No  writer  surely 
was  ever  guilty  of  so  much  false  and  absurd 
criticism.  He  almost  invariably  speaks  with 
contempt  of  those  books  which  are  now  univer 
sally  allowed  to  be  the  best  that  appeared  in 
his  time ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  he  speaks  of 
writers  of  rank  and  fashion  as  if  they  were 
entitled  to  the  same  precedence  in  literature 
which  would  have  been  allowed  to  them  in  a 
drawing-room.  In  these  letters,  for  example, 
he  says,  that  he  would  rather  have  written  the 
most  absurd  lines  in  Lee  than  Thomson's 
"  Seasons."  The  periodical  paper  called  "  The 
World,"  on  the  other  hand,  was  by  "our  first 
writers."  Who,  then,  were  the  first  writers  of 
England  in  the  year  1753  1  Walpole  has  told 
us  in  a  note.  Our  readers  will  probably  guess 
that  Hume,  Fielding,  Smollett,  Richardson, 
Johnson,  Warburton,  Collins,  Akenside,  Gray, 
Dyer,  Young,  Warton,  Mason,  or  some  of 
those  distinguished  men,  were  on  the  list.  Not 
one  of  them.  Our  first  writers,  it  seems,  were 
Lord  Chesterfield,  Lord  Bath,  Mr.  W.  White- 
head,  Sir  Charles  Williams,  Mr.  Soame  Jenyns, 
Mr.  Cambridge,  Mr.  Coventry.  Of  these  sevea 
gentlemen,  Whitehead  was  the  lowest  in  sta 
tion,  but  was  the  most  accomplished  tuft-hunter 
of  his  time.  Coventry  was  of  a  noble  family. 
The  other  five  had  among  them  two  peerages, 
two  seats  in  the  House  of  Commons,  three 
seats  in  the  Privy  Council,  a  baronetcy,  a  blue 
riband,  a  red  riband,  about  a  hundred  thousand 
pounds  a  year,  and  not  ten  pages  that  are  worth 
reading.  "  The  writings  of  Whitehead,  Cam 
bridge,  Coventry,  and  Lord  Bath  are  forgotten. 
Soame  Jenyns  is  remembered  chiefly  by  John 
son's  review  of  the  foolish  Essay  on  the  Origin 
of  Evil.  Lord  Chesterfield  stands  much  lower 
in  the  estimation  of  posterity  than  he  wr  -'d 
have  done  if  his  letters  had  never  been  p 
lished.  The  lampoons  of  Sir  Charles  Williams 
are  now  read  only  by  the  curious  ;  and,  though 
not  without  occasional  flashes  of  wit,  have  al 
ways  seemed  to  us,  we  must  own,  very  poor 
performances. 

Walpole  judged  of  French  literature  after 
the  same  fashion.  He  understood  and  loved 
the  French  language.  Indeed,  he  loved  it  too 
well.  His  style  is  more  deeply  tainted  with 
Gallicisms  than  that  of  any  other  English 
writer  with  whom  we  are  acquainted.  His 
composition  often  reads,  for  a  page  together, 
like  a  rude  translation  from  the  French.  We 
meet  every  minute  with  such  sentences  as 
these,  "One  knows  what  temperaments  Annibal 
Caracci  painted."  "The  impertinent  person 
age!"  "She  is  dead  rich."  "Lord  Dalkeith 
is  dead  of  the  small-pox  in  three  days." 
"  WThat  was  ridiculous,  the  man  who  seconded 
the  motion  happened  to  be  shut  out."  "It  w:ll 
now  be  seen  whether  he  or  they  are  oiost  pa 
triot." 

His  love  of  the  Fr°nch  language  was  of  a 
peculiar  kind.  He  lovea  it  as  having  been  for 
a  century  the  vehicle  of  all  the  polite  nothings 
of  Europe :  as  the  sign  bj  which  the  freeiua 


214 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


sons  of  fashion  recognised  each  other  in  every 
capital  from  Petersburg  to  Naples  ;  as  the  lan 
guage  of  raillery,  as  the  language  of  anecdote, 
as  the  language  of  memoirs,  as  the  language 
of  correspondence.  Its  higher  uses  he  alto 
gether  disregarded.  The  literature  of  France 
has  been  to  ours  what  Aaron  was  to  Moses — 
the  expositor  of  great  truths,  which  would  else 
have  perished  for  want  of  a  voice  to  utter 
them  with  distinctness.  The  relation  which 
existed  between  Mr.  Bentham  and  M.  Dumont 
is  an  exact  illustration  of  the  intellectual  rela 
tion  in  which  the  two  countries  stand  to  each 
other.  The  great  discoveries  in  physics,  in 
metaphysics,  in  political  science,  are  ours. 
But  no  foreign  nation  except  France  has  re 
ceived  them  from  us  by  direct  communication. 
Isolated  in  our  situation,  isolated  by  our  man 
ners,  we  found  truth,  but  we  did  not  impart  it. 
France  has  been  the  interpreter  between  Eng 
land  and  mankind. 

In  the  time  of  Walpole,  this  process  of  in 
terpretation  was  in  full  activity.  The  great 
French  writers  were  busy  in  proclaiming 
through  Europe  the  names  of  Bacon,  of  New 
ton,  and  of  Locke.  The  English  principles  of 
toleration,  the  English  respect  for  personal 
liberty,  the  English  doctrine  that  all  power  is 
a  trust  for  the  public  good,  were  making  rapid 
progress.  There  is  scarcely  any  thing  in  his 
tory  so  interesting  as  that  great  stirring  up  of 
the  mind  of  France,  that  shaking  of  the  foun 
dations  of  all  established  opinions,  that  up 
rooting  of  old  truth  and  old  error.  It  was  plain 
that  mighty  principles  were  at  work,  whether 
for  evil  or  for  good.  It  was  plain  that  a  great 
change  in  the  whole  social  system  was  at 
hand.  Fanatics  of  one  kind  might  anticipate 
a  golden  age,  in  which  men  should  live  under 
the  simple  dominion  of  reason,  in  perfect 
equality  and  perfect  amity,  without  property, 
or  marriage,  or  king,  or  God.  A  fanatic  of 
another  kind  might  see  nothing  in  the  doc 
trines  of  the  philosophers  but  anarchy  and 
atheism,  might  cling  more  closely  to  every  old 
abuse,  and  might  regret  the  good  old  days 
\rhen  St.  Dominic  and  Simon  de  Montfort  put 
down  the  growing  heresies  of  Provence.  A 
wise  man  would  have  seen  with  regret  the  ex 
cesses  into  which  the  reformers  were  running, 
but  he  would  have  done  justice  to  their  genius 
and  to  their  philanthropy.  He  would  have 
censured  their  errors ;  but  he  would  have  re 
membered  that,  as  Milton  has  sa  I,  error  is  but 
opinion  in  the  making.  While  he  condemned 
their  hostility  to  religion,  he  would  have  ac 
knowledged  that  it  was  the  natural  effect  of  a 
system  under  which  religion  had  been  con 
stantly  exhibited  to  them,  in  forms  which  com 
mon  sense  rejected,  and  at  which  humanity 
shuddered.  While  he  condemned  some  of 
their  political  doctrines  as  incompatible  with 
all  law,  all  property,  and  all  civilization,  he 
would  have  acknowledged  that  the  subjects  of 
Louis  the  Fifteenth  had  every  excuse  which 
men  could  have  for  being  eager  to  pull  down, 
and  for  being  isrnorant  of  the  far  higher  art  of 
setting  up.  While  anticipating  a  fierce  con 
flict,  a  great  and  wide-wasting  destruction,  he 
vould  yel  have  looked  forward  to  the  final 


close  with  a  good  hope  for  France  an.d  for 
mankind. 

Walpole  had  neither  hopes  nor  fears. 
Though  the  most  Frenchified  English  writer 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  he  troubled  himself 
little  about  the  portents  which  were  daily  to  be 
discerned  in  the  French  literature  of  his  time. 
While  the  most  eminent  Frenchmen  were 
studying  with  enthusiastic  delight  English  poli 
tics  and  English  philosophy,  he  was  study 
ing  as  intently  the  gossip  of  the  old  court  of 
France.  The  fashions  and  scandal  of  Ver 
sailles  and  Marli,  fashions  and  scandal  a  hun 
dred  years  old,  occupied  him  infinitely  more 
than  a  great  moral  revolution  which  was 
taking  place  in  his  sight.  He  took  a  prodi 
gious  interest  in  every  noble  sharper  whose 
vast  volume  of  wig  and  infinite  length  of 
riband  had  figured  at  the  dressing  or  at  the 
tucking  up  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  and  of 
every  profligate  woman  of  quality  who  had 
carried  her  train  of  lovers  backward  and  for 
ward  from  king  to  Parliament,  and  from  Par 
liament  to  king,  during  the  wars  of  the  Fronde. 
These  were  the  people  of  whom  he  treasured 
up  the  smallest  memorial,  of  whom  he  loved 
to  hear  the  most  trifling  anecdote,  and  for 
whose  likenesses  he  would  have  given  any 
price.  Of  the  great  French  writers  of  his  own 
time,  Montesquieu  is  the  only  one  of  whom  he 
speaks  with  enthusiasm.  And  even  of  Mon 
tesquieu  he  speaks  with  less  enthusiasm  than 
of  that  abject  thing,  Crebillon  the  younger,  a 
scribbler  as  licentious  as  Louvet  and  as  dull 
as  Rapin.  A  man  must  be  strangely  consti 
tuted  who  can  take  interest  in  pedantic  jour 
nals  of  the  blockades  laid  by  the  Duke  of  A.  to 
the  hearts  of  the  Marquise  de  B.  and  the  Com 
tesse  de  C.  This  trash  Walpole  extols  in  Ian 
guage  sufficiently  high  for  the  merits  of  "Don 
Quixote."  He  wished  to  possess  a  likeness  of 
Crebillon,  and  Liotard,  the  first  painter  of 
miniatures  then  living,  was  employed  to  pie« 
serve  the  features  of  the  profligate  twaddler 
The  admirer  of  the  Sopha  and  of  the  Lettret 
jSthcniennes  had  little  respect  to  spare  for  the 
men  who  were  then  at  the  head  of  French 
literature.  He  kept  carefully  out  of  their  way. 
He  tried  to  keep  other  people  from  paying 
them  any  attention.  He  could  not  deny  that 
Voltaire  and  Rousseau  were  clever  men ;  but 
he  took  every  opportunity  of  depreciating 
them.  Of  D'Alembert  he  spoke  with  a  con 
tempt,  which,  when  the  intellectual  powers  of 
the  two  men  are  compared,  seems  exquisitely 
ridiculous.  D'Alembert  complained  that  he 
was  accused  of  having  written  Walpole's 
squib  against  Rousseau.  "I  hope,"  says  Wal 
pole,  "  that  nobody  will  attribute  D'Alembert's 
works  to  me."  He  was  in  little  danger. 

It  is  impossible  to  deny,  however,  that  Wal 
pole's  works  have  real  merit,  and  merit  of  a 
very  rare,  though  not  of  a  very  high  kind. 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  used  to  say,  that  though 
nobody  would  for  a  moment  compare  Claude 
to  Raphael,  there  would  be  another  Raphael 
before  there  was  another  Claude.  Arid  we 
own  that  we  expect  to  see  fresh  Humes  and 
fresh  Burkes  before  we  again  fall  in  with  that 
peculiar  combination  of  moral  andintellectua. 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN. 


215 


qualities  to  which  the  writings  of  Walpole  owe 
their  extraordinary  popularity. 

It  is  easy  to  describe  him  by  negatives.    He 
had  not  a  creative  imagination.    He  had  not 
a  pure  taste.    He  was  not  a  great  reasoner. 
There  is  indeed  scarcely  any  writer,  in  whose 
works  it  would  be  possible  to  find  so  many 
contradictory  judgments,  so   many  sentences 
of  extravagant  nonsense.    Nor  was  it  only  in 
his  familiar  correspondence  that  he  wrote  in 
this  flighty  and  inconsistent  manner;  but  in 
long  and  elaborate  books,  in  books  repeatedly 
transcribed  and  intended  for  the  public  eye. 
We  will  give  an  instance  or  two ;  for,  without 
instances,  readers  not  very  familiar  with  his 
works  will  scarcely  understand  our  meaning. 
In  the  "Anecdotes  of  Painting,"  he  states,  very 
truly,  that  the  art  declined  after  the  commence 
ment  of  the  civil  wars.     He  proceeds  to  in 
quire  why  this  happened.    The  explanation, 
we   should  have   thought,  would   have  been 
easily  found.    The  loss  of  the  most  munificent 
and  judicious  patron  that  the  fine  arts  ever 
had   in  England — for  such  undoubtedly  was 
Charles — the  troubled  state  of  the  country,  the 
distressed  condition  of  many  of  the  aristocracy, 
perhaps  also  the  austevity  of  the  victorious 
party — these  circumstances,  we  conceive,  fully 
account  for  the  phenomenon.     But  this  solu 
tion  was  not  odd  enough  to  satisfy  Walpole. 
He  discovers  another  cause  for  the  decline  of 
the  art,  the  want  of  models.    Nothing  worth 
painting,  it  seems,  was  left  to  paint.     "How 
picaresque,"  he  exclaims,  "  was  the  figure  of 
an  Anabaptist !"    As  if  puritanism  had  put  out 
the  sun  and  withered  the  trees ;  as  if  the  civil 
wars  had  blotted  out  the  expression  of  charac 
ter  and  passion  from  the  human  lip  and  brow; 
as  if  many  of  the  men  whom  Vandyke  painted, 
had  not  been  living  in  the  time  of  the  Com 
monwealth,  with  faces   little   the   worse   for 
wear;  as  if  many  of  the  beauties  afterwards 
portrayed  by  Lely  were  not  in  their  prime  be 
fore  the  Restoration ;  as  if  the  costume  or  the 
features  of  Cromwell  and  Milton  were  less  pic 
turesque  than  those  of  the  round-faced  peers, 
as  like  each  other  as  eggs  to  eggs,  who  look 
out  from  the  middle  of  the  periwigs  of  Kneller. 
In  the  "Memoirs,"  again,  Walpole  sneers  at 
the  Prince  of  Wales,  afterwards  George  the 
Third,  for  presenting  a  collection  of  books  to 
one  of  the  American  colleges  during  the  Seven 
Years'  War,  and  says  that,  instead  of  books, 
His  Royal  Highness  ought  to  have  sent  arms 
and  ammunition  ;  as  if  a  war  ought  to  suspend 
all  study  and  all  education ;  or  as  if  it  were  the 
business  of  the  Prince  of  Wales  to  supply  the 
colonies  with  military  stores  out  of  his  own 
pocket.     We  have  perhaps  dwelt  too  long  on 
these  passages,  but  we  have  done  so  because 
they  are    specimens    of  Walpole's    manner. 
Everybody  who  reads  his  works  with  atten 
tion,  will  find  that  they  swarm  with  loose  and 
foolish  observations  like  those  which  we  have 
cited ;  observations  which  might  pass  in  con 
versation  or  in  a  hasty  letter,  but  which  are 
unpardonable    in    booKo   deliberately  written 
and  repeatedly  corrected. 

He  appears  to  have  thought  that  he  saw 
rery  far  into  men  •  but  we  are  under  the  ne 


cessity  of  altogether  dissenting  from  his  opi 
nion.  We  do  not  conceive  that  he  had  any 

>ower  of  discerning  the  finer  shades  of  cha 
racter.  He  practised  an  art,  however,  which, 

hough  easy  and  even  vulgar,  obtains  for  those 
who  practise  it  the  reputation  of  discernment 
with  ninety-nine  people  out  of  a  hundred.  He 
sneered  at  everybody,  put  on  every  action  the 
worst  construction  which  it  would  bear,  "  spelt 
every  man  backward;"  to  borrow  the  Lady 

Zero's  phrase, 

"Turned  every  man  the  wron<r  side  out, 
And  never  gave  to  truth  and  virtue  that 
Which  simpleness  and  merit  purchaseth." 

In  this  way  any  man  may,  with  little  saga 
city  and  little  trouble,  be  considered,  by  those 
whose  good  opinion  is  not  worth  having,  as  a 
great  judge  of  character. 

It  is  said  that  the  hasty  and  rapacious  Kne' 
er  u™d  to  send  away  the  ladies  who  sate  to 
lim  i'ter  sketching  their  faces,  and  to  paint 
the  >  ,ure  and  hands  from  his  housemaid.  It 
was  juuch  in  the  same  way  that  Walpole  por 
trayed  the  minds  of  others.  He  copied  from 
the  life  only  those  glaring  and  obvious  pecu 
liarities,  which  could  not  escape  the  most  su 
perficial  observation.  The  rest  of  the  canvass 
he  filled  up  in  a  careless  dashing  way,  with 
knave  and  fool,  mixed  in  such  proportions  as 
pleased  Heaven.  What  a  difference  between 
these  daubs  arid  the  masterly  portraits  of  Cla 
rendon  ! 

There  are  contradictions  without  end  in  the 
sketches  of  character  which  abound  in  Wai- 
pole's  works.  But  if  we  were  to  form  our 
opinion  of  his  eminent  contemporaries  from  a 
general  survey  of  what  he  has  written  con 
cerning  them,  we  should  say  that  Pitt  was  a 
strutting,  ranting,  mouthing  actor ;  Charles 
Townshend,  an  impudent  and  voluble  jack- 
pudding  ;  Murray,  a  demure,  cold-blooded, 
cowardly  hypocrite  ;  Hardwicke,  an  insolent 
upstart,  with  the  understanding  of  a  pettifog 
ger  and  the  heart  of  a  hangman  ;  Temple,  an 
impertinent  poltroon ;  Egmotit,  a  solemn  cox 
comb  ;  Lyttleton,  a  poor  creature,  whose  only 
wish  was  to  go  to  heaven  in  a  coronet, 
Onslow,  a  pompous  proser;  Washington,  a 
braggart;  Lord  Camden,  sullen ;  Lord  Town 
shend,  malevolent ;  Seeker,  an  atheist  who 
had  shammed  Christian  for  a  mitre ;  White- 
field,  an  impostor  who  swindled  his  converts 
out  of  their  watches.  The  Walpoles  fare  little 
better  than  their  neighbours.  Old  Horace  is 
constantly  represented  as  a  coarse,  brutal,  nig 
gardly  buffoon,  and  his  son  as  worthy  of  such 
a  father.  In  short,  if  we  are  to  trust  this  dis 
cerning  judge  of  human  nature,  England  in 
his  time  contained  little  sense  and  no  virtue, 
except  what  was  distributed  between  himself, 
Lord  Waldgrave,  and  Marshal  Conway. 

Of  such  a  writer  it  is  scarcely  necessary 
to  say,  that  his  works  are  destitute  of  every 
charm  which  is  derived  from  elevation  or  from 
tenderness  ot  sentiment.  When  he  chose  to 
be  humane  and  magnanimous — for  he  somo- 
times,  by  way  of  variety,  tried  this  affectation 
— he  overdid  his  part  most  ludicrously.  Non« 
of  his  many  disguisos  sate  so  awkwardly  upon 
him.  For  example,  he  tells  us  that  he  did  net 


S16 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


choose  to  be  intimate  with  Mr. Pitt;  and  why? 
Because  Mr.  Pitt  had  been  among  the  perse 
cutors  of  his  father ;  or  because,  as  he  repeat 
edly  assures  us,  Mr.  Pitt  was  a  disagreeable 
man  in  private  life  1  Not  at  all ;  but  because 
Mr.  Pitt  was  too  fond  of  war,  and  was  great 
•with  too  little  reluctance.  Strange,  that  an 
habitual  scoffer  like  Walpole  should  imagine 
that  this  cant  could  impose  on  the  dullest 
reader!  If  Moliere  had  put  such  a  speech 
into  the  mouth  of  TarturTe,  we  should  have 
said  that  the  fiction  was  unskilful,  and  that 
Orgon  could  not  have  been  such  a  fool  as  to 
be  taken  in  by  it.  Of  the  twenty-six  years 
during  which  Walpole  sat  in  Parliament,  thir 
teen  were  years  of  war.  Yet  he  did  not,  during 
all  those  thirteen  years,  utter  a  single  word,  or 
give  a  single  vote,  tending  to  peace.  His  most 
intimate  friend,  the  only  friend,  indeed,  to  whom 
he  appears  to  have  been  sincerely  attached, 
Conway,  was  a  soldier,  was  fond  of  his  pro 
fession,  and  was  perpetually  entreating  Mr. 
Pitt  to  give  him  employment.  In  this,  Wal 
pole  saw  nothing  but  what  was  admirable. 
Conway  was  a  hero  for  soliciting  the  com 
mand  of  expeditions,  which  Mr.  Pitt  was  a 
monster  for  sending  out. 

What  then  is  the  charm,  the  irresistible 
charm  of  Walpole's  writings'?  It  consists, 
we  think,  in  the  art  of  amusing  without  ex 
citing.  He  never  convinces  the  reason,  nor 
fills  the  imagination,  nor  touches  the  heart ; 
but  he  keeps  the  rnind  of  the  reader  constantly 
attentive  and  constantly  entertained.  He  had 
a  strange  ingenuity  peculiarly  his  own,  an 
ingenuity  which  appeared  in  all  that  he  did, 
in  his  building,  in  his  gardening,  in  his  up 
holstery,  in  the  matter  and  in  the  manner  of 
his  writings.  If  we  were  to  adopt  the  classi 
fication — not  a  very  accurate  classification — 
which  Akenside  has  given  of  the  pleasures  of 
the  Imagination,  we  should  say  that  with  the 
Sublime  and  the  Beautiful  Walpole  had  no 
thing  to  do,  but  that  the  third  province,  the 
Odd,  was  his  peculiar  domain.  The  motto 
which  he  prefixed  to  his  "  Catalogue  of  Royal 
and  Noble  Authors,"  might  have  been  in 
scribed  with  perfect  propriety  over  the  door 
of  every  room  in  his  house,  and  on  the  title- 
page  of  every  one  of  his  books.  "  Dove  dia- 
volo,  Messer  Ludovico,  avete  pigliate  tante 
coglionerie  ]"  In  his  villa,  every  apartment 
is  a  museum,  every  piece  of  furniture  is  a  cu 
riosity  ;  there  is  something  strange  in  the  form 
of  the  shovel ;  there  is  a  long  story  belonging 
to  the  bell-rope.  We  wander  among  a  profu 
sion  of  rarities,  of  trifling  intrinsic  value,  but 
so  quaint  in  fashion,  or  connected  with  such 
remarkable  names  and  events,  that  they  may 
well  detain  our  attention  for  a  moment.  A 
inomsnt  is  enough.  Some  new  relic,  some 
new  uniqre,  some  new  carved  work,  some 
new  enamel,  is  forthcoming  in  an  instant. 
One  cabinet  of  trinkets  is  no  sooner  closed 
than  another  is  opened.  It  is  the  same  with 
Walpole's  writings.  It  is  not  in  their  utility, 
it  is  not  in  their  beauty,  that  their  attraction 
lies.  They  are  to  the  works  of  great  histori 
ans  and  poets,  what  Strawberry  Hill  is  to  the 
museum,  of  Sir  Hans  Sloane,  or  to  the  Gallery 


of  Florence.  Walpole  is  constantly  showing 
us  things — not  of  very  great  value  indeed — yet 
things  which  we  are  pleased  to  see,  and  which 
we  can  see  nowhere  else.  They  are  baubles; 
but  they  are  made  curiosities  either  by  his  gro 
tesque  workmanship,  or  by  some  association 
belonging  to  them.  His  style  is  one  of  those 
peculiar  styles  by  which  everybody  is  attract 
ed,  and  which  nobody  can  safely  venture  to 
imitate.  He  is  a  mannerist  whose  manner 
has  become  perfectly  easy  to  him.  His  affecta 
tion  is  so  habitual,  and  so  universal,  that  it 
can  hardly  be  called  affectation.  The  affecta 
tion  is  the  essence  of  the  man.  It  pervades 
all  his  thoughts  and  all  his  expressions.  If  it 
were  taken  away,  nothing  would  be  left.  He 
coins  new  words,  distorts  the  senses  of  old 
words,  and  twists  sentences  into  forms  which 
make  grammarians  stare.  But  all  this  he 
does,  not  only  with  an  air  of  ease,  but  as  if  he 
could  not  help  doing  it.  His  wit  was,  in  its 
essential  properties,  of  the  same  kind  with  that 
of  Cowley  and  Donne.  Like  theirs,  it  con 
sisted  in  an  exquisite  perception  of  points  of 
analogy,  and  points  of  contrast  too  subtle  for 
common  observation.  Like  them,  Walpole 
perpetually  startles  us  by  the  ease  with  which 
he  yokes  together  ideas  between  which  there 
would  seem,  at  first  sight,  to  be  no  connection. 
But  he  did  not,  like  them,  affect  the  gravity  of 
a  lecture,  and  draw  his  illustrations  from  the 
laboratory  and  from  the  schools.  His  tone 
was  light  and  fleering;  his  topics  were  the 
topics  of  the  club  and  the  ball-room.  And 
therefore  his  strange  combinations  and  far 
fetched  allusions,  though  very  closely  resem 
bling  those  which  tire  us  to  death  in  the  poems 
of  the  time  of  Charles  the  First,  are  read  with 
pleasure  constantly  new. 

No  man  who  has  written  so  much  is  so  seldom 
tiresome.  In  his  books  there  are  scarcely  anj 
of  those  passages  which,  in  our  school  days, 
we  used  to  call  skip.  Yet  he  often  wrote  on 
subjects  which  are  generally  considered  as 
dull ;  on  subjects  which  men  of  great  talents 
have  in  vain  endeavoured  to  render  popular. 
When  we  compare  the  "  Historic  Doubts" 
about  Richard  the  Third  with  Whitaker's  and 
Chalmer's  book  on  a  far  more  interesting 
question,  the  character  of  Mary  Queen  of 
Scots  ;  when  we  compare  the  "  Anecdotes  of 
Painting"  with  Nichols's  "  Anecdotes,"  or  even 
with  Mr.  D'Israeli's  "Quarrels  of  Authors," 
and  "Calamities  of  Authors,"  we  at  once  see 
Walpole's  superiority,  not  in  industry,  not  in 
learning,  not  in  accuracy,  not  in  logical  power, 
but  in  the  art  of  writing  what  people  will  like 
to  read.  He  rejects  all  but  the  attractive  parts 
of  his  subject.  He  keeps  only  what  is  in  itself 
amusing,  or  what  can  be  made  so  by  the  arti 
fice  of  his  diction.  The  coarser  morsels  of 
antiquarian  learning  he  abandons  to  others , 
and  sets  out  an  entertainment  worthy  of  a 
Roman  epicure,  an  entertainment  consisting 
of  nothing  but  delicacies — the  brains  of  sing- 
ng  birds,  the  roe  of  mullets,  the  sunny  halves 
of  peaches.  This,  we  think,  is  the  great  merit 
f  his  "  Romance."  There  is  little  skill  in  the 
delineation  of  the  characters.  Manfred  is  as 
commonplace  a  tyrant,  Jerome  as  commonplace 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO   SIR  HORACE  MANN. 


217 


a  confessor, Theodore  as  commonplace  a  young 
gentleman,  Isabella  and  Matilda  as  common 
place  apairof  young  ladies,  as  are  to  be  found  in 
any  of  the  thousand  Italian  castles  in  which  con- 
dottieri  have  revelled,  or  in  which  imprisoned 
duchesses  have  pined.  We  cannot  say  that  we 
much  admire  the  big  man  whose  sword  is  dug 
up  in  one  quarter  of  the  globe,  whose  helmet 
drops  from  the  clouds  in  another,  and  who, 
after  clattering  and  rustling  for  some  days, 
ends  by  kicking  the  house  down.  But  the 
story,  whatever  its  value  may  be,  never  flags 
for  a  single  moment.  There  are  no  digres 
sions,  or  unseasonable  descriptions,  or  long 
speeches.  Every  sentence  carries  the  action 
forward.  The  excitement  is  constantly  re 
newed.  Absurd  as  is  the  machinery,  and  in 
sipid  as  are  the  human  actors,  no  reader  pro 
bably  ever  thought  the  book  dull. 

Walpole's  "Letters"  are  generally  consider 
ed  as  his  best  performances,  and  we  think 
with  reason.  His  faults  are  far  less  offensive 
to  us  in  his  correspondence  than  in  his  books. 
His  wild,  absurd,  and  ever-changing  opinions 
about  men  and  things  are  easily  pardoned  in 
familiar  letters.  His  bitter,  scoffing,  depre 
ciating  disposition,  does  not.  show  itself  in  so 
unmitigated  a  manner  as  in  his  "  Memoirs.'' 
A  writer  of  letters  must  be  civil  and  friendly 
to  his  correspondent  at  least,  if  to  no  other  per 
son. 

He  loved  letter-writing,  and  had  evidently 
studied  it  as  an  art.  It  was,  in  truth,  the  very 
kind  of  writing  for  such  a  man ;  for  a  man 
very  ambitious  to  rank  among  wits,  yet  ner 
vously  afraid  that,  while  obtaining  the  reputa 
tion  of  a  wit,  he  might  lose  caste  as  a  gentle 
man.  There  was  nothing  vulgar  in  writing  a 
letter.  Not  even  Ensign  Northerton,  not  even 
the  captain  described  in  Hamilton's  Baron — 
and  Walpole,  though  the  author  of  many 
quartos,  had  some  feelings  in  common  with 
those  gallant  officers— would  have  denied  that 
a  gentleman  might  sometimes  correspond  with 
a  friend.  Whether  Walpole  bestowed  much 
labour  on  the  composition  of  his  letters,  it  is 
impossible  to  judge  from  internal  evidence. 
There  are  passages  which  seem  perfectly  un 
studied.  But  the  appearance  of  ease  may  be 
the  effect  of  labour.  There  are  passages  which 
have  a  very  artificial  air.  But  they  may  have 
been  produced  without  effort  by  a  mind  of 
which  the  natural  ingenuity  had  been  im 
proved  into  morbid  quickness  by  constant  ex 
ercise.  We  are  never  sure  that  we  see  him 
as  he  was.  We  are  never  sure  that  what 
appears  to  be  nature  is  not  an  effect  of  art. 
We  are  never  sure  that  what  appears  to  be  art 
is  not  merely  habit  which  has  become  second 
nature. 

In  wit  and  animation  the  present  collection 
is  not  superior  to  those  which  have  preceded 
it.  But  it  has  one  great  advantage  over  them 
all.  It  forms  a  connected  whole — a  regular 
journal  of  what  appeared  to  Walpole  the  most 
important  transactions  of  the  last  twenty  years 
of  George  the  Second's  reign.  It  contains  much 
new  information  concerning  the  history  of  that 
time,  the  portion  of  English  history  of  which 
common  readers  know  the  least. 

VOL.  II.— 28 


The  earlier  letters  contain  the  most  lively 
and  interesting  account  which  we  possess  of 
that  "great  Walpolean  battle,"  to  use  the  words 
of  Junius,  which  terminated  in  the  retirement 
of  Sir  Robert.  Horace  Walpole  entered  the 
House  of  Commons  just  in  time  to  witness  the 
last  desperate  struggle  which  his  father,  sur 
rounded  by  enemies  and  traitors,  maintained, 
with  a  spirit  as  brave  as  that  of  the  column  at 
Fontenoy,  first  for  victory,  and  then  for  ho 
nourable  retreat.  Horace  was,  of  course,  on 
the  side  of  his  family.  Lord  Dover  seems  to 
have  been  enthusiastic  on  the  same  side,  and 
goes  so  far  as  to  call  Sir  Robert  "  the  glory  of 
the  Whigs." 

Sir  Robert  deserved  this  high  eulogium,  we 
think,  as  little  as  he  deserved  the  abusive  epi 
thets  which  have  often  been  coupled  with  his 
name.  A  fair  character  of  him  still  remains 
to  be  drawn  ;  and,  whenever  it  shall  be  drawn, 
it  will  be  equally  unlike  the  portrait  by  Coxe 
and  the  portrait  by  Smo'lett. 

He  had,  undoubtedly,  great  talents  and  great 
virtues.  He  was  not,  indeed,  like  the  leaders 
of  the  party  which  opposed  his  government,  a 
brilliant  orator.  He  was  not  a  profound  scho 
lar,  like  Carteret,  or  a  wit  and  a  fine  gentle 
man,  like  Chesterfield.  In  all  these  respects, 
hie  deficiencies  were  remarkable.  His  litera 
ture  consisted  of  a  scrap  or  two  of  Horace, 
and  an  anecdote  or  two  from  the  end  of  the 
Dictionary.  His  knowledge  of  history  was  so 
limited,  that,  in  the  great  debate  on  the  Excise 
Bill,  he  was  forced  to  ask  Attorney-General 
Yorke  who  Empson  and  Dudley  were.  His 
manners  were  a  little  too  coarse  and  boiste 
rous  even  for  the  age  of  Westerns  and  Top- 
halls.  When  he  ceased  to  talk  of  politics,  he 
could  talk  of  nothing  but  women;  and  he  di 
lated  on  his  favourite  theme  with  a  freedom 
which  shocked  even  that  plain-spoken  genera 
tion,  and  which  was  quite  unsuited  to  his  age 
and  station.  The  noisy  revelry  of  his  summer 
festivities  at  Houghton  gave  much  scandal  to 
grave  people,  and  annually  drove  his  kinsman 
and  colleague,  Lord  Townshend,  from  the 
neighbouring  mansion  of  Rainham. 

But,  however  ignorant  he  might  be  of  ge 
neral  history  and  of  general  literature,  he  was 
better  acquainted  than  any  man  of  his  day 
with  what  it  concerned  him  most  to  know, 
mankind,  the  English  nation,  the  court,  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  his  own  office.  Of 
foreign  affairs  he  knew  little ;  but  his  judgment 
was  so  good,  that  his  little  knowledge  went 
very  far.  He  was  an  excellent  parliamentary 
debater,  an  excellent  parliamentary  tactician, 
an  excellent  man  of  business.  No  man  ever 
brought  more  industry  or  more  method  to  the 
transacting  of  affairs.  No  minister  in  his  time 
did  so  much;  yet  no  minister  had  so  much 
leisure. 

He  was  a  good-natured  man,  who  had  for 
thirty  years  seen  nothing  but  the  worst  parts 
ot  human  nature  in  other  men.  He  was  fami 
liar  with  the  malice  of  kind  people,  and  the 
perfidy  of  honourable  people.  Proud  men  had 
licked  the  dust  before  him  Patriots  had  beg 
ged  him  to  come  up  to  the  price  of  their  puffed 
and  advertised  integrity.  "He  said,  aiter  his 
t 


218 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


fall,  that  it  was  a  dangerous  thing  to  be  a  minis 
ter;  that  there  were  few  minds  which  would 
not  be  injured  by  the  constant  spectacle  of 
meanness  and  depravity.  To  his  honour,  it 
must  be  confessed,  that  few  minds  have  come 
out  of  such  a  trial  so  little  damaged  in  the 
most  important  parts.  He  retired,  after  more 
than  twenty  years  of  power,  with  a  temper  not 
soured,  with  a  heart  not  hardened,  with  simple 
tastes,  with  frank  manners,  and  with  a  capa 
city  for  friendship.  No  stain  of  treachery,  of 
ingratitude,  or  of  cruelty  rests  on  his  memory. 
Factious  hatred,  while  flinging  on  his  name 
every  other  foul  aspersion,  was  compelled  to 
own  that  he  was  not  a  man  of  blood.  This 
would  scarcely  seem  a  high  eulogium  on  a 
statesman  of  our  times.  It  was  then  a  rare 
and  honourable  distinction.  The  contest  of 
parties  in  England  had  long  been  carried  on 
with  a  ferocity  unworthy  of  a  civilized  people. 
Sir  Robert  Walpole  was  the  minister  who  gave 
to  our  government  that  character  of  lenity 
which  it  has  since  generally  preserved.  It 
was  perfectly  known  to  him  that  many  of  his 
opponents  had  dealings  with  the  Pretender. 
The  lives  of  some  were  at  his  mercy.  He 
wanted  neither  Whig  nor  Tory  precedents  for 
using  his  advantage  unsparingly.  But,  with  a 
clemency  to  which  posterity  has  never  done 
justice,  he  suffered  himself  to  be  thwarted,  vi 
lified,  and  at  last  overthrown,  by  a  party  which 
included  many  men  whose  necks  were  in  his 
power. 

That  he  practised  corruption  on  a  large 
scale  is,  we  think,  indisputable.  But  whether 
he  deserved  all  the  invectives  which  have  been 
uttered  against  him  on  that  account,  may  be 
questioned.  No  man  ought  to  be  severely  cen 
sured  for  not  being  beyond  his  age  in  virtue. 
To  buy  the  votes  of  constituents  is  as  im 
moral  as  to  buy  the  votes  of  representatives. 
The  candidate  who  gives  five  guineas  to  the 
freeman  is  as  culpable  as  the  man  who  gives 
three  hundred  guineas  to  the  member.  Yet 
we  know  that,  in  our  own  time,  no  man  is 
thought  wicked  or  dishonourable,  no  man  is 
cut,  no  man  is  black-balled,  because,  under 
the  old  system  of  election,  he  was  returned,  in 
the  only  way  in  which  he  could  be  returned,  for 
East  Retford,  for  Liverpool,  or  for  Stafford. 
Walpole  governed  by  corruption,  because,  in 
his  time,  it  was  impossible  to  govern  other 
wise.  Corruption  was  unnecessary  to  the 
Tudors :  for  their  Parliaments  were  feeble. 
The  publicity  which  has  of  late  years  been 
given  to  parliamentary  proceedings  has  raised 
the  standard  of  morality  among  public  men. 
The  power  of  public  opinion  is  so  great,  that, 
even  before  the  reform  of  the  representation, 
a  faint  suspicion  that  a  minister  had  given 
pecuniary  gratifications  to  members  of  Par 
liament  in  return  for  their  votes,  would  have 
been  enough  to  ruin  him.  But,  during  the 
century  which  followed  the  restoration,  the 
House  of  Commons  was  in  that  situation 
in  which  assemblies  must  be  managed  by 
corruption,  or  cannot  be  managed  at  all.  It 
was  not  held  in  awe,  as  in  the  sixteenth  centu- 
ty,  by  the  throne.  It  was  not  held  in  awe,  as 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  by  the  opinion  of  the 


people.  Its  constitution  was  oligarchical.  Its 
deliberations  were  secret.  Its  power  in  the 
state  was  immense.  The  government  had 
every  conceivable  motive  to  offer  bribes.  Many 
of  the  members,  if  they  were  not  men  of  strict 
honour  and  probity,  had  no  conceivable  motive 
to  refuse  what  the  government  offered.  In  the 
reign  of  Charles  the  Second,  accordingly,  the 
practice  of  buying  votes  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons  was  commenced  by  the  daring  Clifford, 
and  carried  to  a  great  extent  by  the  crafty  and 
shameless  Danby.  The  Revolution,  great  and 
manifold  as  were  the  blessings  of  which  it  was 
directly  or  remotely  the  cause,  at  first  aggra 
vated  this  evil.  The  importance  of  the  House 
of  Commons  was  now  greater  than  ever.  The 
prerogatives  of  the  crown  were  more  strictly 
limited  than  ever,  and  those  associations  in 
which,  more  than  in  its  legal  prerogatives,  its 
power  had  consisted,  were  completely  broken. 
No  prince  was  ever  in  so  helpless,  so  distressing 
a  situation  as  William  the  Third.  The  party 
which  defended  his  title  was, on  general  grou  nds, 
disposed  to  curtail  his  prerogative.  The  party 
which  was,  on  general  grounds,  friendly  to  the 
prerogative,  was  adverse  to  his  title.  There  was 
no  quarter  in  which  both  his  office  and  his  person 
could  find  favour.  But  while  the  influence  of 
the  House  of  Commons  in  the  government  was 
becoming  paramount,  the  influence  of  the  peo 
ple  over  the  House  of  Commons  was  declining. 
It  mattered  little  in  the  time  of  Charles  the 
First,  whether  that  House  were  or  were  not 
chosen  by  the  people,  it  was  certain  to  act  for 
the  people ;  because  it  would  have  been  at 
the  mercy  of  the  court,  but  for  the  support  of 
the  people.  Now  that  the  court  was  at  the 
mercy  of  the  House  of  Commons,  that  large 
body  of  members  who  were  not  returned  by 
popular  election  had  nobody  to  please  but 
themselves.  Even  those  who  were  returned 
by  popular  election  did  not  live,  as  now,  under 
a  constant  sense  of  responsibility.  The  con 
stituents  were  not,  as  now,  daily  apprized  of 
the  votes  and  speeches  of  their  representatives. 
The  privileges  which  had,  in  old  times,  been 
indispensably  necessary  to  the  security  and 
efficiency  of  Parliaments,  were  now  superflu 
ous.  But  they  were  still  carefully  maintained ; 
by  honest  legislators,  from  superstitious  vene 
ration  ;  by  dishonest  legislators,  for  their  own 
selfish  ends.  They  had  been  a  useful  defence 
to  the  Commons  during  a  long  and  doubtful 
conflict  with  powerful  sovereigns.  They  were 
now  no  longer  necessary  for  that  purpose  ;  and 
they  became  a  defence  to  the  members  against 
their  constituents.  That  secresy  which  had 
been  absolutely  necessary  in  times  when  the 
Privy  Council  was  in  the  habit  of  sending  th« 
leaders  of  opposition  to  the  Tower,  was  pre 
served  in  times  when  a  vote  of  the  House  of 
Commons  was  sufficient  to  hurl  the  most 
powerful  minister  from  his  post. 

The  government  could  not  go  on  unless  the 
Parliament  could  be  kept  in  order.  And  how 
was  the  Parliament  to  be  kept  in  order  ?  Three 
hundred  years  ago  it  would  have  been  enough 
for  a  statesman  to  have  the  support  of  me 
crown.  It  would  now,  we  hope  and  believe, 
be  enough  for  him  to  enjoy  the  confidence 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN. 


219 


Juicl  approbation  of  the  great  body  of  the  mid 
dle  class.  A  hundred  years  ago  it  would  not. 
Have  been  enough  to  have  both  crown  and 
people  on  his  side.  The  Parliament  had  shak- 
en  off  the  control  of  the  royal  prerogative.  It  j 
had  not  yet  fallen  under  the  control  of  public 
opinion.  A  large  proportion  of  the  members 
had  absolutely  no  motive  to  support  any  admi 
nistration  except  their  own  interest,  and  in  the 
lowest  sense  of  the  word.  Under  these  cir 
cumstances,  the  country  could  be  governed 
only  by  corruption.  Bolingbroke,  who  was  the 
ablest  and  the  most  vehement  of  those  who 
raised  the  cry  of  corruption,  had  no  better  re 
medy  to  propose  than  that  the  royal  prero 
gative  should  be  strengthened.  The  remedy 
would  no  doubt  have  been  efficient.  The  only 
question  is,  whether  it  would  not  have  been 
worse  than  the  disease.  The  fault  was  in  the 
constitution  of  the  legislature ;  and  to  blame 
those  ministers  who  managed  the  legislature  in 
the  only  way  in  which  it  could  be  managed,  is 
gross  injustice.  They  submitted  to  extortion 
because  they  could  not  help  themselves.  We 
might  as  well  accuse  the  poor  Lowland  farmers 
who  paid  "black  mail"  to  Rob  Roy,  of  cor 
rupting  the  virtue  of  the  Highlanders,  as  Sir 
Robert  Walpole  of  corrupting  the  virtue  of 
Parliament.  His  crime  was  merely  this ; 
that  he  employed  his  money  more  dexterously, 
and  got  more  support  in  return  for  it,  than  any 
of  those  who  preceded  or  followed  him. 

He  was  himself  incorruptible  by  money. 
His  dominant  passion  was  the  love  of  power  ; 
and  the  heaviest  charge  which  can  be  brought 
against  him  is,  that  to  this  passion  he  never 
scrupled  to  sacrifice  the  interests  of  his 
country. 

One  of  the  maxims  which,  as  his  son  tells 
us,  he  was  most  in  the  habit  of  repeating  was, 
guieta  non  movers.  It  was  indeed  the  maxim  by 
which  he  generally  regulated  his  public  conduct. 
It  is  the  maxim  of  a  man  more  solicitougjo  hold 
power  long  than  to  use  it  well.  It  is  remark 
able  that,  though  he  was  at  the  head  of  affairs 
during  more  than  twenty  years,  not  one  great 
measure,  not  one  important  change  for  the  bet 
ter  or  for  the  worse  in  any  part  of  our  institu 
tions,  marks  the  period  of  his  supremacy.  Nor 
•was  this  because  he  did  not  clearly  see  that 
many  changes  were  very  desirable.  He  had 
been  brought  up  in  the  school  of  toleration  at 
the  feet  of  Somers  and  of  Burnet.  He  disliked 
the  shameful  laws  against  Dissenters.  Bui  he 
never  could  be  induced  to  bring  forward  a 
proposition  for  repealing  them.  The  sufferers 
represented  to  him  the  injustice  with  which 
they  were  treated,  boasted  of  their  firm  attach 
ment  to  the  house  of  Brunswick  and  to  the 
Whig  party,  and  reminded  him  of  his  own  re 
peated  declarations  of  good-will  to  their  cause. 
He  listened,  assented,  promised,  and  did  no 
thing.  At  length  the  question  was  brought 
forward  by  others ;  and  the  minister,  after  a 
hesitating  and  evasive  speech,  voted  against  it. 
The  truth  was,  that  he  remembered  to  the  latest 
day  of  his  life  that  terrible  explosion  of  high- 
church  feeling  which  the  foolish  prosecution 
of  a  foolish  parson  had  occasioned  in  the  days 
of  Queen  Anne.  If  the  Dissenters  had  been 


turbulent,  he  would  probably  have  relieved 
them ;  but  while  he  apprehended  no  danger 
from  them,  he  would  not  run  the  slightest  risk 
for  their  sake.  He  acted  in  the  same  manner 
with  respect  to  other  questions.  He  knew  the 
state  of  the  Scotch  Highlands.  He  was  con 
stantly  predicting  another  insurrection  in  that 
part  of  the  empire.  Yet  during  his  Ion?  tenure 
of  power,  he  never  attempted  to  perform  what 
was  then  the  most  obvious  and  pressing  duty 
of  a  British  statesman — to  break  the  power  of 
the  chiefs,  and  to  establish  the  authority  of  law 
through  the  farthest  corners  of  the  island.  No 
body  knew  better  than  he  that,  if  this  were  not 
done,  great  mischiefs  would  follow.  But  tha 
Highlands  were  tolerably  quiet  at  this  time 
He  was  content  to  meet  daily  emergencies  by 
daily  expedients ;  and  he  left  the  rest  to  his 
successors.  They  had  to  conquer  the  High 
lands  in  the  midst  of  a  war  with  France  and 
Spain,  because  he  had  not  regulated  the  High 
lands  in  a  time  of  profound  peace. 

Sometimes,  in  spite  of  all  his  caution,  he 
found  that  measures,  which  he  had  hoped  to 
carry  through  quietly,  had  caused  great  agita 
tion.'  When  this  was  the  case,  he  generally 
modified  or  withdrew  them.  It  wat  thus  that 
he  cancelled  Wood's  patent  in  compliance  with 
the  absurd  outcry  of  the  Irish.  It  was  thus 
that  he  frittered  away  the  Porteous  Bill  to  no 
thing,  for  fear  of  exasperating  the  Scotch.  It 
was  thus  that  he  abandoned  the  Excise  Bill,  as 
soon  as  he  found  that  it  was  offensive  to  all  the 
great  towns  of  England.  The  language  which 
he  held  about  that  measure  in  a  subsequent 
session  is  eminently  characteristic.  Pulteney 
had  insinuated  that  the  scheme  would  be  again 
brought  forward.  "As  to  the  wicked  scheme," 
said  Walpole,  "as  the  gentleman  is  pleased  tt 
call  it,  which  he  would  persuade  gentlemen  is 
not  yet  laid  aside,  I,  for  my  part,  assure  this 
House,  I  am  not  so  mad  as  ever  again  to  en 
gage  in  any  thing  that  looks  like  an  excise ; 
though,  in  my  private  opinion,  I  still  think  it 
was  a  scheme  that  would  have  tended  very 
much  to  the  interest  of  the  nation." 

The  conduct  of  Walpole  with  regaid  to  the 
Spanish  War  is  the  great  blemish  of  his  pub 
lic  life.  Archdeacon  Coxe  imagined  that  he 
had  discovered  one  grand  principle  of  action 
to  which  the  whole  public  conduct  of  his  hero 
ought  to  be  referred.  "  Did  the  administration 
of  Walpole,"  says  the  biographer,  "  present 
any  uniform  principle  which  may  be  traced  in 
every  part,  and  which  gave  combination  and 
consistency  to  the  whole  1  Yes,  and  that  prin 
ciple  was,  THE  LOVE  OF  PEACE."  It  would  be 
difficult,  we  think,  to  bestow  a  higher  eulogium 
on  any  statesman.  But  the  eulogium  is  far  too 
high  for  the  merits  of  Walpole.  The  great 
ruling  principle  of  his  public  conduct  was  in 
deed  a  love  of  peace,  but  not  in  the  sense  in 
which  Archdeacon  Coxe  uses  the  phrase.  The 
peace  which  Walpole  sought  was  not  th<? 
peace  of  the  country,  but  the  peace  of  his  own 
administration.  During  the  greater  part  of  his 
public  life,  indeed,  the  two  objects  wore  inse 
parably  connected.  At  length  he  was  reduced 
to  the  necessity  of  choosing  between  them — of 
plunging  the  state  into  hostilities  for  which 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ihere  was  no  just  ground,  and  by  which  no 
thing  was  to  be  got;  or  of  facing  a  violent 
opposition  in  the  country,  in  Parliament,  and 
even  in  the  royal  closet.  No  person  was  more 
thoroughly  convinced  than  he  of  the  absurdity 
ef  the  cry  against  Spain.  But  his  darling 
power  was  at  stake,  and  his  choice  was  soon 
made.  He  preferred  an  unjust  war  to  a  stormy 
session.  It  is  impossible  to  say  of  a  minister 
who  acted  thus,  that  the  love  of  peace  was  the 
one  grand  principle  to  which  all  his  conduct  is 
to  be  referred.  The  governing  principle  of  his 
conduct  was  neither  love  of  peace  nor  love  of 
war,  but  love  of  power. 

The  praise  to  which  he  is  fairly  entitled  is 
this,  that  he  understood  the  true  interest  of  his 
country  better  than  any  of  his  contemporaries, 
and  that  he  pursued  that  interest  whenever  it 
was  not  incompatible  with  the  interest  of  his 
own  intense  and  grasping  ambition.  Itwas  only 
in  matters  of  public  moment  that  he  shrunk 
from  agitation,  and  had  recourse  to  compromise. 
In  his  contest  for  personal  influence  there  was 
no  timidity,  nor  flinching.  He  would  have  all 
or  none.  Every  member  of  the  government 
who  would  riot  submit  to  his  ascendency  was 
turned  out  or  forced  to  resign.  Liberal  of 
every  thing  else,  he  was  avaricious  of  nothing 
but  power.  Cautious  everywhere  else,  when 
pcwer  was  at  stake,  he  had  all  the  boldness  of 
\Volsey  or  Chatham.  He  might  easily  have 
secured  his  authority  if  he  could  have  been  in 
duced  to  divide  it  with  others.  But  he  would 
not  part  with  one  fragment  of  it  to  purchase  de 
fenders  for  all  the  rest.  The  effect  of  this  policy 
was,  that  he  had  able  enemies  and  feeble  allies. 
His  most  distinguished  coadjutors  left  him  one 
by  one,  and  joined  the  ranks  of  the  opposition. 
He  faced  the  increasing  array  of  his  enemies 
with  unbroken  spirit,  and  thought  it  far  better 
that  they  should  inveigh  against  his  power 
than  that  they  should  share  it. 

The  opposition  was  in  every  sense  formida 
ble.  At  its  head  were  two  royal  personages, 
the  exiled  head  of  the  house  of  Stuart,  the 
disgraced  heir  of  the  house  of  Brunswick. 
One  set  of  members  received  directions  from 
Avignon.  Another  set  held  their  consultations 
and  banquets  at  Norfolk  House.  The  majority 
of  the  landed  gentry,  the  majority  of  the  paro 
chial  clergy,  one  of  the  universities,  and  a 
stiong  party  in  the  city  of  London,  and  in  the 
other  great  towns,  were  decidedly  averse  to 
the  government.  Of  the  men  of  letters,  some 
were  exasperated  by  the  neglect  with  which  the 
minister  treated  them — a  neglect  which  was  the 
more  remarkable,  because  his  predecessors, 
both  Whig  and  Tory,  had  paid  court,  with 
emulous  munificence,  to  the  wits  and  the 
poel?  ;  others  were  honestly  inflamed  by  party 
zeal ;  almo,st  all  lent  their  aid  to  the  opposition. 
In  truth,  all  that  was  alluring  to  ardent  and 
imaginative  minds  was  on  that  side : — old  asso 
ciations,  new  visions  of  political  improvement, 
high-flown  theories  of  loyalty,  high-flown  theo 
ries  of  liberty,  the  enthusiasm  of  the  Cavalier, 
the  enthusiasm  of  the  Roundhead.  The  Tory 
gentleman,  fed  in  the  common-rooms  of  Oxford 
wi'.h  the  doctrines  of  Filmer  and  Sacheverell, 
and  proud  of  the  exploits  of  his  great-grand 


father,  who  had  charged  with  Rupert  at  Mars* 
ton,  who  had  held  out  the  old  manor-house 
against  Fairfax,  and  who,  after  the  king's  re» 
turn,  had  been  set  down  for  a  Knight  of  the 
Royal  Oak,  fleAv  to  that  section  of  the  opposi 
tion  which,  under  pretence  of  assailing  the 
existing  administration,  was  in  truth  assailing 
the  reigning  dynasty.  The  young  republican, 
fresh  from  his  Livy  and  his  Lucan,  and  flowing 
with  admiration  of  Hampden,  of  Russell,  and 
of  Sydney,  hastened  with  equal  eagerness  to 
those  benches  from  which  eloquent  voices 
thundered  nightly  against  the  tyranny  and  per 
fidy  of  courts.  So  many  young  politicians 
were  caught  by  these  declarations,  that  Sir  Ro 
bert,  in  one  of  his  best  speeches,  observed,  that 
the  opposition  against  him  consisted  of  three 
bodies — the  Tories,  the  discontented  Whigs, 
who  were  known  by  the  name  of  the  patriots, 
and  the  boys.  In  fact,  every  young  man 
of  warm  temper  and  lively  imagination,  what 
ever  his  political  bias  might  be,  was  drawn, 
into  the  party  adverse  to  the  government ;  and 
some  of  the  most  distinguished  among  them — 
Pitt,  for  example,  among  public  men,  and 
Johnson,  among  men  of  letters — afterwards 
openly  acknowledged  their  mistake. 

The  aspect  of  the  opposition,  even  while  it 
was  still  a  minority  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
was  very  imposing.  Among  those  who,  in 
Parliament  or  out  of  Parliament,  assailed  the 
administration  of  Walpole,  were  Bolingbroke, 
Carteret,  Chesterfield,  Argyle,Pulteney,  Wynd- 
ham,  Doddington,  Pitt,  Ly  ttleton,  Barnard,  Pope, 
Swift,Gay,Arbuthnot,  Fielding,  Johnson,  Thom 
son,  Akenside,  Glover. 

The  circumstance  that  the  opposition  was 
divided  into  two  parties,  diametrically  opposed 
to  each  other  in  political  opinions,  was  long 
the  safety  of  Walpole.  It  was  at  last  his  ruin. 
The  leaders  of  the  minority  knew  that  it  would 
be  difficult  for  them  to  bring  forward  any  im- 
portanfcneasure,  without  producing  an  imme 
diate  schism  in  their  party.  It  was  with  very 
great  difficulty  that  the  Whigs  in  opposition 
had  been  induced  to  give  a  sullen  and  silent 
vote  for  the  repeal  of  the  Septennial  Act.  The 
Tories,  on  the  other  hand,  could  not  be  induced 
to  support  Pulteney's  motion  for  an  addition  to 
the  income  of  Prince  Frederic.  The  two  par 
ties  had  cordially  joined  in  calling  out  for  a 
war  with  Spain  :  but  they  had  now  their  war. 
Hatred  of  Walpole  was  almost  the  only  feeling 
which  was  common  to  them.  On  this  one 
point,  therefore,  they  concentrated  their  whole 
strength.  With  gross  ignorance,  or  gross  dis 
honesty,  they  represented  the  minister  as  the 
main  grievance  of  the  state.  His  dismissal, 
his  punishment,  would  prove  the  certain  cure 
for  all  the  evils  which  the  nation  suffered. 
What  was  to  be  done  after  his  fall,  how  mis- 
government  was  to  be  prevented  in  future, 
were  questions  to  which  there  were  as  many 
answers  as  there  were  noisy  and  ill-informed 
members  of  the  opposition.  The  only  cry  in 
which  all  could  join  was,  "  Down  with  Wal 
pole  !"  So  much  did  they  narrow  the  disputed 
grounds,  so  purely  personal  did  they  make  the 
question,  that  they  threw  out  friendly  hints  to 
the  other  members  of  the  administration,  and 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO   SIR  HORACE   MANN. 


221 


declared  .hat  they  refused  quarter  to  the  prime 
minister  alone.  His  tools  might  keep  their 
heads,  their  fortunes,  even  their  places,  if  only 
the  great  father  of  corruption  were  given  up  to 
the  just  vengeance  of  the  nation. 

If  the  fate  of  Walpole's  colleagues  had  been 
inseparably  bound  up  with  his,  he  probably 
would,  even  after  the  unfavourable  elections 
of  1741,  have  been  able  to  weather  the  storm. 
But  as  soon  as  it  was  understood  that  the  at 
tack  was  directed  against  him  alone,  and  that, 
if  he  were  sacrificed,  his  associates  might  ex 
pect  advantageous  and  honourable  terms,  the 
ministerial  ranks  began  to  waver,  and  the  mur 
mur  of  sauve  quipeut  was  heard.  That  Wai- 
pole  had  foul  play  is  almost  certain :  but  to 
what  extent  it  is  difficult  to  say.  Lord  Islay 
was  suspected  ;  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  some 
thing  more  than  suspected.  It  would  have 
been  strange,  indeed,  if  his  grace  had  been 
idle  when  treason  was  hatching. 

"  Che  Gan  fu  traditor  prima  che  nato."  "His 
name,"  said  Sir  Robert,  "is  perfidy." 

Never  was  a  battle  more  manfully  fought 
cut  than  the  last  struggle  of  the  old  statesman. 
His  clear  judgment,  his  long  experience,  and 
his  fearless  spirit,  enabled  him  to  maintain  a 
defensive  war  through  half  a  session.  To  the 
last  his  heart  never  failed  him ;  and,  when  at 
length  he  yielded,  he  yielded,  not  to  the  threats 
of  his  enemies,  but  to  the  entreaties  of  his  dis 
pirited  and  refractory  followers.  When  he 
could  no  longer  retain  his  power,  he  com 
pounded  for  honour  and  security,  and  retired  to 
his  garden  and  his  paintings,  leaving  to  those 
who  had  overthrown  him — shame,  discord,  and 
ruin. 

Every  thing  was  in  confusion.  It  has  been 
said  that  the  confusion  was  produced  by  the 
dexterous  policy  of  Walpole;  and  undoubtedly, 
he  did  his  best  to  sow  dissensions  amongst  his 
triumphant  enemies.  Cut  there  was  little  for 
him  to  do.  Victory  had  completely  dissolved 
the  hollow  truce  which  the  two  sections  of  the 
opposition  had  but  imperfectly  observed,  even 
while  the  event  of  the  contest  was  still  doubt 
ful.  A  thousand  questions  were  opened  in  a 
moment.  A  thousand  conflicting  claims  were 
preferred.  It  was  impossible  to  follow  any 
line  of  policy,  which  would  not  have  been  of 
fensive  to  a  large  portion  of  the  successful 
party.  It  was  impossible  to  find  places  for  a 
tenth  part  of  those  who  thought  that  they  had 
a  right  to  be  considered.  While  the  parlia 
mentary  leaders  were  preaching  patience  and 
confidence,  while  their  followers  were  clamor 
ing  for  reward,  a  still  louder  voice  was  heard 
from  without — the  terrible  cry  of  a  people 
angry,  they  hardly  knew  with  whom,  and  im 
patient,  they  hardly  knew  for  what.  The  day 
of  retribution  had  arrived.  The  opposition 
reaped  what  they  had  sown :  inflamed  with 
hatred  and  cupidity,  despairing  of  success  by  | 
any  ordinary  mode  of  political  warfare,  and  | 
blind  to  consequences  which,  though  remote,  \ 
were  certain,  they  had  conjured  up  a  devil 
which  they  could  not  lay.  They  had  made  the  | 
public  mind  drunk  with  calumny  and  declama-  ; 
tion.  They  had  raised  expectations  which  it 
was  impossible  tr  satisfy.  The  downfall  of  . 


Walpole  was  to  be  the  beginning  of  a  political 
millennium;  and  every  enthusiast  had  figured 
to  himself  that  millennium  according  to  the 
fashion  of  his  own  wishes.  The  republican 
expected  that  the  power  of  the  crown  would 
be  reduced  to  a  mere  shadow;  the  high  Tory 
that  the  Stuarts  would  be  restored;  the  mode 
rate  Tory  that  the  golden  days  which  the 
church  and  the  landed  interest  had  enjoyed 
during  the  last  years  of  Queen  Anne,  would 
immediately  return.  It  would  have  been  im 
possible  to  satisfy  everybody.  The  conquerors 
satisfied  nobody. 

We  have  no  reverence  for  the  memory  of 
those  who  were  then  called  the  patriots.  We 
are  for  the  principles  of  good  government 
against  Walpole;  and  for  Walpole  against  the 
opposition.  It  was  most  desirable  that  a  purer 
system  should  be  introduced;  but  if  the  old 
system  was  to  be  retained,  no  man  was  so  fit 
as  Walpole  to  be  at  the  head  of  affairs.  There 
were  frightful  abuses  in  the  government, 
abuses  more  than  sufficient  to  justify  a  strong 
opposition;  but  the  party  opposed  to  Walpole, 
while  they  stimulated  the  popular  fury  to  the 
highest  point,  were  at  no  pains  to  direct  it 
aright.  Indeed,  they  studiously  misdirected  it. 
They  misrepresented  the  evil.  They  pre 
scribed  inefficient  and  pernicious  remedies. 
They  held  up  a  single  man  as  the  sole  cause 
of  all  the  vices  of  a  bad  system,  which  had 
been  in  full  operation  before  his  entrance  into 
public  life,  and  which  continued  to  be  in  full 
operation  when  some  of  these  very  bawlers 
had  succeeded  to  his  power.  They  thwarted 
his  best  measures.  They  drove  him  into  an 
unjustifiable  war  against  his  will.  Constantly 
talking  in  magnificent  language  about  tyranny, 
corruption,  wicked  ministers,  servile  courtiers, 
the  liberties  of  Englishmen,  the  Great  Charter, 
the  rights  for  which  our  fathers  bled — Timo 
leon,  Brutus,  Hampden,  Sydney — they  had 
absolutely  nothing  to  propose  which  would 
have  been  an  improvement  on  our  institutions. 
Instead  of  directing  the  public  mind  to  definite 
reforms,  which  might  have  completed  the 
work  of  the  Revolution,  which  might  have 
brought  the  legislature  into  harmony  with  the 
nation,  and  which  might  have  prevented  the 
crown  from  doing  by  influence  what  it  could 
no  longer  do  by  prerogative,  they  exciied  a 
vague  craving  for  change,  by  which  they  pro 
fited  for  a  single  moment,  and  of  which,  as 
they  well  deserved,  they  were  soon  the  victims. 

Among  the  reforms  which  the  state  then 
required,  there  were  two  of  paramount  im 
portance,  two  which  would  alone  have  reme 
died  almost  every  abuse,  and  without  which 
all  other  remedies  would  have  been  unavail 
ing — the  publicity  of  parliamentary  proceed 
ings,  and  the  abolition  of  the  rotten  boroughs. 
Neither  of  these  was  thought  of.  It  seems  to 
us  clear,  that  if  these  were  not  adopted,  ali 
other  measures  would  have  been  illusory. 
Some  of  the  patriots  suggested  changes  which 
would,  beyond  all  doubt,  have  increased  thu 
existing  evils  a  hundredfold.  These  men 
wished  to  transfer  the  disposal  of  employ 
ments,  and  the  command  of  the  army,  trom 
the  crown  to  the  Parliament;  and  this 'on  the 
T  3 


222 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


rery  ground  that  the  Parliament  had  long  J 
been  a  grossly  corrupt  body.  The  security 
against  corruption  was  to  be,  that  the  mem 
bers,  instead  of  having  a  portion  of  the  public 
plunder  doled  out  to  them  by  a  minister,  were 
to  help  themselves. 

The  other  schemes,  of  which  the  public 
mind  was  full,  were  less  dangerous  than  this. 
Some  of  them  were  in  themselves  harmless. 
But  none  of  them  would  have  done  much 
good,  and  most  of  them  were  extravagantly 
absurd.  What  they  were  we  may  learn  from 
the  instructions  which  many  constituent  bodies, 
immediately  after  the  change  of  administra 
tion,  sent  up  to  their  representatives.  A  more 
deplorable  collection  of  follies  can  hardly  be 
imagined.  There  is,  in  the  first  place,  a  gene 
ral  cry  for  Walpole's  head.  Then  there  are 
bitter  complaints  of  the  decay  of  trade — decay 
which,  in  the  judgment  of  those  enlightened 
politicians,  was  all  brought  about  by  Walpole 
and  corruption.  They  would  have  been  nearer 
to  the  truth,  if  they  had  attributed  their  suffer 
ings  to  the  war  into  which  they  had  driven 
Walpole  against  his  better  judgment.  He  had 
foretold  the  effects  of  his  unwilling  conces 
sion.  On  the  day  when  hostilities  against 
Spain  were  proclaimed,  when  the  heralds  were 
attended  into  the  city  by  the  chiefs  of  the  op 
position,  when  the  Prince  of  Wale^  himself 
stopped  at  Temple-Bar  to  drink  success  to  the 
English  arms,  the  minister  heard  all  th'.  stee 
ples  of  the  city  jingling  with  a  merry  pea',  and 
muttered:  "They  may  ring  the  bells  now  : 
they  will  be  wringing  their  hands  before  lon^." 

Another  grievance,  for  which  of  course 
Walpole  and  corruption  were  answerable,  was 
Ihe  great  exportation  of  English  wool.  In  the 
judgment  of  the  sagacious  electors  of  several 
large  towns,  the  remedying  of  this  evil  was  a 
matter  second  only  in  importance  to  the  hang 
ing  of  Sir  Robert.  There  are  also  earnest 
injunctions  on  the  members  to  veto  against 
standing  armies  in  time  of  peace  ;  injunctioiis 
which  were,  to  say  the  least,  ridiculously  un 
reasonable  in  the  midst  of  a  war  which  was 
likely  to  last,  and  which  did  actually  last,  as  long 
as  the  Parliament.  The  repeal  of  the  Septen 
nial  Acl,  as  was  to  be  expected,  was  strongly 
Dressed.  Nothing  was  more  natural  than  that 
the  voters  should  wish  for  a  triennial  recur 
rence  of  their  bribes  and  their  ale.  We  feel 
firmly  convinced  that  the  repeal  of  the  Sep 
tennial  Act,  unaccompanied  by  a  complete 
reform  of  the  constitution  of  the  elective  body, 
would  have  been  an  unmixed  curse  to  the 
country.  The  only  rational  recommendation 
which  we  can  find  in  all  these  instructions  is, 
that  the  number  of  placemen  in  Parliament 
should  be  limited,  and  that  pensioners  should 
not  be  allowed  to  sit  there.  It  is  plain,  how 
ever,  that  this  reform  was  far  from  going  to  the 
root  of  the  evil ;  and  that,  if  it  had  been  adopt 
ed,  the  consequence  would  probably  have 
been,  that  secret  bribery  would  have  been 
more  practised  than  ^ver. 

We  will  give  one  more  instance  of  the  ab 
surd  expectations  which  the  declamations  of 
Ihr  opposition  had  raised  in  the  country. 
Akenside  was  one  of  the  fiercest  and  most 


uncompromising  of  the  young  patriots  out  of 
Parliament.  When  he  found  that  the  change 
of  administration  had  produced  no  change  of 
system,  he  gave  vent  to  his  indignation  in  the 
"  Epistle  to  Curio,"  the  best  poem  that  he  ever 
wrote;  a  poem,  indeed,  which  seems  to  indi 
cate,  that,  if  he  had  left  lyric  composition  to 
Gray  and  Collins,  and  had  employed  his  pow 
ers  in  grave  and  elevated  satire,  he  might 
have  disputed  the  pre-eminence  of  Dryden, 
But  whatever  be  the  literary  merits  of  the 
epistle,  we  can  say  nothing  in  praise  of  the 
political  doctrines  which  it  inculcates.  The 
poet,  in  a  rapturous  apostrophe  to  the  Spirits 
of  the  Great  Men  of  Antiquity,  tells  us  what 
he  expected  from  Pulteney  at  the  moment  of 
the  fall  of  the  tyrant. 

"See  private  life  by  wisest  arta  reclaimed, 
See  ardent  youth  to  noblest  manners  framed, 
See  us  achieve  whate'er  was  sought  by  you, 
If  Curio,  only  Curio,  will  be  true." 

It  was  Pulteney's  business,  it  seems,  to  abolish 
faro  and  masquerades,  to  stint  the  young  Duke 
of  Marlborough  to  a  bottle  of  brandy  a  dav, 
and  to  prevail  on  Lady  Vane  to  be  conteut 
with  three  lovers  at  a  time. 

Whatever  the  people  wanted,  they  certainly 
got  nothing.  Walpole  retired  in  safety,  and 
the  multitude  were  defrauded  of  the  expected 
show  on  Tower  Hill.  The  Septennial  Act  was 
not  repealed.  The  placemen  were  not  turned 
out  of  the  House  of  Commons.  Wool,  we 
believe,  was  still  exported.  "Private  life" 
afforded  as  much  scandal  as  if  the  reign  of 
Walpole  and  corruption  had  continued  ;  and 
"ardent  youth"  fought  with  watchmen,  and 
betted  with  blacklegs  as  much  as  ever. 

The  colleagues  of  Walpole  had,  after  his  re 
treat,  admitted  some  of  the  chiefs  of  the  oppo 
sition  into  the  government.  They  soon  found 
themselves  compelled  to  submit  to  the  ascend 
ency  of  one  of  their  new  allies.  This  was 
Lord  Carteret,  afterwards  Earl  Granville.  No 
public  man  of  that  age  had  greater  courage, 
greater  ambition,  greater  activity,  greater 
talents  for  debate  or  for  declamation.  No 
public  man  had  such  profound  and  extensive 
learning.  He  was  familiar  with  the  ancient 
writers.  His  knowledge  of  modern  languages 
was  prodigious.  The  Privy  Council,  when  he 
was  present,  needed  no  interpreter.  He  spoke 
and  wrote  French,  Italian,  Spanish,  Portu 
guese,  German,  even  Swedish.  He  had  pushed 
his  researches  into  the  most  obscure  nooks  of 
literature.  He  was  as  familiar  with  canonists 
and  schoolmen  as  with  orators  and  poets.  He 
had  read  all  that  the  universities  of  Saxony 
and  Holland  had  produced  on  the  most  intri 
cate  questions  of  public  law.  Harte,  in  the 
preface  to  the  second  edition  of  the  "History 
of  Gustavus  Adolphus,"  bears  a  remarkable 
testimony  to  the  extent  and  accuracy  of  Lord 
Carteret's  knowledge.  "  It  was  my  good  for 
tune  or  prudence  to  keep  the  main  body  of 
my  army  (or  in  other  words  my  matters  of 
fact)  safe  and  entire.  The  late  Earl  of  Gran 
ville  was  pleased  to  declare  himself  of  this 
opinion  ;  especially  when  he  found  that  I  had 
made  Chemnitius  one  of  my  principal  guide*; 


WALPOLE'S  LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE   MANN. 


for  his  lordship  was  apprehensive  I  might  not ! 
have  seen  that  valuable  and  authentic  book, ! 
which  is  extremely  scarce.     I  thought  myself  J 
happy  to  have  contented  his  lordship  even  in 
the  lowest  degree:  for  he  understood  the  Ger 
man  and   Swedish  histories    to    the    highest 
perfection." 

With  all  this  learning,  Carteret  was  far  from 
being  a  pedant.  He  was  not  one  of  those  cold 
spirits,  of  which  the  fire  is  put  out  by  the  fuel. 
In  council,  in  debate,  in  society,  he  was  all 
life  and  energy.  His  measures  were  strong, 
prompt,  and  daring;  his  oratory  animated  and 
glowing.  His  spirits  were  constantly  high. 
No  misfortune,  public  or  private,  could  de 
press  him.  He  was  at  once  the  most  unlucky 
and  the  happiest  public  man  of  his  time. 

He  had  been  Secretary  of  State  in  Walpole's 
administration,  and  had  acquired  considerable 
influence  over  the  mind  of  George  the  First. 
The  other  ministers  could  speak  no  German. 
The  king  could  speak  no  English.  All  the 
communication  that  Walpole  held  with  his 
master  was  in  very  bad  Latin.  Carteret  dis 
mayed  his  colleagues  by  the  volubility  with 
which  he  addressed  his  majesty  in  German. 
They  listened  with  envy  and  terror  to  the 
mysterious  gutturals,  which  might  possibly 
convey  suggestions  very  little  in  unison  with 
their  wishes. 

Walpole  was  not  a  man  to  endure  such  a 
colleague  as  Carteret.  The  king  was  induced 
to  give  up  his  favourite.  Carteret  joined  the 
opposition,  and  signalized  himself  at  the  head 
of  that  party,  till,  after  the  retirement  of  his 
oM  rival,  he  again  became  Secretary  of  State. 

During  some  months  he  was  chief  minister, 
indeed  sole  minister.  He  gained  the  confi 
dence  and  regard  of  George  the  Second.  He 
was  at  the  same  time  in  high  favour  with  the 
Prince  of  Wales.  As  a  debater  in  the  House 
of  Lords,  he  had  no  equal  among  his  col 
leagues.  Among  his  opponents,  Chesterfield 
alone  could  be  considered  as  his  match.  Con 
fident  in  his  talents  and  in  the  royal  favour,  he 
neglected  all  those  means  by  which  the  power 
of  Walpole  had  been  created  and  maintained. 
His  head  was  full  of  treaties  and  expeditions, 
of  schemes  for  supporting  the  Queen  of  Hun 
gary,  and  humbling  the  house  of  Bourbon. 
He  contemptuously  abandoned  to  others  all  the 
drudgery,  and  with  the  drudgery,  all  the  fruits 
of  corruption.  The  patronage  of  the  church 
and  the  bar  he  left  to  the  Pelhams  as  a  trifle 
unworthy  of  his  care.  One  of  the  judges, 
Chief  Justice  Willis,  if  we  remember  rightly, 
went  to  him  to  beg  some  ecclesiastical  prefer 
ment  for  a  friend.  Carteret  said,  that  he  was 
too  much  occupied  with  continental  politics 
to  think  about  the  disposal  of  places  and  bene 
fices.  "You  may  rely  on  it,  then,"  said  the 
Chief  Justice,  "that  people  who  want  places 
and  benefices  will  go  to  those  who  have  more 
leisure."  The  prediction  was  accomplished. 
It  would  have  been  a  busy  time  indeed  in 
which  the  Pelhams  had  wanted  leisure  for  job 
bing  ;  and  to  the  Pelhams  the  whole  cry  of 
place-hunters  and  pension-hunters  resorted. 
The  parliamentary  influence  of  the  two  bro 
thers  became  stronger  every  day,  till  at  length 


they  were  at  the  head  of  a  decided  majority  in 
the  House  of  Commons.  Their  rival,  mean 
while,  conscious  of  his  powers,  sanguine  in 
his  hopes,  and  proud  of  the  storm  which  he 
had  conjured  up  on  the  Continent,  would  brook 
neither  superior  nor  equal.  "  His  rants,"  sayy 
Horace  Walpole,  "are  amazing:  so  are  his 
parts  and  his  spirits."  He  encountered  the 
opposition  of  his  colleagues,  not  with  the  fierce 
haughtiness  of  the  first  Pitt,  or  the  cold  un 
bending  arrogance  of  the  second,  but  with  a 
gay  vehemence,  a  good-humoured  imperious 
ness  that  bore  every  thing  down  before  it 
The  period  of  his  ascendency  was  known  by 
the  name  of  the  "Drunken  Administration;'' 
and  the  expression  was  not  altogether  figura 
tive.  His  habits  were  extremely  convivial, 
and  champagne  probably  lent  its  aid  to  keep 
him  in  that  state  of  joyous  excitement  ia 
which  his  life  was  passed. 

That  a  rash  and  impetuous  man  of  genius 
like  Carteret  should  not  have  been  able  to 
maintain  his  ground  in  Parliament  against 
the  crafty  and  selfish  Pelhams,  is  not  strange. 
But  it  is  less  easy  to  understand  why  he  should 
have  been  generally  unpopular  throughout  the 
country.  His  brilliant  talents,  his  bold  and 
open  temper,  ought,  it  should  seem,  to  have 
made  him  a  favourite  with  the  public.  But 
the  people  had  been  bitterly  disappointed;  and 
he  had  to  face  the  first  burst  of  their  rage 
His  close  connection  with  Pulteney,  now  the 
most  detested  man  in  the  nation,  was  an  un 
fortunate  circumstance.  He  had,  indeed,  only 
three  partisans,  Pulteney,  the  King,  and  the 
Prince  of  Wales — a  most  singular  assem 
blage. 

He  was  driven  from  his  office.  He  shortly 
after  made  a  bold,  indeed  a  desperate  attempt 
to  recover  power.  The  attempt  failed.  From 
that  time  he  relinquished  all  ambitious  hopes; 
and  retired  laughing  to  his  books  and  his  bot 
tle.  No  statesman  ever  enjoyed  success  with 
so  exquisite  a  zest,  or  submitted  to  a  defeat 
with  so  genuine  and  unforced  a  cheerfulness. 
Ill  as  he  had  been  used,  he  did  not  seem,  says 
Horace  Walpole,  to  have  any  resentment,  or 
indeed  any  feeling  except  thirst. 

These  letters  contain  many  good  stories, 
some  of  them  no  doubt  grossly  exaggerated, 
about  Lord  Carteret ;  how,  in  the  height  of  his 
greatness,  he  fell  in  love  at  first  sight  on  a 
birth-day  with  Lady  Sophia  Fermor,  the  hand 
some  daughter  of  Lord  Pomfret;  hov  he 
plagued  the  cabinet  every  day  with  reading  to 
thorn  her  ladyship's  letters;  how  strangely  he 
brought  home  his  bride;  what  fine  jewels  he 
gave  her;  how  he  fondled  her  at  Ranelagh; 
and  what  queen-like  state  she  kept  in  Arling 
ton  street.  Horace  Walpole  has  spoken  less 
bitterly  of  Carteret  than  of  any  public  man  of 
that  time,  Fox,  perhaps,  excepted  ;  and  this  is 
the  more  remarkable,  because  Carteret  was 
one  of  the  most  inveterate  enemies  of  Sir  Ro 
bert.  In  the  "Memoirs,"  Horace  Walpole, 
after  passing  in  review  all  the  great  men 
whom  England  had  produced  within  his  me 
mory,  concludes  by  saying,  that  in  genius  none 
of  them  equalled  Lord  GranviHe.  Smollett,  ±n 
"Humphry  Clinker,"  pronounces  a  similar 


224 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


judgment  in  coarser  language.  "  Since  Gran- 
ville  was  turned  out,  there  has  been  no  minis 
ter  in  this  nation  worth  the  meal  that  whitened 
his  periwig." 

He  fell ;  and  the  reign  of  the  Pelhams  com 
menced.  It  was  Carteret's  misfortune  to  be 
raised  to  power  when  the  public  mind  was 
still  smarting  from  recent  disappointment. 
The  nation  had  been  duped,  and  was  eager 
for  revenge.  A  victim  was  necessary;  and 
on  such  occasions,  the  victims  of  popular 
rage  are  selected  like  the  victim  of  Jephthah. 
The  first  person  who  comes  in  the  way  is 
made  the  sacrifice.  The  wrath  of  the  people 
had  now  spent  itself,  and  the  unnatural  excite 
ment  was  succeeded  by  an  unnatural  calm. 
To  an  irrational  eagerness  for  something  new, 
succeeded  an  equally  irrational  disposition  to 
acquiesce  in  every  thing  established.  A  few 
months  back  the  people  had  been  disposed  to 
impute  every  crime  to  men  in  power,  and  to 
lend  a  ready  ear  to  the  high  professions  of 
men  in  opposition;  they  were  now  disposed  to 
surrender  themselves  implicitly  to  the  manage 
ment  of  ministers,  and  to  look  writh  suspicion 
and  contempt  on  all  who  pretended  to  public 
spirit.  The  name  of  patriot  had  become  a 
byword  of  derision.  Horace  Walpde  scarcely 
exaggerated,  when  he  said,  that  in  those  times, 
the  most  popular  declaration  which  a  candi 
date  could  make  on  the  hustings,  was,  that  he 
had  never  been  and  never  would  be  a  patriot. 
At  this  juncture  took  place  the  rebellion  of  the 
Highland  clans.  The  alarm  produced  by  that 
event  quieted  the  strife  of  internal  factions. 
The  suppression  of  the  insurrection  crushed 
forever  the  spirit  of  the  Jacobite  party.  Room 
ivas  made  in  the  government  for  a  few  Tories. 
Peace  was  patched  up  with  France  and  Spain. 
Death  removed  the  Prince  of  Wales,  who  had 
contrived  to  keep  together  a  small  portion  of 
that  formidable  opposition,  of  which  he  had 
been  the  leader  in  the  time  of  Sir  Robert  Wai- 
pole.  Almost  every  man  of  weight  in  the 
House  of  Commons  was  officially  connected 
•with  the  government.  The  even  tenor  of  the 
session  of  Parliament  was  ruffled  only  by  an 
occasional  harangue  from  Lord  Egmont  on 
the  army  estimates.  For  the  first  time  since 
the  accession  of  the  Stuarts  there  was  no  op 
position.  This  singular  good  fortune,  denied 
to  the  ablest  statesmen — to  Salisbury,  to  Straf- 
ford,  to  Clarendon,  to  Walpole — had  been  re 
served  for  the  Pelhams. 

Henry  Pelham,  it  is  true,  was  by  no  means 
a  contemptible  person.  His  understanding 
was  that  of  Walpole  on  a  somewhat  smaller 
scale.  Though  not  a  brilliant  orator,  he  was, 
like  his  master,  a  good  debater,  a  good  parlia 
mentary  tactician,  a  good  man  of  business. 
Like  his  master,  he  distinguished  himself  by 
the  neatness  and  clearness  of  his  financial 
expositions.  Here  the  resemblance  ceased. 
Their  characters  were  altogether  dissimilar. 
Walpole  was  good-humoured,  but  would  have 
his  way;  his  spirits  were  high,  and  his  man 
ners  frank  even  to  coarseness.  The  temper 
of  Pelham  was  yielding,  but  peevish ;  his 
habits  were  regular,  and  his  deportment 
urictly  decorous.  Walpole  was  constitution 


ally  fearless,  Pelham  constitutionally  timij. 
Walpole  had  to  face  a  strong  opposition ;  but 
no  man  in  the  government  durst  wag  a  finger 
against  him.  Almost  all  the  opposition  which 
Pelham  had,  was  from  members  of  the  govern 
ment  of  which  he  was  the  head.  His  own 
paymaster  spoke  against  his  estimates.  His 
own  secretary  at  war  spoke  against  his  Re 
gency  Bill.  In  one  day  Walpole  turned  Lord 
Chesterfield,  Lord  Burlington,  and  Lord  Clin 
ton  out  of  the  royal  household,  dismissed  the 
highest  dignitaries  of  Scotland  from  their  posts, 
and  took  away  the  regiments  of  the  Duke  of 
Bolton  and  Lord  Cobham,  because  he  sus 
pected  them  of  having  encouraged  the  resist 
ance  to  his  Excise  Bill.  He  would  far  rather 
have  contended  with  a  strong  minority,  under 
able  leaders,  than  have  tolerated  mutiny  in  his 
own  party.  It  would  have  gone  hard  with  any 
of  his  colleagues  who  had  ventured  to  divide 
the  House  of  Commons  against  him.  Pelham, 
on  the  other  hand,  was  disposed  to  bear  any 
thing  rather  than  to  drive  from  office  any  man 
round  whom  a  new  opposition  could  form. 
He  therefore  endured  with  fretful  patience  the 
insubordination  of  Pitt  and  Fox.  He  thought 
it  far  better  to  connive  at  their  occasional  in 
fractions  of  discipline,  than  to  hear  them,  night 
after  night,  thundering  against  corruption  and 
wicked  ministers  from  the  other  side  of  the 
House. 

We  wonder  that  Sir  Walter  Scott  never  tried 
his  hand  on  the  Duke  of  Newcastle.  An  inter 
view  between  his  Grace  and  Jeanie  Deans 
would  have  been  delightful,  and  by  no  means 
unnatural.  There  is  scarcely  any  public  man 
in  our  history  of  whose  manners  and  conver 
sation  so  many  particulars  have  been  pre 
served.  Single  stories  may  be  unfounded  or 
exaggerated.  But  all  the  stories,  whether  told 
by  people  who  were  perpetually  seeing  him  in 
Parliament  and  attending  his  levee  in  Lin 
coln's  Inn  Fields,  or  by  Grub  street  writers 
who  never  had  more  than  a  glimpse  of  his 
star  through  the  windows  of  his  gilded  coach, 
are  of  the  same  character.  Horace  Walpole 
and  Smollett  differed  in  their  tastes  and  opi 
nions  as  much  as  two  human  beings  could 
differ.  They  kept  quite  different  society.  The 
one  played  at  cards  with  countesses  and  corres 
ponded  with  ambassadors.  The  other  passed 
his  life  surrounded  by  a  knot  of  famished 
scribblers.  Yet  Walpole's  Duke  and  SmollettV 
Duke  are  as  like  as  if  they  were  both  from  one 
hand.  Smollett's  Newcastle  runs  out  of  his 
dressing-room  with  his  face  covered  Avith  soap 
suds  to  embrace  the  Moorish  envoy.  Walpole's 
Newcastle  pushes  his  way  into  the  Duke  of 
Grafton's  sick-room  to  kiss  the  old  nobleman's 
plasters.  No  man  was  ever  so  unmercifully 
satirized.  But  in  truth  he  was  himself  a  satir* 
ready  made.  All  that  the  art  of  the  satirist 
does  for  other  ridiculous  men  nature  had  done 
for  him.  Whatever  was  absurd  about  him 
stood  out  with  grotesque  prominence  from  the 
rest  of  the  character.  He  was  a  living,  mov 
ing,  talking  caricature.  His  gait  was  a  shuf 
fling  trot;  his  utterance  a  rapid  stutter;  he 
was  always  in  a  hurry;  he  was  never  in  time; 
he  abounded  in  fulsome  caresses  and  in  hys- 


WALPOLE'S   LETTERS  TO  SIR  HORACE  MANN 


225 


terical  tears.  His  oratory  resembles  that  of 
Justice  Shallow.  It  was  nonsense  effervescent 
with  animal  spirits  and  impertinence.  Of  his 
ignorance  many  anecdotes  remain,  some  well 
authenticated,  some  probably  invented  at  cof 
fee-houses,  but  all  exquisitely  characteristic. 
"  Oh — yes — yes — to  be  sure — Annapolis  must 
be  defended — troops  must  be  sent  to  Annapo 
lis — Pray,  where  is  Annapolis'!" — "Cape  Bre 
ton  an  island!  wonderful — show  it  me  in  the 
map.  So  it  is,  sure  enough.  My  dear  sir,  you 
always  bring  us  good  news.  I  must  go  and 
tell  the  king  that  Cape  Breton  is  an  island." 

And  this  man  was  during  nearly  thirty  years 
secretary  of  state,  and  during  nearly  ten  years 
first  .lord  of  the  treasury!     His  large  fortune, 
his   strong  hereditary   connection,   his   great 
parliamentary  Interest,  will  not  alone  explain 
this  extraordinary  fact.    His  success  is  a  sig 
nal  instance  of  what  may  be  effected  by  a  man  | 
who  devotes  his  whole  heart  and  soul  without , 
reserve  to  one  object.    He  was  eaten  up  by  I 
ambition.    His  love  of  influence  and  authority  ! 
resembled  the  avarice  of  the  old  usurer  in  the  ! 
"  Fortunes  of  Nigel."    It  was  so  intense  a  pas- ! 
sion  that  it  supplied  the  place  of  talents,  that  j 
it  inspired  even  fatuity  with  cunning.     "Have  j 
no  money  dealings  with  my  father,"  says  Mar-  | 
tha  to  Lord  Glenvarloch ;  "  for,  dotard  as  he  ' 


is,  he  will  make  an  ass  of  you."  It  was  as 
dangerous  to  have  any  political  connection 
with  Newcastle  as  to  buy  and  sell  with  old 
Trapbois.  He  was  greedy  after  power  with  a 
greediness  all  his  own.  He  was  jealous  of  all 
his  colleagues,  and  even  of  his  own  brother. 
Under  the  disguise  of  levity  he  was  false  be 
yond  all  example  of  political  falsehood.  All 
the  able  men  of  his  time  ridiculed  him  as  a 
dunce,  a  driveller,  a  child  who  never  knew  his 
own  mind  for  an  hour  together,  and  he  over 
reached  them  all  round. 

If  the  country  had  remained  at  peace,  it  is 
not  impossible  that  this  man  would  have  con 
tinued  at  the  head  of  affairs,  without  admitting 
any  other  person  to  a  share  of  his  authority, 
until  the  throne  was  filled  by  a  new  prince, 
who  brought  with  him  new  maxims  of  govern 
ment,  new  favourites,  and  a  strong  will.  But 
the  inauspicious  commencement  cf  the  Seven 
Years'  War  brought  on  a  crisis  to  which  New 
castle  was  altogether  unequal.  After  a  calm  of 
fifteen  years  the  spirit  of  the  nation  was  again 
stirred  to  its  inmost  depths.  In  a  few  days  the 
whole  aspect  of  the  political  world  was  changed. 

But  that  change  is  too  remarkable  an  event 
to  be  discussed  at  the  end  of  an  article  already 
too  long.  It  is  probable  that  we  may,  at  no  re 
mote  time,  resume  the  subject. 


S26 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


THACKERAY'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  EAEL  OF 
CHATHAM.' 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1834.] 


THOUGH  several  years  have  elapsed  since 
the  publication  of  this  work,  it  is  still,  we  be- 
Meve,  a  new  publication  to  most  of  our  read 
ers.  Nor  are  we  surprised  at  this.  The  book 
is  large  and  the  style  heavy.  The  information 
which  Mr.  Thackeray  has  obtained  from  the 
State  Paper  Office  is  new,  but  much  of  it  is  to 
us  very  uninteresting.  The  rest  of  his  narra 
tive  is  very  little  better  than  Gilford's  or  Tom- 
line's  Life  of  the  Second  Pitt,  and  tells  us  little 
or  nothing  that  may  not  be  found  quite  as  well 
told  in  the  "Parliamentary  History,"  the  "An 
nual  Register,"  and  other  works  equally  com 
mon. 

Almost  every  mechanical  employment,  it  is 
said,  has  a  tendency  to  injure  some  one  or 
other  of  the  bodily  organs  of  the  artisan.  Grind 
ers  of  cutlery  die  of  consumption ;  weavers  are 
stunted  in  their  growth;  and  smiths  become 
blear-eyed.  In  the  same  manner  almost  every 
intellectual  employment  has  a  tendency  to  pro 
duce  some  intellectual  malady.  Biographers, 
translators,  editors — all,  in  short,  who  employ 
themselves  in  illustrating  the  lives  or  the 
writing:  cf  others,  are  peculiarly  exposed  to 
the  Lues  Boswdliana,  or  disease  of  admiration. 
But  we  scarcely  remember  ever  to  have  seen 
a  patient  so  far  gone  in  this  distemper  as  Mr. 
Thackeray.  He  is  not  satisfied  with  forcing 
us  to  confess  that  Pitt  was  a  great  orator,  a 
vigorous  minister,  an  honourable  and  high- 
spirited  gentleman.  He  will  have  it  that  all 
virtues  and  all  accomplishments  met  in  his 
hero.  In  spite  of  gods,  men,  and  columns,  Pitt 
must  be  a  poet — a  poet  capable  of  producing  a 
heroic  poem  of  the  first  order;  and  we  are  as 
sured  that  we  ougkt  to  find  many  charms  in 
such  lines  as  these: 

•*  Midst  all  the  tumults  of  the  warring  sphere, 
My  light-charged  bark  may  haply  glide  ; 

Some  gale  may  waft,  some    conscious  thought  shall 

cheer, 
And  the  small  freight  unanxious^ZuZe." 

Pitt  was  in  the  army  for  a  few  months  in 
time  of  peace.  Mr.  Thackeray  accordingly 
insists  on  our  confessing  that,  if  the  young 
cornet  had  remained  in  the  service,  he  would 
have  been  one  of  the  ablest  commanders  that 
ever  lived.  But  this  is  not  all.  Pitt,  it  seems, 
was  not  merely  a  great  poet  in  esse,  and  a  great 
general  in  posse,  but  a  finished  example  of  mo- 

*  A  History  of  the  Right  Honourable  William  Pitt,  Earl 
•/  Chatham,  containing  his  Speeches  in  Parliament,  a  con- 
giderable  portion  of  his  Correspondence  when  Secretary  of 
State,  upon  French,  Spanish,  and  American  Affairs,  never 
before  published ;  and  an  account  of  the  principal  Events 
and  Persons  of  his  Time,  connected  with  his  Life,  Sen 
timents,  and  Administration.  By  the  Rev.  FRANCIS 
THACKERAY,  A.M.  2  vols.  4to.  London.  1827. 


ral  excellence — the  just  man  made  perfect. 
He  was  in  the  right  when  he  attempted  to  esta 
blish  an  inquisition,  and  to  give  bounties  for 
perjury,  in  order  to  get  Walpole's  head.  He 
was  in  the  right  when  he  declared  Walpole  to 
have  been  an  excellent  minister.  He  was  in 
the  right  when,  being  in  opposition,  he  main 
tained  that  no  peace  ought  to  be  made  with 
Spain,  till  she  should  formally  renounce  the 
right  of  search.  He  was  in  the  right  when, 
being  in  office,  he  silently  acquiesced  in  a 
treaty  by  which  Spain  did  not  renounce  the 
right  of  search.  When  he  left  the  Duke  of 
Newcastle,  when  he  coalesced  with  the  Duke 
of  Newcastle  ;  when  he  thundered  against  sub 
sidies,  when  he  lavished  subsidies  with  unex 
ampled  profusion ;  when  he  execrated  the 
Hanoverian  connection  ;  when  he  declared 
that  Hanover  ought  to  be  as  dear  to  us  as 
Hampshire ;  he  was  still  invariably  speaking 
the  language  of  a  virtuous  and  enlightened 
statesman. 

The  truth  is,  that  there  scarcely  ever  lived  a 
person  who  had  so  little  claim  to  this  sort  of 
praise  as  Pitt.  He  was  undoubtedly  a  great 
man.  But  his  was  not  a  complete  and  well- 
proportioned  greatness.  The  public  life  of 
Hampden,  or  of  Somers,  resembles  a  regular 
drama,  which  can  be  criticised  as  a  whole,  and 
every  scene  of  which  is  to  be  viewed  in  con 
nection  with  the  main  action.  TLe  public  life 
of  Pitt,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  rude  though 
striking  piece — a  piece  abounding  in  incon 
gruities — a  piece  without  any  unity  of  plan, 
but  redeemed  by  some  noble  passages,  the 
effect  of  which  is  increased  by  the  tameness 
or  extravagance  of  what  precedes  and  of  what 
follows.  His  opinions  were  unfixed.  His  con 
duct  at  some  of  the  most  important  conjunc 
tures  of  his  life  was  evidently  determined  by 
pride  and  resentment.  He  had  one  fault,  which 
of  all  human  faults  is  most  rarely  found  in 
company  with  true  greatness.  He  was  ex 
tremely  affected.  He  was  an  almost  solitary 
instance  of  a  man  of  real  genius,  and  of  a 
brave,  lofty,  and  commanding  spirit,  without 
simplicity  of  character.  He  was  an  actor  in  the 
closet,  an  actor  at  Council,  an  actor  in  Parlia 
ment;  and  even  in  private  society  he  could 
not  lay  aside  his  theatrical  tones  and  attitudes. 
We  know  that  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
of  his  partisans  often  complained  that  he  could 
never  obtain  admittance  to  Lord  Chatham's 
room  till  every  thing  was  ready  for  the  repre 
sentation,  till  the  dresses  and  properties  were 
j  all  correctly  disposed,  till  the  light  was  thrown 
i  with  Rembrandt-like  effect 'on  the  head  of  the 
j  illustrious  performer,  till  the  flannels  had  been 


THACKERAY'S   CHATHAM. 


227 


arranged  with  the  air  of  a  Grecian  drapery, 
and  the  crutch  placed  as  gracefully  as  that  of 
Belisarius  or  Lear. 

Yet,  with  all  his  faults  and  affectations,  Pitt 
had,  in  a  very  extraordinary  degree,  many  of 
the  elements  of  greatness.  He  had  splendid 
talents,  strong  passions,  quick  sensibility,  and 
vehement  enthusiasm  for  the  grand  and  the 
beautiful.  There  was  something  about  him 
which  ennobled  tergiversation  itself.  He  often 
went  wrong,  very  wrong.  But  to  quote  £he 
language  of  Wordsworth, 

"  He  still  retained, 

'Mid  such  abasement,  what  he  had  received 
From  nature,  an  intense  and  glowing  mind." 

In  an  age  of  low  and  dirty  prostitution — in 
the  age  of  Doddington  and  Sandys — it  wa» 
something  to  have  a  man  who  might,  perhaps, 
under  some  strong  excitement,  have  been 
tempted  to  ruin  his  country,  but  who  never 
would  have  stooped  to  pilfer  from  her ; — a  man 
whose  errors  arose,  not  from  a  sordid  desire 
of  gain,  but  from  a  fierce  thirst  for  power,  for 
glory,  and  for  vengeance.  History  owes  to 
him  this  attestation — that,  at  a  time  when  any 
thing  short  of  direct  embezzlement  of  the  pub 
lic  money  was  considered  as  quite  fair  in  pub 
lic  men,  he  showed  the  most  scrupulous  dis 
interestedness  ;  that,  at  a  time  when  it  seemed 
to  be  generally  taken  for  granted  that  govern 
ment  could  be  upheld  only  by  the  basest  and 
most  immoral  arts,  he  appealed  to  the  better 
and  nobler  parts  of  human  nature ;  that  he 
made  a  brave  and  splendid  attempt  to  do,  by 
means  of  public  opinion,  what  no  other  states 
man  of  his  day  thought  it  possible  to  do,  ex 
cept  by  means  of  corruption  :  that  he  looked 
for  support,  not  like  the  Pelhams,  to  a  strong 
aristocratical  connection,  not,  like  Bute,  to  the 
personal  favour  of  the  sovereign,  but  to  the 
middle  class  of  Englishmen;  that  he  inspired 
that  class  with  a  firm  confidence  in  his  inte 
grity  and  ability ;  that,  backed  by  them,  he 
forced  an  unwilling  court  and  an  unwilling 
oligarchy  to  admit  him  to  an  ample  share  of 
power ;  and  that  he  used  his  power  in  such  a 
manner  as  clearly  proved  that  he  had  sought 
it,  not  for  the  sake  of  profit  or  patronage,  but 
from  a  wish  to  establish  for  himself  a  great  and 
durable  reputation  by  means  of  eminent  ser 
vices  rendered  to  the  state. 

The  family  of  Pitt  was  wealthy  and  respect 
able.  His  grandfather  was  Governor  of  Madras; 
and  brought  back  from  India  that  celebrated 
diamond  which  the  Regent  Orleans,  by  the  ad 
vice  of  Saint  Simon,  purchased  for  upwards 
of  three  millions  of  livres,  and  which  is  still 
considered  as  the  most  precious  of  the  crown 
jewels  of  France.  Governor  Pitt  bought  estates 
and  rotten  boroughs,  and  sat  in  the  House  of 
Commons  for  Old  Sarum.  His  son  Robert  was 
at  one  time  member  for  Old  Sarum,  and  at  an 
other  for  Oakhampton.  Robert  had  two  sons. 
Thomas,  the  elder,  inherited  the  estates  and 
the  parliamentary  interest  of  his  father.  The 
second  was  the  celebrated  William  Pitt. 

He  was  born  in  November,  1708.  About  the 
early  part  of  his  life  little  more  is  known  than 
that  he  was  educated  at  Eton,  and  that  at  se- 


!  venteen  he  was  entered  at  Trinity  College, 
;  Oxford.  During  the  second  year  of  his  resi 
dence  at  the  University,  George  the  First  died; 
and  the  ever^t  was,  after  the  fashion  of  that  ge 
neration,  celebrated  by  the  Oxonians  in  many 
very  middling  copies  of  verses.  On  this  occa 
sion  Pitt  published  some  Latin  lines,  which 
Mr.  Thackeray  has  preserved.  They  prove 
that  he  had  but  a  very  limited  knowledge  even 
of  the  mechanical  part  of  his  art.  All  true 
Etonians  will  hear  with  concern,  that  their 
illustrious  school-fellow  is  guilty  of  making 
the  first  syllable  in  labenti  short.  The  matter 
of  the  poem  is  as  worthless  as  that  of  any 
college  exercise  that  was  ever  written  before 
or  since.  There  is,  of  course,  much  about 
Mars,  Themis,  Neptune,  and  Cocytus.  The 
Muses  are  earnestly  entreated  to  weep  for 
Ccesar;  for  Caesar,  says  the  poet,  loved  the 
Muses  ; — Caesar,  who  could  not  read  a  line  of 
Pope,  and  who  Icved  nothing  but  punch  and 
fat  women. 

Pitt  had  been,  from  his  schooldays,  cruelly 
tormented  by  the  gout;  and  was  at  last  advised 
to  travel  for  his  health.  He  accordingly  left 
Oxford  without  taking  a  degree,  and  visited 
France  and  Italy.  He  returned,  however, 
without  having  received  much  benefit  from  his 
excursion,  and  continued,  till  the  close  of  his 
life,  to  suffer  most  severely  from  his  constitu 
tional  malady. 

His  father  was  now  dead,  and  had  left  very 
little  to  the  younger  children.  It  was  neces 
sary  that  William  should  choose  a  profession. 
He  decided  for  the  army,  and  a  cornet's  com 
mission  was  procured  for  him  in  the  Blues. 

But,  small  as  his  fortune  was,  his  family  had 
both  the  power  and  the  inclination  to  serve 
him.  At  the  general  election  of  1734,  his  elder 
brother  Thomas  was  chosen  both  for  Old  Sa 
rum  and  for  Oakhampton.  When  Parliament 
met  in  1735,  Thomas  made  his  election  to 
serve  for  Oakhampton,  and  William  was  re 
turned  for  Old  Sarum. 

Walpole  had  now  been,  during  fourteen 
years,  at  the  head  of  affairs.  He  had  risen  to 
power  under  the  most  favourable  circum 
stances.  The  whole  of  the  Whig  party — of 
that  party  which  professed  peculiar  attachmeat 
to  the  principles  of  the  Revolution,  and  which 
exclusively  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  the 
reigning  house — had  been  united  in  support 
of  his  administration.  Happily  for  him,  he 
had  been  out  of  office  when  the  South  Sea  Act 
was  passed;  and,  though  he  does  not  appear 
to  have  foreseen  all  the  consequences  of  that 
measure,  he  had  strenuously  opposed  it,  as  he 
opposed  almost  all  the  measures,  good  or  bad, 
of  Sunderland's  administration.  When  the 
South  Sea  Company  were  voting  dividends  of 
fifty  per  cent. — when  a  hundred  pound?  of  their 
stock  were  selling  for  eleven  hundred  pounds 
— when  Threadneedle  street  was  daily  crowd 
ed  with  the  coaches  of  dukes  and  prelates 
when  divines  and  philosophers  turned  gamblers 
— when  a  thousand  kindred  bubbles  were  daily 
blown  into  existence — the  periwig  company, 
and  the  Spanish-jackass  company,  and  the 
quicksilver-fixation  company — Walpole's  calm 
good  sense  preserved  him  from  the  general  in- 


228 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


fatuation.  He  condemned  the  prevailing  mad 
ness  in  public,  and  turned  a  considerable  sum 
by  taking  advantage  of  it  in  private.  When 
the  crash  came — when  ten  thousand  families 
•were  reduced  to  beggary  in  a  day — when  the 
people,  in  the  frenzy  of  their  rage  and  despair, 
clamoured  not  only  against  the  lower  agents 
in  the  juggle,  but  against  the  Hanoverian  fa 
vourites,  against  the  English  ministers,  against 
the  king  himself — when  Parliament  met,  eager 
for  confiscation  and  blood — when  members  of 
the  House  of  Commons  proposed  that  the  di 
rectors  should  be  treated  like  parricides  in 
ancient  Rome,  tied  up  in  sacks,  and  thrown 
into  the  Thames,  Walpole  was  the  man  on 
whom  all  parties  turned  their  eyes.  Four  years 
before  he  had  been  driven  from  power  by  the 
intrigues  of  Sunderland  and  Stanhope,  and  the 
lead  in  the  House  of  Commons  had  been  in 
trusted  to  Craggs  and  Aislabie.  Stanhope  was 
no  more.  Aislabie  was  expelled  from  Parlia 
ment,  on  account  of  his  disgraceful  conduct 
regarding  the  South  Sea  scheme.  Craggs  was 
saved  by  a  timely  death  from  a  similar  mark 
of  infamy.  A  large  minority  in  the  House  of 
Commons  voted  for  a  severe  censure  on  Sun 
derland,  who,  finding  it  impossible  to  withstand 
the  force  of  the  prevailing  sentiment,  retired 
from  office,  and  outlived  his  retirement  but  a 
very  short  time.  The  schism  which  had  di 
vided  the  Whig  party  was  now  completely 
healed.  Walpole  had  no  opposition  to  en 
counter  except  that  of  the  Tories,  and  the 
Tories  were  naturally  regarded  by  the  king 
with  the  strongest  suspicion  and  dislike. 

For  a  time  business  went  on  with  a  smooth 
ness  and  a  despatch  such  as  had  not  been 
known  since  the  days  of  the  Tudors.  During 
the  session  of  1724,  for  example,  there  was 
enly  a  single  division.  It  was  not  impossible 
that,  by  taking  the  course  which  Pelham  after 
wards  took — by  admitting  into  the  government 
all  the  rising  talents  and  ambition  of  the  Whig 
party,  and  by  making  room  here  and  there  for 
a  Tory  not  unfriendly  to  the  House  of  Bruns 
wick — Walpole  might  have  averted  the  tre 
mendous  conflict  in  which  he  passed  the  lat 
ter  years  of  his  administration,  and  in  which 
he  was  at  length  vanquished.  The  Opposition 
which  overthrew  him  was  an  opposition  cre 
ated  by  his  own  policy,  by  his  own  insatiable 
love  of  power. 

In  the  very  act  of  forming  his  ministry,  he 
turned  one  of  the  ablest  and  most  attached  of 
his  supporters  into  a  deadly  enemy.  Pulteney 
had  strong  public  and  private  claims  to  a  high 
situation  in  the  new  arrangement.  His  fortune 
was  immense.  His  private  character  was 
respectable.  He  was  already  a  distinguished 
speaker.  He  had  acquired  official  experience 
m  an  important  post.  He  had  been,  through 
all  changes  of  fortune,  a  consistent  Whig. 
When  the  Whig  party  was  split  into  two  sec 
tions,  Pulteney  had  resigned  a  valuable  place, 
and  had  followed  the  fortunes  of  Walpole.  Yet 
when  Walpole  returned  to  power,  Pulteney 
was  not  invited  to  take  office.  An  angry  dis 
cussion  took  place  between  the  friends.  The 
minister  offered  a  peerage.  It  was  impossible 
for  Pulteney  not  to  discern  the  motive  of  such 


j  an  offer.  He  indignantly  refused  to  accept* 
For  some  time  he  continued  to  brood  over  his 
wrongs,  and  to  watch  for  an  opportunity  of 
revenge.  As  soon  as  a  favourable  conjunc 
ture  arrived,  he  joined  the  minority,  and  be 
came  the  greatest  leader  of  Opposition  that  the 
House  of  Commons  had  ever  seen. 

Of  all  the  members  of  the  cabinet,  Carteret 
was  the  most  eloquent  and  accomplished.  His 
talents  for  debate  were  of  the  first  order ;  his 
knowledge  of  foreign  affairs  superior  to  that 
of  any  living  statesman ;  his  attachment  to  the 
Protestant  succession  was  undoubted.  But 
there  was  not  room  in  one  government  for  him 
and  Walpole.  Carteret  retired,  and  was,  from 
that  time  forward,  one  of  the  most  persevering 
and  formidable  enemies  of  his  old  colleague. 
,,  If  there  was  any  man  with  whom  Walpole 
could  have  consented  to  make  a  partition  of 
power,  that  man  was  Lord  Townshend.  They 
were  distant  kinsmen  by  birth,  near  kinsmen 
by  marriage.  They  had  been  friends  from 
childhood.  They  had  been  schoolfellows  at 
Eton.  They  were  country-neighbours  in  Nor 
folk.  They  had  been  in  office  together  under 
Godolphin.  They  had  gone  into  opposition 
together  when  Harley  rose  to  power.  They 
had  been  persecuted  by  the  same  House  of 
Commons.  They  had,  after  the  death  of  Anne, 
been  recalled  together  to  office.  They  had 
again  been  driven  out  by  Sunderland,  and  had 
again  come  back  together  when  the  influence 
of  Sunderland  had  declined.  Their  opinions 
on  public  affairs  almost  always  coincided 
They  were  both  men  of  frank,  generous,  and 
compassionate  natures  ;  their  intercourse  had 
been  for  many  years  most  affectionate  and  cor 
dial.  But  the  ties  of  blood,  of  marriage,  and 
of  friendship,  the  memory  of  mutual  services 
and  common  persecutions,  were  insufficient  to 
restrain  that  ambition  which  domineered  over 
all  the  virtues  and  vices  of  Walpole.  He  was 
resolved,  to  use  his  own  metaphor,  that  the  firm 
of  the  house  should  be,  not  "Townshend  and 
Walpole,"  but  "Walpole  and  Townshend." 
At  length  the  rivals  proceeded  to  personal 
abuse  before  witnesses,  seized  each  other  by 
the  collar,  and  grasped  their  swords.  The 
women  squalled.  The  men  parted  the  combat- 
ants.*  By  friendly  intervention  the  scandal 
of  a  duel  between  cousins,  brothers-in-law,  old 
friends,  and  old  colleagues,  was  prevented. 
But  the  disputants  could  not  long  continue  to 
act  together.  Townshend  retired,  and  with 
rare  moderation  and  public  spirit,  refused  to 
take  any  part  in  politics.  He  could  not,  he 
said,  trust  his  temper.  He  feared  that  the  re 
collection  of  his  private  wrongs  might  impel 
him  to  follow  the  example  of  Pulteney,  and  to 
oppose  measures  which  he  thought  generally 
beneficial  to  the  country.  He,  therefore,  never 
visited  London  after  his  resignation ;  but  pass 
ed  the  closing  years  of  his  life  in  dignity  and 
repose  among  his  trees  and  pictures  at  Rain- 
ham. 
Next  went  Chesterfield.  He  too  was  a  Whig 


*The  scene  of  this  extraordinary  quarrel  wa?  we  be 
lieve,  a  house  in  Cleveland  Square,  now  occupied  by 
Mr.  Ellice,  the  Secretary  at  War.  It  was  then  the  resi 
dence  of  Colonel  ti«lwvu. 


THACKERAY'S  CHATHAM. 


229 


ind  a  friend  of  the  Protestant  succession.  He 
was  an  orator,  a  courtier,  a  wit,  and  a  man  of 
tetters.  He  was  at  the  head  of  ton  in  days 
when,  in  order  to  be  at  the  head  of  ton,  it  was 
not  sufficient  to  be  dull  and  supercilious.  It 
was  evident  that  he  submitted  impatiently  to 
the  ascendency  of  Walpole.  He  murmured 
against  the  Excise  Bill.  His  brothers  voted 
against  it  in  the  House  of  Commons.  The 
minister  acted  with  characteristic  caution  and 
characteristic  energy ; — caution  in  the  conduct 
of  public  affairs ;  energy  where  his  own  ad 
ministration  was  concerned.  He  withdrew 
his  bill,  and  turned  out  all  his  hostile  or  waver 
ing  colleagues.  Chesterfield  was  stopped  on 
the  great  staircase  of  St.  James's,  and  sum 
moned  to  deliver  up  the  staff  which  he  bore  as 
Lord  Steward  of  the  Household.  A  crowd  of 
noble  and  powerful  functionaries — the  Dukes 
of  Montrose  and  Bolton,  Lord  Burlington, 
Lord  Stair,  Lord  Cobham,  Lord  Marchmont, 
Lord  Clinton — were  at  the  same  time  dis 
missed  from  the  service  of  the  crown. 

Not  long  after  these  events,  the  Opposition 
•was  reinforced  by  the  Duke  of  Argyle,  a  man 
vainglorious  indeed  and  fickle,  but  brave,  elo 
quent,  and  popular.  It  was  in  a  great  mea 
sure  owing  to  his  exertions  that  the  Act  of  Set 
tlement  had  been  peaceably  executed  in  Eng 
land  immediately  after  the  death  of  Anne,  and 
that  the  Jacobite  rebellion  which,  during  the 
following  year,  broke  out  in  Scotland,  was  sup 
pressed.  He  too  carried  over  to  the  minority 
the  aid  of  his  great  name,  his  talents,  and  his 
paramount  influence  in  his  native  country. 

In  each  of  these  cases  taken  separately,  a 
skilful  defender  of  Walpole  might  perhaps 
make  out  a  case  for  him.  But  when  we  see 
that  during  a  long  course  of  years  all  the  foot 
steps  are  turned  the  same  way — that  all  the 
most  eminent  of  those  public  men  who  agreed 
with  the  minister  in  their  general  views  of 
policy  left  him,  one  after  another,  with  sore  and 
irritated  minds,  we  find  it  impossible  not  to 
believe  that  the  real  explanation  of  the  phe 
nomenon  is  to  be  found  in  the  words  of  his  son, 
"Sir  Robert  Walpole  loved  power  so  much 
that  he  would  not  endure  a  rival."*  Hume  has 
described  this  famous  minister  with  great  feli 
city  in  one  short  sentence — "  moderate  in  exer 
cising  power,  not  equitable  in  engrossing  it." 
Kind-hearted,  jovial,  and  placible  as  Walpole 
was,  he  was  yet  a  man  with  whom  no  person 
of  high  pretensions  and  high  spirit  could  long 
continue  to  act.  He  had,  therefore,  to  stand 
against  an  Opposition  containing  all  the  most 
accomplished  statesmen  of  the  age,  Math  no 
better  support  than  that  which  he  received  from 
persons  like  his  brother  Horace,  or  Henry  Pel- 
ham,  whose  industrious  mediocrity  gave  him 
no  cause  for  jealousy ;  or  from  clever  adven 
turers,  whose  situation  and  character  diminish 
ed  the  dread  which  their  talents  might  other 
wise  have  inspired.  To  this  last  class  belong 
ed  Fox,  who  was  too  poor  to  live  without  office ; 
Sir  William  Yonge,  of  whom  Walpole  himself 
said,  that  nothing  but  such  parts  could  buoy  up 
»uch  a  character,  that  nothing  but  such  a 

*Memoirs,  vol.  i.  p.  201. 


character  could  drag  down  such  parts ;  and 
Winnington,  whose  private  morals  lay,  justly  or 
unjustly,  under  imputations  of  the  worst  kind. 

The  discontented  Whigs  were,  not  perhaps 
in  number,  but  certainly  in  ability,  experience, 
and  weight,  by  far  the  most  important  part  of 
the  Opposition.  The  Tories  Burnished  littla 
more  than  rows  of  ponderous  fox-hunters,  fat 
with  Staffordshire  or  Devonshire  ale — men 
who  drank  to  the  king  over  the  water,  and  be 
lieved  that  all  the  fundholders  were  Jews — 
men  whose  religion  consisted  in  hating  the 
Dissenters,  and  whose  political  researches  had 
led  them  to  fear,  like  Squire  Western,  that  their 
land  might  be  sent  over  to  Hanover  to  be  put 
into  the  sinking-fund.  The  eloquence  of  these 
patriotic  squires,  the  remnant  of  the  on  -,e  for 
midable  October  Club,  seldom  went  be)  ond  a 
hearty  Ay  or  No.  Very  few  members  c  f  this 
party  had  distinguished  themselves  much  in 
Parliament,  or  could,  under  any  circumstances, 
have  been  called  to  fill  any  high  office  ;  and 
those  few  had  generally,  like  Sir  William 
Wyndham,  learned  in  the  company  of  their 
new  associates  the  doctrines  of  toleration  and 
political  liberty,  and  might  indeed  with  strict 
propriety  be  called  Whigs. 

It  was  to  the  WThigs  in  opposition,  the  pa 
triots,  as  they  were  called,  that  the  most  dis 
tinguished  of  the  English  youth,  who  at  this 
season  entered  into  public  life,  attached  them 
selves.  These  inexperienced  politicians  felt 
all  the  enthusiasm  which  the  name  of  liberty 
naturally  excites  in  young  and  ardent  minds. 
They  conceived  that  the  theory  of  the  Tory 
Opposition,  and  the  practice  of  Walpole's  go 
vernment,  were  alike  inconsistent  with  the 
principles  of  liberty.  They  accordingly  re 
paired  to  the  standard  which  Pulteney  had  set 
up.  While  opposing  the  Whig  minister,  they 
professed  a  firm  adherence  to  the  purest  doc 
trines  of  Whigism.  He  was  the  schismatic; 
they  were  the  true  Catholics,  the  peculiar  peo 
ple,  the  depositaries  of  the  orthodox  faith  of 
Hampden  and  Russell ;  the  one  sect  which, 
amidst  the  corruptions  generated  by  time,  and 
by  the  long  possession  of  power,  had  preserved 
inviolate  the  principles  of  the  Revolution.  Of 
the  young  men  who  attached  themselves  t« 
this  portion  of  the  Opposition,  the  most  dis 
tinguished  were  Lyttleton  and  Pitt. 

When  Pitt  entered  Parliament,  the  whole 
political  world  was  attentively  watching  tne 
progress  of  an  event  which  soon  added  great 
strength  to  the  Opposition,  and  particularly 
to  that  section  of  the  Opposition  in  which  the 
young  statesman  enrolled  himself.  The  Prince 
of  Wales  was  gradually  becoming  more  and 
more  estranged  from  his  father  and  his  fa 
ther's  ministers,  and  more  and  more  friendly 
to  the  patriots. 

Nothing  is  more  natural  than  that,  in  a  mo 
narchy,  where  a  constitutional  Opposition  ex 
ists,the  heir-apparent  of  the  throne  should  put 
himself  at  the  head  of  that  Opposition.  He  is 
impelled  to  such  a  course  by  every  feeling  of 
ambition  and  of  vanity.  He  cannot  be  more 
than  second  in  the  estimation  of  the  party 
which  is  in.  He  is  sure  to  be  the  first  mem 
ber  of  the  party  which  is  out.  The  highest 


230 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


favour  which  the  existing  administration  can 
expect  from  him  is,  that  he  will  not  discard 
them.  But,  if  he  joins  the  Opposition,  all  his 
associates  expect  that  he  will  promote  them; 
and  the  feelings  which  men  entertain  towards 
one  from  whom  they  hope  to  obtain  great  ad 
vantages  which  they  have  not,  are  far  warmer 
than  the  feelings  with  which  they  regard  one 
who,  at  the  very  utmost,  can  only  leave  them 
in  possession  of  what  they  already  have.  An 
heir-apparent,  therefore,  who  wishes  to  enjoy, 
in  the  highest  perfection,  all  the  pleasure  that 
can  be  derived  from  eloquent  flattery  and  pro 
found  respect,  will  always  join  those  who  are 
struggling  to  force  themselves  into  power. 
This  is,  we  believe,  the  true  explanation  of  a 
fact  which  Lord  Granville  attributed  to  some 
natural  peculiarity  in  the  illustrious  house  of 
Brunswick.  "This  family,"  said  he  at  Council, 
we  suppose  after  his  daily  half-gallon  of  Bur 
gundy,  "always  has  quarrelled  and  always 
will  quarrel,  from  generation  to  generation." 
He  should  have  known  something  of  the  mat 
ter  ;  for  he  had  been  a  favourite  with  three  suc 
cessive  generations  of  the  royal  house.  We 
cannot  quite  admit  his  explanation ;  but  the 
fact  is  indisputable.  Since  the  accession  of 
George  the  First,  there  have  been  four  Princes 
of  Wales,  and  they  have  all  been  almost  con 
stantly  in  opposition. 

Whatever  might  have  been  the  motives 
which  induced  Prince  Frederic  to  join  the 
party  opposed  to  Sir  Robert  Walpole,  his  sup 
port  infused  into  many  members  of  that  party 
a  courage  and  an  energy,  of  which  they  stood 
greatly  in  need.  Hitherto,  it  had  been  impos 
sible  for  the  discontented  Whigs  not  to  feel 
some  misgivings  when  they  found  themselves 
dividing  night  after  night,  with  uncompromis 
ing  Jacobites,  who  were  known  to  be  in  con 
stant  communication  with  the  exiled  family ; 
or  with  Tories  who  had  impeached  Somers, 
who  had  murmured  against  Harley  and  St. 
John  as  too  remiss  in  the  cause  of  the  Church 
and  the  landed  interest;  and  who,  if  they  were 
not  inclined  to  attack  the  reigning  family,  yet 
considered  the  introduction  of  that  family  as, 
at  best,  only  the  less  of  two  great  evils — as  a 
necessary,  but  a  painful  and  humiliating  pre 
servative  against  Popery.  The  minister  might 
plausibly  say  that  Pulteney  and  Carteret,  in 
the  hope  of  gratifying  their  own  appetite  for 
office  and  for  revenge,  did  not  scruple  to  serve 
the  purposes  of  a  faction  hostile  to  the  Pro 
testant  succession.  The  appearance  of  Fre 
deric  at  the  head  of  the  patriots  silenced  this 
reproach.  The  leaders  of  the  Opposition  might 
now  boast  that  their  proceedings  were  sanc 
tioned  by  a  person  as  deeply  interested  as  the 
king  himself  in  maintaining  the  Act  of  Settle 
ment;  and  that,  instead  of  serving  the  pur 
poses  of  the  Tory  party,  they  had  brought  that 
party  over  to  the  side  of  Whigism.  It  must 
indeed  be  admitted  that,  though  both  the  king 
and  the  prince  behaved  in  a  manner  little  to 
their  honour — though  the  father  acted  harshly, 
the  son  disrespectfully,  and  both  childish 
ly — the  royal  family  was  rather  strengthened 
than  weakened  by  the  disagreement  of  its  two 
most  distinguished  members.  A  large  class 


!  of  politicians,  who  had  considered  themselves 
!  as  placed  under  sentence  of  perpetual  exclu 
sion  from  office,  and  who,  in  their  despair,  had 
j  been  almost  ready  to  join  in  a  counter-revolu 
tion,  as  the  only  mode  of  removing  the  pro 
scription  under  which  they  lay,  now  saw  with 
pleasure  an  easier  and  safer  road  to  power 
opening  before  them,  and  thought  it  far  better 
to  wait  till,  in  the  natural  course  of  things,  the 
crown  should  descend  to  the  heir  of  the  house 
of  Brunswick,  than  to  risk  their  lands  and 
their  necks  in  a  rising  for  the  house  of  Stuart. 
The  situation  of  the  royal  family  resembled 
the  situation  of  those  Scotch  families  in  which 
father  and  son  took  opposite  sides  during  the 
rebellion,  in  order  that,  come  what  might,  the 
estate  might  not  be  forfeited. 

In  April,  1736,  Frederic  was  married  to  the 
Princess  of  Saxe-Gotha,  with  whom  he  after 
wards  lived  on  terms  very  similar  to  those  on 
which  his  father  had  lived  with  Queen  Caro 
line.  The  prince  adored  his  wife,  and  thought 
her  in  mind  and  person  the  most  attractive  of 
her  sex.  But  he  thought  that  conjugal  fidelity 
was  an  unprincely  virtue ;  and,  in  order  to  be 
like  Henry  the  Fourth  and  the  Regent  Orleans, 
he  affected  a  libertinism  for  which  he  had  no 
taste,  and  frequently  quitted  the  only  woman 
whom  he  loved  for  ugly  and  disagreeable 
mistresses. 

The  address  which  the  House  of  Commons 
presented  to  the  king  on  occasion  of  the 
prince's  marriage,  was  moved,  not  by  the  mi 
nister,  but  by  Pulteney,  the  leader  of  the  Whigs 
in  opposition.  It  was  on  this  motion  that  Pitt, 
who  had  not  broken  silence  during  the  session 
in  which  he  took  his  seat,  addressed  the  House 
for  the  first  time.  "  A  contemporary  historian," 
says  Mr.  Thackeray,  "describes  Mr. Pitt's  first 
speech  as  superior  even  to  the  models  of  an 
cient  eloquence.  According  to  Tindal,  it  was 
more  ornamented  than  the  speeches  of  De 
mosthenes,  and  less  diffuse  than  those  of  Ci 
cero."  This  unmeaning  phrase  has  been  a 
hundred  times  quoted.  That  it  should  ever 
have  been  quoted,  except  to  be  laughed  at,  is 
strange.  The  vogue  which  it  has  obtained 
may  serve  to  show  in  how  slovenly  a  way 
most  people  are  content  to  think.  Did  Tindal, 
who  first  used  it,  or  Archdeacon  Coxe,  or  Mr. 
Thackeray,  who  have  borrowed  it,  ever  in  their 
lives  hear  any  speaking  which  did  not  deserve 
the  same  compliment]  Did  they  ever  hear 
speaking  less  ornamented  than  that  of  De 
mosthenes,  or  more  diffuse  than  that  of  Ci 
cero  1  We  know  no  living  orator,  from  Lord 
Brougham  down  to  Mr.  Hunt,  who  is  not  en 
titled  to  the  same  magnificent  eulogy.  It  would 
be  no  very  flattering  compliment  to  a  man's 
figure  to  say,  that  he  was  taller  than  the  Polish 
Count,  and  shorter  than  Giant  O'Brien ; — fatter 
than  the  Jlnatomie  Vivante,  and  more  slender 
than  Daniel  Lambert. 

Pitt's  speech,  as  it  is  reported  in  the  Gentle 
man's  Magazine,  certainly  deserves  Tindal's 
compliment,  and  deserves  no  other.  It  is  just 
as  empty  and  wordy  as  a  maiden  speech  on 
such  an  occasion  might  be  expected  to  be 
But  the  fluency  and  the  personal  advantages 
of  the  young  orator  instantlv  caught  the  e&r 


THACKERAY'S   CHATHAM. 


931 


and  eye  of  his  audience.  He  was,  from  the 
day  of  his  first  appearance,  always  heard  with 
attention;  and  exercise  soon  developed  the 
great  powers  which  he  possessed. 

In  our  time,  the  audience  of  a  member  of 
Parliament  is  the  nation.  The  three  or  four 
hundred  persons  who  may  be  present  while  a 
speech  is  delivered  may  be  pleased  or  disgust 
ed  by  the  voice  and  action  of  the  orator;  but 
in  the  reports  which  are  read  the  next  day  by 
hundreds  of  thousands,  the  difference  between 
the  noblest  and  the  meanest  figure,  between 
the  richest  and  the  shrillest  tones,  between  the 
most  graceful  and  the  most  uncouth  gesture, 
altogether  vanishes.  A  hundred  years  ago, 
scarcely  any  report  of  what  passed  within  the 
walls  of  the  House  of  Commons  was  suffered 
to  get  abroad.  In  those  times,  therefore,  the 
impression  which  a  speaker  might  make  on 
the  persons  who  actually  heard  him  was  every 
thing.  The  impression  out  of  doors  was  hard 
ly  worth  a  thought.  In  the  Parliaments  of 
that  time,  therefore,  as  in  the  ancient  common 
wealths,  those  qualifications  which  enhance 
the  immediate  effect  of  a  speech,  were  far 
more  important  ingredients  in  the  composition 
of  an  orator  than  they  would  appear  to  be  in 
our  time.  All  those  qualifications  Pitt  pos 
sessed  in  the  highest  degree.  On  the  stage,  he 
would  have  been  the  finest  Brutus  or  Coriola- 
nus  ever  seen.  Those  who  saw  him  in  his 
decay,  when  his  health  was  broken,  when  his 
mind  was  jangled,  when  he  had  been  removed 
from  that  stormy  assembly  of  which  he  tho 
roughly  knew  the  temper,  and  over  which  he 
possessed  unbounded  influence,  to  a  small,  a 
torpid,  and  an  unfriendly  audience,  say  that 
his  speaking  was  then,  for  the  most  part, 
low,  monotonous  muttering,  audible  only  to 
those  who  sat  close  to  him — that,  when  vio 
lently  excited,  he  sometimes  raised  his  voice 
for  a  few  minutes,  but  that  it  soon  sank  again 
into  an  unintelligible  murmur.  Such  was  the 
Earl  of  Chatham ;  but  such  was  not  William 
Pitt.  His  figure,  when  he  first  appeared  in 
Parliament,  was  strikingly  graceful  and  com 
manding,  his  features  high  and  noble,  his  eye 
full  of  fire.  His  voice,  even  when  it  sank  to  a 
whisper,  was  heard  to  the  remotest  benches 
when  he  strained  it  to  its  full  extent,  the  sound 
rose  like  the  swell  of  the  organ  of  a  great  ca 
thedral,  shook  the  house  with  its  peal,  and  was 
heard  through  lobbies  and  down  staircases,  to 
the  Court  of  Requests  and  the  precincts  of 
Westminster  Hall.  He  cultivated  all  these 
eminent  advantages  with  the  most  assiduous 
care.  His  action  is  described  by  a  very  ma 
lignant  observer  as  equal  to  that  of  Garrick 
His  play  ol  countenance  was  wonderful ;  he 
frequently  disconcerted  a  hostile  orator  by  a 
single  glance  of  indignation  or  scorn.  Every 
tone,  from  the  impassioned  cry  to  the  thrilling 
aside,  was  perfectly  at  his  command.  It  is  by 
no  means  improbable  that  the  pains  which  he 
took  to  improve  his  great  personal  advantages 
had,  in  some  respects,  a  prejudicial  operation 
and  tended  to  nourish  in  him  that  passion  for 
theatrical  effect  which,  as  we  have  already  re 
marked,  was  one  of  the  most  conspicuous 
blemishes  in  his  character. 


But  it  was  not  solely  or  principally  to  out 
ward  accomplishments  that  Pitt  owed  the  vast 
nfluence  which,  during  nearly  thirty  years,  he 
exercised  over  "the  House  of  Commons.     He 
was  undoubtedly  a  great  orator ;  an'd,  from  the 
descriptions   of  his  contemporaries,  and  the 
ragments  of  his  speeches  which  still  remain, 
it  is  not  difficult  to  discover  the  nature  and  ex 
tent  of  his  oratorical  powers. 

He  was  no  speaker  of  set  speeches.  His 
few  prepared  discourses  were  complete  fail 
ures.  The  elaborate  panegyric  which  he  pro 
nounced  on  General  Wolfe  was  considered  as 
the  very  worst  of  all  his  performances.  "  No 
man,"  says  a  critic  who  had  often  heard  him, 
"ever  knew  so  little  what  he  was  going  t« 
say."  Indeed  his  facility  amounted  to  a  vice. 
He  was  not  the  master,  but  the  slave  of  his 
own  speech.  So  little  self-command  had  he 
when  once  he  felt  the  impulse,  that  he  did  not 
like  to  take  part  in  a  debate  when  his  mind 
was  full  of  an  important  secret  of  state.  "I 
must  sit  still,"  he  once  said  to  Lord  Shelburne 
on  such  an  occasion  ;  "for  when  once  I  am 
up,  every  thing  that  is  in  my  mind  comes 
out." 

Yet  he  was  not  a  great  debater.  That  he 
should  not  have  been  so  when  first  he  enter 
ed  the  House  of  Commons,  is  not  strange. 
Scarcely  any  person  had  ever  become  so 
without  long  practice  an  1  many  failures.  It 
was  by  slow  degrees,  as  Burke  said,  that  the 
late  Mr.  Fox  became  the  most  brilliant  and 
powerful  debater  that  ever  Parliament  saw. 
Mr.  Fox  himself  attributed  his  own  success  to 
the  resolution  which  he  formed  when  very 
young,  of  speaking,  well  or  ill,  at  least  once 
every  night.  "  During  five  whole  sessions," 
he  used  to  say,  "I  spoke  every  night  but  one: 
and  I  regret  only  that  I  did  not  speak  on  that 
night  too."  Indeed,  it  would  be  difficult  to 
name  any  great  debater,  except  Mr.  Stanley 
whose  knowledge  of  the  science  of  parliament 
ary  defence  resembles  an  instinct,  who  has 
not  made  himself  a  master  of  his  art  at  the 
expense  of  his  audience. 

Bui  as  this  art  is  one  which  even  the  ablest 
men  have  seldom  acquired  without  long  prac 
tice,  so  it  is  one  which  men  of  respectable 
abilities,  with  assiduous  and  intrepid  practice, 
seldom  fail  to  acquire.  It  is  singular  that  in 
such  an  art,  Pitt,  a  man  of  splendid  talents,  ci 
great  fluency,  of  great  boldness — a  man  whose 
whole  life  was  passed  in  parliamentary  con 
flict — a  man  who,  during  several  years,  was 
the  leading  minister  of  the  crown  in  the  House 
of  Commons — should  never  have  attained  to 
high  excellence.  He  spoke  without  premedi 
tation;  but  his  speech  followed  the  course  of 
his  own  thoughts,  and  not  the  course  of  the 
previous  discussion.  He  could,  indeed,  trea 
sure  up  in  his  memory  some  detached  expres 
sion  of  a  hostile  orator,  and  make  it  the  text 
for  sparkling  ridicule  or  burning  invective, 
Some  of  the  most  celebrated  bursts  of  his  elo 
quence  were  called  forth  by  an  unguarded 
word,  a  laugh,  or  a  cheer.  But  this  was  th« 
only  sort  of  reply  in  which  he  appears  to  hav« 
excelled.  He  was  perhaps  the  only  great  Eng 
lish  orator  who  did  not  think  it  any  advantage 


*32 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


to  have  the  last  word;  and  who  generally 
sooke  by  choice  before  his  most  formidable 
opponents.  His  merit  was  almost  entirely 
rhetorical.  He  did  not  succeed  either  in  ex 
position  or  in  refutation ;  but  his  speeches 
abounded  with  lively  illustrations,  strikin 
apophthegms,  well-told  anecdotes,  happy  allu 
sions,  passionate  appeals.  His  invective  and 
sarcasm  were  tremendous.  Perhaps  no  Eng 
lish  orator  was  ever  so  much  feared. 

But  that  which  gave  most  effect  to  his  de 
clamation,  was  the  air  of  sincerity,  of  vehe 
ment  feeling,  of  moral  elevation,  which  be 
longed  to  all  that  he  said.  His  style  was  not 
always  in  the  purest  taste.  Several  contem 
porary  judges  pronounced  it  too  florid.  Wai- 
pole,  in  the  midst  of  the  rapturous  eulogy 
which  he  pronounces  on  one  of  Pitt's  greatest 
orations,  owns  that  some  of  the  metaphors 
were  too  forced.  The  quotations  and  classical 
stories  of  the  great  orator  are  sometimes  too 
trite  for  a  clever  schoolboy.  But  these  were 
niceties  for  which  the  audience  cared  little. 
The  enthusiasm  of  the  orator  infected  all  who 
•were  near  him;  his  ardour  and  his  noble 
bearing  put  fire  into  the  most  frigid  conceit, 
and  gave  dignity  to  the  most  puerile  allusion. 

His  powers  soon  began  to  give  annoyance 
to  the  government,  and  Walpole  determined  to 
make  an  example  of  the  patriotic  cornet.  Pitt  was 
accordingly  dismissed  from  the  service.  Mr. 
Thackeray  absurdly  says  that  the  minister  took 
this  step,  because  he  plainly  saw  that  it  would 
have  been  vain  to  think  of  buying  over  so  ho 
nourable  and  disinterested  an  opponent.  We 
do  not  dispute  Pitt's  integrity ;  but  we  do  not 
know  what  proof  he  had  given  of  it,  when  he 
was  turned  out  of  the  army;  and  we  are  sure 
that  Walpole  was  not  likely  to  give  credit  for 
inflexible  honesty  to  a  young  adventurer  who 
had  never  had  an  opportunity  of  refusing  any 
thing.  The  truth  is,  that  it  was  not  Walpole's 
practice  to  buy  off  enemies.  Mr.  Burke  truly 
says,  in  the  Appeal  to  the  old  Whigs,  "  Wal 
pole  gained  very  few  over  from  the  Opposi 
tion."  He  knew  his  business  far  too  well. 
He  knew  that  for  one  mouth  that  is  stopped 
with  a  place,  fifty  other  mouths  will  instantly 
be  opened.  He  knew  that  it  would  have  been 
very  bad  policy  in  him  to  give  the  world  to 
understand  that  more  was  to  be  got  by  thwart 
ing  his  measures  than  by  supporting  them. 
These  maxims  are  as  old  as  the  origin  of  par 
liamentary  corruption  in  England.  Pepys 
learned  them,  as  he  tells  us,  from  the  coun 
sellors  of  Charles  the  Second. 

Pitt  was  no  loser.  He  was  made  Groom  of 
the  Bed-chamber  to  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and 
continued  to  declaim  against  the  minister  with 
unabated  violence  and  with  increasing  ability. 
The  question  of  maritime  right,  then  agitated 
between  Spain  and  England,  called  forth  all 
his  powers.  He  clamoured  for  war  with  a 
vehemence  which  it  is  not  easy  to  reconcile 
with  reason  or  humanity,  but  which  appears 
to  Mr.  Thackeray  worthy  of  the  highest  admi 
ration.  We  will  not  stop  to  argue  a  point  on 
which  we  had  long  thought  that  all  well-in 
formed  people  were  agreed.  We  could  easily 
how,  we  think,  that,  if  any  respect  be  due  to 


international  law — if  right,  where  societies  of 
men  are  concerned,  be  any  thing  but  another 
name  for  might — if  we  do  not  adopt  the  doc 
trine  of  the  Buccaniers,  which  seems  to  be 
also  the  doctrine  of  Mr.  Thackeray,  that  trea 
ties  mean  nothing  within  thirty  degrees  of  the 
line — the  war  with  Spain  was  altogether  un 
justifiable.  But  the  truth  is,  that  the  promoters 
of  that  war  have  saved  the  historian  the  trouble 
of  trying  them :  they  have  pleaded  guilty.  "  I 
have  seen,"  says  Burke,  "and  with  some  care 
examined,  the  original  documents  concerning 
certain  important  transactions  of  those  times. 
They  perfectly  satisfied  me  of  the  extreme  in 
justice  of  that  war,  and  of  the  falsehood  of  the 
colours  which  Walpole,  to  his  ruin,  and  guided 
by  a  mistaken  policy,  suffered  to  be  daubed 
over  that  measure.  Some  years  after,  it  was 
my  fortune  to  converse  with  many  of  the  prin 
cipal  actors  against  that  minister,  and  with 
those  who  principally  excited  that  clamour. 
None  of  them,  no,  not  one,  did  in  the  least  de 
fend  the  measure,  or  attempt  to  justify  their 
conduct.  They  condemned  it  as  freely  as  they 
would  have  done  in  commenting  upon  any 
proceeding  in  history  in  which  they  were  to 
tally  unconcerned."*  Pitt,  on  subsequent  oc 
casions,  gave  ample  proof  that  he  was  not  one 
of  those  tardy  penitents. 

The  elections  of  1741  were  unfavourable  to 
Walpole ;  and  after  a  long  and  obstinate  strug 
gle  he  found  it  necessary  to  resign.  The  Duke 
of  Newcastle  and  Lord  Hardwicke  opened  a 
negotiation  with  the  leading  patriots,  in  the 
hope  of  forming  an  administration  on  a  Whig 
basis.  At  this  conjuncture,  Pitt,  Lyttleton,  and 
those  persons  who  were  most  nearly  connected 
with  them,  acted  in  a  manner  very  little  to 
their  honour.  They  attempted  to  come  to  an 
understanding  with  Walpole,  and  offered,  if  he 
would  use  his  influence  with  the  king  in  their 
favour,  to  screen  him  from  prosecution.  They 
even  went  so  far  as  to  engage  for  the  concur 
rence  of  the  Prince  of  Wales.  But  Walpole 
knew  that  the  assistance  of  the  Boys,  as  he  called 
the  young  patriots,  would  avail  him  nothing  if 
Pulteney  and  Carteret  should  prove  intractable, 
and  would  be  superfluous,  if  the  great  leaders 
of  the  Opposition  could  be  gained.  He,  there 
fore,  declined  the  proposal.  It  is  remarkable 
that  Mr.  Thackeray,  who  has  thought  it  worth 
while  to  preserve  Pitt's  bad  college  verses,  has 
not  even  alluded  to  this  story — a  story  which 
is  supported  by  strong  testimony,  and  which 
may  be  found  in  so  common  a  book  as  Coxe's 
Life  of  Walpole. 

The  new  arrangements  disappointed  almost 
every  member  of  the  Opposition,  and  none 
more  than  Pitt.  He  was  not  invited  to  become  a 
placeman;  and  he,  therefore,  stuck  firmly  to  his 
old  trade  of  patriot.  Fortunate  it  was  for  him 
that  he  did  so.  Had  he  taken  office  at  this  time, 
he  would  in  all  probability  have  shared  largely 
in  the  unpopularity  of  Pulteney,  Sandys,  and 
Carteret.  He  was  now  the  fiercest  and  most 
implacable  of  those  who  called  for  vengeance 
on  Walpole.  He  spoke  with  great  energy  and 
ability  in  favour  of  the  most  unjust  and  violent 


*  Letter  on  a  Regicide  Peace. 


THACKERAY'S  CHATHAM. 


233 


propositions  which  the  enemies  of  the  fallen 
minister  could  invent.  He  urged  the  House 
of  Commons  to  appoint  a  secret  tribunal  for 
the  purpose  of  investigating  the  conduct  of  the 
late  First  Lord  of  the  Treasury.  This  was  done. 
The  great  majority  of  the  inquisitors  were  no 
toriously  hostile  to  the  accused  statesman. 
Yet  they  were  compelled  to  own  that  they 
could  find  no  fault  in  him.  They  therefore 
called  for  new  powers,  for  a  bill  of  indemnity 
to  witnesses ;  or,  in  plain  words,  for  a  bill  to 
reward  all  who  might  give  evidence,  true  or 
false,  against  the  Earl  of  Orford.  This  bill 
Pitt  supported — Pitt,  who  had  offered  to  be  a 
screen  between  Lord  Orford  and  public  justice ! 
These  are  melancholy  facts.  Mr.  Thackeray 
omits  them,  or  hurries  over  them  as  fast  as  he 
can  ;  and,  as  eulogy  is  his  business,  he  is  in 
the  right  to  do  so.  But,  though  there  are  many 
parts  in  the  life  of  Pitt  which  it  is  more  agree 
able  to  contemplate,  we  know  none  more  in 
structive.  What  must  have  been  the  general 
state  of  political  morality,  when  a  young  man, 
considered,  and  justly  considered,  as  the  most 
public-spirited  and  spotless  statesmen  of  his 
time,  could  attempt  to  force  his  way  into  office 
by  means  so  disgraceful  1 

The  bill  of  indemnity  was  rejected  by  the 
Lords.  Walpole  withdrew  himself  quietly 
from  the  public  eye ;  and  the  ample  space 
which  he  had  left  vacant  was  soon  occupied 
by  Carteret.  Against  Carteret  Pitt  began  to 
thunder  with  as  much  zeal  as  he  had  ever 
manifested  against  Sir  Robert.  To  Carteret 
he  transferred  most  of  the  hard  names  which 
were  familiar  to  his  eloquence — sole  minister, 
wicked  minister,  odious  minister,  execrable 
minister.  The  great  topic  of  his  invective  was 
the  favour  shown  to  the  German  dominions  of 
King  George.  He  attacked  with  great  vio 
lence,  and  with  an  ability  which  raised  him  to 
the  very  first  rank  among  the  parliamentary 
speakers,  the  practice  of  paying  the  Hanove 
rian  troops  with  English  money.  The  House 
of  Commons  had  lately  lost  some  of  its  most 
distinguished  ornaments.  Walpole  and  Pul- 
teney  had  accepted  peerages;  Sir  William 
Wyndham  was  dead ;  and  among  the  rising 
men  none  could  be  considered  as,  on  the  whole, 
a  match  for  Pitt. 

During  the  recess  of  1744,  the  old  Duchess 
of  Marlborough  died.  She  carried  to  her  grave 
the  reputation  of  being  decidedly  the  best  hater 
of  her  time.  Yet  her  love  had  been  infinitely 
more  destructive  than  her  hatred.  In  the  time 
of  Anne,  her  temper  had  ruined  the  party  to 
which  she  belonged,  and  the  husband  whom 
she  adored.  Time  had  made  her  neither  wiser 
nor  kinder.  Whoever  was  at  any  moment 
great  and  prosperous,  was  the  object  of  her 
fiercest  detestation.  She  had  hated  Walpole 
— she  now  hated  Carteret 

Pope,  long  before  her  death,  predicted  the 
fate  of  her  vast  property : — 

"To  heirs  unknown  descends  the  unguarded  store, 
Or  wanders,  lloaven-directed,  to  the  poor." 

Pitt  was  poor  enough ;  and  to  him  Heaven 
directed  a  portion  of  the  wealth  of  the  haughty 
dowager.  She  left  him  a  legacy  of  £10,000, 

VOL.  II.— 30 


in  consideration  of  "  the  noble  defence  he  haA 
made  for  the  support  of  the  laws  of  England, 
and  to  prevent  the  ruin  of  his  country." 

The  will  was  made  in  August.  The  Duch 
ess  died  in  October.  In  November  Pitt  had 
become  a  courtier.  The  Pelhams  had  forced 
the  king,  much  against  his  will,  to  part  with 
Lord  Carteret,  now  Earl  Granville.  They  pro 
ceeded,  after  this  victory,  to  form  the  govern 
ment  on  that  basis,  called  by  the  cant  name  of 
the  "  broad  bottom."  Lyttleton  had  a  seat  at 
the  treasury,  and  several  other  friends  of  Pitt 
were  provided  for.  But  Pitt  himself  was,  for 
the  present,  forced  to  be  content  with  promises. 
The  king  resented  most  highly  some  expres 
sions  which  the  ardent  orator  had  used  in  the 
debate  on  the  Hanoverian  troops.  But  New 
castle  and  Pelham  expressed  the  strongest 
confidence  that  time,  and  their  exertions,  would 
soften  the  royal  displeasure. 

Pitt,  on  his  part,  omitted  nothing  that  might 
facilitate  his  admission  to  office.  He  resigned 
his  place  in  the  household  of  Prince  Frederic, 
and,  when  Parliament  met,  exerted  his  elo 
quence  in  support  of  the  government.  The 
Pelhams  were  really  sincere  in  their  endea 
vours  to  remove  the  strong  prejudices  that  had 
taken  root  in  the  king's  mind.  They  knew 
that  Pitt  was  not  a  man  to  be  deceived  with 
ease,  or  offended  with  impunity.  They  were 
afraid  that  they  should  not  be  long  able  to  put 
him  off  with  promises.  Nor  was  it  their  inte 
rest  so  to  put  him  off.  There  was  a  strong  tie 
between  him  and  them.  He  was  the  enemy  of 
their  enemy.  The  brothers  hated  and  dreaded 
the  eloquent,  aspiring,  and  imperious  Granville. 
They  had  traced  his  intrigues  in  many  quarters. 
They  knew  his  influence  over  the  royal  mind. 
They  knew  that,  as  soon  as  a  favourable  oppor 
tunity  might  arrive,  he  would  be  recalled  to  the 
head  of  affairs.  They  resolved  to  bring  things 
to  a  crisis ;  and  the  question  on  which  they  took 
issue  with  their  master  was,  whether  Pitt  should 
or  should  not  be  admitted  to  office  I  They 
chose  their  time  with  more  skill  than  generosi 
ty.  It  was  when  rebellion  was  actually  raging 
in  Britain,  when  the  Pretender  was  master  of 
the  northern  extremity  of  the  island,  that  they 
tendered  their  resignations.  The  king  found 
himself  deserted,  in  one  day,  by  the  whole 
strength  of  that  party  which  had  placed  his 
family  on  the  throne.  Lord  Granville  tried  to 
form  a  government ;  but  it  soon  appeared  that 
the  parliamentary  interest  of  the  Pelhams  was 
irresistible;  and  that  the  king's  favourite 
statesman  could  count  only  on  about  thirty 
Lords,  and  eighty  members  of  the  House  of 
Commons.  The  scheme  was  given  up.  Gran 
ville  went  away  laughing.  The  ministers  canie 
back  stronger  than  ever,  and  the  king  was  now 
no  longer  able  to  refuse  any  thing  that  they 
might  be  pleased  to  demand.  All  that  he  could 
do,  was  to  mutter  that  it  was  very  hard  thai 
Newcastle,  who  was  not  fit  to  be  chamberlain 
to  the  most  insignificant  prince  in  Germany 
should  dictate  to  the  King  of  England. 

One  concession  the  ministers  graciow&ijr 
made.  They  agreed  that  Pitt  should  not  be 
placed  in  a  situation  in  which  it  would  be  ne 
cessary  for  him  to  have  frequent  interviews 


234 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


\rith  the  king.  Instead,  therefore,  of  making 
their  new  ally  Secretary  of  War,  as  they  had  in 
tended,  they  appointed  him  Vice-Treasurer  of 
Ireland,  and  in  a  few  months  promoted  him  to 
the  office  of  Paymaster  of  the  Forces. 

This  was,  at  that  time,  one  of  the  most  lu 
crative  offices  in  the  government.  The  salary 
vas  but  a  small  part  of  the  emolument  which 
•he  Paymaster  derived  from  his  place.  He 
was  allowed  to  keep  a  large  sum — seldom  less 
than  £100,000 — constantly  in  his  hands  ;  and 
the  interest  on  this  sum,  probably  about  £4,000 
a  year,  he  might  appropriate  to  his  own  use. 
This  practice  was  not  secret,  nor  was  it  con 
sidered  as  disreputable.  It  was  the  practice 
of  men  of  undoubted  honour,  both  before  and 
after  the  time  of  Pitt.  He,  however,  refused 
to  accept  one  farthing  beyond  the  salary  which 
the  law  had  annexed  to  his  office.  It  had  been 
usual  for  foreign  princes,  who  received  the  pay 
of  England,  to  give  to  the  Paymaster  of  the 
Forces  a  small  per  centage  on  the  subsidies. 
These  ignominious  vails  Pitt  resolutely  de 
clined. 

Disinterestedness  of  this  kind  was,  in  his 
days,  very  rare.  His  conduct  surprised  and 
amused  politicians.  It  excited  the  warmest 
admiration  throughout  the  body  of  the  people. 
In  spite  of  the  inconsistencies  of  which  Pitt 
had  been  guilty,  in  spite  of  the  strange  contrast 
between  his  violence  in  Opposition  and  his 
lameness  in  office,  he  still  possessed  a  large 
share  of  the  public  confidence.  The  motives 
which  may  lead  a  politician  to  change  his  con 
nections,  or  his  general  line  of  conduct,  are  often 
obscure ;  but  disinterestedness  in  money  mat 
ters  everybody  can  understand.  Pitt  was  thence 
forth  considered  as  a  man  who  was  proof  to  all 
sordid  temptations.  If  he  acted  ill,  it  might  be 
from  an  error  in  judgment ;  it  might  be  from 
resentment ;  it  might  be  from  ambition.  But, 
poor  as  he  was,  he  had  vindicated  himself  from 
all  suspicion  of  covetousness. 

Eight  quiet  years  followed — eight  years  dur 
ing  which  the  minority,  feeble  from  the  time 
of  Lord  Granville's  defeat,  continued  to  dwin 
dle  till  it  became  almost  invisible.  Peace  was 
made  with  France  and  Spain  in  1748.  Prince 
Frederick  died  in  1751,  and  with  him  died  the 
very  semblance  of  opposition.  All  the  most 
distinguished  survivors  of  the  party  which  had 
supported  Walpole  and  of  the  party  which  had 
opposed  him  were  united  under  his  successor. 
The  fiery  and  vehement  spirit  of  Pitt  had  for  a 
time  been  laid  to  rest.  He  silently  acquiesced 
in  that  very  system  of  Continental  measures 
which  he  had"  lately  condemned.  He  ceased 
to  talk  disrespectfully  about  Hanover.  He  did 
not  object  to  the  treaty  with  Spain,  though  that 
treaty  left  us  exactly  where  we  had  been  when 
he  uttered  his  spirit-stirring  harangues  against 
the  pacific  policy  of  Walpole.  Now  and  then 
glimpses  of  his  former  self  appeared,  but  they 
were  few  and  transient.  Pelham  knew  with 
whom  he  had  to  deal,  and  felt  that  an  ally  so 
little  used  to  control  and  so  capable  of  inflict 
ing  injury  might  well  be  indulged  in  an  occa 
sional  fit  of  waywardness. 

Two  men,  little,  if  at  all,  inferior  to  Pitt  in 
wers  of  mind,  held,  like  him,  subordinate 


offices  in  the  government.  One  of  these,  Mur 
ray,  was  successively  Solicitor-general  and  At 
torney-general.  This  distinguished  person  far 
surpassed  Pitt  in  correctness  of  taste,  in  power 
of  reasoning,  in  depth  and  variety  of  know 
ledge.  His  parliamentary  eloquence  never 
blazed  into  sudden  flashes  of  dazzling  bril 
liancy;  but  its  clear,  placid,  and  mellow  splen 
dour  was  never  for  an  instant  overclouded. 
Intellectually  he  was,  we  believe,  fully  equal 
to  Pitt;  but  he  was  deficient  in  the  moral  qua 
lities  to  which  Pitt  owed  most  of  his  success. 
Murray  wanted  the  energy,  the  courage,  the 
all-grasping  and  all-risking  ambition  which 
make  men  great  in  stirring  times.  His  heart 
was  a  little  cold ;  his  temper  cautious  even  to 
timidity;  his  manners  decorous  even  to  forma 
lity.  He  never  exposed  his  fortunes  or  his 
fame  to  any  risk  which  he  could  avoid.  At 
one  time  he  might  in  all  probability  have  been 
Prime  Minister.  But  the  object  of  all  his  wishes 
was  the  judicial  bench.  The  situation  of  Chief 
Justice  might  not  be  so  splendid  as  that  of  First 
Lord  of  the  Treasury;  but  it  was  dignified;  it 
was  quiet ;  it  was  secure ;  and  therefore  it  was 
the  favourite  situation  of  Murray. 

Fox,  the  father  of  that  great  man  whose 
mighty  efforts  in  the  cause  of  peace,  of  truth, 
and  of  liberty  have  made  that  name  immortal, 
was  secretary  at  war.  He  was  a  favourite  with 
the  king,  with  the  Duke  of  Cumberland,  and 
with  some  of  the  most  powerful  individuals  of 
the  great  Whig  connection.  His  parliament 
ary  talents  were  of  the  highest  order.  As  a 
speaker  he  was  in  almost  all  respects  the  very 
opposite  of  Pitt.  His  figure  was  ungraceful : 
his  face,  as  Reynolds  and  Roubiliac  have  pre 
served  it  to  us,  indicated  a  strong  understand 
ing;  but  the  features  were  coarse,  and  the  ge 
neral  aspect  dark  and  lowering.  His  manner 
was  awkward;  his  delivery  was  hesitating;  he 
was  often  at  a  stand  for  want  of  a  word ;  but 
as  a  debater — as  a  master  of  that  keen,  weighty, 
manly  logic  which  is  suited  to  the  discussion 
of  political  questions— he  has  perhaps  never 
been  surpassed  except  by  his  son.  In  reply 
he  was  as  decidedly  superior  to  Pitt  as  in  de 
clamation  he  was  inferior.  Intellectually,  the 
balance  was  nearly  equal  between  the  rivals. 
But  here,  again,  the  moral  qualities  of  Pitt 
turned  the  scale.  Fox  had  undoubtedly  many 
virtues.  In  natural  disposition  as  well  as  in 
talents  he  bore  a  great  resemblance  to  his 
more  celebrated  son.  He  had  the  same  sweet 
ness  of  temper,  the  same  strong  passions,  the 
same  openness,  boldness,  and  impetuosity,  the 
same  cordiality  towards  friends,  the  same  pla 
cability  towards  enemies.  No  man  was  more 
warmly  or  justly  beloved  by  his  family  or  by 
his  associates.  But  unhappily  he  had  been 
trained  in  a  bad  political  school — in  a  school 
the  doctrines  of  which  were,  that  political  vir 
tue  is  the  mere  coquetry  of  political  prostitu 
tion;  that  every  patriot  has  his  price;  that 
government  can  be  carried  on  only  by  means 
of  corruption ;  and  that  the  state  is  given  as  a 
prey  to  statesmen.  These  maxims  were  too 
much  in  vogue  throughout  the  lower  ranks  of 
Walpole's  party,  and  were  too  much  encou 
raged  by  Walpole  himself,  who,  from  contempt 


THACKERAY'S  CHATHAM. 


235 


of  what  is  in  our  day  called  humbug,  often  ran 
extravagantly  and  offensively  into  the  opposite 
extreme.  The  loose  political  morality  of  Fox 
presented  a  remarkable  contrast  to  the  osten 
tatious  purity  of  Pitt.  The  nation  distrusted 
the  former,  and  placed  implicit  confidence  in 
the  latter.  But  almost  all  the  statesmen  of  the 
age  had  still  to  learn  that  the  confidence  of  the 
nation  was  worth  having.  While  things  went 
on  quietly,  while  there  was  no  opposition,  while 
every  thing  was  given  by  the  favour  of  a  small 
ruling  junto,  Fox  had  a  decided  advantage  over 
Pitt;  but  when  dangerous  times  came,  when 
Europe  was  convulsed  with  war,  when  Parlia 
ment  was  broken  up  into  factions,  when  the 
public  mind  was  violently  excited,  the  favour 
ite  of  the  people  rose  to  supreme  power,  while 
his  rival  sank  into  insignificance. 

Early  in  the  year  1754,  Henry  Pelham  died 
unexpectedly.  "Now  I  shall  have  no  more 
peace,"  exclaimed  the  old  king  when  he  heard 
the  news.  He  was  in  the  right.  Pelham  had 
succeeded  in  bringing  together  and  keeping  to 
gether  all  the  talents  of  the  kingdom.  By  his 
death  the  highest  post  to  which  an  English 
subject  can  aspire  was  left  vacant,  and  at  the 
same  moment  the  influence  which  had  yoked 
together  and  reined  in  so  many  turbulent  and 
ambitious  spirits  was  withdrawn. 

Within  a  week  after  Pelham's  death  it  was 
determined  that  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  should 
be  placed  at  the  head  of  the  treasury;  but  the 
arrangement  was  still  far  from  complete.  Who 
was  to  be  the  leading  minister  of  the  crown  in 
the  House  of  Commons]  Was  the  office  to  be 
intrusted  to  a  man  of  eminent  talents  1  And 
would  not  such  a  man  in  such  a  place  demand 
and  obtain  a  larger  share  of  power  and  patron 
age  than  Newcastle  would  be  disposed  to  con 
cede  1  Was  a  mere  drudge  to  be  employed  1 
And  what  probability  was  there  that  a  mere 
drudge  would  be  able  to  manage  a  large  and 
stormy  assembly  abounding  with  able  and  ex 
perienced  men! 

Pope  has  said  of  that  wretched  miser,  Sir 
John  Cutler — 

•'Cutler  naw  tenants  break  and  houses  fall 
For  very  want;  he  could  not  build  a  wall." 

Newcastle's  love  of  power  resembled  Cutler's 
love  of  money.  It  was  an  avarice  which 
thwarted  itself — a  penny-wise  and  pound-fool 
ish  cupidity.  An  immediate  outlay  was  so 
painful  to  him,  that  he  would  not  venture  to 
make  the  most  desirable  improvement.  If  he 
could  have  found  the  heart  to  cede  at  once  a 
portion  of  his  authority,  he  might  probably 
have  insured  the  continuance  of  what  re 
mained  ;  but  he  thought  it  better  to  construct 
a  weak  and  rotten  government,  which  tottered 
at  the  smallest  breath  and  fell  in  the  first 
storm,  than  to  pay  the  necessary  price  for 
sound  and  durable  materials.  He  wished  to 
find  some  person  who  would  be  willing  to  ac 
cept  the  lead  of  the  House  of  Commons  on 
terms  similar  to  those  on  which  Secretary 
Craggs  had  acted  under  Sunderland  five-and- 
thirty  years  before.  Craggs  could  hardly  be 
called  a  minister.  He  was  a  mere  agent  for 
&e  minister.  He  was  not  trusted  with  the 


nigher  secrets  of  state,  but  obeyed  implicitly 
the  directions  of  his  superior,  and  was,  to  use 
Doddington's  expression,  merely  Lord  Sunder- 
land's  man.  But  times  were  changed.  Since 
the  days  of  Sunderland  the  importance  of  the 
House  of  Commons  had  been  constantly  on 
the  increase.  During  many  years  the  person 
who  conducted  the  business  of  the  government 
in  that  house  had  almost  always  been  Prime 
Minister.  Under  these  circumstance  it  was 
not  to  be  supposed  that  any  person  who  pos 
sessed  the  talents  necessary  to  the  situation 
would  stoop  to  accept  it  on  such  terms  as 
Newcastle  was  disposed  to  offer. 

Pitt  was  ill  at  Bath ;  and  had  he  been  well 
and  in  London,  neither  the  king  nor  Newcastle 
would  have  been  disposed  to  make  any  over 
tures  to  him.  The  cool  and  wary  Murray  had 
set  his  heart  on  professional  objects.  Nego 
tiations  were  opened  with  Fox.  Newcastle 
behaved  like  himself — that  is  to  say,  childishly 
and  basely.  The  proposition  which  he  made 
was,  that  Fox  should  be  Secretary  of  State,  with 
the  lead  of  the  House  of  Commons  ;  that  the 
disposal  of  the  secret-service  money,  or  in 
plain  words,  the  business  of  buying  members 
of  Parliament,  should  be  left  to  the  First  Lord 
of  the  Treasury,  but  that  Fox  should  be  exactly 
informed  of  the  way  in  which  this  fund  was 
employed. 

To  these  conditions  Fox  assented.  But  the 
next  day  every  thing  was  confusion.  New 
castle  had  changed  his  mind.  The  conver 
sation  which  took  place  between  Fox  and  the 
duke  is  one  of  the  most  curious  in  English  his 
tory.  "My  brother,"  said  Newcastle,  "when 
he  was  at  the  treasury,  never  told  anybody 
what  he  did  with  the  secret-service  money.  No 
more  will  I."  The  answer  was  obvious.  Pel 
ham  had  been  not  only  First  Lord  of  the  Trea 
sury,  but  manager  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
and  it  was  therefore  unnecessary  for  him  to 
confide  to  any  other  person  his  dealings  with 
the  members  of  that  house.  "  But  how,"  said 
Fox,  "can  I  lead  in  the  Commons  without  in 
formation  on  this  head  1  How  can  I  talk  to 
gentlemen  when  I  do  not  know  which  of  them 
have  received  gratifications  and  which  have 
not?  And  who,"  he  continued,  "is  to  have 
the  disposal  of  places'?"  "I  myself,"  said  the 
duke.  "How  then  am  I  to  manage  the  House 
of  Commons  ?"  "  Oh,  let  the  members  of  the 
House  of  Commons  come  to  me."  Fox  then 
mentioned  the  general  election  which  was  ap 
proaching,  and  asked  how  the  ministerial 
burghs  were  to  be  filled  up.  "Do  not  trouble 
yourself,"  said  Newcastle,  "that  is  all  settled." 
This  was  too  much  for  human  nature  to  bear. 
Fox  refused  to  accept  the  secretaryship  of  state 
on  such  terms,  and  the  duke  confided  the  ma 
nagement  of  the  House  of  Commons  to  a  dull, 
harmless  man,  whose  name  is  almost  forgotten 
in  our  time — Sir  Thomas  Robinson 

When  Pitt  returned  from  Bath,  he  an"ect<  d 
great  moderation,  though  his  haughty  soul  was 
boiling  with  resentment.  He  did  not  complain 
of  the  manner  in  which  he  had  been  passed 
by;  and  said  openly,  that  in  his  opinion,  Fox 
was  the  fittest  man  to  lead  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  The  rivals  were  reconciled  by  their 


£36 


MACAULAVS  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


common  interests  and  their  common  enmities, 
and  concerted  a  plan  of  operations  for  the  next 
session.  "  Sir  Thomas  Robinson  lead  us !" 
said  Pitt  to  Fox;  "the  duke  might  as  well 
send  his  jack-boot  to  lead  us." 

The  elections  of  1754  were  favourable  to 
the  administration.  But  the  aspect  of  foreign 
affairs  was  threatening.  In  India  the  English 
and  the  French  had  been  employed  ever  since 
the  peace  of  Aix-la-Chapelle,  in  cutting  each 
other's  throats.  They  had  lately  taken  to  the 
same  practice  in  America.  It  might  have 
been  foreseen  that  stirring  times  were  at  hand 
— times  which  would  call  for  abilities  very  dif 
ferent  from  those  of  Newcastle  and  Robinson. 

In  November,  the  Parliament  met ;  and  be 
fore  the  end  of  that  month  the  new  Secretary 
of  State  had  been  so  unmercifully  baited  by 
the  Paymaster  of  the  Forces,  and  the  Secre 
tary  at  War,  that  he  was  thoroughly  sick  of 
his  situation.  Fox  attacked  him  with  great 
force  and  acrimony.  Pitt  affected  a  kind  of 
contemptuous  tenderness  for  Sir  Thomas,  and 
directed  his  attacks  principally  against  New 
castle.  On  one  occasion,  he  asked  in  tones 
of  thunder,  whether  Parliament  sat  only  to 
register  the  edicts  of  one  too-powerful  subject? 
The  duke  was  scared  out  of  his  wits.  He  was 
afraid  to  dismiss  the  mutineers;  he  was  afraid 
to  promote  them  ;  but  it  was  absolutely  neces 
sary  to  do  something.  Fox,  as  the  less  proud 
and  intractable  of  the  refractory  pair,  was  pre 
ferred.  A  seat  in  the  cabinet  was  offered  to 
him,  on  condition  that  he  would  give  efficient 
support  to  the  ministry  in  Parliament.  In  an 
evil  hour  for  his  fame  and  his  fortunes,  he  ac 
cepted  the  offer,  and  abandoned  his  connection 
with  Pitt,  who  never  forgave  this  desertion. 

Sir  Thomas,  assisted  by  Fox,  contrived  to 
get  through  the  business  of  the  year  without 
much  trouble.  Pitt  was  waiting  his  time. 
The  negotiations  pending  between  France  and 
England  took  every  day  a  more  unfavourable 
aspect.  Towards  the  close  of  the  session  the 
king  sent  a  message  to  inform  the  House  of 
Commons,  that  he  had  found  it  necessary  to 
make  preparations  for  war.  The  House  re 
turned  an  address  of  thanks,  and  passed  a 
vote  of  credit.  During  the  recess,  the  old 
animosity  of  both  nations  was  inflamed  by  a 
series  of  disastrous  events.  An  English  force 
was  cut  off  in  America;  and  several  French 
merchantmen  were  taken  in  the  West  Indian 
seas.  It  was  plain  that  war  was  at  hand. 

The  first  object  of  the  king  was  to  secure 
Hanover ;  and  Newcastle  was  disposed  to  gra 
tify  his  master.  Treaties  were  concluded,  after 
the  fashion  of  those  times,  with  several  petty 
German  princes,  who  bound  themselves  to  find 
soldiers  if  England  would  find  money;  and  as 
it  was  suspected  that  Frederic  the  Second  had 
set  his  heart  on  the  electoral  dominions  of  his 
uncle,  Russia  was  hired  to  keep  Prussia  in 
awe. 

When  the  stipulations  of  these  treaties  were 
made  known,  there  arose  throughout  the  king 
dom  a  murmur,  from  which  a  judicious  ob-  j 
server  might  easily  prognosticate  the  approach  \ 
ot  a  tempest.     Newcastle  encountered  strong 
pposition,  even  from  those   whom   he  had 


always  considered  as  his  tools.  Legge,  th« 
I  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  refused  to  sigu 
the  treasury  warrants  which  were  necessary 
to  give  effect  to  the  treaties.  Those  persons 
who  were  supposed  to  possess  the  confidence 
of  the  young  Prince  of  Wales  and  his  mother, 
held  very  menacing  language.  In  this  per 
plexity  Newcastle  sent  for  Pitt,  hugged  him, 
patted  him,  smirked  at  him,  wept  over  him, 
and  lisped  out  the  highest  compliments  and 
the  most  splendid  promises.  The  king,  who 
had  hitherto  been  as  srlky  as  possible,  would 
be  civil  to  him  at  the  levee;  he  should  be 
brought  idto  the  cabinet;  he  should  be  con 
sulted  about  every  thing,-  if  he  would  only  be 
so  good  as  to  support  the  Hessian  subsidy  in 
the  House  of  Commons.  Pitt  coldly  declined 
the  proffered  seat  in  the  cabinet,  expressed  the 
highest  love  and  reverence  for  the  king,  and 
said  that  if  his  majesty  felt  a  strong  personal 
interest  in  the  Hessian  treaty,  he  would  so  far 
deviate  from  the  line  which  he  had  traced  out 
for  himself  as  to  give  that  treaty  his  support 
"  Well,  and  the  Russian  subsidy  ?"  said  New 
castle.  "No,"  said  Pitt,  "not  a  system  of 
subsidies."  The  duke  summoned  Lord  Hard- 
wicke  to  his  aid ;  but  Pitt  was  inflexible. 
Murray  would  do  nothing,  Robinson  could  do 
nothing.  It  was  necessary  to  have  recourse 
to  Fox.  He  became  Secretary  of  State,  with 
the  full  authority  of  a  leader  in  the  House  of 
Commons ;  and  Sir  Thomas  was  pensioned 
off  on  the  Irish  establishment. 

In  November,  1755,  the  House  met.  Public 
expectation  was  wound  up  to  the  height.  After 
ten  quiet  years  there  was  to  be  an  Opposi 
tion,  countenanced  by  the  heir-apparent  of  the 
throne,  headed  by  the  most  brilliant  orator  of 
the  age,  and  backed  by  a  strong  party  through 
out  the  country.  The  debate  on  the  address 
was  long  remembered  as  one  of  the  greatest 
parliamentary  conflicts  of  that  generation.  It 
began  at  three  in  the  afternoon,  and  lasted  till 
five  the  next  morning.  It  was  on  this  night 
that  Gerard  Hamilton  delivered  that  single 
speech  from  which  his  nickname  was  derived. 
His  eloquence  threw  into  the  shade  every 
orator  except  Pitt,  who  declaimed  against  the 
subsidies  for  an  hour  and  a  half  with  extraor 
dinary  energy  and  effect.  Those  powers  which 
had  formerly  spread  terror  through  the  majon 
ties  of  Walpole  and  Carteret,  were  now  dis 
played  in  their  highest  perfection  before  an 
audience  long  accustomed  to  such  exhibi 
tions.  One  fragment  of  this  celebrated  oration 
remains  in  a  state  of  tolerable  preservation.  It 
is  the  comparison  between  the  coalition  of 
Fox  and  Newcastle,  and  the  junction  of  the 
Rhone  and  the  Saone.  "At  Lyons,"  he  said, 
"I  was  taken  to  see  the  place'where  the  two 
rivers  meet — the  one  gentle,  feeble,  languid, 
and  though  languid,  yet  of  no  depth,  the  other 
a  boisterous  and  impetuous  torrent;  but  dif 
ferent,  as  they  are,  they  meet  at  last."  The 
amendment  moved  by  the  Opposition  was  re 
jected  by  a  great  majority,  and  Pitt  and  Legge 
were  immediately  dismissed  from  their  offices. 
Lyttleton,  whose  friendship  for  Pitt  had,  during 
some  time,  been  cooling,  succeeded  Legge  as 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer. 


THACKERAY'S  CHATHAM. 


237 


During  several  months  the  contest  in  the 
House  of  Commcns  was  extremely  sharp. 
Warm  debates  took  place  on  the  estimates, 
debates  still  warmer  on  the  subsidiary  treaties. 
The  government  succeeded  in  every  division ; 
but  the  fame  of  Pitt's  eloquence,  and  the  influ 
ence  of  his  lofty  and  determined  character, 
continued  to  increase  through  the  session; 
and  the  events  which  followed  the  prorogation 
rendered  it  utterly  impossible  for  any  other 
person  to  manage  the  Parliament  or  the  coun 
try. 

The  war  began  in  every  part  of  the  world 
•with  events  disastrous  to  'England,  and  even 
more  shameful  than  disastrous.  But  the  most 
humiliating  of  these  events  was  the  loss  of 
Minorca.  The  Duke  of  Richelieu,  an  old  fop, 
who  had  passed  his  life  from  sixteen  to  sixty 
in  seducing  women,  for  whom  he  cared  not 
one  straw,  landed  on  that  island,  with  a  French 
army,  and  succeeded  in  reducing  it.  Admiral 
Byng  was  sent  from  Gibraltar  to  throw  suc 
cours  into  Port  Mahon ;  but  he  did  not  think 
fit  to  engage  the  French  squadron,  and  sailed 
back  without  having  effected  his  purpose. 
The  people  were  inflamed  to  madness.  A 
storm  broke  forth,  which  appalled  even  those 
who  remembered  the  days  of  "Excise"  and 
of  "South  Sea."  The  shops  were  filled  with 
libels  and  caricatures.  The  walls  were  cover 
ed  with  placards.  The  city  of  London  called  for 
vengeance,  and  the  cry  was  echoed  from  every 
corner  of  the  kingdom.  Dorsetshire,  Hunting 
donshire,  Bedfordshire,  Buckinghamshire,  So 
mersetshire,  Lancashire,  Suffolk,  Shropshire, 
Surrey, sent  up  strong  addresses  to  the  throne; 
and  instructed  their  representatives  to  vote  for 
a  strict  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  the  late  dis 
asters.  In  the  great  towns  the  feeling  was  as 
strong  as  in  the  counties.  In  some  of  the  in 
structions  it  was  even  recommended  that  the 
supplies  should  be  stopped. 

The  nation  was  in  a  state  of  angry  and  sul 
len  despondency,  almost  unparalleled  in  histo 
ry.  People  have,  in  all  ages,  been  in  the  habit 
of  talking  about  the  good  old  times  of  their 
ancestors,  and  the  degeneracy  of  their  contem 
poraries.  This  is  in  general  merely  a  cant. 
But  in  1756  it  was  something  more.  At  this 
time  appeared  Brown's  "Estimate" — a  book 
now  remembered  only  by  the  allusions  in 
Cowper's  "Table  Talk," 'and  Burke's  "Let 
ters  on  a  Regicide  Peace."  It  was  universally 
read,  admired,  and  believed.  The  author  fully 
convinced  his  readers,  that  they  were  a  race 
of  cowards  and  scoundrels ;  that  nothing  could 
save  them  ;  that  they  were  on  the  point  of  be 
ing  enslaved  by  their  enemies,  and  that  they 
richly  deserved  their  fate.  Such  were  the 
speculations  to  which  ready  credence  was 
given,  at  the  outset  of  the  most  glorious  war  in 
which  England  had  ever  been  engaged. 

Newcastle  now  began  to  tremble  for  his 
place,  and  for  the  only  thing  which  was  dearer 
to  him  than  his  place — his  neck.  The  people 
were  not  in  a  mood  to  be  trifled  with.  Their 
cry  was  for  blood.  For  this  once  they  might 
be  contented  with  the  sacrifice  of  Byng.  But 
what  if  fresh  disasters  should  take  place  1 
What  if  an  unfriendly  sovereign  should  ascend 


the  throne  1    What  if  a  hostile  House  of  Com 
mons  should  be  chosen  1 

At  length,  in  October,  the  decisive  crisis 
came.  Fox  had  been  long  sick  of  the  perfidy 
and  levity  of  Newcastle,  and  now  began  to  fear 
that  he  might  be  made  a  scape-goat  to  save  the 
old  intriguer,  who,  imbecile  as  he  seemed,  ne 
ver  wanted  dexterity  where  danger  was  to  be 
avoided.  He  threw  up  his  office.  Newcastle 
had  recourse  to  Murray ;  but  Murray  had  now 
within  his  reach  the  favourite  object  of  his 
ambition.  The  situation  of  Chief  Justice  of 
the  King's  Bench  was  vacant;  and  the  attor 
ney-general  was  fully  resolved  to  obtain  it,  or 
to  go  into  Opposition.  Newcastle  offered  him 
any  terms — the  Duchy  of  Lancaster  for  life,  a 
tellership  of  the  Exchequer,  any  pension  that 
he  chose  to  ask,  two  thousand  a  year,  six  thou 
sand  a  year.  When  the  ministers  found  that 
Murray's  mind  was  made  up,  they  pressed  for 
delay ;  the  delay  of  a  session,  a  month,  a  week,  a 
day.  Would  he  only  make  his  appearance  once 
more  in  the  House  of  Commons  1  Would  he 
only  speak  in  favour  of  the  address  7  He  was 
inexorable;  and  peremptorily  said,  that  they 
might  give  or  withhold  the  chief-justiceship; 
but  that  he  would  be  attorney-general  no  longer. 

Newcastle  contrived  to  overcome  the  preju 
dices  of  the  king,  and  overtures  were  made  to 
Pitt,  through  Lord  Hardwicke.  Pitt  knew  his 
power,  and  showed  that  he  knew  it.  He  de 
manded  as  an  indispensable  condition,  that 
Newcastle  should  be  altogether  excluded  from 
the  new  arrangement. 

The  duke  was  now  in  a  state  of  ludicrous 
distress.  He  ran  about  chattering  and  crying, 
asking  advice  and  listening  to  none.  In  tha 
mean  time,  the  session  drew  near.  The  public 
excitement  was  unabated.  Nobody  could  be 
found  to  face  Pitt  and  Fox  in  the  House  of 
Commons.  Newcastle's  heart  failed  him,  and 
he  tendered  his  resignation. 

The  king  sent  for  Fox,  and  directed  him  to 
form  the  plan  of  an  administration  in  concert 
with  Pitt.  But  Pitt  had  not  forgotten  old  inju 
ries,  and  positively  refused  to  act  with  Fox. 

The  king  now  applied  to  the  Duke  of  Devon 
shire,  and  this  mediator  succeeded  in  making 
an  arrangement.  He  consented  to  take  the 
Treasury.  Pitt  became  Secretary  of  State, 
with  the  lead  of  the  House  of  Commcns.  The 
Great  Seal  was  put  into  commission.  Legge 
returned  to  the  exchequer ;  and^Lord  Temple, 
whose  sister  Pitt  had  lately  married,  was 
placed  at  the  head  of  the  Admiralty. 

It  was  clear  from  the  first  that  this  adminis 
tration  would  last  but  a  very  short  time.    It 
lasted  not  quite  five  months  ;  and  during  those 
five   months,    Pitt    and    Lord    Temple   were 
treated  with  rudeness  by  the  king,  and  found 
but  a  feeble  support  in  the  House  of  Commons. 
It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  the  Opposition  pre 
vented  the  re-election  of  some  of  the  new  mi« 
nisters.    Pitt,  who  sat  for  one  of  the  boroughs 
I  which  were  in  the  Pelham  interest,  found  some 
j  difficulty  in  obtaining  a  seat  after  his  accept- 
j  ance  of  the  seals.    So  destitute  was  the  new 
government  of  that  sort  of  influence  without 
which  no  government  could  then  be  durable 
One  of  the  arguments  most  frequently 


MACAULAVS  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


against  the  Reform  Bill  was  that,  under  a  sys 
tem  of  popular  representation,  men,  whose 
presence  in  the  House  of  Commons  was  ne 
cessary  to  the  conducting  of  public  business, 
might  often  find  it  impossible  to  find  seats. 
Should  this  inconvenience  ever  be  felt,  there 
cannot  be  the  slightest  difficulty  in  devising 
and  applying  a  remedy.  But  those  who  threat 
ened  us  with  this  evil  ought  to  have  remem 
bered  that,  under  the  old  system,  a  great  man, 
called  to  power  at  a  great  crisis,  by  the  voice 
of  the  whole  nation,  was  in  danger  of  being 
excluded  by  an  aristocratical  coterie  from  the 
House,  of  which  he  was  the  most  distinguished 
ornament. 

The  most  important  event  of  this  short  ad 
ministration  was  the  trial  of  Byng.  On  that 
subject  public  opinion  is  still  divided.  We 
think  the  punishment  of  the  admiral  altogether 
unjust  and  absurd.  Treachery,  cowardice, 
ignorance,  amounting  to  what  lawyers  have 
called  crassa  ignorantia,  are  fit  objects  of  severe 
penal  inilictions.  But  Byng  was  not  found 
guilty  of  treachery,  or  cowardice,  or  of  gross 
ignorance  of  his  profession.  He  died  for  do 
ing  what  the  most  loyal  subject,  the  most  in 
trepid  warrior,  the  most  experienced  seaman, 
might  have  done.  He  died  for  an  error  in 
judgment — an  error  such  as  the  greatest  com 
manders,  Frederic,  Napoleon,  Wellington, 
have  often  committed,  and  have  often  acknow 
ledged.  Such  errors  are  not  proper  objects  of 
punishment,  for  this  reason — that  the  punish 
ing  of  them  tends  not  to  prevent  them,  but  to 
produce  them.  The  dread  of  an  ignominious 
death  may  stimulate  sluggishness  to  exertion, 
may  keep  a  traitor  to  his  standard,  may  pre 
vent  a  coward  from  leaving  the  ranks,  but  it  has 
no  tendency  to  bring  out  those  qualities  which 
enable  men  to  form  prompt  and  judicious  de- 
tisions  in  great  emergencies.  The  best  marks 
man  may  be  expected  to  fail  when  the  apple 
which  is  to  be  his  mark,  is  set  on  his  child's  head. 
We  cannot  conceive  any  thing  more  likely  to 
deprive  an  officer  of  his  self-possession  at  the 
time  when  he  most  needs  it,  than  the  know 
ledge  that,  if  the  judgment  of  his  superiors 
should  not  agree  with  his,  he  will  be  executed 
with  every  circumstance  of  shame.  Queens, 
it  has  often  been  said,  run  far  greater  risk  in 
childbed  than  private  women,  merely  because 
Aeir  medical  attendants  are  more  anxious. 
The  surgeon  who  attended  Marie  Louise  was 
altogether  unnerved  by  his  emotions.  "  Com 
pose  yourself,"  said  Bonaparte — "imagine 
that  you  are  assisting  a  poor  girl  in  the  Faux- 
bourg  St.  Antoine."  This  was  surely  a  far 
wiser  course  than  that  of  the  Eastern  king  in 
the  "Arabian  Nights'  Entertainments,"  who 
proclaimed  that  the  physicians  who  failed  to 
cure  his  daughter  should  have  their  heads 
chopped  off.  Bonaparte  knew  mankind  well; 
and,  as  he  acted  towards  this  surgeon,  he  acted 
towards  his  officers.  No  sovereign  was  ever 
so  indulgent  to  mere  errors  of  judgment;  and 
it  is  certain  that  no  sovereign  ever  had  in  his 
service  so  many  military  men  fit  for  the  high 
est  commands. 

P;tt  certainly  acted  a  brave  and  honest  part 
»n  tf.is  occasion.  He  ventured  to  put  both  his 


|  power  and  his  popularity  to  hazard,  and  spoka 
!  manfully  for  Byng,  both  in  Parliament  and  in 
I  the  royal  presence.  But  the  king  was  inexo- 
jrable.  "The  House  of  Commons,  sire,"  said 
Pitt,  "  seems  inclined  to  mercy."  "  Sir,"  an 
swered  the  king,  "  you  have  taught  me  to  look 
for  the  sense  of  my  people  in  other  places  than 
the  House  of  Commons."  The  saying  has 
more  point  than  most  of  those  which  are  re 
corded  of  George  the  Second ;  and,  though 
sarcastically  meant,  contains  a  high  and  just 
compliment  to  Pitt. 

The  king  disliked  Pitt,  but  absolutely  hated 
Temple.  The  new  Secretary  of  State,  his  ma 
jesty  said,  had  read  Vattel,  and  was  tedious 
and  pompous,  but  respectful.  The  First  Lord 
of  the  Admiralty  was  grossly  impertinent. 
Walpole  tells  one  story,  which,  we  fear,  is 
much  too  good  to  be  true.  He  assures  us,  that 
Temple  entertained  his  royal  master  with  an. 
elaborate  parallel  between  Byng's  behaviour  at 
Minorca,  and  his  majesty's  behaviour  at  Oude- 
narde.  The  advantage  was  all  on  the  side  of 
the  admiral ;  and  the  obvious  inference  was, 
that  if  Byng  ought  to  be  shot,  the  king  must 
richly  deserve  to  be  hanged. 

This  state  of  things  could  not  last.  Early  in 
April,  Pitt  and  all  his  friends  were  turned  out, 
and  Newcastle  was  summoned  to  St.  James's. 
But  the  public  discontent  was  not  extinguished. 
It  had  subsided  when  Pitt  was  called  to  power. 
But  it  still  glowed  under  the  embers ;  and  it 
now  burst  at  once  into  a  flame.  The  stocks  fell. 
The  Common  Council  met.  The  freedom  of 
the  city  was  voted  to  Pitt.  All  the  greatest 
corporate  towns  followed  the  example.  "  For 
some  weeks,"  says  Walpole,  "it  rained  gold 
boxes." 

This  was  the  turning  point  of  Pitt's  life.  It 
might  have  been  expected  that  a  man  of  so 
haughty  and  vehement  a  nature,  treated  so  un 
graciously  by  the  court,  and  supported  so  en 
thusiastically  by  the  people,  would  have  eager 
ly  taken  the  first  opportunity  of  showing  his 
power,  and  gratifying  his  resentment ;  for  an 
opportunity  was  not  wanting.  The  members 
for  many  counties  and  large  towns  had  been 
instructed  to  vote  for  an  inquiry  into  the  cir 
cumstances  which  had  produced  the  miscar 
riage  of  the  preceding  year.  A  motion  for  in 
quiry  had  been  carried  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  without  opposition;  and  a  few  days 
after  Pitt's  dismissal,  the  investigation  com 
menced.  Newcastle  and  his  colleagues  ob 
tained  a  vote  of  acquittal ;  but  the  minority 
was  so  strong,  that  they  could  not  venture  to 
ask  for  a  vote  of  approbation,  as  they  had  at 
first  intended ;  and  it  was  thought  by  some 
shrewd  observers,  that  if  Pitt  had  exerted  him 
self  to  the  utmost  of  his  power,  the  inquiiy 
might  have  ended  in  a  censure,  if  not  in  an 
impeachment. 

Pitt  showed  on  this  occasion  a  moderation 
and  self-government  which  were  not  habitual 
to  him.  He  had  found  by  experience,  that  he 
could  not  stand  alone.  His  eloquence  and  his 
popularity  had  done  much,  very  much  for 
him.  Without  rank,  without  fortune,  wiihout 
borough  interest,  hated  by  the  king,  hated  by 
the  aristocracy,  he  was  a  person  of  the  firsf 


THACKERAY'S  CHATHAM. 


239 


importance  in  the  state.  He  had  been  suffered  | 
to  form  a  ministry,  and  to  pronounce  sentence 
of  exclusion  on  all  his  rivals — on  the  most 
powerful  noblemen  of  the  Whig  party — on  the 
ablest  debater  in  the  House  of  Commons.  And  j 
he  now  found  that  he  had  gone  too  far.  The  | 
English  Constitution  was  not,  indeed,  without 
a  popular  element.  But  other  elements  gene 
rally  predominated.  The  confidence  and 
admiration  of  the  nation  might  make  a  states 
man  formidable  at  the  head  of  an  Opposition — * 
might  load  him  with  framed  and  glazed  parch 
ments,  and  gold  boxes — might  possibly,  under 
very  peculiar  circumstances,  such  as  those  of 
the  preceding  year,  raise  him  for  a  time  to 
power.  But,  constituted  as  Parliament  then 
was,  the  favourite  of  the  people  could  not  de 
pend  on  a  majority  in  the  people's  own  House. 
The  Duke  of  Newcastle,  however  contemptible 
in  morals,  manners,  and  understanding,  was  a 
dangerous  enemy.  His  rank,  his  wealth,  his 
unrivalled  parliamentary  interest,  would  alone 
have  made  him  important.  But  this  was  not 
all.  The  Whig  aristocracy  regarded  him  as 
their  leader.  His  long  possession  of  power 
had  given  him  a  kind  of  prescriptive  right  to 
possess  it  still.  The  House  of  Commons  had 
been  elected  when  he  was  at  the  head  of  affairs. 
The  members  for  the  ministerial  boroughs  had 
all  been  nominated  by  him.  The  public  offices 
swarmed  with  his  creatures. 

Pitt  desired  power;  and  he  desired  it,  we 
really  believe,  from  high  and  generous  mo 
tives.  He  was  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word 
a  patriot.  He  had  no  general  liberality — none 
of  that  philanthropy  which  the  great  French 
writers  of  his  time  preached  to  all  the  nations 
of  Europe.  He  loved  England  as  an  Athenian 
loved  the  city  of  the  Violet  Crown — as  a  Ro 
man  loved  the  "maxima  rerum  Roma."  He 
saw  his  country  insulted  and  defeated.  He 
saw  the  national  spirit  sinking.  Yet  he  knew 
what  the  resources  of  the  empire,  vigorously 
employed,  could  effect;  and  he  felt  that  he  was 
the  man  to  employ  them  vigorously.  "My 
lord,"  he  said  to  the  Duke  of  Devonshire,  "I 
am  sure  that  I  can  save  this  country,  and  that 
nobody  else  can." 

Desiring,  then,  to  be  in  power,  and  feeling 
that  his  abilities  and  the  public  confidence 
were  not  alone  sufficient  to  keep  him  in  power 
against  the  wishes  of  the  court  and  the  aristo 
cracy,  he  began  to  think  of  a  coalition  with 
Newcastle. 

Newcastle  was  equally  disposed  to  a  recon 
ciliation.  He,  too,  had  profited  by  his  recent 
experience.  He  had  found  that  the  court  and 
the  aristocracy,  though  powerful,  were  not 
every  thing  in  the  state.  A  strong  oligarchical 
connection,  a  great  borough  interest.;  ample 
patronage,  and  secret-service  money,  might, 
in  quiet  times,  be  all  that  a  minister  needed ; 
but  it  was  unsafe  to  trust  wholly  to  such  sup 
port  in  time  of  war,  of  discontent,  and  of 
agitation.  The  composition  of  the  House  of 
Commons  was  not  wholly  aristocratical,  and 
whatever  be  the  composition  of  large  delibera 
tive  assemblies,  their  spirit  is  always  in  some 
degree  popular.  Where  there  are  free  debates,  I 
eloauence  must  have  admirers,  and  reason  j 


must  make  converts.  Where  there  is  a  fret; 
press,  the  governors  must  liv«  in  constant  awe 
of  the  opinions  of  the  governed. 

Thus  these  two  men,  so  unlike  in  character, 
so  lately  mortal  enemies,  were  necessary  to 
each  other.  Newcastle  had  fallen  in  Novem 
ber,  for  want  of  that  public  confidence  which 
Pitt  possessed,  and  of  that  parliamentary  sup 
port  which  Pitt  was  better  qualified  than  any 
man  of  his  time  to  give.  Pitt  had  fallen  in 
April,  for  want  of  that  species  of  influence 
which  Newcastle  had  passed  his  whole  life  iii 
acquiring  and  hoarding.  Neither  of  them  hac 
power  enough  to  support  himself.  Each  of 
them  had  power  enough  to  overturn  the  other 
Their  union  would  be  irresistible.  Neither 
the  king  nor  any  party  in  the  state  would  be 
able  to  stand  against  them. 

Under  these  circumstances,  Pitt  was  not 
disposed  to  proceed  to  extremities  against  his 
predecessors  in  office.  Something,  however, 
was  due  to  consistency ;  something  was  neces 
sary  for  the  preservation  of  his  popularity 
He  did  little  ;  but  that  little  he  did  in  such  a 
manner  as  to  produce  great  effect.  He  came 
down  to  the  House  in  all  the  pomp  of  gout : 
his  legs  swathed  in  flannels,  his  arms  dangling 
in  a  sling.  He  kept  his  seat  through  several 
fatiguing  days,  in  spke  of  pain  and  languor. 
He  uttered  a  few  sharp  and  vehement  sen 
tences  ;  but  during  the  greater  part  of  the  dis 
cussion,  his  language  was  unusually  gentle. 

When  the  inquiry  had  terminated,  without 
a  vote  either  of  approbation  or  of  censure,  the 
great  obstacle  to  a  coalition  was  removed. 
Many  obstacles,  however,  remained.  The 
king  was  still  rejoicing  in  his  deliverance 
from  the  proud  and  aspiring  minister,  who  had 
been  forced  on  him  by  the  cry  of  the  nation. 
His  majesty's  indignation  was  excited  to  the 
highest  point,  when  it  appeared  that  New 
castle,  who  had,  during  thirty  years,  been 
loaded  with  marks  of  royal  favour,  and  who 
had  bound  himself,  by  a  solemn  promise,, 
never  to  coalesce  with  Pitt,  was  meditating  a 
new  perfidy.  Of  all  the  statesmen  of  that  age, 
Fox  had  the  largest  share  of  royal  favour.  A 
coalition  between  Fox  and  Newcastle  was  the 
arrangement  which  the  king  wished  to  bring 
about.  But  the  duke  was  too  cunning  to  fall 
into  such  a  snare.  As  a  speaker  in  Parlia 
ment,  Fox  might  perhaps  be  as  useful  to  an 
administration  as  his  great  rival ;  but  he  was 
one  of  the  most  unpopular  men  in  England. 
Then,  again,  Newcastle  felt  all  that  jealousy 
of  Fox  which,  according  to  the  proverb,  gene 
rally  exists  between  two  of  a  trade.  Fox  would 
certainly  intermeddle  with  that  department, 
which  the  duke  was  most  desirous  to  reserve 
entire  to  himself — the  jobbing  department. 
Pitt,  on  the  other  hand,  was  quite  willing  to 
leave  the  drudgery  of  corruption  to  any  who 
might  be  inclined  to  undertake  it. 

During  eleven  weeks  England  remained 
without  a  ministry;  and,  in  the  mean  time. 
Parliament  was  sitting,  and  a  war  was  raging 
The  prejudices  of  the  king,  the  haughtiness 
of  Pitt,  the  jealousy,  levity,  and  treachery  of 
Newcastle,  delayed  the  settlement.  Pitt  k'ne\r 
the  duke  too  well  to  trust  him  withrit  spcuritv 


40 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  duke  loved  power  too  much  to  be  inclined  amidst  the  roar  of  guns  and  kettledrums,  and 
to  give  security.  While  they  were  haggling,  the  shouts  of  an  immense  multitude.  Ad 
the  king  was  in  vain  attempting  to  produce  a  j  dresses  of  congratulation  came  in  from  all  the 
final  rupture  between  them,  or  to  form  a  go-  great  towns  of  England.  Parliament  met  only 
vernment  without  them.  At  one  time  he  ap-  to  decree  thanks  and  monuments,  and  to  be- 
plied  to  Lord  Waldegrave,  an  honest  and  i  stow,  without  one  murmur,  supplies  more 
sensible  man,  but  unpractised  in  affairs,  than  double  of  those  which  had  been  given 
Lord  Waldegrave  had  the  courage  to  accept  during  the  war  of  the  Grand  Alliance, 
the  Treasury,  but  soon  found  that  no  adminis-  The  year  1759  opened  with  the  conquest  of 
tration  formed  by  him  had  the  smallest  chance  Goree.  Next  fell  Guadaloupe ;  then  Ticon 


of  standing  a  single  week. 

At  length  the  king's  pertinacity  yielded  to 
the  necessity  of  the  case.  After  exclaiming 
with  great  bitterness,  and  with  some  justice, 
against  the  Whigs,  who  ought,  he  said,  to  be 
ashamed  to  talk  about  liberty,  while  they 
submitted  to  be  the  footmen  of  the  Duke  of 
Newcastle,  he  notified  his  submission.  The 
influence  of  the  Prince  of  Wales  prevailed  on 
Pitt  to  abate  a  little,  and  but  a  little,  of  his  high 
demands ;  and  all  at  once,  out  of  the  chaos  in 
which  parties  had  for  some  time  been  rising, 
falling,  meeting,  separating,  arose  a  govern 
ment  as  strong  at  home  as  that  of  Pelham,  as 
successful  abroad  as  that  of  Godolphin. 

Newcastle  took  the  Treasury;  Pitt  was 
Secretary  of  State,  with  the  lead  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  the  supreme  direction  of  the 
war  and  of  foreign  affairs.  Fox,  the  only  man 
who  could  have  given  much  annoyance  to  the 
new  government,  was  silenced  with  the  office 
of  Paymaster,  which,  during  the  continuance 
of  that  war,  was  probably  the  most  lucrative 
place  in  the  whole  government.  He  was  poor, 
and  the  situation  was  tempting ;  yet  it  cannot 
but  seem  extraordinary,  that  a  man  who  had 
played  a  first  part  in  politics,  and  whose  abili 
ties  had  been  found  not  unequal  to  that  part, 
who  had  sat  in  the  cabinet,  who  had  led  the 
House  of  Commons,  who  had  been  twice  in 
trusted  by  the  king  with  the  office  of  forming 
a  ministry,  who  was  regarded  as  the  rival  of 
Pitt,  and  who  at  one  time  seemed  likely  to  be 
a  successful  rival — should  have  consented,  for 
the  sake  of  emolument,  to  take  a  subordinate 
place,  and  to  give  silent  votes  for  all  the  mea 
sures  of  a  government,  to  the  deliberations  of 
which  he  was  not  summoned. 

The  first  measures  of  the  new  administra 
tion  were  characterized  rather  by  vigour  than 
by  judgment.  Expeditions  were  sent  against 
different  parts  of  the  French  coast,  with  little 
success.  The  small  island  of  Aix  was  taken, 
Rochefort  threatened,  a  few  ships  burned  in 
the  harbour  of  St.  Maloes,  and  a  few  guns  and 
mortars  brought  home  as  trophies  from  the 
fortifications  of  Cherbourg.  But,  before  long, 
conquests  of  a  very  different  kind  filled  the 
kingdom  with  pride  and  rejoicing.  A  succes 
sion  of  victories,  undoubtedly  br'lliant,  and,  as 
it  was  thought,  not  barren,  raised  to  the  high- 


deroga ;  then  Niagara.  The  Toulon  squadron 
was  completely  defeated  by  Boscawen  off  Cape 
Lagos.  But  the  greatest  exploit  of  the  year 
was  the  achievement  of  Wolfe  on  the  heights 
of  Abraham.  The  news  of  his  glorious  death, 
and  of  the  fall  of  Quebec,  reached  London  in 
the  very  week  in  which  the  Houses  met.  All 
was  joy  and  triumph ;  envy  and  faction  were 
forced  to  join  in  the  general  applause.  Whigs 
and  Tories  vied  with  each  other  in  extolling 
the  genius  and  energy  of  Pitt.  His  colleagues 
were  never  talked  of  or  thought  of.  The 
House  of  Commons,  the  nation,  the  colonies, 
our  allies,  our  enemies,  had  their  eyes  fixed  on 
him  alone. 

Scarcely  had  Parliament  voted  a  monument 


jreat  event  called  eor 
Irest  fleet,  under  the 


to  Wolfe,  when  another 
fresh  rejoicings.  The 
command  of  Conflans,  had  put  out  to  sea.  It 
was  overtaken  by  an  English  squadron,  under 
Hawke.  Conflans  attempted  to  take  shelter 
close  under  the  French  coast.  The  shore  was 
rocky,  the  night  was  black,  the  wind  was  furi 
ous,  the  Bay  of  Biscay  ran  high.  But  Pitt  had 
infused  into  every  branch  of  the  service  a 
spirit  which  had  been  long  unknown.  No 
British  seaman  was  disposed  to  err  on  the 
same  side  with  Byng.  The  pilot  told  Hawke 
that  the  attack  could  not  be  made  without  the 
greatest  danger.  "  You  have  done  your  duty 
in  remonstrating,"  answered  Hawke ;  "  I  will 
answer  for  every  thing.  I  command  you  to 
lay  me  alongside  the  French  admiral."  The 
result  was  a  complete  victory. 

The  year  1760  came,  and  still  triumph 
followed  triumph.  Montreal  was  taken,  the 
whole  province  of  Canada  was  subjugated; 
the  French  fleets  underwent  a  succession  of 
disasters  in  the  seas  of  Europe  and  America. 

In  the  mean  time,  conquests  equalling  in 
rapidity,  and  far  surpassing  in  magnitude  those 
of  Cortes  and  Pizarro,  had  been  achieved  in 
the  East.  In  the  space  of  three  years  the 
English  had  founded  a  mighty  empire.  The 
French  had  been  defeated  in  every  part  of  In 
dia.  Chandernagore  had  yielded  to  Clive, 
Pondicherry  to  Coote.  Throughout  Bengal, 
Bahar,  Orissa,  and  the  Carnatic,  the  authority 
of  the  East  India  Company  was  more  abso 
lute  than  that  of  Acbar  or  Aurungzebe  had 
ever  been. 


On  the  continent  of  Europe  the  odds  were 
against  England.     We  had  but  one  important 


est  point  the  fame  of  the  minister  to  whom  the 
conduct  of  the  war  had  been  intrusted.    In 

July,  17M,  Louisbourg  fell.  The  whole  island  j  ally,  the  King  of  Prussia,  and  he  was  attacked, 

of  Cape    Ureton  was  reduced:   the   fleet,  to  j  not  only  by  France,  but  by  Russia  and  Austria. 

which  the  court  of  Versailles  had  confided  '  Yet  even  on  the  continent  the  energy  of  Pitt 

the  defence    of   French    America,  was    de-  •  triumphed  over  all  difficulties.    Vehemently 

stroyed.    The  captured  standards  were  borne    as  he  had  condemned  the  practice  of  subsi^ 

triumph  from  Kensington  palace  to  the  city,   dizing  foreign  princes,  he  now  carried  that 

were  suspended  in    St.  Paul's  church,   practice  farther  than  Carteret  himself  would 


THACKERAY'S   CHATHAM. 


241 


have  ventured  or  would  have  wished  to  do. 
The  active  and  able  so\  ereign  of  Prussia  re 
ceived  such  pecuniary  assistance  as  enabled 
him  to  maintain  the  conflict  on  equal  terms 
against  his  powerful  enemies.  On  no  subject 
had  Pitt  ever  spoken  with  so  much  eloquence 
and  ardour,  as  on  the  mischiefs  of  the  Hano 
verian  connection.  He  now  declared,  not 
without  much  show  of  reason,  that  it  would  be 
unworthy  of  the  English  people  to  suffer  their 
king  to  be  deprived  of  his  electoral  dominion 
in  an  English  quarrel.  He  assured  his  coun 
trymen  that  they  should  be  no  losers,  and  that 
he  would  conquer  America  for  them  in  Ger 
many.  By  taking  this  line  he  conciliated  the 
king,  and  lost  no  part  of  his  influence  with 
the  nation.  In  Parliament,  such  was  the  as 
cendency  which  his  eloquence,  his  success,  his 
high  situation,  his  pride,  and  his  intrepidity 
had  obtained  for  him,  that  he  took  liberties 
with  the  House,  of  which  there  had  been  no  ex 
ample,  and  which  has  never  since  been  imi 
tated.  No  orator  could  there  venture  to  reproach 
him  with  inconsistency.  One  unfortunate  man 
made  the  attempt,  and  was  so  much  discon 
certed  by  the  scornful  demeanour  of  the  minis- 
.er  that  he  stammered,  stopped,  and  sat  down. 
Even  the  old  Tory  country  gentlemen,  to  whom 
»he  very  name  of  Hanover  had  been  odious, 
gave  their  hearty  ayes  to  subsidy  after  subsidy. 
In  a  lively  contemporary  satire,  much  more 
lively  indeed  than  delicate,  this  remarkable 
conversion  is  not  unhappily  described. 

••  No  more  they  make  a  fiddle-faddle 
About  a  Hessian  horse  or  saddle; 
No  more  of  continental  measures; 
No  more  of  wasting  British  treasures. 
Ten  millions,  and  a  vote  of  credit — 
Tis  right.    lie  can't  be  wrong  who  did  it." 

The  success  of  Pitt's  continental  measures 
Was  such  as  might  have  been  expected  from 
their  vigour.  When  he  came  into  power, 
Hanover  was  in  imminent  danger;  and  before 
he  had  been  in  office  three  months,  the  whole 
electorate  was  in  the  hands  of  France.  But 
the  face  of  affairs  was  speedily  changed.  The 
invaders  were  driven  out.  An  army,  partly 
English,  partly  Hanoverian,  partly  composed 
of  soldiers  furnished  by  the  petty  princes  of 
Germany,  was  placed  under  the  command  of 
Prince  Ferdinand  of  Brunswick.  The  French 
were  beaten  in  1758  at  Creveldt.  In  1759, 
they  received  a  still  more  complete  and  humi 
liating  defeat  at  Minden. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  nation  exhibited  all 
the  signs  of  wealth  and  prosperity.  The  mer 
chants  of  London  had  never  been  more  thriv 
ing.  The  importance  of  several  great  com 
mercial  and  manufacturing  towns,  Glasgow, 
in  particular,  dates  from  this  period.  "The 
fine  inscription  on  the  monument  of  Lord 
Chatham,  in  Guildhall,  records  the  general 
opinion  of  the  citizens  of  London,  that  under 
his  administration  commerce  had  been  "united 
with  and  made  to  flourish  by  war." 

It  must  be  owned,  that  these  signs  of  pros 
perity  were  in  some  degree  delusive.  It  must 
be  owned,  that  some  of  our  conquests  were 
rather  splendid  than  useful.  It  must  be  own 
ed,  that  the  expense  of  the  war  never  cn- 

VOL.  II.— 31 


tered  into  Pitt's  consideration.  Perhaps  it 
would  be  more  correct  to  say,  that  the  cost  of 
his  victories  increased  the  pride  and  pleasure 
with  which  he  contemplated  them.  Unlike 
other  men  in  his  situation,  he  loved  to  exag 
gerate  the  sums  which  the  nation  Avas  laying 
out  under  his  direction.  He  was  proud  of  the 
sacrifices  and  efforts  which  his  eloquence  and 
his  success  had  induced  his  countrymen  to 
make.  The  price  at  which  he  purchased  faith 
ful  service  and  complete  victory,  though  far 
smaller  than  that  which  his  son,  the  most  pro 
fuse  and  incapable  of  war  ministers,  paid  for 
treachery,  defeat,  and  shame,  was  severely  felt 
by  the  nation. 

Even  as  a  war  ministeu,  Pitt  is  scarcely  en 
titled  to  all  the  praise  which  his  contempo 
raries  lavished  on  him.  We,  perhaps  from 
ignorance,  cannot  discern  in  his  arrangements 
any  appearance  of  profound  or  dexterous  com 
bination.  Several  of  his  expeditions,  parti 
cularly  those  which  were  sent  to  the  coast  of 
France,  were  at  once  costly  and  absurd.  Our 
Indian  conquests,  though  they  add  to  the  splen 
dour  of  the  period  during  which  he  was  at  the 
head  of  affairs,  were  not  planned  by  him.  He 
had  great  energy,  great  determination,  great 
means  at  his  command.  His  temper  was  en 
terprising,  and,  situated  as  he  was,  he  had  only 
to  follow  his  temper.  The  wealth  of  a  rich 
nation,  the  valour  of  a  brave  nation,  were 
ready  to  support  him  in  every  attempt. 

In  one  respect,  however,  he  deserved  all  Ihe 
praise  that  he  has  ever  received.  The  success 
of  our  arms  \vas  perhaps  owing  less  to  tho 
skill  of  his  dispositions,  than  to  the  national 
resources  and  the  national  spirit.  But  that  the 
national  spirit  rose  to  the  emergency,  that  the 
national  resources  were  contributed  with  un 
exampled  cheerfulness — this  was  undoubtedly 
his  work.  The  ardour  of  his  spirit  had  set  the 
whole  kingdom  on  fire.  It  inflamed  every  sol 
dier  who  dragged  the  cannon  up  the  heights 
of  Quebec,  and  every  sailor  who  boarded  the 
French  ships  amidst  the  rocks  of  Brittany. 
The  minister,  before  he  had  been  long  in  office, 
had  imparted  to  the  commanders  whom  he 
employed  his  own  impetuous,  adventurous, 
and  defying  character.  They,  like  him,  were 
disposed  to  risk  every  thing,  to  pay  double  or 
quits  to  the  last,  to  think  nothing  done  while 
any  thing  remained,  to  fail  rather  than  not  to 
attempt.  For  the  errors  of  rashness  there 
might  be  indulgence.  For  over-caution,  for 
faults  like  those  of  Lord  George  Sackville, 
tnere  was  no  mercy.  In  other  times,  and 
against  other  enemies,  this  mode  of  warfare 
might  have  failed.  But  the  state  of  the  French 
government  and  of  the  French  nation  gave 
every  advantage  to  Pitt.  The  fops  and  in 
triguers  of  Versailles  were  appalled  and  be 
wildered  by  his  vigour.  A  panic  spread 
through  all  ranks  of  society.  Our  enemies 
soon  considered  it  as  a  settled  thing  that  they 
were  always  to  be  beaten.  Thus  victory  be-got 
victory  ;  till,  at  last,  wherever  the  forces  of  the 
two  nations  met,  they  met  with  disdainful  con 
fidence  on  the  one  side,  and  with  a  craven  fear 
on  the  other. 

The  situation  which  Pitt  occupies  at  tbf 


242 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


close  of  the  reign  of  George  the  Second  was  • 
the  most  enviable  ever  occupied  by  any  public  ' 
man  in  English  history.    He  had  conciliated  , 
the  king ;  he  domineered  over  the  House  of 
Commons  ;  he  was  adored  by  the  people  ;  he 
was  admired  by  all  Europe.     He  was  the  first ! 
Englishman  of  his   time ;   and  he  had  made  j 
England  the  first  country  in  the  world.    The  j 
Great  Commoner — the  name  by  which  he  was  i 
often  designated — might  look  down  with  scorn  ' 
on  coronets   and  garters.      The   nation  was 
drunk  with  joy  and  pride.    The  Parliament 
was   as  quiet   as  it  had  been  under  Pelham. 
The  old  party  distinctions  were  almost  effaced  ; 
nor  was  their  place  yet  supplied  by  distinctions 
of  a  yet  more  important  kind.     A  new  genera 
tion  of  country-squires  and  rectors  had  arisen 
•who  knew  not  the  Stuarts.    The  Dissenters 
were  tolerated ;  the  Catholics  not  cruelly  per 
secuted.     The  Church  was  drowsy  and  indul 
gent.     The  great  civil  and  religious  conflict 
which  began  at  the  Reformation  seemed  to  have 
terminated  in  universal  repose.    Whigs  and 


Tories,  Churchman  and  Puritans,  spoke  with 
equal  reverence  of  the  constitution,  and  with 
equal  enthusiasm  of  the  talents,  virtues,  and 
services  of  the  minister. 

A  few  years  sufficed  to  change  the  whole 
aspect  of  affairs.  A  nation  convulsed  by  fac 
tion,  a  throne  assailed  by  the  fiercest  invective, 
a  House  of  Commons  hated  and  despised  by 
the  nation,  England  set  against  Scotland,  Bri 
tain  set  against  America,  a  rival  legislature 
sitting  beyond  the  Atlantic,  English  blood  shed 
by  English  bayonets,  our  armies  capitulating, 
our  conquests  wrested  from  us,  our  enemies 
hastening  to  take  vengeance  for  past  humilia 
tion,  our  flag  scarcely  able  to  maintain  itself 
in  our  own  seas — such  was  the  spectacle  Pitt 
lived  to  see.  But  the  history  of  this  great  re 
volution  requires  far  more  space  than  we  can 
at  present  bestow.  We  leave  the  "  Great; 
Commoner"  in  the  zenith  of  his  glory.  It  is 
not  impossible  that  we  may  take  some  other 
opportunity  of  tracing  his  life  to  its  melancholy 
yet  not  inglorious,  close 


LORD  BACON. 


LORD  BACON.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1837.] 


MrE  return  our  hearty  thanks  to  Mr.  Mon 
tagu,  as  well  for  his  very  valuable  edition  of 
Lord  Bacon's  Works,  as  for  the  instructive 
Life  of  the  immortal  author,  contained  in  the 
last  volume.  We  have  much  to  say  on  the 
subject  of  this  Life,  and  will  often  find  our 
selves  obliged  to  dissent  from  the  opinions  of 
the  biographer.  But  about  his  merit  as  a  col 
lector  of  the  materials  out  of  which  opinions 
are  formed,  there  can  be  no  dispute  ;  and  we 
readily  acknowledge  that  we  are  in  a  great 
measure  indebted  to  his  minute  and  accurate 
researches,  for  the  means  of  refuting  what  we 
cannot  but  consider  his  errors. 

The  labour  which  has  been  bestowed  on  this 
volume,  has  been  a  labour  of  love.  The 
writer  is  evidently  enamoured  of  the  subject. 
It  fills  his  heart.  It  constantly  overflows  from 
his  lips  and  his  pen.  Those  who  are  acquainted 
with  the  courts  in  which  Mr.  Montagu  prac 
tises  with  so  much  ability  and  success,  well 
know  how  often  he  enlivens  the  discussion  of  a 
point  of  law  by  citing  some  weighty  aphorism, 
or  some  brilliant  illustration,  from  the  De 
jHugmentis  or  the  Novum  Organum.  The  Life 
before  us,  doubtless,  owes  much  of  its  value  to 
the  honest  and  generous  enthusiasm  of  the 
writer.  This  feeling  has  stimulated  his  acti 
vity;  has  sustained  his  perseverance;  has 
called  forth  all  his  ingenuity  and  eloquence : 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  we  must  frankly  say, 
that  it  has,  to  a  great  extent,  perverted  his 
judgment. 

We  are  by  no  means  without  sympathy  for 
Mr.  Montagu  even  in  what  we  consider  as  his 
weakness.  There  is  scarcely  any  delusion, 
which  has  a  better  claim  to  be  indulgently 
treated  than  that,  under  the  influence  of  which 
a  man  ascribes  every  moral  excellence  to 
those  who  have  left  imperishable  monuments 
of  their  genius.  The  causes  of  this  error  lie 
deep  in  the  inmost  recesses  of  human  nature. 
We  are  all  inclined  to  judge  of  others  as  we 
find  them.  Our  estimate  of  a  character  always 
depends  much  on  the  manner  in  which  that 
character  affects  our  own  interests  and  pas 
sions.  We  find  it  difficult  to  think  well  of 
those  by  whom  we  are  thwarted  or  depressed ; 
and  we  are  ready  to  admit  every  excuse  for 
the  vices  of  those  who  are  useful  or  agreeable 
to  us.  This  is,  we  believe,  one  of  those  illu 
sions  to  which  the  whole  human  race  is  sub 
ject,  and  which  experience  and  reflection  can 
only  partially  remove.  It  is,  in  the  phraseolo 
gy  of  Bacon,  one  of  the  idola  tribus.  Hence  it 
is,  that  the  moral  character  of  a  man  eminent 
in  letters,  or  in  the  fine  arts,  is  treated — often 
by  contemporaries — almost  always  by  posterity 
— w-ith  extraordinary  tenderness.  The  world 

*  The  Works  of  Francis  Bacon,  Lord  Chancellor  of  Eng 
land.  Jl  new  Edition.  By  BASIL  MONTAGU,  Esq.  16 
irola.  Svo.  London.  1825-1834. 


derives  pleasure  and  advantage  from  the  per 
formances  of  such  a  man.  The  number  of 
those  who  suffer  by  his  personal  vices  is  small, 
even  in  his  own  time,  when  compared  with  the 
number  of  those  to  whom  his  talents  arc  a 
source  of  gratification.  In  a  few  years,  all 
those  whom  he  has  injured  disappear.  But  his 
works  remain,  and  are  a  source  of  delight  to 
millions.  The  genius  of  Sallust  is  still  with 
us.  But  the  Numidians  whom  he  plundered, 
and  the  unfortunate  husbands  who  caught  him 
in  their  houses  at  unseasonable  hours,  are  for 
gotten.  We  suffer  ourselves  to  be  delighted  by 
the  keenness  of  Clarendon's  observation,  and 
by  the  sober  majesty  of  his  style,  till  we  forget 
the  oppressor  and  the  bigot  in  the  historian. 
Falstaff  and  Tom  Jones  have  survived  the 
gamekeepers  whom  Shakspeare  cudgelled,  and 
the  landladies  whom  Fielding  bilked.  A  great 
writer  is  the  friend  and  benefactor  of  his 
readers;  and  they  cannot  but  judge  of  him 
under  the  deluding  influence  of  friendship  and 
gratitude.  We  all  know  how  unwilling  we  are 
to  admit  the  truth  of  any  disgrace  Ail  story 
about  a  person  whose  society  we  like,  and 
from  whom  we  have  received  favours,  how 
long  we  struggle  against  evidence,  how  fondly, 
when  the  facts  cannot  be  disputed,  we  cling  to 
the  hope  that  there  may  be  some  explanation, 
or  some  extenuating  circumstance  with  which 
we  are  unacquainted.  Just  such  is  the  feeling 
which  a  man  of  liberal  education  naturally  en 
tertains  towards  the  great  minds  of  former 
ages.  The  debt  which  he  owes  to  them  is  in 
calculable.  They  have  guided  him  to  truth. 
They  have  filled  his  mind  with  noble  and 
graceful  images.  They  have  stood  by  him  in 
all  vicissitudes — comforters  in  sorrow,  nurses 
in  sickness,  companions  in  solitude.  These 
friendships  are  exposed  to  no  danger  from  the 
occurrences  by  which  other  attachments  are 
weakened  or  dissolved.  Time  glides  by  ;  for 
tune  is  inconstant;  tempers  are  soured;  bonds 
which  seemed  indissoluble  are  daily  sundered 
by  interest,  by  emulation,  or  by  caprice.  But 
no  such  cause  can  affect  the  silent  converse 
which  we  hold  with  the  highest  of  human  in 
tellects.  That  placid  intercourse  is  disturbed 
by  no  jealousies  or  resentments.  These  are 
the  old  friends  who  are  never  seen  with  new 
faces,  who  are  the  same  in  wealth  and  in 
poverty,  in  glory  and  in  obscurity.  With  the 
dead  there  is  no  rivalry.  In  the  dead  there  is 
no  change.  Plato  is  never  sullen.  Cervantes 
is  never  petulant.  Demosthenes  never  comes 
unseasonably.  Dante  never  stays  too  long. 
No  difference  of  political  opinion  can  alienate 
Cicero.  No  heresy  can  excite  the  honor  of 
Bossuet. 

Nothing,  then,  can  be  more  natural  than  that 
a  person  of  sensibility  and  imagination  should 
entertain  a  respectful  and  affectionate  feeling 


244 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


towards  those  great  men  with  whose  minds  he 
holds  daily  communion.  Yet  nothing  can  be 
more  certain  than  that  such  men  have  not 
al ways  deserved,  in  their  own  persons,  to  be 
regarded  with  respect  or  affection.  Some 
writers,  whose  works  will  continue  to  instruct 
and  dt?light  mankind  to  the  remotest  ages,  have 
been  placed  in  such  situations,  that  their  actions 
and  motives  are  as  well  known  to  us  as  the  ac 
tions  and  motives  of  one  human  being  can  be 
known  to  another ;  and  unhappily  their  conduct 
has  not  always  been  such  as  an  impartial  judge 
can  contemplate  with  approbation.  But  the 
fanaticism  of  the  devout  worshipper  of  genius 
is  proof  against  all  evidence  and  all  argument. 
The  character  of  his  idol  is  matter  of  faith  ; 
and  the  province  of  faith  is  not  to  be  invaded 
by  reason.  He  maintains  his  superstition  with 
a  credulity  as  boundless,  and  a  zeal  as  unscru 
pulous,  as  can  be  found  in  the  most  ardent  par 
tisans  of  religious  or  political  factions.  The 
most  overwhelming  proofs  are  rejected;  the 
plainest  rules  of  morality  are  explained  away  ; 
extensive  and  important  portions  of  history  are 
completely  distorted;  the  enthusiast  misrepre 
sents  facts  with  all  the  effrontery  of  an  advo 
cate,  and  confounds  right  and  wrong  with  all 
the  dexterity  of  a  Jesuit — and  all  this  only  in 
order  that  some  man  who  l>as  been  in  his 
grave  for  ages  may  have  a  fairer  character 
than  he  deserves. 

Middleton's  "Life  of  Cicero"  is  a  striking 
instance  of  the  influence  of  this  sort  of  par 
tiality.  Never  was  there  a  character  which  it 
was  easier  to  read  than  that  of  Cicero.  Never 
was  there  a  mind  keener  or  more  critical  than 
that  of  Middleton.  Had  the  doctor  brought  to 
the  examination  of  his  favourite  statesman's 
conduct  but  a  very  small  part  of  the  acuteness 
and  severity  which  he  displayed  when  he  was 
engaged  in  investigating  the  high  pretensions 
of  Epiphanins  and  Justin  Martyr,  he  could  not 
have  failed  to  produce  a  most  valuable  history 
of  a  most  interesting  portion  of  time.  But  this 
most  ingenious  and  learned  man,  though 

"  So  wary  lield  and  wise 
T?iat,  as't  was  said,  he  scarce  received 
For  gospel  what  the  church  believed," 

had  a  superstition  of  his  own.  The  great 
Iconoclast  was  himself  an  idolater.  The  great 
JIvvocata  del  Diavolo,  while  he  disputed,  with  no 
small  .ability,  the  claims  of  Cyprian  and  A  th ana- 
sins  to  a  place  in  the  Calendar,  was  himself 
composing  a  lying  legend  in  honour  of  St. 
Tully!  He  was  holding  up  as  a  model  of 
every  virtue  a  man  whose  talents  and  acquire 
ments,  indeed,  can  never  be  too  highly  extol 
led,  and  who  was  by  no  means  destitute  of 
amiable  qualities,  but  whose  whole  soul  was 
^^llder  the  dominion  of  a  girlish  vanity  and  a 
craven  fear.  Actions  for  which  Cicero  him 
self,  the  most  eloquent  and  skilful  of  advocates, 
could  contrive  no  excuse,  actions  which  in  his 
confidential  correspondence  he  mentioned  with 
remorse  anA  ^hame,  are  represented  by  his 
biographer  as  wise,  virtuous,  heroic.  The 
wh«le  history  of  that  great  revolution  which 
overthrew  the  Roman  aristocracy,  the  whole 
utat"  of  parties,  the  character  of  every  public 
man,  is  elaborately  misrepresented,  in  order  to 
make  GUI  something  which  may  look  like  a 


|  defence  of  one  most  eloquent  and  accomplished 
Trimmer. 

The  volume  before  us  reminds  us  now  and 
then  of  the  "  Life  of  Cicero."  But  there  is  this 
marked  difference.  Dr.  Middleton  evidently 
had  an  uneasy  consciousness  of  the  weakness 
of  his  cause,  and  therefore  resorted  to  the  most 
disingenuous  shifts,  to  unpardonable  distortions 
and  suppressions  of  facts.  Mr.  Montagu's 
faith  is  sincere  and  implicit.  He  practises  no 
trickery.  He  conceals  nothing.  He  puts  the 
facts  before  us  in  the  full  confidence  that  they 
will  produce  on  our  minds  the  effect  which 
they  have  produced  on  his  own.  It  is  not  till 
he  comes  to  reason  from  facts  to  motives,  that 
his  partiality  shows  itself;  and  then  he  leaves 
Middleton  himself  far  behind.  His  work  pro 
ceeds  on  the  assumption  that  Bacon  was  an 
eminently  virtuous  man.  From  the  free  Mr. 
Montagu  judges  of  the  fruit.  He  is  forced  to 
relate  many  actions,  which,  if  any  man  bat 
Bacon  had  committed  them,  nobody  would  have 
dreamed  of  defending — actions  which  are 
readily  and  completely  explained  by  supposing 
Bacon  to  have  been  a  man  whose  principles 
were  not  strict,  and  whose  spirit  was  not  high 
— actions  which  can  be  explained  in  no  other 
way,  without  resorting  to  some  grotesque  hy 
pothesis  for  which  there  is  not  a  title  of  evi 
dence.  But  any  hypothesis  is,  in  Mr.  Montagu's 
opinion,  more  probable  than  that  his  hero  should 
ever  have  done  any  thing  very  wrong. 

This  mode  of  defending  Bacon  seems  to  us 
by  no  means  Baconian.  To  take  a  man's  cha 
racter  for  granted,  and  then  from  his  character 
to  infer  the  moral  quality  of  all  his  actions,  is 
surely  a  process  the  very  reverse  of  that  which 
is  recommended  in  the  Novttm  Orgawum.  No 
thing,  we  are  sure,  could  have  led  Mr.  Montagu 
to  depart  so  far  from  his  master's  precepts, 
except  zeal  for  his  master's  honour.  We  shall 
follow  a  different  course.  We  shall  attempt, 
with  the  valuable  assistance  which  Mr.  Mon 
tagu  has  afforded  us,  to  frame  such  an  account 
of  Bacon's  life  as  may  enable  our  readers  cor 
rectly  to  estimate  his  character. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that  Francis 
Bacon  was  the  son  of  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon,  who 
held  the  great  seal  of  England  during  the  first 
twenty  years  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth.  The 
fame  of  the  father  has  been  thrown  into  shade 
by  that  of  the  son.  But  Sir  Nicholas  was  no 
ordinary  man.  He  belonged  to  a  set  of  men 
whom  it  is  easier  to  describe  collectively  than 
separately;  whose  minds  were  formed  by  one 
system  of  discipline ;  who  belonged  to  one 
rank  in  society,  to  one  university,  to  one  party, 
to  one  sect,  to  one  administration;  and  who 
resembled  each  other  so  much  in  talents,  in 
opinions,  in  habits,  in  fortunes,  that  one  cha 
racter,  we  had  almost  said  one  life,  may,  to  a 
considerable  extent,  serve  for  them  all. 

They  were  the  first  generation  of  statesmen 
by  profession  that  England  produced.  Before 
their  time  the  division  of  labour  hatl,  in  this 
respect,  been  very  imperfect.  Those  who  had 
directed  public  affairs  had  been,  with  few  ex 
ceptions,  warriors  or  priests  :  warriors  whose 
rude  courage  was  neither  guided  by  science 
nor  softened  by  humanity  ;  priests  whose 
learning  and  abilities  were  habitually  devoted 


LORD  BACON. 


245 


to  the  defence  of  tyranny  and  imposture.  The 
Hotspurs,  the  Nevilles,  the  Cliffords — rough, 
illiterate,  and  unreflecting — brought  to  the 
council-board  the  fierce  and  imperious  disposi 
tion  which  they  had  acquired  amidst  the  tu 
mult  of  predatory  war,  or  in  the  gloomy  repose 
of  the  garrisoned  and  moated  castle.  On  the 
other  side  was  the  calm  and  subtle  prelate, 
versed  in  all  that  was  then  considered  as 
learning;  trained  in  the  schools  to  manage 
words,  and  in  the  confessional  to  manage 
hearts;  seldom  superstitious,  but  skilful  in 
practising  on  the  superstition  of  others  ;  false 
as  it  was  natural  that  a  man  should  be,  whose 
profession  imposed  on  all  who  were  not  saints 
the  necessity  of  being  hypocrites;  selfish  as  it 
was  natural  that  a  man  should  be,  who  could 
form  no  domestic  ties,  and  cherish  no  hope  of 
legitimate  posterity;  more  attached  to  his  order 
than  to  his  country,  and  guiding  the  politics  of 
England  with  a  constant  side-glance  at  Rome. 
But  the  increase  of  wealth,  the  progress  of 
knowledge,  and  the  reformation  of  religion 
produced  a  great  change.  The  nobles  ceased 
to  be  military  chieftains  ;  the  priests  ceased  to 
possess  a  monopoly  of  learning ;  and  a  new  and 
remarkable  species  of  politicians  appeared. 

These  men  came  from  neither  of  the  classes 
which  had,  till  then,  almost  exclusively  fur 
nished  ministers  of  state.  They  were  all  lay 
men  ;  yet  they  were  all  men  of  learning,  and 
they  were  all  men  of  peace.  They  were  not 
members  of  the  aristocracy.  They  inherited 
no  titles,  no  large  domains,  no  armies  of  re 
tainers,  no  fortified  castles.  Yet  they  were  not 
low  men,  such  as  those  whom  princes,  jealous 
of  the  power  of  a  nobility,  have  sometimes 
raised  from  forges,  and  cobblers'  stalls,  to  the 
highest  situations.  They  were  all  gentlemen 
by  birth.  They  had  all  received  a  liberal  edu 
cation.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  they  were 
all  members  of  the  same  university.  The  two 
great  national  seats  of  learning  had  even  then 
acquired  the  characters  which  they  still  retain. 
In  intellectual  activity,  and  in  readiness  to 
admit  improvements,  the  superiority  was  then, 
as  it  has  ever  since  been,  on  the  side  of  the 
less  ancient  and  splendid  institution.  Cam 
bridge  had  the  honour  of  educating  those  cele 
brated  Protestant  bishops  whom  Oxford  had 
the  honour  of  burning;  and  at  Cambridge 
were  formed  the  minds  of  all  those  statesmen 
to  whom  chiefly  is  to  be  attributed  the  secure 
establishment  of  the  reformed  religion  in  the 
north  of  Europe. 

The  statesmen  of  whom  we  speak  passed 
their  youth  surrounded  by  the  incessant  din  of 
theological  controversy.     Opinions  were  still 
in  a  state  of  chaotic  anarchy,  intermingling, 
separating,  advancing,  receding.     Sometimes 
the    stubborn    bigotry  of    the  Conservatives 
seemed  likely  to  prevail.    Then  the  impetuous 
onset  of  the  Reformers  for  a  moment  carried 
all  before  it.    Then  again  the  resisting  mass 
made  a  desperate  stand,  arrested  the  move 
ment,  and  forced  it  slowly  back.     The  vacilla-  I 
tion  which  at  that   time  appeared  in  English  ! 
legislation,  and  which  it  has  been  the  fashion  j 
to  attribute  to  the  caprice  and  to  the  power  of  ! 
one  or  two  individuals,  was  truly  a  national  \ 
vacillation.    It  was  not  only  in  the  mind  of  > 


Henry  that  the  new  theology  obtained  tiie  as 
cendant  at  one  time,  and  that  the  lessons  of  the 
nurse  and  of  the  priest  regained  their  infVaenee 
at  another.  It  was  not  only  in  the  house  of 
Tudor  that  the  husband  was  exasperated  by 
the  opposition  of  the  wife,  that  the  son  dissented 
from  the  opinions  of  the  father,  that  the  brother 
persecuted  the  sister,  the  one  sister  persecuted 
another.  The  principles  of  conservation  and 
reform  carried  on  their  warfare  in  every  part 
of  society,  in  every  congregation,  in  every 
school  of  learning,  round  the  hearth  of  every 
private  family,  in  the  recesses  of  every  reflect 
ing  mind. 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  this  ferment  that  the 
minds  of  the  persons  whom  we  are  describing 
were  developed.  They  were  born  Reformers. 
They  belonged  by  nature  to  that  order  of  men 
who  always  form  the  front  ranks  in  the  great 
intellectual  progress.  They  were,  therefore, 
one  and  all  Protertants.  In  religious  matters, 
however,  though  there  is  no  reason  to  doubt 
that  they  were  sincere,  they  were  by  no  means 
zealous.  None  of  them  chose  to  run  the  small 
est  personal  risk  during  the  reign  of  Mary. 
None  of  them  favoured  the  unhappy  attempt 
of  Northumberland  in  favour  of  his  daughter- 
in-law.  None  of  them  shared  in  the  desperate 
councils  of  Wyatt.  They  contrived  to  have 
business  on  the  Continent;  or,  if  they  stayed  in 
England,  they  heard  Mass  and  kept  Lent  with 
great  decorum.  When  those  dark  and  peril 
ous  years  had  gone  by,  and  when  the  crown 
had  descended  to  a  new  sovereign,  they  took 
the  lead  in  the  reformation  of  the  church.  But 
they  proceeded  not  with  the  impetuosity  of 
theologians,  but  with  the  calm  determination 
of  statesmen.  They  acted,  not  like  men  who 
considered  the  Romish  worship  as  a  system 
too  offensive  to  God  and  too  destructive  of 
souls  to  be  tolerated  for  an  hour;  but  like  men 
who  regarded  the  points  in  dispute  among 
Christians  as  in  themselves  unimportant;  and 
who  were  not  restrained  by  any  scruple  of 
conscience  from  professing,  as  they  had  before 
professed,  the  Catholic  faith  of  Mary,  the  Pro 
testant  faith  of  Edward,  or  any  of  the  numerous 
intermediate  combinations  which  the  caprice 
of  Henry,  and  the  temporizing  policy  of  Cran- 
mer,  had  formed  out  of  the  doctrines  of  both 
the  hostile  parties.  They  took  a  deliberate 
view  of  the  state  of  their  own  country  and  of 
the  continent.  They  satisfied  thernselvss  as 
to  the  leaning  of  the  public  mind;  and  they 
chose  their  side.  They  placed  themselves  at 
the  head  of  the  Protestants  of  Europe,  anil 
staked  all  their  fame  and  fortunes  on  the  suc 
cess  of  their  party. 

It  is  needless  to  relate  how  dexterously,  how 
resolutely,  how  gloriously,  they  directed  the 
politics  of  England  during  the  eventful  years 
which  followed;  how  they  succeeded  in  unit 
ing  their  friends  and  separating  their  enemies ; 
how  they  humbled  the  pride  of  Philip;  how 
they  backed  the  unconquerable  spirit  of  Co- 
ligni ;  how  they  rescued  Holland  from  tyran 
ny ;  how  they  founded  the  maritime  greatness 
of  their  country;  how  they  outwitted  the  artful 
politicians  of  Italy,  and  tamed  the  ferocious 
chieftains  of  Scotland.  It  is  impossible  to 
deny  that  they  committed  many  acts  ».vnicb 
x  2 


246 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


would  justly  bring  on  a  statesman  of  our  time 
censures  of  the  most  serious  kind.  But  when 
we  consider  the  state  of  morality  in  their  age, 
and  the  unscrupulous  character  of  the  adver 
saries  against  whom  they  had  to  contend,  we 
are  forced  to  admit,  that  it  is  not  without  rea 
son  that  their  names  are  still  held  in  veneration 
by  their  countrymen. 

There  were,  doubtless,  many  diversities  in 
their  intellectual  and  moral  character.  But 
there  was  a  strong  family  likeness.  The  con 
stitution  of  their  minds  was  remarkably  sound. 
No  particular  faculty  was  pre-eminently  de 
veloped;  but  manly  health  and  vigour  were 
equally  diffused  through  the  whole. 

They  were  men  of  letters.  Their  minds 
were  by  nature  and  by  exercise  well-fashioned 
for  speculative  pursuits.  It  was  by  circum 
stances  rather  than  by  any  strong  bias  of  in 
clination,  that  they  were  led  to  take  a  promi 
nent  part  in  active  life.  In  active  life,  however, 
no  men  could  be  more  perfectly  free  from  the 
faults  of  mere  theorists  and  pedants.  No  men 
observed  more  accurately  the  signs  of  the 
times.  No  men  had  a  greater  practical  ac 
quaintance  with  human  nature.  Their  policy 
was  generally  characterized  rather  by  vigi 
lance,  by  moderation,  and  by  firmness,  than 
by  invention  or  by  the  spirit  of  enterprise. 

They  spoke  and  wrote  in  a  manner  worthy 
of  their  excellent  sense.  Their  eloquence 
was  less  copious  and  less  ingenious,  but  far 
purer  and  more  manly  than  that  of  the  succeed 
ing  generation.  It  was  the  eloquence  of  men 
who  had  lived  with  the  first  translators  of  the 
Bible,  and  with  the  authors  of  the  Book  of 
Common  Prayer.  It  was  luminous,  dignified, 
solid,  and  very  slightly  tainted  with  that  affec 
tation  which  deformed  the  style  of  the  ablest 
men  of  the  next  age.  If,  as  sometimes  chanced, 
they  were  under  the  necessity  of  taking  a  part 
in  those  theological  controversies  on  which  the 
dearest  interests  of  kingdoms  were  then  staked, 
they  acquitted  themselves  as  if  their  whole 
lives  had  been  passed  in  the  schools  and  the 
convocation. 

There  was  something  in  the  temper  of  these 
celebrated  men  which  secured  them  against 
the  proverbial  inconstancy  both  of  the  court 
and  of  the  multitude.  No  intrigue,  no  com 
bination  of  rivals,  could  deprive  them  of  the 
confidence  of  their  sovereign.  No  Parliament 
attacked  their  influence.  No  mob  coupled 
their  names  with  any  odious  grievance.  Their 
power  ended  only  with  their  lives.  In  this  re 
spect  their  fate  presents  a  most  remarkable 
contrast  to  that  of  the  enterprising  and  brilliant 
politicians  of  the  preceding,  and  of  the  suc 
ceeding  generation.  Burleigh  was  minister 
during  forty  years.  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon  held 
the  great  seal  more  than  twenty  years.  Sir 
Thomas  Smith  was  Secretary  of  State  eighteen 
years; — Sir  Francis  Walsingham  about  as 
long.  They  all  died  in  office,  and  in  the  full 
enjoyment  of  public  respect  and  royal  favour. 
Far  different  had  been  the  fate  of  Wolsey, 
Ciomwell,  Norfolk,  Somerset,  and  Northum 
berland.  Far  different  also  was  the  fate  of 
Essex,  of  Raleigh,  and  of  the  still  more  illus- 
mous  man  whose  life  we  propose  to  consider. 

The  explanation  of   this   circumstance  is 


perhaps  contained  in  the  motto  which  Sir 
Nicholas  Bacon  inscribed  over  the  entrance  of 
his  hall  at  Gorhambury — Mediocria  frnna.  This 
maxim  was  constantly  borne  in  mind  by  him 
self  and  his  colleagues.  They  were  more 
solicitous  to  lay  the  foundations  of  their  power 
deep,  than  to  raise  the  structure  to  a  conspi 
cuous  but  insecure  height.  None  of  them 
aspired  to  be  sole  minister.  None  of  them 
provoked  envy  by  an  ostentatious  display  of 
wealth  and  influence.  None  of  them  affected 
to  outshine  the  ancient  aristocracy  of  the  king 
dom.  They  were  free  from  that  childish  love 
of  titles  which  characterized  the  successful 
courtiers  of  the  generation  which  preceded 
them,  and  that  which  followed  them.  As  to 
money,  none  of  them  could,  in  that  age,  justly 
be  considered  as  rapacious.  Some  of  them 
would,  even  in  our  time,  deserve  the  praise  of 
eminent  disinterestedness.  Their  fidelity  to 
the  state  was  incorruptible.  Their  private 
morals  were  without  stain.  Their  households 
were  sober  and  well  governed. 

Among  these  statesmen  Sir  Nicholas  Bacon 
was  generally  considered  as  ranking  next  to 
Burleigh.  He  was  called  by  Camden,  "  Sacris 
conciliis  alterum  columen;"  and  by  George 
Buchanan, 

"Diu  Britannici 
Regni  securidum  columen." 

The  second  wife  of  Sir  Nicholas,  and  the 
mother  of  Francis  Bacon,  was  Anne,  one  of 
the  daughters  of  Sir  Anthony  Cook — a  man 
of  distinguished  learning,  who  had  been  tutor 
to  Edward  the  Sixth.  Sir  Anthony  had  paid 
considerable  attention  to  the  education  of  his 
daughters,  and  lived  to  see  them  all  splendidly 
and  happily  married.  Their  classical  acquire 
ments  made  them  conspicuous  even  among 
the  women  of  fashion  of  that  age.  Katherine, 
who  became  Lady  Killigrew,  wrote  Latin  hex 
ameters  and  pentameters  which  would  appear 
with  credit  in  the  Musce  Etnnenses.  Mildied, 
the  wife  of  Lord  Burleigh,  was  described  by 
Roger  Ascham  as  the  best  Greek  scholar 
among  the  young  women  of  England,  Lady 
Jane  Grey  always  excepted.  Anne,  the  mo 
ther  of  Francis  Bacon,  was  distinguished  both 
as  a  linguist  and  as  a  theologian.  She  corres 
ponded  in  Greek  with  Bishop  Jewell,  and 
translated  his  Apologia  from  the  Latin,  so  cor 
rectly  that  neither  he  nor  Archbishop  Parker 
could  suggest  a  single  alteration.*  She  also 
translated  a  series  of  sermons  on  fate  and 
freewill  from  the  Tuscan  of  Bernardo  Ochino. 
This  fact  is  the  more  curious,  as  Ochino  was 
one  of  that  small  and  audacious  band  of  Ita 
lian  reformers — anathematized  alike  by  Wit 
tenberg,  by  Geneva,  by  Zurich,  and  by  Rome 
— from  which  the  Socinian  sect  deduces  its 
origin. 

Lady  Bacon  was  doubtless  a  lady  of  highly 
cultivated  mind  after  the  fashion  of  her  age. 
But  we  must  not  suffer  ourselves  to  be  deluded 
into  the  belief,  that  she  and  her  sisters  were 
more  accomplished  women  than  many  who 
are  now  living.  On  this  subject  there  is,  we 
think,  much  misapprehension.  We  have  often 
heard  men  who  wish,  as  almost  all  men  of 


*  Strype's  Life  of  Parker. 


LORD  BACON. 


247 


sense  wish,  that  women  shou!5  be  highly  edu-  j 
cated,  speak  with  rapture  of  the  English  ladies  j 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  lament  that  they 
can  find  no  modern  damsel  resembling  those  i 
fair  pupils  of  Ascham  and  Aylmer  who  com-  j 
pared,  over  their  embroidery,  the  styles  of  Iso-  j 
crates  and  Lysias,  and  who,  while  the  horns  j 
were  sounding^  and  the  dogs  in  full  cry,  sat  in 
the  lonely  onel,  with  eyes  riveted  to  that 
immortal  page  which  tells  how  meekly  and 
bravely  the  first  great  martyr  of  intellectual 
liberty  took  the  cup  from  his  weeping  jailer. 
But  surely  these  complaints  have  very  little 
foundation.  We  would  by  no  means  dispa 
rage  the  'adies  of  the  sixteenth  century  or  their 
pursuits  But  we  conceive  that  those  who 
extol  them  at  the  expense  of  the  women  of 
our  time  forget  one  very  obvious  and  very 
important  circumstance.  In  the  reign  of 
Henry  the  Eighth,  and  Edward  the  Sixth,  a 
person  who  did  not  read  Greek  and  Latin 
could  read  nothing,  or  next  to  nothing.  The 
Italian  was  the  only  modern  language  which 
possessed  any  thing  that  could  be  called  a 
literature.  All  the  valuable  books  then  extant 
in  all  the  vernacular  dialects  of  Europe  would 
hardly  have  filled  a  single  shelf.  England  did 
not  yet  possess  Shakspeare's  plays,  and  the 
Faerie  Queen ;  nor  France  Montaigne's  Essays; 
nor  Spain  Don  Quixote.  In  looking  round 
a  well-furnished  library,  how  few  English  or 
French  books  can  we  find  which  were  extant 
when  Lady  Jane  Grey  and  Queen  Elizabeth 
received  their  education.  Chaucer,  Gower, 
Froissart,  Comines,  Rabelais,  nearly  complete 
the  list.  It  was  therefore  absolutely  necessary 
that  a  woman  should  be  uneducated  or  classi 
cally  educated.  Indeed,  without  a  knowledge 
of  one  of  the  ancient  languages  no  person 
could  then  have  any  clear  notions  of  what  was 
passing  in  the  political,  the  literary,  or  the 
religious  world.  The  Latin  was  in  the  six 
teenth  century  all  and  more  than  all  that  the 
French  was  in  the  eighteenth.  It  was  the  lan 
guage  of  courts  as  well  as  of  the  schools.  It 
was  the  language  of  diplomacy;  it  was  the 
language  of  theological  and  political  contro 
versy.  Being  a  fixed  language,  while  the  living 
languages  were  in  a  state  of  fluctuation,  be 
ing  universally  known  to  the  learned  and  the 
polite,  it  was  employed  by  almost  every  writer 
who  aspired  to  a  wide  and  durable  reputation. 
A  person  who  was  ignorant  of  it  was  shut  out 
from  all  acquaintance — not  merely  with  Ci 
cero  and  Virgil — not  merely  with  heavy  trea 
tises  on  canon-law  and  school  divinity — but 
with  the  most  interesting  memoirs,  state  pa 
pers,  and  pamphlets  of  his  own  time;  nay, 
even  with  the  most  admired  poetry  and  the 
most  popular  squibs  which  appeared  on  the 
fleeting  topics  of  the  day — with  Buchanan's 
complimentary  verses,  with  Erasmus's  dia 
logues,  with  Mutton's  epistles. 

This  is  no  longer  the  case.  All  political 
and  religious  controversy  is  now  conducted  in 
the  modern  languages.  The  ancient  tongues 
are  used  only  in  comments  on  the  ancient 
writers.  The  great  productions  of  Athenian 
and  Roman  genius  are  indeed  still  what  they 
were.  But  though  their  positive  value  is  un 


changed,  their  relative  value,  when  compared 
with  the  whole  mass  of  mental  wealth  possess 
ed  by  mankind,  has  been  constantly  falling. 
They  were  the  intellectual  all  of  our  ancestors. 
They  are  but  a  part  of  our  treasures.  Over 
what  tragedy  could  Lady  Jane  Grey  have  wept, 
over  what  comedy  could  she  have  smiled,  if 
the  ancient  dramatists  had  not  been  in  her 
library]  A  modern  reader  can  make  shift 
without  (Edipus  and  Medea,  while  he  pos 
sesses  Othello  and  Hamlet.  If  he  knows  no 
thing  of  Pyrgopolynices  and  Thraso,  he  is  fa 
miliar  with  Bobadil,  and  Bessus,  and  Pistol, 
and  Parolles.  If  he  cannot  enjoy  the  delicious 
irony  of  Plato,  he  may  find  some  compensation 
in  that  of  Pascal.  If  he  is  shut  out  from  Ne- 
phelococcygia,  he  may  take  refuge  in  Lilliput. 
We  are  guilty,  we  hope,  of  no  irreverence 
towards  those  great  nations  to  which  the  hu 
man  race  owes  art,  science,  taste,  civil  and 
intellectual  freedom,  when  we  say,  that  the 
stock  bequeathed  by  them  to  us  has  been  so 
carefully  improved  that  the  accumulated  in 
terest  now  exceeds  the  principal.  We  believe 
that  the  books  which  have  been  written  in  the 
languages  of  western  Europe,  during  the  last 
two  hundred  and  fifty  years,  ate  of  greater 
value  than  all  the  books  which,  at  the  beginning 
of  that  period,  were  extant  in  the  world.  With 
the  modern  languages  of  Europe  English  wo 
men  are  at  least  as  well  acquainted  as  English 
men.  When,  therefore,  we  compare  the  ac 
quirements  of  Lady  Jane  Grey  and  those  of  an 
accomplished  young  woman  of  our  own  time, 
we  have  no  hesitation  in  awarding  the  supe 
riority  to  the  latter.  We  hope  that  our  readers 
will  pardon  this  digression.  It  is  long;  but  it 
can  hardly  be  called  unseasonable,  if  it  tends 
to  convince  them  that  they  are  mistaken  in 
thinking  that  their  great-great-grandmothers 
were  superior  women  to  their  sisters  and  their 
wives. 

Francis  Bacon,  the  youngest  son  of  Sir 
Nicholas,  was  born  at  York  House,  his  father's 
residence  in  the  Strand,  on  the  22d  of  January, 
1561.  His  health  was  very  delicate,  and  to 
this  circumstance  may  be  partly  attributed 
that  gravity  of  carriage,  and  that  love  of  se 
dentary  pursuits,  which  distinguished  him  from 
other  boys.  Everybody  knows  how  much  his 
premature  readiness  of  wit  and  sobriety  of 
deportment  amused  the  queen ;  and  how  she 
used  to  call  him  her  young  Lord  Keeper.  We 
are  told  that  while  still  a  mere  child  he  stole 
away  from  his  playfellows  to  a  vault  in  St. 
James's  Fields,  for  the  purpose  of  investi 
gating  the  cause  of  a  singular  echo  which  he 
had  observed  there.  It  is  certain  that,  at  only 
twelve,  he  busied  himself  with  very  ingeni 
ous  speculations  on  the  art  of  legerdemain-— 
a  subject  which,  as  Professor  Dugald  Stewart 
has  most  justly  observed,  merits  much  more 
attention  from  philosophers  than  it  has  ever 
received.  These  are  trifles.  But  the  eminence 
which  Bacon  afterwards  attained  renders  them 
interesting. 

In  the  thirteenth  year  of  his  age  he  wv.s  en 
tered  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  That 
celebrated  school  of  learning  enjoyed  the  pe 
culiar  favour  of  the  Lord  Treasurer  and  the 


248 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Lord  Keeper;  and  acknowledged  the  advan 
tages  which  it  derived  from  their  patronage  in 
a  public  letter  which  bears  date  just  a  month 
after  the  admission  of  Francis  Bacon.*  The 
master  was  Whitgift,  afterwards  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury,  a  narrow-minded,  mean,  and 
tyrannical  priest,  who  gained  power  by  servili 
ty  and  adulation,  and  employed  in  persecuting 
with  impartial  cruelty  those  who  agreed  with 
Calvin  about  church  government,  and  those 
who  differed  from  Calvin  touching  the  doc 
trine  of  reprobation.  He  was  now  in  the  chry 
salis  state — putting  off  the  worm  and  putting 
on  the  dragon-fly — a  kind  of  intermediate  grub 
between  sycophant  and  oppressor.  He  was 
indemnifying  himself  for  the  court  which  he 
found  it  expedient  to  pay  to  the  ministers,  by 
exercising  much  petty  tyranny  within  his  own 
college.  It  would  be  unjust,  however,  to  denv 
him  the  praise  of  having  rendered  about  this 
time  one  important  service  to  letters.  He  stood 
up  manfully  against  those  who  wished  to  make 
Trinity  College  a  mere  appendage  to  West 
minster  school,  and  by  this  act,  the  only  good 
act,  as  far  as  we  remember,  of  his  long  public 
life,  he  saved  the  noblest  place  of  education 
in  England  from  the  degrading  fate  of  King's 
College  and  New  College. 

It  has  often  been  said  that  Bacon,  while  still 
at  college,  planned  that  great  intellectual  revo 
lution  Avith  which  his  name  is  inseparably 
connected.  The  evidence  on  this  subject, 
however,  is  hardly  sufficient  to  prove  what  is 
in  itself  so  improbable  as  that  any  definite 
scheme  of  that  kind  should  have  been  so  early 
formed,  even  by  so  powerful  and  active  a 
mind.  But  it  is  certain  that,  after  a  residence 
of  three  years  at  Cambridge,  Bacon  departed, 
carrying  with  him  a  profound  contempt  for  the 
course  of  study  pursued  there ;  a  fixed  convic 
tion  that  the  system  of  academic  education  in 
England  was  radically  vicious ;  a  just  scorn 
for  the  trifles  on  which  the  followers  of  Aris 
totle  had  wasted  their  powers,  and  no  great 
reverence  for  Aristotle  himself. 

In  his  sixteenth  year  he  visited  Paris,  and 
resided  there  for  some  time,  under  the  care  of 
Sir  Amias  Paulet,  Elizabeth's  minister  at  the 
French  court,  and  one  of  the  ablest  and  most 
upright  of  the  many  valuable  servants  whom 
she  employed.  France  was  at  that  time  in  a 
deplorable  state  of  agitation.  The  Huguenots 
and  the  Catholics  were  mustering  all  their 
force  for  the  fiercest  and  most  protracted  of 
their  many  str  uggles :  while  the  prince,  whose 
duty  it  was  to  protect  arid  to  restrain  both,  had 
by  his  vices  and  follies  degraded  himself  so 
deeply  that  he  had  no  authority  over  either. 
Bacon,  however,  made  a  tour  through  several 
provinces,  and  appears  to  have  passed  some 
time  at  Poitiers.  We  have  abundant  proof 
that  during  his  stay  on  the  continent  he  did 
not  neglect  literary  and  scientific  pursuits. 
But  nis  attention  seems  to  have  been  chiefly 
directed  to  statistics  and  diplomacy.  It  was  at 
this  time  that  he  wrote  those  Notes  on  the 
State  of  Europe  Avhich  are  printed  in  his 
works.  He  studied  the  principles  of  the  art 


*  tfuype's  Life  of  Whitgift. 


of  deciphering  with  great  interest;  and  invent 
ed  one  cipher  so  ingenious  that  many  years 
later  he  thought  it  deserving  of  a  place  in  the 
De  Jlugmentis.  In  February,  1580,  while  en 
gaged  in  these  pursuits,  he  received  intelli 
gence  of  the  almost  sudden  death  of  his  father, 
and  instantly  returned  to  England. 

His  prospects  were  greatly  overcast  by  this 
event.  He  was  most  desirous  to  obtain  a  pro 
vision  which  might  enable  him  to  devote  him 
self  to  literature  and  politics.  He  applied  to 
the  government,  and  it  seems  strange  that  he 
should  have  applied  in  vain.  His  wishes 
were  moderate.  His  hereditary  claims  on  the 
administration  were  great.  He  had  himself 
been  favourably  noticed  by  the  queen.  His 
uncle  was  Prime  Minister.  His  own  talents 
were  such  as  any  minister  might  have  been 
eager  to  enlist  in  the  public  service.  But  his 
solicitations  were  unsuccessful.  The  truth  is, 
that  the  Cecils  disliked  him,  and  did  all  that 
they  could  decently  do  to  keep  him  down.  It 
has  never  been  alleged  that  Bacon  had  done 
any  thing  to  merit  this  dislike  ;  nor  is  it  at  all 
probable  that  a  man  whose  temper  was  natu 
rally  mild,  whose  manners  were  courteous, 
who,  through  life,  nursed  his  fortunes  with  the 
utmost  care,  and  who  was  fearful  even  to  a 
fault  of  offending  the  powerful,  would  have 
given  any  just  cause  of  displeasure  to  a  kins 
man  who  had  the  means  of  rendering  him  es 
sential  service,  and  of  doing  him  irreparable 
injury.  The  real  explanation,  we  have  no 
doubt,  is  this:  Robert  Cecil,  the  Treasurer's 
second  son,  was  younger  by  a  few  months 
than  Bacon.  He  had  been  educated  with  the 
utmost  care ;  had  been  initiated,  while  still  a 
boy,  in  the  mysteries  of  diplomacy  and  court 
intrigue  ;  and  was  just  at  this  time  about  to  be 
introduced  on  the  stage  of  public  life.  The 
wish  nearest  to  Burleigh's  heart  was  that  his 
own  greatness  might  descend  to  this  favourite 
child.  But  even  Burleigh's  fatherly  partiality 
could  hardly  prevent  him  from  perceiving  that 
Robert,  with  all  his  abilities  and  acquirements, 
was  no  match  for  his  cousin  Fr?.ncis.  This 
seems  to  us  the  only  rational  explanation  of 
the  Treasurer's  conduct.  Mr.  Montagu  is 
more  charitable.  He  supposes  that  Burleigh 
was  influenced  merely  by  affection  for  his 
nephew,  and  was  "little  disposed  to  encourage 
him  to  rely  on  others  rather  than  on  himself, 
and  to  venture  on  the  quicksands  of  politics, 
instead  of  the  certain  profession  of  the  law." 
If  such  were  Burleigh's  feelings,  it  seems 
strange  that  he  should  have  suffered  his  son  to 
venture  on  those  quicksands  from  which  he  so 
carefully  preserved  his  nephew.  But  the 
truth  is,  that  if  Burleigh  had  been  so  disposed, 
he  might  easily  have  secured  to  Bacon  a  com 
fortable  provision  which  should  have  been  ex 
posed  to  no  risk.  And  it  is  equally  certain 
that  he  showed  as  little  disposition  to  enable 
his  nephew  to  live  by  a  profession  as  to  enable 
him  to  live  without  a  profession.  That  Bacoi 
himself  attributed  the  conduct  of  his  relative » 
to  jealousy  of  his  superior  talents,  we  have 
not  the  smallest  doubt.  In  a  letter,  written 
many  years  after  to  Villiers,  he  expresses 
hims'elf  thus  :  "  Countenance,  encourage,  and 


LORD  BACON. 


249 


advance  able  men  in  all  kinds,  degrees,  and  j 
professions.     For  in  the  time  of  the  Cecils,  the 
father  and  the  son,  able  men  were  by  design 
and  of  purpose  suppressed."* 

Whatever  Burleigh's  motives  might  be,  his 
purpose  was  unalterable.  The  supplications 
which  Francis  addressed  to  his  uncle  and  aunt 
were  earnest,  humble,  and  almost  servile.  He 
was  the  most  promising  and  accomplished 
young  man  of  his  time.  His  father  had  been 
the  brother-in-law,  the  most  useful  colleague, 
the  nearest  friend  of  the  minister.  But  all  this 
availed  poor  Francis  nothing.  He  was  forced, 
much  against  his  will,  to  betake  himself  to  the 
study  of  the  law.  He  was  admitted  at  Gray's 
Inn,  and,  during  some  years,  he  laboured  there 
in  obscurity. 

What  the  extent  of  his  legal  attainments 
may  have  been,  it  is  difficult  to  say.  It  was 
not  hard  for  a  man  of  his  powers  to.  acquire 
that  very  moderate  portion  of  technical  know 
ledge  which,  when  joined  to  quickness,  tact, 
wit,  ingenuity,  eloquence,  and  knowledge  of 
the  world,  is  sufficient  to  raise  an  advocate  to 
the  highest  professional  eminence.  The  gene 
ral  opinion  appears  to  have  been  that  which 
was  on  one  occasion  expressed  by  Elizabeth. 
"  Bacon,"  said  she,  "  had  a  great  wit  and  much 
learning;  but  in  law  showeth  to  the  uttermost 
of  his  knowledge,  and  is  not  deep."  The  Ce 
cils,  we  suspect,  did  their  best  to  spread  this 
opinion  by  whispers  and  insinuations.  Coke 
openly  proclaimed  it  Avith  that  rancorous  inso 
lence  which  was  habitual  to  him.  No  reports 
are  more  readily  believed  than  those  which 
disparage  genius  and  soothe  the  envy  of  con 
scious  mediocrity.  It  must  have  been  inex 
pressibly  consoling  to  a  stupid  sergeant,  the 
forerunner  of  him  who,  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years  later,  "shook  his  head  at  Murray  as  a 
wit,"  to  know  that  the  most  profound  thinker, 
and  the  most  accomplished  orator  of  the  age, 
was  very  imperfectly  acquainted  with  the  law 
touching  bastard  eigne  and  mulier  puisue,  and 
confounded  the  right  of  free  fishery  with  that 
of  common  of  piscary. 

It  is  certain  that  no  man  in  that  age,  or  in 
deed  during  the  century  and  a  half  which 
followed,  was  better  acquainted  with  the  phi 
losophy  of  law.  His  technical  knowledge  was 
quite  sufficient,  with  the  help  of  his  admirable 
talents,  and  his  insinuating  a-ddress,  to  procure 
clients.  He  rose  very  rapidly  into  business, 
and  soon  entertained  hopes  of  being  called 
within  the  bar.  He  applied  to%Lord  Burleigh 
for  that  purpose,  but  received  a  testy  refusal. 
Of  the  grounds  of  that  refusal  we  can,  in  some 
measure,  judge  by  Bacon's  answer,  which  is 
still  extant.  It  seems  that  the  old  lord,  whose 
temper,  age,  and  gout  had  by  no  means  altered 
for  the  better,  and  who  omitted  no  opportunity 
of  marking  his  dislike  of  the  showy,  quick 
witted  young  men  of  the  rising  generation, 
took  this  opportunity  to  read  Francis  a  very 
sharp  lecture  on  his  vanity,  and  want  of  re 
spect  for  his  betters.  Francis  returned  a  most 
submissive  reply,  thanked  the  Treasurer  for 
the  admonition,  and  promised  to  profit  by  it. 
Strangers  meanwhile  were  less  unjust  to  the 


*  See  page  61,  vol  xii.  of  the  present  edition. 
VOL.  II.— 32. 


young  barrister  than  his  nearest  kinsmen  had 
been.  In  his  twenty-sixth  year  he  became  a 
bencher  of  his  Inn ;  and  two  years  later  he 
was  appointed  Lent  reader.  At  length,  in 
1590,  he  obtained  for  the  first  time  some  show 
of  favour  from  the  court.  He  was  sworn  in 
Queen's  Counsel  extraordinary.  But  this  mark 
of  honour  was  not  accompanied  by  any  pecu 
niary  emolument.  He  continued,  therefore,  to 
solicit  his  powerful  relatives  for  some  provi 
sion  which  might  enable  him  to  live  without 
drudging  at  his  profession.  H<".  bore  with  a 
patience  and  serenity,  which,  we  fear,  border 
ed  on  meanness,  the  morose  humours  of  his 
uncle,  and  the  sneering  reflections  which  his 
cousin  cast  on  speculative  men,  lost  in  philo 
sophical  dreams,  and  too  wise  to  be  capable 
of  transacting  public  business.  At  length  the 
Cecils  were  generous  enough  to  procure  for 
him  the  reversion  of  the  Registrarship  of  the 
Star-Chamber.  This  was  a  lucrative  place ; 
but  as  many  years  elapsed  before  it  fell  in,  he 
was  still  under  the  necessity  of  labouring  for 
his  daily  bread. 

In  the  Parliament  which  was  called  in  1593 
he  sat  as  member  for  the  county  ol  Middlesex, 
and  soon  attained  eminence  as  a  debater.  It 
is  easy  to  perceive  from  the  scanty  remains 
of  his  oratory,  that  the  same  compactness  of 
expression  and  richness  of  fancy  which  appear 
in  his  writings  characterized  his  speeches ; 
and  that  his  extensive  acquaintance  with  lite 
rature  and  history  enabled  him  to  entertain 
his  audience  with  a  vast  variety  of  illustra 
tions  and  allusions  which  were  generally  hap 
py  and  apposite,  but  which  were  probably  not 
least  pleasing  to  the  taste  of  that  age  when 
they  were  such  as  would  now  be  thought 
childish  or  pedantic.  It  is  evident  also  that 
he  was,  as  indeed  might  have  been  expected, 
perfectly  free  from  those  faults  which  are 
generally  found  in  an  advocate  who,  after  hav 
ing  risen  to  eminence  at  the  bar,  enters  the 
House  of  Commons;  that  it  was  his  habit  to 
deal  with  every  great  question,  not  in  small 
detached  portions,  but  as  a  whole;  that  he  re 
fined  little,  and  that  his  reasonings  were  those 
of  a  capacious  rather  than  a  subtle  mind. 
Ben  Jonson,  a  most  unexceptionable  judge, 
has  described  his  eloquence  in  words,  which, 
though  often  quoted,  will  bear  to  be  quoted 
again.  "There  happened  in  my  time  one  no 
ble  speaker  who  was  full  of  gravity  in  his 
speaking.  His  language,  where  he  could  spare 
or  pass  by  a  jest,  was  nobly  censorious.  No 
man  ever  spoke  more  neatly,  more  pressly, 
more  weightily,  or  suffered  less  emptiness,  less 
idleness,  in  what  he  uttered.  No  member  of 
his  speech  but  consisted  of  his  own  graces, 
His  hearers  could  not  cough  or  look  aside 
from  him  without  loss.  He  commanded  where 
he  spoke,  and  had  his  judges  angry  and  pleased 
at  his  devotion.  No  man  had  fheir  affections- 
more  in  his  power.  The  fear  of  every  man 
that  heard  him  was  lest  he  should  make  ar» 
end."  From  the  mention  which  is  made  of 
judges,  it  would  seem  that  Jonson  had  heard 
Bacon  only  at  the  bar.  Indeed,  we  imagine 
that  the  House  of  Commons  was  then  almost- 
inaccessible  to  strangers.  It  is  not  probahl«*. 
that  a  man  of  Bacon's  nice  observation  wou!  * 


250 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


speak  in  Parliament  exactly  as  he  spoke  in 
the  Court  of  King's  Bench.  But  the  graces 
of  manner  and  language  must,  to  a  great  ex 
tent,  have  been  common  between  the  Queen's 
Counsel  and  the  Knight  of  the  Shire. 

Bacon  tried  to  play  a  very  difficult  game  in 
politics.  He  wished  to  be  at  once  a  favourite 
at  court  and  popular  with  the  multitude.  If 
any  man  could  have  succeeded  in  this  attempt, 
a  man  of  talents  so  rare,  of  judgment  so  pre 
maturely  ripe,  of  temper  so  calm,  and  of  man 
ners  so  plausible,  might  have  been  expected 
to  succeed.  Nor  indeed  did  he  wholly  fail. 
Once,  however,  he  indulged  in  a  burst  of  pa 
triotism  which  cost  him  a  long  and  bitter  re 
morse,  and  which  he  never  ventured  to  repeat. 
The  court  asked  for  large  subsidies,  and  for 
speedy  payment.  The  remains  of  Bacon's 
speech  breathe  all  the  spirit  of  the  Long  Par 
liament.  "The  gentlemen,"  said  he,  "must 
sell  their  plate,  and  the  farmers  their  brass 
pots,  ere  this  will  be  paid;  and  for  us,  we  are 
here  to  search  the  wounds  of  the  realm,  and 
not  to  skin  them  over.  The  dangers  are  these. 
First,  we  shall  breed  discontent  and  endanger 
her  majesty's  safety,  which  must  consist  more 
in  the  love  of  the  people  than  their  wealth. 
Secondly,  this  being  granted  in  this  sort,  other 
princes  hereafter  will  look  for  the  like;  so  that 
we  shall  put  an  evil  precedent  on  ourselves 
and  on  our  posterity;  and  in  histories,  it  is  to 
be  observed,  of  all  nations,  the  English  are  not 
to  be  subject,  base,  or  taxable."  The  queen 
and  her  ministers  resented  this  outbreak  of 
public  spirit  in  the  highest  manner.  Indeed, 
many  an  honest  member  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons  had,  for  a  much  smaller  matter,  been 
sent  to  ihe  Tower  by  the  proud  and  hot-blooded 
Tudors.  The  young  patriot  condescended  to 
make  the  most  abject  apologies.  He  adjured 
the  Lord  Treasurer  to  show  some  favour  to 
his  poor  servant  and  ally.  He  bemoaned  him 
self  to  the  Lord  Keeper,  in  a  letter  which  may 
keep  in  countenance  the  most  unmanly  of 
the  epistles  which  Cicero  wrote  during  his 
banishment.  The  lesson  was  not  thrown 
away.  Bacon  never  offended  in  the  same 
manner  again. 

He  was  now  satisfied  that  he  had  little  to 
hope  from  the  patronage  of  those  powerful 
kinsmen  whom  he  had  solicited  during  twelve 
years  with  such  meek  pertinacity;  and  he  be 
gan  to  look  towards  a  different  quarter.  Among 
the  courtiers  of  Elizabeth  had  lately  appeared 
a.  new  favourite — young,  noble,  wealthy,  ac 
complished,  eloqaent,  brave,  generous,  aspiring 
— a  favourite  who  had  obtained  from  the  gray- 
headed  queen  such  marks  of  regard  as  she  had 
scarce  vouchsafed  to  Leicester  in  the  season 
of  the  passions;  who  was  at  once  the  orna 
ment  of  the  palace  and  the  idol  of  the  city; 
who  \vas  the  common  patron  of  men  of  letters 
and  of  men  of  the  sword ;  who  was  the  com 
mon  refuge  oi  the  persecuted  Catholic  and  of 
the  persecuted  Puritan.  The  calm  prudence 
\rhich  had  enabled  Burleigh  to  shape  his 


ened  with  fear  and  envy  as  he  contemplated 
the  rising  fame  and  influence  of  Essex. 

The  history  of  the  factions  which,  towards 
the  close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  divided  her 
court  and  her  council,  though  pregnant  with 
instruction,  is  by  no  means  interesting  or  pleas 
ing.  Both  parties  employed  the  means  which 
are  familiar  to  unscrupulous  statesmen;  and 
neither  had,  or  even  pretended  to  have,  any  im 
portant  end  in  view.  The  public  mind  was 
then  reposing  from  one  great  effort,  and  col 
lecting  strength  for  another.  That  impetuous 
and  appalling  rush  with  which  the  human  in 
tellect  had  moved  forward  in  the  career  of  truth 
and  liberty,  during  the  fifty  years  which  follow 
ed  the  separation  of  Luther  from  the  commu 
nion  of  the  Church  of  Rome,  was  now  over. 
The  boundary  between  Protestantism  and  Po 
pery  had  been  fixed  very  nearly  where  it  still 
remains.  England,  Scotland,  the  Northern 
kingdoms  were  on  one  side;  Ireland,  Spain, 
Portugal,  Italy,  on  the  other.  The  line  of  de 
marcation  ran,  as  it  still  runs,  through  the 
midst  of  the  Netherlands,  of  Germany,  and  of 
Switzerland — dividing  province  from  province, 
electorate  from  electorate,  and  canton  from 
canton.  France  might  be  considered  as  a  de 
batable  land,  in  which  the  contest  was  still  un 
decided.  Since  that  time,  the  two  religions 
have  done  little  more  than  maintain  their 
ground.  A  few  occasional  incursions  have 
been  made.  But  the  general  frontier  remains 
the  same.  During  two  hundred  and  fifty  years 
no  great  society  has  risen  up  like  one  man, 
and  emancipated  itself  by  one  mighty  effort 
from  the  enthralling  superstition  of  ages.  This 
spectacle  was  common  in  the  middle  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  Why  has  it  ceased  to  be 
so  1  Why  has  so  violent  a  movement  been 
followed  by  so  long  a  repose  1  The  doctrines 
of  the  Reformers  are  not  less  agreeable  to  rea 
son  or  to  revelation  now  than  formerly.  The 
public  mind  is  assuredly  not  less  enlightened 
now  than  formerly.  Why  is  it  that  Protestant 
ism,  after  carrying  every  thing  before  it  in  a 
time  of  comparatively  little  knoAvledge  and  lit 
tle  freedom,  should  make  no  perceptible  pro 
gress  in  a  reasoning  and  tolerant  age ;  that  the 
Luthers,  the  Calvins,  the  Knoxes,  the  Zwingles, 
should  have  left  no  successors ;  that  during 
two  centuries  and  a  half  fewer  converts  should 
have  been  brought  over  from  the  Church  of 
Rome  than  at  the  time  of  the  Reformation  were 
sometimes  gained  in  a  year?  This  has  always 
appeared  to  us  one  of  the  most  curious  and 
interesting  problems  in  history.  On  some 
other  occasion  we  may  perhaps  attempt  to  solve 
it.  At  present  it  is  enough  to  say,  that  at  the 
lose  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  the  Protestant  party, 
to  borrow  the  language  of  the  Apocalypse,  had 


eft  its  first  love  and  had  ceased  to  do  its  first 
works. 

The  great  struggle  of  the  sixteenth  century 
was  over.  The  great  struggle  of  the  seven- 
eenth  century  had  not  commenced.  The  con- 

0  _    „    r_    fessors  of  Mary's  reign  were  dead.    The  mem- 

coursfi  through  so  many  dangers,  and  the  vast  I  bers  of  the  Long  Parliament  were  still  in  their 
experience  which  he  had  acquired  in  dealing  |  cradles.  The  Papists  had  been  deprived  of  all 
with  two  generations  of  colleagues  and  rivals,  i  power  in  the  state.  The  Puritans  had  not  yet 
see /led  scarcely  sufficient  to  support  him  in  attained  any  formidable  extent  of  power.  True 
this  new  competition ;  and  Robert  Cecil  sick-  ':  it  is,  that  a  student  well  acquainted  with  the 


LORD  BACON. 


2M 


history  ~>f  the  next  generation  can  easily  dis 
cern  in  the  proceedings  of  the  last  Parliaments 
of  Elizabeth  the  germ  of  great  and  ever-memo 
rable  events.  But  to  the  eye  of  a  contempo 
rary  nothing  of  this  appeared.  The  two  sec 
tions  of  ambitious  men  who  were  struggling 
for  power  differed  from  each  other  on  no  im 
portant  public  question.  Both  belonged  to  the 
Established  Church.  Both  professed  bound 
less  loyalty  to  the  queen.  Both  approved  the 
war  with  Spain.  There  is  not,  as  far  as  we 
are  aware,  any  reason  to  believe  that  they  en 
tertained  different  views  concerning  the  suc 
cession  to  the  crown.  Certainly  neither  fac 
tion  had  any  great  measure  of  reform  in  view. 
Neither  attempted  to  redress  any  public  griev 
ance.  The  most  odious  and  pernicious  griev 
ance  under  which  the  nation  then  suffered  was 
a  source  of  profit  to  both,  and  was  defended  by 
both  with  equal  zeal.  Raleigh  held  a  monopoly 
of  cards — Essex  a  monopoly  of  sweet  wines. 
In  fact,  the  only  ground  of  quarrel  between  the 
parties  was,  that  they  could  not  agree  as  to 
their  respective  shares  of  power  and  patron 
age. 

Nothing  in  the  political  conduct  of  Essex 
entitles  him  to  esteem ;  and  the  pity  with  which 
we  regard  his  early  and  terrible  end  is  dimi 
nished  by  the  consideration,  that  he  put  to  ha 
zard  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  his  most  attached 
friends,  and  endeavoured  to  throw  the  whole 
country  into  confusion,  for  objects  purely  per 
sonal.  Still,  it  is  impossible  not  to  be  deeply 
interested  for  a  man  so  brave,  high-spirited, 
and  generous  ; — for  a  man  who,  while  he  con 
ducted  himself  towards  his  sovereign  with  a 
boldness  such  as  was  then  found  in  no  other 
subject,  conducted  himself  towards  his  depend 
ants  with  a  delicacy  such  as  has  rarely  been 
found  in  any  other  patron.  Unlike  the  vulgar 
herd  of  benefactors,  he  desired  to  inspire,  not 
gratitude,  but  affection.  He  tried  to  make  those 
whom  he  befriended  to  feel  towards  him  as 
towards  an  equal.  His  mind,  ardent,  suscepti 
ble,  naturally  disposed  to  admiration  of  all  that 
is  great  and  beautiful,  was  fascinated  by  the 
genius  and  the  accomplishments  of  Bacon.  A 
close  friendship  was  soon  formed  between  thorn 
— a  friendship  destined  to  have  a  dark,  a 
mournful,  a  shameful  end. 

In  1594  the  office  of  Attorney-General  be 
came  vacant,  and  Bacon  hoped  to  obtain  it. 
Essex  made  his  friend's  cause  his  own — sued, 
expostulated,  promised,  threatened. — but  all  in 
vain.  It  is  probable  that  the  dislike  felt  by  the 
Cecils  for  Bacon  had  been  increased  by  the 
connection  which  he  had  lately  formed  with 
the  earl.  Robert  was  then  on  the  point  of 
being  made  Secretary  of  State.  He  happened 
one  day  to  be  in  the  same  coach  with  Essex, 
and  a  remarkable  conversation  took  place  be 
tween  them.  "  My  lord,"  said  Sir  Robert,  "  the 
queen  has  determined  to  appoint  an  Attorney- 
general  without  more  delay.  I  pray  your 
lordship  to  let  me  know  whom  you  will  fa 
vour."  "I  wonder  at  your  question,"  replied 
the  earl.  "  You  cannot  but  know  that  reso 
lutely,  against  all  the  world,  I  stand  for  your 
cousin,  Francis  Bacon."  "Good  Lord,"  cried 
Cecil,  unable  to  bridle  his  temper,  "  I  wonder 
your  lordship  should  spend  your  strength  on 


so  unlikely  a  matter.  Can  you  name  one;  pre 
cedent  of  so  raw  a  youth  promoted  to  so  great 
a  place?"  This  objection  came  with  a  singu 
larly  bad  grace  from  a  man  who,  though  young 
er  than  Bacon,  was  in  daily  expectation  of 
being  made  Secretary  of  State.  The  blot  was 
too  obvious  to  be  missed  by  Essex,  who  seldom 
forbore  to  speak  his  mind.  "I  have  made  no 
search,"  said  he,  "  for  precedents  of  young  men 
who  have  filled  the  office  of  Attorney-GeneraL 
But  I  could  name  to  you,  Sir  Robert,  a  man 
younger  than  Francis,  less  learned,  and  equally 
inexperienced,  who  is  suing  and  striving  with 
all  his  might  for  an  office  of  far  greater  weight." 
Sir  Robert  had  nothing  to  say  but  that  he 
thought  his  own  abilities  equal  to  the  place 
which  he  hoped  to  obtain  ;  and  that  his  father's 
long  services  deserved  such  a  mark  of  gratitude 
from  the  queen ;  as  if  his  abilities  were  com 
parable  to  his  cousin's,  or  as  if  Sir  Nicholas 
Bacon  had  done  no  service  to  the  state.  Cecil 
then  hinted  that  if  Bacon  would  be  satisfied 
with  the  Solicitorship,  that  might  be  of  easier 
digestion  to  the  queen.  "  Digest  me  no  diges 
tions,"  said  the  generous  and  ardent  earl.  "The 
Attorneyship  for  Francis  is  that  I  must  have ; 
and  in  that  I  will  spend  all  my  power,  might, 
authority,  and  amity;  and  with  tooth  and  nail 
procure  the  same  for  him  against  whomso 
ever  ;  whosoever  getteth  this  office  out  of  my 
hands  for  any  ether,  before  he  have  it,  it  shall 
cost  him  the  coming  by.  And  this  be  you  as 
sured  of,  Sir  Robert,  for  now  I  fully  declare 
myself;  and  for  my  own  part,  Sir  Robert,  1 
think  strange  both  of  my  Lord  Treasurer  and 
you,  that  can  have  the  mind  to  seek  the  pre 
ference  of  a  stranger  before  so  near  a  kins 
man  ;  for  if  you  weigh  in  a  balance  the  parts 
every  way  of  his  competitor  and  him,  only  ex 
cepting  five  poor  years  of  admitting  to  a  house 
of  court  before  Francis,  you  shall  find  in  all 
other  respects  whatsoever  no  comparison  be 
tween  them." 

When  the  office  of  Attorney-General  was 
filled  up,  the  earl  pressed  the  queen  to  make 
Bacon  Solicitor-General,  and,  on  this  occasion, 
the  old  Lord  Treasurer  professed  himself  not 
unfavourable  to  his  nephew's  pretensions. 
But  after  a  contest  which  lasted  more  than  a 
year  and  a  half,  and  in  which  Essex,  to  use 
his  own  words,  "spent  all  his  power,  might, 
authority,  and  amity,"  the  place  was  given  to 
another.  Essex  felt  this  disappointment  keen 
ly,  but  found  consolation  in  the  most  munifi 
cent  and  delicate  liberality.  He  presented 
Bacon  with  an  estate,  worth  near  two  thousand 
pounds,  situated  at  Twickenham,  an- 1  this,  as 
Bacon  owned  many  years  after,  "with  so  kind 
and  noble  circumstances  as  the  manner  was 
worth  more  than  the  matter." 

It  was  soon  after  these  events  that  I  aeon  first 
appeared  before  the  public  as  a  writer.  Early  in 
1597  he  published  a  small  volume  of  Essays, 
which  was  afterwards  enlarged  by  successive 
additions  to  many  times  its  original  bulk.  This 
little  Avork  was,  as  it  well  deserved  to  be,  ex 
ceedingly  popular.  It  was  reprinted  in  a  lew 
months ;  it  was  translated  into  Latin,  French, 
and  Italian ;  and  it  seems  to  have  at  once  es» 
tablished  the  literary  reputation  of  its  author 
But  though  Bacon's  reputation  rose,  h%3  JOT 


252 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tunes  were  still  depressed.  He  was  in  great 
pecuniary  difficulties ;  and,  on  one  occasion, 
was  arrested  in  the  street  at  the  suit  of  a  gold 
smith,  for  a  debt  of  £300,  and  was  carried  to  a 
spunging-house  in  Coleman  street. 

The  kindness  of  Essex  was  in  the  mean 
time  indefatigable.  In  1596  he  sailed  on  his 
memorable  expedition  to  the  coast  of  Spain. 
At  the  very  moment  of  his  embarcation,  he 
wrote  to  several  of  his  friends,  commending  to 
them,  during  his  own  absence,  the  interests  of 
Bacon.  He  returned,  after  performing  the  most 
brilliant  military  exploit  that  was  achieved  on 
the  Continent  by  English  arms,  during  the  long 
interval  which  elapsed  between  the  battle  of 
Agincourt  and  that  of  Blenheim.  His  valour, 
his  talents,  his  humane  and  generous  disposi 
tion,  had  made  him  the  idol  of  his  countrymen, 
and  had  extorted  praise  from  the  enemies 
whom  he  had  conquered.*  He  had  always 
been  proud  and  headstrong;  and  his  splendid 
success  seems  to  have  rendered  his  faults  more 
offensive  than  ever.  But  to  his  friend  Francis 
he  was  still  the  same.  Bacon  had  some 
thoughts  of  making  his  fortune  by  marriage; 
and  had  begun  to  pay  court  to  a  widow  of  the 
name  of  Hatton.  The  eccentric  manners  and 
riolent  temper  of  this  woman  made  her  a  dis 
grace  and  a  torment  to  her  connections.  But 
Bacon  was  not  aware  of  her  faults,  or  was  dis 
posed  to  overlook  them  for  the  sake  of  her 
ample  fortune.  Essex  pleaded  his  friend's 
cause  with  his  usual  ardour.  The  letters 
which  the  earl  addressed  to  Lady  Hatton  and 
to  her  mother  are  still  extant,  and  are  highly 
honourable  to  him.  "If,"  he  wrote,  "she  were 
my  sister  or  my  daughter,  I  protest  I  would  as 
confidently  resolve  to  further  it  as  I  now  per 
suade  you."  And  again :  "  If  my  faith  be  any 
thing,  I  protest,  if  I  had  one  as  near  me  as  she 
is  to  you,  I  had  rather  match  her  with  him, 
than  with  men  of  far  greater  titles."  This 
suit,  happily  for  Bacon,  was  unsuccessful. 
The  lady,  indeed,  was  kind  to  him  in  more 
ways  than  one.  She  rejected  him,  and  she 
accepted  his  enemy.  She  married  that  narrow- 
minded,  bad-hearted  pedant,  Sir  Edward  Coke, 
and  did  her  best  to  make  him  as  miserable  as 
he  deserved  to  be. 

The  fortunes  of  Essex  had  now  reached 
their  height,  and  began  tc,  decline.  He  pos 
sessed  indeed  all  the  qualities  which  raise 
men  to  greatness  rapidly.  But  he  had  neither 
the  virtues  nor  the  vices  which  enable  men  to 
retain  greatness  long.  His  frankness,  his  keen 
sensibility  to  insult  and  injustice,  were  by  no 
means  agreeable  to  a  sovereign  naturally  im 
patient  of  opposition,  and  accustomed,  during 
forty  years,  to  the  most  extravagant  flattery 
and  the  most  abject  submission.  The  daring 
and  contemptuous  manner  in  which  he  bade 
defiance  to  his  enemies  excited  their  deadly 
hatred.  His  administration  in  Ireland  was 
unfortunate,  and  in  many  respects  hignly 
blamable.  Though  his  brilliant  courage  and 
his  impetuous  activity  fitted  him  admirably 
for  such  enterprises  as  that  of  Cadiz,  he  did 
ii./t  possess  the  caution,  patience,  and  resolu 
tion  necessary  for  the  conduct  of  a  protracted 


*  Kee  Cervantea'a  Nuvda  d*  la  Espanola  Inglesa 


war  ;  in  which  difficulties  were  to  be  gradually 
surmounted,  in  which  much  discomfort  was  to 
be  endured,  and  in  which  few  splendid  exploits 
could  be  achieved.  For  the  civil  duties  of  his 
high  place  he  was  still  less  qualified.  Though 
eloquent  and  accomplished,  he  was  in  no 
sense  a  statesman.  The  multitude  indeed  still 
continued  to  regard  even  his  faults  with  fond 
ness.  But  the  court  had  ceased  to  give  him 
credit,  even  for  the  merit  which  he  really  pos 
sessed.  The  person  on  whom,  during  the  de 
cline  of  his  influence,  he  chiefly  depended,  to 
whom  he  confided  his  perplexities,  whose  ad 
vice  he  solicited,  whose  intercession  he  em 
ployed,  was  his  friend  Bacon.  The  lamentable 
truth  must  be  told.  This  friend,  so  loved,  so 
trusted,  bore  a  principal  part  in  ruining  the 
earl's  fortunes,  in  shedding  his  blood,  and 
blackening  his  memory. 

Bullet  us  be  just  to  Bacon.  We  bel'eve 
that,  to  the  last,  he  had  no  wish  to  injure 
Essex.  Nay,  we  believe  that  he  sincerely  ex 
erted  himself  to  serve  Essex,  as  long  as  he 
thought  he  could  serve  Essex  without  injuring 
himself.  The  advice  which  he  gave  to  his 
noble  benefactor  was  generally  most  judicious. 
He  did  all  in  his  power  to  dissuade  the  earl 
from  accepting  the  government  of  Ireland. 
"  For,"  says  he,  "I  did  as  plainly  see  his  over 
throw,  chained  as  it  were  by  destiny  to  that 
journey,  as  it  is  possible  for  a  man  to  ground 
a  judgment  upon  future  contingents."  The 
prediction  was  accomplished.  Essex  returned 
in  disgrace.  Bacon  attempted  to  mediate  be 
tween  his  friend  and  the  queen ;  and,  we 
believe,  honestly  employed  all  his  address  for 
that  purpose.  But  the  task  which  he  had  un 
dertaken  was  too  difficult,  delicate,  and  peril 
ous,  even  for  so  wary  and  dexterous  an  agent. 
He  had  to  manage  two  spirits  equally  proud, 
resentful,  and  ungovernable.  At  Essex  House, 
he  had  to  calm  the  rage  of  a  young  hero,  in 
censed  by  multiplied  wrongs  and  humiliations; 
and  then  to  pass  to  Whitehall  for  the  purpose 
of  soothing  the  peevishness  of  a  sovereign, 
whose  temper,  never  very  gentle,  had  been 
rendered  morbidly  irritable  by  age,  by  de 
clining  health,  and  by  the  long  habit  of  listen 
ing  to  flattery  and  exacting  implicit  obedience. 
It  is  hard  to  serve  two  masters.  Situated  as 
Bacon  was,  it  was  scarcely  possible  for  hirn  to 
shape  his  course  so  as  not  to  give  one  or  Uoth 
of  his  employers  reason  to  complain.  For  a 
time  he  acted  as  fairly  as,  in  circumstances  so 
embarrassing,  could  reasonab'y  be  expected. 
At  length,  he  found  that  while  he  was  trying  to 
prop  the  fortunes  of  another,  he  was  in  danger 
of  shaking  his  own.  He  had  disobliged  both 
of  the  parties  whom  he  wished  to  reconcile. 
Essex  thought  him  wanting  in  zeal  as  a  friend; 
Elizabeth  thought  him  wanting  in  duty  as  a 
subject.  The  earl  looked  on  him  as  a  spy  of 
the  queen,  the  queen  as  a  creature  of  the  earl. 
The  reconciliation  which  he  had  laboured  tc 
effect  appeared  utterly  hopeless.  A  thousand 
signs,  legible  to  eyes  far  less  keen  than  his,  an 
nounced  that  the  fall  of  his  patron  was  at  hand. 
He  shaped  his  course  accordingly.  When, 
Essex  was  brought  before  the  council  to  answer 
for  his  conduct  in  Ireland,  Bacon,  after  a  faint 
attempt  to  excuse  himself  from  taking  parr 


LORD  BACON. 


253 


against  his  friend,  submitted  himself  to  the 
queen's  pleasure,  and  appeared  at  the  bar  in 
support  of  the  charges.  But  a  darker  scene 
was  behind.  The  unhappy  young  nobleman, 
made  reckless  by  despair,  ventured  on  a  rash 
and  criminal  enterprise,  which  rendered  him 
liable  to  the  highest  penalties  of  the  law.  What 
course  was  Bacon  to  take  1  This  was  one  of 
those  conjunctures  which  show  what  men  are. 
To  a  high-minded  man,  wealth,  power,  court- 
favour,  even  personal  safety,  would  have  ap 
peared  of  no  account,  when  opposed  to  friend 
ship,  gratitude,  and  honour.  Such  a  man  would 
have  stood  by  the  side  of  Essex  at  the  trial ; 
would  have  "spent  all  his  power,might,  author 
ity,  and  amity,"  in  soliciting  a  mitigation  of  the 
sentence ;  would  have  been  a  daily  visiter  at 
the  ceil,  would  have  received  the  last  injunc 
tions  and  the  last  embrace  on  the  scaffold ; 
would  have  employed  all  the  powers  of  his  in 
tellect  to  guard  from  insult  the  fame  of  his 
generous  though  erring  friend.  An  ordinary 
man  would  neither  have  incurred  the  danger 
of  succouring  Essex,  nor  the  disgrace  of  as 
sailing  him.  Bacon  did  not  even  preserve 
neutrality.  He  appeared  as  counsel  for  the 
prosecution.  In  that  situation  he  did  not  con 
fine  himself  to  what  would  have  been  amply 
sufficient  to  procure  a  verdict.  He  employed 
all  his  wit,  his  rhetoric,  and  his  learning — not 
to  insure  a  conviction,  for  the  circumstances 
were  such  that  a  conviction  was  inevitable; — 
but  to  deprive  the  unhappy  prisoner  of  all  those 
excuses  which,  though  legally  of  no  value,  yet 
tended  to  diminish  the  moral  guilt  of  the  crime; 
and  which,  therefore,  though  they  could  not 
justify  the  peers  in  pronouncing  an  acquittal, 
might  incline  the  queen  to  grant  a  pardon. 
The  earl  urged  as  a  palliation  of  his  frantic 
acts,  that  he  was  surrounded  by  powerful  and 
inveterate  enemies,  that  they  had  ruined  his 
fortunes,  that  they  sought  his  life,  and  that 
their  persecutions  had  driven  him  to  despair. 
This  was  true,  and  Bacon  well  knew  it  to  be 
true.  But  he  affected  to  treat  it  a?  an  idle 
pretence.  He  compared  Essex  to  Pisistratus, 
who,  by  pretending  to  be  in  imminent  danger 
of  assassination,  and  by  exhibiting  self-inflict 
ed  wounds,  succeeded  in  establishing  tyranny 
at  Athens.  This  was  too  much  for  the  pri 
soner  to  bear.  He  interrupted  his  ungrateful 
friend,  by  calling  on  him  to  quit  the  part  of  an 
advocate ;  to  come  forward  as  a  witness,  and 
tell  the  lords  whether,  in  old  times,  he,  Francis 
Bacon,  had  not,  under  his  own  hand,  repeated 
ly  asserted  the  truth  of  what  he  now  repre 
sented  as  idle  pretexts.  It  is  painful  to  go  on 
with  this  lamentable  story.  Bacon  returned  a 
shuffling  answer  to  the  earl's  question  ;  and,  as 
if  the  allusion  to  Pisistratus  were  not  suf 
ficiently  offensive,  made  another  allusion  still 
more  unjustifiable.  He  compared  Essex  to 
Henry  Duke  of  Guise,  and  the  rash  attempt  in 
the  city,  to  the  day  of  the  barricades  at  Paris. 
Why  Bacon  had  recourse  to  such  a  topic  it  is 
difficult  to  say.  It  was  quite  unnecessary  for 
the  purpose  of  obtaining  a  verdict.  It  was 
certain  to  produce  a  strong  impression  on  the 
mind  of  the  haughty  and  jealous  princess  on 
whose  pleasure  the  earl's  fate  depended.  The 
faintest  allusion  to  the  degrading  tutelage  in 


which  the  last  Valois  had  been  held  by  the 
house  of  Lorraine,  was  sufficient  to  harden  her 
heart  against  a  man  who,  in  rank,  in  military 
reputation,  in  popularity  among  the  citizens  of 
the  capital,  bore  some  resemblance  to  the 
Captain  of  the  League.  Essex  was  convicted. 
Bacon  made  no  eftort  to  save  him,  though  the 
queen's  feelings  were  such,  that  he  might  have 
pleaded  his  benefactor's  cause,  possibly  with 
success,  certainly  without  any  serious  danger 
to  himself.  The  unhappy  nobleman  was  exe 
cuted.  His  fate  excited  strong,  perhaps  un 
reasonable  feelings  of  compassion  and  indig 
nation.  The  queen  was  received  by  the  citi 
zens  of  London  with  gloomy  looks  and  faint 
acclamations.  She  thought  it  expedient  to 
publish  a  vindication  of  her  late  proceedings. 
The  faithless  friend  who  had  assisted  in  taking 
the  earl's  life  was  now  employed  to  murder  the 
earl's  fame.  The  queen  had  seen  some  of 
Bacon's  writings  and  had  been  pleased  with 
them.  He  was  accordingly  selected  to  write 
"A  Declaration  of  the  Practices  and  Treasons 
attempted  and  committed  by  Robert  Earl  of 
Essex,"  which  was  printed  by  authority.  In 
the  succeeding  reign,  Bacon  had  not  a  word  to 
say  in  defence  of  this  performance,  a  per 
formance  abounding  in  expressions  which  no 
generous  enemy  would  have  employed  re- 
specting'aman  who  had  so  dearly  expiated  his 
offences.  His  only  excuse  was,  that  he  wrot* 
it  by  command;  that  he  considered  himself  a* 
a  mere  secretary;  that  he  had  particular  in 
structions  as  to  the  way  in  which  he  was  tc 
treat  every  part  of  the  subject ;  and  that,  it 
fact,  he  had  furnished  only  the  arrangemen/ 
and  the  style. 

We  regret  to  say  that  the  whole  conduct  ol 
Bacon  through  the  course  of  these  transactions 
appears  to  Mr.  Montagu  not  merely  excusable, 
but  deserving  of  high  admiration.  The  inte 
grity  and  benevolence  of  this  gentleman  are  so 
well  known,  that  our  readers  will  probably  be 
at  a  loss  to  conceive  by  what  steps  he  can. 
have  arrived  at  so  extraordinary  a  conclusion; 
and  we  are  half  afraid  that  they  will  suspect 
us  of  practising  some  artifice  upon  them  when 
we  report  the  principal  arguments  which  he 
employs. 

In  order  to  get  rid  of  the  charge  of  ingrati 
tude,  Mr.  Montagu  attempts  to  show  that  Bacon, 
lay  under  greater  obligations  to  the  queen  than, 
to  Essex.  What  these  obligations  were  it  is 
not  easy  to  discover.  The  situation  of  queen's 
counsel  and  a  remote  reversion  were  surely 
favours  very  far  below  Bacon's  personal  and 
hereditary  claims.  They  were  favours  which 
had  not  cost  the  queen  a  groat,  nor  had  they 
put  a  groat  into  Bacon's  purse.  It  was  neces 
sary  to  rest  Elizabeth's  claims  to  gratitude  on 
some  other  ground,  and  this  Mr.  Montagu  felt. 
"What  perhaps  was  her  greatest  kindness," 
says  he,  "  instead  of  having  hastily  advanced 
Bacon,  she  had,  with  a  continuance  of  her 
friendship,  made  him  bear  the  yoke  in  his 
youth.  Such  were  his  obligations  to  Eli/a 
beth."  Such  indeed  they  were.  Being  the  son 
of  one  of  her  oldest  and  most  failhful  minis 
ters,  being  himself  the  ablest  and  most  accom 
plished  young  man  of  his  time,  he  had  been 
condemned  by  her  to  drudgery,  to  obscurity 


254 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


to  poverty.  She  had  depreciated  his  acquire 
ments.  She  had  checked  him  in  the  most  im 
perious  manner  when  in  Parliament  he  ven 
tured  to  act  an  independent  part.  She  had  re 
fused  to  him  the  professional  advancement  to 
which  he  had  a  just  claim.  To  her  it  was 
owing  that  while  younger  men,  not  superior  to 
him  in  extraction  and  far  inferior  to  him  in 
every  kind  of  personal  merit,  were  filling  the 
highest  offices  of  the  state,  adding  manor  to 
manor,  rearing  palace  after  palace,  he  was 
lying  at  a  spunging-house  for  a  debt  of  three 
hundred  pounds.  Assuredly  if  Bacon  owed 
gratitude  to  Elizabeth,  he  owed  none  to  Essex. 
If  the  queen  really  was  his  best  friend,  the  earl 
was  his  worst  enemy.  We  wonder  that  Mr. 
Montagu  did  not  press  this  argument  a  little 
further.  He  might  have  maintained  that  Bacon 
was  fully  justified  in  revenging  himself  on  a 
man  who  had  attempted  to  rescue  his  youth 
from  the  salutary  yoke  imposed  on  it  by  the 
queen,  who  had  wished  to  advance  him  hastily, 
who,  not  content  with  attempting  to  inflict  the 
Attorney-Generalship  upon  him,  had  been  so 
cruel  as  to  present  him  with  a  landed  estate. 

Again,  we  can  hardly  think  Mr.  Montagu 
serious  when  he  tells  us  that  Bacon  was  bound 
for  the  sake  of  the  public  not  to  destroy  his 
own  hopes  of  advancement,  and  that  he  took 
part  against  Essex  from  a  wish  to  obtain  power 
which  might  enable  him  to  be  useful  to  his  coun 
try.  We  really  do  not  know  how  to  refute  such 
arguments  except  by  stating  them.  Nothing  is 
impossible  which  does  not  involve  a  contradic 
tion.  It  is  barely  possible  that  Bacon's  motives 
for  acting  as  he  did  on  this  occasion  may  have 
been  gratitude  to  the  queen  for  keeping  him 
poor,  and  a  desire  to  benefit  his  fellow-crea 
tures  in  some  higher  situation.  And  there  is 
a  possibility  that  Bonner  may  have  been  a 
good  Protestant,  who,  being  convinced  that  the 
blood  of  martyrs  is  the  seed  of  the  church, 
heroically  went  through  all  the  drudgery  and 
infamy  of  persecution  that  he  might  inspire 
the  English  people  with  an  intense  and  lasting 
hatred  of  Popery.  There  is  a  possibility  that 
Jeffries  may  have  been  an  ardent  lover  of 
liberty,  and  that  he  may  have  beheaded  Alger 
non  Sydney  and  burned  Elizabeth  Gaunt  only 
in  order  to  produce  a  reaction  which  might 
lead  to  the  limitation  of  the  prerogative.  There 
is  a  possibility  that  Thurtell  may  have  killed 
Weare  only  in  order  to  give  the  youth  of  Eng 
land  an  impressive  warning  against  gaming 
and  bad  company.  There  is  a  possibility  that 
Fauntleroy  may  have  forged  powers  of  attor 
ney  only  in  order  that  his  fate  might  turn  the 
attention  of  the  public  to  the  defects  of  the 
penal  law.  These  things,  we  say,  are  possible. 
But  they  are  so  extravagantly  improbable,  that 
a  man  who  should  act  on  such  suppositions 
would  be  fit  only  for  Saint  Luke's.  And  we  do 
not  see  why  suppositions  on  which  no  rational 
inan  would  act  in  ordinary  life  should  be  ad 
mitted  luto  history. 

Mr.  Montagu's  notion  that  Bacon  desired 
power  only  in  order  to  do  good  to  mankind 
appears  somewhat  strange  to  us  when  we  con 
sider  how  Bacon  afterwards  use  I  power  and 
how  he  lost  it.  Surely  the  service  which  he 
rendered  to  mankind  by  taking  Lady  Whar- 


ton's  broad  pieces  and  Sir  John  Kennedy's 
cabinet  was  not  of  such  vast  importance  as  to 
sanctify  all  the  means  which  might  conduce  to 
that  end.  If  the  case  were  fairly  stated,  it  would, 
we  much  fear,  stand  thus :  Bacon  was  a  servile 
advocate  that  he  might  be  a  corrupt  judge. 

Mr.  Montagu  conceives  that  none  but  the 
ignorant  and  unreflecting  can  think  Bacon 
censurable  for  any  thing  that  he  did  as  counsel 
for  the  crown ;  and  maintains  that  no  advocate 
can  justifiably  use  any  discretion  as  to  the 
party  for  whom  he  appears.  We  will  not  at 
present  inquire  whether  the  doctrine  which  is 
held  on  this  subject  by  English  lawyers  be  or 
be  not  agreeable  to  reason  and  morality;  whe 
ther  it  be  right  that  a  man  should,  with  a  wig 
on  his  head  and  a  band  round  his  neck,  do  for 
a  guinea  what,  without  those  appendages,  he 
would  think  it  wicked  and  infamous  to  do  for 
an  empire ;  whether  it  be  right  that,  not  merely 
believing,  but  knowing  a  statement  to  be  true, 
he  should  do  all  that  can  be  done  by  sophistry, 
by  rhetoric,  by  solemn  asseveration,  by  indig 
nant  exclamation,  by  gestures,  by  play  of  fea 
tures,  by  terrifying  one  honest  witness,  by  per 
plexing  another,  to  cause  a  jury  to  think  that 
statement  false.  It  is  not  necessary  on  the 
present  occasion  to  decide  these  questions. 
The  professional  rules,  be  they  good  or  bad, 
are  rules  to  which  many  wise  and  virtuous 
men  have  conformed,  and  are  daily  conform 
ing.  If,  therefore,  Bacon  did  no  more  than 
these  rules  required  of  him,  we  shall  readily 
admit  that  he  was  blameless.  But  we  conceive 
that  his  conduct  was  not  justifiable  according 
to  any  professional  rules  that  now  exist  or  that 
ever  existed  in  England.  It  has  always  been 
held,  that  in  criminal  cases,  in  which  the  pri 
soner  was  denied  the  help  of  counsel,  and 
above  all  in  capital  cases,  the  advocate  for 
the  prosecution  was  both  entitled  and  bound  to 
exercise  a  discretion.  It  is  true  that  after  the 
Revolution,  when  the  Parliament  began  to 
make  inquisition  for  the  innocent  blood  which 
had  been  shed  by  the  last  Stuarts,  a  feeble  at 
tempt  was  made  to  defend  the  lawyers  who  had 
been  accomplices  in  the  murder  of  Sir  Thomas 
Armstrong,  on  the  ground  that  they  had  only 
acted  professionally.  The  wretched  sophism 
was  silenced  by  the  execrations  of  the  House 
of  Commons.  "Things  will  never  be  well 
done,"  said  Mr.  Foley,  "  till  some  of  that  pro 
fession  be  made  examples."  "We  have  a 
new  sort  of  monsters  in  the  world,"  said  the 
younger  Hampden,  "haranguing  a  man  to 
death.  These  I  call  bloodhounds.  Sawyer  is 
very  criminal  and  guilty  of  this  murder."  "I 
speak  to  discharge  my  conscience,"  said  Mr. 
Garroway.  "I  will  not  have  the  blood  of  this 
man  at  my  door.  Sawyer  demanded  judgment 
against  him  arid  execution.  I  believe  him 
guilty  of  the  death  of  this  man.  Do  what  you 
will  with  him."  "  If  the  profession  of  the  law," 
said  the  elder  Hampden,  "  gives  a  man  autho 
rity  to  murder  at  this  rate,  it  is  the  interest  of 
all  men  to  rise  and  exterminate  that  profes 
sion."  Nor  was  this  language  held  only  by 
unlearned  country  gentlemen.  Sir  William 
Williams,  one  of  the  ablest  and  most  unscru 
pulous  lawyers  of  the  age,  took  the  same  view 
of  the  case.  He  had  not  hesitated,  he  said,  to 


LORD  BACON. 


255 


take  part  in  the  prosecution  of  the  bishops,  be- 1 
cause   they  \*ere  allowed  counsel.     But  he  j 
maintained  that  where   the  prisoner  was  not  i 
allowed  counsel,  the  counsel  for  the  crown  j 
was  bound  to  exercise  a  discretion,  and  that  j 
every  lawyer  who  neglected  this  distinction 
was  a  betrayer  of  the  law.    But  it  is  unneces 
sary  to  cite  authority.    It  is  known  to  every 
body  who  has  ever  looked  into  a  court  of  quar 
ter-sessions  that  lawyers  do  exercise  a  discre 
tion  in  criminal  cases  ;  and  it  is  plain  to  every 
man  of  common  sense  that  if  they  did  not 
exercise  such  a  discretion,  they  would  be  a 
more  hateful  body  of  men  than  those  bravoes 
who  used  to  hire  out  their  stilettos  in  Italy. 

Bacon  appeared  against  a  man  who  was  in 
deed  guilty  of  a  great  ofTence,  but  who  had 
been  his  benefactor  and  friend.  He  did  more 
than  this.  Nay,  he  did  more  than  a  person 
who  had  never  seen  Essex  would  have  been 
justified  in  doing.  He  employed  all  the  art  of 
an  advocate  in  order  to  make  the  prisoner's 
conduct  appear  more  inexcusable,  and  more 
dangerous  to  the  state,  than  it  really  had  been. 
All  that  professional  duty  could,  in  any  case, 
have  required  of  him,  would  have  been  to  con 
duct  the  cause  so  as  to  insure  a  conviction. 
But  from  the  nature  of  the  circumstances  there 
could  not  be  the  smallest  doubt  that  the  earl 
would  be  found  guilty.  The  character  of  the 
crime  was  unequivocal.  It  had  been  commit 
ted  recently,  in  broad  daylight,  in  the  streets  of 
the  capital,  in  the  presence  of  thousands.  If 
ever  there  was  an  occasion  on  which  an  advo 
cate  had  no  temptation  to  resort  to  extraneous 
topics  for  the  purpose  of  blinding  the  judgment 
and  inflaming  the  passions  of  a  tribunal,  this 
was  that  occasion.  Why  then  resort  to  argu 
ments  which,  while  they  could  add  nothing  to 
the  strength  of  the  case,  considered  in  a  legal 
point  of  view,  tended  to  aggravate  the  moral 
guilt  of  the  fatal  enterprise,  and  to  excite  fear 
and  resentment  in  that  quarter,  from  which 
alone  the  earl  could  now  expect  mercy  1  Why 
remind  the  audience  of  the  arts  of  the  ancient 
tyrants  1  Why  deny,  what  everybody  knew  to 
be  the  truth,  that  a  powerful  faction  at  court 
had  long  sought  to  effect  the  ruin  of  the  pri 
soner  ]  Why,  above  all,  institute  a  parallel 
between  the  unhappy  culprit  and  the  most 
wicked  and  most  successful  rebel  of  the  age  ? 
Was  it  absolutely  impossible  to  do  all  that  pro 
fessional  duty  required,  without  reminding  a 
jealous  sovereign  of  the  League,  of  the  barri 
cades,  and  of  all  the  humiliations  which  a  too 
powerful  subject  had  heaped  on  Henry  the 
Third. 

But  if  we  admit  the  plea  which  Mr.  Montagu 
urges  in  defence  of  what  Bacon  did  as  an 
advocate,  what  shall  we  say  of  the  "Decla 
ration   of  the    Treasons  of    Robert  Eari   of 
Essex !"     Here  at  least  there  was  no  pretence 
of  professional  obligation.     Even  those  who 
may  think  it  the  duty   of  a  lawyer  to   hang,  ! 
draw,    and    quarter    his    benefactors,    for   a  ! 
proper  consideration,  will  hardly  say  that  it 
is  his  duty  to  write  abusive  pamphlets  against  ; 
them,  after  they  are  in  their  graves.    Bacon  i 
excused  himself  by  saying  that  he  was  not  an-  I 
swerable  for  the  matter  of  the  book,  and  that  ! 
he  furnished  only  the  language.    But  why  did  , 


he  endow  such  purposes  with  words  1  Could 
no  hack-writer,  without  virtue  or  shame,  be 
found  to  exaggerate  the  errors,  already  so 
dearly  expiated,  of  a  gentle  and  noble  spirit1? 
Every  age  produces  those  links  between  the 
man  and  the  baboon.  Every  age  is  fertile  of 
Concanens,  of  Gildons,  and  of  Antony  Pas- 
quins.  But  was  it  for  Bacon  so  to  prostitute 
his  intellect]  Could  he  not  feel  that,  while 
he  rounded  and  pointed  some  period  dictated 
by  the  envy  of  Cecil,  or  gave  a  plausible  form 
to  some  slander  invented  by  the  dastardly  ma 
lignity  of  Cobham,  he  was  not  sinning  merely 
against  his  friend's  honour  and  his  own  ] 
Could  he  not  feel  that  letters,  eloquence,  phi 
losophy,  were  all  degraded  in  his  degradation] 
The  real  explanation  of  all  this  is  perfectly 
obvious ;  and  nothing  but  a  partiality  amounting 
to  a  ruling  passion  could  cause  anybody  to  miss 
it.  The  moral  qualities  of  Bacon  were  not  of  a 
high  order.  We  do  not  say  that  he  was  a  bad 
man.  He  was  not  inhuman  or  tyrannical.  He 
bore  with  meekness  his  high  civil  honours, 
and  the  far  higher  honours  gained  by  his  in 
tellect.  He  was  very  seldom,  if  ever,  provoked 
into  treating  any  person  with  malignity  and  in 
solence.  No  man  more  readily  held  up  the  left 
cheek  to  those  who  had  smitten  the  right.  No 
man  was  more  expert  at  the  soft  answer  which 
turneth  away  wrath.  He  was  never  accused 
of  intemperance  in  his  pleasures.  His  even 
temper,  his  flowing  courtesy,  the  general  re 
spectability  of  his  demeanour,  made  a  favour 
able  impression  on  those  who  saw  him  in  situa 
tions  which  do  not  severely  try  the  principles. 
His  faults  were — we  write  it  with  pain — cold 
ness  of  heart  and  meanness  of  spirit.  He 
seems  to  have  been  incapable  of  feeling  strong 
affection,  of  facing  great  dangers,  of  making 
great  sacrifices.  His  desires  were  set  on  things 
below.  Wealth,  precedence,  titles,  patronage, 
the  mace,  the  seals,  the  coronet,  large  houses, 
fair  gardens,  rich  manors,  massy  services  of 
plate,  gay  hangings,  curious  cabinets,  had  as 
great  attractions  for  him  as  for  any  of  the 
courtiers  who  dropped  on  their  knees  in  the 
dirt  when  Elizabeth  passed  by,  and  then  has 
tened  home  to  write  to  the  King  of  Scots  that 
her  grace  seemed  to  be  breaking  fast.  For 
these  objects  he  had  stooped  to  every  thing  and 
endured  every  thing.  For  these  he  had  sued 
in  the  humblest  manner,  and  when  unjustly 
and  ungraciously  repulsed,  had  thanked  those 
who  had  repulsed  him,  and  had  begun  to  sue 
again.  For  these  objects,  as  soon  as  he  found 
that  the  smallest  show  of  independence  in 
Parliament  was  offensive  to  the  queen,  he  had 
abased  himself  to  the  dust  before  her,  and  im 
plored  forgiveness,  in  terms  better  suited  to  a 
convicted  thief  than  to  a  knight  of  the  shire. 
For  these  he  joined,  and  for  these  he  forsook 
Lord  Essex.  He  continued  to  plead  his  pa 
tron's  cause  with  the  queen,  as  long  as  he 
thought  that  by  pleading  that  cause  he  might 
serve  himself.  Nay,  he  went  further,  for  his 
feelings,  though  not  warm,  were  kind — he 
pleaded  that  cause  as  long  as  he  thought  he 
could  plead  it  without  injury  to  himseK  But 
when  it  became  evident  that  Essex  was  going; 
headlong  to  his  ruin,  Bacon  began  to  tremble 
for  his  own  fortunes.  What  tie  had  to  tear 


356 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


would  :.ot  indeed  have  been  very  alarming  to 
ft  man  of  lofty  character.  It  was  not  death. 
It  was  not  imprisonment.  It  was  the  loss  of 
court  favour.  It  was  the  being  left  behind  by 
others  in  the  career  of  ambition.  It  was  the 
having  leisure  to  finish  the  Instauratio  Magna 
The  queen  looked  coldly  on  him.  The  cour 
tiers  began  to  consider  him  as  a  marked  man 
Ke  determined  to  change  his  line  of  conduct 
and  to  proceed  in  a  new  course  with  so  much 
vigour  as  to  make  up  for  lost  time.  When 
once  he  had  determined  to  act  against  his 
friend,  knowing  himself  to  be  suspected,  he 
acted  with  more  zeal  than  would  have  been  ne 
cessary  or  justifiable  if  he  had  been  employed 
against  a  stranger.  He  exerted  his  profession 
al  talents  to  shed  the  earl's  blood,  and  his  lite 
rary  talents  to  blacken  the  earl's  memory.  It 
is  certain  that  his  conduct  excited  at  the  time 
great  and  general  disapprobation.  While 
Elizabeth  lived,  indeed,  this  disapprobation, 
though  deeply  felt,  was  not  loudly  expressed. 
But  a  great  change  was  at  hand. 

The  health  of  the  queen  had  been  long  de 
caying  ;  and  the  operation  of  age  and  disease 
was  now  assisted  by  acute  mental  suffering. 
The  pitiable  melancholy  of  her  last  days  has 
generally  been  ascribed  to  her  fond  regret  for 
Essex.  But  we  are  disposed  to  attribute  her 
dejection  partly  to  physical  causes,  and  partly 
to  the  conduct  of  her  courtiers  and  minis 
ters.  They  did  all  in  their  power  to  conceal 
from  her  the  intrigues  which  they  were 
carrying  on  at  the  court  of  Scotland.  But  her 
keen  sagacity  was  not  to  be  so  deceived.  She 
did  not  know  the  whole.  But  she  knew  that 
she  was  surrounded  by  men  who  were  impa 
tient  for  that  new  world  which  was  to  begin  at 
her  death,  who  had  never  been  attached  to  her 
hy  affection,  and  who  were  now  but  very  slight 
ly  attached  to  her  by  interest.  Prostration 
and  flattery  could  not  conceal  from  her  the 
cruel  truth,  that  those  whom  she  had  trusted 
and  promoted  had  never  loved  her,  and  were 
fast  ceasing  to  fear  her.  Unable  to  avenge 
herself,  and  too  proud  to  complain,  she  suffered 
sorrow  and  resentment  to  prey  on  her  heart, 
till,  after  a  long  career  of  power,  prosperity, 
and  glory,  she  died  sick  and  weary  of  the  world. 
James  mounted  the  throne  ;  and  Bacon  em 
ployed  all  his  address  to  obtain  for  himself  a 
share  of  the  favour  of  his  new  master.  This 
was  no  difficult  task.  The  faults  of  James, 
both  as  a  man  and  as  a  prince,  were  numerous  ; 
but  insensibility  to  the  claims  of  genius  and 
learning  was  not  amongst  them.  He  was  in 
deed  made  up  of  two  men — a  witty,  well-read 
scholar,  who  wrote,  and  disputed,  andharangued, 
and  a  nervous,  drivelling  idiot,  who  acted.  If 
he  had  been  a  Canon  of  Christ  Church,  or  a 
Prebendary  of  Westminster,  it  is  not  improba 
ble  that  he  would  have  left  a  highly  respectable 
name  to  posterity  ;  that  he  would  have  distin 
guished  himself  among  the  translators  of  the 
Bible,  and  among  the  divines  who  attended  the 
fcJynod  of  Dort ;  that  he  would  have  been  re 
garded  by  tke  literary  world  as  no  contemptible 
rival  of  Vosssius  and  Casaubon.  But  fortune 
placed  him  in  a  situation  in  which  his  weakness 
covered  him  with  disgrace;  and  in  which  his 
accomplishments  brought  him  no  honour.  In 


a  college,  much  eccentricity  and  childishness 
would  have  been  readily  pardoned  in  so  learned 
a  man.  But  all  that  learning  could  do  for  him 
on  the  throne,  was  to  make  people  think  him 
a  pedant  as  well  as  a  fool. 

Bacon  was  favourably  received  at  court* 
and  soon  found  that  his  chance  of  promotion 
was  not  diminished  by  the  death  of  the  queen. 
He  was  solicitous  to  be  knighted,  for  two  rea 
sons,  which  are  somewhat  amusing.  The  king 
had  already  dubbed  half  London, "and  Bacon 
found  himself  the  only  untitled  person  in  his 
mess  at  Gray's  Inn.  This  was  not  very  agree 
able  to  him.  He  had  also,  to  quote  his  own 
words,  "found  an  alderman's  daughter,  a 
handsome  maiden,  to  his  liking."  On  both 
these  grounds,  he  begged  his  cousin,  Robert 
Cecil,  "  if  it  might  please  his  good  lordship," 
to  use  his  interest  in  his  behalf.  The  applica 
tion  was  successful.  Bacon  was  one  of  three 
hundred  gentlemen  who,  on  the  coronation-day, 
received  the  honour,  if  it  is  to  be  so  called,  of 
knighthood.  The  handsome  maiden,  a  daughter 
of  Alderman  Barnham,  soon  after  consented 
to  become  Sir  Francis's  lady. 

The  death  of  Elizabeth,  though  on  the  whole 
it  improved  Bacon's  prospects,  was  in  one  re 
spect  an  unfortunate  event  for  him.  The  new 
king  had  always  felt  kindly  towards  Lord  Es 
sex,  who  had  been  zealous  for  the  Scotch  suc 
cession  ;  and,  as  soon  as  he  came  to  the  throne, 
Degan  to  show  favour  to  the  house  of  Devereux, 
and  to  those  who  had  stood  by  that  house  in 
ts  adversity.  Everybody  was  now  at  liberty 
o  speak  out  respecting  those  lamentable  events 
n  which  Bacon  had  borne  so  large  a  share. 
Elizabeth  was  scarcely  cold  when  the  public 
eeling  began  to  manifest  itself  by  marks  of 
respect  towards  Lord  Southampton.  That  ac 
complished  nobleman,  who  will  be  remembered 
o  the  latest  ages  as  the  generous  and  discern- 
ng  patron  of  Shakspeare,  was  held  in  honour 
)y  his  contemporaries,  chiefly  on  account  of 
he  devoted  affection  which  he  had  borne  to 
Sssex.  He  had  been  tried  and  convicted  to 
gether  with  his  friend;  but  the  queen  had 
spared  his  life,  and  at  the  time  of  her  death,  he 
was  still  a  prisoner.  A  crowd  of  visiters 
lastened  to  the  Tower  to  congratulate  him  on 
lis  approaching  deliverance.  With  that  crowd 
3acon  could  not  venture  to  mingle.  The  mul- 
itude  loudly  condemned  him ;  and  his  con 
science  told  him  that  the  multitude  had  but  too 
much  reason.  He  excused  himself  to  South 
ampton  by  letter,  in  terms  which,  if  he  had,  as 
VIr.  Montagu  conceives,  done  only  what  as  a 
subject  and  an  advocate  he  was  bound  to  do, 
nust  be  considered  as  shamefully  servile.  He 
)wns  his  fear  that  his  attendance  would  give 
>fTence,  and  that  his  professions  of  regard 
would  obtain  no  credit.  "  Yet,"  says  he,  "  it  is 
is  true  as  a  thing  that  God  knoweth,  that  this 
great  change  hath  wrought  in  me  no  other 
;hange  towards  your  lordship  than  this,  that  I 
nay  safely  be  that  to  you  now  which  I  was 
ruly  before." 

How  Southampton  received  these  apologies 
ve  are  not  informed.  But  it  is  certain  that 
he  general  opinion  was  pronounced  against 
iacon  in  a  manner  not  to  be  misunderstood. 
Soon  after  his  marriage  lie  put  forth  a  defence 


LORD   BACON. 


257 


-rtf  his  conduct,  in  ihe  form  of  a  letter  to  the 
Earl  of  Devon.  This  tract  seems  to  us  to  prove 
only  the  exceeding  badness  of  a  cause  for 
which  such  talents  could  do  so  little. 

It  is  not  probable  that  Bacon's  defence  had 
much  effect  on  his  contemporaries.  But  the 
unfavourable  impression  which  his  conduct 
oad  made  appears  to  have  been  gradually 
effaced.  Indeed,  it  must  be  some  very  peculiar 
cause  that  can  make  a  man  like  him  long  un 
popular.  His  talents  secured  him  from  con 
tempt,  his  temper  and  his  manners  from  hatred. 
There  is  scarcely  any  story  so  black  that  it 
may  not  be  got  over  by  a  man  of  great  abili 
ties,  whose  abilities  are  united  with  caution, 
good-humour,  patience,  and  affability,  who 
pays  daily  sacrifice  to  Nemesis,  who  is  a  de 
lightful  companion,  a  serviceable  though  not 
an  ardent  friend,  and  a  dangerous  yet  a  placa 
ble  enemy.  Waller  in  the  next  generation  was 
an  eminent  instance  of  this.  Indeed,  Waller 
had  much  more  than  may  at  first  sight  appear 
in  common  with  Bacon.  To  the  higher  intel 
lectual  qualities  of  the  great  English  philoso 
pher — to  the  genius  which  has  made  an  im 
mortal  epoch  in  the  history  of  science — Waller 
had  indeed  no  pretensions.  But  the  mind  of 
Waller,  as  far  as  it  extended,  coincided  with 
that  of  Bacon,  and  might,  so  to  speak,  have 
been  cut  out  of  that  of  Bacon.  In  the  qualities 
which  make  a  man  an  object  of  interest  and 
veneration  to  posterity,  there  was  no  compari 
son  between  them.  But  in  the  qualities  by 
which  chiefly  a  man  is  known  to  his  contem 
poraries,  there  was  a  striking  similarity.  Con 
sidered  as  men  of  the  world,  as  courtiers,  as 
politicians,  as  associates,  as  allies,  as  enemies, 
they  have  nearly  the  same  merits  and  the  same 
defects.  They  were  not  malignant.  They  were 
not  tyrannical.  But  they  wanted  warmth  of 
affection  and  elevation  of  sentiment.  There 
were  many  things  which  they  loved  better  than 
virtue,  and  which  they  feared  more  than  guilt. 
Yet  after  they  had  stooped  to  acts  of  which  it 
is  impossible  to  read  the  account  in  the  most 
partial  narratives  without  strong  disapproba 
tion  and  contempt,  the  public  still  continued  to 
regard  them  with  a  feeling  not  easily  to  be  dis 
tinguished  from  esteem.  The  hyperbole  of 
Juliet  seemed  to  be  verified  with  respect  to 
them.  "  Upon  their  brows  shame  was  ashamed 
to  sit."  Everybody  seemed  as  desirous  to 
throw  a  veil  over  their  misconduct  as  if  it  had 
been  his  own.  Clarendon,  who  felt,  and  who 
had  reason  to  feel,  strong  personal  dislike  to 
wards  Waller,  speaks  of  him  thus:  "There 
needs  no  more  be  said  to  extol  the  excellence 
and  power  of  his  wit  and  pleasantness  of  his 
conversation,  than  that  it  was  of  magnitude 
enough  to  cover  a  world  of  very  great  faults — 
that  is,  so  to  cover  them  that  they  were  not 
taken  notice  of  to  his  reproach — namely,  a 
narrowness  in  his  nature  to  the  lowest  degree 
— an  atjectness  and  want  of  courage  to  sup 
port  him  in  any  virtuous  undertaking — an  in 
sinuation  and  servile  flattery  to  the  height  the 
vainest  and  most  imperious  nature  could  be 
contented  with It  had  power  to  re 
concile  him  to  those  whom  he  had  most  of 
fended  and  provoked,  and  continued  to  his  age 
with  lhat  rare  felicity,  that  his  company  was 

Vor..  II.— 33 


acceptable  where  his  spirit  was  odiouN,  an-d  he 
was  at  least  pitied  where  he  was  most  detest 
ed."  Much  of  this,  with  some  softening,  might, 
we  fear,  be  applied  to  Bacon.  The  influence 
of  Waller's  talents,  manners,  and  accomplish 
ments,  died  with  him;  and  the  world  has  pro 
nounced  an  unbiassed  sentence  on  his  charai 
ter.  A  few  flowing  lines  are  not  bribe  suffi 
cient  to  pervert  the  judgment  of  posterity.  But 
the  influence  of  Bacon  is  felt  and  will  long  be 
felt  over  the  whole  civilized  world.  Leniently 
as  he  was  treated  by  his  contemporaries,  pos 
terity  has  treated  him  more  leniently  still. 
Turn  where  we  may,  the  trophies  of  that 
mighty  intellect  are  full  in  view.  We  are 
judging  Manlius  in  sight  of  the  Capitol. 

Under  the  reign  of  James,  Bacon  grew  ra 
pidly  in  fortune  and  favour.  In  1604  he  was 
appointed  king's  council,  with  a  fee  of  forty 
pounds  a  year ;  and  a  pension  of  sixty  pounds 
a  year  was  settled  upon  him.  In  1607  he  be 
came  Solicitor-General ;  in  1612  Attorney-Ge 
neral.  He  continued  to  distinguish  himself  in 
Parliament,  particularly  by  his  exertions  in 
favour  of  one  excellent  measure  on  which  the 
king's  heart  was  set — the  union  of  England 
and  Scotland.  It  was  not  difficult  for  such  an 
intellect  to  discover  many  irresistible  argu 
ments  in  favour  of  such  a  scheme.  He  con 
ducted  the  great  case  of  the  Post  Nati  in  the 
Exchequer  Chamber ;  and  the  decision  of  the 
judges — a  decision  the  legality  of  which  may 
be  questioned,  but  the  beneficial  effect  of  which 
must  be  acknowledged — was  in  a  great  mea 
sure  attributed  to  his  dexterous  management. 
While  actively  engaged  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons  and  in  the  courts  of  law,  he  still  found 
leisure  for  letters  and  philosophy.  The  noble 
treatise  on  the  "  Advancement  of  Learning," 
which  at  a  later  period  was  expanded  into  the 
De  j&ugmentis,  appeared  in  1605.  The  "  Wis 
dom  of  the  Ancients,"  a  work  which,  if  it  had 
proceeded  from  any  other  writer,  would  have 
been  considered  as  a  masterpiece  of  wit  and 
learning,  but  which  adds  little  to  the  fame  of 
Bacon,  was  printed  in  1609.  In  the  mean  time 
the  Novum  Organum  was  slowly  proceeding* 
Several  distinguished  men  of  learning  had  been 
permitted  to  see  sketches  or  detached  portion* 
of  that  extraordinary  book;  and  though  they 
were  not  generally  disposed  to  admit  the  sound 
ness  of  the  author's  views,  they  spoke  with  the 
greatest  admiration  of  his  genius.  Sir  Thomas 
Bodley,  the  founder  of  the  most  magnificent  of 
English  libraries,  was  among  those  stubborn 
conservatives  who  considered  the  hopes  with 
which  Bacon  looked  forward  to  the  future  des 
tinies  of  the  human  race  as  utterly  chimerical; 
and  who  regarded  with  distrust  and  aversion 
the  innovating  spirit  of  the  new  schismatics 
in  philosophy.  Yet  even  Bodley,  after  perusing 
the  Cogitata  et  Visa,  one  of  the  most  precious 
of  those  scattered  leaves  out  of  which  the  great 
oracular  volume  was  afterwards  made  up,  ar. 
knowledged  that  in  "those  very  points,  and  in 
all  proposals  and  plots  in  that  book,  Bacon 
showed  himself  a  master  workman  ;"  and  that 
"it  could  not  be  gainsaid  but  all  the  treatise 
over  did  abound  with  choice  conceits  of  the 
present  state  of  learning,  and  with  worthy  con 
templations  of  the  means  to  procure  it."  In> 
T  2 


258 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


,  a  new  edition  of  the  "Essays"  appeared, 
with  additions  surpassing  the  original  collec 
tion  both  in  bulk  and  quality.  Nor  did  these 
pursuits  distract  Bacon's  attention  from  a  work 
the  most  arduous,  the  most  glorious,  and  the 
most  useful  that  even  his  mighty  powers  could 
have  achieved,  "  the  reducing  and  recompil 
ing,"  to  use  his  own  phrase,  "of  the  laws  of 
England." 

Unhappily  he  was  at  that  very  time  employ 
ed  in  perverting  those  laws  to  the  vilest  pur 
poses  of  tyranny.  When  Oliver  St.  John  was 
brought  before  the  Star-Chamber  for  main 
taining  that  the  king  had  no  right  to  levy  be 
nevolences,  and  was  for  his  manly  and  consti 
tutional  conduct  sentenced  to  imprisonment 
during  the  royal  pleasure,  and  to  a  fine  of  five 
thousand  pounds,  Bacon  appeared  as  counsel 
for  the  prosecution.  About  the  same  time  he 
was  deeply  engaged  in  a  still  more  disgrace 
ful  transaction.  An  aged  clergyman,  of  the 
name  of  Peacharn,  was  accused  of  treason  on 
account  of  some  passages  of  a  sermon  which 
was  found  in  his  study.  The  sermon,  whether 
written  by  him  or  not,  had  never  been  preach 
ed.  It  did  not  appear  that  he  had  any  inten 
tion  of  preaching  it.  The  most  servile  lawyers 
of  those  servile  times  were  forced  to  admit 
that  there  were  great  difficulties,  both  as  to  the 
facts  and  as  to  the  law.  Bacon  was  employed 
to  remove  those  difficulties.  He  was  employed 
to  settle  the  question  of  law  by  tampering  with 
the  judges,  and  the  question  of  fact  by  tor 
turing  the  prisoner.  Three  judges  of  the 
Court  of  King's  Bench  were  tractable.  But 
Coke  was  made  of  different  stuff.  Pedant, 
bigot,  and  savage  as  he  was,  he  had  qualities 
which  bore  a  strong,  though  a  very  disagreea 
ble  resemblance  to  some  of  the  highest  virtues 
which  a  public  man  can  possess.  He  was  an 
exception  to  a  maxim  which  we  believe  to  be 
generally  true,  that  those  who  trample  on  the 
helpless  are  disposed  to  cringe  to  the  powerful. 
He  behaved  with  gross  rudeness  to  his  ju 
niors  at  the  bar,  and  with  execrable  cruelty  to 
prisoners  on.  trial  for  their  lives.  But  he 
stood  up  manfully  against  the  king  and  the 
king's  favourites.  No  man  of  that  age  ap 
peared  to  so  little  advantage  when  he  was  op 
posed  to  an  inferior,  and  was  in  the  wrong. 
But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  but  fair  to  admit 
that  no  man  of  that  age  made  so  creditable  a 
figure  when  he  was  opposed  to  a  superior,  and 
happened  to  be  in  the  right.  On  such  occa 
sion,  his  half-suppressed  insolence  and  his 
impracticable  obstinacy  had  a  respectable  and 
interesting  appearance,  when  compared  with 
the  abject  servility  of  the  bar  and  of  the  bench. 
On  the  present  occasion  he  was  stubborn  and 
Mirly.  He  declared  it  was  a  new  and  highly 
improper  practice  in  the  judges  to  confer  with 
a  law  officer  of  the  crown  about  capital  cases 
which  they  were  afterwards  to  try;  and  for 
some  time  he  resolutely  kept  aloof.  But  Ba 
con  was  equally  artful  and  persevering.  "I 
am  not  wholly  out  of  hope,"  said  he,  in  a  letter 
to  the  king,  "  that  my  Lord  Coke  himself,  when  ' 
I  have  in  some  dark  manner  put  him  in  doubt 
that  he  shall  be  left  alone,  will  not  be  singu 
lar."  After  some  time  Bacon's  dexterity  was  ! 
successful ;  and  Coke,  sullenly  and  reluctantly, ' 


'  followed  the  example  of  his  brethren.     But  in 
I  order  to  convict  Peacham  it  was  necessary  to 
j  find  facts  as  well  as  law.    Accordingly,  this 
j  wretched  old  man  was  put  to  the  rack ;  and, 
while  undergoing  the  horrible  infliction,  was 
examined  by  Bacon,  but  in  vain.    No  confes 
sion  could  be  wrung  out  of  him  ;  and  Bacon 
wrote  to  the  king,  complaining  that  Peacham 
had  a  dumb  devil.     At  length  the  trial  came 
on.      A   conviction   was    obtained :    but    the 
charges  were  so  obviously  futile  that  the  go 
vernment  could  not  for  very  shame  carry  the 
sentence  into  execution  ;  and  Peacham  was 
suffered  to  languish  away  the  short  remainder 
of  his  life  in  a  prison. 

All  this  frightful  story  Mr.  Montagu  relates 
fairly.  He  neither  conceals  nor  distorts  any 
material  fact.  But  he  can  see  nothing  deserv 
ing  of  condemnation  in  Bacon's  conduct.  He 
tells  us  most  truly  that  we  ought  not  to  try  the 
men  of  one  age  by  the  standard  of  another; 
that  Sir  Matthew  Hale  is  not  to  be  pronounced 
a  bad  man  because  he  left  a  woman  to  be  ex 
ecuted  for  witchcraft;  that  posterity  will  not 
be  justified  in  censuring  judges  of  our  time  for 
selling  offices  in  their  courts,  according  to  the 
established  practice,  bad  as  that  practice  was, 
and  that  Bacon  is  entitled  to  similar  indul 
gence.  "To  persecute  the  lover  of  truth," 
says  Mr.  Montagu,  "  for  opposing  established 
customs,  and  to  censure  him  in  after  ages  for 
not  having  been  more  strenuous  in  opposition, 
are  errors  which  will  never  cease  until  me 
pleasure  of  self-elevation  from  the  depression 
of  superiority  is  no  more." 

We  have  no  dispute  with  Mr.  Montagu  about 
the  general  proposition.  We  assent  to  every 
word  of  it.  But  does  it  apply  to  the  prp?>?nt 
case  'I  Is  it  true  that  in  the  time  of  James  the 
First  it  was  the  established  practice  for  the 
law-officers  of  the  crown  to  hold  private  con 
sultations  with  the  judges,  touching  capital 
cases  which  those  judges  were  afterwards  to 
try  1  Certainly  not.  In  the  very  page  in 
which  Mr.  Montagu  asserts  that  "the  influenc 
ing  a  judge  out  of  court  seems  at  that  period 
scarcely  to  have  been  considered  as  impro 
per,"  he  gives  the  very  words  of  Sir  Edward 
Coke  on  the  subject.  "I  will  not  thus  declare 
what  may  be  my  judgment  by  these  auricular 
confessions  of  new  and  pernicious  tendency, 
and  not.  according  to  the  customs  of  the  realm"  Is 
it  possible  to  imagine  that  Coke,  who  had 
himself  been  Attorney-General  during  thirteen 
years,  who  had  conducted  a  far  greater  num 
ber  of  important  state-prosecutions  than  any 
other  lawyer  named  in  English  history,  and 
who  had  passed  with  scarcely  any  interval 
from  the  Attorney-Generalship  to  the  first  seat 
in  the  first  criminal  court  in  the  realm,  could 
have  been  startled  at  an  invitation  to  confer 
with  the  crown-lawyers,  and  could  have  pro 
nounced  the  practice  new,  if  it  had  really  been 
an  established  usage?  We  well  know  that 
where  property  only  was  at  stake,  it  was  then 
a  common,  though  a  most  culpable  practice,  in 
the  judges  to  listen  to  private  solicitation.  Bui 
the  practice  of  tampering  with  judges  in  order 
to  procure  capital  convictions,  we  believe  to 
have  been  new;  first,  because  Coke,  who  un 
derstood  those  matters  better  than  any  mai>  of 


LORD  BACON. 


259 


his  time,  asserted  it  to  be  new;  and,  secondly, 
because  neither  Bacon  nor  Mr.  Montagu  has 
sho\vn  a  single  precedent. 

How,  then,  stands  the  easel  Even  thus: 
Bacon  was  not  conforming  to  a  usage  then 
generally  admitted  to  be  proper.  He  was  not 
even  the  last  lingering  adherent  of  an  old 
abuse.  It  would  have  been  sufficiently  dis 
graceful  to  such  a  man  to  be  in  this  last  situa 
tion.  Yet  this  last  situation  would  have  been 
honourable  compared  with  that  in  which  he 
stood.  He  was  guilty  of  attempting  to  intro 
duce  into  the  courts  of  law  an  odious  abuse 
for  which  no  precedent  could  be  found.  In 
tellectually,  he  was  better  fitted  than  any  man 
that  England  has  ever  produced  for  the  work 
of  improving  her  institutions.  But,  unhappily, 
we  see  that  he  did  not  scruple  to  exert  his 
great  powers  for  the  purpose  of  introducing 
into  those  institutions  new  corruptions  of  the 
foulest  kind. 

The  same,  or  nearly  the  same,  may  be  said 
of  the  torturing  of  Peacham.  If  it  be  true  that 
in  the  time  of  James  the  First  the  propriety  of 
torturing  prisoners  was  generally  allowed,  we 
should  admit  this  as  an  excuse,  though  we 
should  admit  it  less  readily  in  the  case  of  such 
a  man  as  Bacon,  than  in  the  case  of  an  ordina 
ry  lawyer  or  politician.  But  the  fact  is,  that 
the  practice  of  torturing  prisoners  was  then 
generally  acknowledged  by  lawyers  to  be  ille 
gal,  and  was  execrated  by  the  public  as  bar 
barous.  More  than  thirty  years  before  Peach- 
am's  trial  thai  practice  was  so  loudly  con 
demned  by  the  voice  of  the  nation,  that  Lord 
Burleigh  found  it  necessary  to  publish  an 
apology  for  naving  occasionally  resorted  to 
it.*  But  though  the  dangers  which  then 
threatened  the  government  were  of  a  very 
different  kind  from  those  which  were  to  be  ap 
prehended  from  anything  that  Peacham  could 
write  ;  though  the  life  of  the  queen  and  the 
dearest  interests  of  the  state  were  in  jeopardy, 
though  the  circumstances  were  such  that  all 
ordinary  laws  might  seem  to  be  superseded  by 
that  highest  law,  the  public  safety,  the  apology 
did  not  satisfy  the  country ;  and  the  queen 
found  it  expedient  to  issue  an  order  positively 
forbidding  the  torturing  of  state  prisoners  on 
any  pretence  whatever.  From  that  time,  the 
practice  of  torturing,  which  had  always  been 
unpopular,  which  had  always  been  illegal, 
had  also  been  unusual.  It  is  well  known  that 
in  1628,  only  fourteen  years  after  the  time 
when  Bacon  went  to  the  Tower  to  listen  to  the 
yells  of  Peacham,  the  judges  decided  that  Fel- 
tori,  a  criminal  who  neither  deserved  nor  was 
hl<ely  to  obtain  any  extraordinary  indulgence, 
could  not  lawfully  be  put  to  the  question.  We 
therefore  say  that  Bacon  stands  in  a  very  dif 
ferent  situation  from  that  in  which  Mr.  Mon 
tagu  tries  to  place  him.  Bacon  was  here  dis 
tinctly  behind  his  age.  He  was  one  of  the  last 
of  the  tools  of  power  who  persisted  in  a  prac 
tice  the  most  barbarous  and  the  most  absurd 
that  has  ever  disgraced  jurisprudence — in  a 
practice  of  which,  in  the  preceding  generation, 
Elizabeth  and  her  ministers  had  been  ashamed 


*  This  paper  is  contained  In  the  Harleian  Miscellany. 
I  is  dated  tf83. 


— in  a  practice  which,  a  few  years  later,  no 
sycophant  in  all  the  Inns  of  Court  had  the 
heart  or  the  forehead  to  del-md. 

Bacon  far  behind  his  age  !  Bacon  far  be 
hind  Sir  Edward  Coke!  Bacon  clinging  to 
exploded  abuses !  Bacon  withstanding  the 
progress  of  improvement !  Bacon  struggling 
to  push  back  the  human  mind!  The  words 
seems  strange.  They  sound  like  a  contradic 
tion  in  terms.  Yet  the  fact  is  even  so :  and 
the  explanation  may  be  readily  found  by  any 
person  who  is  not  blinded  by  prejudice.  Mr. 
Montagu  cannot  believe  that  so  extraordinary 
a  man  as  Bacon  could  be  guilty  of  a  bad  ac 
tion  ;  as  if  history  were  not  made  up  of  the 
bad  actions  of  extraordinary  men  ;  as  if  all  the 
most  noted  destroyers  and  deceivers  of  our 
species,  all  the  founders  of  arbitrary  govern 
ments  and  false  religions,  had  not  been  extra 
ordinary  men;  as  if  nine-tenths  of  the  calami 
ties  which  had  befallen  the  human  race  had 
any  other  origin  than  the  union  of  high  intel 
ligence  with  low  desires. 

Bacon  knew  this  well.  He  has  told  us  that 
there  are  persons,  "  scientia  tanquam  angeli 
alati,  cupiditatibus  vero  tanquam  serpentes  qui 
humi  reptant;"*  and  it  did  not  require  his  ad 
mirable  sagacity  and  his  extensive  converse 
with  mankind  to  make  the  discovery.  Indeed, 
he  had  only  to  look  within.  The  difference 
between  the  soaring  angel,  and  the  creeping 
snake,  was  but  a  type  of  the  difference  between 
Bacon  the  philosopher  and  Bacon  the  Attorney- 
General — Bacon  seeking  for  Truth,  and  Bacon 
seeking  for  the  Seals.  Those  who  survey  only 
one-half  of  his  character  may  speak  of  him 
with  unmixed  admiration  or  with  unmixed 
contempt.  But  those  only  judge  of  him  cor 
rectly,  who  take  in  at  one  view  Bacon  in  specu 
lation  and  Bacon  in  action.  They  will  have 
no  difficulty  in  comprehending  how  one  and 
the  same  man  should  have  been  far  before  his 
age  and  far  behind  it;  in  one  line  the  boldest 
and  most  useful  of  innovators,  in  another  line 
the  most  obstinate  champion  of  the  foulest 
abuses.  In  his  library,  all  his  rare  powers 
were  under  the  guidance  of  an  honest  ambi 
tion,  of  an  enlarged  philanthropy,  of  a  sincere 
love  of  truth.  There,  no  temptation  drew  him 
away  from  the  right  course.  Thomas  Aquinas 
could  pay  no  fees;  Duns  Scotus  could  confer 
no  peerages.  The  "  Master  of  the  Sentences" 
had  no  rich  reversions  in  his  gift.  Far  differ 
ent  was  the  situation  of  the  great  philosopher 
when  he  came  forth  from  his  study  and  his 
laboratory  to  mingle  with  the  crowd  which 
filled  the  galleries  of  Whitehall.  In  all  that 
crowd  there  was  no  man  equally  qualified  to 
render  great  and  lasting  services  to  mankind. 
But  in  all  that  crowd  there  was  not  a  heart 
more  set  on  things  which  no  man  ought  to  suf 
fer  to  be  necessary  to  his  happiness,  on  things 
which  can  often  be  obtained  only  by  the  sacri 
fice  of  integrity  and  honour.  To  be  the  leader 
of  the  human  race  in  the  career  of  improve 
ment,  to  found  on  the  ruins  of  ancient  intel 
lectual  dynasties  a  more  prosperous  and  a 
more  enduring  empire,  to  be  revered  to  ihf 
latest  generations  as  the  most  illustrious  among 


*  De  Jlugmentis,  Lib.  F.  ran  » 


260 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  benefactors  of  mankind, — all  this  was  within 
his  reach.  But  all  this  availed  him  nothing 
while  some  quibbling  special  pleader  was  pro 
moted  before  him  to  the  bench ;  while  some 
heavy  country  gentleman  took  precedence  of 
him  by  virtue  of  a  purchased  coronet;  while 
some  pander,  happy  in  a  fair  wife,  could  ob 
tain  a  more  cordial  salute  from  Buckingham  ; 
while  some  buffoon,  versed  in  all  the  latest 
scandal  of  the  court,  could  draw  a  louder  laugh 
from  James. 

During  a  long  course  of  years,  his  unworthy 
ambition  was  crowned  with  success.  His 
sagacity  early  enabled  him  to  perceive  who 
was  likely  to  become  the  most  powerful  man 
in  the  kingdom.  He  probably  knew  the  king's 
mind  before  it  was  known  to  the  king  himself, 
and  attached  himself  to  Villiers,  while  the  less 
discerning  crowd  of  courtiers  still  continued 
to  fawn  on  Somerset.  The  influence  of  the 
younger  favourite  became  greater  daily.  The 
contest  between  the  rivals  might,  however, 
have  lasted  long,  but  for  that  frightful  crime 
which,  in  spite  of  all  that  could  be  effected  by 
the  research  and  ingenuity  of  historians,  is 
still  covered  with  so  mysterious  an  obscurity. 
The  descent  of  Somerset  had  been  a  gradual 
and  almost  imperceptible  lapse.  It  now  be 
came  a  headlong  fall ;  and  Villiers,  left  with 
out  a  competitor,  rapidly  rose  to  a  height  of 
power  such  as  no  subject  since  Wolsey  had 
attained. 

There  were  many  points  of  resemblance 
between  the  two  celebrated  courtiers  who,  at 
different  times,  extended  their  patronage  to 
Bacon.  It  is  difficult  to  say  whether  Essex  or 
Villiers  was  the  more  eminently  distinguished 
by  those  graces  of  person  and  manner  which 
have  always  been  rated  in  courts  at  much  more 
than  their  real  value.  Both  were  constitution 
ally  brave :  and  both,  like  most  men  who  are  con 
stitutional  ly  brave,  were  open  and  unreserved. 
Both  were  rash  and  headstrong.  Both  were 
destitute  of  the  abilities  and  the  information 
which  are  necessary  to  statesmen.  Yet  both, 
rusting  to  the  accomplishments  which  had 
made  them  conspicuous  in  tilt-yards  and  ball 
rooms,  aspired  to  rule  the  state.  Both  owed 
their  elevation  to  the  personal  attachment  of 
the  sovereign ;  and  in  both  cases  this  attach 
ment  was  of  so  eccentric  a  kind,  that  it  per 
plexed  observers,  that  it  still  continues  to  per 
plex  historians,  and  that  it  gave  rise  to  much 
scandal  which  we  are  inclined  to  think  un 
founded.  Each  of  them  treated  the  sovereign 
whose  favour  he  enjoyed,  with  a  rudeness 
which  approached  to  insolence.  This  petu 
lance  ruined  Essex,  who  had  to  deal  with  a 
spirit  naturally  as  proud  as  his  own,  and  ac 
customed,  during  nearly  half  a  century,  to  the 
most  respectful  observance.  But  there  was  a 
wide  difference  between  the  haughty  daughter 
of  Henry  and  her  successor.  James  was  timid 
from  the  cradle.  His  nerves,  naturally  weak, 
had  no',  been  fortified  by  reflection  or  by  habit. 
His  life,  till  he  came  to  England,  had  been  a 
series  of  mortifications  and  humiliations.  With 
all  his  high  notions  of  the  origin  and  extent  of 
his  prerogatives,  he  was  never  his  own  master 
for  a  day.  In  spite  of  his  kingly  title,  in  spite 
of  his  despotic  theories,  he  was  to  the  last  a 


!  slave  at  heart.  Villiers  treated  him  like  one ; 
and  this  course,  though  adopted,  we  believe, 

!  merely  from  temper,  succeeded  as  well  as  if 

;  it  had  been  a  system  of  policy  formed  after 
mature  deliberation. 

In  generosity,  in  sensibility,  in  capacity  for 
friendship,  Essex  far  surpassed  Buckingham 

!  Indeed,  Buckingham  can  scarcely  be  said  t<? 
have  had  any  friend,  with  the  exception  of  the 

!  two  princes,  over  whom  successively  he  exer- 

I  oised  so  wonderful  an  influence.  Essex  was 
to  the  last  adored  by  the  people.  Buckingham 
was  always  a  most  unpopular  man;  except 
perhaps  for  a  very  short  time  after  his  retura 
from  the  childish  visit  to  Spain.  Essex  fell  a 
victim  to  the  rigour  of  the  government  amidst 
the  lamentations  of  the  people.  Buckingham, 
execrated  by  the  people,  and  solemnly  declared 
a  public  enemy  by  the  representatives  of  the 
people,  fell  by  the  hand  of  one  of  the  people, 
and  was  lamented  by  none  but  his  master. 

The  way  in  which  the  two  favourites  acted 
towards  Bacon  was  highly  characteristic,  and 
may  serve  to  illustrate  the  old  and  true  saying, 
that  a  man  is  generally  more  inclined  to  feel 
kindly  towards  one  on  whom  he  has  conferred 
favours,  than  towards  one  from  whom  he  has 
received  them.  Essex  loaded  Bacon  with 
benefits,  and  never  thought  that  he  had  done 
enough.  It  never  seems  to  have  crossed  the 
mind  of  the  powerful  and  mighty  noble,  thai 
the  poor  barrister  whom  he  treated  with  such 
munificent  kindness  was  not  his  equal.  It 
was,  -we  have  no  doubt,  with  perfect  sincerity 
that  he  declared,  that  he  would  willingly  give 
his  sister  or  daughter  in  marriage  to  his  friend. 
He  was  in  general  more  than  sufficiently  sen 
sible  of  his  own  merits  ;  but  he  did  not  seem 
to  know  that  he  had  ever  deserved  well  of 
Bacon.  On  that  cruel  day  when  they  saw 
each  other  for  the  last  time  at  the  bar  of  the 
Lords,  the  earl  taxed  his  perfidious  friend  with 
unkindness  and  insincerity,  but  never  with  in 
gratitude.  Even  in  such  a  moment,  more  bitter 
than  the  bitterness  of  death,  that  noble  heart 
was  too  great  to  vent  itself  in  such  a  reproach. 
Villiers,  on  the  other  hand,  owed  much  to 
Bacon.  When  their  acquaintance  began,  Sir 
Francis  was  a  man  of  mature  age,  of  high  sta 
tion,  and  of  established  fame  as  a  politician, 
an  advocate,  and  a  writer.  Villiers  was  little 
more  than  a  boy,  a  younger  son  of  a  house  then, 
of  no  great  note.  He  was  but  just  entering  on 
the  career  of  court-favour ;  and  none  but  the 
most  discerning  observers  could  as  yet  per 
ceive  that  he  was  likely  to  distance  all  his 
competitors.  The  countenance  and  advice  of  a 
man  so  highly  distinguished  as  the  Attorney- 
General  must  have  been  an  object  of  the  high 
est  importance  to  the  young  adventurer.  But 
though  Villiers  was  the  obliged  party,  he  was 
less  warmly  attached  to  Bacon,  and  far  less 
delicate  in  his  conduct  towards  him,  than  Es 
sex  had  been. 

To  do  the  new  favourite  justice,  he  eanjr 
exerted  his  influence  in  behalf  of  his  illus 
trious  friend.  In  1616,  Sir  Francis  was  sworn, 
of  the  Privy  Council;  and  in  March,  1617,  on 
the  retirement  of  Lord  Brackley,  wis  appointed 

I  Keeper  of  the  Great  Seal. 

On  the  7th  of  May,  the  first  da)   ->r  term,  h« 


LORD  BACON. 


261 


rode  in  state  tp  Westminster  Hall,  with  the 
Lord  Treasurer  on  his  right  hand,  the  Lord 
Privy  Seal  on  his  left,  a  long  procession  of 
students  and  ushers  hefore  him,  and  a  crowd 
of  peers,  privy-councillors,  and  judges  fol 
lowing  in  his  train.  Having  entered  his  court, 
he  addressed  the  splendid  auditory  in  a  grave 
and  dignified  speech,  which  proves  how  well 
he  understood  those  judicial  duties  which  he 
aftsrwards  performed  so  ill.  Even  at  that  mo 
ment,  the  proudest  moment  of  his  life  in  the 
estimation  of  the  vulgar,  and,  it  may  be,  even 
in  his  own,  he  cast  back  a  look  of  lingering 
affection  towards  those  noble  pursuits  from 
which,  as  it  seemed,  he  was  about  to  be  es 
tranged.  "  The  depth  of  the  three  long  vaca 
tions,"  said  he,  "  I  would  reserve  in  some  mea 
sure  free  from  business  of  estate,  and  for  stu 
dies,  arts,  and  sciences,  to  which  of  my  own 
nature  I  am  most  inclined." 

The  years  during  which  Bacon  held  the 
great  seal  were  among  the  darkest  and  most 
shameful  in  English  history.  Every  thing  at 
home  and  abroad  was  mismanaged.  First 
came  the  execution  of  Raleigh,  an  act  which, 
if  done  in  a  proper  manner,  might  have  been 
defensible,  but  which,  under  all  the  circum 
stances,  must  be  considered  as  a  dastardly 
murder.  Worse  was  behind — the  war  of  Bo 
hemia,  the  successes  of  Tilly  and  Spinola,  the 
Palatinate  conquered,  the  king's  son-in-law  an 
exile,  the  house  of  Austria  dominant  on  the 
continent,  the  Protestant  religion  and  the  li 
berties  of  the  Germanic  body  trodden  under 
foot.  In  the  mean  time,  the  wavering  and 
cowardly  policy  of  England  furnished  matter 
of  ridicule  to  all  the  nations  of  Europe.  The 
love  of  peace  which  James  professed  would, 
even  when  indulged  to  an  impolitic  excess, 
have  been  respectable,  if  it  had  proceeded  from 
tenderness  for  his  people.  But  the  truth  is, 
that,  while  he  had  nothing  to  spare  for  the  de 
fence  of  the  natural  allies  of  England,  he  re 
sorted  without  scruple  to  the  most  illegal  and 
oppressive  devices  for  the  purpose  of  enabling 
Buckingham  and  Buckingham's  relations  to 
outshine  the  ancient  aristocracy  of  the  realm. 
Benevolences  were  exacted.  Patents  of  mono 
poly  were  multiplied.  All  the  resources  which 
could  have  been  employed  to  replenish  a  beg 
gared  exchequer,  at  the  close  of  a  ruinous 
war,  were  put  in  motion  during  this  season  of 
ignominious  peace. 

The  vices  of  the  administration  must  be 
chiefly  ascribed  to  the  weakness  of  the  king 
and  to  the  levity  and  violence  of  the  favourite. 
But  it  is  impossible  to  acquit  the  Lord  Keeper. 
For  those  odious  patents,  in  particular,  which 
passed  the  great  seal  while  it  was  in  his 
charge,  he  must  be  held  answerable.  In  the 
speech  which  he  made  on  first  taking  his  seat 
in  his  court,  he  had  pledged  himself  to  dis 
charge  this  important  part  of  his  functions 
with  the  greatest  caution  and  impartiality.  He 
had  declared  that  he  "would  walk  in  the  light," 
"that  men  should  see  that  no  particular  turn 
or  end  led  him,  but  a  general  rule;"  and  Mr. 
Montagu  would  have  us  believe  that  Bacon 
acted  up  to  these  professions.  He  says  that 
"  the  power  of  the  favourite  did  not  deter  the 
Lord  Keeper  from  staying  grants  and  patents, 


when  his  public  duty  demanded  his  interpo 
sition."  Does  Mr.  Montagu  consider  patents 
of  monopoly  as  good  things  ]  or  does  he  mean 
to  say  that  Bacon  stayed  every  patent  of  mono 
poly  that  came  before  him  1  Of  all  the  patents 
in  our  history,  the  most  disgraceful  was  that 
which  was  granted  to  Sir  Giles  Mompe;>son, 
supposed  to  be  the  original  of  Massinger's 
"  Overreach,"  and  to  Sir  Francis  Michell,  from 
whom  "Justice  Greedy"  is  supposed  to  have 
been  drawn,  for  the  exclusive  manufacturing 
of  gold  and  silver  lace.  The  effect  of  this 
monopoly  was  of  course  that  the  metal  em 
ployed  in  the  manufacture  was  adulterated,  to 
the  great  loss  of  the  public.  But  this  was  a 
trifle.  The  patentees  were  armed  with  power 
as  gr^at  as  have  ever  been  given  to  fanners 
of  th  revenue  in  the  worst  governed  coun 
tries.  They  were  authorized  to  search  houses 
and  to  arrest  interlopers  ;  and  these  formidable 
powers  were  used  for  purposes  viler  than  even 
those  for  which  they  were  given — for  the 
wreaking  of  old  grudges,  and  for  the  corrupt 
ing  of  female  chastity.  Was  not  this  a  case 
in  which  public  duty  demanded  the  interposi 
tion  of  the  Lord  Keeper?  And  did  the  Lord 
Keeper  interpose?  He  did.  He  wrote  to  in 
form  the  king,  that  he  "  had  considered  of  the 
fitness  and  conveniency  of  the  gold  and  silver 
thread  business,"  "that  it  was  convenient  that 
it  should  be  settled,"  that  he  "did  conceive 
apparent  likelihood  that  it  would  redound  much 
to  his  majesty's  profit,"  that,  therefore, "  it  were 
good  it  were  settled  with  all  convenient  speed." 
The  meaning  of  all  this  was,  that  certain  of 
the  house  of  Villiers  were  to  go  shares  with 
"Overreach"  and  "Greedy"  in  the  plunder  of 
the  public.  This  was  the  way  in  which,  when, 
the  favourite  pressed  for  patents,  lucrative  to 
his  relations  and  to  his  creatures,  ruinous  and 
vexatious  to  the  body  of  the  people,  the  chief 
guardian  of  the  laws  interposed.  Having  as 
sisted  the  patentees  to  obtain  this  monopoly, 
Bacon  assisted  them  also  in  the  steps  which 
they  took  for  the  purpose  of  guarding  it.  He 
committed  several  people  to  close  confinement 
for  disobeying  his  tyrannical  edict.  It  is  need 
less  to  say  more.  Our  readers  are  now  able  to 
judge  whether,  in  the  matter  of  patents,  Bacon 
acted  conformably  to  his  professions,  or  de 
served  the  praise  which  his  biographer  has 
bestowed  on  him. 

In  his  judicial  capacity  his  conduct  was  not 
less  reprehensible.  He  suffered  Buckingham 
to  dictate  many  of  his  decisions.  Bacon  knew 
as  well  as  any  man,  that  a  judge  who  listens 
to  private  solicitations  is  a  disgrace  to  his 
post.  He  had  himself,  before  he  was  raised 
to  the  woolsack,  represented  this  strongly  to 
Villiers,  then  just  entering  on  his  career.  "By- 
no  means,"  said  Sir  Francis,  in  a  letter  of  ad 
vice  addressed  to  the  young  courtier,  "by  no 
means  be  you  persuaded  to  interpose  yourself, 
either  by  word  or  letter,  in  any  cause  depending 
in  any  court  of  justice,  or  suffer  any  great  man 
to  do  it  where  you  can  hinder  it.  If  it  should 
prevail,  it  perverts  justice ;  but,  if  the  judge 
be  so  just  and  of  such  courage,  as  he  ought 
to  be,  as  not  to  be  inclined  thereby,  y*»t  it 
always  leaves  a  taint  of  suspicion  behinu  it." 
Yet  he  had  not  been  Lord  Keeper  a  mornh 


262 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


when  Buckingham  began  to  interfere  in  Chan 
cery  suits,  and  his  interference  was,  as  might 
have  been  expected,  successful. 

Mr.  Montagu's  reflections  on  the  excellent 
passage  which  we  have  quoted  above  are 
exceedingly  amusing.  "  No  man,"  says  he, 
"more  deeply  felt  the  evils  which  then  existed 
of  the  interference  of  the  crown  and  of  states 
men  to  influence  judges.  How  beautifully  did 
he  admonish  Buckingham,  regardless  as  he 
proved  of  all  admonition !"  We  should  be 
glad  to  know  how  it  can  be  expected  that  ad 
monition  will  be  regarded  by  him  who  receives 
it,  when  it  is  altogether  neglected  by  him  who 
gives  it.  We  do  not  defend  Buckingham,  but 
what  was  his  guilt  to  Bacon's?  Buckingham 
was  young,  ignorant,  thoughtless,  dizzy  with 
the  rapidity  of  his  ascent  and  the  height  of 
his  position.  That  he  should  be  eager  to  serve 
his  relations,  his  flatterers,  his  mistresses ; 
that  he  should  not  fully  apprehend  the  im 
mense  importance  of  a  pure  administration 
of  justice;  that  he  should  think  more  about 
those  who  were  bound  to  him  by  private  ties 
than  about  the  public  interest — all  this  was 
perfectly  natural,  and  not  altogether  unpar 
donable.  Those  who  intrust  a  petulant,  hot- 
blooded,  ill-informed  lad  with  power,  are  more 
to  blame  than  he  for  the  mischief  which  he 
may  do  with  it.  How  could  it  be  expected  of 
a  lively  page,  raised  by  a  wild  freak  of  fortune 
to  the  first  influence  in  the  empire,  that  he 
should  have  bestowed  any  serious  thought  on 
the  principles  which  ought  to  guide  judicial 
decisions  1  Bacon  was  the  ablest  public  man 
then  living  in  Europe.  He  was  nearly  sixty 
years  old.  He  had  thought  much,  and  to  good 
purpose,  on  the  general  principles  of  law.  He 
had  for  many  years  borne  a  part  daily  in  the 
administration  of  justice.  It  was  impossible 
that  a  man  with  a  tithe  of  his  sagacity  and 
experience  should  not  have  known,  that  a 
judge  who  suffers  friends  or  patrons  to  dictate 
his  decrees,  violates  the  plainest  rules  of  duty. 
In  fact,  as  we  have  seen,  he  knew  this  well : 
he  expressed  it  admirably.  Neither  on  this 
occasion  nor  on  any  other  could  his  bad  ac 
tions  be  attributed  to  any  defect  of  the  head. 
They  sprang  from  quite  a  different  cause. 

A  man  who  stooped  to  render  such  services 
to  others  was  not  likely  to  be  scrupulous  as  to 
the  means  by  which  he  enriched  himself.  He 
and  his  dependants  accepted  large  presents 
from  persons  who  were  engaged  in  Chancery 
suits.  The  amount  of  the  plunder  which  he 
collected  in  this  way  it  is  impossible  to  es 
timate.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  he  received 
very  much  more  than  was  proved  on  his  trial, 
though,  it  may  be,  less  than  was  suspected  by 
the  public.  His  enemies  stated  his  illicit  gains 
at  a  hundred  thousand  pounds.  But  this  was 
probably  an  exaggeration. 

It  was  long  before  the  day  of  reckoning  ar 
rived.  During  the  interval  between  the  second 
and  third  Parliaments  of  James,  the  nation 
was  absolutely  governed  by  the  crown.  The 
prospects  of  the  Lord  Keeper  were  bright  and 
serene.  His  great  place  rendered  the  splen 
dour  of  his  talents  even  more  conspicuous; 
and  gave  an  additional  charm  to  the  serenity 
uf  his  temper,  the  courtesy  of  his  manners, 


and  the  eloquence  of  his  conversation.  Tht 
pillaged  suitor  might  mutter*  The  austere 
Puritan  patriot  might,  in  his  retreat,  lament 
that  one  on  whom  God  had  bestowed  without 
measure  all  the  abilities  which  qualify  men 
to  take  the  lead  in  great  reforms,  should 
be  found  among  the  adherents  of  the  worst 
abuses.  But  the  murmurs  of  the  suitor,  and 
the  lamentations  of  the  patriot,  had  scarcely 
any  avenue  to  the  ears  of  the  powerful.  The 
king,  and  the  minister  who  was  the  king's  mas 
ter,  smiled  on  their  illustrious  flatterer.  The 
whole  crowd  of  courtiers  and  nobles  sought 
his  favour  with  emulous  eagerness.  Men  of 
wit  and  learning  hailed  with  delight  the  eleva 
tion  of  one  who  had  so  signally  shown  that  a 
man  of  profound  learning  and  of  brilliant  wit 
might  understand,  far  better  than  any  plodding 
dunce,  the  art  of  thriving  in  the  world. 

Once,  and  but  once,  this  course  of  prosperity 
was  for  a  moment  interrupted.  It  should  seem 
that  even  Bacon's  brain  was  not  strong  enough 
to  bear,  without  some  discomposure,  the  ine 
briating  effect  of  so  much  good  fortune.  For 
some  time  after  his  elevation,  he  showed  him 
self  a  little  wanting  in  that  wariness  and  self- 
command  to  which,  more  than  even  to  his 
transcendent  talents,  his  elevation  was  to  be 
ascribed.  He  was  by  no  means  a  good  hater. 
The  temperature  of  his  revenge,  like  that  of 
his  gratitude,  was  scarcely  ever  more  than 
lukewarm.  But  there  was  one  person  whoir 
he  had  long  regarded  with  an  animosity  which 
though  studiously  suppressed,  was  perhaps  the 
stronger  for  the  suppression.  The  insults  and 
injuries  which,  when  a  young  man  struggling 
into  note  and  professional  practice,  he  had  re 
ceived  from  Sir  Edward  Coke,  were  such  as 
might  move  the  most  placable  nature  to  re 
sentment.  About  the  time  at  which  Bacon 
received  the  seals,  Coke  had,  on  account  of 
his  contumacious  resistance  to  the  royal  plea 
sure,  been  deprived  of  his  seat  in  the  Court  of 
King's  Bench,  and  had  ever  since  languished 
in  retirement.  But  Coke's  opposition  to  the 
court,  we  fear,  was  the  effect,  not  of  good 
principles,  but  of  a  bad  temper.  Perverse 
and  testy  as  he  was,  he  wanted  true  fortitude 
and  dignity  of  character.  His  obstinacy,  un 
supported  by  virtuous  motives,  Avas  not  proof 
against  disgrace.  He  solicited  a  reconcilia 
tion  with  the  favourite,  and  his  solicitations 
were  successful.  Sir  John  Villiers,  the  brother 
of  Buckingham,  was  looking  out  for  a  rich 
wife.  Coke  had  a  large  fortune  and  an  un 
married  daughter.  A  bargain  was  struck. 
But  Lady  Coke,  the  lady  whom  twenty  years 
before  Essex  had  Avooed  on  behalf  of  Bacon, 
would  not  hear  of  the  match.  A  violent  and 
scandalous  family  quarrel  followed.  The  mother 
carried  the  girl  away  by  stealth.  The  father 
pursued  them,  and  regained  possession  of  his 
daughter  by  force.  The  king  was  then  in 
Scotland,  and  Buckingham  had  attended  him 
thither.  Bacon  was,  during  their  absence,  at 
the  head  of  affairs  in  England.  He  felt  to 
wards  Coke  as  much  malevolence  as  it  was  in 
his  nature  to  feel  towards  anybody.  His  wis 
dom  had  been  laid  to  sleep  by  prosperity.  In 
an  evil  hour  he  determined  to  interfere  in  the 
disputes  which  agitated  his  enemy's  house 


LORD  BACON. 


263 


/lold.  He  declared  for  the  wife,  countenanced 
the  Attorney-General  in  filing  an  information 
in  the  Star-Chamber  against  the  husband,  and 
wrote  strongly  to  the  king  and  the  favourite 
against  the  proposed  marriage.  The  language 
which  he  used  in  those  letters  shows  that,  sa 
gacious  as  he  was,  he  did  not  quite  know  his 
place;  that  he  was  not  fully  acquainted  with 
the  extent  either  of  Buckingham's  power,  or 
of  the  change  which  the  possession  of  that 
power  had  produced  in  Buckingham's  charac 
ter.  He  soon  had  a  lesson  which  he  never 
forgot.  The  favourite  received  the  news  of 
the  Lord  Keeper's  interference  with  feelings 
of  the  most  violent  resentment,  and  made  the 
king  even  more  angry  than  himself.  Bacon's 
eyes  were  at  once  opened  to  his  error,  and  to  all 
its  possible  consequences.  He  had  been  elated, 
if  not  intoxicated,  by  greatness.  The  shock 
sobered  him  in  an  instant.  He  was  all  himself 
again.  He  apologized  submissively  for  his 
interference.  He  directed  the  Attorney-General 
to  stop  the  proceedings  against  Coke.  He  sent 
to  tell  Lady  Coke  that  he  could  do  nothing  for 
her.  He  announced  to  both  the  families  that 
he  was  desirous  to  promote  the  connection. 
Having  given  these  proofs  of  contrition,  he 
ventured  to  present  himself  before  Bucking 
ham.  But  the  young  upstart  did  not  think  that 
ne  had  yet  sufficiently  humbled  an  old  man 
who  had  been  his  friend  and  his  benefactor, 
who  was  the  highest  civil  functionary  in  the 
realm,  and  the  most  eminent  man  of  letters  in 
the  world.  It  is  said  that  on  two  successive 
days  Bacon  repaired  to  Buckingham's  house  ; 
that  on  two  successive  days  he  was  suffered 
to  remain  in  an  antechamber  among  footboys, 
seated  on  an  old  wooden  box,  with  the  great 
seal  of  England  at  his  side:  and  that  when  at 
length  he  was  admitted,  he  flung  himself  on 
the  floor,  kissed  the  favourite's  feet,  and  vowed 
never  to  rise  till  he  was  forgiven.  Sir  Anthony 
Weldon,  on  whose  authority  this  story  rest,  is 
likely  enough  to  have  exaggerated  the  mean 
ness  of  Bacon  and  the  insolence  of  Bucking 
ham.  But  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  that  so 
circumstantial  a  narrative,  written  by  a  person 
who  avers  that  he  was  present  on  the  occasion, 
can  be  wholly  without  foundation  ;  and,  un 
happily,  there  is  little  in  the  character  either 
of  the  favourite  or  of  the  Lord  Keeper  to  render 
the  narrative  improbable.  It  is  certain  that  a 
reconciliation  took  place  on  terms  humiliating 
to  Bacon,  who  never  more  ventured  to  cross 
any  purpose  of  anybody  who  bore  the  name 
ofVilliers.  He  put  a  strong  curb  on  those 
angry  passions  which  had  for  the  first  time  in 
his  life  mastered  his  prudence.  He  went 
through  the  forms  of  a  reconciliation  with 
Coke,  ard  did  his  best,  by  seeking  opportuni 
ties  of  paying  little  civilities,  and  by  avoiding 
all  that  could  produce  collision,  to  tame  the 
untamable  ferocity  of  his  old  enemy. 

In  the  main,  however,  his  life,  while  he  held 
the  great  seal,  was,  in  outward  appearance, 
most  enviable.  In  London  he  lived  with  great 
dignity  at  York-house,  the  venerable  mansion 
of  his  father.  Here  it  was  that,  in  January, 
1620,  he  celebrated  his  entrance  into  his  six 
tieth  year,  amidst  a  splendid  circle  of  friends. 
He  had  then  exchanged  the  appellation  of 


Keeper  for  the  higher  title  of  Chancellor.  Ben 
Jonson  was  one  of  the  party,  and  wrote  on 
the  occasion  some  of  the  happiest  of  his  rug 
ged  rhymes.  All  things,  he  tells  us,  seemed 
to  sm  le  about  the  old  house — "the  fire,  the 
wine,  the  men."  The  spectacle  of  the  accom 
plished  host,  after  a  life  marked  by  no  great 
disaster,  entering  on  a  green  old  age,  in  the 
enjoyment  of  riches,  power,  high  honours,  un- 
diminished  mental  activity,  and  vast  literary 
reputation,  made  a  strong  impression  on  the 
poet,  if  we  may  judge  from  those  well-known 
lines: — 

"England's  hieh  Chancellor,  the  destined  heir, 
In  his  soft  cradle,  to  his  father's  chair, 
Whose  even  thread  the  fates  spin  round  and  full 
Out  of  their  choicest  and  their  whitest  wool." 

In  the  intervals  of  rest  which  Bacon's  poli 
tical  and  judicial  functions  afforded,  he  was 
in  the  habit  of  retiring  to  Gorhambury.  At 
that  place  his  business  was  literature,  and  his 
favourite  amusement  gardening,  whiten  in  one 
of  his  most  pleasing  Essays  he  calls  "the 
purest  of  human  pleasures."  In  his  magnifi 
cent  grounds  he  erected,  at  a  cost  of  ten  thou 
sand  pounds,  a  retreat  to  which  he  repaired 
when  he  wished  to  avoid  all  visiters,  and  to 
devote  himself  wholly  to  study.  On  such  oc 
casions,  a  few  young  men  of  distinguished 
talents  were  sometimes  the  companions  of  his 
retirement.  And  among  them  his  quick  eye 
soon  discerned  the  superior  abilities  of  Thomas 
Hobbes.  It  is  not  probable,  however,  that  he 
fully  appreciated  the  powers  of  his  disciple,  or 
foresaw  the  vast  influence,  both  for  good  and 
for  evil,  which  that  most  vigorous  and  acute 
of  human  Intellects  was  destined  to  exercise 
on  the  two  succeeding  generations. 

In  January,  1621,  Bacon  had  reached  the 
zenith  of  his  fortunes.  He  had  jus)  published 
the  Novum  Orgaiium;  and  that  extraordinary 
book  had  drawn  forth  the  warmest  expressions 
of  admiration  from  the  ablest  men  of  Europe- 
He  had  obtained  honours  of  a  widely  different 
kind,  but  perhaps  not  less  valued  by  him.  He 
had  been  created  Baron  Verulam.  He  had 
subsequently  been  raised  to  the  highei  dignity 
of  Viscount  St.  Albans.  His  patent  was  drawn 
in  the  most  flattering  terms,  and  the  Prince  of 
Wales  signed  it  as  a  witness.  The  ceremony 
of  investiture  was  performed  with  great  state 
at  Theobalds,  and  Buckingham  condescended 
to  be  one  of  the  chief  actors.  Posterity  has 
felt  that  the  greatest  of  English  philosophers 
could  derive  no  accession  of  dignity  from  any 
title  which  James  could  bestow;  and,  in  de 
fiance  of  the  royal  letters  patent,  has  obsti 
nately  refused  to  degrade  Francis  Bacon  into 
Viscount  St.  Albans. 

In  a  few  weeks  was  signally  brought  to  the 
test  the  value  of  those  objects  for  which  Bacon 
had  sullied  his  integrity,  had  resigned  his 
independence,  had  violated  the  most  sacred 
obligations  of  friendship  and  gratitude,  had 
flattered  the  worthless,  had  persecuted  the  in 
nocent,  had  tampered  with  judges,  had  tortured 
prisoners,  had  plundered  suitors,  had  wasted 
on  paltry  intrigues  all  the  powers  of  the  most 
exquisitely  constructed  intellect  that  has  ever 
been  bestowed  on  any  of  the  children  o,"  men 
A  sudden  and  terrible  reverse  was  at  hani,  A 


264 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Parliament  had  been  summoned.  After  six 
years  of  silence  the  voice  of  the  nation  was 
again  to  be  heard.  Only  three  days  after  the 
pageant  which  was  performed  at  Theobalds  in 
honour  of  Bacon,  the  Houses  met. 

Want  of  money  had,  as  usual,  induced  the 
fcmg  to  convoke  his  Parliament.  But  it  may 
oe  doubted  whether,  if  he  or  his  ministers  had 
been  at  all  aware  of  the  state  of  public  feeling, 
they  would  not  have  tried  any  expedient,  or 
borne  with  any  inconvenience,  rather  than 
have  ventured  to  face  the  deputies  of  a  justly 
exasperated  nation.  But  they  did  not  discern 
those  times.  Indeed,  almost  all  the  political 
blunders  of  James,  and  of  his  more  unfortu 
nate  son,  arose  from  one  great  error.  During 
the  fifty  years  which  preceded  the  Long  Par 
liament  a  great  and  progressive  change  was 
taking  place  in  the  public  mind.  The  nature 
and  extent  of  this  change  were  not  in  the  least 
understood  by  either  of  the  first  two  kings  of 
the  house  of  Stuart,  or  by  any  of  their  advisers. 
That  the  nation  became  more  and  more  dis 
contented  every  year,  that  every  House  of 
Commons  was  more  unmanageable  than  that 
which  had  preceded  it,  were  facts,  which  it 
was  impossible  not  to  perceive.  But  the  court 
could  not  understand  why  these  things  were 
so.  The  court  could  not  see  that  the  English 
people  and  the  English  government,  though 
they  might  once  have  been  well  suited  to  each 
•ther,  were  suited  to  each  other  no  longer; 
that  the  nation  had  outgrown  its  old  institu 
tions,  was  every  day  more  uneasy  under  them, 
was  pressing  against  them,  and  would  soon 
burst  through  them.  The  alarming  pheno 
mena,  the  existence  of  which  no  sycophant 
could  deny,  were  ascribed  to  every  cause  ex 
cept  the  true.  "  In  my  first  Parliament,"  said 
James,  "I  was  a  novice.  In  my  next,  there 
was  a  kind  of  beasts  called  undertakers"  and 
so  forth.  In  the  third  Parliament  he  could 
hardly  be  called  a  novice,  and  those  beasts, 
the  undertakers,  did  not  exist.  Yet  his  third 
Parliament  gave  him  more  trouble  than  either 
the  first  or  the  second. 

The  Parliament  had  no  sooner  met,  than  the 
House  of  Commons  proceeded,  in  a  temperate 
and  respectful,  but  most  determined  manner, 
to  discuss  the  public  grievances.  Their  first 
attacks  were  directed  against  those  odious  pa 
tents,  under  cover  of  which  Buckingham  and 
his  creatures  had  pillaged  and  oppressed  the 
nation.  The  vigour  with  which  these  proceed 
ings  were  conducted  spread  dismay  through 
the  court.  Buckingham  thought  himself  in 
danger,  and,  in  his  alarm,  had  recourse  to  an 
adviser  who  had  lately  acquired  considerable 
influence  over  him,  Williams,  Dean  of  West 
minster.  This  person  had  already  been  of 
great  use  to  the  favourite  in  a  very  delicate 
matter.  Buckingham  had  set  his  heart  on 
marrying  Lady  Catherine  Manners,  daughter 
and  heiress  of  the  Earl  of  Rutland.  But  the 
difficulties  were  great.  The  earl  was  haughty 
and  impracticable,  and  the  young  lady  was  a 
Catholic.  Williams  soothed  the  pride  of  the 
father,  and  found  arguments  which,  for  a  time 
at  least,  quieted  the  conscience  of  the  daughter. 
Tor  these  services  he  had  been  rewarded  with 
considerable  preferment  in  the  Church ;  and 


he  was  now  rapidly  rising  to  the  same  place 
in  the  regard  of  Buckingham  which  had  for 
merly  been  occupied  by  Bacon. 

Williams  was  one  of  those  who  are  wiser 
for  others  than  for  themselves.  His  own  pub 
lic  life  was  unfortunate,  and  was  rendered  un 
fortunate  by  his  strange  want  of  judgment  and 
self-command  at  several  important  conjunc 
tures.  But  the  counsel  which  he  gave  on  this 
occasion  showed  no  want  of  worldly  wisdom. 
He  advised  the  favourite  to  abandon  all 
thoughts  of  defending  the  monopolies,  to  find 
some  foreign  embassy  for  his  brother  Sir  Ed 
ward,  who  was  deeply  implicated  in  the  vil- 
lanies  of  Mompesson,  and  to  leave  the  other 
offenders  to  the  justice  of  Parliament.  Buck 
ingham  received  this  advice  with  the  warmest 
expressions  of  gratitude,  and  declared  that  a 
load  had  been  lifted  from  his  heart.  He  then 
repaired  with  Williams  to  the  royal  presence. 
They  found  the  king  engaged  in  earnest  con 
sultation  with  Prince  Charles.  The  plan  of 
operations  proposed  by  the  dean  was  fully  dis 
cussed  and  approved  in  all  its  parts. 

The  first  victims  whom  the  court  abandoned 
to  the  vengeance  of  the  Commons  were  Sir 
Giles  Mornpesson  and  Sir  Francis  Michell.  It 
was  some  time  before  Bacon  began  to  enter 
tain  any  apprehensions.  His  talents  and  his 
address  gave  him  great  influence  in  the  House 
of  which  he  had  lately  become  a  member,  as 
indeed  they  must  have  done  in  any  assembly. 
In  the  House  of  Commons  he  had  many  per 
sonal  friends  and  many  warm  admirers.  But 
at  length,  about  six  weeks  after  the  meeting  of 
Parliament,  the  storm  burst. 

A  committee  of  the  lower  House  had  been 
appointed  to  inquire  into  the  state  of  the  Courts 
of  Justice.  On  the  15th  of  March  the  chair 
man  of  that  committee,  Sir  Robert  Phillips, 
member  for  Bath,  reported  that  great  abuses 
had  been  discovered.  "The  person,"  said  he, 
"  against  \vhom  the  things  are  alleged  is  no 
less  than  the  Lord  Chancellor,  a  man  so  en 
dued  with  all  parts,  both  of  nature  and  of  art, 
as  that  I  will  say  no  more  of  him,  being  not 
able  to  say  enough."  Sir  Robert  then  proceed 
ed  to  state,  in  the  most  temperate  manner,  the 
nature  of  the  charges.  A  person  of  the  name 
of  Aubrey  had  a  case  depending  in  Chancery. 
He  had  been  almost  ruined  by  law  expenses, 
and  his  patience  had  been  exhausted  by  the 
delays  of  the  court.  He  received  a  hint  from 
some  of  the  hangers-on  of  the  Chancellor  that 
a  present  of  one  hundred  pounds  would  expedite 
matters.  The  poor  man  had  not  the  sum  re 
quired.  However,  having  found  out  a  usurer 
who  accommodated  him  with  it  at.  high  inte 
rest,  he  carried  it  to  York  House.  The  Chan 
cellor  took  the  money,  and  his  dependants 
assured  the  suitor  that  all  would  go  right.  Au 
brey  was,  however,  disappointed ;  for,  after 
considerable  delay, "  a  killing  decree"  was  pro 
nounced  against  him.  Another  suitor  ol  the 
name  of  Egerton  complained  that  he  had  been 
induced  by  two  of  the  Chancelh  r's  jackals  to 
make  his  lordship  a  present  of  four  hundred 
pounds,  and  that  nevertheless  h<  had  not  been 
able  to  obtain  a  decree  in  hu.  favour.  The 
evidence  to  these  facts  was  overwhelming. 
Bacon's  friends  could  only  entreat  the  House 


LORD  BACON. 


265 


to  suspend  its  judgment,  and  to  send  up  the 
rase  to  the  Lords  in  a  form  less  offensive  than 
an  impeachment. 

On  the  19th  of  March  the  king  sent  a  mes-i 
sage  to  the  Commons  expressing  his  deep  re- ', 
gret  that  so  eminent  a  person  as  the  Chancel-  | 
lor  should  be  suspected  of  misconduct.  His  i 
majesty  declared  that  he  had  no  wish  to  screen 
the  guilty  from  justice,  and  proposed  to  appoint 
a  new  kind  of  tribunal,  consisting  of  eighteen 
commissioners,  who  might  be  chosen  from 
among  the  members  of  the  t\vo  Houses,  to  in 
vestigate  the  matter.  The  Commons  were  not 
disposed  to  depart  from  the  regular  course  of 
proceeding.  On  the  same  day  they  held  a  con 
ference  with  the  Lords,  and  delivered  in  the 
heads  of  the  accusation  against  the  Chancellor. 
At  this  conference  Bacon  was  not  present. 
Overwhelmed  with  shame  and  remorse,  and 
abandoned  by  all  those  in  whom  he  had  weakly 
put  his  trust,  he  shut  himself  up  in  his  cham 
ber  from  the  eyes  of  men.  The  dejection  of 
his  mind  soon  disordered  his  body.  Bucking 
ham,  who  visited  him  by  the  king's  order, 
"found  his  lordship  very  sick  and  heavy."  It 
appears  from  a  pathetic  letter  which  the  un 
happy  man  addressed  to  the  Peers  on  the  day 
of  the  conference,  that  he  neither  expected  nor 
wished  to  survive  his  disgrace.  During  seve 
ral  days  he  remained  in  his  bed,  refusing  to 
see  any  human  being.  He  passionately  told 
his  attendants  to  leav«^  him,  to  forget  him, 
never  again  to  name  his  name,  never  to  re 
member  that  there  had  been  such  a  man  in  the 
world.  In  the  mean  time  fresh  instances  of 
corruption  were  every  day  brought  to  the  know 
ledge  of  his  accusers.  The  number  of  charges 
rapMly  increased  from  two  to  twenty-three. 
The  Lords  entered  on  the  investigation  of  the 
case  with  laudable  alacrity.  Some  witnesses 
were  examined  at  the  bar  of  the  house.  A 
select  committee  was  appointed  to  take  the  de 
position  of  others;  and  the  inquiry  was  rapidly 
proceeding  when,  on  the  26th  of  March,  the 
king  adjourned  the  Parliament  for  three  weeks. 

This  measure  revived  Bacon's  hopes.  He 
made  the  most  of  his  short  respite.  He  at 
tempted  to  work  on  the  feeble  mind  of  the 
king.  He  appealed  to  all  the  strongest  feelings 
of  James,  to  his  fears,  to  his  vanity,  to  his  high 
notions  of  prerogative.  Would  the  Solomon 
of  the  age  commit  so  gross  an  error  as  to  en 
courage  the  encroaching  spirit  of  Parliament? 
Would  God's  anointed,  accountable  to  God 
alone,  pay  homage  to  the  clamorous  multi 
tude]  "Those,"  he  exclaimed,  "who  now 
strike  at  the  Chancellor  will  soon  strike  at  the 
crown.  I  am  the  first  sacrifice.  I  wish  I  may 
be  the  last."  But  all  his  eloquence  and  ad 
dress  were  employed  in  vain.  Indeed,  what 
ever  Mr.  Montagu  may  say,  we  are  firmly 
convinced  that  it  was  not  in  the  king's  power 
to  save  Bacon  without  having  recourse  to  mea 
sures  which  would  have  convulsed  the  realm. 
The  crown  had  not  sufficient  influence  in  Par 
liament  to  procure  an  acquittal  in  so  clear  a 
case  of  guilt.  And  to  dissolve  a  Parliament 
which  is  universally  allowed  to  have  been  one 
of  the  best  Parliaments  that  ever  sat,  which 
had  acted  liberally  and  respectfully  towards 
the  sovereign.  ai?d  which  enjoyed  in  the  high- 
VOL.  11—34 


est  degree  the  favour  of  the  people,  only  in 
order  to  stop  a  grave,  temperate,  and  consti 
tutional  inquiry  into  the  personal  integrity  of 
the  first  judge  in  the  kingdom,  would  have 
been  a  measure  more  scandalous  and  absurd 
than  any  of  those  which  were  the  ruin  of  the 
house  of  Stuart.  Such  a  measure,  while  it 
would  have  been  as  fatal  to  the  Chancellor's 
honour  as  a  conviction,  would  have  endanger* 
ed  the  very  existence  of  the  monarchy.  The 
king,  acting  by  the  advice  of  Williams,  very 
properly  refused  to  engage  in  a  dangerous 
•struggle  with  his  people  for  the  purpose  of 
saving  from  legal  condemnation  a  minister 
whom  it  was  impossible  to  save  from  disho 
nour.  He  advised  Bacon  to  plead  guilty,  and 
promised  to  do  all  in  his  power  to  mitigate  the 
punishment.  Mr.  Montagu  is  exceedingly  an 
gry  with  James  on  this  account.  But  though 
we  are  in  general  very  little  inclined  to  admire 
that  prince's  conduct,  we  really  think  that  his 
advice  was,  under  all  the  circumstances,  the 
best  advice  that  could  have  been  given. 

On  the  17th  of  April  the  Houses  reassembled, 
and  the  Lords  resumed  their  inquiries  into  the 
abuses  of  the  Court  of  Chancery.  On  the  22d 
Bacon  addressed  to  the  Peers  a  letter,  which 
Prince  Charles  condescended  to  deliver.  In 
this  artful  and  pathetic  composition  the  Chan 
cellor  acknowledged  his  guilt  in  guarded  and 
general  terms,  and,  while  acknowledging,  en 
deavoured  to  palliate  it.  This,  however,  was 
not  thought  sufficient  by  his  judges.  They  re 
quired  a  more  particular  confession,  and  sent 
him  a  copy  of  the  charges.  On  the  30th  he 
delivered  a  paper,  in  which  he  admitted,  with 
few  and  unimportant  reservations,  the  truth 
of  the  accusations  brought  against  him,  and 
threw  himself  entirely  on  the  mercy  of  his 
peers.  "  Upon  advised  consideration  of  the 
charges,"  said  he,  "descending  into  my  own 
conscience,  and  calling  my  memory  to  account 
so  far  as  I  am  able,  I  do  plainly  and  ingenu 
ously  confess  that  I  am  guilty  of  corruption, 
and  do  renounce  all  defence." 

The  Lords  came  to  a  resolution  that  the 
Chancellor's  confession  appeared  to  be  full  and 
ingenuous,  and  sent  a  committee  to  inquire  of 
him  whether  it  was  really  subscribed  by  him 
self.  The  deputies,  among  whom  \vas  South 
ampton,  the  common  friend  many  years  before 
of  Bacon  and  Essex,  performed  their  duty  with 
great  delicacy.  Indeed,  the  agonies  of  such  a 
mind  and  the  degradation  of  such  a  nnme 
might  well  have  softened  the  most  obdurate 
natures.  "My  lords,"  said  Bacon,  "it  is  my 
act,  my  hand,  my  heart.  I  beseech  your  lord 
ships  to  be  merciful  to  a  broken  reed."  The} 
withdrew;  and  he  again  retired  to  his  chamber 
in  the  deepest  dejection.  The  next  day  the 
sergeant-at-arms  and  usher  of  the  House  of 
Lords  came  to  conduct  him  to  Westminster 
Hall,  where  sentence  was  to  be  pronounced. 
But  they  found  him  so  unwell  that  he  could 
not  leave  his  bed,  and  this  excuse  for  his  ab 
sence  was  readily  accepted.  In  no  quarter 
does  there  appear  to  have  been  the  smallest 
desire  to  add  to  his  humiliation.  The  sentence 
was,  however,  severe ;  the  more  severe,  no 
doubt,  because  the  Loids  knew  that  it.  would 
not  be  executed,  and  that  they  had  an  ex.ce!taiii 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


opportupity  of  exhibiting  at  small  cost  the  in 
flexibility  of  their  justice  and  their  abhorrence 
of  corruption.  Bacon  was  condemned  to  pay 
a  fine  of  forty  thousand  pounds,  and  to  be  im 
prisoned  in  the  Tower  during  the  king's  plea 
sure.  He  was  declared  incapable  of  holding 
any  office  in  the  state  or  of  sitting  in  Parlia 
ment,  and  he  was  banished  for  life  from  the 
verge  of  the  court.  In  such  misery  and  shame 
ended  that  long  career  of  worldly  wisdom  and 
worldly  prosperity ! 

Even  at  this  pass  Mr.  Montagu  does  not  de 
sert  his  hero.  He  seems  indeed  to  think  that 
the  attachment  of  an  editor  ought  to  be  as  de 
voted  as  that  of  Mr.  Moore's  lovers ;  and  can 
not  conceive  what  biography  was  made  for, 

"if 'tis  not  the  same 

Through  grief  and  through  danger,  through  sin  and 
through  shame." 

He  assures  us  that  Bacon  was  innocent;  that 
he  had  the  means  of  making  a  perfectly  satis 
factory  defence;  that  when  he  "plainly  and 
ingenuously  confessed  that  he  was  guilty  of 
corruption,"  and  when  he  afterwards  solemnly 
affirmed  that  his  confession  was  "his  act,  his 
hand,  his  heart,"  he  was  telling  a  great  lie; 
and  that  he  refrained  from  bringing  forward 
proofs  of  his  innocence,  because  he  durst  not 
disobey  the  king  and  the  favourite,  who,  for 
their  own  selfish  objects,  pressed  him  to  plead 
guilty. 

Now,  in  the  first  place,  there  is  not  the 
smallest  ground  to  believe  that,  if  James  and 
Buckingham  thought  Bacon  had  a  good  de 
fence,  they  would  have  prevented  him  from 
making  it.  What  conceivable  motive  had  they 
for  doing  so?  Mr.  Montagu  perpetually  re 
peats  that  it  was  their  interest  to  sacrifice  Ba 
con.  But  he  overlooks  an  obvious  distinction. 
It  was  their  interest  to  sacrifice  Bacon  on  the 
supposition  of  his  guilt;  but  not  on  the  suppo 
sition  of  his  innocence.  James  was  very  pro 
perly  unwilling  to  run  the  risk  of  protecting 
his  Chancellor  against  the  Parliament.  But 
if  the  Chancellor  had  been  able,  by  force  of 
argument,  to  obtain  acquittal  from  the  Parlia 
ment,  we  have  no  doubt  that  both  the  king  and 
Villiers  would  have  heartily  rejoiced.  They 
would  have  rejoiced,  not  merely  on  account 
of  their  friendship  for  Bacon,  which  seems, 
however,  to  have  been  as  sincere  as  most 
friendships  of  that  sort,  but  on  selfish  grounds. 
Nothing  could  have  strengthened  the  govern 
ment  more  than  such  a  victory  The  king 
and  the  favourite  abandoned  the  Chancellor, 
because  they  were  unable  to  avert  his  disgrace 
and  unwilling  to  share  it.  Mr.  Montagu  mis 
takes  effect  for  cause.  He  thinks  that  Bacon 
did  not  prove  his  innocence,  because  he  was 
Rot  supported  by  the  court.  The  truth  evi 
dently  is,  that  the  court  did  not  venture  to 
support  him,  because  he  could  not  prove  his 
innocence. 

Again,  it  seems  strange  that  Mr.  Montagu 
should  not  perceive  that,  while  attempting  to 
vindicate  Bacon's  reputation,  he  is  really  cast 
ing  on  it  the  foulest  of  all  aspersions.  He 
imputes  to  his  idol  a  degree  of  meanness  and 
depravity  more  loathsome  than  judicial  cor 
ruption  itself.  A  corrupt  judge  may  have 
litany  good  qualities.  But  a  man  who,  to 


please  a.  powerful  patron,  solemnly  declares 
himself  guilty  of  corruption  when  he  knows 
himself  to  be  innocent,  must  be  a  monster  of 
servility  and  impudence.  Bacon  was,  to  say 
nothing  of  his  highest  claims  to  respect,  a  gen 
tleman,  a  nobleman,  a  scholar,  a  statesman,  a 
man  of  the  first  consideration  in  society,  a  man 
far  advanced  in  years.  Is  it  possible  to  be 
lieve  that  such  a  man  would,  to  gratify  any 
human  being,  irreparably  ruin  his  own  cha 
racter  by  his  o\vn  act  ?  Imagine  a  gray-headed 
judge,  full  of  years  and  honours,  owning  with 
tears,  with  pathetic  assurances  of  his  peni 
tence  and  of  his  sincerity,  that  he  had  been 
guilty  of  shameful  malpractices,  repeatedly 
asseverating  the  truth  of  his  confession,  sub 
scribing  it  with  his  own  hand,  submitting  to 
conviction,  receiving  a  humiliating  sentence, 
and  acknowledging  its  justice,  and  all  this 
when  he  has  it  in  his  power  to  show  that  his 
conduct  has  been  irreproachable  !  The  thing 
is  incredible.  But  if  we  admit  it  to  be  true, 
what  must  we  think  of  such  a  man,  if  indeed 
he  deserves  the  name  of  man,  who  thinks  any 
thing  that  kings  and  minions  can  bestow  more 
precious  than  honour,  or  any  thing  that  they 
can  inflict  more  terrible  than  infamy] 

Of  this  most  disgraceful  imputation  we  fully 
acquit  Bacon.  He  had  no  defence ;  and  Mr. 
Montagu's  affectionate  attempt  to  make  a  de 
fence  for  him  has  altogether  failed. 

The  grounds  on  which  Mr.  Montagu  rests 
the  case  are  two;  the  first,  that  the  taking  of 
presents  was  usual,  and,  what  he  seems  to 
consider  as  the  same  thing,  not  discreditable; 
the  second,  that  these  presents  were  not  taken 
as  bribes. 

Mr.  Montagu  brings  forward  many  facts  in 
support  of  his  first  proposition.  He  is  not  con 
tent  with  showing  that  many  English  judges 
formerly  received' gifts  from  suitors,  but  col 
lects  similar  instances  from  foreign  nations 
and  ancient  times.  He  goes  back  to  the  com 
monwealths  of  Greece,  and  attempts  to  press 
into  his  service  a  line  of  Homer,  and  a  sen 
tence  of  Plutarch,  which,  we  fear,  will  hardly 
serve  his  turn.  The  gold  of  which  Homer 
speaks  was  not  intended  to  fee  the  judges,  but 
was  paid  into  court  for  the  benefit  of  the  suc 
cessful  litigant;  and  the  gratuities  which  Peri 
cles,  as  Plutarch  states,  distributed  amongst 
the  members  of  the  Athenian  tribunals,  were 
legal  wages,  paid  out.  of  the  public  revenue. 
We  can  supply  Mr.  Montagu  with  passages 
much  more  in  point.  Hesiod,  who,  like  poor 
Aubrey,  had  "a  killing  decree"  made  against 
him  in  the  Chancery  of  Ascra,  was  so  un 
civil  as  to  designate  the  learned  persons  who 
presided  in  that  court,  as  @-jt,Ti\n-j.<;  So>g.q-jt.yw(» 
Plutarch  and  Diodorus  have  handed  down  to 
the  latest  ages,  the  respectable  name  of  Any. 
tus,  the  son  of  Anthemius,  the  first  defendant 
who,  eluding  all  the  safeguards  which  the  in 
genuity  of  Solon  could  devise,  succeeded  in 
corrupting  a  bench  of  Athenian  judges.  We 
are  indeed  so  far  from  grudging  Mr.  Montagu 
the  aid  of  Greece,  that  we  will  give  him  Rome 
into  the  bargain.  We  acknowledge,  that  the 
honourable  senators  who  tried  Verres  received 
presents  which  were  worth  more  than  the  fee- 
simple  of  York  House  and  Go rh  am  bury  toge- 


LORD  BACON. 


267 


ther;  and  that  the  no  /ess  honourable  senators 
and  knights  who  professed  to  believe  in  the 
alibi  of  CJodius,  obtained  marks  still  more  ex 
traordinary  of  the  esteem  and  gratitude  of  the 
defendant.  In  short,  we  a.-e  ready  to  admit,  that 
before  Bacon's  time,  and  in  Bacon's  time,  judges 
were  in  the  habit  of  receiving  gifts  from  suitors. 

But  is  this  a  defence]  We  think  not.  The 
robberies  of  Cacus  and  Barabbas  are  no  justi 
fication  for  those  of  Turpin.  The  conduct  of 
the  two  men  of  Belial  who  swore  away  the  life 
of  Naboth,  has  never  been  cited  as  an  excuse 
for  the  perjuries  of  Gates  and  Dangerfield. 
Mr.  Montagu  has  confounded  two  things  which 
it  is  necessary  carefully  to  distinguish  from 
each  other,  if  we  wish  to  form  a  correct  judg 
ment  of  the  characters  of  men  of  other  coun 
tries  and  other  times.  That  an  immoral  action 
is,  in  a  particular  society,  generally  considered 
as  innocent,  is  a  good  plea  for  an  individual 
who,  being  one  of  that  society,  and  having 
adopted  the  notions  which  prevail  amr/ng  his 
neighbours,  commits  that  action.  But  the  cir 
cumstance  that  a  great  many  people  are  in 
the  habit  of  committing  immoral  actions,  is  no 
plea  at  all.  We  should  think  it  unjust  to  call 
St.  Louis  a  wicked  man,  because  in  an  age  in 
which  toleration  was  generally  regarded  as  a 
sin,  he  persecuted  heretics.  We  should  think 
it  unjust  to  call  Cowper's  friend,  John  New 
ton,  a  hypocrite  and  a  monster,  because,  at  a 
time  when  the  slave-trade  was  commonly  con 
sidered  by  the  most  respectable  people  as  an 
innocent  and  beneficial  traffic,  he  went,  largely 
provided  with  hymn-books  and  hand-cuffs,  on 
a  Guinea- voyage.  But  the  circumstance  that 
there  are  fifty  thousand  thieves  in  London  is 
no  excuse  for  a  fellow  who  is  caught  breaking 
into  a  shop.  No  man  is  to  be  blamed  for  not 
making  discoveries  in  morality,  for  not  finding 
out  that  something  which  everybody  else  thinks 
to  be  good  is  really  bad.  But  if  a  man  does 
that  which  he  and  all  around  him  know  to  be 
bad,  it  is  no  excuse  for  him,  that  others  have 
done  the  same.  We  should  be  ashamed  of 
spending  so  much  time  in  pointing  out  so 
clear  a  distinction,  but  that  Mr.  Montagu  seems 
altogether  to  overlook  it. 

Now,  to  apply  these  principles  to  *he  case 
before  us;  let  Mr.  Montagu  prove  that,  in  Ba 
con's  age,  the  practices  for  which  Bacon  was 
punished  were  generally  considered  as  inno 
cent;  and  we  admit  that  he  has  made  out  his 
point.  But  this  we  defy  him  to  do.  That 
these  practices  were  common,  we  admit.  But 
they  were  common,  just  as  all  wickedness  to 
which  there  is,  strong  temptation  always  was, 
and  always  will  be  common.  They  were  com 
mon,  just  as  theft,  cheating,  perjury,  adultery, 
have  always  been  common.  They  were  com 
mon,  not  because  people  did  not  know  what 
was  right,  but  because  people  liked  to  do  what 
was  xvrong.  They  were  common,  though  pro 
hibited  by  law.  They  were  common,  though 
condemned  by  public  opinion.  They  were 
common,  because  in  that  age  law  and  public 
opinion  united  had  not  sufficient  force  to  re 
strain  the  greediness  of  powerful  and  unprin 
cipled  magistrates.  They  were  common,  as 
every  crime  will  be  common  when  the  gain 
to  which  it  leads  is  great,  and  the  chance  of 


disgrace  and  punishment  small.  But  though 
common,  they  were  universally  allowed  to  be 
altogether  unjustifiable;  they  were  in  the  high 
est  degree  odious;  and,  though  many  v/ere 
guilty  of  them,  none  had  the  audacity  publicly 
to  avow  and  defend  them. 

We  could  give  a  thousand  proofs  that  the 
opinion  then  entertained  concerning  these  prac 
tices,  was  such  as  we  have  described.  But  we 
will  content  ourselves  with  calling  a  single 
witness,  honest  Hugh  Latimer.  His  sermons, 
preached  more  than  seventy  years  before  the 
inquiry  into  Bacon's  conduct,  abound  with  the 
sharpest  invectives  against  those  very  prac 
tices  of  which  Bacon  was  guilty,  and  which,  as 
Mr.  Montagu  seems  to  think,  nobody  ever  con 
sidered  as  blamable  till  Bacon  was  punished 
for  them.  We  could  easily  fill  twent}'  pages 
with  the  homely  but  just  and  forcible  rhetoric 
of  the  brave  old  bishop.  We  shall  select  a  few 
passages  as  fair  specimens,  and  no  more  than 
fair  specimens,  of  the  rest.  "  Onuses  diligunt 
rnunera.  They  all  love  bribes.  Bribery  is  a 
princely  kind  of  thieving.  They  will  be  waged 
by  the  rich,  either  to  give  sentence  against 
the  poor,  or  to  put  off  the  poor  man's  cause. 
This  is  the  noble  theft  of  princes  and  magis 
trates.  They  are  bribe-takers.  Nowadays  they 
call  them  gentle  rewards.  Let  them  leave  their  co 
louring  and  call  them  by  their  Christian  name, 
bribes"  And  again  :  "  Cambyses  \vas  a  great 
emperor,  such  another  as  our  master  is.  He 
had  many  lord  deputies,  lord  presidents,  and 
lieutenants  under  him.  It  is  a  great  while  ago 
since  I  read  the  history.  It  chanced  he  had 
under  him  in  one  of  his  dominions  a  briber,  a 
gift-taker,  a  gratifier  of  rich  men  ;  he  followed 
gifts  as  fast  as  he  that  followed  the  pudding,  a 
handmaker  in  his  office  to  make  his  son  a  great 
man,  as  the  old  saying  is :  Happy  is  the  child 
whose  father  goeth  to  the  devil.  The  cry  of  the 
poor  widow  came  to  the  emperor's  ear,  and 
caused  him  to  flay  the  judge  quick,  and  laid 
his  skin  in  the  chair  of  judgment,  that  all 
judges  that  should  give  judgment  afterward 
should  sit  in  the  same  skin.  Surely  it  was  a 
goodly  sign,  a  goodly  monument,  the  sign  of  the 
judge's  skin.  /  pray  God  we  may  once  see  the 
skin  in  England"  "  I  am  sure,"  says  he  in 
another  sermon,  "  this  is  scala  inferni,  the  right 
way  to  hell,  to  be  covetous,  to  take  bribes,  and 
pervert  justice.  If  a  judge  should  ask  me  the 
way  to  hell,  I  would  show  him  this  way.  First, 
let  him  be  a  covetous  man ;  let  his  heart  be 
poisoned  with  covetousness.  Then  let  him  go 
a  little  further  and  take  bribes  ;  and,  lastly,  per 
vert  judgment.  Lo,  here  is  the  mother,  and  the 
daughter,  and  the  daughter's  daughter.  Ava 
rice  is  the  mother;  she  brings  forth  bribe-taking, 
and  bribe-taking  perverting  of  judgment.  There 
lacks  a  fourth  thing  to  make  up  the  mess,  which, 
so  help  me  God,  if  I  were  judge,  should  be 
hangum  tuum,  a  Tyburn  tippet  to  take  with  him ; 
an  it  were  the  judge  of  the  King's  Bench,  my 
Lord  Chief  Judge  of  England,  yea,  an  it  mrt 
my  Lord  Chancellor  himself,  to  Tyburn  with  him" 
We  will  quote  but  one  more  passage.  "  Hi* 
that  took  the  silver  basin  and  ewer  for  a  bribe, 
thinkeih  that  it  will  never  come  out.  But  h« 
may  now  know  that  I  know  it,  and  I  know  it 
not  alone ;  there  be  more  beside  me  that  know 


268 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


it.  Oh,  briber  and  bribery  !  He  was  never  a 
good  man  that  will  so  take  bribes.  Nor  can  I 
believe  that  he  that  is  a  briber  will  be  a  good 
Janice.  It  will  never  be  merry  in  England  till 
we  have  the  skins  of  such.  For  what  needeth 
bribing  where  men  do  their  things  uprightly?" 

This  was  not  the  language  of  a  great  philo 
sopher,  Avho  had  made  new  discoveries  in 
moral  and  political  science.  It  was  the  plain 
talk  of  a  plain  man,  who  sprang  from  the  body 
of  the  people,  who  sympathized  strongly  with 
their  wants  and  their  feelings,  and  who  boldly 
uttered  their  opinions.  It  was  on  account  of 
the  fearless  way  in  which  stout-hearted  old 
Hugh  exposed  the  misdeeds  of  man  in  ermine 
tippets  and  gold  collars,  that  the  Londoners 
cheered  him,  as  he  walked  down  the  Strand  to 
preach  at  Whitehall,  struggled  for  a  touch  of 
his  gown,  and  bawled,  "  Have  at  them,  father 
Latimer."  It  is  plain,  from  the  passages 
which  we  have  quoted,  and  from  fifty  others 
which  we  might  quote,  that,  long  before  Bacon 
was  born,  the  accepting  of  presents  by  a  judge 
was  known  to  be  a  wicked  and  shameful  act; 
that  the  fine  words,  under  which  it  was  the 
fashion  to  veil  such  corrupt  practices,  were 
even  then  seen  through  by  the  common  people  ; 
that  the  distinction  on  which  Mr.  Montagu  in 
sists  between  compliments  and  bribes,  was 
even  then  laughed  at  as  a  mere  "  colouring." 
There  may  be  some  oratorical  exaggeration  in 
what  Latimer  says  about  the  Tyburn  tippet  and 
the  sign  of  the  judge's  skin  ;  but  the  fact  that 
he  ventured  to  use  such  expressions  is  amply 
sufficient  to  prove,  that  the  gift-taking  judges, 
the  receivers  of  silver  basins  and  ewers,  were 
regarded  as  such  pests  of  the  commonwealth, 
that  a  venerable  divine  might,  without  any 
breach  of  Christian  charity,  publicly  pray  to 
God  for  their  detection  and  condign  punish 
ment. 

Mr.  Montagu  tells  us,  most  justly,  that  we 
ought  not  to  transfer  the  opinions  of  our  own 
age  to  a  former  age.  But  he  has,  himself,  com 
mitted  a  greater  error  than  that  against  which 
he  has  cautioned  his  readers.  Without  any 
evidence,  nay,  in  the  face  of  the  strongest  evi 
dence,  he  ascribes  to  the  people  of  a  former 
age  a  set  of  opinions  which  no  people  ever 
held.  But  any  hypothesis  is  in  his  view  more 
probable  than  that  Bacon  should  have  been  a 
dishonest  man.  We  firmly  believe  that  if 
papers  were  to  be  discovered  which  should 
irresistibly  prove  that  Bacon  was  concerned 
in  the  poisoning  of  Sir  Thomas  Overbury,  Mr. 
Montagu  would  tell  us  that,  at  the  beginning  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  it  was  net  thought  im 
proper  in  a  man  to  put  arsenic  into  the  broth 
of  his  friends,  and  that  we  ought  to  blame,  not 
Bacon,  but  the  age  in  which  he  lived. 

But  why  should  we.  have  recourse  to  any 
other  evidence,  when  the  proceeding  against 
Bacon  is,  itself,  the  best  evidence  on  the  sub 
ject  ]     When  Mr.  Montagu  tells  us,  that  we 
ought  not  to  transfer  the  opinions  of  our  age 
Vi  Bacon's  age,  he  appears  altogether  to  forget, 
that  it  was  by  men  of  Bacon's  own  age,  that  j 
Bacon  was  prosecuted,  tried,  convicted,  and 
fcenrenced.     Did  not  they  Know  what  their  own  ' 
opinions  were?     Dii  not  they  know  whether  j 
tney  thought  the  taking  of  gifts  by  a  judge  a  • 


;  crime  or  not  ?  Mr.  Montagu  complains  bit- 
I  terly  that  Bacon  was  induced  to  abstain  from 
I  making  a  defence.  But,  if  Bacon's  defence 
resembled  that  which  is  made  for  him  in  the 
volume  before  us,  it  would  have  been  unneces 
sary  to  trouble  the  House  with  it.  The  Lords 
and  Commons  did  not  want  Bacon  to  tell  them 
the  thoughts  of  their  own  hearts — to  inform 
them  that  they  did  not  consider  such  practices 
as  those  in  which  they  had  detected  him,  as  at 
all  culpable.  Mr.  Montagu's  proposition  may 
indeed  be  fairly  stated  thus  :  It  was  very  hard 
that  Bacon's  contemporaries  should  think  it 
wrong  in  him  to  do  what  they  did  not  think  it 
wrong  in  him  to  do.  Hard  indeed;  and  withal 
somewhat  improbable.  Will  any  person  say 
that  the  Commons  who  impeached  Bacon  for 
taking  presents,  and  the  Lords  who  sentenced 
him  to  fine,  imprisonment,  and  degradation, 
for  taking  presents,  did  not  know  that  the 
taking  of  presents  was  a  crime  '?  Or,  will  any 
person  say  that  Bacon  did  not  know  what  the 
whole  House  of  Commons  and  the  whole 
House  of  Lords  knew  ?  Nobody  who  is  not 
prepared  to  maintain  one  of  these  absurd  pro 
positions  can  deny  that  Bacon  committed  what 
he  knew  to  be  a  crime. 

It  cannot  be  pretended  that  the  Houses  were 
seeking  occasion  to  ruin  Bacon;  and  that 
they,  therefore,  brought  him  to  punishment  on 
charges  which  they  themselves  knew  to  be 
frivolous.  In  no  quarter  was  there  the  faintest 
indication  of  a  disposition  to  treat  him  harshly. 
Through  the  whole  proceeding  there  was  no 
symptom  of  personal  animosity  or  of  factious 
violence  in  either  House.  Indeed,  we  will 
venture  to  say  that  no  state  trial  in  our  history 
is  more  creditable  to  all  who  took  part  in  it, 
either  as  prosecutors  or  judges.  The  decency, 
the  gravity,  the  public  spirit,  the  justice  mo 
derated  but  not  unnerved  by  compassion,  which 
appeared  in  every  part  of  the  transaction, 
would  do  honour  to  the  most  respectable  pub 
lic  men  of  our  own  times.  The  accusers, 
while  they  discharged  their  duty  to  their  con 
stituents  by  bringing  the  misdeeds  of  the  Chan 
cellor  to  light,  spoke  with  admiration  of  his 
many  eminent  qualities.  The  Lords,  while  con 
demning  him,  complimented  him  on  the  inge 
nuousness  of  his  confession,  and  spared  him 
the  humiliation  of  a  public  appearance  at  their 
bar.  So  strong  was  the  contagion  of  good  feel 
ing,  that  even  Sir  Edward  Coke,  for  the  first 
time  in  his  life,  behaved  like  a  gentleman. 
No  criminal  ever  had  more  temperate  prose 
cutors  than  Bacon.  No  criminal  ever  had 
more  favourable  judges.  If  he  was  convicted, 
it  was  because  it  was  impossible  to  acquit  him, 
without  offering  the  grossest  outrage  to  justic* 
and  common  sense. 

Mr.  Montagu's  other  argument,  namelj-j  that 
Bacon,  though  he  took  gifts,  did  not  take  bribes, 
seems  to  us  as  futile  as  that  which  we  have 
considered.  Indeed,  we  might  be  content  to 
leave  it  to  be  answered  by  the  plainest  man 
among  our  readers.  Demosthenes  noticed  it 
with  contempt  more  than  two  thousand  years 
asx>.  Latimer,  we  have  seen,  treated  this  so 
phistry  with  similar  disdain.  "Leave  colour 
ing,"  said  he,  "  and  call  these  things  by  their 
Christian  name,  bribes."  Mr.  Montagu  at- 


LORD  BACON". 


269 


tempts,  somewhat  unfairly,  we  must  say,  to  re 
present  the  presents  which  Bacon  received,  as 
similar  to  the  perquisites  which  .suitors  paid  to 
the  members  of  the  Parliaments  of  France. 
The  French  magistrate  had  a  legal  right  to  his 
fee;  and  the  amount  of  fee  was  regulated  by 
law.  Whether  this  be  a  good  mode  of  remu 
nerating  judges  is  not  the  question.  But  what 
analogy  is  there  between  payments  of  this  sort 
And  the  presents  which  Bacon  received — pre 
sents  which  were  not  sanctioned  by  the  law, 
which  were  iui  made  under  the  public  eye,  and 
of  which  the  amount  was  regulated  only  by 
private  bargain  between  the  magistrate  and 
the  suitor  1  Again,  it  is  mere  trifling  to  say 
that  Bacon  could  not  have  meant  to  act  cor 
ruptly,  because  he  employed  the  agency  of 
men  of  rank,  of  bishops,  privy  councillors,  and 
members  of  Parliament ;  as  if  the  whole  history 
of  that  generation  was  not  full  of  the  low  actions 
of  high  people;  as  if  it  was  not  notorious  that 
men,  as  exalted  in  rank  as  any  of  the  decoys 
Bacon  employed,  had  pimped  for  Somerset, 
and  poisoned  Over  bury. 

But,  says  Mr.  Montagu,  these  presents  "  were 
made  openly  and  with  the  greatest  publicity." 

This  would  indeed  be  a  strong  argument  in 
favour  of  Bacon.  But  we  deny  the  fact.  In 
one,  and  only  one  of  the  cases  in  which  Bacon 
was  accused  of  corruptly  receiving  gifts,  does 
he  appear  to  have  received  a  gift  publicly. 
This  was  in  a  matter  depending  between  the 
Company  of  Apothecaries  and  the  Company 
of  Grocers.  Bacon,  in  his  confession,  insisted 
strongly  on  the  circumstance,  that  he  had  on 
this  occasion  taken  presents  publicly,  as  a 
proof  that  he  had  not  taken  them  corruptly. 
Is  it  not  clear,  that  if  he  had  taken  the  presents 
mentioned  in  the  other  charges  in  the  same 
public  manner,  he  would  have  dwelt  on  this 
point  in  his  answer  to  those  charges  1  The  fact, 
that  he  insists  so  strongly  on  the  publicity  of 
one  particular  present,  is  of  itself  sufficient  to 
prove  that  the  other  presents  were  not  publicly 
taken.  Why  he  took  this  present  publicly  and 
the  rest  secretly  is  evident.  He  on  that  occa 
sion  acted  openly,  because  he  was  acting 
honestly.  He  was  not  on  that  occasion  sitting 
judicially.  He  was  called  in  to  effect  an  ami 
cable  arrangement  between  two  parties.  Both 
•were  satisfied  with  his  decision.  Both  joined 
in  making  him  a  present  in  return  for  his  trou 
ble.  Whether  it  was  quite  delicate  in  a  man 
of  his  rank  to  accept  a  present  under  such 
circumstances,  may  be  questioned.  But  there 
is  no  ground  in  this  case  for  accusing  him 
of  corruption. 

Unhappily,  the  very  circumstances  which 
prove  him  to  have  been  innocent  in  this  case, 
prove  him  to  have  been  guilty  on  the  other 
charges.  Once,  and  once  only,  he  alleges  that 
he  received  a  present  publicly.  The  inference 
is,  that  in  all  the  other  cases  mentioned  in  the 
articles  against  him  he  received  presents  se 
cretly.  When  we  examine  the  single  case  in 
which  he  alleges  that  he  received  a  present 
publicly,  we  find  that  it  is  also  the  single  case 
in  which  there  was  no  gross  impropriety  in 
his  receiving  a  present.  Is  it  then  possible  to 
doubt  that  his  reason  for  not  receiving  other 


presents  in  as  public  a  manner  was,  that  he 
knew  that  it  was  wrong  to  receive  them  ? 

One  argument  still  remains,  plausible  in  ap 
pearance,  but  admitting  of  easy  and  complete 
refutation.  The  two  chief  complainants,  Au 
brey  and  Egerton,  had  both  made  presents  to 
the  Chancellor.  But  he  had  decided  against 
them  both.  Therefore  he  had  not  received 
those  presents  as  bribes.  "The  complaints  of 
his  accusers  were,"  says  Mr.  Montagu,  "  not 
that  the  gratuities  had,  but  that  they  had  not 
influenced  Bacon's  judgment,  as  he  had  decid 
ed  against  them." 

The  truth  is,  that  it  is  precisely  in  this  way 
that  an  extensive  system  of  corruption  i.s  gene 
rally  detected.  A  person  who,  by  a  bribe,  has 
procured  a  decree  in  his  favour,  is  by  no  means 
likely  to  come  forward  of  his  own  accord  as 
an  accuser.  He  is  content.  He  has  his  quid 
pro  quo.  He  is  not  impelled  either  by  interested 
or  by  vindictive  motives  to  bring  the  transac 
tion  before  the  public.  On  the  contrary,  he  has 
almost  as  strong  motives  for  holding  his  tongue 
as  the  judge  himself  can  have.  But  when  a 
judge  practises  corruption,  as  we  fear  that  Ba 
con  practised  it,  on  a  large  scale,  and  has  many 
agents  looking  out  in  different  quarters  for 
prey,  it  will  sometimes  happen  that  he  will  be 
bribed  on  both  sides.  It  will  sometimes  hap 
pen  that  he  will  receive  money  from  his  suit 
ors,  who  are  so  obviously  in  the  wrong  that  he 
cannot  in  decency  do  any  thing  to  serve  them. 
Thus,  he  will  now  and  then  be  forced  to  pro 
nounce  against  a  person  from  whom  he  has 
received  a  present;  and  he  makes  that  person 
a  deadly  enemy.  The  hundreds  who  have  got 
what  they  paid  for,  remain  quiet.  It  is  the  two 
or  three  who  have  paid,  and  have  nothing  to 
show  for  their  money,  who  are  noisy. 

The  memorable  case  of  the  Goezmans  is  an 
example  of  this.  Beaumarchais  had  an  im 
portant  suit  depending  before  the  Parliament  of 
Paris.  M.  Goezman  was  the  judge  on  whom 
chiefly  the  decision  depended.  It  was  hinted 
to  Beaumarchais  that  Madame  Goezman  might 
be  propitiated  by  a  present.  He  accordingly 
offered  certain  rouleaus  of  Louis-d'oi  to  the  lady, 
who  received  them  graciously.  There  can  be 
no  doubt  that,  if  the  decision  of  the  court  had 
been  favourable  to  him,  these  things  would 
never  have  been  known  to  the  world.  But  he 
lost  his  cause.  Almost  the  whole  sum  which 
he  had  expended  in  bribery,  was  immediately 
refunded;  and  those  who  had  disappointed  him 
probably  thought  that  he  would  riot,  fur  the 
mere  gratification  of  his  malevolence,  make 
public  a  transaction  which  was  discreditable 
to  himself  as  well  as  to  them.  They  knew 
little  of  him.  He  soon  taught  them  to  curst, 
the  day  in  which  they  had  dared  to  trifle  with 
a  man  of  so  revengeful  and  turbulent  a  spirit, 
of  such  dauntless  effrontery,  and  of  such  emi 
nent  talents  for  controversy  and  satire.  Hn 
compelled  the  Parliament  to  put  a  degrading 
tigma  on  M.  Goezman.  He  drove  Madame 
Goezman  to  a  convent.  Till  it  was  too  late  to 
pause,  his  excited  passions  did  not  suffer  him 
to  remember  that  he  could  effect  their  rum 
only  by  disclosures  ruinous  to  himself  W« 
could  give  other  instances.  But  it  is  needless 


270 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS 


No  person  well  acquainted  with  human  nature 
can  fail  to  perceive  that,  if  the  doctrine  for 
which  Mr.  Montagu  contends  were  admitted, 
society  would  be  deprived  of  almost  the  only 
chance  which  it  has  of  detecting  the  corrupt 
practices  of  judges. 

We  return  to  our  narrative.  The  sentence 
of  Bacon  had  scarcely  been  pronounced  when 
it  was  mitigated.  He  was  indeed  sent  to  the 
Tower.  But  this  was  merely  a  form.  In  two 
days  he  was  set  at  liberty,  and  soon  after  he 
retired  to  Gorhambury.  His  fine  was  speedily 
released  by  the  crown.  He  was  next  suffered 
to  present  himself  at  court;  and  at  length,  in 
1624,  the  rest  of  his  punishment  was  remitted. 
He  was  now  at  liberty  to  resume  his  seat  in 
the  House  of  Lords,  and  he  was  actually  sum 
moned  to  the  next  Parliament.  But  age,  infirmi 
ty,  and  perhaps  shame,  prevented  him  from  at 
tending.  The  government  allowed  him  a  pen 
sion  of  one  thousand  two  hundred  pounds  a  year; 
and  his  whole  annual  income  is  estimated  by 
Mr.  Montagu  at  two  thousand  five  hundred 
pounds,  a  sum  which  was  probably  above  the 
average  income  of  a  nobleman  of  that  genera 
tion,  and  which  was  certainly  sufficient  for 
comfort  and  even  for  splendour.  Unhappily, 
Bacon  was  fond  of  display,  and  unused  to  pay 
minute  attention  to  domestic  affairs.  He  was 
not  easily  persuaded  to  give  up  any  part  of  the 
magnificence  to  which  he  had  been  accustomed 
in  the  time  of  his  power  and  prosperity.  No 
pressure  of  distress  could  induce  him  to  part 
with  the  woods  of  Gorhambury.  "  I  will  not," 
he  said,  "  be  stripped  of  my  feathers."  He 
travelled  with  so  splendid  an  equipage,  and  so 
large  a  retinue,  that  Prince  Charles,  who  once 
fell  in  Avith  him  on  the  road,  exclaimed  with 
surprise,  "  Well ;  do  what  we  can,  this  man 
scorn.s  to  go  out  in  snuff."  This  careless 
ness  and  ostentation  reduced  him  to  frequent 
distress.  He  was  under  the  necessity  of  part 
ing  with  York  House,  and  of  taking  up  his  resi 
dence,  during  his  visits  to  London,  at  his  old 
chambers  in  Gray's  Inn.  He  had  other  vexa 
tions,  the  exact  nature  of  which  is  unknown. 
It  is  evident  from  his  will,  that  some  part  of 
his  wife's  conduct  had  greatly  disturbed  and 
irritated  him. 

But  whatever  might  be  his  pecuniary  diffi 
culties  or  his  conjugal  discomforts,  the  powers 
of  his  intellect  still  remained  undiminished. 
Those  noble  studies  for  which  he  had  found  lei 
sure  in  the  midst  of  his  professional  drudgery 
and  of  courtly  intrigues,  gave  to  this  last  sad 
stage  of  his  life  a  dignity  beyond  what  power  or 
title.-;  could  bestow.  Impeached,  convicted,  sen 
tenced,  driven  with  ignominy  from  the  pre 
sence  cf  his  sovereign,  shut  out  from  the  deli 
berations  of  his  fellow  nobles,  loaded  with  debt, 
branded  with  dishonour,  sinking  under  the 
weight  of  years,  sorrow,  and  disease,  Bacon 
was  Bacon  still. 

"My  conceit  of  his  person,"  says  Ben  Jon- 
*or  very  finely,  "  was  never  increased  towards 
him  ny  his  place  or  honours;  but  I  have  and 
do  reverence  him  for  the  greatness  that  was 
only  proper  to  himself;  in  that  he  seemed  to 
me  ever,  by  his  work,  one  of  the  greatest  men 
and  most  worthy  of  admiration  that  had  been  in 
many  %ges.  In  his  adversity  I  ever  prayed  that 


God  would  give  him  strength ;  for  greatness  he 
could  not  want." 

The  services  which  he  rendered  to  letters 
during  the  last  five  years  of  his  life,  amidst 
ten  thousand  distractions  and  vexations,  in 
crease  the  regret  with  which  we  think  on  the 
many  years  which  he  had  wasted,  to  use  the 
words  of  Sir  Thomas  Bodley,  "  on  such  study 
as  was  not  worthy  such  a  student."  He  com 
menced  a  digest  of  the  Laws  of  England,  a 
History  of  England  under  the  Princes  of  the 
House  of  Tudor,  a  body  of  Natural  History,  a 
Philosophical  Romance.  He  made  extensive 
and  valuable  additions  to  his  Essays.  He  pub 
lished  the  inestimable  Treatise  De  Jlugrnentis 
Scientiarnm.  The  very  trifles  with  which  he 
amused  himself  in  hours  of  pain  and  languor 
bore  the  mark  of  his  mind.  The  best  jest-book 
in  the  world  is  that  which  he  dictated  from 
memory,  without  referring  to  any  book,  on  a 
day  on  which  illness  had  rendered  him  incapa 
ble  of  serious  study. 

The  great  apostle  of  experimental  philosophy 
was  destined  to  be  its  martyr.  It  had  occurred 
to  him  that  snow  might  be  used  w.th  advantage 
for  the  purpose  of  preventinganimal  substances 
from  putrefying.  On  a  very  cold  day,  early  in 
the  spring  of  the  year  1626,  he  alighted  from 
his  coach  near  Highgate,  in  order  to  try  the 
experiment.  He  went  into  a  cottage,  bought  a 
fowl,  and  with  his  own  hands  stuffed  it  with 
snow.  While  thus  engaged  he  felt  a  sudden 
chill,  and  was  soon  so  much  indisposed  that  it 
\vas  impossible  for  him  to  return  to  Gray's 
Inn.  The  Earl  of  Arundel,  with  whom  he  was 
well  acquainted,  had  a  house  at  Highgate.  To 
that  house  Bacon  was  carried.  The  earl  was 
absent;  but  the  servants  who  were  in  charge 
of  the  place  showed  great  respect  and  attention 
to  the  illustrious  guest.  Here,  after  an  illness 
of  about  a  week,  he  expired  early  on  the  morn 
ing  cf  Easter-day,  1626.  His  mind  appears  to 
have  retained  its  strength  and  liveliness  to  the 
end.  He  did  not  forget  the  fowl  which  had 
caused  his  death.  In  the  last  letter  that  he 
ever  wrote,  with  fingers  which,  as  he  said, 
could  not  steadily  hold  a  pen,  he  did  not  omit 
to  mention  that  the  experiment  of  the  snow  had 
succeeded  "  excellently  well." 

Our  opinion  of  the  moral  character  of  this 
great  man  has  already  been  sufficiently  ex 
plained.  Had  his  life  been  passed  in  literary 
retirement,  he  would,  in  all  probability,  have 
deserved  to  be  considered,  not  only  as  a  great 
philosopher,  but  as  a  worthy  and  good-natured 
member  of  society.  But  neither  his  principles 
nor  his  spirit  were  such  as  could  be  trusted, 
when  strong  temptations  were  to  be  resisted- 
and  serious  dangers  to  be  braved. 

In  his  will,  he  expressed,  with  singular  bre 
vity,  energy,  dignity,  and  pathos,  a  mournful 
consciousness  that  his  actions  had  not  been 
such  as  to  entitle  him  to  the  esteem  of  those 
under  whose  observation  his  life  had  been 
passed ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  a  proud  confi 
dence  that  his  writings  had  secured  for  him  a 
high  and  permanent  place  among  the  benefac 
tors  of  mankind.  So  at  least  we  understand 
those  striking  words  which  have  been  often 
quoted,  but  which  we  must  quote  <  nee  more- 
For  my  name  and  memory,  I  leave  it  to  men's 


LORD  BACON. 


271 


charitable  speeches,  and  to  foreign  nations, 
and  to  the  next  age." 

His  confidence  was  just.  From  the  day  of 
his  death  his  fame  has  been  constantly  and 
steadily  progressive;  and  we  have  no  doubt 
that  his  name  will  be  named  with  reverence  to 
the  latest  ages,  and  to  the  remotest  ends  of  the 
civilized  world. 


The  chief  peculiarity  of  Bacon's  philosophy 
seems  to  us  to  have  been  this — that  it  aimed 
at  things  altogether  different  from  those  which 
his  piedecessors  had  proposed  to  themselves. 
This  was  his  own  opinion.  "Finis  scientia- 
rum,"  says  he,  "  a  nemine  adhuc  bene  positus 
est."*  And  again,  "Omnium  gravissimus 
error  in  deviatione  ab  ultimo  doctrinarian  fine 
consistit."f  "Nee  ipsa  meta,"  says  he  else 
where,  "adhuc  ulli,  quod  sciam,  mortalium 
posita  est  et  defixa."t  The  more  carefully  his 
works  are  examined,  the  more  clearly,  we 
think,  it  will  appear,  that  this  is  the  real  clue 
to  his  whole  system ;  and  that  he  used  means 
different  from  those  used  by  other  philosophers, 
because  he  wished  to  arrive  at  an  end  altoge 
ther  different  from  theirs. 

What  then  was  the  end  which  Bacon  pro 
posed  to  himself]  It  was,  to  use  his  own  em 
phatic  expression,  "fruit."  It  was  the  multi 
ply  ing  of  human  enjoyments  and  the  mitigating 
of  human  sufferings.  It  was  "the  relief  of 
man's  estate."^  It  was  "  commodis  humanis 
inservire."R  It  was  "  efficaciter  operari  ad 
sublevanda  vitae  humanse  incornmoda."f  It 
was  "dotare  vitam  humanam  novis  inventis  et 
copiis."**  It  was  "genus  humanam  novis 
operibus  et  potestatibus  continue  dotare."ff 
This  was  the  object  of  all  his  speculations  in 
every  department  of  science — in  natural  phi 
losophy,  in  legislation,  in  politics,  in  morals. 

Two  words  form  the  key  of  the  Baconian 
doctrine — utility  and  progress.  The  ancient 
philosophy  disdained  to  be  useful,  and  was 
content  to  be  stationary.  It  dealt  largely  in 
theories  of  moral  perfection,  which  were  so 
sublime  that  they  never  could  be  more  than 
theories ;  in  attempts  to  solve  insoluble  enig 
mas;  in  exhortations  to  the  attainment  of  un 
attainable  frames  of  mind.  It  could  not  con 
descend  to  the  humble  office  of  ministering  to 
the  comfort  of  human  beings.  All  the  schools 
regarded  that  office  as  degrading;  some  cen 
sured  it  as  immoral.  Once  indeed  Posidonius, 
a  distinguished  writer  of  the  age  of  Cicero  and 
Csesar,  so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  enumerate 
among  the  humbler  blessings  which  mankind 
owed  to  philosophy,  the  discovery  of  the  prin 
ciple  of  the  arch,  and  the  introduction  of  the 
Use  of  metals.  This  eulogy  was  considered  as 
an  affront,  and  was  taken  up  with  proper  spi 
rit.  Seneca  vehemently  disclaims  these  in- 


*  Novum  Organnm,  Lib.  1,  Aph.  81. 

f  De  J9u<rmentis,  Lib.  1. 

J  Cotritatn  et  visa. 

$  Jlit  wince  in  ent  of  Learning,  Bo»k  1. 

||  DC  Jiiigmentis,  Lib.  7,  Cap.  1. 
^1  /)«  Jiitfrmenlis,  Lib.  2,  Cap.  2. 
**  JV/;r«w  Orn-anuir,,  Lib.  1,  Aph.  81. 
H  Ceffilata  ei  viaa. 


suiting  compliments.*  Philosophy,  according 
to  him,  has  nothing  to  do  with  teaching  men 
to  rear  arched  roofs  over  their  heads.  The 
true  philosopher  does  not  care  whether  he  has 
an  arched  roof  or  any  roof.  Philosophy  has 
nothing  to  do  with  teaching  men  the  use  of 
metals.  She  teaches  us  to  be  independent 
of  all  material  substances,  of  all  mecha 
nical  contrivances.  The  wise  man  lives 
according  to  nature.  Instead  of  attempting  to 
add  to  the  physical  comforts  of  his  species,  he 
regrets  that  his  lot  was  not  cast  in  that  golden 
age,  when  the  human  race  had  no  protection 
against  the  cold  but  the  skins  of  wild  beasts, 
no  screen  from  the  sun  but  a  cavern.  To  im 
pute  to  such  a  man  any  share  in  the  invention 
or  improvement  of  a  plough,  a  ship,  or  a  mill, 
is  an  insult.  "In  my  own  time,"  says  Seneca, 
"there  have  been  inventions  of  this  sort — 
transparent  windows,  tubes  for  diffusing  warmth 
equally  through  all  parts  of  a  building,  short 
hand,  which  has  been  carried  to  such  perfec 
tion  that  a  writer  can  keep  pace  with  ihe  most 
rapid  speaker.  But  the  inventing  of  such 
things  is  drudgery  for  the  lowest  slaves:  phi 
losophy  lies  deeper.  It  is  not  her  office  to  teach 
men  how  to  use  their  hands.  The  object  of  her 
lessons  is  to  form  the  soul :  Non  est,  iuguam, 
instrumentorum  ad  usus  necessarios  opifex"  If  the 
non  were  left  out,  this  last  sentence  would  be 
no  bad  description  of  the  Baconian  philosophy; 
and  would,  indeed,  very  much  resemble  seve 
ral  expressions  in  the  Novum  Orgavum.  "  We 
shall  next  be  told,"  exclaims  Seneca,  "that  the 
first  shoemaker  was  a  philosopher."  For  our 
own  part,  if  we  are  forced  to  make  our  choice 
between  the  first  shoemaker  and  the  author 
of  the  three  books  "On  Anger,"  we  pronounce 
for  the  shoemaker.  It  may  be  worse  to  be 
angry  than  to  be  wet.  But  shoes  have  kept 
millions  from  being  wet :  and  AVC  doubt  whether 
Seneca  ever  kept  anybody  from  being  angry. 

It  is  very  reluctantly  that  Seneca  can  be 
brought  to  confess  that  any  philosopher  had 
ever  paid  the  smallest  attention  to  any  thing 
that  could  possibly  promote  what  vulgar  peo 
ple  would  consider  as  the  well-being  of  man 
kind.  He  labours  to  clear  Democritus  from 
the  disgraceful  imputation  of  having  made  the 
first  arch,  and  Anacharsis  from  the  charge  of 
having  contrived  the  potter's  wheel.  He  is 
forced  to  own  that  such  a  thing  might  happen; 
and  it  may  also  happen,  he  tells  us,  that  a  phi 
losopher  may  be  swift  of  foot.  But  it  is  not  in. 
his  character  of  philosopher  that  he  either 
wins  a  race  cr  invents  a  machine.  Nc,  to  be 
sure.  The  business  of  a  philosopher  was  to 
declaim  in  praise  of  poverty  with  two  millions 
sterling  out  at  usury;  to  meiitate  epigrammatic 
conceits  about  the  evils  ot  Juxury,  in  gardens 
which  moved  the  envy  of  sovereigns;  to  rant 
about  liberty,  while  fawning  on  the  insolent 
and  pampered  freedmen  of  a  tyrant;  to  cele 
brate  the  divine  beauty  of  virtue  with  the  same 
pen  which  had  just  before  written  a  defence 
of  the  murder  of  a  mother  by  a  son, 

From  the  cant  of  this  philosophy  —a  philo 
sophy  meanly  proud  of  its  own  unprofitable 
ness — it  is  delightful  to  mrn  to  the  lessons  of 


Seneca,  Epiet.  90. 


272 


MACADLAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  great  English  teacher.  We  can  almost 
forgive  all  the  faults  of  Bacon's  life,  when  we 
read  that  singularly  graceful  and  dignified  pas 
sage  :  '"Ego  certe,  ut  de  me  ipso,  quod  res  est, 
loquar,  et  in  iis  quo?  nunc  edo,  et  in  iis  quce  in 
pofierum  meditor,  dignitatem  ingenii  et  nomi- 
nis  mei,  si  qua  sit,  soepius  sciens  et  volens 
projicio,  (him  commodis  humanis  inscrviam ;  quique 
arohitectus  fortasse  in  philosophia  et  scientiis 
esse  debeam,  etiam  operarius  et  bajulus,  et 
quidvis  demum  fio,  cum  haud  pauca  qua; 
omnino  fieri  necesse  sit,  alii  autem  ob  innatam 
superbiam  subterfugiant,  ipse  sustineam  et 
exsequar."*  This  pltilanllimpia,  which,  as  he 
said,  in  one  of  the  most  remarkable  of  his  early 
letters,  "  was  so  fixed  in  his  mind  as  it  could 
not  be  removed,"  this  majestic  humility,  this 
persuasion  that  nothing  can  be  too  insignificant 
for  the  attention  of  the  wisest,  which  is  not  too 
insignificant  to  give  pleasure  or  pain  to  the 
meanest,  is  the  great  characteristical  distinc 
tion,  the  essential  spirit  of  the  Baconian  phi 
losophy.  We  trace  it  in  all  that  Bacon  has 
written  on  Physics,  on  Laws,  on  Morals.  And 
we  conceive  that  from  this  peculiarity  all  the 
other  peculiarities  of  his  system  directly  and 
almost  necessarily  sprang. 

The  spirit  which  appears  in  the  passage  of 
Seneca  to  which  we  have  referred,  tainted  the 
whole  body  of  the  ancient  philosophy  from  the 
time  of  Socrates  downwards;  and  took  pos 
session  of  intellects  with  which  that  of  Seneca 
cannot,  for  a  moment,  be  compared,  it  per 
vades  the  dialogues  of  Plato.  It  may  be  dis 
tinctly  traced  in  many  parts  of  the  works  of 
Aristotle.  Bacon  has  dropped  hints  from 
which  it  ma}'  be  inferred  that  in  his  opinion 
the  prevalence  of  this  feeling  was  in  a  great 
measure  to  be  attributed  to  the  influence  of 
Socrates.  Our  great  countryman  evidently 
did  not  consider  the  revolution  which  Socrates 
effected  in  philosophy  as  a  happy  event;  and 
he  constantly  maintained  that  the  earlier 
Greek  speculators,  Democritus  in  particular, 
were,  on  the  whole,  superior  to  their  more 
celebrated  successors.! 

Assuredly,  if  the  tree  which  Socrates  plant 
ed,  and  Plato  watered,  is  to  be  judged  of  by 
its  flowers  and  leaves,  it  is  the  noblest  of  trees. 
But  if  we  take  the  homely  test  of  Bacon,  if  we 
judge  of  the  tree  by  its  fruits,  our  opinion  of  it 
may  perhaps  be  less  favourable.  When  we 
sum  up  all  the  useful  truths  which  we  owe  to 
that  philosophy,  to  what  do  they  amount]  We 
find,  indeed,  abundant  proofs  that  some  of 
those  who  cultivated  it  were  men  of  the  first 
order  of  intellect.  We  find  among  their  writ 
ings  incomparable  specimens  both  of  dialecti 
cal  and  rhetorical  art.  We  have  no  doubt  that 
Ihe  ancient  controversies  were  of  use  in  so  far 
as  they  served  to  exercise  the  faculties  of  the 
disputants,  for  there  is  no  controversy  so  idle 
that  it  may  not  be  of  use  in  this  way.  But, 
when  we  look  for  something  more — for  some 
thing  which  adds  to  the  comforts  or  alleviates 
(he  calamities  of  the  human  race — we  are 


*  De  jjuffmentis,  Lib.  7,  Tap.  1. 

f  JVrtKi/w  Oriranuw,  Lib.  1,  Aph.71,79.  De  Jlua-mentis, 
Lib  3.  Cap.  4.  De  principiis  aique  originibus.  Cogitata 
tt  w«*  Rttdargutio  pliilosephiarum. 


forced  to  own  ourselves  disappointed.  We 
are  forced  to  say  with  Bacon,  that  the  cele 
brated  philosophy  ended  in  nothing  but  dispu 
tation;  that  it  was  neither  a  vineyard  nor  an 
olive  ground,  but  an  intricate  wood  of  briers 
and  thistles,  from  which  those  who  lost  them- 
selves  in  it  brought  back  many  scratches  and 
no  food.* 

We  readily  acknowledge  that  some  of  the 
teachers  of  this  unfruitful  wisdom  were  among 
the  greatest  men  that  the  world  had  ever  seen, 
ff  we  admit  the  justice  of  Bacon's  censure,  we 
admit  it  with  regret,  similar  to  that  which 
Dante  felt  when  he  learned  the  fate  of  those 
illustrious  heathens  who  were  doomed  to  the 
first  circles  of  hell. 

"Gran  duol  mi  prese  al  cuor  qnando  lo'ntesi, 
Peroccho  gente  di  rnnlto  valore 
Ccnobbi  che'n  quel  limbo  eran  sospesi." 

But  in  truth  the  very  admiration  which  we 
feel  for  the  eminent  philosophers  of  antiquity, 
forces  us  to  adopt  the  opinion  that  their  powers 
were  systematically  misdirected.  For  how 
el.--,c  could  it  be  that  such  powers  should  effect 
so  little  for  mankind!  A  pedestrian  may 
show  as  much  muscular  vigour  on  a  treadmill 
as  on  the  highway  road.  But  on  the  road  his 
vigour  will  assuredly  carry  him  forward ;  and 
on  the  treadmill  he  will  not  advance  an  inch. 
The  ancient  philosophy  was  a  treadmill,  not  a 
path.  It  was  made  up  of  revolving  questions 
— of  controversies  which  were  always  begin 
ning  again.  It  was  a  contrivance  for  having 
much  exertion  and  no  progress.  We  must 
acknowledge  that  more  than  once,  while  con 
templating  the  doctrines  of  the  Academy  and 
the  Portico,  even  as  they  appear  in  the  trans 
parent  splenctour  of  Cicero's  incomparable 
diction,  we  have  been  tempted  to  mutter  with 
the  surly  centurion  in  Persius,  "  Cur  quis  non 
prandeat  hoc  est  1"  What  is  the  highest  good, 
whether  pain  be  an  evil,  whether  all  things  be 
fated,  whether  we  can  be  certain  of  any  thing, 
whether  we  can  be  certain  that  we  are  certain 
of  nothing,  whether  a  wise  man  can  be  unhap 
py,  whether  all  departures  from  right  be  equal 
ly  reprehensible — these,  and  other  questions 
of  the  same  sort,  occupied  the  brains,  the 
tongues,  and  the  pens  of  the  ablest  men  in  the 
civilized  world  during  several  centuiies.  This 
sort  of  philosophy,  it  is  evident,  could  not  be 
progressive.  It  might,  indeed,  sharpen  and 
invigorate  the  minds  of  those  who  devoted 
themselves  to  it;  and  so  might  the  disputes  of 
the  orthodox  Lilliputians,  and  the  heretical 
Blefuscuxlians,  about  the  big  ends  and  the  lit 
tle  ends  of  eggs.  But  such  disputes  could  add 
nothing  to  the  stock  of  knowledge.  The  hu 
man  mind  accordingly,  instead  of  marching, 
merely  marked  time.  It  took  as  much  trouble 
as  would  have  sufficed  to  carry  it  forward: 
and  yet  remained  on  the  same  spot.  There 
was  no  accumulation  of  truth,  no  heritage  of 
truth  acquired  by  the  labour  of  one  generation 
and  bequeathed  to  another,  to  be  again  tranj* 
mitted  with  large  additions  to  a  third.  Where 
this  philosophy  was  in  the  time  of  Cicero, 
there  it  continued  to  be  n.  the  time  of  Seneca, 
and  there  it  continued  to  be  in  the  time  of  Fa- 


*  Jfovum  Orpanum,     Lib   1,  Aph.  73- 


LORD  BACON. 


273 


rorinus.  The  same  sects  were  still  battling, 
with  the  same  unsatisfactory  arguments,  about 
the  same  interminable  questions.  There  had 
been  no  want  of  ingenuity,  of  zeal,  of  industry. 
Every  trace  of  intellectual  cultivation  was 
there  except  a  harvest.  There  had  been  plen 
ty  of  ploughing,  harrowing,  reaping,  thrashing. 
But  the  garners  contained  only  smut  and  stub 
ble. 

The  ancient  philosophers  did  not  neglect 
natural  science;  but  they  did  not  cultivate  it 
for  the  purpose  of  increasing  the  power  and 
ameliorating  the  condition  of  man.  The  taint 
of  barrenness  had  spread  from  ethical  to  phy 
sical  speculations.  Seneca  wrote  largely  on 
natural  philosophy,  and  magnified  the  import 
ance  of  that  study.  But  why  ?  Not  because 
it  tended  to  assuage  suffering,  to  multiply  the 
conveniences  of  life,  to  extend  the  empire  of 
man  over  the  material  world ;  but  solely  be 
cause  it  tended  to  raise  the  mind  above  low 
cares,  to  separate  it  from  the  body,  to  exercise 
its  subtlety  in  the  solution  of  very  obscure 
questions.*  Thus  natural  philosophy  was 
considered  in  the  light  merely  of  a  mental 
exercise.  It  was  made  subsidiary  to  the  art 
of  disputation;  and  it  consequently  proved 
altogether  barren  of  useful  discoveries. 

There  was  one  sect,  which,  however  absurd 
and  pernicious  some  of  its  doctrines  may  have 
been,  ought,  it  should  seem,  to  have  merited 
an  exception  from  the  general  censures  which 
Bacon  has  pronounced  on  the  ancient  schools 
of  wisdom.  The  Epicurean,  who  referred  all 
happiness  to  bodily  pleasure,  and  all  evil  to 
bocliiy  pain,  might  have  been  expected  to  exert 
himself  for  the  purpose  of  bettering  his  own 
physical  condition  and  that  of  his  neighbours. 
But  the  thought  seems  never  to  have  occurred 
to  any  member  of  that  school.  Indeed,  their 
notion,  as  reported  by  their  great  poet,  was  that 
no  more  improvements  were  to  be  expected  in 
the  arts  which  conduce  to  the  comfort  of  life, 

"  Ad  victum  quce  flag!  tat  usua 
Oinnia  jam  ferine  mortalibua  esse  parata." 

This  contented  despondency — this  disposi 
tion  to  admire  what  has  been  done,  and  to  ex 
pect  that  nothing  more  will  be  done — is  strong 
ly  characteristic  of  all  the  schools  which 
preceded  the  school  of  Fruit  and  Progress. 
Widely  as  the  Epicurean  and  the  Stoic  differed 
on  most  points,  they  seem  to  have  quite  agreed 
in  their  contempt  for  pursuits  so  vulgar  as  to 
be  useful.  The  philosophy  of  both  was  a  gar 
rulous,  declaiming,  canting,  wrangling  philo 
sophy.  Century  after  century  they  continued 
to  repeat  their  hostile  war-cries— Virtue  and 
Pleasure ;  and  in  the  end  it  appeared  the  Epi 
curean  had  added  as  little  to  the  quantity  of 
pleasure  as  the  Stoic  to  the  quantity  of  virtue. 
It  is  on  the  pedestal  of  Bacon,  not  on  that  of 
Epicurus,  that  those  noble  lines  ought  to  be 
inscribed: 

"O  tenehris  tantis  tarn  clanini  extollere  lumen 
Qui  primus  potuisti,  ILLUSTRANS  COMMODA  VIT^E." 

In  the  fifth  century,  Christianity  had  con 
quered  Paganism,  and  Paganism  had  infected 


*  Seneca,  JV«t.  Quest,  prtf.  Lib.  3. 
VOL.  II.— 35 


Christianity.  The  Church  was  now  victorious 
and  corrupt.  The  rites  of  the  Pantheon  had 
passed  into  her  worship ;  the  subtleties  of  the 
Academy  into  her  creed.  In  an  evil  day,  says 
Bacon,  though  with  great  pomp  and  solemnity, 
was  the  ill-starred  alliance  stricken  between, 
the  old  philosophy  and  the  new  faith.*  Ques 
tions  widely  different  from  those  which  had 
employed  the  ingenuity  of  Pyrrho  and  Car- 
neades,  but  just  as  subtle,  just  as  interminable, 
and  just  as  unprofitable,  exercised  the  minds 
of  the  lively  and  voluble  Greeks.  When  learn 
ing  began  to  revive  in  the  West,  similar  trifles 
occupied  the  sharp  and  vigorous  intellects  of 
the  Schoolmen.  There  was  another  sowing 
of  the  wind,  and  another  reaping  of  the  whirl 
wind.  The  great  work  of  improving  the  con 
dition  of  the  human  race  was  still  considered 
as  unworthy  of  a  man  of  learning.  Those 
who  undertook  that  task,  if  what  they  effected 
could  be  readily  comprehended,  were  despised 
as  mechanics ;  if  not,  they  were  in  danger  of 
being  burned  as  conjurors. 

There  can  be  no  stronger  proof  of  the  de 
gree  in  which  the  human  mind  had  been  mis 
directed,  than  the  history  of  the  two  greatest 
events  which  took  place  during  the  middle 
ages.  We  speak  of  the  invention  of  gunpow 
der,  and  of  the  invention  of  printing.  The 
dates  of  both  are  unknown.  The  authors 
of  both  are  unknown.  Nor  was  this  be 
cause  men  were  too  rude  and  ignorant  to 
value  intellectual  superiority.  The  inventcr 
of  gunpowder  appears  to  have  been  contem 
porary  with  Petrarch  and  Boccaccio.  The 
inventor  of  printing  was  contemporary  with 
Nicholas  the  Fifth,  with  Cosmo  de'  Medici, 
and  with  a  crowd  of  distinguished  scholars. 
But  the  human  mind  still  retained  that  fatal 
bent  which  it  had  received  two  thousand  years 
earlier.  George  of  Trebisond  and  Marsillio 
Ficino  would  not  easily  have  been  brought  to 
believe  that  the  inventor  of  the  printing-press 
had  done  more  for  mankind  than  themselves; 
or  than  those  ancient  writers  of  whom  they 
were  the  enthusiastic  votaries. 

At  length  the  time  arrived  when  the  barren 
philosophy  which  had,  during  so  many  ages,, 
employed  the  faculties  of  the  ablest  men,  wa» 
destined  to  fall.  It  had  worn  many  shapes. 
It  had  mingled  itself  with  many  creeds.  It 
had  survived  revolutions,  in  which  empires, 
religions,  languages,  races,  had  perished. 
Driven  from  its  ancient  haunts,  it  had  taken 
sanctuary  in  that  church  which  it  had  perse 
cuted  ;  and  had,  like  the  daring  fiends  of  the 
poet,  placed  its  seat 

"next  the  seat  of  God, 
And  with  its  darkness  dared  affront  his  light." 

Words  and  mere  words,  and  nothing  btrt 
words,  had  been  all  the  fruit  of  all  the  toil,  of 
all  the  most  renowned  sages  of  sixty  genera 
tions.  But  the  days  of  this  sterile  exuberance 
were  numbered. 

Many  causes  predisposed  the  public  mmd; 
to  a  change.  The  study  of  a  great  variety  of 
ancient  writers,  though  it  did  not  give  a  righ* 


•  Cogitat*  et  viim, 


274 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


direction  to  philosophical  research,  did  much 
towards  destroying  that  blind  reverence  for 
authority  which  had  prevailed  when.  Aristotle 
ruled  alone.  The  rise  of  the  Florentine  sect 
of  Platonists,  a  iect  to  which  belonged  some 
of  the  finest  minds  of  the  fifteenth  century, 
was  not  an  unimportant  event.  The  mere  ! 
substitution  of  the  Academic  for  the  Peripa- ! 
tetic  philosophy  would  indeed  have  done  little 
good.  But  any  thing  was  better  than  the  old 
habit  of  unreasoning  servility.  It  was  some 
thing  to  have  a  choice  of  tyrants.  "A  spark 
of  freedom,"  as  Gibbon  has  jusily  remarked, 
"  was  produced  by  this  collision  of  adverse 
servitude." 

Other  causes  might  be  mentioned.  But  it 
is  chiefly  to  the  great  reformation  of  religion 
that  we  owe  the  great  reformation  of  philo 
sophy.  The  alliance  between  the  schools  and 
the  Vatican  had  for  ages  been  so  close,  that 
those  who  threw  off  the  dominion  of  the  Va 
tican  could  not  continue  to  recognise  the  au 
thority  of  the  schools.  Most  of  the  great 
reformers  treated  the  Peripatetic  philosophy 
with  contempt;  and  spoke  of  Aristotle  as  if 
Aristotle  had  been  answerable  for  all  the  dog 
mas  of  Thomas  Aquinas.  "Nulla  apud  Lu- 
theianos  philosophiam  esse  in  pretio,"*  was  a 
reproach  which  the  defenders  of  the  Church 
of  Rome  loudly  repeated,  and  which  many  of 
the  Protestant  leaders  considered  as  a  compli 
ment.  Scarcely  any  text  was  more  frequently 
cited  by  them  than  that  in  which  St.  Paul 
cautions  the  Colossians  not  to  let  any  man 
spoil  them  by  philosophy.  Luther,  almost  at 
the  outset  of  his  career,  went  so  far  as  to 
declare  that  no  man  could  be  at  once  a  pro 
ficient  in  the  school  of  Aristotle  and  in  that  of 
Christ  Zwingle,  Bucer,  Peter  Martyr,  Calvin, 
had  similar  language.  In  some  of  the  Scotch 
universities,  the  Aristotelian  system  was  dis 
carded  for  that  of  Ramus.  Thus,  before  the 
birth  of  Bacon,  the  empire  of  the  scholastic 
philosophy  had  been  shaken  to  its  foundations. 
There  was  in  the  intellectual  world  an  anarchy 
resembling  that  which  in  the  political  world 
often  follows  the  overthrow  of  an  old  and 
deeply  rooted  government.  Antiquity,  pre 
scription,  the  sound  of  great  names,  had  ceased 
to  awe  mankind.  The  dynasty  which  had 
reigned  for  ages  was  at  an  end;  and  the  va 
cant  throne  was  left  to  be  struggled  for  by 
pretenders. 

The  first  effect  of  this  great  revolution  was, 
as  Bacon  most  justly  observed,f  to  give  for  a 
time  an  undue  importance  to  the  mere  graces 
of  style.  The  new  breed  of  scholars,  the 
Aschams  and  Buchanans,  nourished  with  the 
finest  compositions  of  the  Augustan  age,  re 
garded  Avith  loathing  the  dry,  crabbed,  and 
barbarous  diction  of  respondents  and  oppo 
nents.  They  were  far  less  studious  about  the 
matter  of  their  works  than  about  the  manner. 
They  succeeded  in  reforming  Latinity;  but 
they  never  even  aspired  to  effect  a  reform  in 
philosophy. 

At  this  time  Bacon  appeared.    It  is  alto- 

*  We  quote,  on  the  authority  of  Bayle,  frwm  Melchior 
(Vino,  a  .scholastic  divine  of  great  reputation. 
i  De  Jtuff  mentis,  Lib.  1. 


gether  incorrect  to  say,  as  has  often  been  said, 
that  he  was  the  first  man  who  rose  up  against 
the  Aristotelian  philosophy  when  in  the  height 
of  its  power.  The  authority  of  that  philoso 
phy  had,  as  we  have  shown,  received  a  fatal 
blow  long  before  he  was  born.  Several  spe 
culators,  among  whom  Ramus  was  the  best 
known,  had  recently  attempted  to  form  new 
sects.  Bacon's  own  expressions  about  the 
state  of  public  opinion  in  the  time  of  Luther, 
are  clear  and  strong:  " Accedebat,"  says  he, 
"odium  et  contemptus,  illis  ipsis  temporibus 
ortus  erga  scholasticos."  And  again,  "  Scho- 
lasticorum  doctrina  despectui  prorsus  haberi 
cocpit  tanquam  aspera  et  barbara."*  The  part 
which  Bacon  played  in  this  great  change  was 
the  part,  not  of  Robespierre,  but  of  Bonaparte. 
When  he  came  forward  the  ancient  order  of 
things  had  been  subverted.  Some  bigots  still 
cherished  with  devoted  loyalty  the  remem 
brance  of  the  fallen  monarchy,  and  exerted 
themselves  to  effect  a  restoration.  But  the 
majority  had  no  such  feeling.  Freed,  yet  not 
knowing  how  to  use  their  freedom,  they  pur 
sued  no  determinate  course,  and  had  found  no 
leader  capable  of  conducting  them. 

That  leader  at  length  arose.  The  philoso 
phy  which  he  taught  was  essentially  new.  It 
differed  from  that  of  the  celebrated  ancient 
teachers,  not  merely  in  method  but  in  object. 
Its  object  was  the  good  of  mankind,  in  the 
sense  in  which  the  mass  of  mankind  always 
have  understood,  and  always  will  understand, 
the  word  good.  "Meditor,"  said  Bacon,  "in- 
staurationem  philosophies  ejusmodi  quae  nihil 
inanis  aut  abstracti  habeat,  quaeque  vitse  hu- 
mance  conditiones  in  melius  provehat."f 

The  difference  between  the  philosophy  of 
Bacon  and  that  of  his  predecessors  cannot,  we 
think,  be  better  illustrated  than  by  comparing 
his  views  on  some  important  subjects  with 
those  of  Plato.  We  select  Plato,  because  we 
conceive  that  he  did  more  than  any  other  per 
son  towards  giving  to  the  minds  of  speculative 
men  that  bent,  which  they  retained  till  they 
received  from  Bacon  a  new  impulse  in  a  dia 
metrically  opposite  direction. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  how  differently  these 
great  men  estimated  the  value  of  every  kind 
of  knowledge.  Take  arithmetic  for  example. 
Plato,  after  speaking  slightly  of  the  conve 
nience  of  being  able  to  reckon  and  compute 
in  the  ordinary  transactions  of  life,  passes  to 
what  he  considers  as  a  far  more  important 
advantage.  The  study  of  the  properties  of 
numbers,  he  tells  us,  habituates  the  mind  to 
the  contemplation  of  pure  truth,  and  raises  it 
above  the  material  universe.  He  would  have 
his  disciples  apply  themselves  to  this  study — 
not  that  they  may  be  able  to  buy  or  sell — not 
that  they  may  qualify  themselves  to  be  shop 
keepers  or  travelling  merchants — but  that  they 
may  learn  to  withdraw  their  minds  from  the 
ever-shifting  spectacle  of  this  visible  and  tan 
gible  world,  and  to  fix  them  on  the  immutable 
essence  of  things.t 

*  Both  these  passages  are  in  the  firsrt  book  of  the  Dt 
Augmevlis. 

f  Redargutio  Pfiilosfipliiarum. 
j  Plato's  Republic,  Book  7. 


LORD  BACON. 


275 


Bacon,  on  the  other  hand,  vaiued  this  branch 
of  knowledge  only  on  account  of  its  uses  with 
reference  to  that  visible  and  tangible  world 
which  Plato  so  much  despised.  He  speaks 
with  scorn  of  the  mystical  arithmetic  of  the 
later  Platonists ;  and  laments  the  propensity 
of  mankind  to  employ,  on  mere  matters  of 
curiosity,  powers,  the  whole  exertion  of  which 
.s  required  for  purposes  of  solid  advantage. 
lie  advises  arithmeticians  to  leave  their  trifles, 
and  to  employ  themselves  in  framing  con 
venient  expressions,  which  may  be  of  use  in 
physical  researches.* 

The  same  reasons  which  led  Plato  to  re 
commend  the  study  of  arithmetic  led  hira  to  re 
commend  also  the  study  of  mathematics.  The 
vulgar  crowd  of  geometricians,  he  says,  will 
not  understand  him.  They  have  practice  always 
in  view.  They  do  not  know  that  the  real  use  of 
the  science  is  to  lead  men  to  the  knowledge 
of  abstract,  essential,  eternal  truth.f  Indeed, 
if  we  are  to  believe  Plutarch,  Plato  carried  this 
feeling  so  far,  that  he  considered  geometry  as 
degraded  by  being  applied  to  any  purpose  of 
vulgar  utility.  Archytas,  it  seems,  had  framed 
machines  of  extraordinary  power,  on  mathe 
matical  principles-^  Plato  remonstrated  with 
his  friend ;  and  declared  that  this  was  to  de 
grade  a  noble  intellectual  exercise  into  a  low 
craft,  fit  only  for  carpenters  and  wheelwrights. 
The  oflice  of  geometry,  he  said,  was  to  dis 
cipline  the  mind,  not  to  minister  to  the  base 
wants  of  the  body.  His  interference  was 
successful ;  and  from  that  time,  according  to 
Plutarch,  the  science  of  mechanics  was  con 
sidered  as  unworthy  of  the  attention  of  a 
philosopher. 

Archimedes  in  a  later  age  imitated  and  sur 
passed  Archytas.  But  even  Archimedes  was 
not  free  from  the  prevailing  notion,  that  geo 
metry  was  degraded  by  being  employed  to  pro 
duce  any  thing  useful.  It  was  with  difficulty 
that  he  was  induced  to  stoop  from  speculation 
to  practice.  He  was  half  ashamed  of  those 
inventions  which  were  the  wonder  of  hostile 
nations  ;  and  always  spoke  of  them  slightingly 
as  mere  amusements — as  trifles  in  which  a 
mathematician  might  be  suffered  to  relax  his 
mind  after  intense  application  to  the  higher 
parts  of  his  science. 

The  opinion  of  Bacon  on  this  subject  was 
diametrically  opposed  to  that  of  the  ancient 
philosophers.  He  valued  geometry  chiefly,  if 
not  solely,  on  account  of  those  uses  which  to 
Plato  appeared  so  base.  And  it  is  remarkable 
that  the  longer  he  lived  the  stronger  this  feel 
ing  became.  When,  in  1605,  he  wrote  the 
two  books  on  the  "  Advancement  of  Learning," 
he  dwelt  on  the  advantages  which  mankind 
derived  from  mixed  mathematics;  but  he  at 
the  same  time  admitted,  that  the  beneficial  ef 
fect  produced  by  mathematical  study  on  the 
intellect,  though  a  collateral  advantage,  was 
"  no  less  worthy  than  that  which  was  princi 
pal  and  intended."  But  it  is  evident  that  his 


views  underwent  a  change.  When,  n parly 
twenty  years  later,  he  published  the  De  Jlug- 
mentis,  which  is  the  treatise  on  the  "Advance 
ment  of  Learning"  greatly  expanded  and  care 
fully  corrected,  he  made  important  alterations 
in  the  part  which  related  to  mathematics.  He 
condemned  with  severity  the  high  pretensions 
of  the  mathematicians,  "  delicias  et  fastum 
mathematicorum."  Assuming  the  well-being 
of  the  human  race  to  be  the  end  of  knowledge,* 
he  pronounced  that  mathematical  science  could 
claim  no  higher  rank  than  that  of  an  append 
age,  or  an  auxiliary  to  other  sciences.  Mathe 
matical  science,  he  says,  *s  the  handmaid  of 
natural  philosophy ;  she  ought  to  demean  her 
self  as  such ;  and  he  declares  that  he  cannot 
conceive  by  what  ill  chance  it  has  happened 
that  she  presumes  to  claim  precedence  over 
her  mistress.  He  predicts — a  prediction  which 
would  have  made  Plato  shudder — that  as  more 
and  more  discoveries  are  made  in  physics, 
there  will  be  more  and  more  branches  of 
mixed  mathematics.  Of  that  collateral  advan 
tage,  the  value  of  which,  twenty  years  before, 
he  rated  so  highly,  he  says  not  one  word.  This 
omission  cannot  have  been  the  effect  of  mere 
inadvertence.  His  own  treatise  was  before 
him.  From  that  treatise  he  deliberately  ex 
punged  whatever  was  favourable  to  the  study 
of  pure  mathematics,  and  inserted  several  keen 
reflections  on  the  ardent  votaries  of  that  study. 
This  fact,  in  our  opinion,  admits  of  only  one 
explanation.  Bacon's  love  of  those  pursuits 
which  directly  tend  to  improve  the  condition 
of  mankind,  and  his  jealousy  of  all  pursuits 
merely  curious,  had  grown  upon  him,  and  had, 
it  may  be,  become  immoderate.  He  was  afraid 
of  using  any  expression  which  might  have  the 
effect  of  inducing  any  man  of  talents  to  employ 
in  speculations,  useful  only  to  the  mind  of  the 
speculator,  a  single  hour  which  might  be  em 
ployed  in  extending  the  empire  Oi*  man  over 
matter.f  If  Bacon  erred  here,  we  must  ac 
knowledge  that  we  greatly  prefer  his  error  to 
the  opposite  error  of  Plato.  We  have  no  pa 
tience  with  a  philosophy  which,  like  those 
Roman  matrons  who  swallowed  abortives  in 
order  to  preserve  their  shapes,  takes  pains  to 
be  barren  for  fear  of  being  homely. 

Let  us  pass  to  astronomy.  This  was  one  of 
the  sciences  which  Plato  exhorted  his  disciples 
to  learn,  but  for  reasons  far  removed  from 
common  habits  of  thinking.  "Shall  we  set 
down  astronomy,"  says  Socrates,  "  among  ihe 
subjects  of  study ?"*  "I  think  so,"  answers 
his  young  friend  Glaucov. :  "to  know  some 
thing  about  the  seasons,  about  the  months  and 
the  years,  is  of  use  for  military  purposes,  as 
well  as  for  agriculture  and  navigation."  "It 
amuses  me,"  says  Socrates, "  to  see  how  afraid 
you  are  lest  the  common  herd  of  people 
should  accuse  you  of  recommending  useless 
studies."  He  then  proceeds  in  that  pure  and 
magnificent  diction,  which,  as  Cicero  said,  Ju 
piter  would  use  if  Jupiter  spoke  Greek,  to  ex 


*  De  jtugmeiitis,  Lib.  3,  Cap.  6. 

f  Plato's  Republic.,  Book  7. 

j  Plutarch,  Syinpos.  viii.,  and  Life  of  Mnrcellug.  The 
innrhim-s  of  Archytas  are  also  mentioned  by  Aulus  Gel- 
bus  and  Diogenes  Laertius. 


*  Usui  et  commodis  hominutn  consultants 

t  Compare  the  passage  relating  to  mathematics  in  the 

Second  Book  of  the  Advancement  of  Learning  with  tli« 

De  Jininntntis,  Lih.  3,  Cap.  6. 
t  Plato's  Republic,  Book  7. 


2T6 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


plain,  that  the  use  of  astronomy  is  not  to  add  to  j 
the  vulgar  comforts  of  life,  but  to  assist  in  | 
raising  the  mind  to  the  contemplation  of  things  J 
which  are  to  be  perceived  by  the  pure  intellect 
alone.  The  knowledge  of  the  actual  motions 
of  the  heavenly  bodies  he  considers  as  of  little 
value.  The  appearances  which  make  the  sky 
beautiful  at  night  are,  he  tells  us,  like  the 
figures  which  a  geometrician  draws  on  the 
sand,  mere  examples,  mere  helps  to  feeble 
minds.  We  must  get  beyond  them  ;  we  must 
neglect  them  ;  we  must  attain  to  an  astronomy  j 
which  is  as  independent  of  the  actual  stars  as  J 
geometrical  truth  is  Independent  of  the  lines  of 
an  ill-drawn  diagram.  This  is,  we  imagine, 
very  nearly,  if  not  exactly,  the  astronomy 
which  Bacon  compared  to  the  ox  of  Prome 
theus* — a  sleek,  well-shaped  hide,  stuffed  with 
rubbish,  goodly  to  look  at,  but  containing  no 
thing  to  eat.  He  complained  that  astronomy 
had,  to  its  great  injury,  been  separated  from 
natural  philosophy,  of  which  it  was  one  of  the 
noblest  provinces,  and  annexed  to  the  domain 
of  mathematics.  The  world  stood  in  need,  he 
said,  of  a  very  different  astronomy — of  a  living 
astronomy,^  of  an  astronomy  which  should  sett 
forth  the  nature,  the  motion,  and  the  influences 
of  the  heavenly  bodies,  as  they  really  are. 

On  the  greatest  and  most  useful  of  all  in 
ventions,  the  invention  of  alphabetical  writing, 
Plato  did  not  look  with  much  complacency. 
He  seems  to  have  thought  that  the  use  of  letters 
had  operated  on  the  human  mind  as  the  use  of 
the  go-cart  in  learning  to  walk,  or  of  corks  in 
learning  to  swim,  is  said  to  operate  on  the  hu 
man  body.  It  was  a  support  which  soon  be 
came  indispensable  to  those  who  used  it,  which 
made  vigorous  exertion  first  unnecessary,  and 
then  impossible.  The  powers  of  the  intellect 
would,  he  conceived,  have  been  more  fully  de 
veloped  without  this  delusive  aid.  Men  would 
have  been  compelled  to  exercise  the  under 
standing  and  the  memory;  and,  by  deep  and 
assiduous  meditation,  to  make  truth  thoroughly 
their  own.  Now,  on  the  contrary,  much  know 
ledge  is  traced  on  paper,  but  little  is  engraved 
on  the  soul.  A  man  is  certain  that  he  can  find 
information  at  a  moment's  notice  when  he 
wants  it.  He  therefore  suffers  it  to  fade  from 
his  mind.  Such  a  man  cannot  in  strictness  be 
said  to  know  any  thing.  He  has  the  show 
without  the  reality  of  wisdom.  These  opinions 
Plato  has  put  into  the  mouth  of  an  ancient  king 
of  Egypt.§  But  it  is  evident  from  the  context 
that  they  were  his  own ;  and  so  they  were  un 
derstood  to  be  by  Quintilian.||  Indeed,  they 
are  in  perfect  accordance  with  the  whole  Pla 
tonic  system. 

Bacon's  views,  as  may  easily  be  supposed, 
were  widely  different.^  The  powers  of  the 
memory,  he  observes,  without  the  help  of  writ 
ing,  can  do  little  towards  the  advancement  of 
any  useful  science.  He  acknowledges  that  the 
memory  may  be  disciplined  to  such  a  point  as 


*  De  Jitig-mentis,  Lib.  3,  Cap.  4.        f  A»tronomia  viva. 

t  «•  QIIIR  •ubttantiam  et  mntum  et  infltmim  ctelestiiim, 
front  re  vera  sunt,  proponat."  Compare  this  language 
With  Plato's  "  ra  6'tv  ra>  o«para>  caotftcr." 

9  Plato's  Phfdrus.  \\  Quintilian.  XI. 

If  DC  Aug mentis,  Lib.  5,  Cap.  5. 


to  be  able  to  perform  very  extraordinary  feats. 
But  on  such  feats  he  sets  little  value.  The 
habits  of  his  mind,  he  tells  us,  are  such  that  he 
is  not  disposed  to  rate  highly  any  accomplish 
ment,  however  rare,  which  is  of  no  practical 
use  to  mankind.  As  to  these  prodigious 
achievements  of  the  memory,  he  ranks  them 
with  the  exhibitions  of  rope-dancers  and  tum 
blers.  "  The  two  performances,"  he  says,  "  arc 
of  much  the  same  sort.  The  one  is  an  abuse 
of  the  powers  of  the  body ;  the  other  is  an 
abuse  of  the  powers  of  the  mind.  Both  may 
perhaps  excite  our  wonder;  but  neither  is  en 
titled  to  our  respect." 

To  Plato,  the  science  of  medicine  appeared 
one  of  very  disputable  advantage.*  He  did 
not  indeed  object  to  quick  cures  for  acute  dis 
orders,  or  for  injuries  produced  by  accidents. 
But  the  art  which  resists  the  slow  sap  of  a 
chronic  disease,  which  repairs  frames  ener 
vated  by  lust,  swollen  by  gluttony,  or  inflamed 
by  wine,  which  encourages  sensuality,  by  mi 
tigating  the  natural  punishment  of  the  sensual 
ist,  and  prolongs  existence  when  the  intellect 
has  ceased  to  retain  its  entire  energy,  had  no 
share  of  his  esteem.  A  life  protracted  by 
medical  skill  he  pronounced  to  be, a  long  death. 
The  exercise  of  the  art  of  medicine  ought,  he 
said,  to  be  tolerated  so  far  as  that  art  may 
serve  to  cure  the  occasional  distempers  of  men, 
whose  constitutions  are  good.  As  to  those 
who  have  bad  constitutions,  let  them  die ;  and 
the  sooner  the  better.  Such  men  are  unfit  for 
war,  for  magistracy,  for  the  management  of 
their  domestic  affairs.  That,  however,  is  com 
paratively  of  little  consequence.  But  they  are 
incapable  of  study  and  speculation.  If  they 
engage  in  any  severe  mental  exercise,  they  are 
troubled  with  giddiness  and  fulness  of  the 
head ;  all  which  they  lay  to  the  account  of  phi 
losophy.  The  best  thing  that  can  happen  to 
such  wretches  is  to  have  done  with  life  at 
once.  He  quotes  mythical  authority  in  sup 
port  of  this  doctrine ;  and  reminds  his  disci 
ples  that  the  practice  of  the  sons  of  ^Esculapius, 
as  described  by  Homer,  extended  only  to  the 
cure  of  external  injuries. 

Far  different  was  the  philosophy  of  Bacon. 
Of  all  the  sciences,  that  which  he  seems  to 
have  regarded  with  the  greatest  interest  was 
the  science  which,  in  Plato's  opinion,  would 
not  be  tolerated  in  a  well-regulated  community. 
To  make  men  perfect  was  no  part  of  Bacon's 
plan.  His  humble  aim  was  to  make  impeifect 
men  comfortable.  The  beneficence  of  hit*  phi 
losophy  resembled  the  beneficence  of  the  com 
mon  Father,  whose  sun  rises  on  the  c'.vil  and 
the  good,  whose  rain  descends  for  the  jast  and 
the  unjust.  In  Plato's  opinion  man  was  made 
for  philosophy ;  in  Bacon's  opinion  philosophy 
was  made  for  man ;  it  was  a  means  to  an  end ; 
and  that  end  was  to  increase  the  pleasures,  and 
to  mitigate  the  pains  of  millions  who  are  not 
and  cannot  be  philosophers.  That  a  valetudi 
narian  who  took  great  pleasure  in  being  wheel-, 
ed  along  his  terrace,  who  relished  his  boiled 
chicken  and  his  weak  wine  and  water,  and  who 
enjoyed  a  hearty  laugh  over  the  Queen  of  NJU 

*  Plato'i  Republic,  Book  3. 


LORD  BACON. 


277 


rarre's  tales,  should  be  treated  as  caput  lupimtm 
because  he  could  not  read  the  Timieus  without 
a  headache,  was  a  notion  which  the  humane 
spirit  of  the  English  school  of  wisdom  alto 
gether  rejected.  Bacon  would  not  have 
thought  it  beneath  the  dignity  of  a  philosopher 
to  contrive  an  improved  garden-chair  for  such 
a  valetudinarian;  to  devise  some  way  of  ren 
dering  his  medicines  more  palatable;  to  in 
vent  repasts  which  he  might  enjoy,  and  pillows 
on  which  he  might  sleep  soundly;  and  this, 
though  there  might  not  be  the  smallest  hope 
that  the  mind  of  the  poor  invalid  would  ever 
rise  to  the  contemplation  of  the  ideal  beautiful 
and  the  ideal  good.  As  Plato  had  cited  the  re 
ligious  legends  of  Greece  to  justify  his  con 
tempt  for  the  more  recondite  parts  of  the  art 
of  healing,  Bacon  vindicated  the  dignity  of  that 
art  by  appealing  to  the  example  of  Christ;  and 
reminded  his  readers  that  the  great  Physician 
of  the  soul  did  not  disdain  to  be  also  the  phy 
sician  of  the  body.* 

When  we  pass  from  the  science  of  medicine 
to  that  of  legislation,  we  find  the  same  differ 
ence  between  the  systems  of  these  two  great 
men.  Plato,  at  the  commencement  of  the  fine 
Dialogue  on  Laws,  lays  it  down  as  a  funda 
mental  principle,  that  the  end  of  legislation  is 
to  make  men  virtuous.  It  is  unnecessary  to 
point  out  the  extravagant  conclusions  to  which 
such  a  proposition  leads.  Bacon  well  knew  to 
how  great  an  extent  the  happiness  of  every 
society  must  depend  on  the  virtue  of  its  mem 
bers  ;  and  he  also  knew  what  legislators  can, 
and  what  they  cannot  do  for  the  purpose  of 
promoting  virtue.  The  view  which  he  has 
given  of  the  end  of  legislation,  and  of  the  prin 
cipal  means  for  the  attainment  of  that  end,  has 
always  seemed  to  us  eminently  happy ;  even 
among  the  many  happy  passages  of  the  same 
kind  with  which  his  works  abound.  "  Finis  et 
scopus  quern  leges  intueri  atque  ad  quern  jus- 
siones  et  sanctiones  suas  dirigere  debent,  non 
alius  est  quam  ut  cives  feliciter  degant.  Id 
fiet  si  pietate  et  religione  recte  instituti,  mori- 
bus  honesti,  armis  adversus  hostes  externos 
tuti,  legum  auxilio  adversus  seditiones  et  pri- 
vatas  injurias  muniti,  imperio  et  magistratibus 
obsequentes,  copiis  et  opibus  locupletes  et  flo- 
rentes  fuermt."f  The  end  is  the  well-being  of 
the  people.  The  means  are  the  imparting  of 
moral  and  religious  education ;  the  providing 
of  every  thing  necessary  for  defence  against 
foreign  enemies ;  the  maintaining  of  internal 
order;  the  establishing  of  a  judicial,  finan 
cial,  and  commercial  system,  under  which 
wealth  may  be  rapidly  accumulated  and  se 
curely  enjoyed. 

Evn  with  respect  to  the  form  in  which  laws 
ought  to  be  drawn,  there  is  a  remarkable  differ 
ence  of  opinion  between  the  Greek  and  the  Eng 
lishman.  Plato  thought  a  preamble  essential; 
Bacon  thought  it  mischievous.  Each  was  con 
sistent  with  himself.  Plato,  considering  the 
moral  improvement  of  the  people  as  the  end 
of  legislation,  justly  inferred  that  a  law  which 
commanded  and  threatened,  but  which  neither 


*  De  JJurrmentis,  Lib.  4,  Cap.  2. 

\De,  dug  mentis,  Lib.  8,  Cap.  3,  Aph.  5. 


convinced  the  reason  nor  touched  the  heart, 
must  be  a  most  imperfect  law.  He  was  not 
content  with  deterring  from  theft  a  man  who 
still  continued  to  be  a  thief  at  heart,  with  re 
straining  a  son  who  hated  his  mother  from 
beating  his  mother.  The  only  obedience  on 
which  he  set  much  value,  was  the  obedience 
which  an  enlightened  understanding  yields  to 
reason,  and  which  a  virtuous  disposition  yields 
to  precepts  of  virtue.  He  really  seems  to  have 
believed  that,  by  prefixing  to  every  law  an  elo 
quent  and  pathetic  exhortation,  he  should,  to  a 
great  extent,  render  penal  enactments  super 
fluous.  Bacon  entertained  no  such  romantic 
hopes  ;  and  he  well  knew  the  practical  incon 
veniences  of  the  course  which  Plato  recom 
mended.  "Neque  nobis,"  says  he,  "prologi 
legum  qui  inepti  olim  habiti  sunt  et  leges  intro- 
ducunt  disputantes  npn  jubentes  utique  place- 
rent  si  priscos  mores  ferre  possemus 

Quantum  fieri  potest  prologi  evitentur  et  lex 
incipiat  a  jussione."* 

Had  Plato  lived  to  finish  the  "  Critias,"  a 
comparison  between  that  noble  fiction  and  the 
"  New  Atlantis"  would  probably  have  furnish 
ed  us  with  still  more  striking  instances.  It  is 
amusing  to  think  with  what  horror  he  would 
have  seen  such  an  institution  as  "  Solomon's 
House"  rising  in  his  republic ;  with  what  ve 
hemence  he  would  have  ordered  the  brew- 
houses,  the  perfume-houses,  and  the  dispensa 
tories  to  be  pulled  down  ;  and  with  what  inex 
orable  rigour  he  \vould  have  driven  beyond  the 
frontier  all  the  Fellows  of  the  College,  Mer 
chants  of  light  and  Depredators,  Lamps  and 
Pioneers. 

To  sum  up  the  whole :  we  should  say  that 
the  aim  of  the  Platonic  philosophy  was  to  exalt 
man  into  a  god.  The  aim  of  the  Baconian 
philosophy  was  to  provide  man  with  what  he 
requires  while  he  continues  to  be  man.  The 
aim  of  the  Platonic  philosophy  was  .to  raise 
us  far  above  vulgar  wants.  The  aim  of  the 
Baconian  philosophy  was  to  supply  our  vulgar 
wants.  The  former  aim  was  noble;  but  the 
latter  was  attainable.  Plato  drew  a  good  bow; 
but,  like  Acestes  in  Virgil,  he  aimed  at  the 
stars ;  and  therefore,  though  there  was  no  want 
of  strength  or  skill,  the  shot  was  thrown  away. 
His  arrow  was  indeed  followed  by  a  track  "f 
dazzling  radiance,  but  it  struck  nothirg. 

"  Volans  liquidis  in  nubibus  arsit  arundo 
Sipnavilque  viain  flainmis,  tenuisqu*  receisit 
Consumata  in  ventos." 

Bacon  fixed  his  eye  on  a  mark  which  wa* 
placed  on  the  earth  and  within  bow-shot,  and 
hit  it  in  the  white.  The  philosophy  of  Piato 
began  in  words  and  ended  in  words — noble 
words  indeed — words  such  as  were  to  be  ex 
pected  from  the  finest  of  human  intellects  ex 
ercising  boundless  dominion  over  the  finest  of 
human  languages.  The  philosophy  of  Bacon 
began  in  observations  and  ended  in  arts. 

The  boast  of  the  ancient  philosophers  was 
that  their  doctrine  formed  the  minds  of  men  to 
a  high  degree  of  wisdom  and  virtue.  This  was 
indeed  the  only  practical  good  which  the  most 
celebrated  of  those  teachers  even  pretended  to 

*  De  Jugmentis,  Lib.  8,  Cap.  3,  Aph.  90. 
2  A 


278 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


cffec';  and  undoubtedly  if  they  had  effected 
this,  they  would  have  deserved  the  greatest 
praise.  But  the  truth  is,  that  in  those  very 
matters  in  which  alone  they  professed  to  do 
any  good  to  mankind,  in  those  very  matters  for 
the  sake  of  which  they  neglected  all  the  vulgar 
interests  of  mankind,  they  did  nothing,  or  worse 
than  nothing.  They  promised  what  was  im 
practicable  ;  they  despised  what  was  practica 
ble  ;  they  filled  the  world  with  long  words  and 
long  beards ;  and  they  left  it  as  wicked  and  as 
ignorant  as  they  found  it. 

An  acre  in  Middlesex  is  better  than  a  princi- 
pajity  in  Utopia.  The  smallest  actual  good  is 
better  than  the  most  magnificent  promises  of 
impossibilities.  The  wise  man  of  the  Stoics 
would,  no  doubt,  be  a  grander  object  than  a 
steam-engine.  But  there  are  steam-engines. 
And  the  wise  man  of  the  Stoics  is  yet  to  be 
born.  A  philosophy  which-»should  enable  a 
man  to  feel  perfectly  happy  while  in  agonies 
of  pain,  may  be  better  than  a  philosophy  which 
assuages  pain.  But  we  know  that  there  are 
remedies  which  will  assuage  pain;  and  we 
know  that  the  ancient  sages  liked  the  tooth 
ache  just  as  little  as  their  neighbours.  A  phi 
losophy  which  should  extinguish  cupidity, 
would  be  better  than  a  philosophy  which 
should  devise  laws  for  the  security  of  property. 
But  it  is  possible  to  make  laws  which  shall,  to 
a  very  great  extent,  secure  property.  And  we 
do  not  understand  how  any  motives  which  the 
ancient  philosophy  furnished  could  extinguish 
cupidity.  We  know  indeed  that  the  philoso 
phers  were  no  better  than  other  men.  From 
the  testimony  of  friends  as  well  as  of  foes,  from 
the  confessions  of  Epictetus  and  Seneca,  as 
well  as  from  the  sneers  of  Lucian  and  the  fierce 
invectives  of  Juvenal,  it  is  plain  that  these 
teachers  of  virtue  had  all  the  vices  of  their 
neighbours,  with  the  additional  vice  of  hypocri 
sy.  Some  people  may  think  the  object  of  the 
Baconian  philosophy  a  low  object,  but  they 
cannot  deny  that,  high  or  low,  it  has  been  at 
tained.  They  cannot  deny  that  every  year 
makes  an  addition  to  what  Bacon  called  "fruit." 
They  cannot  deny  that  mankind  have  made, 
and  are  making,  great  and  constant  progress 
in  the  road  which  he  pointed  out  to  them. 
Was  there  any  such  progressive  movement 
among  the  ancient  philosophers.  After  they 
had  been  declaiming  eight  hundred  years,  had 
they  made  the  world  better  than  when  they 
began  7  Our  belief  is,  that  among  the  philoso 
phers  themselves,  instead  of  a  progressive  im 
provement,  there  was  a  progressive  degeneracy. 
An  abject  superstition,  which  Democritus  or 
Anaxagoras  would  have  rejected  with  scorn, 
added  the  last  disgrace  to  the  long  dotage  of 
the  Stoic  and  Platonic  schools.  The  unsuc 
cessful  attempts  to  articulate  which  are  so  de 
lightful  and  interesting  in  a  child,  shock  and 
disgust  us  in  an  aged  paralytic;  and  in  the 
same  way,  those  wild  mythological  fictions 
which  charm  us  when  lisped  by  Greek  poetry 
in  its  infancy,  excite  a  mixed  sensation  of  pity 
and  loathing  when  mumbled  by  Greek  philoso 
phy  in  its  old  age.  We  know  that  guns,  cut 
lery,  spy-glasses,  clocks,  are  better  in  our  time 
than  they  were  in  the  time  of  our  fathers ;  and 


were  better  in  the  time  of  our  fathers  than  they 
were  in  the  time  of  our  grandfathers.  We 
might,  therefore,  be  inclined  to  think,  that 
when  a  philosophy  which  boasted  that  its  ob 
ject  was  the  elevation  and  purification  of  the 
mind,  and  which  for  this  object  neglected  the 
sordid  office  of  ministering  to  the  comforts  of 
the  body,  had  flourished  in  the  highest  honour 
for  many  hundreds  of  years,  a  vast  moral  ame 
lioration  must  have  taken  place.  Was  it  so  1 
Look  at  the  schools  of  this  wisdom  four  centu 
ries  before  the  Christian  era,  and  four  centu 
ries  after  that  era.  Compare  the  men  whom 
those  schools  formed  at  those  two  periods. 
Compare  Plato  and  Libanius.  Compare  Peri 
cles  and  Julian.  This  philosophy  confessed, 
nay  boasted,  that  for  every  end  but  one  it  was 
useless.  Had  it  attained  that  one  end? 

Suppose  that  Justinian,  when  he  closed  the 
schools  of  Athens,  had  called  on  the  last  few 
sages  who  still  haunted  the  Portico,  and  lin 
gered  round  the  ancient  plane-trees,  to  show 
their  title  to  public  veneration;  suppose  that 
he  had  said,  "A  thousand  years  have  elapsed 
since,  in  this  famous  city,  Socrates  posed  Pro 
tagoras  and  Hippias ;  during  those  thousand 
years  a  large  proportion  of  the  ablest  men  of 
every  generation  has  been  employed  in  con 
stant  efforts  to  bring  to  perfection  the  philoso 
phy  which  you  teach;  that  philosophy  has 
been  munificently  patronised  by  the  powerful ; 
its  professors  have  been  held  in  the  highest 
esteem  by  the  public ;  it  has  drawn  to  itself 
almost  all  the  sap  and  vigour  of  the  human 
intellect,  and  what  has  it  effected  1  What 
profitable  truth  has  it  taught  us,  which  we 
should  not  equally  have  known  without  it  1 
What  has  it  enabled  us  to  do  which  we  should 
not  have  been  equally  able  to  do  without  it  ?" 
Such  questions,  we  suspect,  would  have  puz 
zled  Simplicius  and  Isidore.  Ask  a  follower 
of  Bacon  what  the  new  philosophy,  as  it  was 
called  in  the  time  of  Charles  the  Second,  has 
effected  for  mankind,  and  his  answer  is  ready; 
"It  has  lengthened  life;  it  has  mitigated  pain  ; 
it  has  extinguished  diseases  ;  it  has  increased 
the  fertility  of  the  soil ;  it  has  given  new  secu 
rities  to  the  mariner;  it  has  furnished  new 
arms  to  the  warrior;  it  has  spanned  great 
rivers  and  estuaries  with  bridges  of  form  un 
known  to  our  fathers  ;  it  has  guided  the  thun 
derbolt  innocuously  from  heaven  to  earth;  it 
has  lighted  up  the  night  with  the  .splendour  of 
the  day;  it  has  extended  the  range  of  the  hu 
man  vision;  it  has  multiplied  the  power  of  the 
human  muscle;  it  has  accelerated  motion;  it 
has  annihilated  distance;  it  has  facilitated  in 
tercourse,  correspondence,  all  friendly  offices, 
all  despatch  of  business;  it  has  enabled  man 
to  descend  to  the  depths  of  the  sea,  to  soar  into 
the  air,  to  penetrate  securely  into  the  noxious 
recesses  of  the  earth,  to  traverse  the  land  on 
cars  which  whirl  along  without  horses,  and 
the  ocean  in  ships  which  sail  against  the  wind. 
These  are  but  a  part  of  its  fruits,  and  of  its 
first  fruits.  For  it  is  a  philosophy  which  ne 
ver  rests,  which  has  never  attained  it,  which 
is  never  perfect.  Its  law  is  progress.  A  point 
which  yesterday  was  invisible  is  its  goal  to 
day,  and  will  be  its  starting-post  to-morrow." 


LORD  BACON. 


279 


Great  and  various  as  the  powers  of  Bacon 
were,  he  owes  his  wide  and  durable  fame 
chiefly  to  this,  that  all  these  powers  re*  °ived 
their  direction  from  common  sense.  His  love 
of  the  vulgar  useful,  his  strong  sympathy  Avith 
the  popular  notion  of  good  and  evil,  and  the 
openness  with  which  he  avowed  that  sympa 
thy,  are  the  secret  of  his  influence.  There 
was  in  his  system  no  cant,  no  illusion.  He 
had  no  anointing  foi  broken  bones,  no  fine 
theories  de  finibus,  no  arguments  to  persuade 
men  out  of  their  senses.  He  knew  that  men, 
and  philosophers  as  well  as  other  men,  do  ac 
tually  love  life,  health,  comfort,  honour,  secu 
rity,  the  society  of  friends;  and  do  actually 
dislike  death,  sickness,  pain,  poverty,  disgrace, 
danger,  separation  from  those  to  whom  they 
are  attached.  He  knew  that  religion,  though 
it  often  regulates  and  moderates  these  feelings, 
seldom  eradicates  them ;  nor  did  he  think  it 
desirable  for  mankind  that  they  should  be 
eradicated.  The  plan  of  eradicating  them  by 
conceits  like  those  of  Seneca,  or  syllogisms 
like  those  of  Chrysippus,  was  too  preposterous 
to  be  for  a  moment  entertained  by  a  mind  like 
his.  He  did  not  understand  what  wisdom 
there  could  be  in  changing  names  where  it 
was  impossible  to  change  things;  in  denying 
that  blindness,  hunger,  the  gout,  the  rack,  were 
evils,  and  calling  them  &7rG7r$o»y/uevj. — in  refus 
ing  to  acknowledge  that  health,  safety,  plenty, 
were  good  things,  and  dubbing  them  by  the 
name  of  ah-tq^a..  In  his  opinions  on  all  these 
subjects,  he  was  not  a  Stoic,  nor  an  Epicurean, 
nor  an  Academic,  but  what  would  have  been 
called  by  Stoics,  Epicureans,  and  Academics, 
a  mere  J/*T»C — a  mere  common  man.  And  it 
was  precisely  because  he  was  so,  that  his 
name  makes  so  great  an  era  in  the  history  of 
the  world.  It  was  because  he  dug  deep  that 
he  was  able  to  pile  high.  It  was  because,  in 
order  to  lay  his  foundations,  he  went  down 
into  those  parts  of  human  nature  which  lie 
low,  but  which  are  not  liable  to  change,  that 
the  fabric  which  he  reared  has  risen  to  so 
stately  an  elevation,  and  stands  with  such  im 
movable  strength. 

We  have  sometimes  thought  that  an  amus 
ing  fiction  might  be  written,  in  which  a  disci 
ple  of  Epictetus  and  a  disciple  of  Bacon  should 
be  introduced  as  fellow-travellers.  They  come 
to  a  village  where  the  small-pox  has  just  be 
gun  to  rage ;  and  find  houses  shut  up,  inter 
course  suspended,  the  sick  abandoned,  mothers 
weeping  in  terror  over  their  children.  The 
Stoic  assures  the  dismayed  population  that 
there  is  nothing  bad  in  the  small-pox,  and  that 
to  a  wise  man  diseases,  deformity,  death,  the 
loss  of  friends,  are  not  evils.  The  Baconian 
takes  out  a  lancet  and  begins  to  vaccinate. 
They  find  a  body  of  miners  in  great  dismay. 
An  explosion  of  noisome  vapours  has  just 
killed  many  of  those  who  were  at  work;  and 
the  survivors  are  afraid  to  venture  into  the 
cavern.  The  Stoic  assures  them  that  such  an 
accident  is  nothing  but  a  mere  ajrwgox^wcv. 
The  Baconian,  who  has  no  such  fine  word  at 
his  command,  contents  himself  with  devising 
a  safety-lamp.  They  find  a  shipwrecked  mer 
chant  wringing  his  hands  on  the  shore.  His 


vessel  with  an  inestimable  cargo  has  just  gone 
down,  and  he  is  reduced  in  a  moment  from 
opulence  to  beggary.  The  Stoic  exhorts  him 
not  to  seek  happiness  in  things  which  lie  with 
out  himself,  and  repeats  the  whole  chapter  of 
Epictetus  n§j?  Tcuf  T»V  ATTO^IAV  JtJwr*.?.  The 
Baconian  constructs  a  diving-bell,  goes  down 
in  it,  and  returns  with  the  most  precious  effects 
from  the  wreck.  It  would  be  easy  to  multiply 
illustrations  of  the  difference  between  the  phi 
losophy  of  thorns  and  the  philosophy  of  fruit 
— the  philosophy  of  words  and  the  philosophy 
of  works. 

Bacon  has  been  accused  of  overrating  the 
importance  of  those  sciences  which  minister 
to  the  physical  well-being  of  man,  and  of  un 
derrating  the  importance  of  moral  philosophy; 
and  it  cannot  be  denied  that  persons  who 
read  the  Novum  Organum  and  the  De  dugmentisj 
without  adverting  to  the  circumstances  under 
which  those  works  were  written,  will  find 
much  that  may  seem  to  countenance  the  accu 
sation.  It  is  certain,  however,  that,  though  in 
practice  he  often  went  very  wrong,  and  though, 
as  his  historical  work  and  his  essays  prove, 
he  did  not  hold,  even  in  theory,  very  strict 
opinions  on  points  of  political  morality,  he 
was  far  too  wise  a  man  not  to  know  ho\r 
much  our  well-being  depends  on  the  regula 
tion  of  our  minds.  The  world  for  which  he 
wished  was  not,  as  some  people  seem  to  ima 
gine,  a  world  of  Avater-wheels,  power-looms, 
steam-carriages,  sensualists,  and  knaves.  He 
would  have  been  as  ready  as  Zeno  himself  to 
maintain,  that  no  bodily  comforts  which  could 
be  devised  by  the  skill  and  labour  of  a  hundred 
generations  would  give  happiness  to  a  man 
whose  mind  was  under  the  tyranny  of  licen 
tious  appetite,  of  envy,  of  hatred,  or  of  fear 
If  he  sometimes  appeared  to  ascribe  import 
ance  too  exclusively  to  the  arts  which  increase 
the  outward  comforts  of  our  species,  the  rea 
son  is  plain.  Those  arts  had  been  most  un 
duly  depreciated.  They  had  been  represented 
as  unworthy  of  the  attention  of  a  man  of  libe 
ral  education.  "Cogitavit,"  says  Bacon  of 
himself,  "earn  esse  opinionem  sive  asstima- 
tionem  humidam  et  damnosam,  minui  nempe 
majestatem  mentis  humance,  si  in  experimentis 
et  rebus  particularibus,  sensui  subjectis,  et  in 
materia  terminatis,  diu  ac  multum  versetur: 
proesertim  cum  hujusmodi  res  ad  inquirendum 
laborioso?,  ad  meditandum  ignobiles,  ad  discen- 
dum  asperse,  ad  practicam  illiberales,  numero 
infinite,  et  subtilitate  pusillse  videri  soleant.  et 
ob  hujusmodi  conditioiies,  glorice  artium  minus 
sint  accommodates."*  This  opinion  seemed 
to  him  "omnia  in  familia  humana  turhasse." 
It  had  undoubtedly  caused  many  arts  v/hich 
were  of  the  greatest  utility,  and  which  were 
susceptible  of  the  greatest  improvements,  to 
be  neglected  ty  speculators,  and  abandoned 
to  joiners,  masons,  smiths,  weavers,  apotheca 
ries.  It  was  necessary  to  assert  the  dignity 
of  those  arts,  to  bring  them  prominently  for 

*  Cogitata  et.  visa.  The  expression  opinio  Jiumitla  may 
urprise  a  reader  not  accustomed  to  Bacon's  style.  The 
allusion  is  to  the  maxim  of  Herarlitiis  the  obscure,  Drj 
light  is  the  best.  By  dry  light,  Bacon  understood  the 
light  of  the  intellect,  not  obscured  by  the  mist*  of  (>»5- 
Bion,  interest,  or  prejudice. 


230 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


vard ;  to  proclaim  that,  as  they  have  a  most 
serious  effect  on  human  happiness,  they  are 
not  unworthy  of  the  attention  of  the  highest 
human  intellects.  Again,  it  was  by  illustra 
tions  drawn  from  these  arts  that  Bacon  could 
most  easily  illustrate  his  principles.  It  was 
by  improvements  effected  in  these  arts  that 
the  soundness  of  his  principles  could  be  most 
speedily  and  decisively  brought  to  the  test,  and 
made  manifest  to  common  understandings. 
He  acted  like  a  wise  commander  who  thins 
every  other  part  of  his  line  to  strengthen  a 
point  where  the  enemy  is  attacking  with  pecu 
liar  fury,  and  on  the  fate  of  which  the  event 
of  the  battle  seems  likely  to  depend.  In  the 
Novum  Organum,  however,  he  distinctly  and 
most  truly  declares  that  his  philosophy  is  no 
less  a  Moral  than  a  Natural  Philosophy ;  that, 
though  his  illustrations  are  drawn  from  physi 
cal  science,  the  principles  which  those  illus 
trations  are  intended  to  explain,  are  just  as 
applicable  to  Ethical  and  Political  inquiries, 
as  to  inquiries  into  the  nature  of  Heat  and 
Vegetation.* 

He  frequently  treated  of  moral  subjects,  and 
he  almost  always  brought  to  those  subjects 
that  spirit  which  was  the  essence  of  his  whole 
system.  He  has  left  us  many  admirable  prac 
tical  observations  on  what  he  sometimes 
quaintly  tailed  the  Georgics  of  the  mind — on 
the  mental  culture  which  tends  to  produce 
good  dispositions.  Some  persons,  he  said, 
might  accuse  him  of  spending  labour  on  a 
matter  so  simple  that  his  predecessors  had 
passed  it  by  with  contempt.  He  desired  such 
persons  to  remember  that  he  had  from  the  first 
announced  the  objects  of  his  search  to  be,  not 
the  splendid  and  the  surprising,  but  the  useful 
and  the  true ;  not  the  deluding  dreams  which 
go  forth  through  the  shining  portal  of  ivory, 
but  the  humbler  realities  of  the  gate  of  horn.f 

True  to  this  principle,  he  indulged  in  no 
rants  about  the  fitness  of  things,  the  all-suffi 
ciency  of  virtue,  and  the  dignity  of  human 
nature.  He  dealt  not  at  all  in  resounding  no 
things,  such  as  those  with  which  Bolingbroke 
pretended  to  comfort  himself  in  exile  ;  and  in 
which  Cicero  sought  consolation  after  the  loss 
of  Tullia.  The  casuistical  subtleties  which 
occupied  the  attention  of  the  keenest  spirits  of 
his  age  had,  it  should  seem,  no  attractions  for 
him.  The  treatises  of  the  doctors  whom  Es 
cobar  afterwards  compared  to  the  four  beasts, 
and  the  four-and-twenty  elders  in  the  Apoca 
lypse,  Bacon  dismissed  with  most  contemptu 
ous  brevity.  "Inanes  plerumque  evadunt  et 
futiles."t  Nor  did  he  ever  meddle  with  those 
enigmas  which  have  puzzled  hundreds  of  ge 
nerations,  and  will  puzzle  hundreds  more.  He 
said  nothing  about  the  grounds  of  moral  obli 
gation,  or  the  freedom  of  the  human  will.  He 
had  no  inclination  to  employ  himself  in  la- 
Vur?  resembling  those  of  the  damned  in  the 
Grecian  Tartarus — to  spin  forever  on  the  same 
wheel  round  the  same  pivot,  to  gape  forever 
after  tne  same  deluding  clusters,  to  pour  water 
forever  into  the  same  bottomless  buckets,  to 

*  Jfovum  Oryanum,  Lib.  1,  Aph.  127. 
f  De  dug-mentis,  Lib.  7,  Cap.  3. 
£  DC  Jtujrmentis,  Lib.  7,  Cap.  2. 


pace  forever  to  and  fro  on  the  same  wearisome 
path  after  the  same  recoiling  stone.  He  ex- 
horted  his  disciples  to  prosecute  researches 
of  a  very  different  description  ;  to  consider 
moral  science  as  a  practical  science — a  science 
of  which  the  object  was  to  cure  the  diseases 
and  perturbations  of  the  mind,  and  which 
could  be  improved  only  by  a  method  analogous 
to  that  which  has  improved  medicine  and  sur 
gery.  Moral  philosophers  ought,  he  said,  to 
set  themselves  vigorously  to  work  for  the  pur 
pose  of  discovering  what  are  the  actual  effects 
produced  on  the  human  character  by  particular 
modes  of  education,  by  the  indulgence  of  pai- 
ticular  habits,  by  the  study  of  particular  books, 
by  society,  by  emulation,  by  imitation.  Then 
we  might  hope  to  find  out  what  mode  of  train 
ing  was  most  likely  to  preserve  and  restore 
moral  health.* 

What  he  was  as  a  natural  philosopher  and 
a  moral  philosopher,  that  he  was  also  as  a  the 
ologian.  He  was,  we  are  convinced,  a  sincere 
believer  in  the  divine  authority  of  the  Chris 
tian  revelation.  Nothing  can  be  found  in  his 
writings,  or  in  any  other  writings,  more  elo 
quent  and  pathetic  than  some  passages  which 
were  apparently  written  under  the  influence 
of  strong  devotional  feeling.  He  loved  to 
dwell  on  the  power  of  the  Christian  religion 
to  effect  much  that  the  ancient  philosophers 
could  only  promise.  He  loved  to  consider  that 
religion  as  the  bond  of  charity ;  the  curb  of 
evil  passions  ;  the  consolation  of  the  wretched; 
the  support  of  the  timid ;  the  hope  of  the  dying. 
But  controversies  on  speculative  points  of  the 
ology  seemed  to  have  engaged  scarcely  any 
portion  of  his  attention.  In  what  he  wrote  on 
Church  Government  he  showed,  as  far  as  he 
dared,  a  tolerant  and  charitable  spirit.  Ha 
troubled  himself  not  at  all  about  Homoons'an? 
and  Homoiousians,  Monothelites  and  N^sto 
rians.  He  lived  in  an  age  in  which  disputes1 
on  the  most  subtle  points  of  divinity  ej .eitc<?l 
an  intense  interest  throughout  Europe;  an^ 
nowhere  more  than  in  England.  H<3  wa.« 
placed  in  the  very  thick  of  the  conflict..  Ha 
was  in  power  at  the  time  of  the  Synod  of  Dort, 
and  must  for  months  have  been  daily  Deafened 
with  talk  about  election,  reprobation,  and  final 
perseverance.  Yet  we  do  not  remember  a  line 
in  his  works  from  which  it  can  be  inferred 
that  he  was  either  a  Calvinist  or  an  Arminian. 
While  the.  world  was  resounding  with  the 
noise  of  a  disputatious  philosophy  and  a  dis 
putatious  theology,  the  Baconian  school,  like 
Alworthy  seated  between  Square  and  Thwack- 
urn,  preserved  a  calm  neutrality,  half-scornful, 
half-benevolent,  and,  content  with  adding  to 
the  sum  of  practical  good,  left  the  war  of 
words  to  those  who  liked  it. 

We  have  dwelt  long  on  the  end  of  the  Baco 
nian  philosophy,  because  from  this  peculiarity 
all  the  other  peculiarities  of  that  philosonhv 
necessarily  arose.  Indeed,  scarcely  any  person 
who  proposed  to  himself  the  same  end  with 
Bacon  could  fail  to  hit  upon  the  same  means. 

The  vulgar  notion  about  Bacon  we  take  to 
be  this — that  he  invented  a  new  method  of 

*  De  Augmtntis,  Lib.  7,  Cap.  3. 


LORD  BACON. 


281 


arriving  at  truth,  which  method  is  called  In-  ] 
duction  ;  and  that  he  exposed  the  fallacy  of  the  ' 
syllogistic  reasoning  which  had  been  in  vogue  j 
before  his  time.    This  notion  is  about  as  well  > 
founded  as  that  of  the  people  who,  in  the  mid- 
die  ages,  imagined  that  Virgil  was   a  great 
conjurer.    Many  who  are  far  too  well  informed 
to  talk  such  extravagant  nonsense,  entertain 
what  we  think  incorrect  notions  as  to  what 
Bacon  really  effected  in  this  matter. 

The  inductive  method  has  been  practised 
ever  since  the  beginning  of  the  world  by  every 
human  being.  It  is  constantly  practised  by 
the  most  ignorant  clown,  by  the  most  thought 
less  schoolboy,  by  the  very  child  at  the  breast. 
That  method  leads  the  clown  to  the  conclusion, 
that  if  he  sows  barley  he  shall  net  reap  wheat. 
By  that  method  the  schoolboy  learns,  that  a 
cloudy  day  is  the  best  for  catching  trout.  The 
very  infant,  we  imagine,  is  led  by  induction  to 
expect  milk  from  his  mother  or  nurse,  and 
none  from  his  father. 

Not  only  ^s  it  not  true  that  Bacon  invented 
the  inductive  method;  but  it  is  not  true  that  he 
was  the  first  person  who  correctly  analyzed 
that  method  and  explained  its  u^es.  Aristotle 
had  long  before  pointed  out  the  absurdity  of 
supposing  that  syllogistic  reasoning  could 
ever  conduct  men  to  the  discovery  of  any  new 
principle;  had  shown  that  such  discoveries 
can  be  made  by  induction,  and  by  induction 
alone;  and  had  given  the  history  of  the  induc 
tive  process,  concisely  indeed,  but  with  great 
perspicuity  and  precision.* 

Again,  we  are  not  inclined  to  ascribe  much 
practical  value  to  the  analysis  of  the  inductive 
method  which  Bacon  has  given  in  the  second 
book  of  the  "Novum  Organ  urn."  It  is  indeed 
an  elaborate  and  correct  analysis.  But  it  is 
an  analysis  of  that  which  we  are  all  doing 
from  morning  to  night,  and  which  we  continue 
to  do  even  in  our  dreams.  A  plain  man  finds 
his  stomach  out  of  order.  He  never  heard 
Lord  Bacon's  name.  But  he  proceeds  in  the 
strictest  conformity  with  the  rules  laid  down 
in  the  second  book  of  the  "Novum  Organum," 
and  satisfies  himself  that  minced  pies  have 
done  the  mischief.  "I  ate  minced  pies  on 
Monday  and  Wednesday,  and  I  was  kept 
awake  by  indigestion  all  night."  This  is  the 
comparentia  ad  intellectum  instantiarum  convenien- 
tiutn.  "  I  did  not  eat  any  on  Tuesday  and  Fri 
day,  and  I  was  quite  well."  This  is  the  com- 
parcniia  instantiarum  in  proximo  qua  natura  data 
privantur.  "I  ate  very  sparingly  of  them  on 
Sunday,  and  was  very  slightly  indisposed  in 
the  evening.  But  on  Christmas  day  I  almost 
dined  on  them,  and  was  so  ill  that  I  was  in 
some  danger."  This  is  the  ccmparentia  instan 
tiarum  serundum  magis  et  minus.  "It  cannot 
have  been  the  brandy  which  I  took  with  them. 
For  I  have  drunk  brandy  daily  for  years  with 
out  bein,T  the  worse  for  it."  This  is  the  rc- 
jectio  ndturarum.  Our  invalid  iheri  proceeds 
to  what  is  termed  by  Bacon  the  Vindemiatio, 
and  pronounces  that  mince  pies  do  not  agree 
with  him. 


*  See  the  last  chapter  of  the  Posterior  Analytics,  arid 
the  first  of  the  Metaph>sicB. 
VOL.  II.— 36 


"We  might  go  on  to  what  are  called  by  Bacon 
prerogatives  instantiarum.  For  example:  •' It 
must  be  something  peculiar  to  mincea  pies, 
for  I  can  eat  any  other  pastry  without  the 
least  bad  effect."  This  is  the  instantia  solitaria, 
We  might  easily  proceed,  but  we  have  already 
sufficiently  explained  our  meaning. 

We  repeat,  that  we  dispute  neither  the  inge 
nuity  nor  the  accuracy  of  the  theory  contained 
in  the  second  book  of  the  Novum  Organum;  but 
we  think  that  Bacon  greatly  overrated  its  utility. 
We  conceive  that  the  inductive  process,  like 
many  other  processes,  is  not  likely  to  be  better 
performed  merely  because  men  know  how  they 
perform  it.  William  Tell  would  not  have  been 
one  whit  more  likely  to  cleave  the  apple  if  he 
had  known  that  his  arrow  would  describe  a  para 
bola  under  the  influence  of  the  attraction  of  the 
earth.  Captain  Barclay  would  not  have  been 
more  likely  to  walk  a  thousand  miles  in  a  thou 
sand  hours  if  he  had  known  the  place  arid  name 
of  every  muscle  in  his  legs.  Monsieur  Jourdain 
probably  did  riot  pronounce  D  and  F  more 
correctly  after  he  had  been  apprized  that  D  is 
pronounced  by  touching  the  teeth  with  the  end 
of  the  tongue,  and  F  by  putting  the  upper  teeth 
on  the  lower  lip.  We  cannot  perceive  that  the 
study  of  grammar  makes  the  smallest  differ 
ence  in  the  speech  of  people  who  have  always 
lived  in  good  society.  Not  one  Londoner  in  ten 
thousand  can  lay  down  the  rules  for  the  proper 
use  of  will  and  shall.  Yet  not  one  Londoner  in 
•  million  ever  misplaces  his  will  and  shall.  No 
man  uses  figures  of  speech  with  more  pro 
priety  because  he  knows  that  one  figure  is 
called  a  metonomy  and  another  a  synecdoche. 
A  drayman  in  a  passion  calls  out,  "You  are  a 
pretty  fellow,"  without  suspecting  that  he  is 
uttering  irony,  and  that  irony  is  one  of  the  four 
primary  tropes.  The  old  systems  of  rhetoric 
were  never  regarded  by  the  most  experienced 
and  discerning  judges  as  of  any  use  in  form 
ing  an  orator.  "  Ego  hanc  vim  intelligo,"  said 
Cicero,  "esse  in  prceceptis  omnibus,  non  ut  ea 
secuti  oratores  eloquentioe  laudem  sint  adepti, 
sed  quce  sua  sponte  homines  eloquentes  face- 
rent,  ea  quosdam  observasse,  atque  id  egisse; 
sic  esse  non  eloquentiam  ex  artificio,  sed  arti- 
cium  ex  eloquentia  natum."*  We  must  own 
that  we  entertain  the  same  opinion  concerning 
the  study  of  logic  which  Cicero  entertained 
concerning  the  study  of  rhetoric.  A  man  of 
sense  syllogizes  in  cclarent  and  cesare  all  day 
long  without  suspecting  it;  and  though  he  may 
not  know  what  an  ignoratio  elenchi  is,  has  no 
difficulty  in  exposing  it  whenever  he  falls  in 
with  it,  which  is  likely  to  be  as  often  as  he 
falls  in  with  a  reverend  Master  of  Arts,  nou 
rished  on  mode  and  figure  in  the  cloisters  ot 
Oxford.  Considered  merely  as  an  intellectual 
feat,  the  Organum  of  Aristotle  can  scarcely  be 
admired  too  highly.  But  the  more  we  compare 
individual  with  individual,  school  with  school, 
nation  with  nation,  generation  with  generation, 
the  more  do  we  lean  to  tne  opinion  *hat  the 
knowledge  of  the  theory  of  logic  has  no  tendf 
ency  whatever  to  make  men  gcod  reasoners. 

What  Aristotle  did  for  ihe  syllogistic  pro- 

*  De  Oratore,  Lib.  1. 
3*2 


282 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


cess  Bacon  has,  in  the  second  book  of  the  No 
vum  Organum,  done  for  the  inductive  process  ; 
lhat  is  to  say,  he  has  analyzed  it  well.  His 
rule^  are  quite  proper;  but  we  do  not  need 
them,  because  they  are  drawn  from  our  own 
constant  practice. 

But  though  everybody  is  constantly  perform 
ing  the  process  described  in  the  second  book 
of  tho  Novum  Organum,  some  men  perform  it 
well  and  some  perform  it  ill.  Some  are  led 
by  it  to  truth  and  some  to  error.  It  led  Frank 
lin  to  discover  the  nature  of  lightning.  It  led 
thousands  who  had  less  brains  than  Franklin 
to  believe  in  animal  magnetism.  But  this  was 
not  because  Franklin  went  through  the  process 
described  by  Bacon  and  the  dupes  of  Mesmer 
through  a  different  process.  The  comparentia 
and  rejertinnes,  of  which  we  have  given  exam 
ples,  will  be  found  in  the  most  unsound  deduc 
tions.  We  have  heard  that  an  eminent  judge 
of  the  last  generation  was  in  the  habit  of 
jocosely  propounding  after  dinner  a  theory, 
that  the  cause  of  the  prevalence  of  Jacobinism 
was  the  practice  of  bearing  three  names.  He 
quoted  on  the  one  side  Charles  James  Fox, 
Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan,  John  Home  Tooke, 
John  Philpot  Curran,  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge, 
Theobald  Wolfe  Tone.  These  were  instuntite 
convenientes.  He  then  proceeded  to  cite  instances 
absentia  in  proxime : — William  Pitt,  John  Scott, 
William  Wyndham,  Samuel  Horsley,  Henry 
Dundas,  Edmund  Burke.  He  might  have  gone 
on  to  instances  secundum  magis  et  minus.  Thf 
practice  of  givingchildren  three  names  has  been 
for  some  time  a  growing  practice,  and  Jacobin 
ism  has  also  been  growing.  The  practice  of 
giving  children  three  names  is  more  common  in 
America  than  in  England.  In  England  we  still 
have  a  king  and  a  House  of  Lords,  but  the 
Americans  are  republicans.  The  rejeclioncs  are 
obvious.  Burke  and  Theobald  Wolfe  Tone 
were  both  Irishmen;  therefore  the  being  an 
Irishman  is  not  the  cause  of  Jacobinism. 
Horsley  and  Home  Tooke  are  both  clergy 
men  ;  therefore  the  being  a  clergyman  is  not 
the  cause  of  Jacobinism.  Fox  and  Wyndham 
•were  both  educated  at  Oxford ;  and  therefore 
the  being  educated  at  Oxford  is  not  the  cause 
of  Jacobinism.  Pitt  and  Home  Tooke  were 
both  educated  at  Cambridge ;  therefore  the  be 
ing  educated  at  Cambridge  is  not  the  cause 
of  Jacobinism.  In  this  way  our  inductive  phi 
losopher  arrives  at  what  Bacon  calls  the  vin 
tage,  and  pronounces  that  the  having  three 
hames  is  the  cause  of  Jacobinism. 

Here  is   an   induction   corresponding  with 
Bacon's  analysis,  and  ending  in  a  monstrous 
absurdity.     In  what,  then,  does  this  induction 
differ  from  the  induction  which  leads  us  to  the 
conclusion  that  the  presence  of  the  sun  is  the 
cause  of  our  having  more  light  by  day  than  | 
by  night  1     The  difference  evidently  is  not  in  j 
the  kind  of  instances,  but  in  the  number  of  in-  j 
stances ;  that  is  to  say,  the  difference  is  not  in  ( 
that  part  of  the  process  for  which  Bacon  has 
given  precise  rule5?,  but  in  a  circumstance  for 
which  no  precise  rtue  can  possibly  be  given. 
If  the  learned  author  or  the  theory  about  Ja 
cobinism  had  enlarged  either  of  his  tables  a 
little,  his  system  would  have  been  destroyed. 
The  names  of  Tom  Paine  and  William  Wynd 


ham  Grenville  would  have  been  sufficient  to 
do  the  work. 

It  appears  to  us,  then,  that  the  difference  be 
tween  a  sound  and  an  unsound  induction,  or, 
to  use  the  Baconian  phraseology,  between  the 
interpretation  of  nature  and  the  anticipation 
of  nature,  does  not  lie  in  this — that  the  inter 
preter  of  nature  goes  through  the  process  ana 
lyzed  in  the  second  book  of  the  Novum  Organum 
and  the  anticipator  through  a  different  process 
They  may  both  perform  the  same  process.  But 
the  anticipator  performs  it  foolishly  or  care 
lessly;  the  interpreter  performs  it  with  patience, 
attention,  sagacity,  and  judgment.  Now,  pre 
cepts  can  do  little  towards  making  men  patient 
and  attentive,  and  still  less  towards  making 
them  sagacious  and  judicious.  It  is  very  well 
to  tell  men  to  be  on  their  guard  against  preju 
dices,  not  to  believe  facts  on  slight  evidence, 
not  to  be  content  with  a  scanty  collection  of 
facts,  to  put  out  of  their  minds  the  idola  which 
Bacon  has  so  finely. described.  But  these  rules 
are  too  general  to  be  of  much  practical  use. 
The  question  is,  what  is  a  prejud.ce]  How 
long  does  the  incredulity  with  which  I  hear  a 
new  theory  propounded  continue  to  be  a  wise 
and  salutary  incredulity]  When  does  it  be 
come  an  idolum  specus,  the  unreasonable  perti 
nacity  of  a  too  skeptical  mind?  What  is  slight 
evidence]  What  collection  of  facts  is  scanty] 
Will  ten  instances  do,  or  fifty,  or  a  hundred] 
In  how  many  months  would  the  first  human 
beings  who  settled  on  the  shores  of  the  ocean 
have  been  justified  in  believing  that  the  moon 
had  an  influence  on  their  tides]  After  how 
many  experiments  would  Jenner  have  been 
justified  in  believing  that  he  had  discovered, 
a  safeguard  against  the  small-pox]  These 
are  questions  to  which  it  would  be  most  desi 
rable  to  have  a  precise  answer;  but  unhappily 
they  are  questions  to  which  no  precise  answer 
can  be  returned. 

We  think,  then,  that  it  is  possible  to  lay 
down  accurate  rules,  as  Bacon  has  done,  for 
the  performing  of  that  part  of  the  inductive 
process  which  all  men  perform  alike;  but  that 
these  rules,  though  accurate,  are  not  wanted, 
because  in  truth  they  only  tell  us  to  do  what 
we  are  all  doing.  We  think  that  it  is  impossi 
ble  to  lay  down  any  precise  rule  for  the  per 
forming  of  that  part  of  the  inductive  process 
which  a  great  experimental  philosopher  per 
forms  in  one  way  and  a  superstitious  old  wo 
man  in  another. 

On  this  subject,  we  think,  Bacon  was  in  an 
error.  He  certainly  attributed  to  his  rules  a 
value  which  did  not  belong  to  them.  He  went 
so  far  as  to  say,  that  if  his  method  of  making 
discoveries  were  adopted,  little  would  depend 
on  the  degree  of  force  or  acuteness  of  any  in 
tellect;  that  all  minds  would  be  reduced  to  one 
level;  that  his  philosophy  resembled  a  com 
pass  or  a  rule  which  equalizes  all  hands,  and 
enables  the  most  unpractised  person  to  draw 
a  more  correct  circle  or  line  than  the  best 
draughtsman  can  produce  without  such  aid.* 
This  really  seems  to  us  as  extravagant  as  it 
would  have  been  in  Lindley  Murray  to  an 
nounce  that  everybody  who  should  learn  his 


*  Wovum  Organum,  Pnef.  and  Lib.  1,  Aph.  129. 


LORD   BACON. 


283 


grammar  would  write  as  good  English  as 
Dryden;  or  in  that  very  able  writer,  Dr. 
Whately,  to  promise  that  all  the  readers  of  his 
.ogic  wou\d  reason  like  ChilLngworth,  and 
that  all  the  readers  of  his  rhetoric  would 
speak  like  Burke.  That  Bacon  was  altogether 
mistaken  as  to  this  point  will  now  hardly  be 
disputed.  His  philosophy  has  flourished  d^r- 
ing  two  hundred  years,  and  has  produced  none 
of  this  levelling.  The  interval  between  a  man 
of  talents  and  a  dunce  is  as  wide  as  ever;  and 
is  never  more  clearly  discernible  than  when 
they  engage  in  researches  which  require  the 
constant  use  of  induction. 

It  will  be  seen  that  we  do  not  consider  Ba 
con's  ingenious  analysis  of  the  inductive  me 
thod  as  a  very  useful  performance.  Bacon 
was  not,  as  we  have  already  said,  the  inventor 
of  the  inductive  method.  He  was  not  even  the 
person  who  first  analyzed  the  inductive  method 
correctly,  though  he  undoubtedly  analyzed  it 
more  minutely  than  any  who  preceded  him. 
He  was  not  the  person  who  first  showed  that 
by  the  inductive  method  alone  new  truth  could 
be  discovered.  But  he  was  the  person  who 
first  turned  the  minds  of  speculative  men, 
long  occupied  in  verbal  disputes,  to  the  dis 
covery  of  new  truth ;  and,  by  doing  so,  he  at 
once  gave  to  the  inductive  method  an  import 
ance  and  dignity  which  had  never  before  be 
longed  to  it.  He  was  not  the  maker  of  that 
road  ;  he  was  not  the  discoverer  of  that  road  ; 
he  was  not  the  person  who  first  surveyed  and 
mapped  that  road.  But  he  was  the  person 
who  first  called  the  public  attention  to  an  in 
exhaustible  mine  of  wealth,  which  had  been 
utterly  neglected,  and  which  was  accessible  by 
that  road  alone.  By  doing  so,  he  caused  that 
road  which  had  previously  been  trodden  only 
by  peasants  and  higglers,  to  be  frequented  by  a 
higher  class  of  travellers. 

That  which  was  eminently  his  own  in  his 
system  was  the  end  which  he  proposed  to  him 
self.  The  end  being  given,  the  means,  as  it  ap 
pears  to  us,  could  not  well  be  mistaken.  If  others 
had  aimed  at  the  same  object  with  Bacon,  we 
hold  it  to  be  certain  that  they  would  have  em 
ployed  the  same  method  with  Bacon.  It  would 
have  been  hard  to  convince  Seneca  that  the 
inventing  of  a  safety-lamp  was  an  employ 
ment  worthy  of  a  philosopher.  It  would  have 
been  hard  to  persuade  Thomas  Aquinas  to  de 
scend  from  the  making  of  syllogisms  to  the 
making  of  gunpowder.  But  Seneca  would 
never  have  doubted  for  a  moment  that  it  was 
only  by  a  series  of  experiments  that  a  safety- 
lamp  could,  be  invented.  Thomas  Aquinas 
would  never  have  thought  that  his  barbara  and 
baralipton  would  enable  him  to  ascertain  the 
proportion  which  charcoal  ought  to  bear  to 
saltpetre  in  a  pound  of  gunpowder.  Neither 
common  sense  nor  Aristotle  would  have  suf 
fered  him  to  fall  into  such  an  absurdity. 

By  stimulating  men  to  the  discovery  of 
new  truth,  Bacon  stimulated  them  to  employ 
the  inductive  method,  the  only  method,  even 
the  ancier.t  philosophers  and  the  schoolmen 
themselves  being  judges,  by  which  new  truth 
can  be  discovered.  By  stimulating  men  to  the 
discovery  t  f  useful  truth,  he  furnished  them  with 
a  motive  to  perform  the  inductive  process  well 


|  and  carefully.     His  predecessors  had  been  an. 

j  ticipators  of  nature.  They  had  been  content 
with  first  principles,  at  which  they  had  arrived 

1  by  the  most  scanty  and  slovenly  induction. 
And  why  was  this  1  It  was,  we  conceive,  be 
cause  their  philosophy  proposed  to  itself  no 
practical  end,  because  it  was  merely  an  exer 
cise  of  the  mind.  A  man  who  wants  to  con 
trive  a  new  machine  or  a  new  medicine  has  a 
strong  motive  to  observe  accurately  and  pa 
tiently,  and  to  try  experiment  after  experiment 
But  a  man  who  merely  wants  a  theme  for  dis 
putation  or  declamation  has  no  such  motive. 
He  is  therefore  content  with  premises  ground' 
ed  on  assumption,  or  on  the  most  scanty  and 
hasty  induction.  Thus,  we  conceive,  the 
schoolmen  acted.  On  their  foolish  premises 
they  often  argued  with  great  ability;  and  as 
their  object  was  "  assensum  subjugare,  non  res  "* 
— to  be  victorious  in  controversy,  not  to  be 
victorious  over  nature — they  were  consistent. 
For  just  as  much  logical  skill  could  be  shown 
in  reasoning  on  false  as  on  true  premises. 
But  the  followers  of  the  new  philosophy,  pro 
posing  to  themselves  the  discovery  of  useful 
truth  as  their  object,  must  have  altogether  fail 
ed  of  attaining  that  object,  if  they  had  been, 
content  to  build  theories  on  superficial  induw. 
tion. 

Bacon  has  remarkedf  that  in  all  ages  when 
philosophy  was  stationary,  the  mechanical  arts 
went  on  improving.  Why  was  this?  Evident 
ly  because  the  mechanic  was  not  content  with 
so  careless  a  mode  of  induction  as  served 
the  purpose  of  the  philosopher.  And  why  was 
the  philosopher  more  easily  satisfied  than  the 
mechanic1?  Evidently  because  the  object  of 
the  mechanic  was  to  mould  things,  whilst  the 
object  of  the  philosopher  was  only  to  mould 
words.  Careful  induction  is  not  at  all  neces 
sary  to  the  making  of  a  good  syllogism.  But 
it  is  indispensable  to  the  making  of  a  good 
shoe.  Mechanics,  therefore,  have  always  been, 
as  far  as  the  range  of  their  humble  but  useful 
callings  extended,  not  anticipators  but  inter 
preters  of  nature.  And  when  a  philosophy 
arose,  the  object  of  which  was  to  do  on  a  large 
scale  what  the  mechanic  does  on  a  small  scale 
— to  extend  the  power  and  to  supply  the  wants 
of  man — the  truth  of  the  premises,  which  logic 
ally  is  a  matter  altogether  unimportant,  be 
came  a  matter  of  the  highest  importance ;  and 
the  careless  induction  with  which  men  of  * 
learning  had  previously  been  satisfied,  gave 
place,  of  necessity,  to  an  induction  far  more 
accurate  and  satisfactory. 

What  Bacon  did  for  the  inductive  philoso 
phy  may,  we  think,  be  fairly  stated  Jims.  The 
objects  of  preceding  speculators  v/ere  objects 
which  could  be  obtained  without  careful  in 
duction.  Those  speculators,  therefore,  did 
not  perform  the  inductive  process  carefully. 
Bacon  stirred  up  men  to  pursue  an  object 
which  cjuld  be  attained  only  by  induction, 
and  by  induction  carefully  performed ;  and  cm 
sequently  induction  was  more  carefully  per 
formed.  We  do  not  think  that  the  importance 
of  what  Bacon  did  for  inductive  philosophy 


*  Novum  Organum,  Lib.  1,  Aph.  29. 
f  De  Auffinentis,  Lib.  1. 


294 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


has  ever  been  overrated.  But  we  think  that 
the  nature  of  his  services  is  often  mistaken, 
and  was  not  fully  understood  even  by  himself. 
It  was  not  by  furnishing  philosophers  with 
rules  for  performing  the  inductive  process 
well,  but  by  furnishing  them  with  a  motive  for 
performing  it  well,  that  he  conferred  so  vast  a 
benefit  on  society. 

To  give  to  the  human  mind  a  direction 
which  it  shall  retain  for  ages  is  the  rare  pre 
rogative  of  a  few  imperial  spirits.  It  cannot, 
therefore,  be  uninteresting  to  inquire,  what 
was  the  moral  and  intellectual  constitution 
which  enabled  Bacon  to  exercise  so  vast  an 
influence  on  the  world. 

Iii  the  temper  of  Bacon — we  speak  of  Bacon 
the  philosopher,  not  of  Bacon  the  lawyer  and 
politician — there  was  a  singular  union  of  au 
dacity  and  sobriety.  The  promises  which  he 
made  to  mankind  might,  to  a  superficial  read 
er,  seem  to  resemble  the  rants  which  a  great 
dramatist  has  put  into  the  mouth  of  an  Oriental 
conqueror,  half-crazed  by  good  fortune  and  by 
violent  passions: 

"  lie  shall  have  chariots  easier  than  air, 
Which  I  will  have  invented  ;  and  thyself 
That  art  the  messenger  shall  ride  before  him 
On  a  horse  cut  out  of  an  entire  diamond, 
That  shall  be  made  logo  with  golden  wheels, 
I  know  not  how  yet." 

But  Bacon  performed  what  he  promised.  In 
truth,  Fletcher  would  not  have  dared  to  make 
Arbaces  promise,  in  his  wildest  fits  of  excite 
ment,  the  tithe  of  what  the  Baconian  philoso 
phy  has  performed. 

The  true  philosophical  temperament  may, 
we  think,  be  described  in  four  words — much 
hope,  little  faith  ;  a  disposition  to  believe  that 
any  thing,  however  extraordinary,  may  be 
done;  an  indisposition  to  believe  that  any 
thing  extraordinary  has  been  done.  In  these 
points  the  constitution  of  Bacon's  mind  seems 
to  us  to  have  been  absolutely  perfect.  He  was 
at  once  the  Mammon  and  the  Surly  of  his  friend 
Ben.  Sir  Epicure  did  not  indulge  in  visions 
more  magnificent  and  gigantic.  Surly  did  not 
sift  evidence  with  keener  and  more  sagacious 
incredulity. 

Closely  connected  with  this  peculiarity  of 
Bacon's  temper  was  a  striking  peculiarity  of 
his  understanding.  With  great  minuteness  of 
observation  he  had  an  amplitude  of  compre 
hension  such  as  has  never  yet  been  vouchsafed 
to  any  other  human  being.  The  small  fine 
mind  of  Labruyere  had  not  a  more  delicate 
tact  than  the  large  intellect  of  Bacon.  The 
"Essays"  contain  abundant  proofs  that  no 
nice  feature  of  character,  no  peculiarity  in  the 
ordering  of  a  house,  a  garden,  or  a  court- 
masque,  could  escape  the  notice  of  one  whose 
mind  was  capable  of  taking  in  the  whole  world 
of  knowledge.  His  understanding  resembled  the 
tent  which  the  fairy  Paribanou  gave  to  Prince 
Ahmed.  Fold  it,  and  it  seemed  a  toy  for  the 
hand  of  a  lady.  Spread  it,  and  the  armies  of 
powerful  sultans  might  repose  beneath  its 
shade. 

In  keenn-ess  of  observation  he  has  been 
rnualled,  though  perhaps  never  surpassed. 
bcu  the  largeness  of  his  mind  was  all  his  own. 
The  glance  with  which  he  surveyed  the  intel 


lectual  universe  resembled  that  which  the  arch 
angel,  from  the  golden  threshold  of  heaven, 
darted  down  into  the  new  creation. 

"Round  he  surveyed — and  well  might,  where  he  stood 
So  high  above  the  circling  cunnpy 
Of  night's  extended  shade— from  eastern  point 
Of  Libra,  to  the  fleecy  star  which  bears 
Andromeda  fur  off  Atlantic  seas 
Beyond  the  horizon." 

His  knowledge  differed  from  that  of  other 
men  as  a  Terrestrial  Globe  differs  from  an  At 
las  which  contains  a  different  country  on  every 
leaf.  The  towns  and  roads  of  England,  France, 
and  Germany  are  better  laid  down  in  the  atlas 
than  in  the  globe.  But  while  we  are  looking  at 
England  we  see  nothing  of  France;  and  while 
we  are  looking  at  France  we  see  nothing  of 
Germany.  We  may  go  to  the  atlas  to  learn 
the  bearings  and  distances  of  York  and  Bristol, 
or  of  Dresden  and  Prague.  But  it  is  useless 
if  we  want  to  know  the  bearings  and  distances 
of  France  and  Martinique,  or  of  England  and 
Canada.  On  the  globe  we  shall  not  find  all 
the  market-towns  in  our  own  neighbourhood; 
but  we  shall  learn  from  it  the  comparative  ex 
tent  and  the  relative  position  of  all  the  king 
doms  of  the  earth.  "I  have  taken,"  said  Ba 
con,  in  a  letter  written  when  he  was  only  thirty- 
one,  to  his  uncle,  Lord  Burleigh,  "I  have 
taken  all  knowledge  to  be  my  province."  In 
any  other  young  man,  indeed  in  any  other  man, 
this  would  have  been  a  ridiculous  flight  of  pre 
sumption.  There  have  been  thousands  of 
better  mathematicians,  astronomers,  chemists, 
physicians,  botanists,  mineralogists,  than  Ba 
con.  No  man  would  go  to  Bacon's  works  to 
learn  any  particular  science  or  art;  any  more 
than  he  would  go  to  a  twelve-inch  globe  in 
order  to  find  his  way  from  Kennington  Turn 
pike  to  Clapham  Common.  The  art  which 
Bacon  taught  was  the  art  of  inventing  arts. 
The  knowledge  in  which  Bacon  excelled  all 
men,  was  a  knowledge  of  the  mutual  relations 
of  all  departments  of  knowledge. 

The  mode  in  which  he  communicated  his 
thoughts  was  exceedingly  peculiar.  He  had 
no  touch  of  that  disputatious  temper  which  he 
often  censured  in  his  predecessors.  He  effected 
a  vast  intellectual  revolution  in  opposition  to 
a  vast  mass  of  prejudices ;  yet  he  never  en 
gaged  in  any  controversy ;  nay,  we  cannot  at 
present  recollect,  in  all  his  philosophical  works, 
a  single  passage  of  a  controversial  character. 
All  those  works  might  with  propriety  have 
been  put  into  the  form  which  he  adopted  in  the 
work  entitled  Cogitata  et.  visa ;  "  Franciscus  Ba- 
conus  sic  cogitavit."  These  are  thoughts  which 
have  occurred  to  me :  weigh  them  well,  and 
take  them  or  leave  them. 

Borgia  said  of  the  famous  expedition  of 
Charles  the  Eighth,  that  the  French  had  con 
quered  Italy,  not  with  steel,  but  with  chalk ;  for 
that  the  only  exploit  which  they  had  found  ne 
cessary  for  the  purpose  of  taking  military  oc 
cupation  of  any  place,  had  been  to  mark  the 
doors  of  the  houses  where  they  meant  to  quar 
ter.  Bacon  often  quoted  this  saying,  and  loved 
to  apply  it  to  the  victories  ot  nis  own  intel 
lect.*  'His  philosophy,  he  said,  came  as  a 


*  Jfovum  Organum,  Lib.  1,  Aph.  35,  and  elsewhere 


LORD  BACON. 


guest,  not  as  an  enerf  y.  She  found  no  difficulty 
in  obtaining  admittance,  without  a  contest,  into 
?rery  understanding  fitted,  by  its  structure,  and 
by  its  capacity,  to  receive  her.  In  all  this  we 
think  that  he  acted  most  judiciously;  first,  be 
cause,  as  he  has  himself  remarked,  the  differ 
ence  between  his  school  and  other  schools  was  a 
difference  so  fundamental,  that  there  was  hardly 
any  common  ground  on  which  a  controversial 
battle  could  be  fought;  and,  secondly,  because 
his  mind,  eminently  observant,  pre-eminently 
discursive  and  capacious,  was,  we  conceive, 
neither  formed  by  nature,  nor  disciplined  by 
habit,  for  dialectical  combat. 

Though  Bacon  did  not  arm  his  philosophy 
with  the  weapons  of  logic,  he  adorned  her  pro 
fusely  with  all  the  richest  decorations  of  rhe 
toric.  His  eloquence,  though  not  untainted 
with  the  vicious  taste  of  his  age,  would  alone 
have  entitled  him  to  a  high  rank  in  literature. 
He  had  a  wonderful  talent  for  packing  thought 
close  and  rendering  it  portable.  In  wit,  if  by 
wit  be  meant  the  power  of  perceiving  analo 
gies  between  things  which  appear  to  have  no 
thing  in  common,  he  never  had  an  equal — not 
even  Cowley — not  even  the  author  of  Hudibras. 
Indeed,  he  possessed  this  faculty,  or  rather  this 
faculty  possessed  him,  to  a  morbid  degree. 
When  he  abandoned  himself  to  it  without  re 
serve,  as  he  did  in  the  Sapientia  Vetcrum,  and  at 
the  end  of  the  second  book  of  the  DC  Jlugmentis, 
the  feats  which  he  performed  were  not  merely 
admirable,  but  portentous,  and  almost  shock 
ing.  On  those  occasions  we  marvel  at  him  as 
clowns  on  a  fair-day  marvel  at  a  juggler,  and 
can  hardly  help  thinking  that  the  devil  must 
be  in  him. 

These,  however,  were  freaks  in  which  his 
ingenuity  now  and  then  wantoned,  with  scarce 
ly  any  other  object  than  to  astonish  and  amuse. 
But  it  occasionally  happened  that,  when  he 
was  engaged  in  grave  and  profound  investiga 
tions,  his  wit  obtained  the  mastery  over  all  his 
other  faculties,  and  led  him  into  absurdities 
into  which  no  dull  man  could  possibly  have 
fallen.  We  will  give  the  most  striking  instance 
which  at  present  occurs  to  us.  In  the  third 
book  of  the  De  Jlugmetitis  he  tells  us  that  there 
are  some  principles  which  are  not  peculiar  to 
one  science,  but  are  common  to  several.  That 
part  of  philosophy  which  concerns  itself  with 
these  principles  is,  in  his  nomenclature,  de 
signated  as  plnlosophia  prima.  He  then  pro 
ceeds  to  mention  some  of  the  principles  with 
which  this philosophia  prima  is  conversant.  One 
of  them  is  this:  An  infectious  disease  is  more 
likely  to  be  communicated  while  it  is  in  pro 
gress  than  when  it  has  reached  its  height. 
This,  says  he,  is  true  in  medicine.  It  is  also 
true  in  morals  ;  for  we  see  that  the  example  of 
very  abandoned  men  injures  public  morality 
less  than  the  example  of  men  in  whom  vice 
has  not  yet  extinguished  all  good  qualities. 
Again,  he  tells  us  that  in  music  a  discord  end 
ing  in  a  concord  is  agreeable,  and  that  the 
same  thing  may  be  noted  in  the  affections. 
Once  more  he  tells  us,  that  in  physics  the 
energy  with  which  a  principle  acts  is  often 
increased  by  the  antiperistasis  of  its  opposite; 
ami  that  it  is  the  same  in  the  contests  of 


factions.  If  this  be  indeed  the  pkilosopJna  prima, 
we  are  quite  sure  that  the  greatest  philoso 
phical  work  of  the  nineteenth  century  is  Mr. 
Moore's  "  Lalla  Rookh."  The  similitudes 
which  we  have  cited  are  very  happy  simili 
tudes.  But  that  a  man  like  Bacon  should 
have  taken  them  for  more,  that  he  should  have 
thought  the  discovery  of  such  resemblances  as 
these  an  important  part  of  philosophy,  has  al 
ways  appeared  to  us  one  of  the  most  singular 
facts  in  the  history  of  letters. 

The  truth  is,  that  his  mind  was  wonderfully 
quick  in  perceiving  analogies  of  all  .sorts.  But 
like  several  eminent  men  whom  we  could 
name,  both  living  and  dead,  he  sometimes  ap 
peared  strangely  deficient  in  the  power  of  dis 
tinguishing  rational  from  fanciful  analogies — 
analogies  which  are  arguments  from  analo 
gies  which  are  mere  illustrations — analogies 
like  that  which  Bishop  Butler  so  ably  pointed 
out  between  natural  and  revealed  religion, 
from  analogies  like  that  which  Addison  dis 
covered  between  the  series  of  Grecian  gods 
carved  by  Phidias,  and  the  series  of  English 
kings  painted  by  Kneller.  This  want  of  dis 
crimination  has  led  to  many  strange  political 
speculations.  Sir  William  Temple  deduced  a 
theory  of  government  from  the  properties  of 
the  pyramid.  Mr.  Southey's  whole  system  of 
finance  is  grounded  on  the  phenomena  of  eva 
poration  and  rain.  In  theology  this  perverted 
ingenuity  has  made,  still  wilder  work.  From 
the  time  of  Irenoeus  and  Origen,  down  to  the 
present  day,  there  has  not  been  a  single  gene- 
ration  in  which  great  divines  have  not  been 
led  into  the  most  absurd  expositions  of  Scrip 
ture,  by  mere  incapacities  to  distinguish  ana 
logies  proper,  to  use  the  scholastic  phrase, 
from  analogies  metaphorical.*  It  is  curious 
that  Bacon  has  himself  mentioned  this  very 
kind  of  delusion  among  the  idola  spccus ;  and 
has  mentioned  it  in  language  which,  we  are  in 
clined  to  think,  indicates  that  he  knew  himself 
to  be  subject  to  it.  It  is  the  vice,  he  tells  us, 
of  subtle  minds  to  attach  too  much  importance 
to  slight  distinctions ;  it  is  the  vice,  on  the  other 
hand,  of  high  and  discursive  intellects  to  at 
tach  too  much  importance  to  slight  resem 
blances  ;  and  he  adds,  that  when  this  last  pro 
pensity  is  indulged  to  excess,  it  leads  men  to 
catch  at  shadows  instead  of  substances.f 

Yet  we  cannot  wish  that  Bacon's  wit  had 
been  less  luxuriant.  For,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  pleasure  which  it  affords,  it  was  in  the 
vast  majority  of  cases  employed  for  the  pur 
pose  of  making  obscure  truth  plain,  of  making 
repulsive  truth  attractive,  of  fixing  in  the 
mind  forever  truth  which  might  otherwise 
have  made  but  a  transient  impression. 

The  poetical  faculty  was  powerful  in  Bacon  s 
mind  ;  but  not,  like  his  wit,  so  powerful  as  oc 
casionally  to  usurp  the  place  of  his  reason, 
and  to  tyrannize  over  the  whole  man.  No 
imagination  was  ever  at  once  so  strong  and  so 
thoroughly  subjugated.  It  never  stirred  but  a'. 
a  signal  from  good  sense.  It  stopped  at  tne 


*  See   some   interesting  remarks  on  this  subject  in 
Pishop  Berkeley's    "Minute  Philosopher."     Dialog** 

f  JVcrum  Organum,  Lib.  1,  ADh.  55. 


286 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


first  check  from  good  sense.  Yet,  though  dis 
ciplined  to  such  obedience,  it  gave  noble  proofs 
of  its  vigour.  In  truth,  much  of  Bacon's  life 
was  passed  in  a  visionary  world — amidst  things 
as  strange  as  any  that  are  described  in  the 
"Arabian  Tales,"  or  in  those  romances  on 
which  the  curate  and  barber  of  Don  Quixote's 
village  performed  so  cruel  an  auto-da-fe — 
amidst  buildings  more  sumptuous  than  the 
palace  of  Aladdin,  fountains  more  wonderful 
than  the  golden  water  of  Parizade,  conveyances 
more  rapid  than  the  hippogryph  of  Ruggiero, 
arms  more  formidable  than  the  lance  of  As- 
tolfo,  remedies  more  efficacious  than  the  balsam 
of  Fierabras.  Yet  in  his  magnificent  day 
dreams  there  was  nothing  wild — nothing  but 
what  sober  reason  sanctioned.  He  knew  that 
all  the  secrets  feigned  by  poets  to  have  been 
written  in  the  books  of  enchanters,  are  worth 
less  when  compared  with  the  mighty  secrets 
which  are  really  written  in  the  book  of  nature, 
and  which,  with  time  and  patience,  will  be 
read  there.  He  knew  that  all  the  wonders 
wrought  by  all  the  talismans  in  fable,  were 
trifles,  when  compared  to  the  wonders  which 
might  reasonably  be  expected  from  the  phi 
losophy  of  fruit;  and,  that  if  his  words  sank 
deep  into  the  minds  of  men,  they  would  pro 
duce  effects  such  as  superstition  had  never 
ascribed  to  the  incantations  of  Merlin  and  Mi 
chael  Scot.  It  was  here  that  he  loved  to  let  his 
imagination  loose.  He  loved  to  picture  to  him 
self  the  world  as  it  would  be  when  his  philoso 
phy  should,  in  his  own  noble  phrase,  "have 
enlarged  the  bounds  of  human  empire."*  We 
might  refer  to  many  instances.  But  we  will 
content  ourselves  with  the  strongest,  the  de 
scription  of  the  "House  of  Solomon"  in  the 
"  New  Atlantis."  By  most  of  Bacon's  contem 
poraries,  and  by  some  people  of  our  time,  this 
remarkable  passage  would,  we  doubt  not,  be 
considered  as  an  ingenious  rodomontade — a 
counterpart  to  the  adventures  of  Sinbad  or  Ba 
ron  Munchausen.  The  truth  is,  that  there  is 
not  to  be  found  in  any  human  composition  a 
passage  more  eminently  distinguished  by  pro 
found  and  serene  wisdom.  The  boldness  and 
originality  of  the  fiction  is  far  less  wonderful 
than  the  nice  discernment  which  carefully  ex 
cluded  from  that  long  list  of  prodigies  every 
thing  that  can  be  pronounced  impossible; 
every  thing  that  can  be  proved  to  lie  beyond 
the  mighty  magic  of  induction  and  of  time. 
Already  some  parts,  and  not  the  least  startling 
parts ,  of  this  glorious  prophecy  have  been  ac 
complished,  even  according  to  the  letter;  and 
the  whole,  construed  according  to  the  spirit,  is 
daily  ace  inplishing  all  around  us. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  circumstances 
in  the  history  of  Bacon's  mind,  is  the  order  in 
which  its  powers  expanded  themselves.  With 
him  the  fruit  came  first  and  remained  till  the 
last :  the  blossoms  did  not  appear  till  late.  In 
general  the  development  of  the  fancy  is  to  the 
development  of  the  judgment,  what  the  growth 
of  a  girl  is  to  the  growth  of  a  boy.  The  fancy 
attains  at  an  earlier  period  to  the  perfection  of 
its  beauty,  its  power,  and  its  fruitfulness  •  and, 

•  "New  Atlantis.** 


as  it  is  first  to  ripen,  it  is  also  first  to  fade.  It 
has  generally  lost  something  of  its  bloom  and 
freshness  before  the  sterner  faculties  have 
reached  maturity  :  and  is  commonly  withered 
and  barren  while  those  faculties  still  retain  all 
their  energy.  It  rarely  happens  that  the  fancy 
and  the  judgment  grow  together.  It  happens 
still  more  rarely  that  the  judgment  grows  faster 
than  the  fancy.  This  seems,  however,  to  have 
been  the  case  with  Bacon.  His  boyhood  and 
youth  appear  to  have  been  singularly  sedate. 
His  gigantic  scheme  of  philosophical  reform  is 
said  by  some  writers  to  have  been  planned 
before  he  was  fifteen ;  and  was  undoubtedly 
planned  while  he  was  still  young.  He  observed 
as  vigilantly,  meditated  as  deeply,  and  judged 
as  temperately,  when  he  gave  his  first  work  to 
the  world  as  at  the  close  of  his  long  career. 
But  in  eloquence,  in  sweetness,  and  variety  of 
expression,  and  in  richness  of  illustration,  hi? 
later  writings  are  far  superior  to  those  of  his 
youth.  In  this  respect  the  history  of  his  mind 
bears  some  resemblance  to  the  history  of  the 
mind  of  Burke.  The  treatise  on  the  "Sublime 
and  Beautiful,"  though  written  on  a  subject 
which  the  coldest  metaphysician  could  hardly 
treat  without  being  occasionally  betrayed  into 
florid  writing,  is  the  most  unadorned  of  all 
Burke's  works-  It  appeared  when  he  wa? 
twenty-five  or  twenty-six.  When  at  forty,  h 
wrote  the  "Thoughts  on  the  Causes  of  the  ex 
isting  Discontents,"  his  reason  and  his  judg 
ment  had  reached  their  full  maturity  ;  but  his 
eloquence  was  still  in  its  splendid  dawn.  At 
fifty,  his  rhetoric  was  quite  as  rich  as  good 
taste  would  permit;  and  when  he  died,  at 
almost  seventy,  it  had  become  ungracefully 
gorgeous.  In  his  youth  he  wrote  on  the  emo 
tions  produced  by  mountains  and  cascades ;  by 
the  masterpieces  of  painting  and  sculpture  ;  by 
the  faces  and  necks  of  beautiful  women,  in  the 
style  of  a  parliamentary  report.  In  his  old  age, 
he  discussed  treaties  and  tariffs  in  the  most 
fervid  and  brilliant  language  of  romance.  It 
is  strange  that  the  essay  on  the  "  Sublime  and 
Beautiful,"  and  the  "  Letter  to  a  Noble  Lord,'* 
should  be  the  productions  of  one  man.  But  it 
is  far  more  strange  that  the  essay  should  have 
been  a  production  of  his  youth,  and  the  letter 
of  his  old  age. 

We  will  give  very  short  specimens  of  Ba 
con's  two  styles.  In  1597,  he  wrote  thus 
"Crafty  men  contemn  studies;  simple  men 
admire  them ;  and  wise  men  use  them ;  for 
they  teach  not  their  own  use :  that  is  a  wisdorr 
without  them,  and  won  by  observation.  Read 
not  to  contradict,  nor  to  believe,  but  to  weigh 
and  consider.  Some  books  are  to  be  tasted 
others  to  be  swallowed,  and  some  few  to  be, 
chewed  and  digested.  Reading  maketh  a  full 
man,  conference  a  ready  man,  and  writing  an 
exact  man.  And  therefore  if  a  man  write 
little,  he  had  need  have  a  great  memory;  if  he 
confer  little,  have  a  present  wit ;  and  if  he  read 
little,  have  much  cunning  to  seem  to  know  that 
he  doth  not.  Histories  make  men  wise,  poets 
witty,  the  mathematics  subtle,  natural  philoso 
phy  deep,  morals  grave,  logic  and  rhetoric  able 
to  contend."  It  will  hardly  be  disputed  that 
this  is  a  passage  to  be  "  chewed  and  digested/ 


LORD   BACON. 


We  do  not  believe  that  Thucydides  himself  has 
anywhere  compressed  so  much  thought  into 
so  small  a  space. 

In  the  additions  which  Bacon  afterwards 
made  to  the  "Essays,"  there  is  nothing  supe 
rior  in  truth  or  weight  to  what  we  have  quoted. 
But  his  style  was  constantly  becoming  richer 
and  softer.  The  following  passage,  first  pub 
lished  in  1625,  will  show  the  extent  of  the 
change:  "Prosperity  is  the  blessing  of  the  Old 
Testament,  adversity  is  the  blessing  of  the 
New,  which  carrieth  the  greater  benediction 
and  the  clearer  evidences  of  God's  favour. 
Yet,  even  in  the  Old  Testament,  if  you  listen 
to  David's  harp  you  shall  hear  as  many  hearse- 
like  airs  as  carols ;  and  the  pencil  of  the  Holy 
Ghost  hath  laboured  more  in  describing  the 
afflictions  of  Job  than  the  felicities  of  Solomon. 
Prosperity  is  not  without  many  fears  and  dis 
tastes  ;  and  adversity  is  not  without  comforts 
and  hopes.  We  see  in  needleworks  and  em 
broideries  it  is  more  pleasing  to  have  a  lively 
work  upon  a  sad  and  solemn  ground,  than  to 
have  a  dark  and  melancholy  work  upon  a 
lightsome  ground.  Judge  therefore  of  the 
pleasure  of  the  heart  by  the  pleasure  of  the 
eye.  Certainly  virtue  is  like  precious  odours, 
most  fragrant  when  they  are  incensed  or 
crushed ;  for  prosperity  doth  best  discover 
rice,  but  adversity  doth  best  discover  virtue." 

It  is  by  the  "  Essays"  that  Bacon  is  best 
known  to  the  multitude.  The  Novum  Organum 
and  the  DC  Augmcntis  are  much  talked  of,  but 
little  read.  They  have  produced  indeed  a  vast 
effect  on  the  opinions  of  mankind;  but  they 
have  produced  it  through  the  operations  of  in 
termediate  agents.  They  have  moved  the 
intellects  which  have  moved  the  world.  It  is 
in.  the  "  Essays"  alone  that  the  mind  of  Bacon 
is  brought  into  immediate  contac<  with  rhe 
minds  of  ordinary  readers.  There,  ne  opens 
an  exoteric  school,  and  he  talks  to  plain  men 
in  language  which  everybody  understands, 
about  things  in  which  everybody  is  interested. 
He  has  thus  enabled  those  who  must  otherwise 
have  taken  his  merits  on  trust  to  judge  for 
themselves  ;  and  the  great  body  of  readers 
have,  during  several  generations,  acknow 
ledged  that  the  man  who  has  treated  with  such 
consummate  ability  questions  with  which  they 
are  familiar,  may  well  be  supposed  to  deserve 
all  the  praise  bestowed  on  him  by  those  who 
have  sat  in  his  inner  school. 

Without  any  disparagement  to  the  admirable 
treatise  De  Jlugmcntis,  we  must  say  that,  in  our 
judgment,  Bacon's  greatest  performance  is  the 
fir^t  book  of  the  Novum  Organum.  All  the  pe 
culiarities  of  his  extraordinary  mind  are  found 
there  in  the  highest  perfection.  Many  of  the 
aphorisms,  but  particularly  those  in  which  he 
gives  examples  of  the  influence  of  the  idola, 
show  a  nicety  of  observation  that  has  never 
been  surpassed.  Every  part  of  the  book  blazes 
with  wit,  but  with  wit  which  is  employed  only 
to  illustrate  and  decorate  truth.  No  book  ever 
made  so  great  a  revolution  in  the  mode  of 
thinking,  overthrew  so  many  prejudices,  in 
troduced  so  many  new  opinions.  Yet,  no  book 
was  ever  written  in  a  less  contentious  spirit. 
T\  iruly  conquers  with  chalk  and  not  with  steel. 


Proposition  after  proposition  enters  into  the 
mind,  is  received  not  as  an  invader,  but  as  a 
welcome  friend,  and  though  previously  un 
known,  becomes  at  once  domesticated.  But 
what  we  most  admire  is  the  vast  capacity  of 
that  intellect  which,  without  effort,  takes  in  at 
once  all  the  domains  of  science — all  the  past, 
the  present,  and  the  future,  all  the  errors  of 
two  thousand  years,  all  the  encouraging  signs 
of  the  passing  times,  all  the  bright  hopes  of  the 
coming  age.  Cowley,  who  was  among  the 
most  ardent,  and  not  among  the  least  discern 
ing  followers  of  the  new  philosophy,  has,  in  one 
of  his  finest  poems,  compared  Bacon  to  Moses 
standing  on  Mount  Pisgah.  It  is  to  Bacon,  we 
think,  as  he  appears  in  the  first  book  of  the 
Novum  Organum,  that  the  comparison  applies 
with  peculiar  felicity.  There  we  see  the  great 
Lawgiver  looking  round  from  his  lonely  eleva 
tion  on  an  infinite  expanse ;  behind  him  a 
wilderness  of  dreary  sands  and  bitter  waters 
in  which  successive  generations  have  so 
journed,  always  moving,  yet  never  advancing, 
reaping  no  harvest  and  building  no  abiding 
city;  before  him  a  goodly  land,  a  land  of  pro 
mise,  a  land  flowing  with  milk  and  honey. 
While  the  multitude  below  saw  only  the  flat 
sterile  desert  in  which  they  had  so  long  wan 
dered,  bounded  on  every  side  by  a  near  horizon, 
or  diversified  only  by  some  deceitful  mirage,  he 
was  gazing  from  a  far  higher  stand,  on  a  far 
lovelier  country — following  with  his  eye  the 
long  course  of  fertilizing  rivers,  through  ample 
pastures,  and  under  the  bridges  of  great  capi 
tals — measuring  the  distances  of  marts  and 
havens,  and  portioning  out  all  those  wealthy 
regions  from  Dan  to  Beersheba. 

It  is  painful  to  turn  back  from  contemplating 
Bac^rV  philosophy  to  contemplate  his  life. 
Yet  without  so  turning  back  it  is  impossible 
fairly  to  estimate  his  poweis.  He  left  the  Uni 
versity  at  an  earlier  age  than  that  at  which 
most  people  repair  thither.  While  yet  a  boy 
he  was  plunged  into  the  midst  of  diplomatic 
business.  Thence  he  passed  to  the  study  of 
a  vast  technical  system  of  law,  and  worked 
his  way  up  through  a  succession  of  laborious 
offices  to  the  highest  post  in  his  profession. 
In  the  mean  time  he  took  an  active  part  in 
every  Parliament;  he  was  an  adviser  of  the 
crown ;  he  paid  court  with  the  greatest  assi 
duity  and  address  to  all  whose  favour  was 
likely  to  be  of  use  to  him ;  he  lived  much  in 
society  ;  he  noted  the  slightest  peculiarities  of 
character  and  the  slightest  changes  of  fashion. 
Scarcely  any  man  has  led  a  more  stirring  life 
than  that  which  Bacon  led  from  sixteen  to 
sixty.  Scarcely  any  man  has  been  better  en 
titled  to  be  called  a  thorough  man  of  the  world. 
The  founding  of  a  new  philosophy,  the  impart 
ing  of  a  new  direction  to  the  minds  of  specu 
lators — this  was  the  amusement  of  his  leisure, 
the  work  of  hours  occasionally  stolen  from  the 
Woolsack  and  the  Council  Board.  This  con 
sideration,  while  it  increases  the  admiration 
with  which  we  regard  his  intellect,  increases 
also  our  regret  that  such  an  intellect  should  so 
often  have  been  unworthily  employed.  He 
well  knew  the  better  course,  and  had,  at  ono 


288 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


time,  resolved  to  pursue  it.  "  I  confess,"  said 
he  in  a  letter  written  when  he  was  still  young, 
**that  I  have  as  vast  contemplative  ends  as  I 
have  moderate  civil  ends."  Had  his  civil  ends 
continued  to  be  moderate,  he  would  have  been. 
not  only  the  Moses,  but  the  Joshua  of  philo 
sophy.  He  would  have  fulfilled  a  large  part 
of  his  own  magnificent  predictions.  He  would 
have  led  his  followers,  not  only  to  the  verge, 
but  into  the  heart  of  the  promised  land.  He 
would  not  merely  have  pointed  out,  but  would 
have  divided  the  spoil.  Above  all,  he  would 
have  left  not  only  a  great,  but  a  spotless  name. 
Mankind  would  then  have  been  able  to  esteem 
their  illustrious  benefactor.  We  should  not 
then  be  compelled  to  regard  his  character  with 
mingled  contempt  and  admiration,  with  min 
gled  aversion  and  gratitude.  We  should  not 
then  regret  that  there  should  be  so  many  proofs 
of  the  narrowness  and  selfishness  of  a  heart, 
the  benevolence  of  which  was  yet  large  enough 
ID  lake  ia  all  races  and  all  ages.  We  should 


not  then  have  to  blush  for  the  disingenuous, 
ness  of  the  most  devoted  worshipper  of  specu 
lative  truth,  for  the  servility  of  the  boldest 
champion  of  intellectual  freedom.  We  should 
not  then  have  seen  the  same  man  at  one  tinTS 
far  in  the  van,  and  at  another  time  far  in  the 
rear  of  his  generation.  We  should  not  then  be 
forced  to  own,  that  he  who  first  treated  legis 
lation  as  a  science  was  among  the  last  Eng 
lishmen  who  used  the  rack ;  that  he  who  first 
summoned  philosophers  to  the  great  work  of 
interpreting  nature  was  among  the  last  Eng 
lishmen  who  sold  justice.  And  we  should 
conclude  our  survey  of  a  life  placidly,  honour 
ably,  beneficently  passed,  "in  industrious  ob 
servations,  grounded  conclusions,  and  profita 
ble  inventions  and  discoveries,"*  with  feelings 
very  different  from  those  with  which  we  now 
turn  away  from  the  checkered  spectacle  of  so 
much  glory  and  so  much  shame. 

*  Frcin  a  Letter  of  Bacon  to  Lord  Burleigb. 


END  or  VOL. 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


289 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTOKY  OF  THE  REVOLUTION  IN 
ENGLAND,  IN  1688.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  1835.] 


IT  is  with  unfeigned  diffidence  that  we  ven-  [ 
lure  to  give  our  opinion  of  the  last  work  of  Sir 
James  Mackintosh.  We  have  in  vain  tried  to 
perform  what  ought  to  be  to  a  critic  an  easy 
and  habitual  act.  We  have  in  vain  tried  to 
separate  the  book  from  the  writer,  and  to  judge 
of  it  as  if  it  bore  some  unknown  name.  But 
it  is  to  no  purpose.  All  the  lines  of  that  vene 
rable  countenance  are  before  us.  All  the  little 
peculiar  cadences  of  that  voice,  from  which 
scholars  and  statesmen  loved  to  receive  the 
lessons  of  a  serene  and  benevolent  wisdom, 
are  in  our  ears.  We  will  attempt  to  preserve 
strict  impartiality.  But  we  are  not  ashamed 
to  own,  that  we  approach  this  relic  of  a  virtu 
ous  and  most  accomplished  man  with  feelings 
of  respect  and  gratitude  which  may  possibly 
perveri  jur  judgment. 

It  is  hardly  possible  to  avoid  instituting  a 
comparison  between  this  work  and  another 
celebrated  Fragment.  Our  readers  will  easily 
guess  that  we  allude  to  Mr.  Fox's  History  of 
JamcF  II.  The  two  books  are  written  on  the 
same  subject.  Both  were  posthumously  pub 
lished  Neither  had  received  the  last  correc 
tions.  The  authors  belonged  to  the  same  poli 
tical  party,  and  held  the  same  opinions  con 
cerning  the  merits  and  defects  of  the  English 
constitution,  and  concerning  most  of  the  pro 
minent  characters  and  events  in  English  his 
tory.  They  had  thought  much  on  the  princi 
ples  of  government;  but  they  were  not  mere 
speculators.  They  had  ransacked  the  archives 
of  rival  kingdoms,  and  pored  on  folios  which 
had  movide-ed  for  ages  in  deserted  libraries; 
but  they  wc'e  not  mere  antiquaries.  They 
had  one  eminent  qualification  for  writing  his 
tory  : — they  had  spoken  history,  acted  history, 
lived  history.  The  turns  of  political  fortune, 
the  ebb  and  flow  of  popular  feeling,  the  hidden 
mechanism  by  which  parties  are  moved,  all 
these  things  were  the  subjects  of  their  con 
stant  thought  and  of  their  most  familiar  con 
versation.  Gibbon  has  remarked,  that  his 
history  is  much  the  better  for  his  having  been 
an  officer  in  the  militia  and  a  member  of  the 
House  of  Commons.  The  remark  is  most  just. 
We  have  not  the  smallest  doubt  that  his  cam 
paign,  though  he  never  saw  an  enemy,  and  his 
jarliamentary  attendance,  though  he  never 
made  a  speech,  were  of  far  more  use  to  him 
than  years  of  retirement  and  study  would  have 
been.  If  the  time  that  he  spent  on  parade  and 


*  Y/isfory  of  the  Revolution  in  England,  in  1CS8.  Com 
prising  a  view  of  the  Ueign  of  James  the  Second,  from 
his  Accession,  to  the  Enterprise  of  the  Prince  of  Orange, 
by  the  late  Right  Honourable  Sir  JAMES  MACKINTOSH  ; 
and  completed  to  the  Settlement  of  the  Crown,  by  the 
Editor.  To  which  is  prefixed  a  Notice  of  the  Life,  Writ 
ings,  and  Speeches  of  Sir  James  Mackintosh.  4to.  Lon 
don.  1834. 

VOL.  1II.—3T 


at  mess  in  Hampshire,  or  on  the  Treasury- 
bench  and  atBrookes's  during  the  storms  which 
overthrew  Lord  North  and  Lord  Shelburne  had 
been  passed  in  the  Bodleian  Library,  he  mighf 
have  avoided  some  inaccuracies;  he  might 
have  enriched  his  notes  with  a  greater  number 
of  references  ;  but  he  never  would  have  pro 
duced  so  lively  a  picture  of  the  court,  the 
amp,  and  the  senate-house.  In  this  respect 
Mr.  Fox  and  Sir  James  Mackintosh  had  great 
advantages  over  almost  every  English  his 
torian  who  has  written  since  the  time  of  Bur* 
net.  Lord  Lyttleton  had  indeed  the  same  ad 
vantages  ;  but  he  was  incapable  of  using  them. 
Pedantry  was  so  deeply  fixed  in  his  nature, 
that  the  hustings,  the  treasury,  the  exchequer, 
the  House  of  Commons,  the  House  of  Lords, 
left  him  the  same  dreaming  schoolboy  that 
they  found  him. 

When  we  compare  the  two  interesting  work* 
of  which  we  have  been  speaking,  we  have  lit 
tle  difficulty  in  awarding  the  superiority  to  that 
of  Sir  James  Mackintosh.  Indeed,  the  supe 
riority  of  Mr.  Fox  to  Sir  James  as  an  orator  i$ 
hardly  more  clear  than  the  superiority  of  Sir 
James  to  Mr.  Fox  as  an  historian.  Mr.  Fox 
with  a  pen  in  his  hand,  and  Sir  James  on  his 
legs  in  the  House  of  Commons,  were,  we  think, 
each  out  of  his  proper  element.  They  were 
men,  it  is  true,  of  far  too  much  judgment  and 
ability  to  fail  scandalously  in  any  undertaking 
to  which  they  brought  the  whole  power  of  their 
minds.  The  History  of  James  II.  will  always 
keep  its  place  in  our  libraries  as  a  valuable 
book;  and  Sir  James  Mackintosh  succeeded  in, 
winning  and  maintaining  a  high  place  among 
the  parliamentary  speakers  of  his  time.  Yet 
we  could  never  read  a  page  of  Mr.  Fox's  writ 
ing,  we  could  never  listen  for  a  quarter  of  an 
hour  to  the  speaking  of  Sir  James,  without 
feeling  that  there  was  a  constant  effort,  a  tug 
up  hill.  Nature,  or  habit  which  had  become 
nature,  asserted  its  rights.  Mr.  Fox  wrote  de 
bates.  Sir  James  Mackintosh  spoke  essays. 

As  far  as  mere  diction  was  concerned,  in 
deed,  Mr.  Fox  did  his  best  10  avoid  those  faults 
which  the  habit  of  public  speaking  is  likely  tot 
generate.  He  was  so  nervously  apprehensive 
of  sliding  into  some  colloquial  incorrectness, 
of  debasing  his  style  by  a  mixture  of  parlia 
mentary  slang,  that  he  ran  into  the  opposite 
error,  and  purified  his  vocabulary  with  a  scru 
pulosity  unknown  to  any  purist.  "  Ciceronera 
Allobroga  dixit."  He  would  not  allow  Addison, 
Bolingbroke,  or  Middleton,  to  be  a  sufficien* 
authority  for  an  expression.  He  declared  ihat 
he  would  use  no  word  which  was  not  to  be  found1 
in  Dryden.  In  any  other  person  we  should 
have  called  this  solicitude  mere  loppery;  and« 
in  spite  of  all  our  admiration  for  Mr.  Fox.  w« 
2B 


290 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


cannot  but  think  that  his  extreme  attention  to 
the  petty  niceties  of  language  was  hardly 
worthy  of  so  manly  and  so  capacious  an  un 
derstanding.  There  were  purists  of  this  kind 
at  Rome ;  and  their  fastidiousness  was  cen 
sured  by  Horace  with  that  perfect  good  sense 
and  good  taste  which  characterize  all  his  writ 
ings.  There  were  purists  of  this  kind  at  the 
time  of  the  revival  of  letters :  and  the  ewo 
greatest  scholars  of  that  time  raised  their 
voices,  the  one  from  within,  the  other  from 
without  the  Alps,  against  a  scrupulosity  so  un 
reasonable.  "  Carent,"  said  Politian,  "  quae 
scribunt  isti  viribus  et  vita,  carent  actu,  carent 

affectu,  carent  indole Nisi  liber  ille 

proesto  sit  ex  quo  quid  excerpant,  colligere 
tria  verba  non  possunt Horum  sem 
per  igitur  oratio  tremula,  vacillans,  infirma. 

Quaeso  ne  ista  superstitione  te  alliges. 

Ut  bene  currere  non   potest  qui   pe- 

dum  ponere  studet  in  alienis  tantum  vestigiis, 
ita  nee  bene  scribere  qui  tanquam  de  prse- 
scripto  non  audet  egredi." — "Posthac,"  ex 
claims  Erasmus,  "non  licebit  episcopos  appel- 
lare  patres  reverendos,  nee  in  calce  literarum 
scribere  annum  a  Christo  nato,  quod  id  nus- 
quam  facial  Cicero.  Quid  autem  ineptius 
quam,  toto  seculo  novato,  religione,  imperils, 
magistratibus,  locorum  vocabulis,  aedificiis, 
cultu,  moribus,  non  aliter  audere  loqui  quam 
locutus  est  Cicero  1  Si  revivisceret,  ipse  Ci 
cero,  rideret  hoc  Ciceronianorum  genus." 

While  Mr.  Fox  winnowed  and  sifted  his 
phraseology  with  a  care,  which  seems  hardly 
consistent  with  the  simplicity  and  elevation  of 
his  mind,  and  of  which  the  effect  really  was  to 
debase  and  enfeeble  his  style,  he  was  little  on 
his  guard  against  those  more  serious  improprie 
ties  of  manner  into  which  a  great  orator,  who 
undertakes  to  write  history,  is  in  danger  of 
falling.  There  is  about  the  whole  book  a  ve- 
hemen-t,  contentions,  replying  manner.  Almost 
every  argument  is  put  in  the  form  of  an  inter 
rogation,  an  ejaculation,  or  a  sarcasm.  The 
writer  seems  to  be  addressing  himself  to  some 
imaginary  audience ;  to  be  tearing  in  pieces  a 
defence  of  the  Stuarts  which  has  just  been 
pronounced  by  an  imaginary  Tory.  Take,  for 
example,  his  answer  to  Hume's  remarks  on 
the  execution  of  Sydney  ;  and  substitute  "  the 
honourable  gentleman,"  or  "  the  noble  lord/'  for 
the  name  of  Hume.  The  whole  passage  sounds 
like  a  powerful  reply,  thundering  at  three  in 
the  morning  from  the  Opposition  Bench. 
While  we  read  it,  we  can  almost  fancy  that  we 
see  and  hear  the  great  English  debater,  such 
a.*,  ho  has  been  described  to  us  by  the  few  who 
can  still  remember  the  Westminster  Scrutiny, 
and  the  Oczakow  Negotiations,  in  the  full 
paroxysm  of  inspiration,  foaming,  screaming, 
choked  by  the  rushing  multitude  of  his  words. 
It  is  true  that  the  passage  to  which  we  have 
referred,  and  several  other  passages  which  we 
could  point  out,  are  admirable,  when  considered 
merely  as  exhibitions  of  mental  power.  We 
at  once  recognise  that  consummate  master  of 
the  whole  art  of  intellectual  gladiatorship, 
whose  Speeches,  imperfectly  as  they  have  been 
transmitted  to  us,  should  be  studied  day  and 
sight  by  every  man  who  wishes  to  learn  the 
iftience  of  logical  defence.  We  find  in  several 


parts  of  the  History  of  James  II.  fine  sp*oi- 
mens  of  that  which  we  conceive  to  have  been 
the  great  characteristic  of  Demosthenes  among 
the  Greeks,  and  of  Fox  among  the  orators  of 
England, — reason  penetrated,  and  if  we  may 
venture  on  the  expression,  made  red-hot  by 
passion.  But  this  is  not  the  kind  of  excellence 
proper  to  history;  and  it  is  hardly  too  much 
to  say,  that  whatever  is  strikingly  good  in  Mr. 
Fox's  Fragment  is  out  of  place. 

With  Sir  James  Mackintosh  the  case  was 
reversed.  His  proper  place  was  his  library,  a 
circle  of  men  of  letters,  or  a  chair  of  moral 
and  political  philosophy.  He  distinguished 
himself  highly  in  Parliament.  But  neverthe 
less  Parliament  was  not  exactly  the  sphere 
for  him.  The  effect  of  his  most  successful 
speeches  was  small,  when  compared  with  the 
quantity,  of  ability  and  learning  which  was 
expended  on  them.  We  could  easily  name 
men  who,  not  possessing  a  tenth  part  of  his 
intellectual  powers,  hardly  ever  address  the 
House  of  Commons  without  producing  a 
greater  impression  than  was  produced  by  his 
most  splendid  and  elaborate  orations.  His  lu 
minous  and  philosophical  disquisition  on  the 
Reform  Bill  was  spoken  to  empty  benches. 
Those,  indeed,  who  had  the  wit  to  keep  their 
seats,  picked  up  hints  which,  skilfully  used, 
made  the  fortune  of  more  than  one  speech. 
But  "it  was  caviare  to  the  general."  And  evea 
those  who  listened  to  Sir  James  with  pleasure 
and  admiration,  could  not  but  acknowledge  that 
he  rather  lectured  than  debated.  An  artist 
who  should  waste  on  a  panorama,  on  a  scene, 
or  on  a  transparency,  the  exquisite  finishing 
which  we  admire  in  some  of  the  small  Dutch 
interiors,  would  not  squander  his  powers  more 
than  this  eminent  man  too  often  did.  His  au 
dience  resembled  the  boy  in  the  "  Heart  of  Mid- 
Lothian,"  who  pushes  away  the  lady's  guineas 
with  contempt,  and  insists  on  having  the  white 
money.  They  preferred  the  silver  with  which 
they  were  familiar,  and  which  they  were  con 
stantly  passing  about  from  hand  to  hand,  to 
the  gold  which  they  had  never  before  seen,  and 
with  the  value  of  which  they  were  unacquainted. 

It  is  much  to  be  regretted,  we  think,  that  Sir 
James  Mackintosh  did  not  wholly  devote  his 
later  years  to  philosophy  and  literature.  His 
talents  were  not  those  which  enable  a  speaker 
to  produce  with  rapidity  a  series  of  striking 
but  transitory  impressions,  to  excite  the  minds 
of  five  hundred  gentlemen  at  midnight,  without 
saying  any  thing  that  any  one  of  them  will  be 
able  to  remember  in  the  morning.  His  argu 
ments  were  of  a  very  different  texture  from 
those  which  are  produced  in  Parliament  at  a 
moment's  notice, — which  puzzle  a  plain  man 
who,  if  he  had  them  before  him  in  writing, 
would  soon  detect  their  fallacy,  and  which  the 
great  debater  who  employed  them  forgets  with 
in  half  an  hour,  and  never  thinks  of  again. 
Whatever  was  valuable  in  the  compositions 
of  Sir  James  Mackintosh,  was  the  ripe  fruit 
of  study  and  of  meditation.  It  was  the  same 
with  his  conversation.  In  his  most  familiar 
talk  there  was  no  wildness,  no  inconsistency, 
no  amusing  nonsense,  no  exaggeration  for  the 
sake  of  momentary  effect.  His  mind  was  a 
vast  magazine,  admirably  arranged ;  every 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


29. 


thing  was  there,  and  every  thing  was  in  its  I 
place.  His  judgments  on  men,  on  sects,  on  | 
books,  had  been  often  and  carefully  tested  and  j 
weighed,  and  had  then  been  committed,  each 
to  its  proper  receptacle,  in  the  most  capacious 
and  accurately  constructed  memory  that  any 
human  being  ever  possessed.  It  would  have 
been  strange  indeed,  if  you  had  asked  for  any 
thin?  that  was  not  to  be  found  in  that  immense 
storehouse.  The  article  which  you  required 
was  riot  only  there.  It  was  ready.  It  was  in 
its  own  proper  compartment.  In  a  moment  it 
was  brought  down,  unpacked,  and  displayed. 
If  those  who  enjoyed  the  privilege — for  privi 
lege  indeed  it  was — of  listening  to  Sir  James 
Mackintosh,  had  been  disposed  to  find  some 
fault  in  his  conversation,  they  might  perhaps 
have  observed  that  he  yielded  too  little  to  the 
impulse  of  the  moment.  He  seemed  to  be 
recollecting,  not  creating.  He  never  appeared 
to  catch  a  sudden  glimpse  of  a  subject  in  a 
new  light.  You  never  saw  his  opinions  in  the 
making, — still  rude,  still  inconsistent,  and  re 
quiring  to  be  fashioned  by  thought  and  discus 
sion.  They  came  forth,  like  the  pillars  of  that 
temple  in  which  no  sound  of  axes  or  hammers 
was  heard,  finished,  rounded,  and  exactly  suit 
ed  to  their  places.  What  Mr.  Charles  Lamb 
has  said  with  much  humour  and  some  truth, 
of  the  conversation  of  Scotchmen  in  general, 
was  certainly  true  of  this  eminent  Scotchman. 
He  did  not  find,  but  bring.  You  could  not  cry 
halves  to  any  thing  that  turned  up  while  you 
were  in  his  company. 

The  intellectual  and  moral  qualities  which 
are  most  important  in  an  historian,  he  possessed 
in  a  very  high  degree.  He  was  singularly 
mild,  calm,  and  impartial,  in  his  judgments  of 
men  and  of  parties.  Almost  all  the  distin 
guished  writers  who  have  treated  of  English 
history  are  advocates.  Mr.  Hallam  and  Sir 
James  Mackintosh  are  alone  entitled  to  be 
called  judges.  But  the  extreme  austerity  of 
Mr.  Hallam  takes  away  something  from  the 
pleasure  of  reading  his  learned,  eloquent,  and 
judicious  writings.  He  is  a  judge,  but  a  hang 
ing  judge,  the  Page  or  Duller  of  the  high  court 
of  literary  justice.  His  black  cap  is  in  con 
stant  requisition.  In  the  long  calendar  of 
those  whom  he  has  tried,  there  is  hardly  one 
who  has  not,  in  spite  of  evidence  to  charac 
ter  and  recommendations  to  merc.y,  been  sen 
tenced  and  left  for  execution.  Sir  James, 
perhaps,  erred  a  little  on  the  other  side.  He 
liked  a  maiden  assize,  and  came  away  with 
white  gloves,  after  sitting  in  judgment  on 
batches  of  the  most  notorious  offenders.  He 
had  a  quick  eye  for  the  redeeming  parts  of  a 
character,  and  a  large  toleration  for  the  infir 
mities  of  men  exposed  to  strong  temptations. 
But  this  lenity  did  not  arise  from  ignorance  or 
neglect  of  moral  distinctions.  Though  he  al 
lowed,  perhaps,  too  much  weight  to  every  ex 
tenuating  circumstance  that  could  be  urged  in 
favour  of  the  transgressor,  he  never  disputed 
the  authority  of  the  law,  or  showed  his  inge 
nuity  by  refining  away  its  enactments.  On 
wry  occasion  he  showed  himself  firm  wnere 
}>nnc:ples  were  in  question,  but  full  of  charity 
toward'  individuals. 


We  have  no  hesitation  in  pronouncing  this 
Fragment  decidedly  the  best  history  now  ex 
tant  of  the  reign  of  James  the  Second.  It  con 
tains  much  new  and  curious  information,  of 
which  excellent  use  has  been  made.  The  ac 
curacy  of  the  narrative  is  deserving  of  high 
admiration.  We  have  noticed  only  one  mis 
take  of  the  smallest  Importance,  and  that,  we 
believe,  is  to  be  laid  to  the  charge  of  the  editor, 
who  has  far  more  serious  blunders  to  answer 
for.  The  pension  of  60,000  livres,  which  Lord 
Sunderland  received  from  France,  is  said  to 
have  been  equivalent  to  2,500Z.  sterling.  Sir 
James  had  perhaps  for  a  moment  forgotten, — 
his  editor  had  certainly  never  heard, — that  a 
great  depreciation  of  the  French  coin  took 
place  after  1888.  When  Sunderland  was  in 
power,  the  livre  was  worth  about  eighteen 
pence,  and  his  pension  consequently  amounted 
to  about  4,500/.  This  is  really  the  only  inac 
curacy  of  the  slightest  moment  that  we  have 
been  able  to  discover  in  several  attentive  pe 
rusals. 

We  are  not  sure  that  the  book  is  not  in  some 
degree  open  to  the  charge  which  the  idle  citi 
zen  in  the  Spectator  brought  against  his  pud 
ding.  "  Mem.  too  many  plums,  and  no  suet." 
There  is  perhaps  too  much  disquisition  and 
too  little  narrative;  and,  indeed,  this  is  the 
fault  into  which,  judging  from  the  habits  of 
Sir  James's  mind,  we  should  have  thought  him 
most  likely  to  fall.  What  we  assuredly  did 
not  anticipate  was,  that  the  narrative  would  be 
better  executed  than  the  disquisitions.  We 
expected  to  find,  and  we  have  found,  many  just 
delineations  of  character,  and  many  digres 
sions  full  of  interest,  such  as  the  account 
of  the  order  of  Jesuits,  and  of  the  state  of 
prison  discipline  in  England  a  hundred  and 
fifty  years  ago.  We  expected  to  find,  and  we 
have  found,  many  reflections  breathing  the 
spirit  of  a  calm  and  benignant  philosophy. 
But  we  did  not,  we  own,  expect  to  find  that 
Sir  James  could  tell  a  story  as  well  as  Voltaire 
or  Hume.  Yet  such  is  the  fact;  and  if  any 
person  doubts  it,  we  would  advise  him  to  read 
the  account  of  the  events  which  followed  the 
issuing  of  King  James's  famous  declaration, — 
the  meeting  of  the  clergy,  the  violent  scene  at 
the  Privy  Council,  the  commitment,  trial,  and 
acquittal  of  the  bishops.  The  most  superficial 
reader  must  be  charmed,  we  think,  by  the  live 
liness  of  the  narrative.  But  no  person  who  is 
not  acquainted  with  that  vast  mass  of  intracta 
ble  materials,  of  which  the  valuable  and  inte 
resting  part  has  been  extracted  and  condensed, 
can  fully  appreciate  the  skill  of  the  writer. 
Here,  and  indeed  throughout  the  book,  we  find 
many  harsh  and  careless  expressions,  which 
the  author  would  probably  have  removed  if  he 
had  lived  to  complete  his  work.  But,  in  spite 
of  these  blemishes,  we  must  say  that  we  should 
find  it  difficult  to  point  out,  in  any  modern  his 
torian,  any  passage  of  equal  length,  and  at  the 
same  time  of  equal  merit.  We  find  in  it  the 
diligence,  the  accuracy,  and  the  judgment  of 
Hallam.  united  to  the  vivacity  and  the  colour 
ing  of  Southev.  A  historv  of  England,  written 
througnout  in  tms  manner,  wou*d  be  the  most 
fascinating  book  in  the  language.  It  would  w 


292 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


more  in  request  at  the  circulating  libraries  than 
the  last  novel. 

Su  James  was  not,  we  think,  gifted  with 
poetical  imagination.  But  the  lower  kind  of 
imagination  which  is  necessary  to  the  histo 
rian,  he  had  in  large  measure.  It  is  not  the 
business  of  the  historian  to  create  new  world 
and  to  people  them  with  new  races  of  beings. 
He  is  to  Homer  and  Shakspeare,  to  Dante  and 
Milton,  what  Nollekens  was  to  Canova,  or 
Lawrence  to  Michel  Angelo.  The  object  of 
the  historian's  imagination  is  not  within  him  ; 
it  is  furnished  from  without.  It  is  not  a  vision 
of  beauty  and  grandeur  discernible  only  by  the 
eye  of  his  own  mind  ;  but  a  real  model  which 
he  did  not  make,  and  which  he  cannot  alter. 
Yet  his  is  not  a  mere  mechanical  imitation. 
The  triumph  of  his  skill  is  to  select  such  parts 
as  may  produce  the  effect  of  the  whole,  to  bring 
out  strongly  Kll  the  characteristic  features,  and 
to  throw  the  light  and  shade  in  such  a  manner 
as  may  heighten  the  effect.  This  skill,  as  far 
as  we  can  judge  from  the  unfinished  work  now 
before  us,  Sir  James  Mackintosh  possessed  in 
an  eminent  degree. 

The  style  of  this  Fragment  is  weighty,  man 
ly,  and  unaffected.  There  are,  as  we  have 
said,  some  expressions  which  seem  to  us 
harsh,  and  some  which  we  think  inaccurate. 
These  would  probably  have  been  corrected,  if 
Sir  James  had  lived  to  superintend  the  publi 
cation.  We  ought  to  add  that  the  printer  has 
by  no  means  done  his  duty.  One  misprint  in 
particular  is  so  serious  as  to  require  notice. 
Sir  James  Mackintosh  has  paid  a  high  and 
just  tribute  to  the  genius,  the  integrity,  and 
the  courage  of  a  good  and  great  man,  a  dis 
tinguished  ornament  of  English  literature,  a 
fearless  champion  of  English  liberty,  Thomas 
Burnet,  Master  of  the  Charter-House,  and  au 
thor  of  that  most  eloquent  and  imaginative 
work,  the  Telluris  Thcoria  Sacra.  Wherever 
the  name  of  this  celebrated  man  occurs,  it  is 
printed  "Bennet,"  both  in  the  text  and  in  the 
index.  This  cannot  be  mere  negligence  :  it  is 
plain  that  Thomas  Burnet  and  his  writings 
were  never  heard  of  by  the  gentleman  who  has 
been  employed  to  edite  this  volume;  and  who, 
not  content  with  deforming  Sir  James  Mackin 
tosh's  text  by  such  blunders,  has  prefixed  to  it 
a  calumnious  Memoir,  has  appended  to  it  a 
roost  unworthy  Continuation,  and  has  thus 
succeeded  in  expanding  the  volume  into  one 
of  the  thickest,  and  debasing  it  into  one  of  the 
worst  that  we  ever  saw.  Never  did  we  see  so 
admirable  an  illustration  of  the  old  Greek  pro 
verb,  which  tells  us  that  half  is  sometimes 
more  than  the  whole.  Never  did  we  see  a 
case  in  which  the  increase  of  the  bulk  was  so 
evidently  a  diminution  of  the  value. 

Why  such  an  artist  was  selected  to  deface  so 
line  a  Torso,  we  cannot  pretend  to  conjecture. 
We  read  that,  when  the  Consul  Mummius,  after 
the  taking  of  Corinth,  was  preparing  to  send 
to  Rome  some  works  of  the  greatest  Grecian 
sculptors,  he  toici  the  packers  that  if  they  broke 
his  Venus  or  his  Apollo,  he  would  force  them 
to  icstore  the  limbs  which  should  be  wanting. 
A  head  by  a  hewer  of  milestones,  joined  to  a 
bosom  by  Praxiteles,  would  not  surprise  or 


shock  us  more  than  this  Supplement.  The 
Memoir  contains  much  that  is  worth  read 
ing;  for  it  contains  many  extracts  from  the. 
compositions  of  Sir  James  Mackintosh.  Bui 
when  we  pass  from  what  the  biographer  has 
done  with  his  scissors,  to  what  he  has  done 
with  his  pen,  we  find  nothing  worthy  of  appro 
bation.  Instead  of  confining  himself  to  the 
only  work  which  he  is  competent  to  perform- 
that  of  relating  facts  in  plain  words—he  fa 
vours  us  with  his  opinions  about  Lord  Bacon, 
and  about  the  French  literature  of  the  age  of 
Louis  XIV. ;  and  with  opinions,  more  absurd 
still,  about  the  poetry  of  Homer,  whom  it  i? 
evident,  from  his  criticisms,  that  he  cannot 
read  in  the  original.  He  affects,  and  for  aught 
we  know,  feels  something  like  contempt  foi 
the  celebrated  man  whose  life  he  has  under 
taken  to  write,  and  whom  he  was  incompetent 
to  serve  in  the  capacity  even  of  a  corrector  of 
the  press.  Our  readers  may  form  a  notion  of 
the  spirit  in  which  the  whole  narrative  is  com 
posed,  from  expressions  which  occur  at  the 
beginning.  This  biographer  tells  us  that  Mack 
intosh,  on  occasion  of  taking  his  medical  de 
gree  at  Edinburgh,  "  not  only  put  off  the  writing 
of  his  Thesis  to  the  last  moment,  but  was  an 
hour  behind  his  time  on  the  day  of  examina 
tion,  and  kept  the  Academic  Senate  wailing 
for  him  in  full  conclave."  This  irregularity, 
which  no  sensible  professor  would  have  thought 
deserving  of  more  than  a  slight  reprimand,  is. 
described  by  the  biographer,  after  a  lapse  of 
nearly  half  a  century,  as  an  incredible  instance,, 
"not  so  much  of  indolence  as  of  gross  negli 
gence  and  bad  taste."  But  this  is  not  all.  Our 
biographer  has  contrived  to  procure  a  copy  of 
the  Thesis,  and  has  sate  down  with  his  Jls  in, 
prasenti  and  his  Propria  qua>  marihus  at  his  side» 
to  pick  out  blunders  in  a  composition  written 
by  a  youth  of  twenty-one,  on  the  occasion  al 
luded  to.  He  finds  one  mistake — such  a  mis 
take  as  the  greatest  scholar  might  commit  when 
in  haste,  and  as  the  veriest  schoolboy  would 
detect  when  at  leisure.  He  glories  over  this, 
precious  discovery  with  all  the  exultation  of  a 
pedagogue.  "  Deceived  by  the  passive  termi 
nation  of  the  deponent  verb  defungor,  Mackin 
tosh  misuses  it  in  a  passive  sense."  He  is 
not  equally  fortunate  in  his  other  discovery. 
" Laitik  conspimare"  whatever  he  may  think,  is 
not  an  improper  phrase.  Mackintosh  mfant 
to  say  that  there  are  men  whose  praise  is  a, 
disgrace.  No  person,  we  are  sure,  who  has 
read  this  Memoir,  will  doubt  that  there  are 
men  whose  abuse  is  an  honour. 

But  we  must  proceed  to  more  important 
matters.  This  writer  evidently  wishes  to  im 
press  his  readers  with  a  belief  that  Sir  James 
Mackintosh,  from  interested  motives,  aban 
doned  the  doctrines  of  the  "Vindicioe  Gallicop." 
Had  his  statements  appeared  in  their  natural 
place,  we  should  leave  them  to  their  natu 
ral  fate.  We  would  not  stoop  to  defend  Sir 
James  Mackintosh  from  the  attacks  of  fourth- 
rate  magazines  and  pothouse  newspapers.  But 
here  his  own  fame  is  turned  against  him.  A. 
book,  of  which  not  one  copy  would  ever  have 
been  bought  but  for  his  name  in  the  title-page, 
is  made  the  vehicle  of  the  slander.  Under 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


293 


such  circumstances  we  cannot  help  exclaim 
ing,  in  the  words  of  one  of  the  most  amiable 
of  Homer's  heroes,  — 


<5j<Ao<o 

Mfffffflo^a),  naaiv  yap  ctriffTuro  fieiXi 
ZOJMJ  co)v't  vvv  6'av  Oavaros  KOU  finipa  Ki\avti." 

We  have  no  difficulty  in  admitting  that,  dur 
ing  the  ten  or  twelve  years  which  followed  the 
appearance  of  the  "Vindicice  Gallicoe,"  the 
opinions  of  Sir  James  Mackintosh  underwent 
some  change.  But  did  this  change  pass  on 
him  alone  1  Was  it  not  common?  Was  it 
not  almost  universal?  Was  there  one  honest 
friend  of  liberty  in  Europe  or  in  America  whose 
ardour  had  not  been  damped,  whose  faith  in  the 
high  destinies  of  mankind  had  not  been  shaken! 
Was  there  one  observer  to  whom  the  French 
Revolution,  or  revolutions  in  general,  appeared 
exactly  in  the  same  light  on  the  day  when  the 
Bastille  fell  and  on  the  day  when  the  Girond 
ists  were  dragged  to  the  scaffold  —  the  day  when 
the  Directory  shipped  off  their  principal  oppo 
nent  for  Guiana,  or  the  day  when  the  Legisla 
tive  Body  was  driven  from  its  hall  at  the  point 
of  the  bayonet]  We  do  riot  speak  of  enthu 
siastic  and  light-minded  people  —  of  wits  like 
Sheridan,  or  poets  like  Alfieri,  but  of  the  most 
virtuous  and  intelligent  practical  statesmen, 
and  of  the  deepest,  the  calmest,  the  most  im 
partial  political  speculators  of  that  time.  What 
was  the  language  and  conduct  of  Lord  Spen 
ser,  of  Lord  Fitz  william,  of  Mr.  Grattan]  What 
is  the  tone  of  Dumont's  Memoirs,  written  just 
at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century?  What 
Tory  could  have  spoken  with  greater  disgust 
and  contempt  of  the  French  Revolution  and  its 
authors  ?  Nay,  this  writer,  a  republican,  and 
the  most  upright  and  zealous  of  republicans, 
has  gone  so  far  as  to  say  that  Mr.  Burke's 
work  on  the  Revolution  had  saved  Europe. 
The  name  of  M.  Dumont  naturally  suggests 
that  of  Mr.  Bentham.  He,  we  presume,  was  not 
ratting  for  a  place  ;  and  what  language  did  he 
hold  at  that  time?  Look  at  his  little  treatise 
entitled  "Sophismes  dnarchiques"  In  that  trea 
tise  he  says,  that  the  atrocities  of  the  Revolu 
tion  were  the  natural  consequences  of  the  ab 
surd  principles  on  which  it  was  commenced;  — 
that  while  the  chiefs  of  the  constituent  assem 
bly  gloried  in  the  thought  that  they  were  pull 
ing  down  an  aristocracy,  they  never  saw  that 
their  doctrines  tended  to  produce  an  evil  a 
hundred  times  more  formidable  —  anarchy;  — 
that  the  theory  laid  down  in  the  "Declaration 
of  the  Rights  of  Man"  had,  in  a  great  measure, 
produced  the  crimes  of  the  Reign  of  Terror;  — 
that  none  but  an  eye-witness  could  imagine 
the  horrors  of  a  state  of  society  in  which  com 
ments  on  that  Declaration  were  put  forth  by 
men  with  no  food  in  their  bellies,  with  rags  on 
their  backs,  and  with  arms  in  their  hands.  He 
praises  the  English  Parliament  for  the  dislike 
which  it  has  always  shown  to  abstract  reason 
ings,  and  to  the  affirming  of  general  principles. 
In  M.  Dumont's  preface  to  the  "Treatise  on  the 
Principles  of  Legislation"  —  a  preface  written 
under  the  eye  of  Mr.  Bentham  and  published 
•with  his  sanction  —  are  the  following  still  more 
remarkable  expressions  :  —  "  M.  Bentham  est 
bien  loin  d'attacher  une  preference  exclusive 


a  aucune  forme  de  gouvernement.  II  pense 
que  la  meilleure  constitution  pour  un  peuplc 

est  celle  a  laquelle  il  est  accoutume 

Le  vice  fondamental  des  theories  sur  les  con 
stitutions  politiques,  c'est  de  commencer  par 
attaquer  celles  qui  existent,  et  d'exciter  toui  au 
moins  des  inquietudes  et  des  jalousies  de  pou- 
voir.  Une  telle  disposition  n'est  poii.  t  favor 
able  au  perfectionnement  des  lois.  La  seule 
epoque  ou  Ton  puisse  entreprendre  avec  suc- 
ces  de  grandes  reformes  de  legislation,  est 
celle  ou  les  passions  publiqu.es  sont  calmes,  et 
ou  le  go'ivernement  jouit  de  la  stabilite  la  plus 
grande.  L'objet  de  M.  Bentham,  en  cherch.int 
dans  le  vice  des  lois  la  cause  de  la  plupart  des 
maux,  a  ete  constamment  d'eloigner  le  plus 
grand  de  tous,  le  bouleversement  de  1'autorite, 
les  revolutions  de  propriete  et  de  pouvoir." 

To  so  conservative  a  frame  of  mind  had  the 
excesses  of  the  French  Revolution  brought  the 
most  uncompromising  reformers  of  that  time. 
And  why  is  one  person  to  be  singled  out  from 
among  millions  and  arraigned  before  posterity 
as  a  traitor  to  his  opinions,  only  because  events 
produced  on  him  the  effect  which  they  pro 
duced  on  a  whole  generation?  This  biographer 
may,  for  aught  we  know,  have  revelations  from 
Heaven  like  Mr.  Percival,  or  pure  anticipated 
cognitions  like  the  disciples  of  Kant.  But  such 
poor  creatures  as  Mackintosh,  Dumont,  and 
Bentham  had  nothing  but  observation  and  rea 
son  to  guide  them,  and  they  obeyed  the  guidance 
of  observation  and  reason.  How  is  it  in  phy 
sics?  A  traveller  falls  in  with  a  fruit  which 
he  had  never  before  seen.  He  tastes  it,  and 
finds  it  sweet  and  refreshing.  He  praises  it, 
and  resolves  to  introduce  it  into  his  own  coun 
try.  But  in  a  few  minutes  he  is  taken  violently 
sick;  he  is  convulsed;  he  is  at  the  point  of 
death ;  no  medicine  gives  him  relief.  He  of 
course  pronounces  fhis  delicious  food  a  poison, 
blames  his  own  folly  in, tasting  it,  and  cautions 
his  friends  against  it.  After  a  long  and  violent 
struggle  he  recovers,  and  finds  himself  much 
exhausted  by  his  sufferings,  but  free  from  some 
chronic  complaints  which  had  been  the  torment 
of  his  life.  He  then  changes  his  opinion  again, 
and  pronounces  this  fruit  a  very  powerful  re 
medy,  which  ought  to  be  employed  only  in  ex 
treme  cases,  and  with  great  caution,  but  which 
ought  not  to  be  absolutely  excluded  from  the 
"Pharmacopoeia."  And  would  it  not  be  the 
height  of  absurdity  to  call  such  a  man  fickle 
and  inconsistent  because  he  had  repeatedly 
altered  his  judgment?  If  he  had  not  altered 
his  judgment,  would  he  have  been  a  rational 
being?  It  was  exactly  the  same  with  the 
French  Revolution.  That  event  was  a  new 
phenomenon  in  politics.  Nothing  that  nact 
gone  before  enabled  any  person  to  judge  wilh, 
certainty  of  the  course  which  affairs  might 
take.  At  first  the  effect  was  the  reform  of  great 
abuses,  and  honest  men  rejoiced.  Then  came 
commotion, proscription, confiscation,  the  bank  > 
ruptcy,  the  assignats,  the  maximum,  civil  war 
foreign  war,  revolutionary  tribunals,  guillotin- 
ades,  noyades,  fusillades.  Yet  a  little  while, 
and  a  military  despotism  rose  out  of  the  con 
fusion,  and  threatened  the  independence  of 
every  state  in  Europe.  And  yet  again  a  litti* 
while,  and  the  old  dynasty  returned,  followed 
2  B  3 


294 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


by  a  train  of  emigrants  eager  to  restore  the  old 
abuses.  We  have  now,  we  think,  the  whcle 
before  us.  We  should  therefore  he  justly 
accused  of  levity  or  insincerity  if  our  lan 
guage  concerning  those  events  were  constant 
ly  changing.  It  is  our  deliberate  opinion  that 
the  French  Revolution,  in  spite  of  all  its  crimes 
and  follies,  was  a  great  blessing  to  mankind. 
But  it  was  not  only  natural,  but  inevitable,  that 
those  who  had  only  seen  the  first  act  should  be 
ignorant  of  the  catastrophe,  and  should  be  al 
ternately  elated  and  depressed  as  the  plot  went 
on  disclosing  itself  to  them.  A  man  who  had 
held  exactly  the  same  opinion  about  the  Revo 
lution  in  1789,  in  1794,  in  1804,  in  1814,  and 
"in  1834,  would  have  been  either  a  divinely  in 
spired  prophet  or  an  obstinate  fool.  Mackin- 
•tosh  was  neither.  He  was  simply  a  wise  and 
good  man ;  and  the  change  which  passed  on 
his  mind  was  a  change  which  passed  on  the 
mind  of  almost  every  wise  and  good  man  in 
Europe.  In  fact,  few  of  his  contemporaries 
changed  so  little.  The  rare  moderation  and 
calmness  of  his  temper  preserved  him  alike 
from  extravagant  elation  and  from  extrava 
gant  despondency.  He  was  never  a  Jacobin. 
He  was  never  an  An ti jacobin.  His  mind  os 
cillated  undoubtedly;  but  the  extreme  points 
of  the  oscillation  were  not  very  remote.  Here 
in  he  differed  greatly  from  some  persons  of  dis 
tinguished  talents  who  entered  into  life  at  near 
ly  the  same  time  with  him.  Such  persons  we 
have  seen  rushing  from  one  wild  extreme  to 
another — out-Paining  Paine — out-Castlereagh- 
ing  Castlereagh — Pantisocratists — ultra-Tories 
— Heretics — Persecutors — breaking  the  old 
iaws  against  sedition — calling  for  new  and 
sharper  laws  against  sedition — writing  demo 
cratic  dramas — writing  laureate  odes — pane 
gyrizing  Marten — panegyrizing  Laud — consist 
ent  in  nothing  but  in  an  intolerance  which  in 
any  person  would  be  offensive,  but  which  is 
altogether  unpardonable  in  men  who,  by  their 
own  confession,  have  had  such  ample  experi 
ence  of  their  own  fallibility.  We  readily  con 
cede  to  some  of  these  persons  the  praise  of  elo 
quence  and  of  poetical  invention,  nor  are  we 
by  any  means  disposed,  even  where  they  have 
been  gainers  by  their  conversion,  to  question 
their  sincerity.  It  would  be  most  uncandid  to 
attribute  to  sordid  motives  actions  which  ad 
mit  of  a  less  discreditable  explanation.  We 
think  that  the  conduct  of  these  persons  has 
been  precisely  what  was  to  be  expected  from 
men  who  were  gifted  with  strong  imagination 
and  quick  sensibility,  but  who  were  neither 
accurate  observers  nor  logical  reasoners.  It 
•was  natural  that  such  men  should  see  in  the 
victory  of  the  third  estate  in  France  the  dawn 
of  a  new  Saturn ian  age.  It  was  natural  that 
the  disappointment  should  be  proportioned  to 
the  extravagance  of  their  hopes.  Though  the 
direction  of  their  passions  was  altered,  the  vio 
lence  of  those  passions  was  the  same.  The 
force  of  the  rebouna  was  proportioned  to  the 
force  of  the  original  impulse.  The  pendulum 
s.wung  furiously  to  the  left  because  it  had  been 
drawn  too  far  to  the  right. 

We  own  that  nothing  gives  us  so  high  an 
iriea  of  the  judgment  and  temper  of  Sir  James 
Mackintosh  as  the  manner  in  which  he  shaped 


his  course  through  those  times.     Exposed  suc- 
;  cessively  to  two  opposite  infections,  he  took 
both  in  their  very  mildest  form.     The  consti- 
;  tution  of  his  mind  was  such  that  neither  of  the 
diseases    which   committed    such    havoc  all 
I  around  him  could,  in  any  serious  degree,  or  for 
I  any  great  length  of  time,  derange  his  intcl- 
:  lectual   health.       He,  like   every  honest   and 
|  enlightened  man  in  Europe,  saw  with  delight 
!  the  great  awakening  of  the  French   nation. 
j  Yet  he  never,  in  the  season  of  his  warmest 
i  enthusiasm,  proclaimed  doctrines  inconsistent 
with  the  safety  of  property  and  the  just  authori 
ty  of  governments.      He,  like   almost  every 
honest  and  enlightened  man,  was  discouraged 
and  perplexed  by  the  terrible  events  which  fol 
lowed.       Yet  he  never,  in  the   most  gloomy 
times,  abandoned  the  cause  of  peace,  of  liber 
ty,  and  of  toleration.     In  that  great  convulsion 
which  overset  almost  every  other  understand 
ing,  he  was  indeed  so  much  shaken  that  he  lean 
ed  sometimes  in  one  direction  and  sometimes  in 
the  other;  but  he  never  lost  his  balance.     The 
opinions  in  which  he  at  last  reposed,  and  to 
which,  in  spite  of  strong  temptations,  he  ad 
hered  with  a  firm,  a  disinterested,  an  ill-re 
quited  fidelity,  were  a  just  mean  between  those 
which  he  had  defended  with  a  youthful  ardour 
and  with  more   than  manly  prowess  against 
Mr.  Burke  ;  and  those  to  which  he  had  inclined 
during  the  darkest  and  saddest  years   in  the 
history  of  modern  Europe.      We  are   much 
mistaken  if  this  be  the  picture  either  of  a  weak 
or  of  a  dishonest  mind. 

What  his  political  opinions  were  in  his  lat 
ter  years  is  written  in  the  annals  of  his  country. 
Those  annals  will  sufficiently  refute  the  calum 
ny  which  his  biographer  has  ventured  to  pub 
lish  in  the  very  advertisement  to  his  work. 
"  Sir  James  Mackintosh,"  says  he,  "  was  avow 
edly  and  emphatically  a  Whig  of  the  Revo 
lution:  and  since  the  agitation  of  religious 
liberty  and  parliamentary  reform  became  a  na 
tional  movement,  the  great  transaction  of  1688 
has  been  more  dispassionately,  more  correctly, 
and  less  highly  estimated." — While  we  tran 
scribe  the  words,  our  anger  cools  down  into 
scorn.  If  they  mean  any  thing,  they  must 
mean  that  the  opinions  of  Sir  James  Mackin 
tosh  concerning  religious  liberty  and  parlia 
mentary  reform  went  no  further  than  those  of 
the  authors  of  the  Revolution, — in  other  words, 
that  Sir  James  Mackintosh  opposed  Catholic 
Emancipation,  and  quite  approved  of  the  old 
constitution  of  the  House  of  Commons.  The 
allegation  is  confuted  by  twenty  volumes  of 
parliamentary  debates,  nay,  by  innumerable 
passages  in  the  very  fragment  which  this  wri 
ter  has  done  his  little  utmost  to  deface.  We 
tell  him  that  Sir  James  Mackintosh  has  often 
done  more  for  religious  liberty  and  for  parlia 
mentary  reform  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour  than 
the  feeble  abilities  of  his  biographer  will  ever 
effect  in  the  whole  course  of  a  long  life. 

The  Continuation  which  follows  Sir  James 
Mackintosh's  Fragment  is  as  offensive  as  the 
Memoir  which  precedes  it.     We  do  not  pre 
tend  to  have  read  the  whole,  or  even  one  half 
i  of  it.     Three  hundred  quarto  pages  of  such 
^  matter  are  too  much  for  human,  patience.     It 
i  would  be  unjust  to  the  writer  not  to  present 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


295 


our  readers  few  of  whom,  we  suspect,  will  be 
his  readers,  with  a  sample  of  his  eloquence. 
We  will  treat  them  with  a  short  sentence,  and 
will  engage  that  they  shall  think  it  long  enough. 
"Idolatry!  fatal  word,  which  has  edged  more 
swords,  lighted  more  fires,  and  inhumanized 
more  hearts,  than  the.  whole  vocabulary  of  the 
passions  besides."  A  choice  style  for  history, 
we  must  own !  This  gentleman  is  fond  of  the 
Word  "vocabulary."  He  speaks  very  scorn 
fully  of  Churchill's  "vocabulary,"  and  blames 
Burnet  for  the  "  hardihood  of  his  vocabulary." 
What  this  last  expression  may  mean,  we  do 
not  very  clearly  understand.  But  we  are  quite 
sure  that  Burnet's  vocabulary,  with  all  its  hardi 
hood,  would  never  have  dared  to  admit  such  a 
word  as  "  inhumanized." 

Of  the  accuracy  of  the  Continuation  as  to 
matters  of  fact  we  will  give  a  single  specimen. 
With  a  little  time  we  could  find  twenty  such. 
*  Bishop  Lloyd  did  not  live  to  reap,  at  least 
to  enjoy,  the  fruit  of  his  public  labours  and 
secret  intrigues.  He  died  soon  after  the  Re 
volution,  upon  his  translation  from  St.  Asaph 
to  Worcester."  Nobody  tolerably  well  ac 
quainted  with  political,  ecclesiastical,  or  lite 
rary  history,  can  need  to  be  told  that  Lloyd  was 
Hot  made  Bishop  of  Worcester  till  the  year 
1699,  after  the  death  of  Stillingfleet;  that  he 
outlived  the  Revolution  nearly  thirty  years; 
and  died  in  the  reign  of  George  I.  This  blun 
der  is  the  more  inexcusable,  as  one  of  the  most 
curious  and  best  known  transactions  in  the 
time  of  Anne,  was  the  address  of  the  House  of 
Commons  to  the  queen,  begging  her  to  dismiss 
Lloyd  from  his  place  of  almoner. 

As  we  turn  over  the  leaves,  another  sentence 
catches  our  eye.  We  extract  it  as  an  instance 
both  of  historical  accuracy  and  philosophical 
profundity.  "Religion  in  1688  was  not  a  ra 
tional  conviction,  or  a  sentiment  of  benevo 
lence  and  charity;  but  one  of  the  malignant  | 
passions,  and  a  cause  of  quarrel.  Even  in  the 
next  age,  Congreve  makes  a  lying  sharper,  in 
one  of  his  plays,  talk  seriously  of  fighting  for 
his  religion."  What  is  meant  by  "  even  in  the 
next  age  1"  Congreve's  first  work,  the  novel 
of  "Cleophil,"  was  written  in  the  very  year 
1688;  and  the  "  Old  Bachelor,"  from  which  the 
quotation  is  taken,  was  brought  on  the  stage 
only  five  years  after  the  Revolution.  But  this 
great  logician  ought  to  go  further.  Sharper 
talks  of  fighting,  not  only  for  his  religion,  but 
for  his  friends.  We  presume,  therefore,  that 
in  the  year  1688,  friendship  was  "one  of  the 
malignant  passions,  and  a  cause  of  quarrel." 
But  enough  arid  too  much  of  such  folly. 

Never  was  there  such  a  contrast  as  that 
which  Sir  James's  Fragment  presents  to  this 
Continuation.  In  the  former,  we  have  scarcely 
been  able,  during  several  close  examinations, 
to  detect  one  mistake  as  to  matter  of  fact.  We 
never  open  the  latter  without  lighting  on  a  ri 
diculous  blunder  which  it  does  not  require  the 
assistance  of  any  book  of  reference  to  detect. 
The  author  has  not  the  smallest  notion  of  the 
state  of  England  in  1688;  of  the  feelings  and 
opinions  of  the  people  ;  of  the  relative  position 
of  parties  ;  of  the  character  of  one  single  pub 
lic  man  on  either  side.  No  single  passage  can 
give  any  idea  of  this  equally  liffused  ignorance, 


this  omninescience, — if  we  may  carry  the 
"hardihood  of  our  vocabulary"  so  far  as  to 
coin  a  new  word  for  what  is  to  us  quite  a  new 
thing.  We  take  the  first  page  on  which  we 
open  as  a  fair  sample,  and  no  more  than  a  fair 
sample,  of  the  whole. 

"  Lord  Halifax  played  his  part  with  deeper 
perfidy.  This  opinion  is  expressed  without  re 
ference  to  the  strange  statement  of  Bishop  Bur- 
net,  which  seems,  indeed,  too  inconsistent  to  be 
true.  It  should  be  cited,  however,  for  the  judg 
ment  of  the  reader.  '  The  Marquis  of  Halifax/ 
says  he,  (on  the  arrival  of  the  commissioners 
at  Hungerford,)  'sent  for  me;  but  the  prince 
said,  though  he  would  suspect  nothing  from 
our  meeting,  others  might;  so  I  did  not  speak 
with  him  in  private,  but  in  the  hearing  of  others. 
Yet  he  took  occasion  to  ask  me.  so  as  nobody 
observed  it,  if  we  had  a  mind  to  have  the  king  in 
our  hands.  I  said  by  no  means,  for  we  would 
not  hurt  his  person.  He  asked  next,  what  if  he 
had  a  mind  to  go  away  ?  I  said  nothing  was 
so  much  to  be  wished  for.  This  I  told  the 
prince,  and  he  approved  of  both  my  answers.' 

"  Is  it  credible  that  Lord  Halifax  started  an 
overture  of  the  blackest  guilt  and  infamy  in  a 
room  with  others,  in  a  mere  conversation  with 
an  inferior  personage,  who  had  little  credit  and 
no  discretion,  and  whilst  he  had,  it  has  been 
shown,  more  suitable  vehicles  of  communica 
tion  with  the  Prince  of  Orange !  Such  a  step 
outrages  all  probability  when  imputed  to  a 
statesman  noted  for  his  finesse.  But  why 
should  Burnet  invent  and  dramatize  such  a 
scene  ?  It  may  be  accounted  for  by  his  dis 
tinctive  character.  He  appears  throughout 
his  history  a  subaltern  partisan,  conscious  of 
his  inferiority,  and  struggling  to  convince 
others  and  himself,  that  he  was  a  personage  of 
the  first  pretension.  Such  a  man,  whose  vani 
ty,  moreover,  was  notoriously  unscrupulous, 
having  heard  of  the  intrigue  of  Lord  Halifax, 
would  seize  and  mould  it  to  his  purpose  as  a 
proof  of  his  importance,  and  as  an  episode  in 
his  history." 

And  this  is  the  man  who  has  been  chosen  to 
complete  a  work  which  Sir  James  Mackintosh 
left  unfinished !  Every  line  of  the  passage 
proves  the  writer  to  be  ignorant  of  the  most  no 
torious  facts,  and  unable  to  read  characters  of 
which  the  peculiarities  lie  most  open  to  super 
ficial  observation.  Burnet  was  partial,  vain, 
credulous,  and  careless.  But  Burnet  was  quite 
incapable  of  framing  a  deliberate  and  circum 
stantial  falsehood.  And  what  reason  does  this 
writer  assign  for  giving  the  lie  direct  to  the 
good  bishop  ?  Absolutely  none,  except  that 
Lord  Halifax  would  not  have  talkou  on  a  deli 
cate  subject  to  so  "  inferior  a  personage." 
Was  Burnet  then  considered  as  an  insignifi 
cant  man!  Was  it  to  an  insignificant  mah 
that  Parliament  voted  thanks  for  servicos  ren» 
dered  to  the  Protestant  religion?  "Was  ii 
against  aii  insignificant  man  that  Dry  den  put 
forth  all  his  powers  of  invective  in  the  most 
elaborate,  though  not  the  most  vigorous  of  his 
works  ?  Was  he  an  insignificant  man  whom 
the  great  Bossuet  constantly  described,  as  the 
most  formidable  of  all  the  champions  of  th** 
Reformation?  Was  it  to  an  insignificant  mat» 


296 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


:hat  King  William  gave  the  very  first  bishopric  j 
that  became  vacant  after  the  Revolution  1  Til- 
lotson,  Tennyson,  Stillingfleet,  Hough,  Patrick, 
all  distinguished  by  their  exertions  in  defence 
i)f  the  reformed  faith,  all  supporters  of  the  new 
government,  were  they  all  passed  by  in  favour 
of  a  man  of  no  weight — of  a  man  so  unimport 
ant  that  no  person  of  rank  would  talk  with  him 
about  momentous  affairs  1  And,  even  granting 
that  Burnet  was  a  very  "inferior  personage/ 
did  Halifax  think  him  sol  Everybody  knows 
the  contrary — that  is,  everybody  except  this 
writer.  In  1680  it  was  reported  that  Halifax 
was  a  concealed  Papist.  It  was  accordingly 
moved  in  the  House  of  Commons  by  Halifax's 
stepfather,  Chichley,  that  Dr.  Burnet  should  be 
examined  as  to  his  lordship's  religious  opi 
nions.  This  proves  that  they  were  on  terms 
of  the  closest  intimacy.  But  this  is  not  all. 
There  is  still  extant  among  the  writings  of 
Halifax  a  character  of  Burnet,  drawn  with  the 
greatest  skill  and  delicacy.  It  is  no  unmixed 
panegyric.  The  failings  of  Burnet  are  pointed 
out ;  but  he  is  described  as  a  man  whose  very 
failings  arose  from  the  constant  activity  of  his 
intellect.  "His  friends,"  says  the  Marquis, 

*  love  him  too  well  to  see  small  faults,  or  if  they 
do,  think  that  his  greater  talents  give  him  a 
privilege  of  straying  from  the  strict  rules  of 
caution."     Men  like  Halifax  do  not  write  ela 
borate  characters,  either  favourable  or  unfa 
vourable,  of  those   whom    they  consider   as 

*  inferior  personages."    Yet  Burnet,  it  seems, 
was  so  inferior  a  personage,  that  Halifax  would 
not  trust  him  with  a  secret !     And  what,  after 
all,  was  the  mighty  secret  1     This  writer  calls 
it  "  an  overture  of  guilt  and  infamy."     It  was 
no  overture  of  guilt  and  infamy.    It  was  no 
overture  at  all.    It  was,  on  the  face  of  it,  a  very 
simple  question,  which  the  most  devoted  adhe 
rent  of  King  James  might  naturally  and  pro 
perly  have  asked. 

This,  we  repeat,  is  only  a  fair  sample.  We 
have  not  observed  one  paragraph  in  the  vast 
mass,  which,  if  examined  in  the  same  manner, 
would  not  yield  an  equally  abundant  harvest 
of  error  a.i.d  impotence. 

What  most  disgusts  us  is  the  contempt  with 
which  the  writer  thinks  fit  to  speak  of  all 
things  that  were  done  before  the  corning  in  of 
the  very  last  fashions  in  politics.  What  he 
thinks  about  this,  or  about  any  other  matter,  is 
of  little  consequence,  and  would  be  of  no  con 
sequence  at  all,  if  he  had  not  deformed  an  ex 
cellent  work,  by  fastening  to  it  his  own  specu 
lations.  But  we  think  that  we  have  sometimes 
observed  a  leaning  towards  the  same  fault  in 
persons  of  a  very  different  order  of  intellect 
from  this  writer.  We  will  therefore  take  this 
opportunity  of  making  a  few  remarks  on  an 
error  which  is,  we  fear,  becoming  common; 
and  which  appears  to  us  not  only  absurd,  but 
as  pernicious  as  any  error  concerning  the 
transactions  of  a  past  age  can  possibly  be. 

We  shall  not,  we  hope,  be  suspected  of  a 
Digoted  attachment  to  the  doctrines  and  prac 
tices  of  past  generations.  Our  creed  is,  that 
»he  science  of  government  is  an  experimental 
science,  and  that,  like  all  other  experimental 
sciences,  it  is  generally  in  a  state  of  progres 
sion  No  man  is  so  obstinate  an  admirer  of 


the  old  times,  as  to  deny  that  medicine,  surge 
ry,  botany,  chemistry,  engineering,  navigation, 
are  better  understood  now  than  in  any  former 
age.  We  conceive  that  it  is  the  same  with 
political  science.  Like  those  other  sciences 
which  we  have  mentioned,  it  has  always  been 
working  itself  clearer  and  clearer,  and  deposit 
ing  impurity  after  impurity.  There  was  a 
time  when  the  most  powerful  of  human  intel 
lects  were  deluded  by  the  gibberish  of  the 
astrologer  and  the  alchymist;  and  just  so  there 
was  a  time  when  the  most  enlightened  and 
virtuous  statesmen  thought  it  the  first  duty  of  a 
government  to  persecute  heretics,  to  found 
monasteries,  tc  make  war  on  Saracens.  But 
time  advances,  facts  accumulate,  doubts  arise. 
Faint  glimpses  of  truth  begin  to  appear,  and 
shine  more  and  more  unto  the  perfect  day. 
The  highest  intellects,  like  the  tops  of  moun 
tains,  are  the  first  to  catch  and  to  reflect  the 
dawn.  They  are  bright,  while  the  level  below 
is  still  in  darkness.  But  soon  the  light,  which 
at  first  illuminated  only  the  loftiest  eminences, 
descends  on  the  plain,  and  penetrates  to  the 
deepest  valley.  First  come  hints,  then  frag 
ments  of  systems,  then  defective  systems,  then 
complete  and  harmonious  systems.  The  sound 
opinion,  held  for  a  time  by  one  bold  specu 
lator,  becomes  the  opinion  of  a  small  minority, 
of  a  strong  minority,  of  a  majority — of  man 
kind.  Thus,  the  great  progress  goes  on,  till 
schoolboys  laugh  at  the  jargon  which  imposed 
on  Bacon, — till  country  rectors  condemn  the 
illiberality  and  intolerance  of  Sir  Thomas 
More. 

Seeing  these  things — seeing  that,  by  the  con 
fession  of  the  most  obstinate  enemies  of  inno 
vation,  our  race  has  hitherto  been  almost 
.constantly  advancing  in  knowledge,  and  not 
seeing  any  reason  to  believe  that,  precisely  at 
the  point  of  time  at  which  we  came  into  the 
world,  a  change  took  place  in  the  faculties  of 
the  human  mind,  or  in  the  mode  of  discovering 
truth,  we  are  reformers  :  we  are  on  the  side  of 
progress.  From  the  great  advances  which 
European  society  has  made,  during  the  last 
four  centuries,  in  every  species  of  knowledge, 
we  infer,  not  that  there  is  no  more  room  for 
improvement,  but  that  in  every  science  which 
deserves  the  name,  immense  improvements 
may  be  confidently  expected. 

But  the  very  considerations  which  lead  us 
to  look  forward  with  sanguine  hope  to  the  fu 
ture,  prevent  us  from  looking  back  with  con 
tempt  on  the  past.  We  do  not  flatter  ourselves 
with  the  notion,  that  we  have  attained  per 
fection,  and  that  no  more  truth  remains  to  be 
found.  We  believe  that  we  are  wiser  than 
our  ancestors.  We  believe,  also,  that  our  pos 
terity  will  be  wiser  than  we.  It  would  be  gross 
injustice  in  our  grandchildren  to  talk  of  us  with 
contempt,  merely  because  they  may  have  sur 
passed  us — to  call  Watt  a  fool,  because  me 
chanical  powers  may  be  discovered  which 
may  supersede  the  use  of  steam — to  deride  the 
efforts  which  have  been  made  in  our  time  to 
improve  the  discipline  of  prisons,  and  to  en 
lighten  the  minds  of  the  poor,  because  future 
philanthropists  may  devise  better  places  of 
confinement  than  Mr.  Bentham's  Panopticon, 
and  better  places  of  education  than  Mr,  Laa- 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


29V 


caster's  Schools.  As  we  would  have  our  de 
scendants  judge  us,  so  ought  we  to  judge  our 
fathers.  In  order  to  form  a  correct  estimate 
of  their  merits,  we  ought  to  place  ourselves  in 
their  situation — to  put  out  of  our  minds,  for  a 
time,  ail  that  knowledge  which  they,  however 
eager  in  the  pursuit  of  truth,  could  riot  have, 
and  which  we,  however  negligent  we  may 
have  been,  could  not  help  having.  It  was  not 
merely  difficult,  but  absolutely  impossible,  for 
the  best  and  greatest  of  men,  two  hundred 
years  ago,  to  be  what  a  very  commonplace 
person  in  our  days  may  easily  be,  and.  indeed, 
must  necessarily  be.  But  it  is  too  much  that 
the  benefactors  of  mankind,  after  having  been 
reviled  by  the  dunces  of  their  own  generation 
for  going  too  far,  are  to  be  reviled  by  the 
dunces  of  the  next  generation  for  not  going  far 
enough. 

The  truth  lies  between  two  absurd  extremes. 
On  one  side  is  the  bigot  who  pleads  the  wisdom 
of  our  ancestors  as  a  reason  for  not  doing  what 
they,  in  our  place,  would  be  the  first  to  do, — 
who  opposes  the  Reform  Bill  because  Lord 
Somers  did  not  see  the  necessity  of  parlia 
mentary  reform, — who  would  have  opposed 
•the  Revolution  because  Ridley  and  Cranmer 
professed  boundless  submission  to  the  royal 
prerogative, — and  who  would  have  opposed 
the  Reformation  because  the  Fitzwalters  and 
Marischals,  whose  seals  are  set  to  the  Great 
Charter,  were  devoted  adherents  to  the  Church 
of  Rome.  On  the  other  side  is  the  conceited 
sciolist  who  speaks  with  scorn  of  the  Great 
Charter,  because  it  did  not  reform  the  church  ; 
of  ihe  Reformation,  because  it  did  not  limit  the 
prerogative;  and  of  the  Revolution, because  it 
did  not  purify  the  House  of  Commons.  The 
former  of  these  errors  we  have  often  combated, 
and  shall  always  be  ready  to  combat;  the  lat 
ter,  though  rapidly  spreading,  has  not,  we 
think,  yet  come  under  our  notice.  The  former 
error  bears  directly  on  practical  questions,  and 
obstructs  useful  reforms.  It  may,  therefore, 
seem  to  be,  and  probably  is,  the  more  mis 
chievous  of  the  two.  But  the  latter  is 
equally  absurd;  it  is  at  least  equally  symp 
tomatic  of  a  shallow  understanding  and  an 
unamiable  temper;  and,  if  it  should  ever 
become  general,  it  will,  we  are  satisfied,  pro 
duce  very  prejudicial  effects.  Its  tendency  is 
to  deprive  the  benefactors  of  mankind  of  their 
honest  fame,  and  to  put  the  best  and  the  worst 
men  of  past  times  on  the  same  level.  The  au 
thor  of  a  great  reformation  is  almost  always 
unpopular  in  his  own  age.  He  generally 
passes  his  life  in  disquiet  and  danger.  It  is 
therefore  for  the  interest  of  the  human  race 
that  the  memory  of  such  men  should  be  had  in 
reverence,  and  that  they  should  be  supported 
against  the  scorn  and  hatred  of  their  contem 
poraries,  by  the  hope  of  leaving  a  great  and 
imperishable  name.  To  go  on  the  forlorn 
hope  of  truth  is  a  service  of  peril :  who  will 
undertake  it,  if  it  be  not  also  a  service  of  ho 
nour  1  It  is  easy  enough,  after  the  ramparts 
are  carried,  to  find  men  to  plant  the  flag  on  the 
highest  tower.  The  difficulty  is  to  find  men 
who  are  ready  to  go  first  into  the  breach  ;  and 
it  would  be  bad  policy  indeed  to  insult  their 
VOL.  III.— 38 


remains  because  they  fell  in  the  breach,  and 
did  not  live  to  penetrate  to  the  citadel. 

Now  here  we  have  a  book  written  by  a  man 
who  is  a  very  bad  specimen  of  the  English  of 
the  nineteenth  century, — a  man  who  knows 
nothing  but,  what  it  is  a  scandal  not  to  know. 
And  if  we  were  to  judge  by  the  self-compla 
cent  pity  with  which  he  speaks  of  the  great 
statesmen  and  philosophers  of  a  former  age, 
we  should  guess  that  he  was  the  author  of  the 
most  original  and  important  inventions  in  po 
litical  science.  Yet  not  so  : — for  men  who  arc 
able  to  make  discoveries  are  generally  dis 
posed  to  make  allowances.  Men  who  are 
eagerly  pressing  forward  in  pursuit  of  truth 
are  grateful  to  every  one  who  has  cleared  an 
inch  of  the  way  for  them.  It  is,  for  the  most 
part,  the  man  below  mediocrity,  the  man  who 
has  just  capacity  enough  to  pick  up  and  repeat 
the  commonplaces  which  are  fashionable  in 
his  own  time, — it  is  he,  we  say,  who  look* 
with  disdain  on  the  very  intellects  to  which  it 
is  owing  that  those  commonplaces  are  not  still 
considered  as  startling  paradoxes  or  damnable 
heresies.  The  writer  is  just  the  man  who,  if 
he  had  lived  in  the  seventeenth  century,  would 
have  devoutly  believed  that  the  Papists  burned 
London, — who  would  have  swallowed  the 
whole  of  Oates's  story  about  the  forty  thou 
sand  soldiers  disguised  as  pilgrims,  who  were 
to  meet  in  Gallicia,  and  sail  thence  to  invade 
England, — who  would  have  carried  a  Pro 
testant  flail  under  his  coat, — and  who  would 
have  been  furious  if  the  story  of  the  warming- 
pan  had  been  questioned.  It  is  quite  natural 
that  such  a  man  should  speak  with  contemp* 
of  the  great  reformers  of  that  time,  because 
they  did  not  know  some  things  which  he  never 
would  have  known,  but  for  the  salutary  effects 
of  their  exertions.  The  men  to  whom  \ve  ow6 
it  that  we  have  the  House  of  Commons  are 
sneered  at  because  they  did  not  suffer  the  de 
bates  of  the  House  to  be  published.  The 
authors  of  the  Toleration  Act  are  treated  as 
bigots,  because  they  did  not  go  the  whole 
length  of  Catholic  emancipation.  Just  so  we 
have  heard  a  baby,  mounted  on  the  shoulders 
of  its  father,  cry  out,  "  How  much  taller  I  am 
than  papa!" 

This  gentleman  can  never  want  matter  for 
pride,  if  he  finds  it  so  easily.    He  may  boast 
of  an  indisputable  superiority  to  all  the  great 
est  men  of  all  past  ages.     He  can  read  and 
write.    Homer  did  not  know  a  letter.     He  has 
been  taught  that  the  earth  goes  round  the  sun. 
Archimedes  held  that  the  sun  went  round  the 
!  earth.     He  is  aware  that  there  is  a  place  called 
j  New  Holland.     Columbus  and  Gama  went  to 
j  their  graves  in  ignorance  of  the  fact.     He  has 
I  heard  of  the  Georgium  Sidus.     Newton  was 
i  ignorant  of  the  existence  of  such  a  planet.   He 
i  is   acquainted   with   the   use   of    gunpowder. 
!  Hannibal  and  Ccesar  won  their  victories  with 
j  sword  and  spear.     We  submit,  however,  thai 
I  is  not  the  way  in  which  men  are  to  be  esti- 
j  mated.     We  submit  that  a  wooden  spoon  of 
:  our  day  would  not  be  justified  in  calling  Gaii 
leo  and  Napier  blockheads,  because  they  never 
heard  of  the  different]'  il  calculus.     We  submit 
,  that  Caxton's  press  in  Westminster  Abbey, 


298 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


rude  as  it  is,  ought  to  be  looked  at  with  quite  : 
as  much  respect  as  the  best  constructed  ma 
chinery  that  ever,  in  our  time,  impressed  the  i 
clearest  type  on  the  finest  paper.  Sydenham 
first  discovered  that  the  cool  regimen  succeed 
ed  best  in  cases  of  small-pox.  By  this  dis 
covery  he  saved  the  lives  of  hundreds  of  thou 
sands  ;  and  we  venerate  his  memory  for  it, 
though  he  never  heard  of  inoculation.  Lady 
Mary  Montague  brought  inoculation  into  use; 
and  we  respect  her  for  it,  though  she  never 
heard  of  vaccination.  Jenner  introduced  vac 
cination  ;  \ve  admire  him  for  it,  and  we  shall 
continue  to  admire  him  for  it,  although  some 
still  safer  and  more  agreeable  preservative 
should  be  discovered.  It  is  thus  that  we  ought 
to  judge  of  the  events  and  the  men  of  other 
times.  They  Avere  behind  us.  It  could  not 
be  otherwise.  But  the  question  with  respect 
to  them  is  not  where  they  were,  but  which  way 
they  were  going.  Were  their  faces  set  in  the 
right  or  wrong  direction  ]  Were  they  in  the 
front  or  in  the  rear  of  their  generation  ?  Did 
they  exert  themselves  to  help  onward  the  great 
movement  of  the  human  race,  or  to  stop  it] 
This  is  not  charity,  but  simple  justice  and 
common  sense.  It  is  the  fundamental  law  of 
the  world  in  which  we  live  that  truth  shall 
grow, — first  the  blade,  then  the  ear,  after  that 
the  full  corn  in  the  ear.  A  person  who  com 
plains  of  the  men  of  1688  for  not  having  been 
men  of  1835,  might  just  as  well  complain  of 
projectiles  for  describing  a  parabola,  or  of 
quicksilver  for  being  heavier  than  water. 

Undoubtedly  we  ought  to  lock  at  ancient 
transactions  by  the  light  of  modern  knowledge. 
Undoubtedly  it  is  among  the  first  duties  of  an 
historian  to  point  out  the  faults  of  the  eminent 
men  of  former  generations.  There  are  no 
errors  which  are  so  likely  to  be  drawn  into 
precedent,  and  therefore  none  which  it  is  so 
necessary  to  expose,  as  the  errors  of  persons 
who  have  a  just  title  to  the  gratitude  and  ad 
miration  of  posterity.  In  politics  as  in  reli 
gion,  there  are  devotees  who  show  their  reve 
rence  for  a  departed  saint  by  converting  his 
tomb  into  a  sanctuary  for  crime.  Receptacles 
of  wickedness  are  suffered  to  remain  undis 
turbed  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  church, 
which  glories  in  the  relics  of  some  martyred 
apostle.  Because  he  was  merciful,  his  bones 
give  security  to  assassins.  Because  he  was 
chaste,  the  precinct  of  his  temple  is  filled  with 
licensed  stews.  Privileges  of  an  equally  ab 
surd  kind  nave  oeen  set  up  against  the  juris 
diction  of  political  philosophy.  Vile  abuses 
cluster  thick  round  every  glorious  event, — 
round  every  venerable  name;  and  this  evil 
assuredly  calls  for  vigorous  measures  of  lite 
rary  police.  But  the  proper  course  is  to  abate 
the  nuisance  without  defacing  the  shrine, — to 
drive  out  the  gangs  of  thieves  and  prostitutes 
without  doing  foul  and  cowardly  wrongs  to  the 
ashes  of  the  illustrious  dead. 

In  this  respect,  two  historians  of  our  time 
may  be  proposed  as  models,  Sir  James  Mack 
intosh  and  Mr.  Mill.  Differing  in  most  things, 
in  this  they  closely  resemble  each  other.  Sir 
James  is  lenient — Mr.  Mill  is  severe.  But 
neither  of  them  ever  omits,  in  the  apportioning 
ct  praise  and  censure,  to  make  ample  allow 


ances  for  the  state  of  political  science  and 
political  morality  in  former  kges.  In  the  work 
before  us,  Sir  James  Mack'.ntosh  speaks  with 
just  respect  of  the  Whigs  of  the  Revolution, 
while  he  never  fails  to  condemn  the  conduct 
of  that  party  towards  the  members  of  the 
Church  of  Rome.  His  doctrines  are  the  libe 
ral  and  benevolent  doctrines  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  But  he  never  forgets  that  the  men 
whom  he  is  describing  were  men  of  the  seven 
teenth  century. 

From  Mr.  Mill  this  indulgence,  or  to  speak 
more  properly,  this  justice,  was  less  to  be  ex 
pected.  That  gentleman,  in  some  of  his  works, 
appears  to  consider  politics,  not  as  an  experi 
mental,  and  therefore  a  progressive  science, 
but  as  a  science  of  which  all  the  difficulties 
may  be  resolved  by  short  synthetical  argu 
ments  drawn  from  truths  of  the  most  vulgar 
notoriety.  Were  this  opinion  well  founded,  the 
people  of  one  generation  would  have  little  or 
no  advantage  over  those  of  another  generation. 
But  though  Mr.  Mill,  in  some  of  his  essays,  has 
been  thus  misled,  as  we  conceive,  by  a  fond 
ness  for  neat  and  precise  forms  of  demonstra 
tion,  it  would  be  gross  injustice  not  to  admit 
that,  in  his  History,  he  has  employed  the  in 
ductive  method  of  investigation  with  eminent 
ability  and  success.  We  know  of  no  writer 
who  takes  so  much  pleasure  in  the  truly  use 
ful,  noble,  and  philosophical  employment  of 
tracing  the  progress  of  sound  opinions  from 
their  embryo  state  to  their  full  maturity.  He 
eagerly  culls  from  old  despatches  and  minutes 
every  expression  in  which  he  can  discern  the 
imperfect  germ  of  any  great  truth  which  has 
since  been  fully  developed.  He  never  fails  to 
bestow  praise  on  those  who,  though  far  from 
coming  up  to  his  standard  of  perfection,  yet 
rose  in  a  small  degree  above  the  common  level 
of  their  contemporaries.  It  is  thus  that  the 
annals  of  past  times  ought  to  be  written.  It  is 
thus,  especially,  that  the  annals  of  our  own 
country  ought  to  be  \vritten. 

The  history  of  England  is  emphatically  the 
history  of  progress.  It  is  the  history  of  a  con 
stant  movement  of  the  public  mind  which  pro 
duced  a  constant  change  in  the  institutions  c.f  a 
great  society.  We  see  that  society,  at  the  be 
ginning  of  the  twelfth  century,  in  a  state  more 
miserable  than  the  state  in  -which  the  most  de 
graded  nations  of  the  east  now  are.  We  see  it 
subjected  to  the  tyranny  of  a  handful  of  armed 
foreigners.  We  see  a  strong  distinction  of  caste 
separating  the  victorious  Norman  from  the 
vanquished  Saxon.  We  see  the  great  body  of 
the  population  in  a  state  of  personal  slavery. 
We  see  the  most  debasing  and  cruel  supersti 
tion  exercising  boundless  dominion  over  the 
most  elevated  and  benevolent  minds.  We  see 
the  multitude  sunk  in  brutal  ignorance,  and 
the  studious  few  engaged  in  acquiring  what 
did  not  deserve  the  name  of  knowledge.  In  the 
course  of  seven  centuries  this  wretched  and 
degraded  race  have  become  the  greatest  and 
most  highly  civilized  people  that  ever  the  world 
saw, — have  spread  their  dominion  over  every 
quarter  of  the  globe, — have  scattered  the  seeds 
of  mighty  empires  and  republics  over  vast 
continents  of  which  no  dim  intimation  had 
ever  reached  Ptolemy  or  Strabo, — have  created 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


299 


a  maritime  power  which  would  annihilate  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour  the  natives  of  Tyre,  Athens, 
Carthage,  Venice,  and  Genoa  together, — have 
carried  the  science  of  healing,  the  means  of 
locomotion  and  correspondence,  every  mecha 
nical  art,  every  manufacture,  every  thing  that 
promotes  the  convenience  of  life,  to  a  perfec 
tion  which  our  ancestors  would  have  thought 
magical, — have  produced  a  literature  abound 
ing  wilh  works  not  inferior  to  the  noblest  which 
Greece  has  bequeathed  to  us, — have  discovered 
the  laws  which  regulate  the  motions  of  the 
heavenly  bodies,  have  speculated  with  ex 
quisite  subtlety  on  the  operations  of  the  human 
mind, — have  been  the  acknowledged  leaders 
of  the  human  race  in  the  career  of  political 
improvement.  The  history  of  England  is  the 
history  of  this  great  change  in  the  moral,  intel 
lectual,  and  physical  state  of  the  inhabitants 
of  our  own  island.  There  is  much  amusing 
and  instructive  episodical  matter ;  but  this  is 
the  main  action.  To  us,  we  will  own,  nothing 
is  so  interesting  and  delightful  as  to  contem- 

S'ate  the  steps  by  which  the  England  of  the 
omesday  Book, — the  England  of  the  Curfew 
and  the  Forest  Laws, — the  England  of  crusa 
ders,  monks,  schoolmen,  astrologers,  serfs,  out 
laws, — became  the  England  which  we  know 
and  love, — the  classic  ground  of  liberty  and 
philosophy,  the  school  of  all  knowledge,  the 
mart  of  all  trade.  The  Charter  of  Henry 
Beauclerk, — the  Great  Charter, — the  first  as 
sembling  of  the  House  of  Commons, — the  ex 
tinction  of  personal  slavery, — the  separation 
from  the  See  of  Rome,— the  Petition  of  Right, 
— the  Habeas  Corpus  Act,— the  Revolution, — 
the  establishment  of  the  liberty  of  unlicensed 
printing, — the  abolition  of  religious  disabilities, 
— the  reform  of  the  representative  system, — all 
these  seem  to  us  to  be  the  successive  stages 
of  one  great  revolution  ;  nor  can  we  compre 
hend  any  one  of  these  memorable  events  un 
less  we  look  at  it  in  connection  with  those 
which  preceded  and  with  those  which  followed 
it.  Each  of  those  great  and  ever-memorable 
struggles,  —  Saxon  against  Norman,— Villein 
against  Lord, — Protestant  against  Papist, — 
Roundhead  against  Cavalier,  —  Dissenter 
against  Churchman, — Manchester  against 
Old  Sarum,  was,  in  its  own  order  and  sea 
son,  a  struggle  on  the  result  of  which  were 
staked  the  dearest  interests  of  the  human  race ; 
and  every  man  who  in  the  contests  which,  in 
his  time,  divided  our  country,  distinguished 
himself  on  the  right  side,  is  entitled  to  our  gra 
titude  and  respect. 

Whatever  the  conceited  editor  of  this  book 
may  think,  those  persons  who  estimate  most 
correctly  the  value  of  the  improvements  which 
have  recently  been  made  in  our  institutions, 
are  precisely  the  persons  who  are  least  dis 
posed  to  speak  slightingly  of  what  was  done  in 
1688.  Such  men  consider  the  Revolution  as  a 
reform,  imperfect  indeed,  but  still  most  benefi 
cial  to  the  English  people  and  to  the  human 
race, — as  a  reform  which  has  been  the  fruitful 
parent  of  reforms, — as  a  reform,  the  happy 
effects  of  which  are  at  this  moment  felt,  not 
only  throughout  our  own  country,  but  in  the 
cities  yf  France  and  in  the  depths  of  the  forests 
of  Ohio.  We  shall  be  pardoned,  we  hope,  if 


we  call  the  attention  of  our  readers  to  the 
causes  and  to  the  consequences  of  that  great 
event. 

We  said  that  the  history  of  England  is  the 
history  of  progress,  and,  when  we  take  a  com 
prehensive  view  of  it,  it  is  so.  But  when  ex 
amined  in  small  separate  portions,  it  may  with 
more  propriety  be  called  a  history  of  actions 
and  reactions.  We  have  often  thought  that  the 
motion  of  the  public  mind  in  our  country  re 
sembles  that  of  the  sea  when  the  tide  is  rising. 
Each  successive  wave  rushes  forward,  breaks, 
and  rolls  back;  but  the  great  flood  is  steadily 
coming  in.  A  person  who  looked  on  the  waters 
only  for  a  moment  might  fancy  that  thej'  were 
retiring,  or  that  they  obeyed  no  fixed  law,  but 
were  rushing  capriciously  to  and  fro.  But 
when  he  keeps  his  eye  on  them  for  a  quarter 
of  an  hour,  and  sees  one  sea-mark  disappear 
after  another,  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  doubt 
of  the  general  direction  in  which  the  ocean  is 
moved.  Just  such  has  been  the  course  of 
events  in  England.  In  the  history  of  the  na 
tional  mind,  which  is,  in  truth,  the  history  of 
the  nation,  we  must  carefully  distinguish  that 
recoil  which  regularly  follows  every  advance 
from  a  great  general  ebb.  If  we  take  short  in 
tervals—if  we  compare  1640  and  1660,  1680 
and  1685,  1708  and  1712,  1782  and  1794,— we 
find  a  retrogression.  But  if  we  take  centuries, 
— if,  for  example,  we  compare  1794  wilh  1660, 
or  with  1685, — we  cannot  doubt  in  which  di 
rection  society  is  proceeding. 

The  interval  which  elapsed  between  the  Re 
storation  and  the  Revolution,  naturally  divides 
itself  into  three  periods.  The  first  extends 
from  1660  to  1679,  the  second  from  1679  to 
1681,  the  third  from  1681  to  1688. 

In  1660  the  whole  nation  was  mad  with  loyal 
excitement.  If  we  had  to  choose  a  lot  from 
among  all  the  multitude  of  those  which  men 
have  drawn  since  the  beginning  of  the  world, 
we  would  select  that  of  Charles  the  Second  on 
the  day  of  his  return.  He  was  in  a  situation 
in  which  the  dictates  of  ambition  coincided 
with  those  of  benevolence,  in  which  it  was 
easier  to  be  virtuous  than  to  be  wicked,  to  be 
loved  than  to  be  hated,  to  earn  pure  and  im 
perishable  glory  than  to  become  infamous. 
For  once  the  road  of  goodness  was  a  smooth 
descent.  He  had  done  nothing  to  merit  the 
affection  of  his  people.  But  they  had  paid  him 
in  advance  without  measure.  Elizabeth,  after 
the  rout  of  the  Armada,  or  after  the  abolition 
of  monopolies,  had  not  excited  a  thousandth 
part  of  the  enthusiasm  with  which  the  young 
exile  was  welcomed  home.  He  was  not,  like 
Louis  the  Eighteenth,  imposed  on  his  subjects 
by  foreign  conquerors  ;  nor  did  he,  like  Louis 
the  Eighteenth,  come  back  to  a  country  which 
had  undergone  a  complete  change.  The  house 
of  Bourbon  was  placed  in  Paris  as  a  trophy 
of  the  victory  of  the  European  confederation. 
Their  return  was  inseparably  associated  in  th<J 
public  mind  with  the  cession  of  extensive  pro- 
j  vinces,  with  the  payment  of  an  immense  tri- 
I  bute,  with  the  devastation  of  flourishing  depart- 
|  ments,  with  the  occupation  of  the  kingdom  by 
|  hostile  armies,  with  the  emptiness  of  those 
j  niches  in  which  the  gods  of  Athens  and  R^mc 
'<  had  been,  the  objects  of  a  new  idolatry,  with 


300 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  nakedness  of  those  walls  on  which  the 
Transfiguration  had  shone  with  light  as  glorious 
as  that  which  overhung  Mount  Tabor.  They 
came  back  to  a  land  in.  which  they  could  re 
cognise  nothing.  The  seven  sleepers  of  the 
legend,  who  closed  their  eyes  when  the  Pagans 
v/ere  persecuting  .he  Christians,  and  woke 
when  the  Christians  \vere  persecuting  each 
other,  did  not  find  themselves  in  a  world  more 
completely  new  to  them.  Twenty  years  had 
done  the  work  of  twenty  generations.  Events 
had  come  thick.  Men  had  lived  fast.  The  old 
institutions  and  the  old  feelings  had  been  torn 
up  by  the  roots.  There  was  a  new  church 
founded  and  endowed  by  the  usurper;  a  new 
nobility,  whose  titles  were  taken  from  fields  of 
battle,  disastrous  to  the  ancient  line ;  a  new 
chivalry,  whose  crosses  had  been  won  by  ex 
ploits  which  had  seemed  likely  to  make  the 
banishment  of  the  emigrants  perpetual.  A 
•new  code  was  administered  by  a  new  magis 
tracy.  A  new  body  of  proprietors  held  the  soil 
by  a  new  tenure.  The  most  ancient  local  dis 
tinctions  had  been  effaced.  The  most  familiar 
names  had  become  obsolete.  There  was  no 
longer  a  Normandy,  or  a  Burgundy,  a  Brittany, 
or  a  Guienne.  The  France  of  Louis  the  Six 
teenth  had  passed  away  as  completely  as  one 
of  the  Preadamite  worlds.  Its  fossil  remains 
might  now  and  then  excite  curiosity.  But  it 
was  as  impossible  to  put  life  into  the  old  insti 
tutions  as  to  animate  the  skeletons  which  are 
imbedded  in  the  depths  of  primeval  strata.  It 
was  as  absurd  to  think  that  France  could  be 
again  placed  under  the  ancient  system,  as  that 
our  globe  could  be  overrun  by  mammoths. 
The  revolution  in  the  laws,  and  in  the  form  of 
government,  was  but  an  outward  sigh  of  that 
mightier  revolution  which  had  taken  place  in 
the  heart  and  brain  of  the  people,  and  which 
affected  every  transaction  of  life,— trading, 
farming,  .studying,  marrying,  and  giving  in 
marriage.  The  French  whom  the  emigrant 
prince  had  to  govern  were  no  more  like  the 
French  of  his  youth,  than  the  French  of  his 
youth  were  like  the  French  of  the  Jaqueri.  He 
came  back  to  a  people  who  knew  not  him  nor 
his  house, — to  a  people  to  whom  the  Bourbon 
was  no  more  than  a  Carlovingian  or  a  Mero 
vingian.  He  might  substitute  the  white  flag 
for  the  tri-colour;  he  might  put  lilies  in  the 
place  of  bees ;  he  might  order  the  initials  of 
the  emperor  to  be  carefully  effaced.  But  he 
could  turn  his  eyes  nowhere  without  meeting 
some  object  which  reminded  him  that  he  was 
a  stranger  in  the  place  of  his  fathers.  He 
returned  to  a  country  in  which  even  the  pass 
ing  traveller  is  every  moment  reminded  that 
there  has  lately  been  a  great  dissolution  and 
reconstruction  of  the  social  system.  To  win 
the  nearts  of  a  people  under  such  circum- 
Btance*  would  have  been  no  easy  task  even  for 
Henry  the  Fourth. 

hi  the  English  Revolution  the  case  was  alto 
gether  different.     Charles  was  not  imposed  on 
his  countrymen,  but  sought  by  them.  His  resto-  ! 
ration  was  not  attended  by  any  circumstance  \ 
which  could  inflict  a  wound  on  their  national 
pride     Insulated  by  our  geographical  position, ! 
insulated  by  our  character,  we  had  fought  out  our 
quarrel.*  and  effected  our  reconciliation  among 


ourselves.  Our  great  internal  questions  had 
never  been  mixed  up  with  the  still  greater 
question  of  national  independence.  The  poli 
tical  doctrines  of  the  Roundheads  were  not, 
like  those  of  the  French  philosophers,  doctrines 
of  universal  application.  Our  ancestors,  fcr 
the  most  part,  took  their  stand  not  on  a  general 
theory,  but  on  the  particular  constitution  of  the 
realm.  They  asserted  the  rights,  not  of  men, 
but  of  Englishmen.  Their  doctrines,  there 
fore,  were  not  contagious,  and,  had  it  been 
otherwise,  no  neighbouring  country  was  then 
susceptible  of  the  contagion.  The  language 
in  which  our  discussions  were  generally  con 
ducted  was  scarcely  known  even  to  a  single 
man  of  letters  out  of  the  islands.  Our  local 
situation  rendered  it  almost  impossible  that 
we  should  make  great  conquests  on  the  Conti 
nent.  The  kings  of  Europe  had,  therefore,  no 
reason  to  fear  that  their  subjects  would  follow 
the  example  of  the  English  Puritans.  They 
looked  with  indifference,  perhaps  with  compla 
cency,  on  the  death  of  the  monarch  and  the 
abolition  of  the  monarchy.  Clarendon  com 
plains  bitterly  of  their  apathy.  But  we  believie 
that  this  apathy  was  of  the  greatest  service  to 
the  royal  cause.  If  a  French  or  Spanish  aimy 
had  invaded  England,  and  if  that  army  had 
been  cut.  to  pieces,  as  we  have  no  doubt  it 
would  have  been,  on  the  first  day  on  which  it 
came  face  to  face  with  the  soldiers  of  Preston 
and  Dun  bar, — with  Colonel  Fight-the-good- 
Fight,  and  Captain  Smite-them-hip-and-tbigh, 
— the  house  of  Cromwell  would  probably  now 
have  been  reigning  in  England.  The  nation 
would  have  forgotten  all  the  misdeeds  of  the 
man  who  had  cleared  the  soil  of  foreign  in 
vaders. 

Happily  for  Charles,  no  European  state, 
even  when  at  war  with  the  Commonwealth, 
chose  to  bind  up  its  cause  with  that  of  the 
wanderers  \Vho  were  playing  in  the  garrets  of 
Paris  and  Cologne  at  being  princes  and  chan 
cellors.  Under  the  administration  of  Crom 
well,  England  was  more  respected  and  dreaded 
than  any  power  in  Christendom  ;  and,  even, 
under  the  ephemeral  government  which  fol 
lowed  his  death,  no  foreign  state  ventured  to 
treat  her  with  contempt.  Thus  Charles  came 
back,  riot  as  a  mediator  between  a  people  and 
a  victorious  enemy,  but  as  a  mediator  between 
internal  factions.  He  was  heir  to  the  con 
quests  and  to  the  influence  of  the  able  usurpef 
who  had  excluded  him. 

The  old  government  of  England,  as  it  had 
been  far  milder  than  the  old  government  of 
France,  had  been  far  less  violently  and  com 
pletely  subverted.  The  old  institutions  had 
been  spared,  or  imperfectly  eradicated.  Th6 
laws  had  undergone  little  alteration.  The  te 
nures  of  the  soil  were  still  to  be  learned  fiorrt 
Littleton  and  Coke.  The  Great  Charter  was 
mentioned  xvith  as  much  reverence  in  the 
Parliaments  of  the  Commonwealth  as  in  those 
of  any  earlier  or  of  any  later  age.  A  new  Con 
fession  of  Faith  and  anew  ritual  had  been  in 
troduced  into  the  church.  But  the  bulk  of  the 
ecclesiastical  property  still  remained.  The  col 
leges  still  held  their  estates.  The  parson  still 
received  his  tithes.  The  Lords  had,  at  a  crisis 
of  great  excitement,  been  excluded  by  military 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


301 


violence  from  their  House ;  but  they  retained 
their  titles  and  an  ample  share  of  public  vene 
ration.  When  a  nobleman  made  his  appear 
ance  in  the  House  of  Commons,  he  was  re 
ceived  with  ceremonious  respect.  Those  few 
Peers  who  consented  to  assist  at  the  inaugura 
tion  of  the  Protector  were  placed  next  to  him 
self,  and  the  most  honourable  offices  of  the  day 
were  assigned  to  them.  We  learn  from  the 
debates  of  Richard's  Parliament  how  strong  a 
hold  the  old  aristocracy  had  on  the  affections 
of  the  people.  One  member  of  the  House  of 
Commons  went  so  far  as  to  say,  that  unless 
their  lordships  were  peaceably  restored,  the 
country  might  soon  be  convulsed  by  a  war 
of  the  barons.  There  was  indeed  at  that  time 
no  great  party  hostile  to  the  Upper  House. 

There  was  nothing  exclusive  in  the  consti 
tution  of  that  body.  It  was  regularly  recruited 
from,  among  the  most  distinguished  of  the 
country  gentlemen,  thejawyers,  and  the  clergy. 
The  most  powerful  nobles  of  the  century  which 
preceded  the  civil  war,  the  Duke  of  Somerset, 
the  Duke  of  Northumberland,  Lord  Sudley,  the 
Earl  of  Leicester,  Lord  Burleigh,  the  Earl  of 
Salisbury,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham,  the  Earl 
of  Stratford,  had  all  been  commoners,  and  had 
all  raised  themselves,  by  courtly  arts  or  by 
parliamentary  talents,  not  merely  to  seats  in 
the  House  of  Lords,  but  to  the  first  influence 
in  that  assembly.  Nor  had  the  general  con 
duct  of  the  Peers  been  such  as  to  make  them 
unpopular.  They  had  not,  indeed,  in  opposing 
arbitrary  measures,  shown  so  much  eagerness 
and  pertinacity  as  the  Commons.  But  still 
they  had  opposed  those  measures,  They  had, 
at  the  beginning  of  the  discontents,  a  common 
interest  with  the  people.  If  Charles  had  suc 
ceeded  in  his  scheme  of  governing  without 
Parliaments,  the  consequence  of  the  Peers 
would  have  been  grievously  diminished.  If 
he  had  been  able  to  raise  taxes  by  his  own  au 
thority,  the  estates  of  the  Peers  would  have 
been  as  much  at  his  mercy  as  those  of  the  mer 
chants  or  the  farmers.  If  he  had  obtained 
the  power  of  imprisoning  his  subjects  at  his 
pleasure,  a  peer  ran  far  greater  risk  of  in 
curring  the  royal  displeasure,  and  of  being  ac 
commodated  with  apartments  in  the  Tower,  than 
any  city  trader  or  country  squire.  Accordingly, 
Charles  found  that  the  Great  Council  of  Peers 
which  he  convoked  at  York  would  do  nothing 
for  him.  In  the  most  useful  reforms  which 
were  made  during  the  first  session  of  the  Long 
Parliament,  the  Peers  concurred  heartily  with 
the  Lower  House;  and  a  large  and  powerful 
minority  of  the  English  nobles  stood  by  the 
popular  side  through  the  first  years  of  the  war. 
At  Edgehill,  Newbury,  Marston,  ard  Naseby, 
the  army  of  the  Houses  was  commanded  by 
members  of  the  aristocracy.  It  was  not  for 
gotten  that  a  peer  had  imitated  the  example  of 
Hampden  in  refusing  the  payment  ot'  the  ship- 
money,  or  that  a  peer  had  been  among  the  six 
members  of  the  legislature  whom  Charles  ille 
gally  impeached. 

Thus  the  old  constitution  of  England  was 
without  difficulty  re-established  ;  and  of  all  the 
parts  of  the  old  constitution  the  monarchical 
part  was,  at  the  time,  dearest  to  the  body  of  the 
peoole.  It  had  been  injudiciously  depressed, 


and  it  was  in  consequence  unduly  exalted. 
From  the  day  when  Charles  the  First  became 
a  prisoner,  had  commenced  a  reaction  in  fa 
vour  of  his  person  and  of  his  office.  From  the 
day  when  the  axe  fell  on  his  neck  before  the 
windows  of  his  palace,  that  reaction  became 
rapid  and  violent.  At  the  Restoration  it  had 
attained  such  a  point  that  it  could  go  no  fur 
ther.  The  people  were  ready  to  place  at  the 
mercy  of  their  sovereign  all  their  most  an 
cient  and  precious  rights.  The  most  servile 
doctrines  were  eagerly  avowed.  The  most, 
moderate  and  constitutional  opposition  was 
condemned.  Resistance  was  spoken  of  with 
more  horror  than  any  crime  which  a  human 
being  can  commit.  The  Commons  were  more 
eager  than  the  king  himself  to  avenge  the 
wrongs  of  the  royal  house;  more  desirous  than 
the  bishops  themselves  to  restore  the  church; 
more  ready  to  give  money  than  the  ministers 
to  ask  for  it.  They  abrogated  some  of  the  best 
laws  passed  in  the  first  session  of  the  Long- 
Parliament — laws  which  Falkland  had  sup 
ported,  and  which  Hyde  had  not  opposed. 
They  might  probably  have  been  induced  to  go 
further,  and  to  restore  the  High  Commission 
and  the  Star-Chamber.  All  the  contemporary 
accounts  represent  the  nation  as  in  a  state  of 
hysterical  excitement,  of  drunken  joy.  In  the 
immense  multitude  which  crowded  the  beach 
at  Dover,  and  bordered  the  road  along  which 
the  king  traveiled  to  London,  there  was  not 
one  who  was  not  weeping.  Bonfires  blazed. 
Bells  jingled.  The  streets  were  thronged  at 
night  by  boon  companions,  who  forced  all  ths 
passers  by  to  swallow  on  their  knees  brim 
ming  glasses  to  the  health  of  his  Most  Sacred 
Majesty,  and  the  damnation  of  Red-nosed  Noll 
That  tenderness  to  the  fallen  which  has,  through 
many  generations,  been  a  marked  feature  of 
the  national  character,  was  for  a  time  hardly 
discernible.  All  London  crowded  to  shout  and 
laugh  round  the  gibbet  where  hung  the  rotting 
remains  of  a  Prince  who  had  made  England 
the  dread  of  the  world, — who  had  been  the 
chief  founder  of  her  maritime  greatness  and 
of  her  colonial  empire, — who  had  conquered 
Scotland  and  Ireland, — who  had  humbled  Hol 
land  and  Spain, — the  terror  of  whose  name 
had  been  as  a  guard  round  every  English  tra 
veller  in  remote  countries,  a,nd  round  every 
Protestant  congregation  in  the  heart  of  Catho 
lic  empires.  When  some  of  those  brave  and 
honest,' though  misguided  men,  who  had  sate 
in  judgment  on  their  king,  were  dragreJ  on 
hurdles  to  a  d^ath  of  prolonged  torture,  their 
last  prayers  were  interrupted  by  the  hisses  and 
execrations  of  thousands. 

Such  was  England  in  1660,     In  1679  the 
whole  face  of  things   had   changed.     At  the 
former  of  those  epochs  twenty  years  of  com 
motion  had  made  the  majority  of  the  people 
ready  to  buy  repose  at  any  price.    At  the  latter 
i  epoch,  twenty  years  of  misgovernment  had 
I  made   the  same  majority  desirous   to   obtain 
j  security  for  their  liberties  at  any  risk.    The 
fury  of  their  returning  loyalty  had  spent  itself 
in  its  first  outbreak.     In  a  very  few  months 
they  had  hanged  and   half-hanged,  quartered 
and  embowel  led  enough  to  satisfy  them.    Thp 
Roundhead  pany  seemed   to  be  not  merr-1* 
3  C 


302 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


overcome,  but  too  much  broken  and  scattered 
ever  to  rally  again.  Then  commenced  the  re 
flux  of  public  opinion.  The  nation  began  to 
find  out  to  what  a  man  it  had  intrusted,  without 
conditions,  all  its  dearest  interests, — on  what 
a  man  it  had  laAashed  all  its  fondest  affection. 
On  the  ignoble  nature  of  the  restored  exile, 
adversity  had  exhausted  all  her  discipline  in 
vain.  He  had  one  immense  advantage  over 
most  other  princes.  Though  born  in  the  pur 
ple,  he  was  far  better  acquainted  with  the 
vicissitudes  of  life  and  the  diversities  of  cha 
racter  than  most  of  his  subjects.  He  had 
known  restraint,  danger,  penury,  and  depend 
ence.  He  had  often  suffered  from  ingratitude, 
insolence,  and  treachery.  He  had  received 
many  signal  proofs  of  faithful  and  heroic  at 
tachment.  He  had  seen,  if  ever  man  saw, 
both  sides  of  human  nature.  But  only  one 
side  remained  in  his  memory.  He  had  learn 
ed  only  to  despise  and  to  distrust  his  species, 
— to  consider  integrity  in  men,  and  modesty  in 
women,  as  mere  acting: — nor  did  he  think  it 
worth  while  to  keep  his  opinion  to  himself. 
He  was  incapable  of  friendship;  yet  he  was 
perpetually  led  by  favourites  without  being  in 
the  smallest  degree  duped  by  them.  He  knew 
Ehat  their  regard  to  his  interests  was  all  simu 
lated  ;  but  from  a  certain  easiness  which  had 
no  connection  with  humanity,  he  submitted, 
half-laughing  at  himself,  to  be  made  the  tool 
of  any  woman  whose  person  attracted  him,  or 
of  any  man  whose  tattle  diverted  him.  He 
thought  little  and  cared  less  about  religion. 
He  seems  to  have  passed  his  life  in  dawdling 
suspense  between  Hobbism  and  Popery.  He 
was  crowned  in  his  youth  with  the  Covenant 
in  his  hand;  he  died  at  last  with  the  Host 
sticking  in  his  throat ;  and,  during  most  of  the 
intermediate  years,  was  occupied  in  persecut 
ing  both  Covenanters  and  Catholics.  He  was 
not  a  tyrant  from  the  ordinary  motives.  He 
valued  power  for  its  own  sake  little,  and  fame 
still  less.  He  does  not  appear  to  have  been 
vindictive,  or  to  have  found  any  pleasing  ex 
citement  in  cruelty.  What  he  wanted  was  to 
be  amused, — to  get  through  the  twenty-four 
hours  pleasantly  without  sitting  down  to  dry 
business.  Sauntering  was,  as  Sheffield  ex 
presses  it,  the  true  Sultana  Queen  of  his  ma 
jesty's  affections.  A  sitting  in  council  would 
have  been  insupportable  to  him  if  the  Duke 
of  Buckingham  had  not  been  there  to  make 
mouths  at  the  Chancellor.  It  has  been  said, 
and  is  highly  probable,  that,  in  his  exile,  he 
was  quite  disposed  to  sell  his  rights  to  Crom 
well  for  a  good  round  sum.  To  the  last,  his 
Dnly  quarrel  with  his  Parliament  was,  that 
4hey  often  gave  him  trouble  and  would  not  al 
ways  give  him  money.  If  there  was  a  person 
for  whom  he  ftlt  a  real  regard,  that  person 
was  his  brother.  If  there  was  a  point  about 
which  he  really  entertained  a  scruple  of  con 
science  or  of  honour,  it  was  the  descent  of  the 
crown.  Yet  he  was  willing  lo  consent  to  the 
Exclusion  Bill  for  600,000/.;  and  the  negotia 
tion  was  broken  off  only  because  he  insisted 
rn  being  paid  beforehand.  To  do  him  justice, 
his  temper  was  good  ;  his  manners  agreeable ; 
Jus  natural  talents  above  mediocrity.  But  he 
was  sensual,  frivolous,  false,  and  cold-hearted, 


beyond  almost  any  prince  of  whom  history 
makes  mention. 

Under  the  government  of  such  a  man,  the 
English  people  could  not  be  long  in  recovering 
from  the  intoxication  of  loyalty.  They  were 
then,  as  they  are  still,  a  brave,  proud,  and  high- 
spirited  race,  unaccustomed  to  defeat,  to  shame, 
or  to  servitude.  The  splendid  administration, 
of  Oliver  had  taught  them  to  consider  their 
country  as  a  match  for  the  greatest  empires 
of  the  earth,  as  the  first  of  maritime  powers, 
as  the  head  of  the  Protestant  interest.  Though, 
in  the  day  of  their  affectionate  enthusiasm, 
they  might  sometimes  extol  the  royal  preroga 
tive  in  terms  which  would  have  better  become 
the  courtiers  of  Aurungzebe,  they  were  not  men 
whom  it  was  quite  safe  to  take  at  their  word. 
They  were  much  more  perfect  in  the  theory 
than  in  the  practice  of  passive  obedience. 
Though  they  might  deride  the  austere  manners 
and  scriptural  phrases  of  the  Puritans,  they 
were  still  at  heart  a  religious  people.  The 
majority  saw  no  great  sin  in  field-sports,  stage- 
plays,  promiscuous  dances,  cards,  fairs,  starch, 
or  false  hair.  But  gross  profaneness  and  li 
centiousness  were  regarded  with  general  hor 
ror;  and  the  Catholic  religion  was  held  in 
utter  detestation  by  nine-tenths  of  the  middle 
class. 

Such  was  the  nation  which,  awaking  from 
its  rapturous  trance,  found  itself  sold  to  a 
foreign,  a  despotic,  a  Popish  court,  defeated 
on  its  own  seas  and  rivers  by  a  state  of  far  in 
ferior  resources, — and  placed  under  the  rule 
of  panders  and  buffoons.  Our  ancestors  saw 
the  best  and  ablest  divines  of  the  age  turned 
out  of  their  benefices  by  hundreds.  They  saw 
the  prisons  filled  with  men  guilty  of  no  other 
crime  than  that  of  worshipping  God  according 
to  the  fashion  generally  prevailing  throughout 
Protestant  Europe.  They  saw  a  Popish  queen 
on  the  throne,  and  a  Popish  heir  on  the  steps 
of  the  throne.  They  saw  unjust  aggression 
followed  by  feeble  war,  and  feeble  war  ending 
in  disgraceful  peace.  They  saw  a  Dutch  fleet 
riding  triumphant  in  the  Thames ;  they  saw 
the  Triple  Alliance  broken,  the  Exchequer 
shut  up,  the  public  credit  shaken,  the  arms  of 
England  employed,  in  shameful  subordination, 
to  France,  against  a  country  which  seemed 
to  be  the  last  asylum  of  civil  and  religious 
liberty.  They  saw  Ireland  discontented,  and 
Scotland  in  rebellion.  They  saw,  meantime, 
Whitehall  swarming  with  sharpers  and  cour 
tesans.  They  saw  harlot  after  harlot,  and 
bastard  after  bastard,  not  only  raised  to  the 
highest  honours  of  the  peerage,  but  supplied 
out  of  the  spoils  of  the  honest,  industrious,  and 
ruined  public  creditor,  with  ample  means  of 
supporting  the  new  dignity.  The  government 
became  more  odious  every  day.  Even  in  the 
bosom  of  that  very  House  of  Commons,  whvch 
had  been  elected  by  the  nation  in  the  ecstasy 
of  its  penitence,  of  its  joy,  and  of  its  hope,  an 
opposition  sprang  up  and  became  powerful. 
Loyalty  which  had  been  proof  against  all  the 
disasters  of  the  civil  war,  which  had  survived 
the  routs  of  Nasebv  and  Worcester,  which  had 
never  flinched  from  sequestration  and  exile, 
which  the  Protector  could  never  intimidate  or 
seduce,  began  to  fail  in  this  last  and  hardest 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


303 


trial.  The  «*orm  had  long  been  gathering.  At 
length  it  burst  with  a  furv  which  threatened 
the  whole  frame  of  society  with  dissolution. 

When  the  general  election  of  1679  took  place, 
the  nation  had  retraced  the  path  which  it  had 
been  describing  from  1640  to  1660.  It  was 
again  in  the  same  mood  in  which  it  had  been 
when,  after  twelve  years  of  misgovernment, 
the  Long  Parliament  assembled.  In  every  part 
of  the  country,  the  name  of  courtier  had  be 
come  a  byword  of  reproach.  The  old  warriors 
of  the  Covenant  again  ventured  out  of  those 
retreats  in  which  they  had,  at  the  time  of  the 
Restoration,  hid  themselves  from  the  insults 
of  the  triumphant  malignants,  and  in  which, 
during  twenty  years,  they  had  preserved  in  full 
vigour 

"The  unconquerable  will 
And  study  of  revenge,  immortal  hate, 
With  courage  never  to  submit  or  yield, 
And  what  is  else  not  to  be  overcome." 

Then  were  again  seen  in  the  streets  faces 
which  called  up  strange  and  terrible  recollec 
tions  of  the  days,  when  the  saints,  with  the 
high  praises  of  God  in  their  mouths  and  a  two- 
edged  sword  in  their  hands,  had  bound  kings 
with  chains  and  nobles  with  links  of  iron. 
Then  were  again  heard  voices  which  had 
shouted,  "  Privilege"  by  the  coach  of  Charles 
I.  in  the  time  of  his  tyranny,  and  had  called 
for  "Justice"  in  Westminster  Hall  on  the  day 
of  his  trial.  It  has  been  the  fashion  to  repre 
sent  the  excitement  of  this  period  as  the  effect 
of  the  Popish  Plot.  To  us  it  seems  perfectly 
clear,  that  the  Popish  Plot  was  rather  the  effect 
than  the  cause  of  the  general  agitation.  It  was 
not  the  disease,  but  a  symptom,  though,  like 
many  other  symptoms,  it  aggravated  the  seve 
rity  of  the  disease.  In  1660  or  1661,  it  would 
have  been  utterly  out  of  the  power  of  such  men 
as  Oates  or  Bedloe  to  give  any  serious  dis 
turbance  to  the  government.  They  would 
have  been  laughed  at,  pilloried,  well  pelted, 
soundly  whipped,  and  speedily  forgotten.  In 
1678  or  1679,  there  would  have  been  an  out 
break,  if  those  men  had  never  been  born.  For 
years  things  had  been  steadily  tending  to  such 
a  consummation.  Society  was  one  mass  of 
combustible  matter.  No  mass  so  vast  and  so 
combustible  ever  waited  long  for  a  spark. 

Rational  men,  we  suppose,  are  now  fully 
agreed,  that  by  far  the  greater  part,  if  not  the 
whole  of  Oates's  story,  was  a  pure  fabrication. 
It  is  indeed  highly  probable,  that,  during  his 
intercourse  with  the  Jesuits,  he  may  have 
heard  much  wild  talk  about  the  best  means  of 
re-establishing  the  Catholic  religion  in  Eng 
land  ;  and  that  from  some  of  the  absurd  day 
dreams  of  the  zealots  with  whom  he  then  asso 
ciated,  he  may  have  taken  hints  for  his  narra 
tive.  But  we  do  not  believe  that  he  was  privy 
to  any  thing  which  deserved  the  name  of  con 
spiracy.  And  it  is  quite  certain,  that  if  there 
be  any  small  portion  of  truth  in  his  evidence, 
that  portion  is  so  deeply  buried  in  falsehood, 
that  no  human  skill  can  now  effect  a  separa 
tion.  We  must  not,  however,  forget,  that  we 
*ce  his  story  by  the  light  of  much  information 
which  his  contemporaries  did  not  at  first  pos 
sess.  We  have  nothing  to  say  for  the  witness 
es;  but  something  in  mitigation  to  offer  o*  be 


half  of  the  public.  We  oun  that  Ihe  credulity 
which  the  nation  showed  on  that  occasion  seems 
to  us,  though  censurable  indeed,  yet  not  wholly 
inexcusable. 

Our  ancestors  knew,  from  the  experience  of 
several  generations  at  home  and  abroad,  how 
restless  and  encroaching  was  the  disposition 
of  the  Church  of  Rome.  The  heir-apparent  to 
the  crown  was  a  bigoted  member  of  that 
church.  The  reigning  king  seemed  far  more 
inclined  to  show  favour  to  that  church  than  to 
the  Presbyterians.  He  was  the  intimate  ally, 
or  rather  the  hired  servant,  of  a  powerful  king> 
who  had  already  given  proofs  of  his  determi 
nation  to  tolerate  within  his  dominions  no 
other  religion  than  that  of  Rome.  The  Catho 
lics  had  begun  to  talk  a  bolder  language  than 
formerly,  and  to  anticipate  the  restoration  of 
their  worship  in  all  its  ancient  dignity  and 
splendour.  At  this  juncture,  it  is  rumoured 
that  a  Popish  plot  has  been  discovered.  A 
distinguished  Catholic  is  arrested  on  suspicion. 
It  appears  that  he  has  destroyed  almost  all  his 
papers.  A  few  letters,  however,  have  escaped 
the  flames:  and  these  letters  are  found  to  con 
tain  much  alarming  matter,  strange  expres 
sions  about  subsidies  from  France,  allusions 
to  a  vast  scheme  which  would  "  give  the  great 
est  blow  to  the  Protestant  religion  that  it  ever 
received;"  and  which  "would  utterly  subdue 
a  pestilent  heresy."  It  was  natural  that  those 
who  saw  these  expressions,  in  letters  which 
had  been  overlooked,  should  suspect  that  there 
was  some  horrible  villany  in  those  which  had 
been  carefully  destroyed.  Such  was  the  feel 
ing  of  the  House  of  Commons  :  "  Question, 
question  !  Coleman's  letters  !"  was  the  cry 
which  drowned  the  voices  of  the  minority. 

Just  after  the  discovery  of  these  papers,  a 
magistrate,  who  had  been  distinguished  by  his 
independent  spirit,  and  who  had  taken  the  de 
position  of  the  informer,  is  found  murdered 
under  circumstances  which  render  it  almost 
incredible  that  he  should  have  fallen  either  by 
robbers  or  by  his  own  hands.  Many  of  our 
readers  can  remember  the  state  of  London  just 
after  the  murders  of  Mar  and  Williamson,— 
the  terror  which  was  on  every  face, — the  care 
ful  barring  of  doors, — the  providing  of  blunder 
busses  and  watchmen's  rattles.  We  know  of 
a  shopkeeper  who  on  that  occasion  sold  three 
hundred  rattles  in  about  ten  hours.  Those  who 
remember  that  panic  may  be  able  to  form  some 
notion  of  the  state  of  England  after  the  death 
of  Godfrey.  Indeed,  we  must  say,  that,  after 
having  read  and  weighed  all  the  evidences 
now  extant  on  that  mysterious  subject,  we  in 
clined  to  the  opinion  that  he  was  assassinated, 
and  assassinated  by  Catholics, — not  assuredly 
by  Catholics  of  the  least  weight  or  note,  but  by 
some  of  those  crazy  and  vindictive  fanatics, 
who  may  be  found  in  every  large  sect,  and 
who  are  peculiarly  likely  to  abound  in  a  perse, 
cuted  sect.  Some  of  the  violent  Cameronians 
had  recently,  under  similar  exasperation,  com 
mitted  similar  crimes. 

It  was  natural  there  should  be  a  panic;  and 
it  was  natural  that  the  people  should,  in  a 
panic,  be  unreasonable  and  credulous.  It  must 
be  remembered  also  that  they  had  not  at  first, 
as  we  have,  the  means  of  comparing  th«.  evi 


304 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


dence  which  was  given  on  different  trials. 
They  were  not  aware  of  one-tenth  part  of  the 
contradictions  and  absurdities  which  Gates 
had  committed.  The  blunders,  for  example, 
into  which  he  fell  before  the  counsel;  his  mis 
take  about  the  person  of  Don  John  of  Austria; 
and  about  the  situation  of  the  Jesuits'  College 
at  Paris,  were  not  publicly  known.  He  was  a 
bad  man  ;  but  the  spies  and  deserters  by  whom 
governments  are  informed  of  conspiracies  are 
generally  bad  men.  His  story  was  strange 
and  frightful ;  but  it  was  not  more  strange  or 
frightful  than  a  well-authenticated  Popish  plot, 
which  some  few  people  then  living  might  re 
member — the  Gunpowder  treason.  Oates's 
account  of  the  burning  of  London  was  in  it 
self  by  no  means  so  improbable  as  the  project 
of  blowing  up  King,  Lords,  and  Commons, — 
a  project  which  had  not  only  been  entertained 
by  very  distinguished  Catholics,  but  which 
had  very  narrowly  missed  of  success.  As  to 
the  design  on  the  king's  person,  all  the  world 
knew,  that,  within  a  century,  two  kings  of 
France  and  a  prince  of  Orange  had  been  mur 
dered  by  Catholics,  purely  from  religious  en 
thusiasm, — that  Elizabeth  had  been  in  constant 
danger  of  a  similar  fate, — and  that  such  at 
tempts,  to  say  the  least,  had  not  been  discou 
raged  by  the  highest  authority  of  the  Church  of 
Rome.  The  characters  oi'  some  of  the  accused 
persons  stood  high;  but  so  did  that  of  Anthony 
Babington,  and  of  Everard  Digby.  Those  who 
suffered  denied  their  guilt  to  the  last;  but  no 
person  versed  in  criminal  proceedings  would 
attach  any  importance  to  this  circumstance. 
It  was  well  known  also  that  the  most  distin 
guished  Catholic  casuists  had  written  largely 
in  defence  of  regicide,  of  mental  reservation, 
and  of  equivocation.  It  was  not  quite  impos 
sible,  that  men  whose  minds  had  been  nou 
rished  with  the  writings  of  such  casuists  might 
think  themselves  justified  in  denying  a  charge 
which,  if  acknowledged,  would  bring  great 
scandal  on  the  church.  The  trials  of  the  ac 
cused  Catholics  were  exactly  like  all  the  state 
trials  of  those  days ;  that  is  to  say,  as  infamous 
as  they  could  be.  They  were  neither  fairer 
nor  less  fair  than  those  of  Algernon  Sydney, 
of  Roswell,  of  Cornish, — of  all  the  unhappy 
men,  in  short,  whom  a  predominant  party 
brought  to  what  was  then  facetiously  called 
justice.  Till  the  Revolution  purified  our  in 
stitutions  and  our  manners,  a  state  trial  was 
a  murder  preceded  by  the  uttering  of  certain 
gibberish  and  the  performance  of  certain 
mummeries. 

"When  the  Houses  met  in  the  autumn  of 
16V8,  the  Opposition  had  the  great  body  of  the 
nation  with  them.  Thrice  the  king  dissolved 
Iht  Parliament;  and  thrice  the  constituent 
body  sent  him  back  representatives  fully  de 
termined  to  keep  strict  watch  on  all  his  mea 
sures,  and  to  exclude  his  brother  from  the 
throne.  Had  the  character  of  Charles  resem 
bled  that  of  his  father,  this  intestine  discord 
would  infallibly  have  ended  in  a  civil  war. 
Obstinacy  and  passion  would  have  been  his 
ruin.  His  levity  and  apathy  were  his  security. 
He  resembled  one  of  those  light  Indian  boats, 
which  are  safe  because  they  are  pliant,  which 
yield  to  the  impact  of  every  wave,  and  which 


therefore  bound  without  danger  through  a  surf 
in  which  a  vessel  ribbed  with  heart  of  oak 
would  inevitably  perish.  The  only  thing  about 
which  his  mind  was  unalterably  made  up  was, 
that,  to  use  his  own  phrase,  he  would  not  go 
on  his  travels  again  for  anybody,  or  for  any 
thing.  His  easy,  indolent  behaviour  produced 
all  the  effects  of  the  most  artful  policy.  He 
suffered  things  to  take  their  course ;  and  if 
Achitophel  had  been  at  one  of  his  ears,  and 
Machiavel  at  the  other,  they  could  have  given 
him  no  better  advice  than  to  let  things  take 
their  course.  He  gave  way  to  the  violence  of 
the  movement,  and  waited  for  the  correspond 
ing  violence  of  the  rebound.  He  exhibited 
himself  to  his  subjects  in  the  interesting  cha 
racter  of  an  oppressed  king,  who  was  ready  to 
do  any  thing  to  please  them,  and  who  asked 
of  them,  in  return,  only  some  consideration  for 
his  conscientious  scruples,  and  for  his  feel 
ings  of  natural  affection, — who  was  ready  to 
accept  any  ministers,  to  grant  any  guarantees 
to  public  liberty,  but  who  could  not  find  it  in 
his  heart  to  take  away  his  brother's  birthright. 
Nothing  more  was  necessary.  He  had  to  deal 
with  a  people  whose  noble  weakness  it  has 
always  been,  not  to  press  too  hardly  on  the  van 
quished, — with  a  people,  the  lowest  and  most 
brutal  of  whom  cry  "  Shame !"  if  they  see  a 
man  struck  when  he  is  on  the  ground.  The 
resentment  which  the  nation  had  felt  towards 
the  court  began  to  abate  as  soon  as  the  court 
was  manifestly  unable  to  offer  any  resistance. 
The  panic  which  Godfrey's  death  had  excited 
gradually  subsided.  Everyday  brought  to  light 
some  new  falsehood  or  contradiction  in  the 
stories  of  Oates  and  Bedloe.  The  people  were 
glutted  with  the  blood  of  Papists,  as  they  had, 
twenty  years  before,  been  glutted  with  the  blood 
of  regicides.  When  the  first  sufferers  in  the 
plot  were  brought  to  the  bar,  the  witnesses  for 
the  defence  were  in  danger  of  being  torn  in 
pieces  by  the  mob.  Judges,  jurors,  and  specta 
tors  seemed  equally  indifferent  to  justice,  and 
equally  eager  for  revenge.  Lord  Strafford,  the 
last  sufferer,  was  pronounced  not  guilty  by  a 
large  minority  of  his  peers;  and  when  he  pro 
tested  his  innocence  on  the  scaffold,  the  people 
cried  out,  "God  bless  you,  my  lord  :  we  believe 
you,  my  lord."  The  extreme  folly  of  the  Oppo 
sition  in  setting  up  the  feeble  and  pusillani 
mous  Monmouth  as  a  claimant  of  the  throne  did 
them  great  harm.  The  story  about  the  box  and 
the  marriage-contract  was  an  absurd  romance  ; 
and  the  attempt  to  make  a  son  of  Lucy  Wallers, 
King  of  England,  was  alike  offensive  to  the  pride 
of  the  nobles  and  to  the  moral  feel  ing  of  the  mid 
dle  class.  The  old  Cavalier  party,  the  great  ma 
jority  of  the  landed  gentry,  the  clergy,  and  the 
universities,  almost  to  a  man,  began  to  dra'ir 
together,  and  to  form  in  close  array  round  the 
throne. 

A  similar  reaction  had  begun  to  take  place 
in  favour  of  Charles  I.  during  the  second  ses 
sion  of  the  Long  Parliament ;  and  if  that  prince 
had  been  honest  or  sagacious  enough  to  kee«> 
himself  strictly  within  the  limits  of  the  law,  we 
have  not  the  smallest  doubt  that  he  would  in  a 
few  months  have  found  himself  at  least  as 
powerful  as  his  best  friends,  Lord  Falkland. 
Ctilpeper,  or  Hyde,  would  have  wished  to  see 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


him.     By  illegally  impeaching  the  leaders  of  ! 
the  Opposition,  and  by  making  in  person  a  > 
wicked  attempt  on  the  House  of  Commons,  he  ; 
stopped  and  turned  back  that  tide  of  loyal  feel-  j 
ing  which  was  just  beginning  to  run  strongly. 
The  son,  quite  as  little  restrained  by  law  or  by 
honour  as  the  father,  was,  luckily  for  himself, 
a  man  of  a  lounging,  careless   temper;  and, 
from  temper,  we    believe,  rather    than  from 
policy,  escaped  that  great  error  which  had 
cost  the  father  so  dear.    Instead  of  trying  to 
vpluck  the  fruit  before  it  was  ripe,  he  lay  still 
till  it  fell  mellow  into  his  very  mouth.    If  he 
had  arrested  Lord  Shaftesbury  and  Lord  Russel 
in  a  manner  not  warranted  by  law,  it  is  not 
improbable  that  he  would  have  ended  his  life 
in  exile.     He  took  the  sure  course.    He  em 
ployed  only  his  legal  prerogatives,  and  he  found 
them  amply  sufficient  for  his  purpose. 

During  the  first  eighteen  or  nineteen  years 
of  his  reign,  he  had  been  playing  the  game  of 
his  enemies.  From  1678  to  1681,  his  enemies 
had  played  his  game.  They  owed  their  power 
to  his  rnisgovernment.  He  owed  the  recovery 
of  his  power  to  their  violence.  The  great  body 
of  the  people  came  back  to  him  after  their  es 
trangement  with  impetuous  affection.  He  had 
scarcely  been  more  popular  when  he  landed  on 
the  coast  of  Kent  than  when,  after  several 
years  of  restraint  and  humiliation,  he  dissolved 
his  last  Parliament. 

Nevertheless,  while  this  flux  and  reflux  of 
opinion  went  on,  the  cause  of  public  liberty 
\va:>  steadily  gaining.  There  had  been  a  great 
reaction  in  favour  of  the  throne  at  the  Restora 
tion.  But  the  Star-Chamber,  ihe  High  Com 
mission,  and  ship-money,  had  forever  disap 
peared.  There  was  now  another  similar  re 
action.  But  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act  had  been 
passed  during  the  short  predominance  of  the 
Opposition,  and  it  was  not  repealed. 

The  king,  however,  supported  as  he  was  hy 
the  nation,  was  quite  strong  enough  to  inflict  a 
terrible  revenge  on  the  party  which  had  lately 
held  him  in  bondage.  In  1681  commenced  the 
third  of  those  periods  into  which  we  have 
divided  the  history  of  England  from  the  Resto 
ration  to  the  Revolution.  During  this  period, 
a  third  great  reaction  took  place.  The  ex 
cesses  of  tyranny  restored  to  the  cause  of 
liberty  the  hearts  which  had  been  alienated 
from  that  cause  by  the  excesses  of  faction.  In 
1681,  the  king  had  almost  all  his  enemies  at  his 
feet.  In  1688,  the  king  was  an  exile  in  a  strange 
land. 

The  whole  of  that  machinery  which  had 
lately  been  in  motion  against  the  Papists  was 
now  put  in  motion  against  the  Whigs — brow 
beating  judges,  packed  jurors,  lying  witnesses, 
clamorous  spectators.  The  ablest  chief  of  the 
party  fled  to  a  foreign  country  and  died  there. 
The  most  virtuous  man  of  the  party  was  be 
headed.  Another  of  its  most  distinguished 
members  preferred  a  voluntary  death  to  the 
shame  of  a  public  execution.  The  boroughs 
on  which  the  government  could  not  depend 
were,  by  means  of  legal  quibbles,  deprived  of 
their  charters ;  and  their  constitution  was  re 
modelled  in  such  a  manner  as  almost  to  insure 
the  return  of  representatives  devoted  to  the 
court.  All  parts  of  the  kingdom  emulously 

in.— ar 


sent  up  the  most  extravagant  assurances  of 
the  love  which  they  bore  to  their  sovereign, 
and  of  the  abhorrence  with  which  they  re 
garded  those  who  questioned  the  divine  origin 
or  the  boundless  extent  of  his  power.  It  is 
scarcely  necessary  to  say,  that  in  this  hot  com 
petition  of  bigots  and  slaves,  the  University  of 
Oxford  had  the  unquestioned  pre-eminence, 
The  glory  of  being  farther  behind  the  age  than 
any  other  class  of  the  British  people,  is  one 
which  that  learned  body  acquired  early,  and 
has  never  lost ! 

Charles  died,  and  his  brother  came  to  the 
throne ;  but  though  the  person  of  the  sovereign 
was  changed,  the  love  and  awe  with  which  the 
office  was  regarded  were  undiminished.  In 
deed,  it  seems  that,  of  the  two  princes,  James 
was,  in  spite  of  his  religion,  rather  the  favourite 
of  the  High  Church  party.  He  had  been  espe* 
cially  singled  out  as  the  mark  of  the  Whigs, 
and  this  circumstance  sufficed  to  make  him 
the  idol  of  the  Tories.  He  called  a  Parliament. 
The  loyal  gentry  of  the  counties,  and  the  packed 
voters  of  the  remodelled  boroughs,  gave  him  a 
Parliament  such  as  England  had  not  seen  for  a 
century — a  Parliament  beyond  all  comparison 
the  most  obsequious  that  ever  sate  under  a 
prince  of  the  house  of  Stuart.  One  insurrec 
tionary  movement,  indeed,  took  place  in  Eng 
land,  and  another  in  Scotland.  Both  were  put 
down  with  ease,  and  punished  with  tremendous 
severity.  Even  after  that  bloody  circuit,  which 
will  never  be  forgotten  while  the  English  race- 
exists  in  any  part  of  the  globe,  no  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons  ventured  to  whisper 
even  the  mildest  censure  of  Jeffries.  Edmund 
Waller,  emboldened  by  his  great  age  and  hi& 
high  reputation,  attacked  the  cruelty  of  the 
military  chiefs  ;  and  this  is  the  brightest  part 
of  his  long  and  checkered  public  life.  But- 
even  Waller  did  not  venture  to  arraign  the  still 
more  odious  cruelty  of  the  Chief  Justice.  It  is 
hardly  too  much  to  say  that  James,  at  that  time,, 
had  little  reason  to  envy  the  extent  of  authority 
possessed  by  Louis  XIV. 

By  what  means  this  vast  power  was  in  three 
years  broken  down — by  what  perverse  ant£ 
frantic  misgovernment  the  tyrant  revived  the 
spirit  of  the  vanquished  Whigs,  turned  to  fixed 
hostility  the  neutrality  of  the  trimmers,  and* 
drove  from  him  the  landed  gentry,  the  church, 
the  army,  his  own  creatures,  his  own  children. 
— is  well  known  to  our  readers.  But  we  wish 
to  say  something  about  one  part  of  the  ques 
tion,  which  in  our  own  time  has  a  htUe  puzzled1 
some  very  worthy  men,  and  upon  which  the 
"Continuation"  before  us  pours  forth,  as  might 
be  expected,  much  nonsense. 

James,  it  is  said,  declared  himself  a  •sup 
porter  of  toleration.    If  he  violated  the  consti 
tution,  he  at  least  violated  it  for  one  of  the 
noblest  ends  that  any  statesman  ever  had  in 
view.    His  object  was  to  free  millions  of  hi* 
countrymen  from  penal  laws  and  disabilities 
which  hardly  any  person  now  considers   as 
just.    He  ought,  therefore,  to  he  regarded  a* 
j  blameless,  or,  at  worst,  as  guilty  only  of  em» 
ploying  irregular  means  to  effect  a  most  prais* 
j  worthy  purpose.   A  very  ingenious  man,  whoie 
I  we  believe  to  be  a  Catholic,  Mr.  Banim,  hrw 
j  written  an  historical  novel,  of  the  literary  mem 


306 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  which  we  cannot  speak  very  highly,  for  the 
purpose  of  inculcating  this  opinion.  The  edi 
tor  of  Sir  James  Mackintosh's  Fragment  as 
sures  us  that  the  standard  of  James  bore  the 
nobler  inscription,  and  so  forth;  the  meaning 
of  which  is,  that  William  and  the  other  authors 
of  the  Revolution  were  vile  Whigs,  who  drove 
out  James  for  being  a  Radical — that  the  crime 
of  the  king  was  his  going  farther  in  liberality 
than  his  subjects — that  he  was  the  real  cham 
pion  of  freedom,  and  that  Somers,  Locke, 
Newton,  and  other  narrow-minded  people  of 
the  same  sort,  were  the  real  bigots  and  op 
pressors. 

Now,  we  admit  that  if  the  premises  can  be 
made  out,  the  conclusion  follows.  If  it  can  be 
shown  that  James  did  sincerely  wish  to  esta 
blish  perfect  freedom  of  conscience,  we  shall 
think  his  conduct  deserving,  not  only  of  indul 
gence,  but  of  praise.  We  shall  applaud  even 
his  illegal  acts.  We  conceive  that  so  noble 
and  salutary  an  object  would  have  justified 
resistance  on  the  part  of  subjects.  We  can 
therefore  scarcely  deny  that  it  would  justify 
encroachment  on  the  part  of  a  king.  But  it 
can  be  proved,  we  think,  on  the  strongest  evi 
dence,  that  James  had  no  such  object  in  view ; 
and  that,  under  the  pretence  of  establishing 
perfect  religious  liberty,  he  was  establishing 
the  ascendency  and  the  exclusive  dominion  of 
the  Church  of  Rome. 

It  is  true  that  he  professes  himself  a  sup 
porter  of  toleration.  Every  sect  clamours  for 
toleration  when  it  is  down.  We  have  not  the 
smallest  doubt  that,  when  Bonner  was  in  the 
Marshalsea,  he  thought  it  a  very  hard  thing 
that  a  man  should  be  locked  up  in  a  jail  for 
not  being  able  to  understand  the  words  "  This 
is  my  body"  in  the  same  way  with  the  lords 
of  the  Council.  It  would  be  thought  strange 
logic  to  conclude  that  a  beggar  is  full  of  Chris 
tian  charity  because  he  assures  you  that  God 
will  reward  you  if  you  give  him  a  penny;  or 
that  a  soldier  is  humane  because  he  cries  out 
lustily  for  quarter  when  a  bayonet  is  at  his 
throat.  The  doctrine  which,  from  the  very  first 
origin  of  religious  dissensions,  has  been  held 
by  all  bigots  of  all  sects,  when  condensed  into 
a  few  words  and  stripped  of  all  rhetorical  dis 
guise,  is  simply  this — I  am  in  the  right,  and 
you  are  in  the  wrong.  When  you  are  the 
stronger,  you  ought  to  tolerate  me ;  for  it  is 
your  duty  to  tolerate  the  truth.  But  when  I 
am  the  stronger,  I  shall  persecute  you ;  for  it 
is  my  duty  to  persecute  error. 

The  Catholics  lay  under  severe  restraints  in 
England.  James  wished  to  remove  those  re 
straints,  and  therefore  he  held  a  language 
favourable  to  liberty  of  conscience.  But  the 
whole  history  of  his  life  proves  that  this  was 
a  mere  pretence.  In  1679  he  held  similar  lan 
guage  in  a  conversation  with  the  magistrates 
of  Amsterdam,  and  the  author  of  the  "Con 
tinuation"  refers  to  this  circumstance  as  a 
proof  that  the  king  had  long  entertained  a 
strong  feeling  on  the  subject.  Unhappily  it 
proves  only  the  utter  insincerity  of  all  the 
king's  later  professions.  If  he  had  pretended 
to  be  converted  to  the  doctrines  of  toleration 
after  his  accession  to  the  throne,  some  credit 
ought  have  been  due  to  his  professions.  But 


we  know  most  certainly  that  in  1679,  and  .ong 
after  that  year,  James  was  a  most  bloody  and 
remorseless  persecutor.  After  1679  he  was 
placed  at  the  head  of  the  government  of  Scot 
land.  And  what  had  been  his  conduct  in  that 
country!  He  had  hunted  down  the  scattered 
remnant  of  the  Covenanters  with  a  barbarity 
of  which  no  prince  of  modern  time?,  Philip  the 
Second  excepted,  had  ever  shown  himself  ca 
pable.  He  had  indulged  himself  in  the  amuse 
ment  of  seeing  the  torture  of  the  "Boot"  in 
flicted  on  the  wretched  enthusiasts  whom  per 
secution  had  driven  to  resistance.  After  his 
accession,  almost  his  first  act  was  to  obtain 
from  the  servile  Parliament  of  Scotland  a  law 
for  inflicting  death  on  preachers  at  conventi 
cles  held  within  houses,  and  on  both  preachers 
and  hearers  at  conventicles  held  in  the  open  air. 
And  all  this  he  had  done  for  a  religion  which 
was  not  his  own.  All  this  he  had  done,  not  in 
defence  of  truth  against  error,  but  in  defence 
of  ons  damnable  error  against  another — in  de 
fence  of  the  Episcopalian  against  the  Presby 
terian  apostasy.  Louis  XIV.  is  justly  censured 
for  trying  to  dragoon  his  subjects  to  Heaven. 
But  it  was  reserved  for  James  to  torture  and 
murder  for  the  difference  between  the  two  roads 
to  hell.  And  this  man,  so  deeply  imbued  with 
the  poison  of  intolerance,  that  rather  than  not 
persecute  at  all  he  would  persecute  men  out 
of  one  heresy  into  another — this  man  is  held 
up  as  the  champion  of  religious  liberty! — This 
man,  who  persecuted  in  the  cause  of  the  un 
clean  panther,  would  not,  we  are  told,  have 
persecuted  for  the  sake  of  the  milk-white  and 
immortal  hind ! 

And  what  was  the  conduct  of  James  at  the 
very  time  when  he  was  professing  zeal  for 
the  rights  of  conscience  1  Was  he  not  even 
then  persecuting  to  the  very  best  of  his  power! 
Was  he  not  employing  all  his  legal  preroga 
tives,  and  many  prerogatives  which  were  not 
legal,  for  the  purpose  of  forcing  his  subjects 
to  conform  to  his  creed1?  While  he  pretended  to 
abhor  the  laws  which  excluded  dissenters  from 
office,  was  he  not  himself  dismissing  from  office 
his  ablest,  his  most  experienced,  his  most  faith 
ful  servants,  on  account  of  their  religious  opi 
nions?  For  what  offence  was  Lord  Rochester 
driven  from  the  treasury!  He  was  closely  con 
nected  with  the  royal  house.  He  was  at  the 
head  of  the  Tory  party.  He  had  stood  firmly 
by  James  in  the  most  trying  emergencies.  But 
he  would  not  change  his  religion,  and  he  was 
dismissed.  That  we  may  not  be  suspected  of 
overstating  the  case,  Dr.  Lingard,  a  very  com 
petent,  and  assuredly  not  a  very  willing  wit 
ness,  shall  speak  for  us.  "The  king,"  says 
thai  able  but  partial  writer,  "was  disappointed; 
he  complained  to  Barillon  of  the  obstinacy  and 
insincerity  of  the  treasurer;  and  the  latter  re 
ceived  from  the  French  envoy  a  very  intelli 
gible  hint  that  the  loss  of  office  would  result 
from  his  adhesion  to  his  religious  creed.  He 
was,  however,  inflexible,  and  James,  after  a 
long  delay,  communicated  to  him,  but  with 
considerable  embarrassment  and  many  tears, 
his  final  determination.  He  had  hoped,  he 
said,  that  Rochester,  by  conforming  to  the 
Church  of  Rome,  would  have  spared  him  the 
unpleasant  task;  but  kings  must  sacrifice  thei« 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


307 


feelings  to  their  duty."  And  this  was  the  king 
who  wished  to  have  all  men  of  all  sects  ren 
dered  alike  capable  of  holding  office.  These 
proceedings  were  alone  sufficient  to  take  away 
all  credit  from  his  liberal  professions ;  and 
such,  as  we  learn  from  the  despatches  of  the 
Papal  Nuncio,  was  really  the  effect.  "  Pare," 
says  D'Adda,  writing  a  few  days  after  the  re 
tirement  of  Rochester,  "pare  che  gli  animi 
soni  inaspriti  della  voce  che  corre  tra  il  po- 
polo,  d'esser  cacciato  il  detto  ministro  per  non 
essere  Cattolico,  percio  tirarsi  al  estermino  de 
Protestanti."  Was  it  ever  denied  that  the  fa 
vours  of  the  crown  were  constantly  bestowed 
and  withheld  purely  on  account  of  the  reli 
gious  opinions  of  the  claimants!  And  if  these 
things  were  done  in  the  green  tree,  what  would 
have  been  done  in  the  dry1?  If  James  acted 
thus  when  he  had  the  strongest  motives  to 
court  his  Protestant  subjects,  what  course  was 
he  likely  to  follow  when  he  had  obtained  from 
them  all  that  he  asked  ? 

Who  again  was  his  closest  ally?  And  what 
was  the  policy  of  that  ally  1  The  subjects  of 
James,  it  is  true,  did  not  know  half  the  infamy  of 
their  sovereign.  They  did  not  know, as  we  know, 
that  while  he  was  lecturing  them  on  the  bless 
ings  of  equal  toleration,  he  was  constantly  con 
gratulating  his  good  brother  Louis  on  the  suc 
cess  of  that  intolerant  policy  which  had  turned 
the  fairest  tracts  of  France  into  deserts,  and 
driven  into  exile  myriads  of  the  most  peace 
able,  industrious,  and  skilful  artisans  in  the 
•world.  But  the  English  did  know  that  the  two 
princes  were  bound  together  in  the  closest 
union.  They  saw  their  sovereign,  with  tolera 
tion  on  his  lips,  separating  himself  from  those 
states  which  had  first  set  the  example  of  tolera 
tion,  and  connecting  himself  by  the  strongest 
ties  with  the  most  faithless  and  merciless  per 
secutor  who  could  then  be  found  on  any  con 
tinental  throne. 

By  what  advice  again  was  James  guided  ? 
Who  were  the  persons  in  whom  he  placed  the 
greatest  confidence,  and  who  took  the  warmest 
interest  in  his  schemes?  The  ambassador  of 
France, — the  nuncio  of  Rome, — and  Father 
Petre  the  Jesuit.  These  were  the  people  who 
showed  the  greatest  anxiety  that  the  king's  plan 
might  succeed.  And  is  not  this  enough  to  prove 
that  the  establishment  of  equal  toleration  was 
rot  that  plan  ?  Was  Louis  for  toleration  ?  Was 
the  Vatican  for  toleration  ?  Was  the  order  of 
Jesuits  for  toleration  1  We  know  that  the  li 
beral  professions  of  James  were  highly  ap 
proved  by  those  very  governments,  by  those 
very  societies,  whose  theory  and  practice  it  no 
toriously  was  to  keep  no  faith  with  heretics, 
and  to  give  no  quarter  to  heretics.  And  are 
we,  in  order  to  save  James's  reputation  for  sin 
cerity,  to  believe  that  all  at  once  those  govern 
ments  and  those  societies  had  changed  their 
nature, — had  discovered  the  criminality  of  all 
their  former  conduct, — had  adopted  principles 
far  more  liberal  than  those  of  Locke,  of  Leigh- 
ton,  or  of  Tillotson  1  Which  is  the  more  pro 
bable  supposition, — that  the  king  who  had  re 
voked  the  edict  of  Nantes,  the  pope  under 
v  hose  sanction  the  Inquisition  was  then  im 
prisoning  and  burning,  the  religious  order 
which,  in  every  controversy  in  which  it  had 


ever  been  engaged,  had  called  in  the  aid  either 
of  the  magistrate  or  of  the  assassin,  should  have 
become  as  thorough-going  friends  to  religious 
liberty  as  Dr.  Franklin  or  Mr.  Jefferson  after 
wards  were, — or,  that  a  Jesuit-ridden  bigot 
should  be  induced  to  dissemble  for  the  good 
of  the  church  ? 

The  game  which  the  Jesuits  were  playing 
was  no  new  game.  A  hundred  years  before, 
they  had  preached  up  political  freedom,  just 
as  they  were  now  preaching  up  religious  free 
dom.  They  had  tried  to  raise  the  republican* 
against  Henry  the  Fourth  and  Elizabeth,  just 
as  they  were  now  trying  to  raise  the  Protestant 
Dissenters  against  the  Church  Establishment. 
In  the  sixteenth  century,  the  tools  of  Philip  the 
Second  were  constantly  teaching  doctrines  that 
bordered  on  Jacobinism, — constantly  insisting 
on  the  right  of  the  people  to  cashier  kings,  and 
of  every  private  citizen  to  plunge  his  dagger 
in  the  heart  of  a  wicked  ruler.  In  the  seven 
teenth  century,  the  persecutors  of  the  Hugue 
nots  were  crying  out  against  the  tyranny  of  the 
Established  Church  of  England,  and  vindicat 
ing  with  the  utmost  fervour  the  right  of  aU, 
men  to  adore  God  after  their  own  fashion.  In 
both  cases  they  were  alike  insincere.  In  both 
cases  the  fool  who  had  trusted  them  would  hare 
found  himself  miserably  duped.  A  good  and 
wise  man  would  doubtless  disapprove  of  the 
arbitrary  measures  of  Elizabeth.  But  would 
he  have  really  served  the  interests  of  political 
liberty,  if  he  had  put  faith  in  the  professions 
of  the  Romish  casuists,  joined  their  party,  and 
taken  a  share  in  Northumberland's  revolt,  or  in 
Babington's  conspiracy'!  Would  he  not  have 
been  assisting  to  establish  a  far  worse  and 
more  loathsome  tyranny  than  that  which  he 
was  tiying  to  put  down  1  In  the  same  manner, 
a  good  and  wise  man  would  doubtless  see  very 
much  to  condemn  in  the  conduct  of  the  Church 
of  England  under  the  Stuarts.  But  was  he 
therefore  to  join  the  king  and  the  Catholics 
against  that  Church?  And  was  it  not  plain, 
that,  by  so  doing,  he  would  assist  in  setting  up 
a  spiritual  despotism,  compared  with  which  the 
despotism  of  the  establishment  was  as  a  liule 
finger  to  the  loins, — as  chastisement  with  whips 
to  chastisement  with  scorpions  ? 

Louis  had  a  far  stronger  mind  than  James. 
He  had  at  least  an  equally  high  sense  of  honour. 
He  was  in  a  much  less  degree  the  slave  of  his 
priests.  He  had  promised  to  respect  the  edict 
of  Nantes  as  solemnly  as  ever  James  had  pro 
mised  to  respect  the  religious  liberty  of  the 
English  people.  Had  Louis  kept  his  word  ? 
'  And  was  not  one  such  instance  of  treachery 
enough  for  one  generation  ? 

The  plan  of  James  seems  to  us  perfectly  in 
telligible.  The  toleration,  which,  with  the  con 
currence  and  applause  of  all  the  most  cruel 
persecutors  in  Europe,  he  was  offering  to  his 
people,  was  meant  simply  to  divide  them.  Thi* 
is  the  most  obvious  and  vulgar  of  political  arti 
fices.  We  have  seen  it  employed  a  hundred 
times  within  our  own  memory.  At  this  mo 
ment  we  see  the  Carlists  in  France  hallooing 
on  the  "  extreme  left"  against  the  "  centre  left.** 
Four  years  ago  the  same  trick  was  practised 
in  England.  We  have  heard  old  buyers  and 
sellers  of  boroughs,— men  who  had  been  seated 


308 


MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


in  the  House  of  Commons  by  the  unsparing 
ase  of  ejectments,  and  who  had,  through  their 
whole  lives,  opposed  every  measure  which 
tended  to  increase  the  power  of  the  democracy, 
• — abusing  the  Reform  Bill  as  not  democratic 
enough,  appealing  to  the  labouring  classes, 
execrating  the  tyranny  of  the  ten-pound  house 
holders,  and  exchanging  compliments  and  ca 
resses  with  the  most  noted  incendiaries  of  our 
times.  The  cry  of  universal  toleration  was  em 
ployed  by  James  just  as  the  cry  of  universal 
suffrage  was  lately  employed  by  some  veteran 
Tories.  The  object  of  the  mock  democrats  of 
our  time  was  to  produce  a  conflict  between  the 
middle  classes  and  the  multitude,  and  thus  to 
prevent  all  reform.  The  object  of  James  was  to 
produce  a  conflict  between  the  Church  and  the 
Protestant  Dissenters,  and  thus  to  facilitate  the 
victory  of  the  Catholics  over  both. 

We  do  not  believe  that  he  could  have  suc 
ceeded.  But  we  do  not  think  his  plan  so  ut 
terly  frantic  and  hopeless  as  it  has  generally 
been  thought ;  and  we  are  sure  that,  if  he  had 
been  allowed  to  gain  his  first  point,  the  people 
would  have  had  no  remedy  left  but  an  appeal 
to  physical  force, — an  appeal,  too,  which  would 
have  been  made  under  the  most  unfavourable 
circumstances.  He  conceived  that  the  Tories, 
hampered  by  their  professions  of  passive  obe 
dience,  would  have  submitted  to  his  pleasure  ; 
and  that  the  Dissenters,  seduced  by  his  delusive 
promises  of  relief,  would  have  given  him  stre 
nuous  support.  In  this  way  he  hoped  to  obtain 
a  law,  nominally  for  the  removal  of  all  religious 
disabilities,  but  really  for  the  excluding  of  all 
Protestants  from  all  offices.  It  is  never  to  be 
forgotten,  that  a  prince  who  has  all  the  pa 
tronage  of  the  state  in  his  hands  can,  without 
violating  the  letter  of  the  law,  establish  what 
ever  test  he  chooses.  And,  from  the  whole 
conduct  of  James,  we  have  not  the  smallest 
doubt  that  he  would  have  availed  himself  of  his 
power  to  the  utmost.  The  statute-book  might 
declare  all  Englishmen  equally  capable  of  hold 
ing  office ;  but  to  what  end,  if  all  offices  were 
in  the  gift  of  a  sovereign  resolved  not  to  em 
ploy  a  single  heretic]  We  firmly  believe  that 
not  one  post  in  the  government,  in  the  army, 
in  the  navy,  on  the  bench,  or  at  the  bar — not 
one  peerage,  nay,  not  one  ecclesiastical  bene 
fice  in  the  royal  gift,  would  have  been  bestowed 
on  any  Protestant  of  any  persuasion.  Even 
while  the  king  had  still  strong  motives  to  dis 
semble,  he  had  made  a  Catholic  Dean  of  Christ 
Church,  and  a  Catholic  President  of  Magdalen 
College.  There  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that  the 
See  of  York  was  kept  vacant  for  another  Ca 
tholic.  If  James  had  been  suffered  to  follow 
this  ceurse  for  twenty  years,  every  military 
man,  from  a  general  to  a  drummer,  every  offi 
cer  of  a  ship,  every  judge,  evary  king's  coun 
cil,  every  lord-lieutenant  of  a  county,  every 
justice  of  the  peace,  every  ambassador,  every 
minister  of  state,  every  person  employed  in  the 
royal  household,  in  the  custom-house,  in  the 
po-n-oflice,  in  the  excise,  would  have  been  a 
Catholic.  The  Catholics  would  have  had  a 
majority  in  the  House  of  Lords,  even  if  that 
majority  had  been  made,  to  use  Sunderland's 
phrase,  by  calling  up  a  whole  troop  of  the 
ttimrdA  lo  that  House.  They  would  have  had, 


|  we  believe,  the  chief  weight  even  in  the  Convo- 
i  cation.  Every  bishop,  every  dean,  every  holder 
:  of  a  crown  living,  every  head  of  every  college 
which  was  subject  to  the  royal  power,  would 
have  belonged  to  the  Church  of  Rome.  Almost 
all  the  places  of  liberal  education  would  have 
been  under  the  direction  of  Catholics.  The 
whole. power  of  licensing  books  would  have 
been  in  the  hands  of  Catholics.  All  this  im 
mense  mass  of  power  would  have  been  stea 
dily  supported  by  the  arms  and  by  the  gold  of 
France,  and  would  have  descended  to  an  heir, 
whose  whole  education  would  have  been  con 
ducted  with  a  view  to  one  single  end, — the  com 
plete  re-establishment  of  the  Catholic  religion. 
The  House  of  Commons  would  have  been  the 
only  legal  obstacle.  But  the  rights  of  a  great 
portion  of  the  electors  were  at  the  mercy  of  the 
courts  of  law,  and  the  courts  of  law  were  abso 
lutely  dependent  on  the  crown.  We  cannot 
think  it  altogether  impossible  that  a  house 
might  have  been  packed  which  would  have  re 
stored  the  days  of  Mary. 

We  certainly  do  not  believe  that  this  would 
have  been  tamely  borne.  But  we  do  believe 
that,  if  the  nation  had  been  deluded  by  the 
king's  professions  of  toleration,  all  this  would 
have  been  attempted,  and  could  have  been 
averted  only  by  a  most  bloody  and  destruc 
tive  contest,  in  which  the  whole  Prote.stanl 
population  would  have  been  opposed  to  the 
Catholics.  On  the  one  side  would  have  been 
a  vast  numerical  superiority.  But  on  the 
other  side  would  have  been  the  whole  organi 
zation  of  government,  and  two  great  disciplined 
armies,  that  of  James  and  that  of  Louis.  We 
do  not  doubt  that  the  nation  would  have 
achieved  its  deliverance.  But  we  believe  that 
the  struggle  would  have  shaken  the  whole  fa 
bric  of  society,  and  that  the  vengeance  of  the 
conquerors  would  have  been  terrible  and  un 
sparing. 

But  James  was  stopped  at  the  outset.  He 
thought  himself  secure  of  the  Tories,  because 
they  professed  to  consider  all  resistance  as  sin 
ful — and  of  the  Protestant  Dissenters,  because 
he  offered  them  relief.  He  was  in  the  wrong 
as  to  both.  The  error  into  which  he  fell  about 
the  Dissenters  was  very  natural.  But  the  con 
fidence  which  he  placed  in  the  loyal  assurances 
of  the  High  Church  party  was  the  most  exqui 
sitely  ludicrous  proof  of  folly  that  a  politician 
ever  gave. 

Only  imagine  a  man  acting  for  one  single 
day  on  the  supposition  that  all  his  neighbours 
believe  all  that  they  profess,  and  act  up  to  what 
they  believe.  Imagine  a  man  acting  on  the 
supposition,  that  he  may  safely  offer  the  dead 
liest  injuries  and  insults  to  everybody  who 
says  that  revenge  is  sinful ;  or  that  he  may 
safely  intrust  all  his  property  without  security 
to  any  person,  who  says  that  it  is  wrong  to 
steal.  Such  a  character  would  be  too  absurd 
for  the  wildest  farce.  Yet  the  folly  of  James 
did  not  stop  short  of  this  incredible  extent. 
Because  the  clergy  had  declared  that  resistance 
to  oppression  was  in  no  case  lawful,  he  con 
ceived  that  he  might  oppress  them  exactly  as 
much  as  he  cho.se,  without  the  smallest  danger 
of  resistance.  He  quite  forgot  that  when  they 
magnified  the  royal  prerogative,  that  preroga* 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


309 


tive  was  exerted  on  their  side — that  when  they 
preached  endurance,  they  had  nothing  to  en 
dure — that  when  they  declared  it  unlawful  to 
resist  evil,  none  but  Whigs  and  Dissenters 
suffered  any  evil.  It  had  never  occurred  to  him 
that  a  man  feels  the  calamities  of  his  enemies 
with  one  sort  of  sensibility,  and  his  own  with 
quite  a  different  sort.  It  had  never  occurred  to 
him  as  possible  that  a  reverend  divine  might 
think  it  ihe  duty  of  Baxter  and  Bunyan  to  bear 
insults,  and  to  lie  in  dungeons  without  murmur 
ing  ;  and  yet,  when  he  saw  the  smallest  chance 
that  his  own  prebend  might  be  transferred  to 
some  sly  Father  from  Italy  or  Flanders,  might 
begin  to  discover  much  matter  for  useful  medi 
tation  in  the  texts  touching  Ehud's  knife  and 
Jael's  hammer.  His  majesty  was  not  aware, 
it  should  seem,  that  people  do  sometimes  re 
consider  their  opinions,  and  that  nothing  more 
disposes  a  man  to  reconsider  his  opinions 
than  a  suspicion  that,  if  he  adheres  to  them,  he 
is  very  likely  to  be  a  beggar  or  a  martyr.  Yet 
it  seems  strange  that  these  truths  should  have 
escaped  the  royal  mind.  Those  Churchmen 
who  had  signed  the  Oxford  declaration  in  fa 
vour  of  passive  obedience  had  also  signed  the 
thirty-nine  articles.  And  yet  the  very  man 
who  confidently  expected  that,  by  a  little  coax 
ing  and  bullying,  he  should  induce  them  to  re 
nounce  the  articles,  was  thunderstruck  when 
he  found  that  they  were  disposed  to  soften 
down  the  doctrines  of  the  declaration.  Nor 
did  it  necessarily  follow  that  even  if  the  theory 
of  the  Tories  had  undergone  no  modification, 
their  practice  would  coincide  with  their  theory. 
It  might,  one  should  think,  have  crossed  the 
mind  of  a  man  of  fifty,  who  had  seen  a  great 
deal  of  the  world,  that  people  sometimes  do 
what  they  think  wrong.  Though  a  prelate 
might  hold  ihat  Paul  directs  us  to  obey  even 
a  Nero,  it  might  not,  on  that  account,  be  perfect 
ly  safe  to  treat  the  Right  Reverend  Father  in 
God  after  the  fashion  of  Nero,  in  the  hope  that 
he  would  continue  to  obey  on  the  principles 
of  Paul.  The  king  indeed  had  only  to  look  at 
home.  He  was  at  least  as  much  attached  to 
the  Catholic  Church  as  any  Tory  gentleman  or 
clergyman  could  be  to  the  Church  of  England. 
Adultery  was  at  least  as  strongly  condemned 
by  his  Church  as  resistance  by  the  Church  of 
England.  Yet  his  priests  could  not  keep  him 
from  Arabella  Sedley.  While  he  was  risking 
his  crown  for  the  sake  of  his  soul,  he  was  risk 
ing  his  soul  for  the  sake  of  an  ugly,  dirty  mis 
tress.  There  is  something  delightfully  gro 
tesque  in  the  spectacle  of  a  man  who,  while 
Jiving  in  the  habitual  violation  of  his  own 
known  duties,  is  unable  to  believe  that  any 
temptation  can  draw  any  other  person  aside 
from  the  path  of  virtue. 

James  was  disappointed  in  all  his  calcula 
tions.  His  hope  was,  that  the  Tories  would 
follow  their  principles,  and  that  the  Noncon 
formists  wouid  follow  their  interests.  Exactly 
the  reverse  took  place.  The  Tories  sacrificed 
the  principle  of  non-resistance  to  their  inte 
rests  •  the  Nonconformists  rejected  the  delu 
sive  cffers  of  the  king,  and  stood  firmly  by 
their  principles.  The  two  parties  whose  strife 
had  convulsed  the  empire  during  half  a  centu 
ry',  were  united  for  a  moment;  and  all  that 


vast  royal  power  which  three  years  before  had 
seemed  immovably  fixed,  vanished  at  once 
like  chaff  in  a  hurricane. 

The  very  great  length  to  which  this  article 
has  already  been  extended,  renders  it  impossi 
ble  for  us  to  discuss,  as  we  had  meant  to  do, 
the  characters  and  conduct  of  the  leading  Eng 
lish  statesmen  at  this  crisis.  But  we  must 
offer  a  few  remarks  on  the  spirit  and  tendency 
of  the  Revolution  of  1688. 

The  editor  of  this  volume  quotes  the  Decla 
ration  of  Right,  and  tells  us,  that  by  looking  at 
it,  we  may  "judge  at  a  glance  whether  the  au 
thors  of  the  Revolution  achieved  all  they  might 
and  ought,  in  their  position,  to  have  achieved 
— whether  the  Commons  of  England  did  their 
duty  to  their  constituents,  their  country,  poste 
rity,  and  universal  freedom."  We  are  at  a  loss 
to  imagine  how  even  this  writer  can  have  read 
and  transcribed  the  Declaration  of  Right,  and 
yet  have  so  utterly  misconceived  its  nature. 
That  famous  document  is,  as  its  very  name 
imports,  declaratory,  and  not  remedial.  It  was 
never  meant  to  be  a  measure  of  reform.  It 
neither  contained,  nor  was  designed  to  con 
tain,  any  allusion  to  those  innovations  which  the 
authors  of  the  Revolution  considered  as  desira 
ble,  and  which  they  speedily  proceeded  to  make. 
The  Declaration  was  merely  a  recital  of  certain 
old  and  wholesome  laws  which  had  been  violat 
ed  by  the  Stuarts  ;  and  a  solemn  protest  against 
the  validity  of  any  precedent  which  might  be 
set  up  in  opposition  to  those  laws.  The  words, 
as  quoted  by  the  writer  himself,  ran  thus: 
"They  do  claim,  demand,  and  insist  upon  all 
and  singular  the  premises  as  their  undoubted 
rights  and  liberties."  Before  a  man  begins  to 
make  improvements  on  his  estate,  he  must 
know  its  boundaries.  Before  a  legislature  sits 
down  to  reform  a  constitution,  it  is  fit  to  ascer 
tain  what  that  constitution  really  is.  This  was 
all  that  the  declaration  intended  to  do;  and  to, 
quarrel  with  it  because  it  did  not  directly  in 
troduce  any  beneficial  changes,  is  to  quarrel 
with  meat  for  not  being  clothing. 

The  principle  on  which  the  authors  of  the 
Revolu'ion  acted  cannot  be  mistaken.  They 
were  perfectly  aware  that  the  English  institu 
tions  stood  in  need  of  reform.  But  they  also 
knew  that  an  important  point  was  gained  if 
they  could  settle,  once  for  all,  by  a  solemn 
compact,  the  matters  which  had,  during  several 
generations,  been  in  controversy  between  the 
Parliament  and  the  crown.  They  therefore 
most  judiciously  abstained  from  mixing  up  tho 
irritating  and  perplexing  question  of  what 
ought  to  be  the  law,  with  the  plain  question  of 
what  was  the  law.  As  to  the  claims  set  forth 
in  the  Declaration  of  Right,  there  was  little  room 
for  debate.  Whigs  and  Tories  were  generally 
agreed  as  to  the  legality  of  the  dispensing 
power,  and  of  taxation  imposed  by  the  roya". 
prerogative.  The  articles  were  therefore  ad 
justed  in  a  very  few  days.  But  if  the  Parlia 
ment  had  determined  to  revise  the  whole  con 
stitution,  and  to  provide  new  securities  against 
misgovernment,  before  proclaiming  the  ne\y 
sovereigns,  months  would  have  been  lost  in 
disputes.  The  coalition  which  had  delivered 
the  country  would  have  been  instantly  dis 
solved.  The  Whigs  would  have  quarreitad 


310 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


with  the  Tories,  the  Lords  with  the  Commons, 
Ihe  Church  with  the  Dissenters ;  and  all  this 
storm  of  conflicting  interests  and  conflicting 
theories  would  have  been  raging  round  a  va 
cant  throne.  In  the  mean  time,  the  greatest 
power  on  the  continent  was  attacking  our  al 
lies,  and  meditating  a  descent  on  our  own  ter 
ritories.  Dundee  was  raising  the  Highlands. 
The  authority  of  James  was  still  owned  by  the 
Irish.  If  the  authors  of  the  Revolution  had 
been  fools  enough  to  take  this  course,  we  have 
little  doubt  that  Luxembourg  would  have  been 
upon  them  in  the  middle  of  their  constitution- 
making.  They  might  probably  have  been  in 
terrupted  in  a  debate  on  Filmer's  and  Sydney's 
theories  of  government,  by  the  entrance  of  the 
musketeers  of  Louis's  household ;  and  have 
been  marched  off1,  two  and  two,  to  frame  ima 
ginary  monarchies  and  commonwealths  in  the 
Tower.  We  have  had  in  our  time  abundant 
experience  of  the  effects  of  such  folly.  We 
have  seen  nation  after  nation  enslaved,  be 
cause  the  friends  of  liberty  wasted  on  discus 
sions  upon  abstract  points  the  time  which  ought 
to  have  been  employed  in  preparing  for  vigo 
rous  national  defence.  The  editor,  apparently, 
would  have  had  the  English  Revolution  of  1688 
end  as  the  Revolutions  of  Spain  and  Naples 
ended  in  our  days.  Thank  God,  our  deliverers 
were  men  of  a  very  different  order  from  the 
Spanish  and  Neapolitan  legislators !  They 
might,  on  many  subjects,  hold  opinions  which, 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  would  not  be  con 
sidered  as  liberal ;  but  they  were  not  dreaming 
pedants.  They  were  statesmen  accustomed 
to  the  management  of  great  affairs.  Their 
plans  of  reform  were  not  so  extensive  as  those 
of  the  lawgivers  of  Cadiz;  but  what  they 
planned,  they  effected  !  and  what  they  effected, 
that  they  maintained  against  the  fiercest  hos 
tility  at  home  and  abroad. 

Their  first  object  was  to  seat  William  on  the 
throne ;  and  they  were  right.  We  say  this 
without  any  reference  to  the  eminent  personal 
qualities  of  William,  or  to  the  follies  and 
crimes  of  James.  If  the  two  princes  had  in 
terchanged  characters,  our  opinion  would  have 
still  been  the  same.  It  was  even  more  neces 
sary  to  England  at  the  time  that  her  king 
should  be  a  usurper  than  that  he  should  be  a 
hero.  There  could  be  no  security  for  good 
government  without  a  change  of  dynasty.  The 
reverence  for  hereditary  right  and  the  doctrine 
of  passive  obedience  had  taken  such  a  hold  on 
the  minds  of  the  Tories  that,  if  James  had  been 
restored  to  power  on  any  conditions,  their  at 
tachment  to  him  would  in  all  probability  have 
revived,  as  the  indignation  which  recent  op 
pression  had  produced  faded  from  their  minds. 
It  had  become  indispensable  to  have  a  sove 
reign  whose  title  to  his  throne  was  strictly 
bound  up  with  the  title  of  the  nation  to  its 
liberties.  In  the  compact  between  the  Prince 
of  Orange  and  the  Convention,  there  was  one 
most  important  article  which,  though  not  ex 
pressed,  was  perfectly  understood  by  both  par 
ties,  and  for  the  performance  of  which  the 
country  had  securities  far  better  than  all  the 
vows  that  Charles  I.  or  Ferdinand  VII.  ever 
took  in  the  day  of  their  weakness,  and  broke 
in  the  .lay  of  their  power.  The  article  was 


this — that  William  would  in  all  things  conform 
himself  to  what  should  appear  to  be  the  fixed 
and  deliberate  sense  of  his  Parliament.  The 
security  for  the  performance  was  this — that  he 
had  no  claim  to  the  throne  except  the  choice 
of  Parliament,  and  no  means  of  maintaining 
himself  on  the  throne  but  the  support  of  Par 
liament.  All  the  great  and  inestimable  re 
forms  which  speedily  followed  the  Revolution 
were  implied  in  those  simple  words, — "The 
Lords  Spiritual  and  Temporal,  and  Commons, 
assembled  at  Westminster,  do  resolve  that 
William  and  Mary,  Prince  and  Princess  of 
Orange,  be,  and  be  declared  King  and  Queen 
of  England." 

And  what  were  the  reforms  of  which  we 
speak  ]  We  will  shortly  recount  some  which 
we  think  the  most  important;  and  we  will 
then  leave  our  readers  to  judge  whether  those 
who  consider  the  Revolution  as  a  mere  change 
of  dynasty,  beneficial  to  a  few  aristocrats,  but 
useless  to  the  body  of  the  people,  or  those  who 
consider  it  as  a  glorious  and  happy  era  in  the 
history  of  the  British  nation  and  of  the  human 
species,  have  judged  more  correctly  of  its  na 
ture. 

First  in  the  list  of  the  benefits  which  our 
country  owes  to  the  Revolution  we  place  the 
Toleration  Act.  It  is  true  that  this  measure 
fell  short  of  the  wishes  of  the  leading  Whigs. 
It  is  true  also  that,  where  Catholics  were  con 
cerned,  even  the  most  enlightened  of  the  lead 
ing  Whigs  held  opinions  by  no  means  so  libe 
ral  as  those  which  are  happily  common  at  the 
present  day.  Those  distinguished  statesmen 
did,  however,  make  a  noble,  and,  in  some  re 
spects,  a  successful  struggle  for  the  rights  of 
conscience.  Their  wish  was  to  bring  the  great 
body  of  the  Protestant  Dissenters  within  the 
pale  of  the  Church,  by  judicious  alterations  in 
the  liturgy  and  the  articles ;  and  to  grant  to 
those  who  still  remained  without  that  pale  the 
most  ample  toleration.  They  framed  a  plan, 
of  comprehension  which  would  have  satisfied 
a  great  majority  of  the  seceders ;  and  they 
proposed  the  complete  abolition  of  that  absurd 
and  odious  test  which,  after  having  been  for  a 
century  and  a  half  a  scandal  to  the  pious,  and 
a  laughing-stock  to  the  profane,  was  at  length 
removed  in  our  own  time.  The  immense 
power  of  the  clergy  and  of  the  Tory  gentry 
frustrated  these  excellent  designs.  The  Whigs, 
however,  did  much.  They  succeeded  in  ob 
taining  a  law,  in  the  provisions  of  which  a 
philosopher  will  doubtless  find  much  to  con 
demn,  but  which  had  the  practical  effect  of 
enabling  almost  every  Protestant  noncon 
formist  to  follow  the  dictates  of  his  own  con 
science  without  molestation.  Scarcely  a  law 
in  the  statute-book  is  theoretically  more  objec 
tionable  than  the  Toleration  Act.  But  we 
question  whether  in  the  whole  of  that  mass  of 
legislation,  from  the  Great  Charter  down  wards, 
there  be  a  single  law  which  has  so  much  di 
minished  the  sum  of  human  suffering, — which 
has  done  so  much  to  allay  bad  passions, — 
which  has  put  an  end  to  so  much  petty  tyran 
ny  and  vexation, — which  has  brought  glad 
ness,  peace,  and  a  sense  of  security  to  so  many 
private  dwellings. 

The  second  of  those  great  reforms  which  the 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


311 


Revolution  produced  was  the  final  establish 
ment  of  the  Presbyterian  Kirk  in  Scotland. 
We  shall  not  now  inquire  whether  the  Episco 
pal  or  the  Calvinistic  form  of  church  govern 
ment  be  more  agreeable  to  primitive  practice. 
Far  be  it  from  us  to  disturb  with  our  doubts 
the  repose  of  an  Oxonian  Bachelor  of  Divinity, 
who  conceives  that  the  English  prelates,  with 
their  baronies  and  palaces,  their  purple  and 
their  fine  linen,  their  mitred  carnages  and 
their  sumptuous  tables,  are  the  true  successors 
and  exact  resemblances  of  those  ancient  bish 
ops  who  lived  by  catching  fish  and  mending 
tents.  We  only  say  that  the  Scotch,  doubtless 
from  their  own  inveterate  stupidity  and  malice, 
were  not  Episcopalians;  that  they  could  not 
be  made  Episcopalians;  that  the  whole  power 
of  government  had  been  in  vain  employed  for 
the  purpose  of  converting  them ;  that  the  full 
est  instruction  on  the  mysterious  questions  of 
the  Apostolical  succession,  and  the  imposition 
of  hands,  had  been  imparted  to  them  by  the 
very  logical  process  of  putting  the  legs  of  the 
students  into  wooden  boots,  and  driving  two  or 
more  wedges  between  their  knees ;  that  a 
course  of  divinity  lectures,  of  the  most  edify 
ing  kind,  had  been  given  in  the  Grass-market 
of  Edinburgh;  yet  that,  in  spite  of  all  the  exer 
tions  of  those  great  theological  professors,  Lau- 
derdale  and  Dundee,  the  Covenanters  were  as 
obstinate  as  ever.  The  contest  between  the 
Scotch  nation  and  the  Anglican  Church  had 
produced  near  thirty  years  of  the  most  fright 
ful  misgovernment  ever  seen  in  any  part  of 
Great  Britain.  If  the  Revolution  had  pro 
duced  no  other  effect  than  that  of  freeing  the 
Scotch  from  the  yoke  of  an  establishment 
which  they  detested,  and  giving  them  one  to 
which  they  were  attached,  it  would  have  been 
one  of  the  happiest  events  in  our  history. 

The  third  great  benefit  which  the  country 
derived  from  the  Revolution  was  the  alteration 
in  the  mode  of  granting  the  supplies.  It  had 
been  the  practice  to  settle  on  every  prince,  at 
the  commencement  of  his  reign,  the  produce 
of  certain  taxes,  which,  it  was  supposed,  would 
yield  a  sum  sufficient  to  defray  the  ordinary 
expenses  of  government.  The 'distribution  of 
the  revenue  was  left  wholly  to  the  sovereign. 
He  might  be  forced  by  war,  or  by  his  own  pro 
fusion,  to  ask  for  an  extraordinary  grant.  But, 
if  his  policy  were  economical  and  pacific,  he 
might  reign  many  years  without  once  being 
tinder  the  necessity  of  summoning  his  Parlia 
ment,  or  of  taking  their  advice  when  he  had 
summoned  them.  This  was  not  all.  The  na 
tural  tendency  of  every  society,  in  which  pro 
perty  enjoys  tolerable  security,  is  to  increase 
in  wealth.  With  the  national  wealth,  the  pro 
duce  of  the  customs,  the  excise,  and  the  post- 
office,  would  of  course  increase ;  and  thus  it 
might  well  happen,  that  taxes  which,  at  the 
beginning  of  a  long  reign,  were  barely  suffi 
cient  to  support  a  frugal  government  in  time 
of  peace,  might,  before  the  end  of  that  reign, 
enable  the  sovereign  to  imitate  the  extrava 
gance  of  Nero  or  Heliogabalus, — to  raise  great 
armies — to  carry  on  expensive  wars.  Some 
thing  of  this  sort  had  actually  happened  under 
Charles  the.  Second,  though  his  reign  lasted 
only  twenty-five  years.  His  first  Parliament 


settled  on  him  taxes  estimated  to  produce 
£1,200,000  a  year.  This  they  thought  suffi 
cient,  as  they  allowed  nothing  for  a  standing 
army  in  time  of  peace.  At  the  time  of  Charles's 
death,  the  annual  produce  of  these  taxes  cer 
tainly  exceeded  a  million  and  a  half;  and  the 
king  who,  during  the  years  which  immediately 
followed  his  accession,  was  perpetually  in  dis 
tress,  and  perpetually  asking  his  Parliaments 
for  money,  was  at  last  able  to  keep  a  consider 
able  body  of  regular  troops  without  any  as 
sistance  from  the  House  of  Commons.  If  his 
reign  had  been  as  lonf  as  that  of  George  the 
Third,  he  would  probably  before  the  close  of 
it  have  been  in  the  annual  receipt  of  several 
millions  over  and  above  what  the  ordinary  ex 
penses  of  the  state  required ;  and  of  those  mil 
lions  he  would  have  been  as  absolutely  master 
as  the  king  now  is  of  the  sum  allowed  for  his 
privy-purse.  He  might  have  spent  them  in 
luxury,  in  corruption,  in  paying  troops  to  over 
awe  his  people,  or  in  carrying  into  effect  wild 
schemes  of  foreign  conquest.  The  authors  of 
the  Revolution  applied  a  remedy  to  this  great 
abuse.  They  settled  on  the  king,  not  the  fluc 
tuating  produce  of  certain  fixed  taxes,  but  a 
fixed  sum  sufficient  for  the  support  of  his  own 
royal  state.  They  established  it  as  a  rule,  that 
all  the  expenses  of  the  army,  the  navy,  and  the 
ordnance,  should  be  brought  annually  under 
the  review  of  the  House  of  Commons,  and  that 
every  sum  voted  should  be  applied  tc  the  ser 
vice  specified  in  the  vote.  The  direct  effect  of 
this  change  was  important.  The  indirect  ef 
fect  has  been  more  important  still.  From  that 
time  the  House  of  Commons  has  been  reaLy 
the  paramount  power  in  the  state.  It  has,  in 
truth,  appointed  and  removed  ministers,  de 
clared  war,  and  concluded  peace.  No  combi 
nation  of  the  king  and  the  Lords  has  ever  been 
able  to  effect  any  thing  against  the  Lower 
House,  backed  by  its  constituents.  Three  or 
four  times,  indeed,  the  sovereign  has  been  able 
to  break  the  force  of  an  opposition,  by  dissolv 
ing  the  Parliament.  But  if  that  experiment 
should  fail,  if  the  people  should  be  of  the  same 
mind  with  their  representatives  —  he  would 
clearly  have  no  course  left  but  to  yield,  to  ab 
dicate,  or  to  fight. 

The  next  great  blessing  which  we  owe  to 
the  Revolution,  is  the  purification  of  the  ad 
ministration  of  justice  in  political  cases.  Of 
the  importance  of  this  change,  no  person  can 
judge  who  is  not  well  acquainted  with  the  ear 
lier  volumes  of  the  State  Trials.  Those  vo 
lumes  are,  we  do  not  hesitate  to  say,  the  most 
frightful  record  of  baseness  and  depravity  that 
is  extant  in  the  world.  Our  hatred  is  alto 
gether  turned  away  from  the  crimes  and  the 
criminals,  and  directed  against  the  law  and  its 
ministers.  We  see  villanies  as  black  as  ever 
were  imputed  to  any  prisoner  at  any  bar,  daily 
committed  on  the  bench  and  in  the  jury-box. 
The  worst  of  the  bad  acts  which  brought  dis 
credit  on  the  old  Parliaments  of  France, — the 
condemnation  of  Lally,  for  example,  or  even 
that  of  Galas, — may  seem  praiseworthy  when 
J  compared  with  those  which  follow  each  other 
I  in  endless  succession,  as  we  turn  over  that 
I  huge  chronicle  of  the  shame  of  England.  Thf 
I  magistrates  of  Paris  and  Toulouse  were  blind 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ed  by  prejudice,  passion,  or  bigotry.  But  the  i 
abandoned  judges  of  our  own  country  com- 
mitted  murder  with  their  eyes  open.  The  j 
cause  of  this  is  plain.  In  France  there  was  j 
no  constitutional  opposition.  If  a  man  held  j 
language  offensive  to  the  government,  he  was 
at  once  sent  to  the  Bastile  or  to  Vincennes. 
But  in  England,  at  least  after  the  days  of  the 
Long  Parliament,  the  fcing  could  not,  by  a  mere 
act  of  his  prerogative,  rid  himself  of  a  trouble 
some  politician.  Re  was  forced  to  remove 
Ihose  who  thwarted  him  by  means  of  perjured 
witnesses,  packed  juries,  and  corrupt,  hard 
hearted,  brow-beating  judges.  The  Opposition 
naturally  retaliated  whenever  they  had  the 
upper  hand.  Every  time  that  the  power  passed 
from  one  party  to  the  other,  took  place  a  pro 
scription  and  a  massacre,  thinly  disguised 
under  the  forms  of  judicial  procedure.  The 
tribunals  ought  to  be  sacred  places  of  refuge, 
where,  in  all  the  vicissitudes  of  public  affairs, 
the  innocent-  of  all  parties  may  find  shelter. 
They  were,  before  the  Revolution,  an  unclean 
Jmblic  shambles,  to  which  each  party  in  its 
turn  dragged  its  opponents,  and  where  each 
found  the  same  venal  and  ferocious  butchers 
waiting  for  its  custom.  Papist  or  Protestant, 
Tory  or  Whig,  Priest  or  Alderman,  all  was 
one  to  those  greedy  and  savage  natures,  pro 
vided  only  there  was  money  to  earn  and  blood 
to  shed. 

Of  course,  these  worthless  judges  soon 
created  around  them,  as  was  natural,  a  breed 
of  informers  more  wicked,  if  possible,  than 
themselves.  The  trial  by  jury  afforded  little 
or  no  protection  to  the  innocent.  The  juries 
were  nominated  by  the  sheriffs.  The  sheriffs 
were  in  most  parts  of  England  nominated  by 
the  crown.  In  London,  the  great  scene  of 
political  contention,  those  officers  were  chosen 
by  the  people.  The  fiercest  parliamentary 
election  of  our  time  will  give  but  a  faint  notion 
of  the  storm  which  raged  in  the  city  on  the  day 
when  two  infuriated  parties,  each  bearing  its 
badge,  met  to  select  the  men  in  whose  hands 
were  to  be  the  issues  of  life  and  death  for  the 
coming  year.  On  that  day  nobles  of  the  high 
est  descent  did  not  think  it  beneath  them  to 
canvass  and  marshal  the  livery,  to  head  the 
procession,  and  to  watch  the  poll.  On  that 
day,  the  great  chiefs  of  parties  waited  in  an 
agony  of  suspense  for  the  messenger  who  was 
to  bring  from  Guildhall  the  news  whether  their 
lives  and  estates  were,  for  the  next  twelve 
months,  to  be  at  the  mercy  of  a  friend  or  of  a 
foe.  In  1681,  Whig  sheriffs  were  chosen,  and 
Shaftesbury  defied  the  whole  power  of  the  go- 
rernment.  In  1682,  the  sheriffs  were  Tories, 
bhaftesbury  fled  to  Holland.  The  other  chiefs 
of  the  party  broke  up  their  councils,  and  re 
tired  in  haste  to  their  country-seats.  Sydney 
on  the  scaffold  told  those  sheriffs  that  his  blood 
was  on  their  heads  Neither  of  them  could 
deny  the  charge,  and  one  of  them  wept  with 
«hame  and  remorse. 

Thus  every  man  who  then  meddled  with 
jiiiblir.  affairs'  too"*  his  life  in  his  hand.  The 
consequence  was,  that  men  of  gentle  natures 
stood  aloof  from  contests  in  which  they  could 
not  engage  without  hazarding  their  own  necks 
and  the  fortunes  of  their  children.  This  was 


the  course  adopted  by  Sir  William  Temple,  by 
Evelyn,  and  by  many  other  men,  who  were, 
in  every  respect,  admirably  qualified  to  serve 
the  state.  On  the  other  hand,  those  resolute 
and  enterprising  spirits  who  put  their  heads 
and  lands  to  hazard  in  the  game  of  politics, 
naturally  acquired,  from  the  habit  of  playing 
for  so  deep  a  stake,  a  reckless  and  desperate 
turn  of  mind.  It  was,  we  seriously  believe,  as 
safe  to  be  a  highwayman  as  to  be  a  distin 
guished  leader  of  Opposition.  This  may  serve 
to  explain,  and  in  some  degree  to  excuie,  the 
violence  with  which  the  factions  of  that  age 
are  justly  reproached.  They  were  fighting, 
not  for  office,  but  for  life.  If  they  reposed  for 
a  moment  from  the  work  of  agitation,  if  they 
suffered  the  public  excitement  to  flag,  they 
were  lost  men.  Hume,  in  describing  this  state 
of  things,  has  employed  an  image  which  seems 
hardly  to  suit  the  general  simplicity  of  his 
style,  but  which  is  by  no  means  too  strong  for 
the  occasion.  "  Thus/'  says  he,  "  the  two  par 
ties,  actuated  by  mutual  rage,  but  cooped  up 
within  the  narrow  limits  of  the  law,  levelled 
with  poisoned  daggers  the  most  deadly  blows 
against  each  other's  breast,  and  buried  in 
their  factious  divisions  all  regard  to  truth,  ho 
nour,  and  humanity." 

From  this  terrible  evil  the  Revolution  set  us 
free.  The  law  which  secured  to  the  judges 
their  seats  during  life  or  good  behaviour  did 
something.  The  law  subsequently  passed  for 
regulating  trials  in  cases  of  treason  did  much 
more.  The  provisions  of  that  law  show,  in 
deed,  very  little  legislative  skill.  It  is  not 
framed  on  the  principle  of  securing  the  inno 
cent,  but  on  the  principle  of  giving  a  great 
chance  of  escape  to  the  accused,  whether  in 
nocent  or  guilty.  This,  however,  is  decidedly 
a  fault  on  the  right  side.  The  evil  produced 
by  the  occasional  escape  of  a  bad  citizen  is 
not  to  be  compared  with  the  evils  of  that  Reign 
of  Terror,  for  such  it  was,  which  preceded  the 
Revolution.  Since  the  passing  of  this  law, 
scarcely  one  single  person  has  suffered  death 
in  England  as  a  traitor,  who  had  not  been  con 
victed  on  overwhelming  evidence,  to  the  satis 
faction  of  all  parties,  of  a  really  great  crime 
against  the  state.  Attempts  have  been  made 
in  times  of  great  excitement,  to  bring  in  per 
sons  guilty  of  high  treason  for  acts  which, 
though  sometimes  highly  blamable,  did  not 
necessarily  imply  a  design  of  altering  the  go 
vernment  by  physical  force.  All  those  attempts 
have  failed.  For  a  hundred  and  forty  years 
no  statesman,  while  engaged  in  constitutional 
opposition  to  a  government,  has  had  the  axe 
before  his  eyes.  The  smallest  minorities  strug 
gling  against  the  most  powerful  majorities  in 
the  most  agitated  times,  have  felt  themselves 
perfectly  secure.  Pulteney  and  Fox  were  the 
two  most  distinguished  leaders  of  Opposition 
since  the  Revolution.  Both  were  personally 
obnoxious  to  the  court.  But  the  utmost  harm 
that  the  utmost  anger  of  the  court  could  do  to 
them,  was  to  strike  off  the  "Right  Honourable" 
I  from  before  their  names. 

But  of  all  the  reforms  produced  by  the  Re- 
|  volution,  the  most  important  was  the  full  esta- 
|  blishment  of  the  liberty  of  unlicensed  printing. 
1  The  censorship,  which,  under  some  form  or 


MACKINTOSH'S  HISTORY. 


other  had  existed,  with  rare  and  short  intermis 
sions,  under  every  government,  monarchical 
or  republican,  from  the  time  of  Henry  VIII. 
downwards,  expired,  and  has  never  since  been 
renewed. 

We  are  aware  that  the  great  improvements 
which  we  have  recapitulated  were,  in  many 
respects,  imperfectly  and  unskilfully  executed. 
The  authors  of  those  improvements  sometimes, 
while  they  removed  or  mitigated  a  great  prac 
tical  evil,  continued  to  recognise  the  erroneous 
principle  from  which  that  evil  had  sprung. 
Sometimes,  when  they  had  adopted  a  sound 
principle,  they  shrank  from  following  it  to  all 
the  conclusions  to  which  it  would  have  led 
them.  Sometimes  they  failed  to  perceive  that 
the  remedies  which  they  applied  to  one  disease 
of  the  state  were  certain  to  generate  another 
disease,  and  to  render  another  remedy  neces 
sary.  Their  knowledge  was  inferior  to  ours ; 
nor  were  they  always  able  to  act  up  to  their 
knowledge.  The  pressure  of  circumstances, 
the  necessity  of  compromising  differences  of 
opinion,  the  power  and  violence  of  the  party 
which  was  altogether  hostile  to  the  new  settle 
ment,  must  be  taken  into  the  account.  When 
these  things  are  fairly  weighed,  there  will,  we 
think,  be  little  difference  of  opinion  among 
liberal  and  right-minded  men  as  to  the  real 
value  of  what  the  great  events  of  1688  did  for 
this  country. 

We  have  recounted  what  appear  to  us  the 
most  important  of  those  changes  which  the 
Revolution  produced  in  our  laws.  The  changes 
which  it  produced  in  our  laws,  however,  were 
not  more  important  than  the  change  which  it 
indirectly  produced  in  the  public  mind.  The 
Whig  party  had,  during  seventy  years,  an 
almost  uninterrupted  possession  of  power.  It 
had  always  been  the  fundamental  doctrine  of 
that  party,  that  power  is  a  trust  for  the  people ; 
that  it  is  given  to  magistrates,  not  for  their 
own,  but  for  the  public  advantage  ;  that,  where 
it  is  abused  by  magistrates,  even  by  the  highest 
of  all,  it  may  lawfully  be  withdrawn.  It  is 
perfectly  true,  that  the  Whigs  were  not  more 
exempt  than  other  men  from  the  vices  and  in 
firmities  of  our  nature,  and  that,  when  they  had 
power,  they  sometimes  abused  it.  But  still 
they  stood  firm  to  their  theory.  The  theory 
was  the  badge  of  their  party.  It  was  some 
thing  more.  It  was  the  foundation  on  which 
rested  the  power  of  the  houses  of  Nassau  and 
Brunswick.  Thus,  there  was  a  government 
interested  in  propagating  a  class  of  opinions 
which  most  governments  are  interested  in  dis 
couraging, — a  government  which  looked  with 
complacency  on  all  speculations  tending  to 
democracy,  and  with  extreme  aversion  on  all 
speculations  favourable  to  arbitrary  power. 
There  was  a  king  who  decidedly  preferred  a 
republican  to  a  believer  in  the  divine  right  of 
kings ;  who  considered  every  attempt  to  exalt 
his  prerogative  as  an  attack  on  his  title;  and 
who  reserved  all  his  favours  for  those  who 
declaimed  on  the  natural  equality  of  men  and 
the  popular  origin  of  government.  This  was 
the  state  of  things  from  the  Revolution  till  the 
death  of  George  II.  The  effect  was  what  might 
have  been  expected.  Even  in  that  profession 

VOL.  III.— 40 


which  has  generally  been  most  disposed  *.o 
magnify  the  prerogative,  a  great  change  took 
place.  Bishopric  after  bishopric,  and  iieanery 
after  deanery,  were  bestowed  on  Whigs  and 
Latitudinarians.  The  consequence  was,  that 
Whigism  and  Latitudinarianism  were  pro 
fessed  by  the  ablest  and  most  aspiring  church 
men. 

Hume  has  complained  bitterly  of  this  at  the 
close  of  his  history.  "The  Whig  party,"  says 
he,  "for  a  course  of  near  seventy  years,  has 
almost  without  interruption  enjoyed  the  whole 
authority  of  government,  and  no  honours  or 
offices  could  be  obtained  but  by  their  counte 
nance  and  protection.  But  this  event,  which  in 
some  particulars  has  been  advantageous  to  the 
state,  nas  proved  destructive  to  the  truth  of 
history,  and  has  established  many  gross  false 
hoods,  which  it  is  unaccountable  how  any 
civilized  nation  could  have  embraced  with  re 
gard  to  its  domestic  occurrences.  Composi 
tions  the  most  despicable,  both  for  style  and 
matter"  (in  a  note  he  instances  Locke,  Sydney, 
Hoadley,  and  Rapin)  "have  been  extolled  and 
propagated  and  read  as  if  they  had  equalled  the 
most  celebrated  remains  of  antiquity.  And 
forgetting  that  a  regard  to  liberty,  though  a 
laudable  passion,  ought  commonly  to  be  sub* 
servient  to  a  reverence  for  established  govern 
ment,  the  prevailing  faction  has  celebrated 
only  the  partisans  of  the  former."  We  will 
not  here  enter  into  an  argument  about  the 
merit  of  Rapin's  history,  or  Locke's  political 
speculations.  We  call  Hume  merely  as  evi 
dence  to  a  fact  well  known  to  all  reading  men, 
that  the  literature  patronised  by  the  English 
court  and  the  English  ministry,  during  the 
first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  of  that 
kind  which  courtiers  and  min  sters  generally 
do  all  in  their  power  to  discountenance,  and 
tended  to  inspire  zeal  for  the  liberties  of  the 
people  rather  than  respect  for  the  authority  of 
the  government. 

There  was  still  a  very  strong  Tory  party  in 
England.  But  that  party  was  in  opposition. 
Many  of  its  members  still  held  the  doctrine  of 
passive  obedience.  But  they  did  not  admit 
that  the  existing  dynasty  had  any  claim  to  such 
obedience.  They  condemned  resistance.  But 
by  resistance  they  meant  the  keeping  out  of 
James  III.,  and  not  the  turning  out  of  George  II. 
No  Radical  of  our  times  could  grumble  more 
at  the  expenses  of  the  royal  household,  could 
exert  himself  more  strenuously  to  reduce  the 
military  establishment,  could  oppose  with  more 
earnestness  every  proposition  for  arming  the 
executive  with  extraordinary  powers,  or  could 
pour  more  unmitigated  abuse  on  placemen  and 
courtiers.  If  a  writer  were  now,  in  a  massive 
Dictionary,  to  define  a  Pensioner  as  a  traitor 
and  a  slave,  the  Excise  as  a  hateful  tax.  the 
Commissioners  of  the  excise  as  wretches, — if 
he  were  to  write  a  satire  full  of  reflections  on 
men  who  receive  "  the  price  of  boroughs  anc* 
of  souls,"  who  "  explain  their  country's  dear 
bought  rights  away,"  or 

"whom  pensions  can  incite 
To  vote  a  patriot  black,  a  courtier  white," 

we  should  set  him  down  for  something  inor 
2D 


314 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


democratic  than  a  Whig.  Yet  this  was  the 
language  which  Johnson,  the  most  bigoted  of 
Tories  and  High  Churchmen,  held  under  the 
administration  of  Walpole  and  Pelham. 

Thus  doctrines  favourable  to  public  liberty 
were  inculcated  alike  by  those  who  were  in 
power,  and  by  those  who  were  in  opposition. 
It  was  by  means  of  these  doctrines  alone 
that  the  former  could  prove  that  they  had  a 
king  dejure.  The  servile  theories  of  the  latter 
did  not  prevent  them  from  offering  every  mo 
lestation  to  one  whom  they  considered  as 
merely  a  king  de  facto.  The  attachment  of  the 
one  party  to  the  house  of  Hanover,  of  the  other 
to  that  of  Stuart,  induced  both  to  talk  a  lan 
guage  much  more  favourable  to  popular  rights 
than  tc  monarchical  power.  What  took  place 
at  the  first  representation  of  "  Cato"  is  no  bad 
illustration  of  the  way  in  which  the  two  great 
sections  of  the  community  almost  invariably 
acted.  A  play,  the  whole  merit  of  which  con 
sists  in  its  stately  rhetoric, — a  rhetoric  some 
times  not  unworthy  of  Lucan, — about  hating 
tyrants  and  dying  for  freedom,  is  brought  on 
the  stage  in  a  time  of  great  political  excite 
ment.  Both  parties  crowd  to  the  theatre. 
Each  affects  to  consider  every  line  as  a  com 
pliment  to  itself,  and  an  attack  on  its  oppo 
nents.  The  curtain  falls  amidst  an  unanimous 
roar  of  applause.  The  Whigs  of  the  "  Kit  Cat" 
embrace  the  author,  and  assure  him  that  he 
has  rendered  an  inestimable  service  to  liberty. 
The  Tory  Secretary  of  State  presents  a  purse 
to  the  chief  actor  for  defending  the  cause  of 
liberty  so  well.  The  history  of  that  night  was, 
in  miniature,  the  history  of  two  generations. 

We  well  know  how  much  sophistry  there 
was  in  the  reasonings,  and  how  much  exagge 
ration  in  the  declamations  of  both  parties.  But 
when  we  compare  the  state  in  which  political 
science  was  at  the  close  of  the  reign  of  George 
the  Second,  with  the  state  in  which  it  had  been 
wher  James  the  Second  came  to  the  throne,  it 
is  impossible  not  to  admit  that  a  prodigious 


improvement  had  taken  place.  We  are  no 
admirers  of  the  political  doctrines  laid  down 
in  Blackstone's  Commentaries.  But  ip  we  con 
sider  that  those  Commentaries  were  rt.ad  with 
great  applause  in  the  very  schools  -vhere, 
within  the  memory  of  some  persons  then  living, 
books  had  been  publicly  burned  by  order  of  the 
University  of  Oxford,  for  containing  the  "  damn 
able  doctrine,"  that  the  English  monarchy  [3 
limited  and  mixed,  we  cannot  deny  that  a  salu 
tary  change  had  taken  place.  "  The  Jesuits," 
says  Pascal,  in  the  last  of  his  incomparable 
letters,  "  have  obtained  a  Papal  decree  con 
demning  Galileo's  doctrine  about  the  motion 
of  the  earth.  It  is  all  in  vain.  If  the  world  is 
really  turning  round,  all  mankind  together  will 
not  be  able  to  keep  it  from  turning,  or  to  keep 
themselves  from  turning  with  it."  The  decrees 
of  Oxford  were  as  ineffectual  to  stay  the  great 
moral  and  political  revolution,  as  those  of  the 
Vatican  to  stay  the  motion  of  our  globe.  That 
learned  University  found  itself  not  only  unable 
to  keep  the  mass  from  moving,  but  unable  to 
keep  itself  from  moving  along  with  the  mass. 
Nor  was  the  effect  of  the  discussions  and  spe 
culations  of  that  period  confined  to  our  own 
country.  While  the  Jacobite  party  was  in  the 
last  dotage  and  weakness  of  its  paralytic  old 
age,  the  political  philosophy  of  England  began 
to  produce  a  mighty  effect  on  France,  and, 
through  France,  on  Europe. 

Here  another  vast  field  opens  itself  before  us. 
But  we  must  resolutely  turn  away  from  it.  We 
will  conclude  by  earnestly  advising  ail  our  read 
ers  to  study  Sir  James  Mackintosh's  invaluable 
Fragment;  and  by  expressing  the  satisfaction 
we  have  received  from  learning,  sh  ce  this 
article  was  written,  that  the  intelligent  publish 
ers  of  the  volume  before  us  have  resolved  to 
reprint  the  Fragment  in  a  separate  form,  with 
out  those  accompaniments  which  have  hitherto 
impeded  its  circulation.  The  resolution  is  as 
creditable  to  them  as  the  publication  is  sure  tg 
be  acceptable  to  the  lovers  of  English  historj, 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


316 


SIB  JOHN  MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  LORD  CLUE/ 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW  FOR  JANUARY,  1840.] 


WE  have  always  thought  it  strange  that,! 
while  the  history  of  the  Spanish  empire  in  I 
America  is  so  familiarly  known  to  all  the  na 
tions  of  Europe,  the  great  actions  of  our  own 
countrymen  in  the  East  should,  even  among 
ourselves,  excite  little  interest.  Every  school 
boy  knows  who  imprisoned  Montezuma,  and  i 
who  strangled  Atabalipa.  But  we  doubt  whe-  ! 
ther  one  in  ten,  even  among  English  gentlemen 
of  highly  cultivated  minds,  can  tell  who  won 
the  battle  of  Buxar,  who  perpetrated  the  mas 
sacre  of  Patna,  whether  Surajah  Dowlah  ruled 
in  Oude  or  in  Travancore,  or  whether  Holkar 
was  a  Hindoo  or  a  Mussulman.  Yet  the  vic 
tories  of  Cortes  were  gained  over  savages  who 
had  no  letters,  who  were  ignorant  of  the  use 
of  metals,  who  had  not  broken  in  a  single  ani 
mal  to  labour,  who  wielded  no  better  weapons 
than  those  which  could  be  made  out  of  sticks, 
flints,  and  fish-bones,  who  regarded  a  horse- 
soldier  as  a  monster,  half  man  and  half  beast, 
who  took  a  harquebusier  for  a  sorcerer  able  to 
scatter  the  thunder  and  lightning  of  the  skies. 
The  people  of  India  when  we  subdued  them 
were  ten  times  as  numerous  as  the  vanquished 
Americans,  and  were  at  the  same  time  quite  as 
highly  civilized  as  the  victorious  Spaniards. 
They"  had  reared  cities  larger  and  fairer  than 
Saragossa  or  Toledo,  and  buildings  more  beau 
tiful  and  costly  than  the  cathedral  of  Seville. 
They  could  show  bankers  richer  than  the  rich 
est  firms  of  Barcelona  or  Cadiz;  viceroys 
whose  splendour  far  surpassed  that  of  Ferdi 
nand  the  Catholic ;  myriads  of  cavalry  and 
long  trains  of  artillery  which  would  have  asto 
nished  the  Great  Captain.  It  might  have  been 
expected  that  every  Englishman  who  takes 
any  interest  in  any  part  of  history  would  be 
curious  to  know  how  a  handful  of  his  country 
men,  separated  from  their  home  by  an  immense 
ocean,  subjugated,  in  the  course  of  a  few 
years,  one  of  the  greatest  empires  in  the  world. 
Yet,  unless  we  greatly  err,  this  subject  is  to 
most  readers  not  only  insipid,  but  positively 
distasteful. 

Perhaps  the  fault  lies  partly  with  the  histo 
rians.  Mr.  Mill's  book,  though  it  has  undoubt 
edly  great  and  rare  merit,  is  not  sufficiently 
animated  and  picturesque  to  attract  those  who 
read  for  amusement.  Orme,  inferior  to  no 
English  historian  in  style  and  power  of  paint 
ing,  is  minute  even  to  tediousness.  In  one 
volume  he  allots,  on  an  average,  a  closely 
printed  quarto  page  to  the  events  of  every 
forty-eight  hours.  The  consequence  is  that  his 
narrative,  though  one  of  the  most  authentic 
and  one  of  the  most  finely  written  in  our  lan- 


*  The  Life  of  Robert  Lord  Cline ;  collected  from  the 
Family  Papers,  communicated  by  the  Earl  of  Powi».  By 
Major -General  Sir  JOHN  MALCOLM,  K.  C.  B.  3  vola.  8vo. 
London.  1636. 


guage,  has  never  been  very  popular,  and  is 
now  scarcely  ever  read. 

We  fear  that  Sir  John  Malcolm's  volumes 
will  not  much  attract  those  readers  whom 
Orme  and  Mill  have  repelled.  The  naterials 
placed  at  his  disposal  by  the  late  Lord  Powis 
were  indeed  of  great  value.  But  we  cannot 
Stay  that  they  have  been  very  skilfully  worked 
up.  It  would,  however,  be  unjust  to  criticise 
with  severity  a  work  which,  if  the  author  had 
lived  to  complete  and  revise  it,  would  proba 
bly  have  been  improved  by  condensation  and 
by  a  better  arrangement.  We  are  more  dis 
posed  to  perform  the  pleasing  duty  of  express 
ing  our  gratitude  to  the  noble  family  to  which 
the  public  owes  so  much  useful  and  curious 
information. 

The  effect  of  the  book,  even  when  we  make 
the  largest  allowance  for  the  partiality  of  those 
who  have  furnished  and  of  those  who  have  di 
gested  the  materials,  is,  on  the  whole,  greatly 
to  raise  the  character  of  Lord  Clive.  We  are 
far  indeed  from  sympathizing  with  Sir  John 
Malcolm,  whose  love  passes  the  love  of  bio 
graphers,  and  who  can  see  nothing  but  wisdom 
and  justice  in  the  actions  of  his  idol.  But  we 
are  at  least  equally  far  from  concurring  in  the 
severe  judgment  of  Mr.  Mill,  who  seems  to  us 
to  show  less  discrimination  in  his  account  of 
Clive  than  in  any  other  part  of  his  valuable 
work.  Clive,  like  most  men  who  are  born  with 
strong  passions,  and  tried  by  strong  tempta 
tions,  committed  great  faults.  But  every  per 
son  who  takes  a  fair  and  enlightened  view  of 
his  whole  career  must  admit  that  our  island, 
so  fertile  in  heroes  and  statesmen,  has  scarcely 
ever  produced  a  man  more  truly  great  either  in 
arms  or  in  council. 

The  Clives  had  been  settled  ever  since  the 
twelfth  century  on  an  estate  of  no  great  value 
near  Market-Drayton,  in  Shropshire.  In  the 
reign  of  George  the  First  this  moderate  but 
ancient  inheritance  was  possessed  by  Mr. 
Richard  Clive,  who  seems  to  have  been  a 
plain  man  of  no  great  tact  or  capacity.  He 
had  been  bred  to  the  law,  and  divided  his  firne 
between  professional  business  and  the  avoca 
tions  of  a  small  proprietor.  He  married  a  lady 
from  Manchester  of  the  name  of  Gasldll  and 
became  the  father  of  a  very  numerous  family. 
His  eldest  son,  Robert,  the  founder  of  the  Bri 
tish  empire  in  India,  was  born  at  the  old  seat 
of  his  ancestors  on  the  29th  of  September, 
1725. 

Some  lineaments  of  the  character  of  the  man 
were  early  discerned  in  the  child.  There  re 
main  letters  written  by  his  relations  wncn  he 
was  in  his  seventh  year;  and  from  these  it  ap 
pears  that,  even  at  that  early  age,  his  strong 
will  and  his  fiery  passions,  sustainei  by  a  con. 
stitutional  intrepidity  which  sometimes  seenu-d 


316 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


hardly  compatible  with  soundness  of  mind,  had  |  ed  by  its  garden,  whither  the  wealthy  agents 
begun  to  cause  great  uneasiness  to  his  family,  of  the  Company  retired,  after  the  labours  of 
"Fighting,"  says  one  of  his  uncles,  "  to  which  the  desk  and  the  warehouse,  to  enjoy  the  cool 
he  is  oat  of  measure  addicted,  gives  his  tern-  breeze  which  springs  up  at  sunset  from  the 

Eer  such  a  fierceness  and  imperiousness  that  j  Bay  of  Bengal.    The  habits  of  these  mercan- 
e  flies  out  on  every  trifling  occasion."     The  !  tile  grandees  appear  to  have  been  more  pro- 

/»         _        i   _    •       _  i       _  ..         • 


old  people  of  the  neighbourhood  still  remem 
ber  to  have  heard  from  their  parents  how  Bob 
Clive  climbed  to  the  top  of  the  lofty  steeple  of 
Market-Dray  ton,  and  with  what  terror  the  inha 
bitants  saw  him  seated  on  a  stone  spout  near 
the  summit.  The)'-  also  relate  how  he  formed 
all  the  good-for-nothing  lads  of  the  town  into  a 
kind  of  predatory  army,  and  compelled  the 
shopkeepers  to  submit  to  a  tribute  of  apples 
and  halfpence,  in  consideration  of  which  he 
guarantied  the  security  of  their  windows.  He 
was  sent  from  school  to  school,  making  very 
little  progress  in  his  learning,  and  gaining  for 
himself  everywhere  the  character  of  an  ex 
ceedingly  naughty  boy.  One  of  his  masters, 
it  is  said,  was  sagacious  enough  to  prophesy 
that  the  idle  lad  would  make  a  great  figure  in 
the  world.  But  the  general  opinion  seems  to 
have  been  that  poor  Robert  was  a  dunce,  if  not 
a  reprobate.  His  family  expected  nothing  good 


fuse,  luxurious,  and  ostentatious,  than  those 
of  the  high  judicial  and  political  functionaries 
who  have  succeeded  them.  But  comfort  was 
far  less  understood.  Many  devices  which  now 
mitigate  the  heat  of  the  climate,  preserve 
health,  and  prolong  life,  were  unknown. 
There  was  far  less  intercourse  with  Europe 
than  at  present.  The  voyage  by  the  Cape, 
which  in  our  time  has  often  been  performed 
within  three  months,  was  then  very  seldom 
accomplished  in  six,  and  was  sometimes  pro 
tracted  to  more  than  a  year.  Consequently  the 
Anglo-Indian  was  then  much  more  estranged 
from  his  country,  much  more  an  oriental  in 
his  tastes  and  habits,  and  much  less  fitted  to 
mix  in  society  after  his  return  to  Europe,  than 
the  Anglo-Indian  of  the  present  day. 

Within  the  fort  and  its  precincts,  ihe  English 
governors  exercised,  by  permission  of  the  na 
tive  rulers,  an  extensive  authority.  But  they 


from  such  slender  parts  and  such  a  headstrong    had  never  dreamed  of  claiming  independent 

power.  The  surrounding  country  was  go 
verned  by  the  Nabob  of  the  Carnatic,  a  deputy 
of  the  Viceroy  of  the  Deccan,  commonly  called 
the  Nizam,  who  was  himself  only  a  deputy  of 
the  mighty  prince  designated  by  our  ancestors 
as  the  Great  Mogul.  Those  names,  once  so 
august  and  formidable,  still  remain.  There  is 
still  a  Nabob  of  the  Carnalic,  who  lives  on  a 
pension  allowed  to  him  by  the  Company,  out 
of  the  revenues  of  the  province  which  his  an 
cestors  ruled.  There  is  still  a  Nizam,  whose 
capital  is  overawed  by  a  British  cantonment, 
and  to  whom  a  British  resident  gives,  under 
the  name  of  advice,  commands  which  are  not 
to  be  disputed.  There  is  still  a  Mogul,  who  is 
permitted  to  play  at  holding  courts  and  receiv 
ing  petitions,  but  who  has  less  power  to  help 
or  hurt  than  the  youngest  civil  servant  of  the 
Company. 

Clive's  voyage  was  unusually  tedious  even 
for  that  age.  The  ship  remained  some  months 
at  the  Brazils,  where  the  young  adventurer 
picked  up  some  knowledge  of  Portuguese,  and 
spent  all  his  pocket-money.  He  did  not  arrive 
in  India  till  more  than  a  year  after  he  had  left 
England.  His  situation  at  Madras  was  most 
painful.  His  funds  were  exhausted.  His  pay 
was  small.  He  had  contracted  debts.  He  was 
wretcheJUy  lodged — no  small  calamity  in  a  cli 
mate  which  can  be  rendered  tolerable  to  a 
European  only  by  spacious,  and  well-placed 
apartments.  He  had  been  furnished  with  let 
ters  of  recommendation  to  a  gentleman  who 
might  have  assisted  him;  but  when  he  landed 
at  Fort  St.  George  he  found  that  this  gentleman 
had  sailed  for  England.  His  shy  and  haughty 
disposition  withheld  him  from  introducing  him- 
self.  He  was  several  months  in  India  before 
he  became  acquainted  with  a  single  family. 
The  climate  affected  his  health  and  spirits. 
His  duties  were  of  a  kind  ill  suited  to  his  ar- 


temper.  It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  they 
gladly  accepted  for  him,  when  he  was  in  his 
eighteenth  year,  a  writership  in  the  service 
of  the  East  India  Company,  and  shipped  him 
off  to  make  a  fortune  01  to  die  of  a  fever  at 
Madras. 

Far  different  were  the  prospects  of  Clive 
from  those  of  the  youths  whom  the  East  India 
College  now  annually  sends  to  the  Presiden 
cies  of  our  Asiatic  empire.  The  Company 
was  then  purely  a  trading  corporation.  Its 
territory  consisted  of  a  few  square  miles,  for 
which  rent  was  paid  to  the  native  governments. 
Its  troops  were  scarcely  numerous  enough  to 
man  the  batteries  of  three  or  four  ill-construct 
ed  forts,  which  had  been  erected  for  the  pro 
tection  of  the  warehouses.  The  natives,  who 
composed  a  considerable  part  of  these  little 
garrisons  had  not  yet  been  trained  in  the  dis 
cipline  of  Europe,  and  were  armed,  some  with 
swords  and  shields,  some  with  bows  and  ar 
rows.  The  business  of  the  servants  of  the 
Company  was  not,  as  now,  to  conduct  the  ju 
dicial,  financial,  and  diplomatic  business  of  a 
great  country,  but  to  take  stock,  to  make  ad 
vances  to  weavers,  to  ship  cargoes,  and  to 
keep  a  sharp  look-out  for  private  traders  who 
dared  to  infringe  the  monopoly.  The  younger 
clerks  were  so  miserably  paid  that  they  could 
scarcely  subsist  without  incurring  debt;  the 
elder  enriched  themselves  by  trading  on  their 
own  account;  and  those  who  lived  to  rise  to 
the  top  of  the  service,  often  accumulated  con 
siderable  fortunes. 

Madras,  to  which  Clive  had  been  appointed, 
was,  at  this  time,  perhaps,  the  first  in  import 
ance  of  the  Company's  settlements.  In  the 
preceding  century,  Fort  St.  George  had  arisen 
on  a  barren  spot,  beaten  by  a  raging  surf;  and 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  a  town,  inhabited  by 
many  thousands  of  natives,  had  sprung  up,  as 


towns  spring  up  in  the  East,  with"  the  rapidity  '  dent  and  daring  character.  He  pined  for  his 
ol  the  prophet's  gourd.  There  were  already  in  home,  and  in  his  letters  to  his  relations  ex- 
3h*  suourbs  manv  white  villas,  each  surround-  !  pressed  his  feelings  in  language  softer  and 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


317 


more  ]  ensive  than  we  should  have  expected, 
from  the  waywardness  of  his  boyhood,  or  from 
the  inflexible  sternness  of  his  later  years.  "I 
have  not  enjoyed,"  says  he,  "  one  happy  day 
since  I  left  my  native  country."  And  again, 
"I  must  confess,  at  intervals,  when  I  think  of 
my  dear  native  England,  it  affects  me  in  a  very 

particular  manner If  I  should  be  so  far 

blest  as  to  revisit  again  my  own  country,  but 
more  especially  Manchester,  the  centre  of  all 
my  wishes,  all  that  I  could  hope  or  desire  for 
would  be  presented  before  me  in  one  view." 

One  solace  he  found  of  the  most  respectable 
kind.  The  Governor  possessed  a  good  library, 
and  permitted  Olive  to  have  access  to  it.  The 
young  man  devoted  much  of  his  leisure  to 
reading,  and  acquired  at  this  time  almost  all 
the  knowledge  of  books  that  he  ever  possessed. 
As  a  boy  he  had  been  too  idle,  as  a  man  he 
soon  became  too  busy,  for  literary  pursuits. 

But  neither  climate,  nor  poverty,  nor  study, 
nor  the  sorrows  of  a  homesick  exile,  could 
fame  the  desperate  audacity  of  his  spirit.  He 
behaved  to  his  official  superiors  as  he  had  be 
haved  to  his  schoolmasters,  and  was  several 
times  in  danger  of  losing  his  situation.  Twice, 
while  residing  in  the  Writers'  Buildings,  he  at 
tempted  to  destroy  himself;  and  twice  the  pis 
tol  which  he  snapped  fit  his  own.  head  failed  to 
go  off.  This  circumstance,  it  is  said,  affected 
him  as  a  similar  escape  affected  Wallenstein. 
After  satisfying  himself  that  the  pistol  was 
really  well  loaded,  he  burst  forth  into  an  excla 
mation,  that  surely  he  was  reserved  for  some 
thing  great. 

About  this  time  an  event,  which  at  first 
seemed  likely  to  destroy  all  his  hopes  in  life, 
suddenly  opened  before  him  a  new  path  to 
eminence.  Europe  had  been,  during  some 
yesrs,  distracted  by  the  war  of  the  Austrian 
succession.  George  II.  was  the  steady  ally  of 
Maria  Theresa.  The  house  of  Bourbon  took 
the  opposite  side.  Though  England  was  even 
then  the  first  of  maritime  powers,  she  was  not, 
as  she  has  since  become,  more  than  a  match 
on  the  sea  for  all  the  nations  of  the  world  to 
gether;  and  she  found  it  difficult  to  maintain  a 
contest  against  the  united  navies  of  France 
and  Spain,  in  the  eastern  seas  France  ob 
tained  the  ascendency.  Labourdonnais,  Go 
vernor  of  Mauritius,  a  man  of  eminent  talents 
and  virtues,  conducted  an  expedition  to  the 
continent  of  India,  in  spite  of  the  opposition 
of  the  British  fleet — landed ;  assembled  an  ar 
my,  appeared  before  Madras,  and  compelled 
the  town  and  fort  to  capitulate.  The  keys 
were  delivered  up;  the  French  colours  were 
displayed  on  Fort  St.  George  ;  and  the  contents 
of  the  Company's  warehouses  were  seized  as 
prize  of  war  by  the  conquerors.  It  was  stipu 
lated  by  the  capitulation  that  the  English  in 
habitants  should  be  prisoners  of  war  on  parole, 
and  that  the  town  should  remain  in  the  hands 
of  the  French  till  i»  should  be  ransomed.  La 
bourdonnais  pledged  his  honour  that  only  a 
moderate  ransom  should  be  required. 

But  the  success  of  Labourdonnais  had 
awakened  the  jealousy  of  his  countryman, 
Dupleix,  Governor  of  Pondicherry.  Dupleix, 
moreover,  had  already  begun  to  revolve  gigan- 
ic  schemes,  with  which  the  restoration  of 


Madras  to  the  English  was  by  no  means  com 
patible.  He  declared  that  Labourdonnais  had 
gone  beyond  his  powers;  that  conquests  made 
by  the  French  arms  on  the  continent  of  India 
were  at  the  disposal  of  the  Governor  of  Pondi 
cherry  alone ;  and  that  Madras  should  be  rased 
to  the  ground.  Labourdonnais  was  forced  to 
yield.  The  anger  which  the  breach  of  the  ca 
pitulation  excited  among  the  English  was  in 
creased  by  the  ungenerous  manner  in  which 
Dupleix  treated  the  principal  servants  of  the 
company,  The  Governor  and  several  of  the 
first  gentlemen  of  Fort  St.  George  were  carried 
under  a  guard  to  Pondicherry,  and  conducted 
through  the  town  in  a  triumphal  procession, 
under  the  eyes  of  fifty  thousand  spectators.  It 
was  with  reason  thought  that  this  gross  viola 
tion  of  public  faith  absolved  the  inhabitants  of 
Madras  from  the  engagements  into  which  they 
had  entered  with  Labourdonnais.  Clive  fled 
from  the  town  by  night,  in  the  disguise  of  a 
Mussulman,  and  took  refuge  at  Fort  St.  David, 
one  of  the  small  English  settlements  subordi 
nate  to  Madras. 

The  circumstances  in  which  he  was  now 
placed  naturally  led  him  to  adopt  a  profession 
better  suited  to  his  restless  and  intrepid  spirit 
than  the  business  of  examining  packages  and 
casting  accounts.  He  solicited  and  obtained 
an  ensign's  commission  in  the  service  of  the 
Company,  and  at  twenty-one  entered  on  his 
military  career.  His  personal  courage,  of 
which  he  had,  while  still  a  writer,  given  signal 
proof  by  a  desperate  duel  with  a  military  bu'.ly 
who  was  the  terror  of  Fort  St.  David,  speedily 
made  him  conspicuous  even  among  hundreds 
of  brave  men.  He  soon  began  to  show  in  his 
new  calling  other  qualities  which  had  not  be 
fore  been  discerned  in  him — judgment,  sagacity, 
deference  to  legitimate  authority.  He  distin 
guished  himself  highly  in  several  operations 
against  the  French,  and  was  particularly  no 
ticed  by  Major  Lawrence,  who  was  then  con 
sidered  as  the  ablest  British  officer  in  India, 

He  had  been  only  a  few  months  in  the  armj 
when  intelligence  arrived  that  peace  had  bees 
concluded  between  Great  Britain  and  France 
Dupleix  was  in  consequence  compelled  to  re 
store  Madras  to  the  English  Company;  and  th< 
young  ensign  was  at  liberty  to  resume  his  for 
mer  business.  He  did  indeed  return  for  a  shor» 
time  to  his  desk.  He  again  quitted  it  in  orde. 
to  assist  Major  La\\>ence  in  some  petty  hosti 
lities  with  the  native..,  and  ihen  again  returned 
to  it.  While  he  was  thus  wavering  between  a 
military  and  a  commercial  life,  events  took 
place  which  decided  his  choice.  The  politics 
of  India  assumed  a  new  aspect.  There  was 
peace  between  the  English  and  French  crowns; 
but  there  arose  between  the  English  and  French 
companies  trading  to  the  East,  a  war  most 
eventful  and  important — a  war  in  whit  h  the 
prize  was  nothing  less  than  the  magnificent 
inheritance  of  the  house  of  Tamerlane. 

The  empire  which  Baber  and  his  Mogul* 
reared  in  the  sixteenth  century  was  long  one 
of  the  most  extensive  and  splendid  in  the  world. 
In  no  European  kingdom  was  so  large  a  pt-pu- 
lation  subject  to  a  single  prince,  or  so  large 
(  revenue  poured  into  the  treasury.    The  beauty 
i  and  magnificence  of  the  buildings  erected  by 
2u  2 


318 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  sovereigns  of  Hindostan,  amazed  even  tra 
vellers  who  had  seen  St.  Peter's.  The  innu 
merable  retinues  and  gorgeous  decorations 
which  surrounded  the  throne  of  Delhi,  dazzled 
even  eyes  which  were  accustomed  to  the  pomp 
of  Versailles.  Some  of  the  great  viceroys 
who  held  their  posts  by  virtue  of  commissions 
from  the  Mogul,  ruled  as  many  subjects  and 
enjoyed  as  large  an  income  as  the  King  of 
France  or  the  Emperor  of  Germany.  Even  the 
deputies  of  these  deputies  might  well  rank,  as 
to  extent  of  territory  and  amount  of  revenue 
with  the  Grand-duke  of  Tuscany  and  the 
Elector  of  Saxony. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  this  great  em 
pire,  powerful  and  prosperous  as  it  appears  on 
a  superficial  view,  was  yet,  even  in  its  best 
days,  far  worse  governed  than  the  worst  go 
verned  parts  of  Europe  now  are.  The  admi 
nistration  was  tainted  with  all  the  vices  of 
Oriental  despotism,  and  with  all  the  vices  in 
separable  from  the  domination  of  race  over 
race.  The  conflicting  pretensions  of  the 
princes  of  the  royal  house  produced  a  long 
series  of  crimes  and  public  disasters.  Ambi 
tious  lieutenants  of  the  sovereign  sometimes 
aspired  to  independence.  Fierce  tribes  of  Hin 
doos,  impatient  of  a  foreign  yoke,  frequently 
withheld  tribute,  repelled  the  armies  of  the  go 
vernment  from  their  mountain  fastnesses,  and 
poured  down  in  arms  on  the  cultivated  plains. 
In  spite,  however,  of  much  constant  misadmi- 
nistration,  in  spite  of  occasional  convulsions 
which  shook  the  whole  frame  of  society,  this 
great  monarchy,  on  the  whole,  retained,  during 
some  generations,  an  outward  appearance  of 
unity,  majesty,  and  energy.  But,  throughout 
the  long  reign  of  Aurungzebe,  the  state,  not 
withstanding  all  that  the  vigour  and  policy  of 
the  prince  could  effect,  was  hastening  to  disso 
lution.  After  his  death,  which  took  place  in 
the  year  1707,  the  ruin  was  fearfully  rapid. 
Violent  shocks  from  without  co-operated  with 
an  incurable  decay  which  was  fast  proceeding 
within  ;  and  in  a  few  years  the  empire  had  un- 
gone  utter  decomposition. 

The  history  of  the  successors  of  Theodosius 
bears  no  small  analogy  to  that  of  the  succes 
sors  of  Aurungzebe.  But  perhaps  the  fall  of 
the  Carlovingians  furnishes  the  nearest  paral 
lel  to  the  fall  of  the  Moguls.  Charlemagne  was 
scarcely  interred  when  the  imbecility  and  the 
di.sputes  of  his  descendants  began  to  bring 
con-empt  on  themselves  and  destruction  on 
theii  subjects.  The  wide  dominion  of  the 
Franks  was  severed  into  a  thousand  pieces. 
Nothing  more  than  a  nominal  dignity  was  left 
to  the  abject  heirs  of  an  illustrious  name, 
Charles  the  Bald,  and  Charles  the  Fat,  and 
Charles  the  Simple.  Fierce  invaders,  differing 
from  each  other  in  race,  language,  and  reli 
gion,  flocked  as  if  by  concert  from  the  furthest 
corners  of  the  earth,  to  plunder  provinces 
which  the  government  could  no  longer  defend. 
The  virates  of  tne  Baltic  extended  their  ra 
vages  from  the  Elbe  to  the  Pyrenees,  and  at 
length  fixed  their  seat  in  the  rich  valley  of  the 
Seine.  The  Hungarian,  in  whom  the  trem- 
Ming  monks  fancied  that  they  recognised  the 
Gog  and  Magog  of  prophecy, "carried  back  the 
plunder  of  the  cities  of  Lombardy  to  the  depth 


of  the  Pannonian  forests.  The  Saracen  ruled 
in  Sicily,  desolated  the  fertile  plains  of  Cam 
pania,  and  spread  terror  even  to  the  walls  of 
Rome.  In  the  midst  of  these  sufferings,  a  great 
internal  change  passed  upon  the  empire.  The 
corruption  of  death  began  to  ferment  into  new 
forms  of  life.  While  the  great  body,  as  a  whole, 
was  torpid  and  passive,  every  separate  member 
began  to  feel  with  a  sense,  and  to  move  with 
an  energy  all  its  own.  Just  here,  in  the  most 
barren  and  dreary  tract  of  European  history, 
all  feudal  privileges,  all  modern  nobility,  take 
their  source.  To  this  point  we  trace  the  power 
of  those  princes  who,  nominally  vassals,  but 
really  independent,  long  governed,  with  the 
titles  of  dukes,  marquesses,  and  counts,  almost 
every  part  of  the  dominions  which  had  obeyed 
Charlemagne. 

Such  or  nearly  such  was  the  change  which 
passed  on  the  Mogul  empire  during  the  forty 
years  which  followed  the  death  of  Aurungzebe. 
A  series  of  nominal  sovereigns,  sunk  in  indo 
lence  and  debauchery,  sauntered  away  life  in 
secluded  palaces,  chewing  bang,  fondling  con 
cubines,  and  listening  to  buffoons.  A  series 
of  ferocious  invaders  had  descended  through 
the  western  passes,  to  prey  on  the  defenceless 
wealth  of  Hindostan.  A*  Persian  conqueror 
crossed  the  Indus,  marched  through  the  gates 
of  Delhi,  and  bore  away  in  triumph  those  trea 
sures  of  which  the  magnificence  had  astounded 
Roe  and  Bernier; — the  Peacock  Throne  on 
which  the  richest  jewels  of  Golconda  had  been 
disposed  by  the  most  skilful  hands  of  Europe, 
and  the  inestimable  Mountain  of  Light,  which, 
after  many  strange  vicissitudes,  lately  shone  in 
(he  bracelet  of  Runjeet  Sing,  and  is  now  des 
tined  to  adorn  the  hideous  idol  of  Orissa.  The 
Afghan  soon  followed  to  complete  the  work  of 
devastation  which  the  Persian  had  begun.  The 
warlike  tribes  of  Rajpoots  threw  off  the  Mus 
sulman  yoke.  A  band  of  mercenary  soldiers 
occupied  Rohilcund.  The  Seiks  ruled  on  the 
Indus.  The  Jauts  spread  terror  along  the  Jum- 
nah.  The  high  lands  which  border  on  the 
western  seacoast  of  India  poured  forth  a  yet 
more  formidable  race; — a  race  whieh  was 
long  the  terror  of  every  native  power,  and 
which  yielded  only,  after  many  desperate  and 
doubtful  struggles,  to  the  fortune  and  genius  of 
England.  It  was  under  the  reign  of  Aurung 
zebe  that  this  wild  clan  of  plunderers  first 
descended  from  the  mountains ;  and  soon  after 
his  death,  every  corner  of  his  wide  empire 
learned  to  tremble  at  the  mighty  name  of  the 
Mahrattas.  Many  fertile  viceroyalties  were 
entirely  subdued  by  them.  Their  dominions 
stretched  across  the  Peninsula  from  sea  ta 
sea.  Their  captains  reigned  at  Poonah,  at 
Gaulior,  in  Guzerat,  in  Berar,  and  in  Tanjore. 
Nor  did  they,  though  they  had  become  great 
sovereigns,  therefore  cease  to  be  freebooters. 
They  still  retained  the  predatory  habits  of  their 
forefathers.  Every  region  which  was  not  sub 
ject  to  their  rule  was  wasted  by  their  incur 
sions.  Wherever  their  kettledrums  were  heard, 
the  peasant  threw  his  bag  of  rice  on  his  shoulder, 
bid  his  small  savings  in  his  girdle,  and  fled  with 
his  wife  and  children  to  the  mountains  or  the 
jungles — to  the  milder  neighbourhood  of  the 
lyaena  and  the  tiger.  Many  provinces  redeemer, 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF   CLIVE. 


319 


their  harvests  by  the  payment  of  an  annual 
ransom.  Even  the  wretched  phantom  who  still 
bore  the  imperial  title,  stooped  to  pay  this  igno 
minious  "black  mail."  The  camp-fires  of  one 
rapacious  leader  were  seen  from  the  walls  of 
the  palace  of  Delhi.  Another,  at  the  head  of 
his  innumerable  cavalry,  descended  year  after 
year  on  the  rice-fields  of  Bengal.  Even  the 
European  factors  trembled  for  their  magazines. 
Less  than  a  hundred  years  ago,  it  was  thought 
necessary  to  fortify  Calcutta  against  the  horse 
men  of  Berar ;  and  the  name  of  the  Mahratta 
ditch  still  preserves  the  memory  of  the  danger. 

Wherever  the  viceroys  of  the  Mogul  retained 
authority  they  became  sovereigns.  They  might 
still  acknowledge  in  words  the  superiority  of 
the  house  of  Tamerlane  ;  as  a  Count  of  Flan 
ders  or  a  Duke  of  Burgundy  would  have  ac 
knowledged  the  superiority  of  the  most  hope 
less  driveller  among  the  later  Carlovingians. 
They  might  occasionally  send  their  titular  so 
vereign  a  complimentary  present,  or  solicit 
from  him  a  title  of  honour.  But  they  were  in 
truth  no  longer  lieutenants  removable  at  plea 
sure,  but  independent  hereditary  princes.  In 
this  way  originated  those  great  Mussulman 
houses  which  formerly  ruled  Bengal  and  the 
Carnatic,  and  those  which  still,  though  in  a 
state  of  vassalage,  exercise  some  of  the  powers 
ol  royalty  at  Lucknow  and  Hyderabad. 

In  what  was  this  confusion  to  end  ?  Was 
the  strife  to  continue  during  centuries  1  Was 
it  to  terminate  in  the  rise  of  another  great  mo 
narchy  1  Was  the  Mussulman  or  the  Mahratta 
to  be  (he  Lord  of  India?  Was  another  Baber 
to  descend  from  the  mountains,  and  lead  the 
hardy  tribes  of  Cabul  and  Chorasan  against  a 
wealthier  and  less  warlike  race  1  None  of 
these  events  seemed  improbable.  But  scarcely 
any  man,  however  sagacious,  would  have 
thought  it  possible,  that  a  trading  company, 
separated  from  India  by  fifteen  thousand  miles 
of  sea,  and  possessing  in  India  only  a  few 
acres  for  purposes  of  commerce,  would,  in  less 
than  a  hundred  years,  spread  its  empire  from 
Cape  Comorin  to  the  eternal  snow  of  the  Hi 
malayas — would  compel  Mahratta  and  Moham 
medan  to  forget  their  mutual  feuds  in  common 
subjection — would  tame  down  even  those  wild 
races  which  had  resisted  the  most  powerful  of 
the  Moguls ; — and,  having  established  a  go 
vernment  far  stronger  than  any  ever  known  in 
those  countries,  would  carry  its  victorious 
arms  far  to  the  east  of  the  Burrampooter,  and 
far  to  the  west  of  the  Hydaspes — dictate  terms 
of  peace  at  the  gates  of  Ava,  and  seat  its  vas 
sals  on  the  throne  of  Candahar. 

The  man  who  first  saw  that  it  was  possible 
to  found  a  European  empire  on  the  ruins  of 
the  Mogul  monarchy  was  Dupleix.  His  restless, 
capacious,  and  inventive  mind  had  formed  this 
scheme,  at  a  time  when  the  ablest  servants  of  i 
the  English  Company  were  busied  only  about 
invoices  and  bills  of  lading.    Nor  had  he  only 
proposed  to  himself  the  end.    He  had  also  a  ! 
just  and  distinct  view  of  the  means  by  which 
it  was  to  be  attained.     He  clearly  saw  that  the 
greatest  force  which  the  princes  of  India  could 
bring  into  the  field  would  be  no  match  for  a  ' 
small  body  of  men  trained  in  the  discipline,  ; 
and  guided  by  the  tactics,  of  the  West.    He  , 


saw  also  that  the  natives  of  India  might,  under 
European  commanders,  be  formed  info  armies, 
such  as  Saxe  or  Frederick  would  be  proud  to 
command.  He  was  perfectly  aware  that  the 
most  easy  and  convenient  way  in  which  a 
European  adventurer  could  exercise  sovereign 
ty  in  India,  was  to  govern  the  motions,  and  to 
speak  through  the  mouth,  of  some  glittering 
puppet  dignified  with  the  title  of  Nabob  or  Ni 
zam.  The  arts  both  of  war  and  policy,  which 
a  few  years  later  were  successfully  employed 
by  the  English,  were  first  understood  and  prac 
tised  by  this  ingenious  and  aspiring  French 
man. 

The  state  of  India  was  such  that  scarcely 
any  aggression  could  be  without  a  decent  pre 
text,  either  in  old  laws  or  in  recent  practice. 
All  rights  were  in  a  state  of  utter  uncertainty ; 
and  the  Europeans  who  took  part  in  the  dis 
putes  of  the  natives  confounded  the  confusion, 
by  applying  to  Asiatic  politics  the  public  law 
of  the  West,  and  analogies  drawn  from  the 
feudal  system.  If  it  was  convenient  to  treat  a 
Nabob  as  an  independent  prince,  there  was  an 
excellent  plea  for  doing  so.  He  was  independ 
ent  in  fact.  If  it  was  convenient  to  treat  him 
as  a  mere  deputy  of  the  court  of  Delhi,  there 
was  no  difficulty ;  for  he  was  so  in  theory.  If 
it  was  convenient  to  consider  this  office  as  an 
hereditary  dignity,  or  as  a  dignity  held  during 
life  only,  or  a  dignity  held  only  during  the  good 
pleasure  of  the  Mogul,  arguments  and  prece 
dents  might  be  found  for  every  one  of  those 
views.  The  party  who  had  the  heir  of  Baber 
in  their  hands,  represented  him  as  the  un 
doubted,  the  legitimate,  the  absolute  sovereign, 
whom  all  the  subordinate  authorities  were 
bound  to  obey.  The  party  against  whom  his 
name  was  used  did  not  want  plausible  pre 
texts  for  maintaining  that  the  empire  was  dt 
facto  dissolved ;  and  that,  though  it  might  be 
proper  to  treat  the  Mogul  with  respect,  as  a 
venerable  relic  of  an  order  of  things  vvhich  had 
passed  away,  it  was  absurd  to  ref,a»d  him  as 
the  real  master  of  Hindostan. 

In  the  year  1748,  died  one  of  the  most  power 
ful  of  the  new  masters  of  ladia — the  great 
Nizam  al  Mulk,  Viceroy  of  Inj  Deccan.  His 
authority  descended  to  his  LOCL  Nazir  Jung.  Of 
the  provinces  subject  to  this  high  functionary, 
the  Carnatic  was  the  wealthiest  and  the  most 
extensive.  It  was  governed  by  an  ancient  Na 
bob,  whose  name  the  English  corrupted  into 
Anaverdy  Khan. 

But  there  were  pretenders  to  the  government 
both  of  the  viceioyalty  and  of  the  subordinate 
province.  Mirz^pha  Jung,  a  grandson  of  Ni 
zam  al  Mulk,  appeared  as  the  competitor  of  Na 
zir  Jung.  C'mnda  Sahib,  son-in-law  of  a  for 
mer  Nabob  of  the  Carnatic,  disputed  (he  title 
of  Anaverdy  Khan.  In  the  unsettled  state  of 
Indian  Ltv,  it  was  easy  for  both  Mirzapha  Jung 
and  Clrunda  Sahib  to  make  out  something  like 
a  claim  of  right.  In  a  society  altogether  disor^ 
ganized,  they  had  no  difficulty  in  finding  greedy 
-adventurers  to  follow  their  standards.  They 
anited  their  interests,  invaded  the  Carnatic, 
and  applied  for  assistance  to  the  French,  whose 
fame  had  been  raised  by  their  success  agains 
the  English  in  the  recent  war  on  the  coast  ol 
Coromandel. 


320 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Nothing  could  have  happened  more  pleasing 
to  the  subtle  and  ambitious  Dunleix.  To  make 
a  Nabob  of  the  Carnatic — to  make  a  Viceroy 
of  the  Deccan,  to  rule  under  their  names  the 
whole  of  southern  India; — this  was  indeed  an 
attractive  prospect.  He  allied  himself  with 
the  pretenders,  and  sent  four  hundred  French 
soldiers,  and  two  thousand  sepoys,  disciplined 
after  the  European  fashion,  to  the  assistance 
of  his  confederates.  A  hattle  was  fought.  The 
French  distinguished  themselves  greatly.  Ana- 
verdy  Khan  was  defeated  and  slain.  His  son 
Mohammed  Ali,  who  was  afterwards  well 
known  in  England  as  the  Nabob  of  Arcot,  and 
who  owes  to  the  eloquence  of  Burke  a  most 
unenviable  immortality,  fled  with  a  scanty  rem 
nant  of  his  army  to  Trichinopoly ;  and  the  con 
querors  became  at  once  masters  of  almost 
every  part  of  the  Carnatic. 

This  was  but  the  beginning  of  the  greatness 
of  Dupleix.  After  some  months  of  fighting, 
negotiation,  and  intrigue,  his  ability  and  good 
fortune  seemed  to  have  prevailed  everywhere. 
Nazir  .Jang  perished  by  the  hands  of  his  own 
followers;  Mirzapha  Jung  was  master  of  the 
Deccan;  and  the  triumph  of  French  arms  and 
French  policy  was  complete.  At  Pondicherry 
all  was  exultation  and  festivity.  Salutes  were 
fired  from  batteries,  and  Te  Deum  sung  in  all 
the  churches.  The  new  Nizam  came  thither 
to  visit  his  allies  ;  and  the  ceremony  of  his  in 
stallation  was  performed  there  with  great  pomp. 
Dupleix,  dressed  in  the  garb  worn  by  Moham 
medans  of  the  highest  rank,  entered  the  town 
in  the  same  palanquin  with  the  Nizam,  and  in 
the  pageant  which  followed,  took  precedence 
of  all  the  court.  He  was  declared  Governor  of 
India,  from  the  river  Kristna  to  Cape  Comorin, 
with  authority  superior  even  to  that  of  Chunda 
Sahib.  He  was  intrusted  with  the  command 
of  seven  thousand  cavalry.  It  was  announced 
that  no  mint  would  be  suffered  to  exist  in  the 
Carnatic  except  that  at  Pondicherry.  A  large 
portion  of  the  treasures  which  former  Viceroys 
of  the  Deccan  had  accumulated,  found  its  way 
into  the  coffers  of  the  French  governor.  It  was 
rumoured  that  he  had  received  two  hundred 
thousand  pounds  sterling  in  money,  besides 
many  valuable  jewels.  In  fact,  there  could 
scarcely  be  any  limit  to  his  gains.  He  now 
ruled  thirty  millions  of  people  with  almost  ab 
solute  power.  No  honour  or  emolument  could 
be  obtained  from  the  government  but  by  his  in 
tervention.  No  petition,  unless  signed  by  him, 
was  even  perused  by  the  Nizam. 

Mirzapha  Jung  survived  his  elevation  only 
a  few  months.  But  another  prince  of  the  same 
house  was  raised  to  the  throne  by  French  in 
fluence,  and  ratified  all  the  promises  of  his  pre 
decessor.  Dupleix  was  now  the  greatest  po 
tentate  in  India.  His  countrymen  boasted  that 
his  name  was  mentioned  with  awe  even  in  the 
chambers  of  the  palace  of  Delhi.  The  native 
population  looked  wilh  amazement  on  the  pro 
gress  which,  in  the  short  space  of  four  years, 
a  European  adventurer  had  made  towards 
dominion  in  Asia.  Nor  was  the  vainglorious 
Frenchman  content  with  reality  of  power.  He 
K»ved  to  display  it  with  arrogant  ostentation 
before  the  eyes  of  his  subjects  and  his  rivals. 
Near  the  spo/  where  his  policy  had  obtained 


its  greatest  triumph,  by  the  fall  of  Nazi 
and  the  elevation  of  Mirzapha,  he  determined 
to  erect  a  column,  on  the  four  sides  of  which 
four  pompous  inscriptions,  in  four  languages, 
should  proclaim  his  victory  to  all  the  nations 
of  the  East.  Medals  stamped  with  emblems 
of  his  success  were  buried  beneath  the  founda 
tions  of  this  stately  pillar,  and  round  it  arose  a 
town  bearing  the  haughty  name  of  Dupleix 
Fatihabad;  which  is,  being  interpreted,  the  City 
of  the  Victory  of  Dupleix.  The  English  had 
made  some  feeble  and  irresolute  attempts  to 
stop  the  rapid  and  brilliant  career  of  the  rival 
Company,  and  continued  to  recognise  Moham 
med  Ali  as  Nabob  of  the  Carnatic.  But  the 
dominions  of  Mohammed  Ali  consisted  of  Tri 
chinopoly  alone  ;  and  Trichinopoly  was  now 
invested  by  Chunda  Sahib  and  the  French 
auxiliaries.  To  raise  the  siege  seemed  im 
possible.  The  small  force  which  was  then  at 
Madras  had  no  commander.  Major  Lawrence 
had  returned  to  England ;  and  not  a  single  ofii- 
cer  of  established  character  remained  in  the 
settlement.  The  natives  had  learned  to  look 
with  contempt  on  the  mighty  nation  which  was 
soon  to  conquer  and  to  rule  them.  They  had 
seen  the  French  colours  flying  at  Fort  Su 
George ;  they  had  seen  the  chiefs  of  the  Eng 
lish  factory  led  in  triumph  through  the  streets 
of  Pondicherry ;  they  had  seen  the  arms  and 
counsels  of  Dupleix  everywhere  successful, 
while  the  opposition  which  the  authorities  of 
Madras  had  made  to  his  progress,  had  served 
only  to  expose  their  own  weakness,  and  to 
heighten  his  glory.  At  this  moment,  the  valour 
and  genius  of  an  obscure  English  youth  sud 
denly  turned  the  tide  of  fortune. 

Clive  was  now  twenty-five  years  old.  After 
hesitating  for  some  lime  between  a  military 
and  a  commercial  life,  he  had.  at  length  been 
placed  in  a  post  which  partook  of  both  cha 
racters — that  of  commissary  to  the  troops,  with 
the  rank  of  captain.  The  present  emergency 
called  forth  all  his  powers.  He  represented 
to  his  superiors,  that  unless  some  vigorous 
effort  were  made,  Trichinopoly  would  fall,  the 
house  of  Anaveidy  Khan  would  perish,  and 
the  French  would  become  the  real  masters  of 
the  whole  peninsula  of  India.  It  7.  ar  abs:> 
lutely  necessary  to  strike  some  daring  biowr. 
If  an  attack  were  made  on  Arcot,  the  capital 
of  the  Carnatic,  and  the  favourite  residence  of 
the  Nabobs,  it  was  not  impossible  that  the 
siege  of  Trichinopoly  would  be  raised.  The 
heads  of  the  English  settlement,  now  thoroughly 
alarmed  by  the  success  of  Dupleix,  and  appre 
hensive  that,  in  the  event  of  a  new  war  be 
tween  France  and  Great  Britain,  Madras 
would  be  instantly  taken  and  destroyed,  ap 
proved  of  Clive's  plan,  and  intrusted  the  exe 
cution  of  it  to  himself.  The  young  captain 
was  put  at  the  head  of  two  hundred  Enghsh 
soldiers,  and  three  hundred  sepoys  armed  and 
disciplined  after  the  European  fashion.  Of 
the  eight  oflicers  who  commanded  this  little 
force  under  him,  not  a  single  one  had  ever 
been  in  action,  and  four  of  the  eight  were  fac 
tors  of  the  Company,  whom  Clive's  example 
had  induced  to  offer  their  services.  The  wea 
ther  was  stormy  ;  but  Clive  pushed  on,  through 
thunder,  lighting,  and  rain,  to  the  gates  of  Ar- 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE   OF   CLIVE. 


321 


cot.  The  garrison,  in  a  panic,  evacuated  the  j 
fort,  and  the  English  entered  it  without  a  | 
blow. 

But  Clive  well  knew  that  he  would  not  be  j 
suffered  to  retain  undisturbed  possession  of 
his  conquest.  He  instantly  began  to  collect 
provisions,  to  throw  up  works,  and  to  make 
preparations  for  sustaining  a  siege.  The  gar 
rison,  which  had  fled  at  his  approach,  had  now 
recovered  from  its  dismay,  and,  having  been 
swollen  by  large  reinforcements  from  the 
neighbourhood  to  a  force  of  three  thousand 
men,  encamped  close  to  the  town.  At  dead  of 
night,  Clive  marched  out  of  the  fort,  attacked 
the  camp  by  surprise,  slew  great  numbers,  dis 
persed  the  rest,  and  returned  to  his  quarters 
without  having  lost  a  single  man. 

The  intelligence  of  these  events  was  soon 
carried  to  Chunda  Sahib,  who,  with  his  French 
allies,  was  besieging  Trichinopoly.  He  im 
mediately  detached  four  thousand  men  from 
his  camp,  and  sent  them  to  Arcot.  They  were 
speedily  joined  by  the  remains  of  the  force 
which  Clive  had  lately  scattered.  They  were 
further  strengthened  by  two  thousand  men 
from  Vellore;  and  by  a  still  more  important 
reinforcement  of  a  hundred  and  fifty  French 
soldiers,  whom  Dupleix  despatched  from  Pon- 
dicherry.  The  whole  of  this  army,  amounting 
to  about  ten  thousand  men,  was  under  the 
command  of  Rajah  Sahib,  son  of  Chunda  Sa 
hib. 

Rajah  Sahib  proceeded  to  invest  the  fort  of 
Arcct,  which  seemed  quite  incapable  of  sus 
taining  a  siege.  The  walls  were  ruinous,  the 
ditches  dry,  the  ramparts  too  narrow  to  admit 
the  guns,  the  battlements  too  low  to  protect  the 
soldie--,  The  little  garrison  had  been  greatly 
reduced  by  casualties.  It  now  consisted  of  a 
hundred  and  twenty  Europeans  and  two  hun 
dred  sepoys.  Only  four  officers  were  left:  the 
stock  of  provisions  was  scanty;  and  the  com 
mander,  who  had  to  conduct  the  defence  under 
circumstances  so  discouraging,  was  a  young 
man  of  five-and-twenty,  who  had  been  bred  a 
book-keeper. 

During  fifty  days  the  siege  went  on.  During 
Sfty  days  the  young  captain  maintained  the 
defence,  with  a  firmness,  vigilance,  and  ability 
which  would  have  done  honour  to  the  oldest 
marshal  in  Europe.  The  breach,  however,  in 
creased  day  by  day.  The  garrison  began  to 
feel  the  pressure  of  hunger.  Under  such  cir 
cumstances,  any  troops  so  scantily  provided 
with  officers  might  have  been  expected  to 
show  signs  of  insubordination  ;  and  the  danger 
was  peculiarly  great  in  a  force  composed  of 
men  differing  widely  from  each  other  in  ex 
traction,  colour,  language,  manners,  and  reli 
gion.  But  the  devotion  of  the  little  band  to  its 
chief  surpassed  any  thing  that  is  related  of  the 
tenth  legion  of  Coesar,  or  of  the  Old  Guard  of 
Napoleon.  The  sepoys  came  to  Clive — not  to 
complain  of  their  scanty  fare,  but  to  propose 
that  all  the  grain  should  be  given  to  the  Euro 
peans,  who  required  more  nourishment  than 
the  natives  of  Asia.  The  thin  gruel,  they  said, 
which  was  strained  away  from  the  rice,  would 
suffice  for  themselves.  History  contains  no 
more  touching  instance  of  military  fidelity,  or 
of  the  influence  of  a  commanding  mind. 

VOL.  III.— 41 


An  attempt  made  by  the  government  of  Ma 
dras  to  relieve  the  place  had  failed.  But  there 
was  hope  from  another  quarter.  A  body  of 
six  thousand  Mahrattas,  half  soldiers,  half  rob 
bers,  under  the  command  of  a  chief  named 
Morari  Row,  had  been  hired  to  assist  Moham 
med  Ali ;  but  thinking  the  French  power  irre 
sistible,  and  the  triumph  of  Chunda  Sahib 
certain,  they  had  hitherto  remained  inactive 
on  the  frontiers  of  the  Carnatic.  The  fame  of 
the  defence  of  Arcot  roused  them  from  their 
torpor.  Morari  Row  declared  that  he  had 
never  before  believed  that  Englishmen  could 
fight,  but  that  he  would  willingly  help  them 
since  he  saw  that  they  had  spirit  to  help  them 
selves.  Rajah  Sahib  learned  that  the  Mahrattas 
were  in  motion.  It  was  necessary  for  him  to 
be  expeditious.  He  first  tried  negotiation. 
He  offered  large  bribes  to  Clive,  which  were 
rejected  with  scorn.  He  vowed  that,  if  his 
proposals  were  not  accepted,  he  would  instantly 
storm  the  fort,  and  put  every  man  in  it  to  the 
sword.  Clive  told  him,  in  reply,  with  charac 
teristic  haughtiness,  that  his  father  was  a 
usurer,  that  his  army  was  a  rabble,  and  that  he 
would  do  well  to  think  twice  before  he  sent 
such  poltroons  into  a  breach  defended  by  Eng 
lish  soldiers. 

Rajah  Sahib  determined  to  storm  the  fort. 
The  day  was  well  suited  to  a  bold  military 
enterprise.  It  was  the  great  Mohammedan 
festival  which  is  sacred  to  the  memory 
Hosein  the  son  of  Ali.  The  history  of  Islam 
contains  nothing  more  touching  than  that 
mournful  legend: — how  the  chief  of  the  Fali- 
mites,  when  all  his  brave  followers  had  perish 
ed  round  him,  drank  his  latest  draught  of 
water  and  uttered  his  latest  prayer — how  the 
assassins  carried  his  head  in  triumph — how 
the  tyrant  smote  the  lifeless  lips  with  his  staff 
— and  how  a  few  old  men  recollected  with 
tears  that  they  had  seen  those  lips  pressed  to 
the  lips  of  the  prophet  of  God.  After  the  lapse 
of  nearly  twelve  centuries,  the  recurrence  of 
this  solemn  season  excites  the  fiercest  and 
saddest  emotions  in  the  bosoms  of  the  devout 
Moslems  of  India.  They  work  themselves 
up  to  such  agonies  of  rage  and  lamentation, 
that  some,  it  is  said,  have  given  up  the  ghost 
from  the  mere  effect  of  mental  excitement. 
They  believe  that  whoever  during  this  festival 
falls  in  arms  against  the  infidels,  atones  by 
his  death  for  all  the  sins  of  his  life,  and  passes 
at  once  to  the  gardens  of  the  Houris.  It  was 
at  this  time  that  Rajah  Sahib  determined  to 
assault  Arcot.  Stimulating  drugs  were  em 
ployed  to  aid  the  effect  of  religious  zeal,  and 
the  besiegers,  drunk  with  enthusiasm,  drunk 
with  bang,  rushed  furiously  to  the  attack. 

Clive  had  received  secret  intelligence  of  tht 
design,  had  made  his  arrangements,  and,  ex 
hausted  by  fatigue,  had  thrown  himself  on  n/.* 
bed.  He  was  awakened  by  the  alarm,  and  was 
instantly  at  his  post.  The  enemy  advanced, 
driving  before  them  elephants  whose  foreheads 
were  armed  M'ith  iron  plates.  It  was  expect 
ed  that  the  gates  would  yield  to  the  shock  of 
these  living  battering-rams.  But  the  huge  beasts 
no  sooner  felt  the  English  musket-balls  than 
they  turned  round,  and  rushed  furiously  away, 
trampling  on  the  multitude  that  had  urged  them 


322 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


forward.  A  raft  was  launched  on  the  water 
which  filled  one  part  of  the  ditch.  Clive,  perceiv 
ing  that  his  gunners  at  that  post  did  not  under 
stand  their  business,  took  the  management  of 
a  piece  of  artillery  himself,  and  cleared  the  raft 
in  a  few  minutes.  Where  the  moat  was  dry, 
the  assailants  mounted  with  great  boldness ; 
but  they  were  received  with  a  fire  so  heavy, 
and  so  well  directed,  that  it  soon  quelled  the 
courage  even  of  fanaticism  and  of  intoxication. 
The  rear  ranks  of  the  English  kept  the  front 
ranks  supplied  with  a  constant  succession  of 
loaded  muskets,  and  every  shot  told  on  the  liv 
ing  mass  below.  After  three  desperate  onsets, 
the  besiegers  retired  behind  the  ditch. 

The  struggle  lasted  about  an  hour.  Four 
nundred  of  the  assailants  fell.  The  garrison 
lost  only  five  or  six  men.  The  besieged  passed 
an  anxious  night,  looking  for  a  renewal  of  the 
attack.  But  when  day  broke  the  enemy  were 
no  more  to  be  seen.  They  had  retired,  leaving 
to  the  English  several  guns  and  a  large  quan 
tity  of  ammunition. 

The  news  was  received  at  Fort  St.  George 
with  transports  of  joy  and  pride.  Clive  was 
justly  regarded  as  a  man  equal  to  any  com 
mand.  Two  hundred  English  soldiers  and 
seven  hundred  sepoys  were  sent  to  him,  and 
with  this  force  he  instantly  commenced  offen 
sive  operations.  He  took  the  fort  of  Timery, 
effected  a  junction  with  a  division  of  Morari 
Row's  army,  and  hastened  by  forced  marches 
to  attack  Rajah  Sahib,  who  was  at  the  head  of 
about  five  thousand  men,  of  whom  three  hun 
dred  were  French.  The  action  was  sharp ; 
but  Clive  gained  a  complete  victory.  The 
military  chest  of  Rajah  Sahib  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  conquerors.  Six  hundred  sepoys 
who  had  served  in  the  enemy's  army,  came 
over  to  Clive's  quarters,  and  were  taken  into 
the  British  service.  Conjeveram  surrendered 
without  a  blow.  The  Governor  of  Arnee  de 
serted  Chunda  Sahib,  and  recognised  the  title 
of  Mohammed  Ali. 

Had  the  entire  direction  of  the  war  been  in 
trusted  to  Clive,  it  would  probably  have  been 
brought  to  a  speedy  close.  But  the  timidity 
and  incapacity  which  appeared  in  all  the 
movements  of  the  English,  except  where  he 
was  personally  present,  protracted  the  strug 
gle.  The  Mahrattas  muttered  that  his  soldiers 
were  of  a  different  race  from  the  British  whom 
they  found  elsewhere.  The  effect  of  this  lan 
guor  was  that  in  no  long  time  Rajah  Sahib,  at 
the  head  of  a  considerable  army,  in  which  were 
four  hundred  French  troops,  appeared  almost 
under  ihe  guns  of  Fort  St.  George,  and  laid 
waste  the  villas  and  gardens  of  the  gentlemen 
of  the  English  settlement.  But  he  was  again 
encountered  and  defeated  by  Clive.  More  than 
a  hundred  of  the  French  were  killed  or  taken 
— a  loss  more  serious  than  that  of  thousands 
of  natives.  The  victorious  army  marched 
from  the  field  of  battle  to  Fort  St.  David.  On 
the  road  lay  the  City  of  the  Victory  of  Dupleix, 
and  the  stately  monument  which  was  designed 
to  commemorate  the  triumphs  of  France  in  the 
Bast.  Clive  ordered  both  the  city  and  the 
monument  to  be  rased  to  the  ground.  He  was 
induced,  we  believe,  to  take  this  step,  not  by 
^personal  or  national  malevolence,  but  by  a  just 


and  profound  policy.  The  town  and  its  pom 
pous  name,  the  pillar  and  its  vaunting  inscrip 
tions,  were  among  the  devices  by  which  Du 
pleix  had  laid  the  public  mind  of  India  under 
a  spell.  This  spell  it  was  Clive's  business  to 
break.  The  natives  had  been  taught  that 
France  was  confessedly  the  first  power  in  Eu 
rope,  and  that  the  English  did  not  presume  to 
dispute  her  supremacy.  No  measure  could 
be  more  effectual  for  the  removing  of  this  de 
lusion  than  the  public  and  solemn  demolition 
of  the  French  trophies. 

The  government  of  Madras,  encouraged  by 
these  events,  determined  to  send  a  strong  de 
tachment,  under  Clive,  to  reinforce  the  garri 
son  of  Trichinopoly.  But  just  at  this  conjunc 
ture,  Major  Lawrence  arrived  from  England, 
and  assumed  the  chief  command.  From  the 
waywardness  and  impatience  of  control  which 
had  characterized  Clive,  both  at  school  and  in 
the  counting-house,  it  might  have  been  expected 
that  he  would  not,  after  such  achievements,  act 
with  zeal  and  good  humour  in  a  subordinate 
capacity.  But  Lawrence  had  early  treated 
him  with  kindness;  and  it  is  bare  justice  to 
Clive  to  say,  that  proud  and  overbearing  as  he 
Avas,  kindness  was  never  thrown  away  upon 
him.  He  cheerfully  placed  himself  under  the 
orders  of  his  old  friend,  and  excited  himself  as 
strenuously  in  the  second  post  as  he  could 
have  done  in  the  first.  Lawrence  well  knew 
the  value  of  such  assistance.  Though  him 
self  gifted  with  no  intellectual  faculty  higher 
than  plain  good  sense,  he  fully  appreciated  the 
powers  of  his  brilliant  coadjutor.  Though  he 
had  made  a  methodical  study  of  military  tac 
tics,  and,  like  all  men  regularly  bred  to  a  pro 
fession,  was  disposed  to  look  with  disdain, 
upon  interlopers,  he  had  yet  liberality  enough 
to  acknowledge  that  Clive  was  an  exception 
to  common  rules.  "  Some  people,"  he  wrote, 
"  are  pleased  to  term  Captain  Clive  fortunate 
and  lucky ;  but,  in  my  opinion,  from  the  know 
ledge  I  have  of  the  gentleman,  he  deserved  and 
might  expect  from  his  conduct  every  thing  as 
it  fell  out ; — a  man  of  an  undaunted  resolution,, 
of  a  cool  temper,  and  a  presence  of  mind  which 
never  left  him  in  the  greatest  danger — born  a 
soldier;  for,  without  a  military  education  of 
any  sort,  or  much  conversing  with  any  of  the 
profession,  from  his  judgment  and  good  sense, 
he  led  on  an  army  like  an  experienced  officer 
and  a  brave  soldier,  with  a  prudence  that  cer 
tainly  warranted  success." 

The  French  had  no  commander  to  oppose  to 
the  two  friends.  Dupleix,  not  inferior  in  talents 
for  negotiation  and  intrigue  to  any  European 
who  has  borne  a  part  in  the  revolutions  of 
India,  was  not  qualified  to  direct  in  person 
military  operations.  He  had  not  been  bred  a 
soldier,  and  had  no  inclination  to  become  one. 
His  enemies  accused  him  of  personal  coward 
ice  ;  and  he  defended  himself  in  a  strain  wor 
thy  of  Captain  Bobadil.  He  kept  away  from 
shot,  he  said,  because  silence  and  tranquillity 
were  propitious  to  his  genius,  and  he  found  it 
difficult  to  pursue  his  meditations  amidst  the 
noise  of  fire-arms.  He  was  then  under  the  ne 
cessity  of  intrusting  to  others  the  execution  of 
his  great  warlike  designs :  and  he  bitterly  com 
plained  that  he  was  ill-served.  He  had  indeed 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF   CLIVE. 


323 


Deen  assisted  by  one  officer  of  eminent  merit, 
the  celebrated  Bussy.  But  Bussy  had  marched 
northward  with  the  Nizam,  and  was  fully  em 
ployed  in  looking  after  his  own  interests,  and 
those  of  France,  at  the  court  of  that  prince. 
Among  the  officers  who  remained  with  Du- 
pleix,  there  was  not  a  single  man  of  talent;  and 
many  of  them  were  boys,  at  whose  ignorance 
and  folly  the  common  soldiers  laughed. 

The  English  triumphed  everywhere.  The 
besiegers  of  Trichinopoly  were  themselves  be 
sieged  and  compelled  to  capitulate.  Chunda 
Sahib  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Mahrattas,  and 
was  put  to  death,  at  the  instigation  probably  of 
his  competitor,  Mohammed  AIL  The  spirit  of 
Dupleix,  however,  was  unconquerable,  and  his 
resources  inexhaustible.  From  his  employers 
in  Europe  he  no  longer  received  help  or  coun 
tenance.  They  condemned  his  policy.  They 
allowed  him  no  pecuniary  assistance.  They 
sent  him  for  troops  only  the  sweepings  of  the 
galleys.  Yet  still  he  persisted,  intrigued, 
bribed,  promised; — lavished  his  private  for 
tune,  strained  his  credit,  procured  new  diplo 
mas  from  Delhi,  raised  up  new  enemies  to  the 
government  of  Madras  on  every  side,  and  even 
among  the  allies  of  the  English  Company.  But 
all  was  in  vain.  Slowly,  but  steadily,  the  power 
of  Britain  continued  to  increase,  and  that  of 
France  to  decline. 

The  health  of  Clive  had  never  been  good 
during  his  residence  in  India,  and  his  consti 
tution  was  now  so  much  impaired  that  he  de 
termined  to  return  to  England.  Before  his  de 
parture  he  undertook  a  service  of  considerable 
difficulty,  and  performed  it  with  his  usual  vi 
gour  and  dexterity.  The  Forts  of  Covelong 
and  Chingleput  were  occupied  by  French  gar 
risons.  It  was  determined  to  send  a  force 
against  them.  But  the  only  force  available 
for  this  purpose  was  of  such  a  description,  that 
no  officer  but  Clive  would  risk  his  reputation 
by  commanding  it.  It  consisted  of  five  hun 
dred  newly-levied  sepoys  and  two  hundred  re 
cruits  who  had  just  landed  from  England,  and 
who  were  the  worst  and  lowest  wretches  that 
the  Company's  crimps  coult!  pick  up  in  the 
flash-houses  in  London.  Clive,  ill  and  ex 
hausted  as  he  was,  undertook  to  make  an  army 
of  this  undisciplined  rabble,  and  marched  with 
them  to  Covelong.  A  shot  from  the  fort  killed 
one  of  these  extraordinary  soldiers;  on  which 
ail  the  rest  faced  about  and  ran  away,  and  it 
was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  Clive  ral 
lied  them.  On  another  occasion  the  noise  of 
a  gun  terrified  the  sentinels  so  much  that  one 
of  them  was  found,  some  hours  later,  at  the 
bottom  of  a  well.  Clive  gradually  accustomed 
them  to  danger,  and  by  exposing  himself  con 
stantly  in  the  most  perilous  situations,  shamed 
them  into  courage.  He  at  length  succeeded  in 
forming  a  respectable  force  out  of  his  un 
promising  materials.  Covelong  fell.  Clive 
learned  that  a  strong  detachment  was  march 
ing  to  relieve  it  from  Chingleput.  He  took 
measures  to  prevent  the  enemy  from  learning 
that  they  were  too  late,  laid  an  ambuscade  for 
them  on  the  road,  killed  a  hundred  of  them 
with  one  fire,  took  three  hundred  prisoners, 
pursued  the  fugitives  to  the  gates  of  Chingle- 
piit,  laid  siege  instantly  to  that  fastness,  reputed 


one  of  the  strongest  in  India,  made  a  breach, 
and  was  on  the  point  of  storming,  when  the 
French  commandant  capitulated  and  retired 
with  his  men. 

Clive  returned  to  Madras  victorious,  but  in  a 
state  of  health  which  rendered  it  impossible 
for  him  to  remain  there  long.  He  married  at 
this  time  a  young  lady  of  the  name  of  Mas- 
kelyne,  sister  of  the  eminent  mathematician, 
who  long  held  the  post  of  Astronomer-Royal. 
She  is  described  as  handsome  arid  accom 
plished,  and  her  husband's  letters,  it  is  said, 
contain  proofs  that  he  was  devotedly  attached 
to  her. 

Almost  immediately  after  the  marriage, 
Clive  embarked  with  his  bride  for  England. 
He  returned  a  very  different  person  from  the 
poor,  slighted  boy  who  had  been  sent  out  ten 
years  before  to  seek  his  fortune.  He  was  only 
twenty-seven  ;  yet  his  country  already  respect 
ed  him  as  one  of  her  first  soldiers.  There  was 
then  general  peace  in  Europe.  The  Carnatic 
was  the  only  part  of  the  world  where  the  Eng 
lish  and  French  were  in  arms  against  each 
other.  The  vast  schemes  of  Dupleix  had  ex 
cited  no  small  uneasiness  in  the  city  of  Lon 
don  ;  and  the  rapid  turn  of  fortune  which  was 
chiefly  owing  to  the  courage  and  talents  <*f 
Clive,  had  been  hailed  with  great  delight. 
The  young  captain  was  known  at  the  India 
House  by  the  honourable  nick-name  of  Gene 
ral  Clive,  and  was  toasted  by  that  appellation, 
at  the  feasts  of  the  Directors.  On  his  arrival 
in  England  he  found  himself  an  object  of  gene 
ral  interest  and  admiration.  The  East  India 
Company  thanked  him  for  his  services  in  the 
warmest  terms,  and  presented  him  with  a 
sword  set  with  diamonds.  With  rare  deli 
cacy,  he  declined  to  receive  this  token  of  gra 
titude,  unless  a  similar  compliment  was  paid 
to  his  friend  and  commander,  Lawrence. 

It  may  easily  be  supposed  that  Clive  was 
most  cordially  welcomed  home  by  his  family, 
who  were  delighted  by  his  success,  though 
they  seem  to  have  been  hardly  able  to  compre 
hend  how  their  naughty,  idle  Bobby  had  be 
come  so  great  a  man.  His  father  had  been, 
singularly  hard  of  belief.  Not  until  the  news 
of  the  defence  of  Arcot  arrived  in  England 
was  the  old  gentleman  heard  to  growl  out, 
that  after  all  the  booby  had  something  in  him. 
His  expressions  of  approbation  became  strong 
er  and  stronger  as  news  arrived  of  one  bril 
liant  exploit  after  another;  and  he  was  at 
length  immoderately  fond  and  proud  of  his 
son. 

Clive's  relations  had  very  substantial  rea 
sons  for  rejoicing  at  his  return.  Considerable 
sums  of  prize-money  had  fallen  to  his  share, 
and  he  had  brought  home  several  thousands, 
some  of  which  he  expended  in  extricating  his 
father  from  pecuniary  difficulties,  and  in  re 
deeming  the  family  estate.  The  remainder  he 
appears  to  have  dissipated  in  the  course  of 
about  two  years.  He  lived  isplendidly,  dressed 
gayly  even  for  those  times,  kept  a  carriage  and 
saddled  horses,  and,  not  content  with  these 
ways  of  getting  rid  of  his  money,  resorted  to 
the  most  speedy  and  effectual  of  all  modes  of 
evacuation,  a  contested  election  followed  by  a 
petition. 


324 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


At  the  time  of  the  general  election  of  1754, 
the  government  was  in  a  very  singular  state. 
There  was  scarcely  any  formal  opposition. 
The  Jacobites  had  been  cowed  by  the  issue  of 
the  last  rebellion.  The  Tory  party  had  fallen 
into  utter  contempt.  It  had  been  deserted  by 
all  the  men  of  talents  who  had  belonged  to  it, 
and  had  scarcely  given  a  symptom  of  life 
during  some  years.  The  small  faction  which 
had  been  held  together  by  the  influence  and 
promises  of  Prince  Frederick  had  been  dis 
persed  by  his  death.  Almost  every  public 
man  of  distinguished  talents  in  the  kingdom, 
whatever  his  early  connections  had  been,  was 
in  olnce,  and  called  himself  a  Whig.  But  this 
extraordinary  appearance  of  concord  was  quite 
delusive.  The  administration  itself  was  dis 
tracted  by  bitter  enmities  and  conflicting  pre 
tensions.  The  chief  object  of  its  members 
was  to  depress  and  supplant  each  other.  The 
prime  minister,  Newcastle,  weak,  timid,  jeal 
ous,  and  perfidious,  was  at  once  detested  and 
despised  by  the  most  important  members  of 
his  government,  and  by  none  more  than  by 
Henry  Fox,  the  Secretary  at  War.  This  able, 
daring,  and  ambitious  man  seized  every  oppor 
tunity  of  crossing  the  First  Lord  of  the  Trea 
sury,  from  whom  he  well  knew  that  he  had 
little  to  dread  and  little  to  hope;  for  Newcastle 
was  through  life  equally  afraid  of  breaking 
with  men  of  parts  and  of  promoting  them. 

Newcastle  had  set  his  heart  on  returning 
two  members  for  St.  Michael,  one  of  those 
wretched  Cornish  boroughs  which  were  swept 
away  by  the  Reform  Act  in  1832.  He  was  op 
posed  by  Lord  Sandwich,  whose  influence  had 
long  been  paramount  there;  and  Fox  exerted 
himself  strenuously  in  Sandwich's  behalf. 
Clive,  who  had  been  introduced  to  Fox,  and 
very  kindly  received  by  him,  was  brought  for 
ward  on  the  Sandwich  interest,  and  was  re 
turned.  But  a  petition  was  presented  against 
the  return,  and  was  backed  by  the  whole  inte 
rest  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle. 

The  case  was  heard,  according  to  the  usage 
of  that  time,  before  a  committee  of  the  whole 
House.  Questions  respecting  elections  were 
then  considered  merely  as  party  questions. 
Judicial  impartiality  was  not  even  affected. 
Sir  Robert  Walpole  was  in  the  habit  of  saying 
openly,  that  in  election  battles  there  ought  to 
be  no  quarter.  On  the  present  occasion  the 
excitement  was  great.  The  matter  really  at 
issue  was,  not  whether  Clive  had  been  proper 
ly  or  improperly  returned;  but  whether  New 
castle  or  Fox  was  to  be  master  of  the  new  House 
of  Commons,  and  consequently  first  minister. 
The  contest  was  long  and  obstinate,  and  suc 
cess  seemed  to  lean  sometimes  to  one  side  and 
sometimes  to  the  other.  Fox  put  forth  all  his 
rare  powers  of  debate,  beat  half  the  lawyers  in 
the  House  at  their  own  weapons,  and  carried 
division  after  division  against  the  whole  in 
fluence  of  the  Treasury.  The  committee  de 
cided  in  Clive's  favour.  But  when  the  reso 
lution  was  reported  to  the  House,  things  took 
a  different  course.  The  remnant  of  the  Tory 
Opposition,  contemptible  as  it  was,  had  yet 
uufficient  weignt  to  Urn  the  scale  between  the 
nicely  balanced  parties  of  Newcastle  and  Fox. 
wcasth  the  Tories  could  only  despise.  Fox 


they  hated,  as  the  boldest  and  most  subtle  poli» 
tician,  and  the  ablest  debater  among  tho 
Whigs;  as  the  steady  friend  of  Walpole,  as 
the  devoted  adherent  of  the  Duke  of  Cumber 
land.  After  wavering  until  the  last  moment, 
they  determined  to  vote  in  a  body  with  the 
prime  minister's  friends.  The  consequence 
was,  that  the  House,  by  a  small  minority,  re 
scinded  the  decision  of  the  committee,  and 
Clive  was  unseated. 

Ejected  from  Parliament,  and  straitened  in 
his  means,  he  naturally  began  to  look  again 
towards  India.  The  Company  and  the  go 
vernment  were  eager  to  avail  themselves  of 
his  services.  A  treaty  favourable  to  England 
had  indeed  been  concluded  in  the  Carnatic. 
Dupleix  had  been  superseded,  and  had  return 
ed  with  the  wreck  of  his  immense  fortune  to 
Europe,  where  calumny  and  chicanery  soon 
hunted  him  to  his  grave.  But  many  signs  in 
dicated  that  a  war  between  France  and  Great 
Britain  was  at  hand,  and  it  was  therefore 
thought  desirable  to  send  an  able  commander 
to  the  Company's  settlements  in  India.  The 
Directors  appointed  Clive  Governor  of  Fort 
St.  David.  The  king  gave  him  the  commis 
sion  of  a  lieutenant-colonel  in  the  British 
army,  and  in  1755  he  again  sailed  for  Asia. 

The  first  service  in  which  he  was  employed 
after  his  return  to  the  East,  was  the  reduction 
of  the  stronghold  of  Gheriah.  This  fortress, 
built  on  a  craggy  promontory,  and  almost  sur 
rounded  by  the  ocean,  was  the  den  of  a  pirate 
named  Angria,  whose  barks  had  long  been  the 
terror  of  the  Arabian  Gulf.  Admiral  Watson, 
who  commanded  the  English  squadron  in  the 
Eastern  seas,  burned  Angria's  fleet,  while 
Clive  attacked  the  fastness  by  land.  The 
place  soon  fell,  and  a  booty  of  a  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  pounds  sterling  was  divided 
among  the  conquerors. 

After  this  exploit  Clive  proceeded  to  his 
government  of  Fort  St.  David.  Before  he  had 
been  there  two  months,  he  received  intelligence 
which  called  forth  all  the  energy  of  his  bold 
and  active  mind. 

Of  the  provinces  which  had  been  subject  to 
the  house  of  Tamerlane,  the  wealthiest  was 
Bengal.  No  part  of  India  possessed  such  na 
tural  advantages,  botirfor  agriculture  and  com 
merce.  The  Ganges,  rushing  through  a  hun 
dred  channels  to  the  sea,  has  formed  a  vast 
plain  of  rich  mould,  which,  even  under  the 
tropical  sky,  rivals  the  verdure  of  an  English 
April.  The  rice  fields  yield  an  increase  such 
as  is  elsewhere  unknown.  Spices,  sugar,  vege 
table  oils,  are  produced  with  similar  exube 
rance.  The  rivers  afford  an  inexhaustible  sup 
ply  of  fish.  The  desolate  islands  along  the 
sea-coast,  overgrown  by  noxious  vegetation, 
and  swarming  with  deer  and  tigers,  supply  the 
cultivated  districts  with  abundance  of  salt. 
The  great  stream  which  fertilizes  the  soil  is  at 
the  same  time  the  chief  highway  of  Eastern 
commerce.  On  its  banks,  and  on  those  of  its 
tributary  waters,  are  the  wealthiest  marts,  the 
most  splendid  capitals,  and  the  most  sacred 
shrines  of  India.  The  tyranny  of  man  had  for 
ages  struggled  in  vain  against  the  overflowing 
bounty  of  nature.  In  spite  of  the  Mussulman 
despot  and  of  the  Mahratta  freebooter,  Bengal 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


325 


was  known  through  the  East,  as  the  garden 
of  Eden,  as  the  rich  kingdom.  Its  population 
multiplied  exceedingly.  Other  provinces  were 
nourished  from  the  overflowing  of  its  grana 
ries;  and  the  ladies  of  London  and  Paris  were 
clothed  in  the  delicate  produce  of  its  looms. 
The  race  by  whom  this  rich  tract  was  peopled, 
enervated  by  a  soft  climate  and  accustomed  to 
peaceful,  avocations,  bore  the  same  relation  to 
other  Asiatics  which  the  Asiatics  generally 
bear  to  the  bold  arid  energetic  children  of  Eu 
rope.  The  Castilians  have  a  proverb,  that  in 
Valencia  the  earth  is  water  and  the  men  wo 
men  ;  and  the  description  is  at  least  equally  ap 
plicable  to  the  vast  plain  of  the  Lower  Ganges. 
Whatever  the  Bengalee  does  he  does  languidly. 
His  favourite  pursuits  are  sedentary.  He  shrinks 
from  bodilyexerci.se;  and,  though  voluble  in 
dispute  and  singularly  pertinacious  in  the  war 
of  chicane,  he  seldom  engages  in  a  personal 
conflict,  and  scarcely  ever  enlists  as  a  soldier. 
We  doubt  whether  there  be  a  hundred  genuine 
Bengalees  in  the  whole  army  of  the  East  India 
Company.  There  never,  perhaps,  existed  a 
people  so  thoroughly  fitted  by  nature  and  by 
habit  for  a  foreign  yoke. 

The  great  commercial  companies  of  Europe 
had  long  possessed  factories  in  Bengal.  The 
French  were  settled,  as  they  still  are,  at  Chan- 
dernagore,  on  the  Hoogley.  Lower  down  the 
stream  the  English  had  built  Fort  William.  A 
church  and  ample  warehouses  rose  in  the  vici 
nity.  A  row  of  spacious  houses,  belonging  to 
the  chief  factors  of  the  East  India  Company, 
lined  the  banks  of  the  river;  and  in  the  neigh 
bourhood  had  sprung  up  a  large  and  busy  na 
tive  town,  where  some  Hindoo  merchants  of 
great  opulence  had  fixed  their  abode.  But  the 
tract  now  covered  by  the  palaces  of  Chow- 
ringhee  contained  only  a  few  miserable  huts 
thatched  with  straw.  A  jungle,  abandoned  to 
water-fowls  and  alligators,  covered  the  site  of 
the  present  Citadel,  and  the  Course,  which  is 
now  daily  crowded  at  sunset  with  the  gayest 
equipages  of  Calcutta.  For  the  ground  on 
which  the  settlement  stood,  the  English,  like 
other  great  landholders,  paid  rent  to  the  govern 
ment;  and  they  were,  like  other  great  land 
holders,  permitted  to  exercise  a  certain  juris 
diction  within  their  domain. 

The  great  province  of  Bengal,  together  with 
Orissa  and  Bahar,  had  long  been  governed  by 
a  viceroy  whom  the  English  called  Aliverdy 
Khan,  and  who,  like  the  other  viceroys  of  the 
Mogul,  had  become  virtually  independent.  He 
died  in  I7of>,  and  the  sovereignty  descended  to 
his  grandson,  a  youth  under  twenty,  who  bore 
the  name  of  Surajah  Dowlah.  Oriental  des 
pots  are  perhaps  the  worst  class  of  human  be 
ings  ;  and  this  unhappy  boy  was  one  of  the 
worst  specimens  of  his  class.  His  under 
standing  was  naturally  feeble,  and  his  temper 
naturally  uriamiable.  His  education  had  been 
such  as  would  have  enervated  even  a  vigorous 
intellect,  and  perverted  even  a  generous  dis 
position.  He  was  unreasonable,  because  no 
body  ever  dared  to  reason  with  him;  and  self 
ish,  because  he  had  never  been  made  to  feel 
himself  dependent  on  the  good-will  of  others. 
Early  debauchery  had  unnerved  his  body  and 
hi^  mind.  He  indulged  immoderately  in  the 


use  of  ardent  spirits,  which  inflamed  his  weak 
brain  almost  to  madness.     His  chosen  compa 
nions  were  flatterers,  sprung  from  the  dregs 
of  the  people,  and  recommended  by  nothing 
but  buffoonery  and  servility.    It  is  said  that 
,  he  had  arrived  at  that  last  stage  of  human  de 
pravity  when  cruelty  becomes  pleasing  for  its 
:  own  sake — when  the  sight  of  pain  as  pain, 
I  where  no  advantage  is  to  be  gained,  no  offence 
!  punished,  no  danger  averted,  is  an  agreeable 
excitement.     It  had  early  been  his  amusement 
to  torture  beasts  and  birds;  and  when  he  grew 
up,  he  enjoyed  with  still  keener  relish  the  misery 
of  his  fellow-creatures. 

From  a  child  Surajah  Dowlah  had  hated  the 
English.  It  was  his  whim  to  do  so:  and  his 
whims  were  never  opposed.  He  had  also 
formed  a  very  exaggerated  notion  of  the  wealth 
which  might  be  obtained  by  plundering  them; 
and  his  feeble  and  uncultivated  mind  was  in 
capable  of  perceiving  that  the  riches  of  Cal 
cutta,  had  they  been  even  greater  than  he  ima 
gined,  would  not  compensate  him  for  what  he 
must  lose  if  the  European  trade,  of  which  Ben 
gal  was  a  chief  seat,  should  be  driven  by  hi* 
violence  to  some  other  quarter.  Pretexts  for 
a  quarrel  were  readily  found.  The  English, 
in  expectation  of  a  war  with  France,  had  be 
gun  to  fortify  their  settlement  without  a  special 
permission  from  the  Nabob.  A  rich  native 
whom  he  longed  to  plunder  had  taken  refuge 
at  Calcutta,  and  had  not  been  delivered  up. 
On  such  grounds  as  these  Surajah  Dowlah 
marched  with  a  great  army  against  Fort  Wil 
liam. 

The  servants  of  the  Company  at  Madras  had 
been  forced  by  Dupleix  to  become  statesmen, 
and  soldiers.  Those  in  Bengal  were  still  mere 
traders,  and  were  terrified  and  bewildered  by  the 
approaching  danger.  The  governor,  who  had 
heard  much  of  Surajah  Dowlah's  cruelty,  was 
frightened  out  of  his  wits,  jumped  into  a  boat, 
and  took  refuge  in  the  nearest  ship.  The  mili 
tary  commandant  thought  that  he  could  not  do 
better  than  follow  so  good  an  example.  The 
fort  was  taken  after  a  feeble  resistance,  and 
great  numbers  of  the  English  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  conquerors.  The  Nabob  seated 
himself  with  regal  pomp  in  the  principal  hall 
of  the  factory,  and  ordered  Mr.  Holwell,  the 
first  in  rank  among  the  prisoners,  to  be  brought 
before  him.  He  abused  the  insolence  of  the 
English,  and  grumbled  at  the  smallnesr  of  the 
treasure  he  had  found,  but  promised  to  spare 
their  lives,  and  retired  to  rest. 

Then  was  committed  that  great  crime,  me 
morable  for  its  singular  atrocity,  memorable 
for  the  tremendous  retribution  by  which  it  was 
followed.     The  English  captives  were  left  at 
the  mercy  of  the  guards,  and  the  guards  deter 
mined   to  secure  them  for  the    night   in   the 
prison  of  the  garrison,  a  chamber  known  by 
the  fearful  name  of  the  Black  Hole.     Even  for 
a  single  European  malefactor  that  dungeon 
would,  in  such  a  climate,  have  been  too  close 
and  narrow.    The  space  was  only  twenty  fe^t 
|  square.     The  air-holes  were   small   and   oo- 
I  structed.   It  was  the  summer  solstice — the  sea- 
;  son  when  the  fierce  heat  of  Bengal  can  scarce 
ly  be  rendered  tolerable  to  natives  of  England 
i  by  lofty  halls  and  the  constant  waving  of  fans. 
2  E 


326 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  number  of  the  prisoners  was  one  hundred 
and  forty-six.  When  they  were  ordered  to  enter 
the  cell,  they  imagined  that  the  soldiers  were 
joking;  and,  being  in  high  spirits  on  account 
of  the  promise  of  the  Nabob  to  spare  their 
lives,  they  laughed  and  jested  at  the  absurdity 
of  the  notion.  They  soon  discovered  their  mis 
take.  They  expostulated  ;  they  entreated;  but 
in  vain.  The  guards  threatened  to  cut  down 
all  who  hesitated.  The  captives  were  driven 
into  the  cell  at  the  point  of  the  sword,  and 
the  door  was  instantly  shut  and  locked  upon 
them. 

Nothing  in  history  or  fiction — not  even  the 
story  which  Ugolino  told  in  the  sea  of  ever 
lasting  ice,  after  he  had  wiped  his  bloody  lips 
on  the  scalp  of  his  murderer — approaches  the 
horrors  which  were  recounted  by  the  few  sur 
vivors  of  that  night.  They  cried  for  mercy. 
They  strove  to  burst  the  door.  Holwell,  who, 
even  in  that  extremity,  retained  some  presence 
of  mind,  offered  large  bribes  to  the  jailers. 
But  the  answer  was  that  nothing  could  be  done 
without  the  Nabob's  orders,  that  the  Nabob 
was  asleep,  and  that  he  would  be  angry  if  any 
body  awoke  him.  Then  the  prisoners  went 
mad  with  despair.  They  trampled  each  other 
down,  fought  for  the  places  at  the  windows, 
fought  for  the  pittance  of  water  with  which 
the  cruel  mercy  of  the  murderers  mocked 
their  agonies — raved,  prayed,  blasphemed — 
implored  the  guards  to  fire  among  them.  The 
jailers  in  the  mean  time  held  lights  to  the 
bars,  and  shouted  with  laughter  at  the  frantic 
struggles  of  their  victims.  At  length  the  tu 
mult  died  away  in  low  gasps  and  moanings. 
The  day  broke.  The  Nabob  had  slept  off  his 
debauch,  and  permitted  the  door  to  be  opened. 
But  it  was  some  time  before  the  soldiers  could 
make  a  lane  for  the  survivors,  by  piling  up  on 
each  side  the  heaps  of  corpses,  on  which  the 
burning  climate  had  already  begun  to  do  its 
loathsome  work.  When  at  length  a  passage 
was  made,  twenty-three  ghastly  figures,  such 
as  their  own  mothers  would  not  have  known, 
staggered  one  by  one  out  of  the  charnel-house* 
A  pit  was  instantly  dug.  The  dead  bodies,  a 
hundred  and  twenty-three  in  number,  were 
flung  into  it  promiscuously,  and  covered  up. 

But  these  things,  which,  after  the  lapse  of 
more  than  eighty  years,  cannot  be  told  or  read 
without  horror,  awakened  neither  remorse  nor 
pity  in  the  bosom  of  the  savage  Nabob.  He 
inflicted  no  punishment  on  the  murderers.  He 
showed  no  tenderness  to  the  survivors.  Some 
of  them,  indeed,  from  whom  nothing  was  to  be 
got,  were  suffered  to  depart;  but  those  from 
whom  it  was  thought  that  any  thing  could  be 
extorted,  were  treated  with  execrable  cruelty. 
Holwell,  unable  to  walk,  was  carried  before 
the  tyrant,  who  reproached  him;  threatened 
him,  and  sent  him  up  the  country  in  irons;  to 
gether  with  some  other  gentlemen  who  were 
S'l^pected  of  knowing  more  than  they  chose  to 
tell  about  the  treasures  of  the  Company.  These 
persons,  still  bowed  down  by  the  sufferings  of 
that  great  agony,  were  lodged  in  miserable 
sheds,  and  fed  only  with  grain  and  water,  till 
at  length  the  intercessions  of  the  female  re 
lations  of  the  Nabob  procured  their  release. 
One  Englishwoman  had  survived  that  night. 


She  was  placed  in  the  harem  of  the  prince,  a! 
Moorshedabad. 

Surajah  Dowlah,  in  the  mean  time,  sen 
letters  to  his  nominal  sovereign  at  Delhi,  de 
scribing  the  late  conquest  in  the  most  pompous 
language.  He  placed  a  garrison  in  Fort  Wil 
liam,  forbade  any  Englishman  to  dwell  in  the 
neighbourhood,  and  directed  that,  in  memory 
of  his  great  actions,  Calcutta  should  thence 
forward  be  called  Alinagore,  that  is  to  say,  the 
Port  of  God. 

In  August  the  news  of  the  fall  of  Calcutta 
reached  Madras,  and  excited  the  fiercest  and 
bitterest  resentment.  The  cry  of  the  whole 
settlement  was  for  vengeance.  Within  forty- 
eight  hours  after  the  arrival  of  the  intelligence, 
it  was  determined  that  an  expedition  should  be 
sent  to  the  Hoogley,  and  that  Clive  should  be  at 
the  head  of  the  land  forces.  The  naval  arma 
ment  was  under  the  command  of  Admiral 
Watson.  Nine  hundred  English  infantry — 
fine  troops  and  full  of  spirit — and  fifteen  hun 
dred  sepoys,  composed  the  army  which  sailed 
to  punish  a  prince  who  had  more  subjects  and 
larger  revenues  than  the  King. of  Prussia  or 
the  Empress  Maria  Theresa.  In  October  the 
expedition  sailed ;  but  it  had  to  make  its  way 
against  adverse  winds,  and  did  not  reach  Ben 
gal  till  December. 

The  Nabob  was  revelling  in  fancied  securi 
ty  at  Moorshedabad.  He  was  so  profoundly 
ignorant  of  the  state  of  foreign  countries,  that 
he  often  used  to  say  that  there  were  not  ten 
thousand  men  in  all  Europe;  and  it  had  never 
occurred  to  him  as  possible,  that  the  English 
would  dare  to  invade  his  dominions.  But, 
though  undisturbed  by  any  fear  of  their  mili 
tary  power,  he  began  to  miss  them  greatly. 
His  revenues  fell  off;  and  his  ministers  suc 
ceeded  in  making  him  understand  that  a  ruler 
may  sometimes  find  it  more  profitable  to  pro 
tect  traders  in  the  open  enjoyment  of  their 
gains  than  to  put  them  to  the  torture  for  the 
purpose  of  discovering  hidden  chests  of  gold 
and  jewels.  He  was  already  disposed  to  per 
mit  the  Company  to  resume  its  mercantile 
operations  in  his  country,  when  he  received 
the  news  that  an  English  armament  was  in  the 
Hoogley.  He  instantly  ordered  all  his  troops 
to  assemble  at  Moorshedabad,  and  marched 
towards  Calcutta. 

Clive  had  commenced  operations  with  his 
usual  vigour.  He  took  Budgebudge,  routed 
the  garrison  of  Fort  William,  recovered  Cal 
cutta,  stormed  and  sacked  Hoogley.  The 
Nabob,  already  disposed  to  make  some  con 
cessions  to  the  English,  was  confirmed  in  his 
pacific  disposition  by  these  proofs  of  their 
power  and  spirit.  He  accordingly  made  over- 
I  tures  to  the  chiefs  of  the  invading  armament, 
and  offered  to  restore  the  factory,  and  to  give 
compensation  to  those  whom  he  had  despoiled. 
Clive's  profession  was  war;  and  he  felt  that 
there  was' something  discreditable  in  an  ac 
commodation  with  Surajah  Dowlah.  But  his 
power  was  limited.  A  committee,  chiefly  com 
posed  of  servants  of  the  Company  who  had 
fled  from  Calcutta,  had  the  principal  direction 
of  affairs ;  and  these  persons  were  eager  to  be 
restored  to  their  posts,  and  compensated  for 
their  losses.  The  government  of  Madras,  ap* 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


327 


prized  that  war  had  commenced  in  Europe,  | 
and  apprehensive  of  an  attack  from  the  French, 
became  impatient  for  the  return  of  the  arma 
ment.    The  promises  of  the  Nabob  were  large,  i 
the  chances  of  a  contest  doubtful ;  and  Clive 
consented  to  treat — though  he  expressed  his 
regret  that  things  should  not  be  concluded  in 
so  glorious  a  manner  as  he  could  have  wished. 

With  this  negotiation  commences  a  new 
chapter  in  the  life  of  Clive.  Hitherto  he  had 
been  merely  a  soldier,  carrying  into  effect,  with 
eminent  ability  and  valour,  the  plans  of  others. 
Henceforth  he  is  to  be  chiefly  regarded  as  a 
statesman;  and  his  military  movements  are  to 
be  considered  as  subordinate  to  his  political 
designs.  That  in  his  new  capacity  he  dis 
played  great  talents,  and  obtained  great  suc 
cess,  is  undeniable.  But  it  is  also  undeniable, 
that  the  transactions  in  which  he  now  began 
to  take  a  part,  have  left  a  stain  on  his  moral 
character. 

We  can  by  no  means  agree  with  Sir  John 
Malcolm,  who  is  obstinately  resolved  to  see 
nothing  but  honour  and  integrity  in  the  con 
duct  of  his  hero.  But  we  can  as  little  agree 
with  Mr.  Mill,  who  has  gone  so  far  as  to  say 
that  Clive  was  a  man  "to  whom  deception, 
when  it  suited  his  purpose,  never  cost  a  pang." 
Clive  seems  to  us  to  have  been  constitutionally 
the  very  opposite  of  a  knave — bold  even  to 
temerity — sincere  even  to  indiscretion — hearty 
in  friendship — open  in  enmity.  Neither  in  his 
private  life,  nor  in  those  parts  of  his  public 
life  in  which  he  had  to  do  with  his  country 
men,  do  we  find  any  signs  of  a  propensity  to 
cunning.  On  the  contrary,  in  all  the  disputes 
in  which  he  was  engaged  as  an  Englishman 
against  Englishmen — from  his  boxing-matches 
at  school  to  the  stormy  altercations  at  the  India 
House  and  in  Parliament,  amidst  which  his 
latter  years  were  passed — his  very  faults  were 
those  of  a  high  and  magnanimous  spirit.  The 
truth  seems  to  have  been,  that  he  considered 
Oriental  politics  as  a  game  in  which  nothing 
was  unfair.  He  knew  that  the  standard  of 
morality  among  the  natives  of  India  differed 
widely  from  that  established  in  England.  He 
knew  that  he  had  to  deal  with  men  destitute  of 
what  in  Europe  is  called  honour — with  men 
who  would  give  any  promise  without  hesita,- 
tion,  and  break  any  promise  without  shame — 
with  men  who  would  unscrupulously  employ 
corruption,  perjury,  forgery,  to  compass  their 
ends.  His  letters  show  that  the  great  differ 
ence  between  Asiatic  and  European  morality 
was  constantly  in  his  thoughts.  He  seems 
to  have  imagined — most  erroneously  in  our 
opinion — that  he  could  effect  nothing  against 
such  adversaries,  if  he  was  content  to  be  bound 
by  ties  from  which  they  were  free — if  he  went 
on  telling  truth,  and  hearing  none — if  he  ful- 
fiillei,  to  his  own  hurt,  all  his  engagements 
with  confederates  who  never  kept  an  engage 
ment  that  was  not  to  their  advantage.  Accord 
ingly  this  man,  in  all  the  other  parts  of  his  life  an 
honourable  English  gentleman  and  soldier,  was 
no  sooner  matched  against  an  Indian  intriguer 
than  he  became  himself  an  Indian  intriguer; 
and  descended,  without  scruple,  to  falsehood, 
to  hypocritical  caresses,  to  the  substitution  of 
to  the  counterfeiting  of  hands. 


The  negotiations  Vween  the  English  and 
the  Nabob  were  carried  on  chiefly  by  two 
agents — Mr.  Watts,  a  servant  of  the  Company, 
and  a  Bengalee  of  the  name  of  Omichund. 
This  Omichund  had  been  one  of  the  wealthiest 
native  merchants  resident  at  Calcutta,  and  had 
sustained  great  losses  in  consequence  of  the 
Nabob's  expedition  against  that  place.  In  the 
course  of  his  commercial  transactions,  he  had 
seen  much  of  the  English,  and  was  peculiarly 
qualified  to  serve  as  a  medium  of  communica 
tion  between  them  and  a  native  court.  He 
possessed  great  influence  with  his  own  race, 
and  had  in  large  measure  the  Hindoo  talents 
— quick  observation,  tact,  dexterity,  perseve 
rance — and  the  Hindoo  vices — servility,  greedi 
ness,  and  treachery. 

The  Nabob  behaved  with  all  the  faithless 
ness  of  an  Indian  statesman,  and  all  the  levity 
of  a  boy  whose  mind  has  been  enfeebled  by 
power  and  self-indulgence.  He  promised, 
retracted,  hesitated,  evaded.  At  one  time  he 
advanced  with  his  army  in  a  threatening  man 
ner  towards  Calcutta  ;  but  when  he  saw  the 
resolute  front  which  the  English  presented,  he 
fell  back  in  alarm,  and  consented  to  make 
peace  with  them  on  their  own  terms.  The 
treaty  was  no  sooner  concluded,  than  he  form 
ed  new  designs  against  them.  He  intrigued 
with  the  French  authorities  at  Chandernagore. 
He  invited  Bussy  to  march  from  the  Deccan  to 
the  Hoogley,  and  to  drive  the  English  out  of 
Bengal.  All  this  was  well  known  to  Clive  and 
Watson.  They  determined  accordingly  to 
strike  a  decisive  blow,  and  to  attack  Chander 
nagore,  before  the  force  there  could  be  strength 
ened  by  new  arrivals,  either  from  the  south  of 
India  or  from  Europe.  Watson  directed  the 
expedition  by  water,  Clive  by  land.  The  suc 
cess  of  the  combined  movements  was  rapid 
and  complete.  The  fort,  the  garrison,  the  artil 
lery,  the  military  stores,  all  fell  into  the  hands 
of  the  English.  Nearly  five  hundred  European 
troops  were  among  the  prisoners. 

The  Nabob  had  feared  and  hated  the  Eng 
lish,  even  while  he  was  still  able  to  oppose  to 
them  their  French  rivals.     The  French  were 
now  vanquished ;  and  he  began  to  regard  the 
English  with  still  greater  fear  and  still  greater 
hatred.      His   weak   and    unprincipled    mind 
oscillated  between  servility  and  insolence.  One 
day  he  sent  a  large  sum  to  Calcutta,  as  part  of 
the  compensation  due  for  the  wrongs  which  he 
had  committed.   The  next  day  he  sent  a  present 
of  jewels  to  Bussy,  exhorting  that  distinguished 
officer  to  hasten   to  protect  Bengal  "  against 
Clive,  the  daring  in  war,  on  whom,"  says  his 
highness,  "may  all  bad  fortune  attend."     He 
ordered  his   army  to  march  against  the  Eng 
lish.      He    countermanded    his    orders.      He 
!  tore  Clive's  letters.     He  then  sent  answers  in 
i  the  most  florid  language  of  compliment.      He 
!  ordered  Watts  out  of  his  presence,  ana  ihreat- 
j  ened  to  impale  him.     He  again  sent  Tur  him, 
i  and  begged  pardon  for  his  intemperance.     lu 
i  the  mean  time,  his  wretched  maladministra- 
i  tion,  his  folly,  his  dissolute  manners,  and  his 
love  of  the  lowest  company,  had  disgusted  al. 
classes  of  his  subjects — soldiers,  traders,  civil 
functionaries,  the  proud  and  ostentatious  Mo- 
I  hammedans,  the  timid,  supple,  and  parsixnoni- 


328 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ous  Hindoos.  A  formidable  confederacy  was 
formed  against  him;  in  which  were  included 
Roydullub,  the  minister  of  finance,  Meer  Jaffier, 
the  principal  commander  of  the  troops,  and 
Jugget  Seit,  the  richest  banker  in  India.  The 
plot  was  confided  to  the  English  agents,  and  a 
communication  was  opened  between  the  mal 
contents  at  Moorshedabad  and  the  committee 
at  Calcutta. 

In  the  committee  there  was  much  hesitation; 
but  Clive's  voice  was  given  in  favour  of  the 
conspirators,  and  his  vigour  and  firmness  bore 
down  all  opposition.  It  was  determined  that 
the  English  should  lend  their  powerful  assist 
ance  to  depose  Surajah  Dovvlah,  and  to  place 
Meer  Jaffier  on  the  throne  cf  Bengal.  In  return, 
Meer  Jaffier  promised  ample  compensation  to 
the  company  and  its  servants,  and  a  liberal 
donative  to  the  army,  the  navy,  and  the  com 
mittee.  The  odious  vices  of  Surajah  Dowlah, 
the  wrongs  which  the  English  had  suffered  at 
his  hands,  the  dangers  to  which  our  trade  must 
have  been  exposed  had  he  continued  to  reign, 
appear  to  us  fully  to  justify  the  resolution  of 
deposing  him.  But  nothing  can  justify  the  dis 
simulation  which  Clive  stooped  to  practise. 
He  wrote  to  Surajah  Dowlah  in  terms  so  affec 
tionate  that  they  for  a  time  lulled  that  weak 
prince  to  perfect  security.  The  same  courier 
who  carried  this  "soothing  letter,"  as  Clive 
calls  it,  to  the  Nabob,  carried  to  Mr.  Watts  a 
letter  in  the  following  terms  : — "  Tell  Meer 
Jaffier  to  fear  nothing.  I  will  join  him  with 
five  thousand  men  who  never  turned  their 
backs.  Assure  him  I  will  march  night  and  day 
to  his  assistance,  and  stand  by  him  as  long  as 
I  have  a  man  left." 

It  was  impossible  that  a  plot  which  nad  so 
many  ramifications  should  long  remain  entirely 
concealed.  Enough  reached  the  ears  of  the 
Nabob  to  arouse  his  suspicions.  But  he  was 
soon  quieted  by  the  fictions  and  artifices  which 
the  inventive  genius  of  Omichund  produced 
•wiih  miraculous  readiness.  All  was  going 
well ;  the  plot  was  nearly  ripe ;  when  Clive 
learned  that  Omichund  was  likely  to  play 
false.  The  artful  Bengalee  had  been  promised 
a  liberal  compensation  for  all  that  he  had  lost 
at  Calcutta.  But  this  would  not  satisfy  him. 
His  services  had  been  great.  He  held  the 
thread  of  the  whole  intrigue.  By  one  word 
breathed  in  the  ear  of  Surajah  Dowlah,  he 
could  undo  all  that  he  had  done.  The  lives  of 
Watts,  of  Meer  Jaffier,  of  all  the  conspirators, 
were  at  his  mercy;  and  he  determined  to  take 
advantage  of  his  situation,  and  to  make  his 
own  terms.  He  demanded  three  hundred 
thousand  pounds  sterling,  as  the  price  of  his 
secrecy  and  of  his  assistance.  The  committee, 
incensed  by  the  treachery,  and  appalled  by  the 
danger,  knew  not  what  course  to  take.  But 
Clive  was  more  than  Omichund's  match  in 
Omichund's  own  arts.  The  man,  he  said,  was 
a  villain.  Any  artifice  which  would  defeat  such 
knavery  was  justifiable.  The  best  course 
>ould  be  to  promise  what  was  asked.  Omi 
chund  would  soon  be  at  their  mercv,  and  then 
tney  might  punish  him  by  withholding  from 
him,  not  only  the  bribe  which  he  now  demand 
ed,  but  also  the  compensation  which  all  the 
oilier  suiferers  of  Calcutta  were  to  receive. 


His  advice  was  taken ;  but  how  was  the 
wary  and  sagacious  Hindoo  to  be  deceived  1 
He  had  demanded  that  an  article  touching  his 
claims  should  be  inserted  in  the  treaty  between 
Meer  Jaffier  and  the  English,  and  he  would 
not  be  satisfied  unless  he  saw  it  with  his  own 
eyes.  Clive  had  au  expedient  ready.  Two 
treaties  were  drawn  up,  one  on  whits  paper, 
the  other  on  red — the  former  real,  the  latter 
fictitious.  In  the  former  Omichund's  name 
was  not  mentioned;  the  latter,  which  was  to 
be  shown  to  him,  contained  a  stipulation  in  his 
favour. 

But  another  difficulty  arose.  Admiral  Wat 
son  had  scruples  about  signing  the  red  treaty. 
Omichund's  vigilance  and  acuteness  were 
such,  that  the  absence  of  so  important  a  name 
would  probably  awaken  his  suspicions.  But 
Clive  was  not  a  man  to  do  any  thing  by  halves. 
We  almost  blush  to  write  it.  He  forged  Ad 
miral  Watson's  name. 

All  was  now  ready  for  action.  Mr.  Watts 
fled  secretly  from  Moorshedabad.  Clive  put 
his  troops  in  motion,  and  wrote  to  the  Nabob 
in  a  tone  very  different  from  that  of  his  pre 
vious  letters.  He  set  forth  all  the  wrongs 
which  the  British  had  suffered,  offered  to  sub 
mit  the  points  in  dispute  to  the  arbitration  of 
Meer  Jaffier;  and  concluded  by  announcing 
that,  as  the  rains  were  about  to  set  in,  he  and 
his  men  would  do  themselves  the  honour  of 
waiting  on  his  highness  for  an  answer.  ' 

Surajah  Dowlah  instantly  assembled  his 
whole  force,  and  marched  to  encounter  the 
English.  It  had  been  agreed  that  Meer  Jaffier 
should  separate  himself  from  the  Nabob,  and 
carry  over  his  division  to  Clive.  But  as  the 
decisive  moment  approached,  the  fears  of  the 
conspirator  overpowered  his  ambition.  Clive 
had  advanced  to  Cossirnbuzar ;  the  Nabob  lay 
with  a  mighty  power  a  few  miles  off  at  Plas- 
sey ;  and  still  Meer  Jaffier  delayed  to  fulfil  his 
engagements,  and  returned  evasive  answers 
to  the  earnest  remonstrances  of  the  English 
general. 

Clive  was  in  a  painfully  anxious  situation. 
He  could  place  no  confidence  in  the  sincerity 
or  in  the  courage  of  his  confederate;  and, 
whatever  confidence  he  might  place  in  his  own. 
military  talents,  and  in  the  valour  and  disci 
pline  of  his  troops,  it  was  no  light  thing  to 
engage  an  army  twenty  times  as  numerous  as 
his  own.  Before  him  lay  a  river  over  which 
it  was  easy  to  advance,  but  over  which,  if 
things  went  ill,  not  one  of  his  little  band  would 
ever  return.  On  this  occasion,  for  the  first  and 
for  the  last  lime,  his  dauntless  spirit,  during  a 
few  hours,  shrank  from  the  fearful  responsibi 
lity  of  making  a  decision.  He  called  a  council 
of  war.  The  majority  pronounced  against 
fighting;  and  Clive  declared  his  concurrence 
with  the  majority.  Long  afterwards,  he  said 
that  he  had  never  called  but  one  council  of  war, 
and  that,  if  he  had  taken  the  advice  of  that 
council,  the  British  would  never  have  been 
masters  of  Bengal.  But  scarcely  had  the 
meeting  broken  up  when  he  was  himself  again. 
He  retired  alone  under  the  shade  of  some 
trees,  and  passed  near  an  hour  there  in  thought. 
He  came  back  determined  to  put  every  th:ng  to 
the  hazard,  and  gave  orders  that  all  should  be 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


329 


in  readiness  for  passing  the  river  on  the  mor 
row. 

The  river  was  passed,  and  at  the  close  of  a 
toilsome  day's  march,  the  army,  long  alter  sun-  j 
set,  took  up  its  quarters  in  a  grove  of  mango-  j 
trees  near  Plassey,  within  a  mile  of  the  enemy. 
Clive  was  unable  to  sleep:  he  heard,  through 
the  whole  night,  the  sounds  of  drums  and 
cymbals  from  the  vast  camp  of  the  Nabob.  It 
is  not  strange  that  even  his  stout  heart  should 
now  and  then  have  sunk  when  he  reflected 
against  what  odds  and  for  what  a  prize  he  was 
in  a  few  hours  to  contend. 

Nor  was  the  rest  of  Surajah  Dowlah  more 
peaceful.  His  mind,  at  once  weak  and  stormy, 
was  distracted  by  wild  and  horrible  apprehen 
sions.  Appalled  by  the  greatness  and  near* 
ness  of  the  crisis,  distrusting  his  captains, 
dreading  every  one  who  approached  him, 
dreading  to  be  left  alone,  he  sate  gloomily  in 
his  tent,  haunted,  a  Greek,  poet  would  have 
said,  by  the  furies  of  those  who  had  cursed  him 
with  their  last  breath  in  the  Black  Hole. 

The  day  broke — the  day  which  was  to  decide 
the  fate  of  India.  At  sunrise,  the  army  of  the 
Nabob,  pouring  through  many  openings  from 
the  camp,  began  to  move  towards  the  grove 
where  the  English  lay.  Forty  thousand  in 
fantry,  armed  with  firelocks,  pikes,  swords, 
bows  and  arrows,  covered  the  plain.  They 
were  accompanied  by  fifty  pieces  of  ordnance 
of  the  largest  size,  each  tugged  by  a  long  team 
of  white  oxen,  and  each  pushed  on  from  be 
hind  by  an  elephant.  Some  smaller  guns,  un 
der  the  direction  of  a  few  French  auxiliaries, 
were  perhaps  more  formidable.  The  cavalry 
were  fifteen  thousand,  drawn,  not  from  the  ef 
feminate  population  of  Bengal,  but  from  the 
bolder  race  which  inhabits  the  northern  pro 
vinces;  and  the  practised  eye  of  Clive  could 
perceive  that  both  the  men  and  the  horses  were 
more  powerful  than  those  of  the  Carnatic.  The 
force  which  he  had  to  oppose  to  this  great  multi 
tude  consisted  of  only  three  thousand  men. 
But  of  these  nearly  a  thousand  were  English, 
and  all  were  led  by  English  officers,  and 
trained  in  the  English  discipline.  Conspicu 
ous  in  the  ranks  of  the  little  army  were  the 
men  of  the  Thirty-Ninth  Regiment,  which 
still  bears  on  its  colours,  amidst  many  honour 
able  additions  won  under  Wellington  in  Spain 
and  Gascony,  the  name  of  Plassey,  and  the 
proud  motto,  Primus  in  Ir,dis. 

The  battle  commenced  with  a  cannonade,  in 
which  the  artillery  of  the  Nabob  did  scarcely 
any  execution,  while  the  few  field  pieces  of  the 
English  produced  great  effect.  Several  of  the 
most  distinguished  officers  in  Surajah  Dowlah's 
service  fell.  Disorder  began  to  spread  through 
his  ranks.  His  own  terror  increased  every 
moment.  One  of  the  conspirators  urged  on 
him  the  expediency  of  retreating.  The  insidi 
ous  advice,  agreeing  as  it  did  with  what  his 
own  terrors  suggested,  was  readily  received. 
He  ordered  the  army  to  fall  back,  and  this  or 
der  decided  his  fate.  Clive  snatched  the  mo 
ment,  and  ordered  his  troops  to  advance.  The 
confused  and  dispirited  multitude  gave  way 
before  the  onset  of  disciplined  valour.  No 
mob  attacked  by  regular  soldiers  was  ever  more 
completely  routed.  The  little  band  of  French- 
Voi.  III.— 43 


men,  who  alone  ventured  to  confront  the  En«r 
lish,    were    swept    down    the    stream   of   fu 
gitives.     In    an    hour  the   forces  of  Surajan 
Dowlah  were  dispersed,  never  to  reassemble 
Only  five   hundred  of   the  vanquished  Avere 
slain.     But  their  camp,  their  guns,  their  bag 
age,  innumerable  wagons,  innumerable  cat 
tie,  remained  in  the  power  of  the  conquerors 
With  the  loss  of  twenty-two  soldiers  killed,  and 
fifty  wounded,  Clive  had  scattered  an  army  of 
nearly  sixty  thousand  men,  and  subdued  an 
empire  larger  and  more  populous  than  Great 
Britain. 

Meer  Jaffier  had  given  no  assistance  to  the 
English  during  the  action.  But,  as  soon  as  he 
saw  that  the  fate  of  the  day  was  decided,  hfc 
drew  off  his  division  of  the  army,  and  when 
the  battle  was  over,  sent  his  congratulations  to 
his  ally.  The  next  day  he  repaired  to  th£  Eng 
lish  quarters,  not  a  little  uneasy  as  to  the  re 
ception  which  awaited  him  there.  He  gave 
evident  signs  of  alarm  when  a  guard  was 
drawn  out  to  receive  him  with  the  honours  due 
to  his  rank.  But  his  apprehensions  were 
speedily  removed.  Clive  came  forward  to  meet 
him,  embraced  him,  saluted  him  as  Nabob  of 
the  three  great  provinces  of  Bengal,  Bahar, 
and  Orissa,  listened  graciously  to  his  apolo 
gies,  and  advised  him  to  march  without  delay 
to  Moorshedabad. 

Surajah  Dowlah  had  fled  from  the  field  of 
battle  with  all  the  speed  with  which  a  fleet 
camel  could  carry  htm,  and  arrived  at  Moor 
shedabad  in  a  little  more  than  twenty-four 
hours.  There  he  called  his  councillors  round 
him.  The  wisest  advised  him  to  put  himself 
into  the  hands  of  the  English,  from  wh.im  he 
had  nothing  worse  to  fear  than  depositijn  and 
confinement.  But  he  attributed  this  suggestion 
to  treachery.  Others  urged  him  to  try  the 
chance  of  war  again.  He  approved  the  ad 
vice,  and  issued  orders  accordingly.  But  he 
wanted  spirit  to  adhere  even  during  one  day  to 
a  manly  resolution.  He  learned  that  Meer 
Jaffier  had  arrived ;  and  his  terrors  became  in 
supportable.  Disguised  in  a  mean  dress,  with 
a  casket  of  jewels  in  his  hand,  he  let  himself 
down  at  night  from  a  window  of  his  palace, 
and,  accompanied"*}1-  only  two  attendants,  em 
barked  on  the  river  for  Patria. 

In  a  few  days  Clive  arrived  at  Moorshedabad, 
escorted  by  two  hundred  English  soldiers  and 
three  hundred  sepoys.  For  his  residence  he 
had  been  assigned  a  palace,  which  was  sur 
rounded  by  a  garden  so  spacious,  that  ah  Ihe 
troops  who  accompanied  him  could  conve 
niently  encamp  within  it.  The  ceremonv  of  the 
installation  of  Meer  Jaffier  was  instantly  per 
formed.  Clive  led  the  new  Nabob  to  the  sea' 
of  honour,  placed  him  on  it,  presented  to  him, 
after  the  immemorial  fashion  of  the  East,  an 
offering  of  gold,  and  then,  turning  to  the  na 
tives  who  filled  the  hall,  congratulated  them  on. 
the  good  fortune  which  had  freed  them  from  a 
tyrant.  •  He  was  compelled  on  this  occasion  to 
use  the  services  of  an  interpreter;  for  it  is  re 
mark-able  that,  long  as  he  resided  in  India,  inti 
mately  acquainted  as  he  was  with  the  Indian 
politics  and  the  Indian  character,  aud  adored 
j  as  he  was  by  his  Indian  soldiery,  he  nevei 
i  learned  to  express  Irmself  with  facility  ;n  any 


330 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Cndian  language ;  and  is  said  to  have  been 
sometimes  under  the  necessity  of  employing 
the  smattering  of  Portuguese  which  he  had  ac 
quired,  when  a  lad,  in  Brazil. 

The  new  sovereign  was  now  called  upon  to 
fulfil  the  engagements  into  which  he  had  entered 
with  his  allies.  A  conference  was  held  at  the 
house  of  Jugget  Seit,  the  great  banker,  for  the 
purpose  of  making  the  necessary  arrange 
ments.  Omichund  came  thither,  fully  believ 
ing  himself  to  stand  high  in  the  favour  of 
Clive,  who,  with  dissimulation  surpassing 
even  the  dissimulation  of  Bengal,  had  up  to 
that  day  treated  him  with  undiminished  kind 
ness.  The  white  treaty  was  produced  and 
read.  Clive  then  turned  to  Mr.  Scrafton,  one 
of  the  servants  of  the  Company,  and  said  in 
English,  "It  is  now  time  to  undeceive  Omi 
chund."  "Omichund,"  said  Mr.  Scrafton  in 
Hindostanee,  "  the  red  treaty  is  a  take-in.  You 
are  to  have  nothing."  Omichund  fell  back  in 
sensible  into  the  arms  of  his  attendants.  He 
revived  ;  but  his  mind  was  irreparably  ruined. 
Clive,  who,  though  unscrupulous  in  his  deal 
ings  with  Indian  politicians,  was  not  inhuman, 
seems  to  have  been  touched.  He  saw  Omi 
chund  a  few  days  later,  spoke  to  him  kindly, 
advised  him  to  make  a  pilgrimage  to  one  of  the 
great  temples  of  India,  in  the  hope  that  change 
of  scene  might  restore  his  health,  and  was 
even  disposed,  notwithstanding  all  that  had 
passed,  again  to  employ  his  talents  in  the  pub 
lic  service.  But  from  the  moment  of  that  sud 
den  shock,  the  unhappy  man  sank  gradually 
into  idiocy.  He  who  had  formerly  been  dis 
tinguished  by  the  strength  of  his  understand 
ing,  and  the  simplicity  of  his  habits,  now 
squandered  the  remains  of  his  fortune  on  child 
ish  trinkets,  and  loved  to  exhibit  himself  dressed 
in  rich  garments,  and  hung  with  precious 
stones.  In  this  abject  state  he  languished  a 
few  months,  and  then  died. 

We  should  not  think  it  necessary  to  offer 
any  remarks  for  the  purpose  of  directing  the 
judgment  of  our  readers  with  respect  to  this 
transaction,  had  not  Sir  John  Malcolm  under 
taken  to  defend  it  in  all  its  parts.  He  regrets, 
indeed,  that  it  was  necessary  to  employ  means 
so  liable  to  abuse  as  forgery;  but  he  will  not 
admit  that  any  blame  attaches  to  those  who 
deceived  the  deceiver.  He  thinks  that  the 
English  were  not  bound  to  keep  faith  with  one 
who  kept  no  faith  with  them;  and  that,  if  they 
had  fulfilled  their  engagements  with  the  wily 
Bengalee,  so  signal  an  example  of  successful 
treason  would  have  produced  a  crowd  of  imi 
tators.  Now,  we  will  not  discuss  this  point  on 
any  rigid  principles  of  morality.  Indeed,  it  is 
quite  unnecessary  to  do  so  ;  for,  looking  at  the 
question  as  a  question  of  expediency  in  the 
lowest  sense  of  the  word,  and  using  no  argu 
ments  but  such  as  Machiavelli  might  have 
employed  in  his  conference  with  Borgia,  we 
are  convinced  that  Clive  was  altogether  in  the 
wrong,  and  that  he  committed,  not  merely  a 
crime,  but  a  blunder.  That  honesty  is  the 
best  policy,  is  a  maxim  which  we  firmly  be 
lieve  to  be  generally  correct,  even  with  respect 
to  the  temporal  interest  of  individuals;  but 
vith  respect  to  societies,  the  rule  is  subjec*.  to 


still  fewer  objections,  and  that  for  this  reason, 
that  the  life  of  societies  is  longer  than  the  life 
of  individuals.  It  is  possible  to  mention  men 
who  have  owed  great  worldly  prosperity  to 
breaches  oi  private  faith.  But  we  doubt  whe 
ther  it  be  pc  ssible  to  mention  a  state  which  has 
on  the  whole  been  a  gainer  by  a  breach  of  pub 
lic  faith.  The  entire  history  of  British  India 
is  an  illustration  of  this  great  truth,  that  it  is 
not  prudent  to  oppose  perfidy  to  perfidy — that 
the  most  efficient  weapon  with  which  men  can 
encounter  falsehood  is  truth.  During  a  long 
course  cf  years,  the  English  rulers  of  India, 
surrounded  by  allies  and  enemies  whom  no 
engagements  could  bind,  have  generally  acted 
with  sincerity  and  uprightness  ;  and  the  event 
has  proved  that  sincerity  and  uprightness  are 
wisdom.  English  valour  and  English  intelli 
gence  have  done  less  to  extend  and  to  preserve 
our  Oriental  empire  than  English  veracity. 
All  that  we  could  have  gained  by  imitating  the 
doublings,  the  evasions,  the  fictions,  the  per 
juries  which  have  been  employed  against  us, 
is  as  nothing,  when  compared  with  what  we 
have  gained  by  being  the  one  power  in  India 
on  whose  word  reliance  can  be  placed.  No 
oath  which  superstition  can  devise,  no  hostage 
however  precious,  inspires  a  hundredth  part 
of  the  confidence  which  is  produced  by  the 
"yea,  yea,"  and  "nay,  nay,"  of  a  British  envoy, 
No  fastness,  however  strong  by  art  or  nature, 
gives  to  its  inmates  a  security  like  that  en 
joyed  by  the  chief  who,  passing  through  the 
territories  of  powerful  and  deadly  enemies,  is 
armed  with  the  British  guarantee.  The  might 
iest  princes  of  the  East  can  scarcely,  by  the 
offer  of  enormous  usury,  draw  forth  any  por 
tion  of  the  wealth  which  is  concealed  under 
the  hearths  of  their  subjects.  The  British  go 
vernment  offers  little  more  than  four  per  cent, 
and  avarice  hastens  to  bring  forth  tens  of  mil 
lions  of  rupees  from  its  most  secret  repositories. 
A  hostile  monarch  may  promise  mountains  of 
gold  to  our  sepoys,  on  condition  that  they  will 
desert  the  standard  of  the  Company.  The 
Company  promises  only  a  moderate  pension 
after  a  long  service.  But  every  sepoy  knows 
that  the  promise  of  the  Company  will  be  kept; 
he  knows  that  if  he  lives  a  hundred  years  his 
rice  and  salt  are  as  secure  as  the  salary  of  the 
Governor-General;  and  he  knows  that  there  is 
not  another  state  in  India  which  would  not,  in 
spite  of  the  most  solemn  vows,  leave  him  to 
die  of  hunger  in  a  ditch  as  soon  as  he  had 
ceased  to  be  useful.  The  greatest  advantage 
which  a  government  can  possess,  is  to  be  the 
one  trustworthy  government  in  the  midst  of 
governments  which  nobody  can  trust.  This 
advantage  we  enjoy  in  Asia.  Had  we  acted 
during  the  last  two  generations  on  the  princi 
ples  which  Sir  John  Malcolm  appears  to  have 
considered  as  sound — had  we,  as  often  as  we 
had  to  deal  Math  people  like  Omichund,  reta 
liated  by  lying  and  forging,  and  breaking  faith, 
after  their  fashion — it  is  our  firm  belief  that  no 
courage  or  capacity  could  have  upheld  our 
empire. 

Sir  John  Malcom  admits  that  Clive's  breach 
of  faith  could  be  justified  only  by  the  strongest 
necessity.  As  we  think  that  breach  of  faith 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


331 


not  only  unnecessary,  but  most  inexpedient,  J 
we  need  hardly  say  that  we  condemn  it  most  i 
severely. 

Omichund  was  not  the  only  victim  of  the 
revolution.     Surajah  Dowlah  was  taken  a  few  j 
days  after  his  flight,  and  was  brought  before  | 
Meer  Jaftier.    There  he  flung  himself  on  the  j 
ground  in  convulsions  of  fear,  and  with  tears  i 
and  loud  cries  implored  the  mercy  which  he  | 
had  never  shown.     Meer  Jaffier  hesitated  ;  but 
his  son  Meeran,  a  youth  of  seventeen,  who  in 
feebleness  of  brain  and  savageness  of  nature 
greatly  resembled  the  wretched  captive,  was 
implacable.     Surajah  Dowlah  was  led  into  a 
secret  chamber,  to  which  in  a  short  time  the 
ministers  of  death  were  sent.     In  this  act  the 
English  bore  no  part;  and  Meer  Jaffier  urider- 
derstood  so   much   of  their  feelings,  that  he 
thought  it  necessary  to  apologize  to  them  for 
having  avenged  them  on  their  most  malignant 
enemy. 

The  shower  of  wealth  now  fell  copiously  on 
the  Company  and  its  servants.  A  sum  of 
eight  hundred  thousand  pounds  sterling,  in 
coined  silver,  was  sent  down  the  river  from 
Moorshedabad  to  Fort  William.  The  fleet 
which  conveyed  this  treasure  consisted  of 
more  than  a  hundred  boats,  and  performed  its 
triumphal  voyage  with  flags  flying  and  music 
playing.  Calcutta,  which  but  a  few  months 
ago  had  been  so  desolate,  was  now  more  pros 
perous  than  ever.  Trade  revived ;  and  the 
signs  of  affluence  appeared  in  every  English 
house.  As  to  Clive,  there  was  no  limit  to  his 
acquisitions  but  his  own  moderation.  The 
treasury  of  Bengal  was  thrown  open  to  him. 
There  were  piled  up,  after  the  usage  of  Indian 
princes,  immense  masses  of  coin,  among  which 
might  not  seldom  be  detected  the  florins  arid 
byzants  with  which,  before  any  European  ship 
had  turned  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  the  Vene 
tians  purchased  the  stuffs  and  spices  of  the 
East.  Clive  walked  between  heaps  of  gold 
and  silver,  crowned  with  rubies  and  diamonds, 
and  was  at  liberty  to  help  himself.  He  ac 
cepted  between,  two  and  three  hundred  thou 
sand  pounds. 

The  pecuniary  transactions  between  Meer 
Jaffier  and  Clive  were  sixteen  years  later  con 
demned  by  the  public  voice  and  severely  criti 
cised  in  Parliament.  They  are  vehemently 
defended  by  Sir  John  Malcolm.  The  accusers 
of  the  victorious  general  represented  his  gains 
as  the  wages  of  corruption,  or  as  plunder  ex 
torted  at  the  point  of  the  sword  from  a  helpless 
ally.  The  biographer,  on  the  other  hand,  con 
siders  these  great  acquisitions  as  free  gifts, 
honourable  alike  to  the  donor  and  the  receiver, 
and  compares  them  to  the  rewards  bestowed 
by  foreign  powers  on  Marlborough,  on  Nelson, 
and  on  Wellington.  It  had  always,  he  says, 
been  customary  in  the  East  to  give  and  receive 
presents  ;  and  there  was,  as  yet,  no  act  of  Par 
liament  positively  prohibiting  English  func 
tionaries  in  India  from  profiting  by  this  Asiatic 
usage.  This  reasoning,  we  own,  does  not  quite 
satisfy  us.  We  fully  acquit  Clive  of  selling 
the  interest  of  his  employers  or  his  country ; 
but  we  cannot  acquit  him  of  having  done  what, 
if  not  in  itself  evil,  was  yei  of  evil  example. 
Nothing  is  more  clear  than  that  a  general 


ought  to  be  the  servant  of  his  own  government, 
and  of  no  other.  It  follows,  that  whatever  re 
wards  he  receives  for  his  services  ought  to  be 
given  either  by  his  own  government,  cr  with 
the  full  knowledge  and  approbation  of  his  own 
government.  This  rute  ought  to  be  strictly 
maintained  even  with  respect  to  the  merest 
bauble — with  respect  to  a  cross  a  medal,  or  a 
yard  of  coloured  riband.  But  how  can  any 
government  be  well  served,  if  those  who  com 
mand  its  forces  are  at  liberty,  without  its  per 
mission,  without  its  privity,  to  accept  princely 
fortunes  from  its  allies  ]  It  is  idle  to  say 
that  there  was  then  no  act  of  Parliament  pro 
hibiting  the  practice  of  taking  presents  from 
Asiatic  sovereigns.  It  is  not.  on  the  act  which* 
was  passed  at  a  later  period  for  the  purpose  of 
preventing  any  such  taking  of  presents,  but  en 
grounds  which  were  valid  before  that  act  was 
passed — on  grounds  of  common  law  and  com 
mon  sense — that  we  arraign  the  conduct  of 
Clive.  There  is  no  act  that  we  know  of,  pro« 
hibiting  the  Secretary  of  State  for  Foreign  Af 
fairs  being  in  the  pay  of  continental  powers. 
But  it  is  not  the  less  true  that  a  secretary  who 
should  receive  a  secret  pension  from  France, 
would  grossly  violate  his  duty,  and  would  de 
serve  severe  punishment.  Sir  John  Malcolm 
compares  the  conduct  of  Clive  with  that  of  the 
Duke  of  Wellington.  Suppose — and  we  beg 
pardon  for  putting  such  a  supposition  even  for 
the  sake  of  argument — that  the  Duke  of  Wel 
lington  had,  after  the  campaign  of  1815,  and 
while  he  commanded  the  army  of  occupation 
in  France,  privately  accepted  two  hundred 
thousand  pounds  from  Louis  the  Eighteenth  as 
a  mark  of  gratitude  for  the  great  services 
which  his  grace  had  rendered  to  the  house  of 
Bourbon — what  would  be  thought  of  such  a 
transaction  1  Yet  the  statute-book  no  more 
forbids  the  taking  of  presents  in  Europe  now, 
than  it  forbade  the  taking  of  presents  in  Asia 
then. 

At  the  same  time  it  must  be  admitted,  that 
in  Clive's  case  there  were  many  extenuating 
circumstances.  He  considered  himself  as  the 
general,  not  of  the  crown,  but  of  the  Company. 
The  Company  had,  by  implication  at,  least, 
authorized  its  agents  to  enrich  themselves  by 
means  of  the  liberality  of  the  native  princes, 
and  by  other  means  still  more  objectionable. 
It  was  hardly  to  be  expected  that  the  servant 
should  entertain  stricter  notions  of  his  duty 
than  were  entertained  by  his  masters.  Though 
Clive  did  not  distinctly  acquaint  his  employers 
with  what  had  taken  place,  and  request  their 
sanction,  he  did  not,  on  the  other  hand,  by  stu 
died  concealment,  show  that  he  was  conscious 
of  having  done  wrong.  On  the  contrary,  he 
avowed  with  the  greatest  openness  that  the 
Nabob's  bounty  had  raised  him  to  affluence. 
Lastly,  though  we  think  that  he  ought  not  in 
such  a  way  to  have  taken  any  thing,  ~e  must 
admit  that  he  deserves  praise  for  having  taken 
so  little.  He  accepted  twenty  lacs  of  rupees. 
It  would  have  cost  him  only  a  word  to  make 
the  twenty  forty.  It  was  a  very  easy  exercise 
of  virtue  to  declaim  in  England  against  Clive's 
rapacity;  but  not  one  in  a  bundled  of  his  ac 
cusers  would  have  shown  so  much  self-corn 
mand  in  the  treasury  of  Moorshedabad 


332 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Meer  JafTier  could  be  upheld  on  the  throne 
tfnly  by  the  hand  which  had  placed  him  on  it. 
He  was  not,  indeed,  a  mere  boy  ;  nor  had  he 
been  so  unfortunate  as  to  be  born  in  the  pur 
ple.  He  was  not  therefore  quite  so  imbecile  or 
quite  as  depraved  as  his  predecessor  had  been. 
But  he  had  none  of  the  talent  or  virtues  which 
his  post  required ;  and  his  son  and  heir, 
Meeran,  was  another  Surajah  Dowlah.  The 
recent  revolution  had  unsettled  the  minds  of 
men.  Many  chiefs  w^re  in  open  insurrection 
against  the  new  Nabob.  The  viceroy  of  the 
rich  and  powerful  province  of  Oude,  who,  like 
other  viceroys  of  the  Mogul,  was  now  in  truth 
an  independent  sovereign,  menaced  Bengal 
'with  invasion.  Nothing  but  the  talents  and 
authority  of  Olive  could  support  the  tottering 
government.  While  things  were  in  this  state 
a  ship  arrived  with  despatches,  which  had  been 
Avritten  at  the  India-House  before  the  news  of 
the  battle  of  Plassey  had  reached  London.  The 
Directors  had  determined  to  place  the  English 
settlements  in  Bengal  under  a  government 
constituted  in  the  most  cumbrous  and  absurd 
manner;  and,  to  make  the  matter  worse,  no 
place  in  the  arrangement  was  assigned  to 
Clive.  The  persons  who  were  selected  to  form 
this  new  gove-rnment,  greatly  to  their  honour, 
took  on  themselves  the  responsibility  of  dis 
obeying  these  preposterous  orders,  and  invited 
Clive  to  exercise  the  supreme  authority.  He 
consented ;  and  it  soon  appeared  that  the  ser 
vants  of  the  Company  had  only  anticipated  the 
wish  of  their  employers.  The  Directors,  on 
receiving  news  of  Clive's  brilliant  success, 
instantly  appointed  him  governor  of  their  pos 
sessions  in  Bengal,  with  the  highest  marks  of 
gratitude  and  esteem.  His  power  was  now 
boundless,  and  far  surpassed  even  that  which 
Dupleix  had  attained  in  the  south  of  India. 
Meer  Jaffier  regarded  him  with  slavish  awe. 
On  one  occasion,  the  Nabob  spoke  with  severity 
to  a  native  chief  of  high  rank,  whose  followers 
had  been  engaged  in  F  brawl  with  some  of  the 
Company's  sepoys.  "Are  you  yet  to  learn," 
he  said,  "who  that  Colonel  Clive  is,  and  in 
what  station  God  has  placed  him  ?"  The  chief, 
who,  as  a  famous  jester  and  an  old  friend  of 
Meer  Jaffier,  could  venture  to  take  liberties, 
answered,  "  I  affront  the  Colonel — I,  who  never 
get  up  in  the  morning  without  making  three 
low  bows  to  his  jackass  !"  This  was  hardly 
an  exaggeration.  Europeans  and  natives  were 
alike  at  Clive's  feet.  The  English  regarded 
him  as  the  only  man  who  could  force  Meer 
Jaffier  to  keep  his  engagements  with  them. 
Meer  Jaffier  regarded  him  as  the  only  man 
who  could  protect  the  new  dynasty  against  tur 
bulent  subjects  and  encroaching  neighbours. 

It  is  but  justice  to  say  that  Clive  used  his 
power  ably  and  vigorously  for  the  advantage  of 
his  country.  He  sent  forth  an  expedition  against 
the  tract  lying  to  the  north  of  the  Carnatic. 
In  this  tract  the  French  still  had  the  ascendency; 
and  it  was  important  to  dislodge  them.  The 
conduct  of  the  enterprise  was  intrusted  to  an 
officer  of  the  name  of  Forde.  who  was  then 
little  known,  but  in  whom  the  keen  eye  of  the 
governor  had  detected  military  talents  of  a  high 
order.  The  success  of  the  expedition  was 
rapid  and  splendid. 


|  While  a  considerable  part  of  t»,  tnny  of 
I  Bengal  was  thus  engaged  at  a  distance,  a  new 
j  and  formidable  danger  menaced  the  western 
frontier.  The  Great  Mogul  was  a  prisoner  at 
Delhi,  in  the  hands  of  a  subject.  His  eldest 
son,  named  Shah  Alum,  destined  to  be  the 
sport,  during  many  years,  of  adverse  fortune, 
and  to  be  a  tool  in  the  hands,  first  of  the  Mah- 
rattas,  and  then  of  the  English,  had  fled  from 
the  palace  of  his  father.  His  birth  was  still 
revered  in  India.  Some  powerful  princes,  the 
Nabob  of  Oude  in  particular,  were  inclined  to 
favour  him.  He  found  it  easy  to  draw  to  his 
standard  great  numbers  of  the  military  adven 
turers  with  whom  every  part  of  the  country 
swarmed.  An  army  of  forty  thousand  men, 
of  various  races  and  religions,  Mahrattas,  Ro- 
hillas,  Jauts,  and  Afghans,  was  speedily  assem 
bled  round  him ;  and  he  formed  the  design  of 
overthrowing  the  upstart  whom  the  English 
had  elevated  to  a  throne,  and  of  establishing  his 
own  authority  throughout  Bengal,  Orissa,  and 
Bahar. 

Jaffier's  terror  was  extreme ;  and  the  only 
expedient  which  occurred  to  him  was  to  pur 
chase,  by  the  payment  of  a  large  sum  of 
money,  an  accommodation  with  Shah  Alum. 
This  expedient  had  been  repeatedly  employed 
by  those  who,  before  him,  had  ruled  the  rich 
and  unwarlike  provinces  near  the  mouth  of  the 
Ganges.  But  Clive  treated  the  suggestion  with 
a  scorn  worthy  of  his  strong  sense  and  daunt 
less  courage.  "  If  you  do  this,"  he  Avrote,  "  you 
will  have  the  Nabob  of  Oude,  the  Mahrattas, 
and  many  more,  come  from  all  parts  of  the  con 
fines  of  your  country,  who  will  bully  you  out 
of  money  till  you  have  none  left  in  your  trea 
sury.  I  beg  your  excellency  will  rely  on  the 
fidelity  of  the  English,  and  of  those  troops 
which  are  attached  to  you."  He  wrote  in  a 
similar  strain  to  the  Governor  of  Patna,  a  brave 
native  soldier,  whom  he  highly  esteemed. 
"  Come  to  no  terms ;  defend  your  city  to  the 
last.  Rest  assured  that  the  English  are  stanch 
and  firm  friends,  and  that  they  never  desert  a 
cause  in  which  they  have  once  taken  a  part." 

He  kept  his  word.  Shah  Alum  had  invested 
Patna,  and  was  on  the  point  of  proceeding  to 
storm,  when  he  learned  that  the  Colonel  was 
advancing,  by  forced  marches.  The  whole 
army  which  was  approaching  consisted  of  only 
four  hundred  and  fifty  Europeans  and  two 
thousand  five  hundred  sepoys.  But  Clive  and 
his  Englishmen  were  now  objects  of  dread  over 
all  the  East.  As  soon  as  his  advanced  guard 
appeared,  the  besiegers,  fled  before  him.  A  few 
French  adventurers  who  were  about  the  person 
of  the  prince,  advised  him  to  try  the  chance  of 
battle ;  but  in  vain.  In  a  few  days  this  great 
army,  which  had  been  regarded  with  so  much 
uneasiness  by  the  court  of  Moorshedabad, 
melted  away  before  the  mere  terror  of  the 
British  name. 

The  conqueror  returned  in  triumph  to  Fort 
William.  The  joy  of  Meer  Jaffier  was  as  un 
bounded  as  his  fears  had  been,  and  led  him  to 
bestow  on  his  preserver  a  princely  token  of 
gratitude.  The  quit-rent  which  the  East  India 
Company  was  bound  to  pay  to  the  Nabob  for 
the  extensive  lands  held  by  them  to  the  south 
of  Calcutta,  amounted  to  near  thirty  thousand 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE   OF   CLIVE. 


333 


|  main  strength  of  the  invading  army,  were 
killed  or  taken.  The  conqueror*  sat  down 
before  Chinsura;  and  the  chiefs  of  that  settle 
ment,  now  thoroughly  humbled,  consented  to 
the  terms  which  Clive  dictated.  They  engaged 
to  build  no  fortifications,  and  to  raise  no  troops 


pounds  sterling  a  year.    The   whole  of  this  i  the   European   soldiers,   who  constituted  the 
splendid  estate,  sufficient  to  support  with  dig 
nity  the  highest  rank  of  the  British  peerage, 
wa's  now  conferred  on  Clive  for  life. 

This  present  we  think  Clive  justified  in  ac 
cepting.  It  was  a  present  which,  from  its  very 
nature,  could  be  no  secret.  In  fact,  the  Com 
pany  itself  was  his  tenant,  and,  by  its  acqui 
escence,  signified  its  approbation  of  Meer  Jaf- 
fier's  grant. 

But  the  gratitude  of  Meer  Jaflier  did  not  last 
long.  He  had  for  some  time  felt  that  the  power 
ful  ally  who  had  set  him  up  might  pull  him 
down,  and  had  been  looking  round  for  support 
against  the  formidable  strength  by  which  he 
had  himself  been  hitherto  supported.  He  knew 
that  it  would  be  impossible  to  find  among  the 
natives  of  India  any  force  which  would  look 
the  Colonel's  little  army  in  the  face.  The 
French  power  in  Bengal  was  extinct.  But  the 
fame  of  the  Dutch  had  anciently  been  great  in 
the  Eastern  seas  ;  and  it  was  not  yet  distinctly 
known  in  Asia  how  much  the  power  of  Hol 
land  had  declined  in  Europe.  Secret  commu 
nications  passed  between  the  court  of  Moorshe- 
dabad  and  the  Dutch  factory  at  Chinsura ;  and 
urgent  letters  were  sent  from  Chinsura,  exhort 
ing  the  government  of  Batavia  to  fit  out  an  ex 
pedition  which  might  balance  the  power  of  the 
English  in  Bengal.  The  authorities  of  Batavia, 
eager  to  extend  the  influence  of  their  country — 
still  more  eager  to  obtain  for  themselves  a 
share  of  the  wealth  which  had  recently  raised 
so  many  English  adventurers  to  opulence — 
equipped  a  powerful  armament.  Seven  large 
ships  from  Java  arrived  unexpectedly  in  the 
Hoogley.  The  military  force  on  board  amount 
ed  to  fifteen  hundred  men,  of  whom  about  one- 
half  were  Europeans.  The  enterprise  was 
well-timed. 

Clive  had  sent  such  large  detachments  to 
oppcse  the  French  in  the  Carnatic,  that  his 
army  was  now  inferior  in  number  to  that  of 
the  Dutch.  He  knew  that  Meer  Jaffier  secretly 
favoured  the  invaders.  He  knew  that  he  took 
on  himself  a  serious  responsibility,  if  he  attack 
ed  the  forces  of  a  friendly  power  ;  that  the  Eng 
lish  ministers  could  not  wish  to  see  a  war  with 
Holland  added  to  that  in  which  they  vrere 
already  engaged  with  France  ;  that  they  might 
disavow  his  acts  ;  that  they  might  punish  him. 
He  had  recently  remitted  a  great  part  of  his  for 
tune  to  Europe,  through  the  Dutch  East  India 
Company ;  and  he  had  therefore  a  strong  inte 
rest  in  avoiding  any  quarrel.  But  he  was 
satisfied,  that  if  he  suffered  the  Batavian 
armament  to  pass  up  the  river  and  join  the  erar- 
rison  at  Chinsura,  Meer  Jaffier  would  throw 
himself  into  the  arms  of  these  new  allies,  and 
that  the  English  ascendency  in  Bengal  would 
be  exposed  to  most  serious  danger.  He  took 
his  resolution  with  characteristic  boldness,  and 
was  most  ably  seconded  by  his  officers,  parti 
cularly  by  Colonel  Forde,  to  whom  the  most 
important  part  of  the  operations  was  intrusted. 


beyond  a  small  force  necessary  for  the  police 
of  their  factories ;  and  it  was  distinctly  pro 
vided  that  any  violation  of  these  covenants 
should  be  punished  with  instant  expulsion  from 
Bengal. 

Three  months  after  this  great  victory,  Clive 
sailed  for  England.  At  home,  honours  and 
rewards  awaited  him — not  indeed  equal  to  his 
claims  or  to  his  ambition;  but  still  such  as, 
when  his  age,  his  rank  in  the  army,  and  his 
original  place  in  society  are  considered,  must 
be  pronounced  rare  and  splendid.  He  was 
raised  to  the  Irish  peerage,  arid  encouraged  to 
expect  an  English  title.  George  the  Third, 
who  had  just  ascended  the  throne,  received 
him  with  great  distinction.  The  ministers  paid 
him  marked  attention ;  and  Pitt,  whose  in 
fluence  in  the  House  of  Commons  and  in  the 
country  was  unbounded,  was  eager  to  mark 
his  regard  for  one  whose  exploits  had  contri 
buted  so  much  to  the 'lustre  of  that  memorable 
period.  The  great  orator  had  already  in  Par 
liament  described  Clive  as  a  heaven-born  ge 
neral, — a  man  who,  bred  to  the  labour  of  the 
desk,  had  displayed  a  military  genius  which 
might  excite  the  admiration  of  the  King  of 
Prussia.  There  were  then  no  reporters  in  the 
gallery;  but  these  words,  emphatically  spoken 
by  the  first  statesman  of  the  age,  had  passed 
from  mouth  to  mouth,  had  been  transmitted  to 
Clive  in  Bengal,  and  had  greatly  delighted  and 
flattered  him.  Indeed,  since  the  death  of  Wolfe, 
Clive  was  the  only  English  general  of  whom 
his  countrymen  had  much  reason  to  be  proud. 
The  Duke  of  Cumberland  had  been  generally 
unfortunate ;  and  his  single  victory  having 
been  gained  over  his  countrymen,  and  used 
Avith  merciless  severity,  had  been  more  fatal  to 
his  popularity  than  his  many  defeats.  Con- 
way,  versed  in  the  learning  of  his  profession, 
and  personally  courageous,  wanted  vigour  and 
capacity.  Granby,  honest,  generous,  and  hrave 
as  a  lion,  had  neither  science  nor  genius.  Sack- 
ville,  inferior  in  knowledge  and  abilities  to  none 
of  his  contemporaries,  had  incurred,  unjustly 
as  we  believe,  the  imputation  most  fatal  to  the 
character  of  a  soldier.  It  was  under  the  com 
mand  of  a  foreign  general  that  the  British  had 
triumphed  at  Minden  and  Warburg.  The 
people,  therefore,  as  was  natural,  greeted  with 
pride  and  delight  a  captain  of  their  own,  whose 
native  courage  and  self-taught  skill  had  placed 
him  on  a  level  with  the  great  tacticians  of 
Germany. 

The  wealth  of  Clive  was  such  as  enabled 
him  to  vie  with  the  first  grandees  of  England. 
There  remains  proof  that  he  had  remitted  more 
than  a  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  pounds 


The  Dutch  attempted  to  force  a  passage.    The  j  through  the  Dutch  East  India  Company,  and 


English  encountered  them  both  by  land  and 
water.  On  both  elements  the  enemy  had  a  great 
superiority  of  force.  On  both  they  were  sig 
nally  defeated.  Their  ships  were  taken.  Their 
troops  were  put  to  a  total  rout.  Almost  all  i 


more  than  forty  thousand  pounds  thro-j<;h  the 
English  Company.  The  amount  which  lie  seni 
home,  through  private  houses,  was  also  con 
siderable.  He  invested  great  sums  ir  jewels, 
then  a  very  common  mode  of  remittance  froir 


334 


MALA  I/LAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


fndia.    His  purchases  of  diamonds,  at  Madras 
alone,     amounted     to    twenty-five    thousand 
pounds.  Besides  a  great  mass  of  ready  money, 
he  had  his  Indian  estate,  valued  by  himself  at 
twenty-seven  thousand  a  year.     His  whole  an-  j 
nual  income,  in  the  opinion  of  Sir  John  Mai-  | 
cclm,  who  is  desirous  to  state  it  as  low  as  pos-  j 
sible,  exceeded  forty  thousand  pounds  ;  and  in 
comes  of  forty  thousand  pounds  at  the  time  of  the  ' 


accession  of  George  the  Third,  were  at  least  as 
rare  as  incomes  of  a  hundred  thousand  pounds 
now.  We  may  safely  alhrm  that  no  Englishman 
who  started  with  nothing,  has  ever,  in  any  line 
of  life,  created  such  a  fortune,  at  the  early  age 
of  thirty-four.  It  would  be  unjust  not  to  add, 
that  he  made  a  creditable  use  of  his  riches.  As 
soon  as  the  battle  of  Plassey  had  laid  the  foun 
dation  of  his  fortune,  he  sent  ten  thousand 
pounds  to  his  sisters,  bestowed  as  much  more 
on  other  poor  friends  and  relations,  ordered  his 
agent  to  pay  eight  hundred  a  year  to  his  pa 
rents,  and  to  insist  that  they  should  keep  a  car 
riage,  and  settled  five  hundred  a  year  on  his 
old  commander  Lawrence,  whose  means  were 
very  slender.  The  whole  sum  which  he  ex 
pended  in  this  manner,  may  be  calculated  at 
fifty  thousand  pounds. 

He  now  set  himself  to  cultivate  parliamentary 
interest.  His  purchases  of  land  seemed  to  have 
been  made  in  a  great  measure  with  that  view; 
and  after  the  general  election  of  1761,  he  found 
himself  in  the  House  of  Commons,  at  the  head 
of  a  body  of  dependants  whose  support  must 
have  been  important  to  any  administration. 
In  English  politics,  however,  he  did  not  take  a 
prominent  part.  His  first  attachments,  as  we 
have  seen,  were  to  Mr.  Fox ;  at  a  later  period 
he  was  attracted  by  the  genius  and  success  of 
Mr.  Pitt;  but  finally  he  connected  himself  in 
the  closest  manner  with  George  Grenville. 
Early  in  the  session  of  1764,  when  the  illegal 
and  impolitic  persecution  of  that  worthless  de 
magogue  Wilkes  had  strongly  excited  the  pub 
lic  mind,  the  town  was  amused  by  an  anecdote, 
which  we  have  seen  in  some  unpublished  me 
moirs  of  Horace  Walpole.  Old  Mr.  Richard 
Clive,  who,  since  his  son's  elevation,  had  been 
introduced  into  society  for  which  his  former 
habits  had  not  well  fitted  him,  presented  him 
self  at  the  levee.  The  king  asked  him  where 
Lord  Clive  was.  "  He  will  be  in  town  very 
soon,"  said  the  old  gentleman,  loud  enough  to 
be  heard  by  the  whole  circle,  "  and  then  your 
majesty  will  have  another  vote." 

But  in  truth  all  Clive's  views  were  directed 
towards  the  country  in  which  he  had  so  emi 
nently  distinguished  himself  as  a  soldier  and  a 
statesman;  and  it  was  by  considerations  relat 
ing  to  India  that  his  conduct  as  a  public  man  in 
England  was  regulated.  The  power  of  the  Com 
pany,  though  an  anomaly,  is,  in  our  time,  we  are 
firmly  persuaded,  a  beneficial  anomaly.  In  the 
time  of  Clive,  it  was  not  merely  an  anomaly, 
but  a  nuisance  There  was  no  Board  of  Con 
trol.  The  Directors  were  for  the  most  part 
mere  traders,  ignorant  of  general  politics,  igno 
rant  of  the  peculiarities  of  the  empire  which 
had  so  strangely  become  subject  to  them.  The 
Court  of  Proprietors,  wherever  it  chose  to  in 
terfere,  was  able  to  have  its  way.  That  court 
was  more  numerous  as  well  as  powerful  than 


at  present ;  for,  then,  every  share  of  five  hun 
dred  pounds  conferred  a  vote.  The  meetings 
were  large,  stormy,  even  riotous, — the  debates 
indecently  virulent.  All  the  turbulence  of  a 
Westminster  election,  all  the  trickery  and  cor 
ruption  of  a  Grampound  election,  disgraced 
the  proceeding  of  this  assembly  on  questions 
of  the  most  solemn  importance.  Fictitious 
votes  were  manufactured  on  a  gigantic  scale. 
Clive  himself  laid  out  a  hundred  thousand 
pounds  in  the  purchase  of  stock,  which  he  then 
divided  among  nominal  proprietors  on  whom 
he  could  depend,  and  whom  he  brought  down 
in  his  train  to  every  discussion  and  every 
ballot.  Others  did  the  same,  though  not  to  quite 
so  enormous  an  extent. 

The  interest  taken  by  the  public  of  England 
in  Indian  questions  was  then  far  greater  than  at 
present,  and  the  reason  is  obvious.  At  present 
the  writer  enters  the  service  young;  he  climbs 
slowly;  he  is  rather  fortunate,  if,  at  forty-five, 
he  can  return  to  his  country,  with  an  annuity 
of  a  thousand  a  year,  and  with  savings  amount 
ing  to  thirty  thousand  pounds.  A  great  quan 
tity  of  wealth  is  made  by  English  functionaries 
in  India ;  but  no  single  functionary  makes  a 
very  large  fortune,  and  what  is  made  is  slowly, 
hardly,  and  honestly  earned.  Only  four  or  five 
high  political  offices  are  reserved  for  public 
men  from  England.  The  residencies,  the  se 
cretaryships,  the  seats  in  the  boards  of  revenue 
and  in  the  Sudder  courts,  are  all  filled  by  men 
who  have  given  the  best  years  of  life  to  the 
service  of  the  Company;  nor  can  any  talents 
however  splendid,  nor  any  connections  how 
ever  powerful,  obtain  those  lucrative  posts  for 
any  person  who  has  not  entered  by  the  regular 
door,  and  mounted  by  the  regular  gradations. 
Seventy  years  ago,  much  less  money  was 
brought  home  from  the  East  than  in  our  own 
time.  But  it  was  divided  among  a  very  much 
smaller  number  of  persons,  and  immense  sums 
were  often  accumulated  in  a  few  months.  Any 
Englishman,  whatever  his  age  might  be,  might 
hope  to  be  one  of  the  lucky  emigrants.  If  he 
made  a  good  speech  in  Leadenhall  Street,  or 
published  a  clever  pamphlet  in  defence  of  the 
chairman,  he  might  be  sent  out  in  the  Com 
pany's  service,  and  might  return  in  three  or 
four  years  as  rich  as  Pigot  or  as  Clive.  Thus 
the  India  House  was  a  lottery-office,  which  in 
vited  everybody  to  take  a  chance,  and  held  out 
ducal  fortunes  as  the  prizes  destined  for  the 
lucky  few.  As  soon  as  it  was  known  that  thore 
was  a  part  of  the  world  where  a  lieutenant- 
colonel  had  one  morning  received,  as  a  present, 
an  estate  as  large  as  that  of  the  Earl  of  Bath 
or  the  Marquis  of  Rockingham,  and  where  it 
seemed  that  such  a  trifle  as  ten  or  twenty  thou 
sand  pounds  was  to  be  had  by  any  British 
functionary  for  the  asking,  society  began  to 
exhibit  all  the  symptoms  of  the  South  Sea 
year — a  feverish  excitement,  an  ungovernable 
impatience  to  be  rich,  a  contempt  for  slow, 
sure,  and  moderate  gains. 

At  the  head  of  the  preponderating  party  in 
the  India  House,  had  long  stood  a  powerful, 
able,  and  ambitious  director  of  the  name  of 
Sullivan.  He  had  conceived  a  strong  jealousy 
of  Clive,  and  remembered  with  bitterness  the 
audacity  with  which  the  late  Governor  of  Ben- 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE   OF  CLIVE. 


335 


gal  had  repeatedly  set  at  naught  the  authority 
of  the  distant  Directors  of  the  Company.  An 
apparent  reconciliation  took  place  after  Clive's 
arrival;  but  enmity  remained  deeply  rooted  in  j 
the  hearts  of  both.  The  whole  body  of  Direct 
ors  was  then  chosen  annually.  At  the  elec 
tion  of  1763,  Clive  attempted  to  break  down 
the  power  of  the  dominant  faction.  The  con 
test  was  carried  on  with  a  violence  which  he 
describes  as  tremendous.  Sullivan  was  victo 
rious,  and  hastened  to  take  his  revenge.  The 
grant  of  rent  which  Clive  had  received  from 
Meer  Jaflier  was,  in  the  opinion  of  the  best 
English  lawyers,  valid.  It  had  been  made  by 
exactly  the  'same  authority  from  which  the 
Company  had  received  their  chief  possessions 
in  Bengal,  and  the  Company  had  long  acqui 
esced  in  it.  The  Directors,  however,  most  un 
justly  determined  to  confiscate  it,  and  Clive 
was  compelled  to  file  a  bill  in  Chancery  against 
them. 

But  a  great  and  sudden  turn  in  affaitfi  was 
at  hand.  Every  ship  from  Bengal  had  for 
some  time  brought  alarming  tidings.  The  in 
ternal  misgovernment  of  the  province  had 
reached  such  a  point  that  itcould  go  no  further. 
What,  indeed,  was  to  be  expected  from  a  body 
of  public  servants  exposed  to  temptation  such 
that,  as  Clive  once  said,  fiesh  and  blood  could 
not  bear  it ;— armed  with  irresistible  power, 
and  responsible  only  to  the  corrupt,  turbulent, 
distracted,  ill-informed  Company,  situated  at 
such  a  distance,  that  the  average  interval  be- 
tween  the  sending  of  a  despatch  and  the  receipt 
of  an  answer  was  above  a  year  and  a  half! 
Accordingly,  during  the  five  years  which  fol 
lowed  the  departure  of  Clive  from  Bengal,  the 
misgovernment  of  the  English  was  carried  to 
a  point,  such  as  seems  hardly  compatible  with 
the  very  existence  of  society.  The  Roman  pro 
consul,  who,  in  a  year  or  two,  squeezed  out  of 
a  province  the  means  of  rearing  marble  palaces 
and  baths  on  the  shores  of  Campania,  of  drink 
ing  from  amber,  of  feasting  on  singing-birds, 
of  exhibiting  armies  of  gladiators  and  flocks  of 
camelopards — the  Spanish  viceroy,  who,  leav 
ing  behind  him  the  curses  of  Mexico  or  Lima, 
entered  Madrid  with  a  long  train  of  gilded 
coaches  and  of  sumpter-horses,  trapped  and 
shod  with  silver — were  now  outdone.  Cruelty, 
indeed,  properly  so  called,  was  not  among  the 
vices  of  the  servants  of  the  Company.  But 
cruelty  itself  could  hardly  have  produced  great 
er  evils  than  were  the  effect  of  their  unprinci 
pled  eagerness  to  be  rich.  They  pulled  down 
their  creature,  Meer  Jaffier.  They  set  up  in 
his  place  another  Nabob,  Meer  Cossim.  But 
Meer  Cossim  had  talents  and  a  will;  and, 
though  sufficiently  inclined  to  oppress  his  sub 
jects  himself,  he  could  not  bear  to  see  them 
ground  to  the  dust  by  oppressions  which  yield 
ed  him  no  profit — nay,  which  destroyed  his 
revenue  in  its  very  source.  The  English  ac 
cordingly  pulled  down  Meer  Cossim,  and  set 
up  Meer  Jaffier  again;  and  Meer  Cossim,  after 
revenging  himself,  by  a  massacre  surpassing 
in  atrocity  that  of  the  Black  Hole,  fled  to  the 
dominions  of  the  Nabob  of  Oude.  At  every 
one  of  these  revolutions,  the  new  prince  di 
vided  among  his  foreign  masters  whatever 
could  be  scraped  together  from  the  treasury  of 


his  fallen  predecessor.  The  immense  popula 
tion  of  his  dominions  was  given  up  as  a  prey 
to  those  who  had  made  him  a  sovereign,  and 
who  could  unmake  him.  The  servants  of  the 
Company  obtained — not  for  their  employers, 
but  for  themselves — a  monopoly  of  almost  the 
whole  internal  trade.  They  forced  the  natives 
to  buy  dear  arid  sell  cheap.  They  insulted 
with  perfect  impunity  the  tribunals,  tne  police, 
and  the  fiscal  authorities  of  the  country.  They 
covered  with  their  protection  a  set  of  native 
dependants  who  ranged  through  the  provinces 
spreading  desolation  and  terror  wherever  they 
appeared.  Every  servant  of  a  British  factor 
was  armed  with  all  the  power  of  his  master, 
and  his  master  was  armed  with  all  the  power 
of  the  Company.  Enormous  fortunes  were 
thus  rapidly  accumulated  at  Calcutta,  while 
thirty  millions  of  human  beings  were  reduced 
to  the  last  extremity  of  wretchedness.  They 
had  been  accustomed  to  live  under  tyranny, 
but  never  under  tyranny  like  this.  They 
found  the  little  finger  of  the  Company  thicker 
than  the  loins  of  Surajah  Dowlah.  Under  their 
old  masters  they  had  at  least  one  resource: 
when  the  evil  became  insupportable,  they  rose 
and  pulled  down  the  government.  But  the 
English  government  was  not  to  be  so  shaken 
off.  That  government,  oppressive  as  the  most 
oppressive  form  of  barbarian  despotism,  was 
strong  with  all  the  strength  of  civilization.  It 
resembled  the  government  of  evil  genii,  ra 
ther  than  the  government  of  human  tyrants. 
Even  despair  could  not  inspire  the  soft  Ben 
galee  with  courage  to  confront  men  of  English 
breed — the  hereditary  nobility  of  mankind, 
whose  skill  and  valour  had  so  often  triumphed 
in  spite  of  tenfold  odds.  The  unhappy  race 
never  attempted  resistance.  Sometimes  they 
submitted  in  patient  misery.  Sometimes  they 
fled  from  the  white  man,  as  their  fathers  had 
been  used  to  fly  from  the  Mahratta ;  and  the 
palanquin,  of  the  English  traveller  was  often 
carried  through  silent  villages  and  towns,  which 
the  report  of  his  approach  had  made  desolate. 
The  foreign  lords  of  Bengal  were  naturally  ob 
jects  of  hatred  to  all  the  neighbouring  powers; 
and  to  all,  the  haughty  race  presented  a  dauntless 
front.  Their  armies,  everywhere  outnumbered, 
were  everywhere  victorious.  A  succession  of 
commanders  formed  in  the  school  of  Clive,  still 
maintained  the  fame  of  their  country.  "  It  must 
be  acknowledged,"  says  the  Mussulman  histo 
rian  of  those  times, "  that  this  nation's  presence 
of  mind,  firmness  of  temper,  and  undaunted 
bravery,  are  past  all  question.  They  join  the 
most  resolute  courage  to  the  most  caution? 
prudence  :  nor  have  they  their  equal  in  the  art 
of  ranging  themselves  in  battle  array  and 
fighting  in  order.  If  to  so  many  military  quali 
fications  they  knew  how  to  join  the  arts  of  go 
vernment — if  they  exerted  as  much  ingenuity 
and  solicitude  in  relieving  the  people  of  God, 
as  they  do  in  whatever  concerns  their  military 
affairs,  no  nation  in  the  world  would  be  prefer 
able  to  them,  or  worthier  cf  command ;  but  the 
people  under  their  dominion  groan  every 
where,  and  are  reduced  to  poverty  and  distress. 
Oh  God!  come  to  the  assistance  of  thine 
afflicted  servants,  and  deliver  them  from  th« 
oppressions  they  suffer." 


336 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


It  was  impossible,  however,  that  even  the 
military  establishment  should  long  continue 
exempt  from  the  vices  which  pervaded  every 
other  part  of  the  government.  Rapacity, 
luxury,  and  the  spirit  of  insubordination  spread 
from  the  civil  service  to  the  officers  of  the 
army,  and  from  the  officers  to  the  soldiers. 
The  evil  continued  to  grow  till  every  mess- 
room  became  the  seat  of  conspiracy  and  cabal, 
and  till  the  sepoys  could  be  kept  in  order  only 
by  wholesale  executions. 

At  length  the  state  of  things  in  Bengal  be 
gan  to  excite  uneasiness  at  home.  A  succes 
sion  of  revolutions,  a  disorganized  administra 
tion  ;  the  natives  pillaged,  yet  the  Company  not 
enriched;  every  fleet  bringing  back  individu 
als  able  to  purchase  manors  and  to  build 
stately  dwellings,  yet  bringing  back  also  alarm 
ing  accounts  of  the  financial  prospects  of  the 
government;  war  on  the  frontier,  disaffection 
in  the  army,  the  national  character  disgraced 
by  excesses  resembling  those  of  Verres  and 
Fizarro ; — such  was  the  spectacle  which  dis 
mayed  those  who  were  conversant  with  Indian 
affairs.  The  general  cry  was,  that  Clive,  and 
Olive  alone,  could  save  the  empire  which  he 
had  founded. 

This  feeling  manifested  itself  in  the  strong 
est  manner  at  a  very  full  General  Court  of  Pro 
prietors.  Men  of  all  parties,  forgetting  their 
feuds,  and  trembling  for  their  dividends,  ex 
claimed  that  Clive  was  the  man  whom  the  cri 
sis  required; — that  the  oppressive  proceedings 
vrhich  had  been  adopted  respecting  his  estate 
ought  to  be  dropped,  arid  that  he  ought  to  be 
entreated  to  return  to  India. 

Clive  rose.  As  to  his  estate,  he  said,  he 
would  make  such  propositions  to  the  Directors 
as  would,  he  trusted,  lead  to  an  amicable  set 
tlement.  But  there  was  a  still  greater  difficul 
ty.  It  was  proper  to  tell  them  that  he  never 
would  undertake  the  government  of  Bengal 
while  his  enemy  Sullivan  was  chairman  of  the 
Company.  The  tumult  was  violent.  Sullivan 
Could  scarcely  obtain  a  hearing.  An  over 
whelming  majority  of  the  assembly  was  on 
Clive's  side.  Sullivan  wished  to  try  the  result 
of  a  ballot.  But,  by  the  by-laws  of  the  Com 
pany,  there  can  be  no  ballot  except  on  a  requi 
sition  signed  by  nine  proprietors;  and  though 
hundreds  were  present,  nine  persons  could  not. 
be  found  to  set  their  hands  to  such  a  requisi 
tion 

Clive  was  in  consequence  nominated  Go 
vernor  and  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  British 
possessions  in  Bengal.  But  he  adhered  to  his 
Declaration,  and  refused  to  enter  on  his  office 
till  the  event  of  the  next  election  of  Directors 
should  be  known.  The  contest  was  obstinate, 
but  Clive  triumphed.  Sullivan,  lately  absolute 
master  of  the  India  House,  was  within  one  vote 
of  losing  his  own  seat;  and  both  the  chairman 
and  deputy-chairman  were  friends  of  the  new 
governor. 

Such  were  the  circumstances  under  which 
Lord  Clive  sailed  for  the  third  and  last  time  to 
India.  In  May,  1765,  he  reached  Calcutta,  and 
he  found  the  whole  machine  of  government 
more  fearfuhy  disorganized  than  he  had  anti 
cipated.  Meer  Jaffier,  who  had  some  time  be 
fore  lost  his  eldest  son  Meeran,  had  died  while 


Clive  was  on  his  voyage  out.  The  English 
functionaries  at  Calcutta  had  already  received 
from  home  strict  orders  not  to  accept  presents 
from  the  native  princes.  But,  eager  for  gain, 
and  unaccustomed  to  respect  the  commands 
of  their  distant,  ignorant,  and  negligent  mas 
ters,  they  again  set  up  the  throne  of  Bengal 
for  sale.  About  one  hundred  and  forty  thou 
sand  pounds  sterling  were  distributed  among 
nine  of  the  most  powerful  servants  of  the 
Company  ;  and,  in  consideration  of  this  bribe, 
an  infant  son  of  the  deceased  Nabob  was 
placed  on  the  seat  of  his  father.  The  news  of 
the  ignominious  bargain  met  Clive  on  his  ar 
rival.  In  a  private  letter,  written  immediately 
after  to  an  intimate  friend,  he  poured  out  his 
feelings  in  language  which,  proceeding  from 
a  man  so  daring,  so  resolute,  and  so  little 
given  to  theatrical  display  of  sentiment,  seems 
to  us  singularly  touching.  "Alas!"  he  says, 
"how  is  the  English  name  sunk !  I  could  not 
avoid  paying  the  tribute  of  a  few  tears  to  the 
departed  and  lost  fame  of  the  British  nation — 
irrecoverably  so,  I  fear.  However,  I  do  de 
clare,  by  that  great  Being  who  is  the  searcher 
of  all  hearts,  and  to  whom  we  must  be  ac 
countable  if  there  be  an  hereafter,  that  I  am 
come  out  with  a  mind  superior  to  all  corrup 
tion,  and  that  I  am  determined  to  destroy  those 
great  and  growing  evils,  or  perish  in  the  at 
tempt." 

The  Council  met,  and  Clive  stated  to  tnem 
his  full  determination  to  effect  a  thorough  re 
form,  and  to  use  for  that  purpose  the  whole  of 
the  ample  authority,  civil  and  military,  which 
had  been  confided  to  him.  Johnstone,  one  of 
the  boldest  and  worst  men  in  the  assembly, 
made  some  show  of  opposition.  Clive  inter 
rupted  him,  and  haughtily  demanded  whether 
he  meant  to  question  the  power  of  th?  new 
government.  Johnstone  was  cowed,  and  dis 
claimed  any  such  intention.  All  the  faces 
round  the  board  grew  long  and  pale;  and  not 
another  syllable  of  dissent  was  uttered. 

Clive  redeemed  his  pledge.  He  remained  in 
India  about  a  year  and  a  half;  and  in  that 
short  time  effected  one  of  the  most  extensive, 
difficult,  arid  salutary  reforms  that  ever  was 
accomplished  by  any  statesman.  This  was 
the  part  of  his  life  on  which  he  afterwards 
looked  back  with  most  pride.  He  had  it  in  his 
power  to  triple  his  already  splendid  fortune,  to 
connive  at  abuses  while  pretending  to  remove 
them,  to  conciliate  the  good-will  of  all  the 
English  in  Bengal,  by  giving  up  to  their  rapa 
city  a  helpless  and  timid  race,  who  knew  not 
where  lay  the  island  which  sent  forth  their  op 
pressors;  and  whose  complaints  had  little 
chance  of  being  heard  across  fifteen  thousand 
miles  of  ocean.  He  knew  that  if  he  applied 
himself  in  earnest  to  the  work  of  reformation, 
he  should  raise  every  bad  passion  in  arms 
against  him.  He  knew  how  unscrupulous, 
how  implacable,  would  be  the  hatred  of  those 
ravenous  adventurers,  who,  having  counted  on 
accumulating  in  a  few  months  fortunes  sufficient 
to  support  peerages,  should  find  all  their  hopes 
frustrated.  But  he  had  chosen  the  good  part; 
and  he  called  up  all  the  force  of  his  mind  for 
a  battle  far  harder  than  that  of  Plaasey.  At 
first  success  seemed  hopeless ;  but  very  soon 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE   OF   CLIVE. 


337 


all  obstacles  began  to  bend  before  that  iron 
courage  and  that  vehement  will.  The  receiv 
ing  of  presents  from  the  natives  was  rigidly 
prohibited.  The  private  trade  of  the  servants 
of  the  Company  was  put  down.  The  whole 
settlement  seemed  to  be  set,  as  one  man, 
against  thes  measures.  But  the  inexorable 
governor  declared  that,  if  he  could  not  find 
support  at  Fort  William,  he  would  procure  it 
elsewhere ;  and  sent  for  some  civil  servants 
from  Madras  to  assist  him  in  carrying  on  the 
administration.  The  most  factious  of  his  op 
ponents  he  turned  out  of  their  offices.  The  rest 
submitted  to  what  was  inevitable ;  and  in  a 
very  short  time  all  resistance  was  quelled. 

But  Clive  was  far  too  wise  a  man  not  to  see 
that  the  recent  abuses  were  partly  to  be  ascrib 
ed  to  a  cause  which  could  not  fail  to  produce 
similar  abuses  as  soon  as  the  pressure  of  his 
strong  hand  was  withdrawn.  The  Company 
had  followed  a  mistaken  policy  with  respect  to 
the  remuneration  of  its  servants.  The  salaries 
were  too  low  to  afford  even  those  indulgences 
which  are  necessary  to  the  health  and  comfort 
of  Europeans  in  a  tropical  climate.  To  lay 
by  a  rupee  from  such  scanty  pay  was  impos 
sible.  It  could  not  be  supposed  that  men  of 
even  average  abilities  would  consent  to  pass 
the  best  years  of  life  in  exile,  under  a  burning 
sun,  for  no  other  consideration  than  these  stinted 
wages.  It  had  accordingly  been  understood, 
from  a  very  early  period,  that  the  Company's 
agents  were  at  liberty  to  enrich  themselves  by 
their  private  trade.  This  practice  had  been 
seriously  injurious  to  the  commercial  interests 
of  the  corporation.  That  very  intelligent  ob 
server,  Sir  Thomas  Roe,  in  the  reign  of  James 
the  First,  strongly  urged  the  Directors  to  apply 
a  remedy  to  the  abuse.  "Absolutely  prohibit 
the  private  trade,"  said  he,  "  tor  your  business 
will  be  better  done.  I  know  this  is  harsh. 
Men  profess  they  come  not  for  bare  wages. 
But  you  will  take  away  this  plea  if  you  give 
great  wages  to  their  content;  and  then  you 
know  what  you  part  from." 

In  spite  of  this  excellent  advice  the  Compa 
ny  adhered  to  the  old  system,  paid  low  sala 
ries,  and  connived  at  the  by-gains  of  its  ser 
vants.  The  pay  of  a  member  of  Council  was 
only  three  hundred  pounds  a  year.  Yet  it  was 
notorious  that  such  a  functionary  could  hardly 
live  in  India  for  less  than  ten  times  that  sum; 
and  it  could  not  be  expected  that  he  would  be 
content  to  live  even  handsomely  in  India  with 
out  laying  up  something  against  the  time  of  his 
return  to  England.  This  system,  before  the 
conquest  of  Bengal,  might  affect  the  amount  of 
the  dividends  payable  to  the  proprietors,  but 
could  do  little  harm  in  any  other  way.  But 
the  Company  was  now  a  ruling  body.  Its  ser 
vants  might  still  be  called  factors,  junior  mer 
chants,  senior  merchants.  But  they  were  in 
truth  proconsuls,  proprietors,  procurators  of 
extensive  regions.  They  had  immense  power. 
Their  regular  pay  was  universally  admitted  to 
be  insufficient.  They  were,  by  the  ancient 
usage  of  the  service,  and  by  the  implied  per 
mission  of  their  employers,  warranted  in  en 
riching  themselves  by  indirect  means;  and 
this  had  been  the  origin  of  the  frightful  oppres 
sion  and  corruption  which  had  desolated  Ben- 
VOL.  Ill  —43 


gal.  Clive  saw  clearly  that  it  was  absurd  to 
give  men  power,  and  to  expect  that  they  would 
be  content  to  live  in  penury  He  had  justly 
concluded  that  no  reform  could  be  effectual 
which  should  not  be  coupled  with  a  plan  for 
liberally  remunerating  the  civil  servants  of  the 
Company.  The  Directors,  he  knew,  were  not 
disposed  to  sanction  any  increase  of  the  sala 
ries  out  of  their  own  treasury.  The  only 
course  which  remained  open  to  the  governor, 
was  one  which  exposed  him  to  much  misre 
presentation,  but  which  we  think  him  fully 
justified  in  adopting.  He  appropriated  to  the 
support  of  the  service  the  monopoly  of  salt, 
which  has  formed,  down  to  our  own  time,  a 
principal  head  of  Indian  revenue ;  and  he  di 
vided  the  proceeds  according  to  a  scale  which 
seems  to  have  been  not  unreasonably  fixed. 
He  was  in  consequence  accused  by  his  ene 
mies,  and  has  been  accused  by  historians,  of 
disobeying  his  instructions — of  violating  his 
promises  —  of  authorizing  that  very  abuse 
which  it  was  his  especial  mission  to  destroy, 
— namely,  the  trade  of  the  Company's  ser 
vants.  But  every  discerning  and  impartial 
judge  will  admit,  that  there  was  really  nothing 
in  common  between  the  system  which  he  set 
up  and  that  which  he  was  sent  to  destroy. 
The  monopoly  of  salt  had  been  a  source  of 
revenue  to  the  governments  of  India  before 
Clive  was  born.  It  continued  to  be  so  long 
after  his  death.  The  civil  servants  wer« 
clearly  entitled  to  a  maintenance  out  of  the 
revenue,  and  all  that  Clive  did  was  to  charge 
a  particular  portion  of  the  revenue  with  their 
maintenance.  He  thus,  while  he  put  an  end 
to  the  practices  by  which  gigantic  fortunes 
had  been  rapidly  accumulated,  gave  to  every 
British  functionary  employed  in  the  East  the 
means  of  slowly,  but  surely,  acquiring  a  com 
petence.  Yet,  such  is  the  injustice  of  mankind, 
that  none  of  those  acts  which  are  the  real  stains 
of  his  life,  has  drawn  on  him  so  much  obloquy 
as  this  measure,  which  was  in  truth  a  reform 
necessary  to  the  success  of  all  his  other  re 
forms. 

He  had  quelled  the  opposition  of  the  civil 
service:  that  of  the  army  was  more  formida 
ble.  Some  of  the  retrenchments  which  had 
been  ordered  by  the  Directors  affected  the  in 
terests  of  the  military  service;  and  a  storm 
arose,  such  as  even  Caesar  would  not  willingly 
have  faced.  It  was  no  light  thing  to  encounter 
the  resistance  of  those  who  held  the  power  of 
the  sword,  in  a  country  governed  only  by  the 
sword!  Two  hundred  English  officers  engaged 
in  a  conspiracy  against  the  government,  and 
determined  to  resign  their  commissions  on  the 
same  day,  not  doubting  that  Clive  would  grant 
any  terms  rather  than  see  the  army,  on  which 
alone  the  British  empire  in  the  East  rested,  left 
without  commanders.  They  little  know  the 
unconquerable  spirit  with  which  they  had  to 
deal.  Clive  had  still  a  few  officers  round  hi.« 
person  on  whom  he  could  rely.  He  sent  to 
Fort  St.  George  for  a  fresh  supply.  He  gay1 
commissions  even  to  mercantile  agents  \vh 
were  disposed  to  support  him  at  this  crisis, 
and  he  sent  orders  that  every  officer  who  re 
signed  should  be  instantly  brought  up  to  Cal 
cutta.  The  conspirators  found  that  thev 
2F 


338 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


miscalculated.  The  governor  was  inexorable. 
The  troops  were  steady.  The  sepoys,  over 
whom  Clive  had  always  possessed  extraordi 
nary  influence,  stood  by  him  with  unshaken 
fidelity.  The  leaders  in  the  plot  were  arrested, 
tried,  and  cashiered.  The  rest,  humbled  and 
dispirited,  begged  to  be  permitted  to  withdraw 
their  resignations.  Many  of  them  declared 
their  repentance  even  with  tears.  The  younger 
offenders  Clive  treated  with  lenity.  To  the 
ringleaders  he  was  inflexibly  severe  ;  but  his 
severity  was  pure  from  all  taint  of  private  ma 
levolence.  While  he  sternly  upheld  the  just 
authority  of  his  office,  he  passed  by  personal 
insults  and  injuries  with  magnanimous  disdain. 
One  of  the  conspirators  was  accused  of  having 
planned  the  assassination  of  the  governor  ;  but 
Clive  would  not  listen  to  the  charge.  "The 
officers,"  he  said,  "are  Englishmen,  not  assas 
sins/' 

While  he  reformed  the  civil  service  and 
established  his  authority  over  the  army,  he  was 
equally  successful  in  his  foreign  policy.  His 
landing  on  Eastern  ground  was  the  signal  for 
immediate  peace.  The  Nabob  of  Oude,  with  a 
large  army,  lay  at  that  time  on  the  frontier  of 
Bahar.  He  had  been  joined  by  many  Afghans 
and  Mahrattas,  and  there  was  no  small  reason 
to  expect  a  general  coalition  of  all  the  native 
powers  against  the  English.  But  the  name  of 
Clive  quelled  in  an  instant  all  opposition.  The 
enemy  implored  peace  in  the  humblest  lan 
guage,  and  submitted  to  such  terms  as  the  new 
governor  chose  to  dictate. 

At  the  same  time,  the  government  of  Bengal 
was  placed  on  a  new  footing.  The  power  of 
the  English  in  that  province  had  hitherto  been 
altogether  undefined.  It  was  unknown  to  the 
ancient  constitution  of  the  empire,  and  it  had 
been  ascertained  by  no  compact.  It  resembled 
the  power  which,  in  the  last  decrepitude  of  the 
western  empire,  was  exercised  over  Italy  by 
the  great  chiefs  of  foreign  mercenaries,  the 
Ricimers  and  the  Odoacers,  who  put  up  and 
pulled  down  at  their  pleasure  a  succession  of 
insignificant  princes,  dignified  with  the  names 
of  Coesar  and  Augustus.  But  as  in  one  case, 
so  in  the  other,  the  warlike  strangers  at  length 
found  it  expedient  to  give  to  a  domination 
which  had  been  established  by  arms  alone,  the 
sanction  of  law  and  ancient  prescription. 
Theodoric  thought  it  politic  to  obtain  from  the 
distant  court  of  Byzantium  a  commission  ap 
pointing  him  ruler  of  Italy;  and  Clive,  in  the 
same  manner,  applied  to  the  court  of  Delhi  for 
a  formal  grant  of  the  powers  of  which  he 
already  possessed  the  reality.  The  Mogul  was 
absolutely  helpless;  and,  though  he  murmured, 
had  reason  to  be  well  pleased  that  the  English 
were  disposed  to  give  solid  rupees,  which  he 
never  could  have  extorted  from  them,  in  ex 
change  foi  a  few  Persian  characters  which 
cost  him  nothing.  A  bargain  was  speedily 
Struck;  and  the  titular  sovereign  of  Hindostan 
issued  a  warrant,  empowering  the  Company  to 
collect  and  administer  the  revenues  of  Bengal, 
Orissa,  and  Bahar. 

There  was  still  a  Nabob,  who  stood  to  the 

ritish  authorities  in  the  same  relation  in 
which  the  last  drivelling  Chilperics  and  Chil- 
der'cs  of  the  Merovingian  line  stood  to  their 


able  and  vigorous  Mayors  of  the  Palace — to 
Charles  Martel  and  to  Pepin.  At  one  time 
Clive  had  almost  made  up  his  mind  to  discard 
this  phantom  altogether;  but  he  afterwards 
thought  that  it  might  be  convenient  still  to  use 
the  name  of  the  Nabob,  particularly  in  dealings 
with  other  European  nations.  The  French,  the 
Dutch,  and  the  Danes,  would,  he  conceived, 
submit  far  more  readily  to  the  authority  of  the 
native  prince,  whom  they  had  always  been  ac 
customed  to  respect,  than  to  that  of  a  rival 
trading  corporation.  This  policy  may,  at  that 
time,  have  been  judicious.  But  the  pretence 
was  soon  found  to  be  too  flimsy  to  impose  on 
anybody;  and  it  was  altogether  laid  aside.  The 
heir  of  Meer  Jaflier  still  resides  at  Moorsheda- 
bad,  the  ancient  capital  of  his  house,  still  bears 
the  title  of  Nabob,  is  still  accosted  by  the  Eng 
lish  as  "Your  Highness,"  and  is  still  suffered 
to  retain  a  portion  of  the  regal  state  which  sur 
rounded  his  ancestors.  A  pension  of  a  hun 
dred  and  sixty  thousand  pounds  a  year  is  an 
nually  paid  to  him  by  the  government.  His 
carriage  is  surrounded  by  guards,  and  preceded 
by  attendants  with  silver  maces.  His  person 
and  his  dwelling  are  exempted  from  the  ordi 
nary  authority  of  the  ministers  of  justice.  But 
he  has  not  the  smallest  share  of  political 
power,  and  is,  in  fact,  only  a  noble  and  wealthy 
subject  of  the  Company. 

It  would  have  been  easy  for  Clive,  during 
his  second  administration  in  Bengal,  to  accu 
mulate  riches  such  as  no  subject  in  Europe 
possessed.  He  might,  indeed,  without  subject 
ing  the  rich  inhabitants  of  the  province  to  any 
pressure  beyond  that  to  which  their  mildest 
rulers  had  accustomed  them,  have  received 
presents  to  the  amount  of  three  hundred  thou 
sand  pounds  a  year.  The  neighbouring  princes 
would  gladly  have  paid  any  price  for  his 
favour.  But  he  appears  to  have  strictly  ad 
hered  to  the  rules  which  he  laid  down  for  the 
guidance  of  others.  The  Prince  of  Benares 
offered  him  diamonds  of  great  value.  The 
Nabob  of  Oude  pressed  him  to  accept  a  large 
sum  of  money  and  a  casket  of  costly  jewels. 
Clive  courteously,  but  peremptorily,  refused; 
and  it  deserves  notice  that  he  made  no  merit 
of  his  refusal,  and  that  the  facts  did  not  come 
to  light  till  after  his  death.  He  kept  an  exact 
account  of  his  salary,  of  his  share  of  the  profits 
accruing  from  the  'trade  in  salt,  and  of  those 
presents,  which,  according  to  the  fashion  of  the 
East,  it  would  be  churlish  to  refuse.  Out  of 
the  sum  arising  from  these  resources,  he  de 
frayed  the  expenses  of  his  situation.  The  sur 
plus  he  divided  among  a  few  attached  friends 
who  had  accompanied  him  to  India.  He 
always  boasted,  and  as  far  as  we  can  judge  he 
boasted  with  truth,  that  his  last  administra 
tion  diminished  instead  of  increasing  his  for 
tune. 

One  large  sum  indeed  he  accepted.  Meer 
Jaffier  had  left  him  by  will  above  sixty  thou 
sand  pounds  sterling,  in  specie  and  jewels 
and  the  rules  which  had  been  recentl)  laid 
down  extended  only  to  presents  from  the  living 
and  did  not  affect  legacies  from  the  dead.  Clivt 
took  the  money,  but  not  for  himself.  He  made 
the  whole  over  to  the  Company,  in  trust  foi 
officers  and  soldiers  invalided  in  their  service 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF   CLIVE. 


339 


The  fund,  which  still  bears  his  name,  owes  its 
origin  to  this  princely  donation. 

After  a  stay  of  eighteen  months,  the  state  of 
his  health  rendered  it  necessary  for  him  to  re 
turn  to  Europe.  At  the  close  of  January,  1767, 
he  quitted  for  the  last  time  the  country  on 
whose  destinies  he  had  exercised  so  mighty  an 
influence. 

His  second  return  from  Bengal  was  not,  like 
his  first,  greeted  by  the  acclamations  of  his 
countrymen.  Numerous  causes  were  already 
at  work  which  imbittered  the  remaining  years 
of  his  life,  and  hurried  him  to  an  untimely 
grave.  His  old  enemies  at  the  India  House 
were  still  powerful  and  active ;  and  they  had 
been  reinforced  by  a  large  band  of  allies,  whose 
violence  far  exceeded  their  own.  The  whole 
crew  of  pilferers  and  oppressors  from  whom 
he  had  rescued  Bengal,  persecuted  him  with 
the  implacable  rancour  which  belongs  to  such 
abject  natures.  Many  of  them  even  invested 
their  property  in  India  stock,  merely  that  they 
might  be  better  able  to  annoy  the  man  whose 
firmness  had  set  bounds  to  their  rapacity. 
Lying  newspapers  were  set  up  for  no  purpose 
but  to  abuse  him ;  and  the  temper  of  the  public 
mind  was  then  such,  that  these  arts,  which 
under  ordinary  circumstances  would  have 
been  ineffectual  against  truth  and  merit,  pro 
duced  an  extraordinary  impression. 

The  great  events  which  had  taken  place  in 
India  had  called  into  existence  a  new  class  of 
Englishmen,  to  whom  their  countrymen  gave 
the  name  of  Nabobs.  These  persons  had 
generally  sprung  from  families  neither  ancient 
nor  opulent ;  they  had  generally  been  sent  at 
an  early  age  to  the  East;  and  they  had  there 
acquired  large  fortunes,  which  they  had  brought 
back  to  their  native  land.  It  was  natural  that, 
not  having  had  much  opportunity  of  mixing 
with  the  best  society,  they  should  exhibit  some 
of  the  awkwardness  and  some  of  the  pomposity 
of  upstarts.  It  was  natural  that,  during  their 
sojourn  in  Asia,  they  should  have  acquired 
some  tastes  and  habits  surprising,  if  not  dis 
gusting,  to  persons  who  never  had  quitted 
Europe.  It  was  natural  that,  having  enjoyed 
great  consideration  in  the  East,  they  should 
not  be  disposed  to  sink  into  obscurity  at  home ; 
and  as  they  had  money,  and  had  not  birth  or 
high  connection,  it  was  natural  that  they  should 
display  a  little  obtrusively  the  advantage  which 
they  possessed.  Wherever  they  settled  there 
was  a  kind  of  feud  between  them  and  the  old 
nobility  and  gentry,  similar  to  that  which  raged 
in  France  between  the  farmer-general  and  the 
marquess.  This  enmity  to  the  aristocracy  long 
continued  to  distinguish  the  servants  of  the 
Company.  More  than  twenty  years  after  the 
time  of  which  we  are  now  speaking,  Burke 
pronounced,  that  among  the  Jacobins  might 
be  reckoned  "  the  East  Indians  almost  to  a 
man,  who  cannot  bear  to  find  that  their  present 
importance  does  not  bear  a  proportion  to  their 
wealth." 

The  Nabobs  soon  became  a  most  unpopular 
class  of  men.  Some  of  them  had  in  the  East 
displayed  eminent  talents,  and  rendered  great 
services  to  the  state ;  but  at  home  their  talents 
were  not  shown  to  advantage,  and  their  ser 
vices  were  little  known.  That  they  had  sprung 


from  obscurity,  that  they  had  acquired  great 
j  wealth,  that  they  exhibited  it  insolently,  that 
I  they  spent  it  extravagantly,  that  they  raised 
;  the  price  of  every  thing  in  their  neighbour 
hood,  from  fresh  eggs  to  rotten  boroughs ;  that 
their  liveries  outshone  those  of  dukes,  that 
their  coaches  were  finer  than  that  of  the  Lord 
Mayor,  that  the  examples  of  their  large  and  ill- 
governed  households  corrupted  half  the  ser 
vants  in  the  country;  that  some  of  them,  with 
all  their  magnificence,  could  not  catch  the  tone 
of  good  society,  but,»in  spite  of  the  stud  and 
the  crowd  of  menials,  of  the  plate  and  the 
Dresden  china,  of  the  venison  and  the  Bur 
gundy,  were  still  low  men  ; — these  were  things 
which  excited,  both  in  the  class  from  which 
they  had  sprung,  and  in  that  into  which  they 
attempted  to  force  themselves,  that  bitter  aver 
sion  which  is  the  effect  of  mingled  envy  and 
contempt.  But  when  it  was  also  rumored  that 
the  fortune  which  had  enabled  its  possessor  to 
eclipse  the  Lord-Lieutenant  on  the  race-ground, 
or  to  carry  the  county  against  the  head  of  a 
house  as  old  as  "Domesday  Book,"  had  been 
accumulated  by  violating  public  faith — by  de 
posing  legitimate  princes,  by  reducing  whole 
provinces  to  beggary — all  the  higher  and  bet 
ter  as  well  as  all  the  low  and  evil  parts  of  hu 
man  nature,  were  stirred  against  the  wretch 
who  had  obtained,  by  guilt  and  dishonour,  the 
riches  which  he  now  lavished  with  arrogant 
and  inelegant  profusion.  The  unfortunate 
Nabob  seemed  to  be  made  up  of  those  foibles 
against  which  comedy  has  pointed  the  most 
merciless  ridicule,  and  of  those  crimes  which 
have  thrown  the  deepest  gloom  over  tragedy 
— of  Turcaret  and  Nero,  of  Monsieur  Jourdain 
and  Richard  the  Third.  A  tempest  of  execra 
tion  and  derision,  such  as  can  be  compared 
only  to  that  outbreak  of  public  feeling  against 
the  Puritans  which  took  place  at  the  time  of 
the  Restoration,  burst  on  the  servants  of  the 
Company.  The  humane  man  was  horror- 
struck  at  the  way  in  which  they  had  got  their 
money,  the  thrifty  man  at  the  way  in  which 
they  spent  it.  The  dilettante  sneered  at  theii 
want  of  taste.  The  maccarorii  black-balled 
them  as  vulgar  fellows.  Writers  the  most  un 
like  in  sentiment  and  style — Methodists  and 
libertines,  philosophers  and  buffoons — were 
for  once  on  the  same  side.  It  is  hardly  too 
much  to  say,  that,  during  a  space  of  about 
thirty  years,  the  whole  lighter  literature  of 
England  was  coloured  by  the  feelings  which 
we  have  described.  Foote  brought  on  the 
stage  an  Anglo-Indian  chief,  dissolute,  ungene 
rous,  and  tyrannical,  ashamed  of  the  humble 
friends  of  his  youth,  hating  the  aristocracy, 
yet  childishly  eager  to  be  numbered  among 
them,  squandering  his  weaitn  uu  panders  and 
flatterers,  tricking  out  his  chairmen  with  the 
most  costly  hot-house  flowers,  and  astounding 
the  ignorant  with  jargon  about  rupe°s,  lacs, 
and  jaghires.  Mackenzie,  with  more  delicaut 
humour,  depicted  a  plain  country  family,  laised 
by  the  Indian  acquisitions  of  one  of  its  mern- 
I  bers  to  sudden  opulence,  and  exciting  dcrisiou 
|  by  an  awkward  mimicry  of  the  manners  of 
•  the  great.  Cowper,  in  that  lofty  expostulation 
:  which  glows  with  the  very  spirit  of  the  He 
1  brew  poets,  placed  the  oppression  of  Ind.a  for* 


340 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELI ANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


most  in  the  list  of  those  national  crimes  for  [  grounds,  was  amazed  to  see  in  the  house  of  his 
which  God  had  punished  England  with  years  j  noble  employer  a  chest  which  had  once  beea 
of  disastrous  war,  with  discomfiture  in  her  j  filled  with  gold  from  the  treasury  of  Moorshe- 
own  seas,  and  with  the  loss  of  her  transatlan 
tic  empire.  If  any  of  our  readers  will  take  the 
trouble  to  search  in  the  dusty  recesses  of  cir 
culating  libraries  for  some  novel  published 
sixty  years  ago,  the  chance  is,  that  the  villain 
or  sub-villain  of  the  story  will  prove  to  be  a 
ravage  old  Nabob,  with  an  immense  fortune, 
a  tawny  complexion,  a  bad  liver,  and  a  worse 
heart. 


Such,  as  far  as  we  can  now  judge,  was  the 
feeling  of  the  country  respecting  Nabobs  in 
general.  And  Olive  was  eminently  the  Nabob 
— the  ablest,  the  most  celebrated,  the  highest  in 
rank,  the  highest  in  fortune,  of  all  the  fraterni 
ty.  His  wealth  was  exhibited  in  a  manner 
which  could  not  fail  to  excite  odium.  He 
lived  with  great  magnificence  in  Berkeley 
Square.  He  reared  one  palace  in  Shropshire, 
and  another  at  Claremont.  His  parliamentary 
influence  might  vie  with  that  of  the  greatest 
families.  But  in  all  this  splendour  and  power, 
envy  found  something  to  sneer  at.  On  some 
of  his  relations,  wealth  and  dignity  seem  to 
have  sate  as  awkwardly  as  on  Mackenzie's 
"Margery  Mushroom."  Nor  was  he  himself, 
with  all  his  great  qualities,  free  from  those 
weaknesses  which  the  satirists  of  that  age  re 
presented  as  characteristic  of  his  whole  class. 
In  the  field,  indeed,  his  habits  were  remarkably 
simple.  He  was  constantly  on  horseback,  was 
never  seen  but  in  his  uniform,  never  wore  silk, 
never  entered  a  palanquin,  and  was  content 
with  the  plainest  fare.  But  when  he  was  no 
longer  at  thrj  head  of  an  army,  he  laid  aside 
this  Spartan  temperance  for  the  ostentatious 
luxury  of  a  Sybarite.  Though  his  person  was 
ungraceful,  and  though  his  harsh  features  were 
redeemed  from  vulgar  ugliness  only  by  their 
stern,  dauntless,  and  commanding  expression, 
he  was  fond  of  rich  and  gay  clothing,  and  re 
plenished  his  wardrobe  with  absurd  profusion. 
Sir  John  Malcolm  gives  us  a  letter  worthy  of 
Sir  Matthew  Mite,  in  which  Olive  orders  "two 
hundred  shirts,  the  best,  and  finest  that  can  be 
pot  for  love  or  money."  A  few  follies  of  this 
description,  grossly  exaggerated  by  report,  pro 
duced  an  unfavourable  impression  on  the  pub 
lic  mind.  But  this  v/as  not  the  worst.  Black 
stories,  of  which  the  greater  part  were  pure 
inventions,  were  circulated  respecting  his  con 
duct  in  the  East.  He  had  to  bear  the  whole 
odium,  not  only  of  these  bad  acts  to  which  he 
had  once  or  twice  stooped,  but  of  all  the  bad 
ads  of  all  the  English  in  India — of  bad  acts 
committed  when  he  was  absent — nay,  of  bad 
acts  which  he  had  manfully  opposed  and  se 
verely  punished.  The  very  abuses  against 
which  he  had  waged  an  honest,  resolute,  and 
successful  war,  were  laid  to  his  account.  He 
was,  in  fact,  regarded  as  the  personification  of 
all  the  vices  and  weaknesses  which  the  public, 

with  or  without  reason,  ascribed  to  the  English  eight,  ten,  twelve  times  the  price  at  which  they 
adventurers  in  Asia.  We  have  ourselves  heard  i  had  bought  it;  that  one  English  functionary, 
old  men,  who  Knew  nothing  of  his  history,  but  !  who,  the  year  before,  was  not  worth  one  him- 
who  still  retained  the  prejudices  conceived  in  dred  guineas,  had,  during  that  season  of  mise- 
their  youth,  talk  of  him  as  an  incarnate  fiend. 
Johnson  always  held  this  language.  Brown, 
Olive  employed  to  lay  out  his  pleasure- 


dabad;  and  could  not  understand  how  the  con 
science  of  the  criminal  suffered  him  to  sleep 
with  such  an  object  so  near  to  his  bedchamber. 
The  peasantry  of  Surrey  looked  with  mysteri 
ous  horror  on  the  stately  house  that  was  rising 
at  Ctaremont,  and  whispered  that  the  great 
wicked  lord  had  ordered  the  walls  to  be  made 
so  thick  in  order  to  keep  out  the  devil,  who 
would  one  day  carry  him  away  bodily.  Among 
the  gaping  clowns  who  drank  in  this  frightful 
story,  was  a  worthless  ugly  lad  of  the  name  of 
Hunter,  since  widely  known  as  William  Hunt 
ingdon,  S.S.;  and  the  superstition  which  was 
strangely  mingled  with  the  knavery  of  that  re 
markable  impostor,  seems  to  have  derived  no 
small  nutriment  from  the  tales  which  he  heard 
of  the  life  and  character  of  Olive.* 

In  the  mean  time,  the  impulse  which  Olive 
had  given  to  the  administration  of  Bengal,  was 
constantly  becoming  fainter  and  fainter.  His 
policy  was  to  a  great  extent  abandoned ;  the 
abuses  which  he  had  suppressed  began  to  re 
vive ;  and  at  length  the  evils  which  a  bad 
government  had  engendered,  were  aggravated 
by  one  of  those  fearful  visitations  which  the 
best  government  cannot  avert.  In  the  summer 
of  1770,  the  rains  failed;  the  earth  was  parch 
ed  up;  the  tanks  were  empty;  the  rivers  shrank 
within  their  beds  ;  a  famine,  such  as  is  known 
only  in  countries  where  every  household  de 
pends  for  support  on  its  own  little  patch  of 
cultivation,  filled  the  whole  valley  of  the  Ganges 
with  misery  and  death.  Tender  and  delicate 
women,  whose  veils  had  never  been  lifted  be 
fore  the  public  gaze,  came  forth  from  the  inner 
chambers  in  which  Eastern  jealousy  had  kept 
watch  over  their  beauty,  threw  themselves  on 
the  earth  before  the  passers-by,  and  with  loud 
waitings  implored  a  handful  of  rice  for  iheir 
children.  The  Hoogley  every  day  rolled  down 
thousands  of  corpses  close  by  the  porticoes 
and  gardens  of  the  English  conquerors.  The 
very  streets  of  Oalcutta  were  blocked  up  by 
the  dying  and  the  dead.  The  lean  and  feeble 
survivors  had  not  energy  enough  to  bear  the 
bodies  of  their  kindred  to  the  funeral  pile  or  to 
the  holy  river,  or  even  to  scare  away  the  jack 
als  and  vultures,  \vho  fed  on  human  remains 
in  the  face  of  day.  The  extent  of  the  mortality 
was  never  ascertained,  but  it  was  po 
reckoned  by  millions.  This  melancholy  intel 
ligence  added  to  the  excitement  which  already 
prevailed  in  England  on  Indian  subjects.  The 
proprietors  of  East  India  stock  were  uneasy 


about  their  dividends. 


men  of  common, 


humanity  were  touched  by  the  calamities  'of 
our  unhappy  subjects,  and  indignation  soon 
began  to  mingle  itself  with  pity.  It  was  ru 
moured  that  the  Oompany's  servants 


had 

all  the  rice 
of  the  country;  that  they  had  sold  grain  for 


created  the  famine  by  engrossin 


*  See    Huntingdon's    Kingdom    of  Hume*   taken   i| 
Prayer,  and  his  Letters. 


MALCOLM'S   LIFE   OF  CLIVE. 


341 


ry,  remitted  sixty  thousand  pounds  to  London. 
These  charges  we  believe  to  have  been  utterly 
unfounded.  That  servants  of  the  Company 
had  ventured,  since  Clive's  departure,  to  deal 
in  rice,  is  probable.  That  if  they  dealt  in  rice, 
they  must  have  gained  by  the  scarcity,  is  cer- 
fain.  But  there  is  no  reason  for  thinking  that 
ihey  either  produced  or .  aggravated  an  evil 
which  physical  causes  sufficiently  explain. 
The  outcry  which  was  raised  against  them  on 
this  occasion  was,  we  suspect,  as  absurd  as 
the  imputations  which,  in  times  of  dearth  at 
home,  were  once  thrown  by  statesmen  and 
judges,  and  are  still  thrown  by  two  or  three 
old  women,  on  the  corn-factors.  It  was,  how 
ever,  so  loud  and  so  general,  that  it  appears  to 
have  imposed  on  an  intellect  raised  so  high 
above  vulgar  prejudices  as  that  of  Adam 
Smith.*  What  was  still  more  extraordinary, 
these  unhappy  events  greatly  increased  the 
unpopularity  of  Lord  Clive.  He.  had  been 
some  years  in  England  when  the  famine  took 
place.  None  of  his  measures  had  the  smallest 
tendency  to  produce  such  a  calamity.  If  the 
servants  of  the  Company  had  traded  in  rice, 
they  had  done  so  in  direct  contravention  of  the 
rule  which  he  had  laid  down,  and,  while  in 
power,  had  resolutely  enforced.  But  in  the 
eyes  of  his  countrymen,  he  was,  as  we  have 
said,  the  Nabob — the  Anglo-Indian  character 
personified  ;  and,  while  he  was  building  and 
planting  in  Surrey,  he  was  held  responsible  for 
all  the  effects  of  a  dry  season  in  Bengal. 

Parliament  had  hitherto  bestowed  very  little 
attention  on  our  Eastern  possessions.  Since 
the  death  of  George  the  Second,  a  rapid  suc 
cession  of  weak  administrations,  each  of  which 
was  in  turn  flattered  and  betrayed  by  the  court, 
had  held  the  semblance  of  power.  Intrigues 
in  the  palace,  riots  in  the  city,  and  insurrec 
tionary  movements  in  the  American  colonies, 
had  left  them  little  leisure  to  study  Indian  po 
litics.  Where  they  did  interfere,  their  inter 
ference  was  feeble  and  irresolute.  Lord 
Chatham,  indeed,  during  the  short  period  of 
his  ascendency  in  the  councils  of  George  the 
Third,  had  meditated  a  bold  and  sweeping  mea 
sure  respecting  the  acquisitions  of  the  Com 
pany.  But  his  plans  were  rendered  abortive 
by  the  strange  malady  which  about  that  time 
began  to  overcloud  his  splendid  genius. 

At  length,  in  1772,  it  was  generally  felt  that 
Parliament  could  no  longer  neglect  the  affairs 
of  India.  The  government  was  stronger  than 
any  which  had  held  power  since  the  breach 
between  Mr.  Pitt  and  the  great  Whig  connec 
tion  in  1761.  No  pressing  question  of  domes 
tic  or  European  policy  required  the  attention 
of  public  men.  There  was  a  short  and  delu 
sive  lull  between  two  tempests.  The  excite 
ment  produced  by  the  Middlesex  election  was 
over;  the  discontent  of  America  did  not  yet 
threaten  civil  war ;  the  financial  difficulties  of 
the  Company  brought  on  a  crisis  ;  the  minis 
ters  were  forced  to  take  up  the  subject ;  and 
the  whole  storm,  which  had  long  been  gather 
ing,  now  broke  at  once  on  the  head  of  Clive. 

His  situation  was  indeed  singularly  unfor 
tunate.  He  was  hated  throughout  the  coun- 


*  Wealth  cf  Nations,  Book  IV.  chap,  v.— Digression. 


try,  hated  at  the  India  House,  hated,  above  all, 
by  those  wealthy  and  powerful  servants  of  the 
Company,  whose  rapacity  and  tyranny  he  had 
withstood.  He  had  to  bear  the  double  odium 
of  his  bad  and  of  his  good  actions — of  every 
Indian  abuse,  and  of  every  Indian  reform. 
The  state  of  the  political  world  was  such, 
that  he  could  count  on  the  support  of  no  pow 
erful  connection.  The  party  to  which  he  had 
belonged,  that  of  George  Grenville,  had  been 
hostile  to  the  government,  and  yet  had  never 
cordially  united  with  the  other  sections  of  the 
Opposition — with  the  little  band  who  still  fol 
lowed  the  fortunes  of  Lord  Chatham,  or  with 
the  large  and  respectable  body  of  which  Lord 
Rockingham  was  the  acknowledged  leader 
George  Grenville  was  now  dead:  his  follow 
ers  were  scattered;  and  Clive,  unconnected 
with  any  of  the  powerful  factions  which  di 
vided  the  Parliament,  could  reckon  on  the  votes 
only  of  those  members  who  were  returned  by 
himself.  His  enemies,  particularly  those  who 
were  the  enemies  of  his  virtues,  were  unscru 
pulous,  ferocious,  implacable.  Their  malevo 
lence  aimed  at  nothing  less  than  the  utter  nun 
of  his  fame  and  fortune.  They  wished  to  see 
him  expelled  from  Parliament,  to  see  his  spurs 
chopped  off,  to  see  his  estate  confiscated ;  and 
it  may  be  doubted  whether  even  such  a  result 
as  this  would  have  quenched  their  thirst  for 
revenge. 

Clive's  parliamentary  tactics  resembled  his 
military  tactics.  Deserted,  surrounded,  out 
numbered,  and  with  every  thing  at  stake,  he 
did  not  even  deign  to  stand  on  the  defensive, 
but  pushed  boldly  forward  to  the  attack.  At 
an  early  stage  of  the  discussions  on  Indian  af 
fairs,  he  rose,  and  in  a  long  and  elaborate 
speech,  vindicated  himself  from  a  large  part 
of  the  accusations  which  had  been  brought 
against  him.  He  is  said  to  have  produced  a 
great  impression  on  his  audience.  Lord  Chat 
ham,  who,  now  the  ghost  of  his  former  self, 
loved  to  haunt  the  scene  of  his  glory,  was  that 
night  under  the  gallery  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  and  declared  that  he  had  never  heard  a 
finer  speech.  It  was  subsequently  printed 
under  Clive's  direction,  and  must  be  allowed 
to  exhibit,  not  merely  strong  sense  and  a  manly 
spirit,  but  talents  both  for  disquisition  and  de 
clamation,  which  assiduous  culture  might  have 
improved  into  the  highest  excellence.  He 
confined  his  defence  on  this  occasion  to  the 
measures  of  his  last  administration  ;  and  suc 
ceeded  so  far,  that  his  enemies  thenceforth 
thought  it  expedient  to  direct  their  attacks 
chiefly  against  the  earlier  part  of  his  life. 

The  earlier  part  of  his  life  unfortunately  pre 
sented  some  assailable  points  to  their  nostility. 
A  committee  was  chosen  by  ballot,  u/  inquir* 
into  the  affairs  of  India;  and  by  this  committ-e 
the  whole  history  of  that  great  revolution  which 
threw  down  Surajah  Dowlah,  and  raised  Meer 
laffier,  was  sifted  with  malignant  care.  Clivo 
was  subjected  to  the  most  unsparing  examina 
tion  and  cross-examination,  and  afterwards 
bitterly  complained  that  he,  the  Baron  of  Pi  as- 
sey,  had  been  treated  like  a  sheep-stealej%  The 
boldness  and  ingenuousness  01  his  replies 
would  alone  suffice  to  show  how  alien  from  hi« 
nature  were  the  frauds  to  which,  in  the  course 
2r  2 


342 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


l*  his  Eastern  negotiations,  he  had  sometimes 
escended.  He  avowed  the  arts  which  he  had 
m ployed  to  deceive  Omichund;  and  resolutely 
-id  that  he  was  not  ashamed  of  them,  and  that, 
n  the  same  circumstances,  he  would  again  act 
in  the  sjime  manner.  He  admitted  that  he  had 
receive*,  .mmense  sums  from  MeerJamer;  but 
he  denied  that,  in  doing  so,  he  had  violated 
any  obligation  of  morality  or  honour.  He  laid 
claim,  on  the  contrary,  and  not  without  some 
reason,  to  the  praise  of  eminent  disinterested 
ness.  He  described,  in  vivid  language,  the 
situation  in  which  his  victory  had  placed  him; 
— a  great  prince  dependent  on  his  pleasure ; 
an  opulent  city  afraid  of  being  given  up  to 
plunder;  wealthy  bankers  bidding  against  each 
other  for  his  smiles;  vaults  piled  with  gold 
and  jewels,  thrown  open  to  him  alone.  "  By 
God,  Mr.  Chairman,"  he  exclaimed,  "  at  this 
moment  I  stand  astonished  at  my  own  modera 
tion  !" 

The  inquiry  was  so  extensive  that  the  Houses 
rose  before  it  had  been  completed.  It  was  con 
tinued  in  the  following  session.  When  at 
length  the  committee  had  concluded  its  la 
bours,  enlightened  and  impartial  men  hj.v.1  little 
difficulty  in  making  up  their  minds  as  to  the 
result.  It  was  clear  that  Clive  had  been  guilty 
of  some  acts  which  it  is  impossible  to  vindi 
cate  without  attacking  the  authority  of  all  the 
most  sacred  laws  which  regulate  the  inter 
course  of  individuals  and  of  states.  But  it  was 
equally  clear  that  he  had  displayed  great  ta 
lents,  and  even  great  virtues ;  that  he  had  ren 
dered  eminent  services  both  to  his  country  and 
to  the  people  of  India;  and  that  it  was  in  truth 
not  for  his  dealings  with  Meer  Jaftier,  nor  for 
the  fraud  which  he  had  practised  on  Omi 
chund,  but  for  his  determined  resistance  to 
avarice  and  tyranny  that  he  was  now  called  in 
question. 

Ordinary  criminal  justice  knows  nothing  of 
set-off.  The  greatest  desert  cannot  be  pleaded 
in  answer  to  a  charge  of  the  slightest  trans 
gression  If  a  man  has  sold  beer  on  Sunday 
morning,  it  is  no  defence  that  he  has  saved  the 
iife^of  a  fellow-creature  at  the  risk  of  his  own. 
If  he  has  harnessed  a  Newfoundland  dog  to 
his  little  child's  carriage,  it  is  no  defence  that 
he  was  wounded  at  Waterloo.  But  it  is  not  in 
this  way  that  we  ought  to  deal  with  men  who, 
raised  far  above  ordinary  restraints,  and  tried 
by  far  more  than  ordinary  temptations,  are  en 
titled  to  a  more  than  ordinary  measure  of  in 
dulgence.  Such  men  should  be  judged  by  their 
contemporaries  as  they  will  be  judged  by  pos 
terity.  Their  bad  actions  ought  not,  indeed,  to 
be  ca  led  good;  but  their  good  and  bad  actions 
ought  to  "be  fairly  weighed : — and  if  on  the 
whole  the  good  preponderate,  the  sentence 
ought  to  be  one,  not  merely  of  acquittal,  but  of 
approbation.  Not  a  single  great  ruler  in  his 
tory  can  be  absolved  by  a  judge  who  fixes  his 
eye  inexorably  on  one  or  two  unjustifiable  acts. 
Bruce,  the  deliverer  of  Scotland;  Maurice,  the 
deliverer  of  Germany;  William,  the  deliverer 
of  Holland;  his  great  descendant,  the  deliverer 
of  England;  Murray,  the  good  regent;  Cosmo, 
the  father  of  his  country;  Henry  IV.  of  France ; 
IVter  the  Great  of  Russia — how  would  the  best 
»  them  oass  such  a  scrutiny  I  History  takes 


wider  views ;  and  the  best  tribunal  for  greaX 
political  cases  is  that  tribunal  which  antici 
pates  the  verdict  of  history. 

Reasonable  and  moderate  men  of  all  parties 
felt  this  in  Clive's  case.  They  could  not  pro 
nounce  him  blameless ;  but  they  were  not  dis 
posed  to  abandon  him  to  that  low-minded  and 
rancorous  pack  who  had  ran  him  down,  and 
were  eager  to  worry  him  to  death.  Lord  North, 
though  not  very  friendly  to  him,  was  not  dis« 
posed  to  go  to  extremities  against  him.  While 
the  inquiry  was  still  in  progress,  Clive,  who 
had  some  years  before  been  created  a  Knight 
of  the  Bath,  was  installed  with  great  pomp  in 
Henry  the  Seventh's  Chapel.  He  was  soon 
after  appointed  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Shropshire, 
When  he  kissed  hands,  George  III.,  who  had 
always  been  partial  to  him,  admitted  him  to  a 
private  audience,  talked  to  him  half  an  hour 
on  Indian  politics,  and  was  visibly  affected 
when  the  persecuted  general  spoke  of  his  ser 
vices  and  of  the  way  in  which  they  had  been 
requited. 

At  length  the  charges  came  in  a  definite 
form  before  the  House  of  Commons.  Bur- 
gpyne,  chairman  of  the  committee,  a  man  of 
wit,  fashion,  and  honour,  an  agreeable  drama 
tic  writer,  an  officer  whose  courage  was  never 
questioned,  and  whose  skill  was  at  that  time 
highly  esteemed,  appeared  as  the  accuser. 
The  members  of  the  administration  took  dif 
ferent  sides;  for  in  that  age  all  questions  were 
open  questions  except  such  as  were  brought 
forward  by  the  government,  or  such  as  implied 
some  censure  on  the  government.  Thurlow,  the 
Attorney-General,  was  among  the  assailants. 
Wedderburne,  the  Solicitor-General,  strongly 
attached  to  Clive,  defended  his  friend  with  ex 
traordinary  force  of  argument  and  language. 
It  is  a  curious  circumstance  that,  some  years 
later,  Thurlow  was  the  most  conspicuous 
champion  of  Warren  Hastings,  while  Wed 
derburne  was  among  the  most  unrelenting  per 
secutors  of  that  great  though  not  faultless 
statesman.  Clive  spoke  in  his  own  defence 
at  less  length  and  with  less  art  than  in  the 
preceding  year,  but  with  great  energy  and  pa 
thos.  He  recounted  his  great  actions  and  his 
wrongs;  and,  after  bidding  his  hearers  remem 
ber  that  they  were  about  to  decide  not  only  on 
his  honour  but  on  their  own,  retired  from  the 
House. 

The  Commons  resolved  that  acquisitions 
made  by  the  arms  of  the  State  belong  to  the 
State  alone,  and  that  it  is  illegal  in  the  ser- 
ants  of  the  State  to  appropriate  such  acqusi- 
tions  to  themselves.  They  resolved  that  this 
wholsome  rule  appeared  to  have  been  system 
atically  violated  by  the  English  functionaries 
in  Bengal.  On  a  subsequent  day  they  went 
a  step  further,  and  resolved  that  Clive  had,  by 
means  of  the  power  which  he  possessed  as 
commander  of  the  British  forces  in  India,  ob 
tained  large  sums  from  Meer  Jaffier.  Here 
the  House  stopped.  They  had  voted  the  major 
and  minor  of  Burgoyne's  syllogism,  but  they 
shrunk  from  drawing  the  logical  conclusion. 
When  it  was  moved  that  Lord  Clive  had 
abused  his  powers  and  set  an  evil  example  to 
the  servants  of  the  public,  the  previous  ques.ion 
was  put  and  carried.  At  length,  long  alter  tna 


MALCOLM'S  LIFE  OF  CLIVE. 


343 


sun  had  risen  on  an  animated  debate,  Wedder- 
burue  moved  that  Lord  Clive  had  at  the  same 
time  rendered  great  and  meritorious  services 
to  his  country,  and  this  motion  passed  without 
a  division. 

The  result  of  this  memorable  inquiry  ap 
pears  to  us,  on  the  whole,  honourable  to  the 
justice,  moderation,  and  discernment  of  the 
Commons.  They  had,  indeed,  no  great  tempta 
tion  to  do  wrong.  They  would  have  been  very 
Dad  judges  of  an  accusation  brought  against 
Jenkinson  or  against  Wilkes.  But  the  ques 
tion  respecting  Clive  was  not  a  party  question, 
and  the  House  accordingly  acted  with  the  good 
sense  and  good  feeling  which  may  always  be 
expected  from  an  assembly  of  English  gentle 
men,  not  blinded  by  faction. 

The  equitable  and  temperate  proceedings  of 
the  British  Parliament  were  set  off  to  the  great 
est  advantage  by  a  foil.  The  wretched  govern 
ment  of  Louis  XV.  had  murdered,  directly  or 
indirectly,  almost  every  Frenchman  who  had 
served  his  country  with  distinction  in  the  East. 
Labourdonnais  was  flung  into  the  Bastile,  and, 
after  years  of  suffering,  left  it  only  to  die.  Du- 
pleix,  stripped  of  his  immense  fortune,  and 
broken-hearted  by  humiliating  attendance  in 
Antechambers,  sank  into  an  obscure  grave. 
Lally  was  dragged  to  the  common  place  of 
jxecution  with  a  gag  between  his  lips.  The 
Commons  of  England,  on  the  other  hand,  treat 
ed  their  living  captain  with  that  discriminating 
justice  which  is  seldom  shown  except  to  the 
dead.  They  laid  down  sound  general  princi 
ples  ;  they  delicately  pointed  out  where  he  had 
deviated  from  those  principles;  and  they  tem 
pered  a  gentle  censure  with  liberal  eulogy. 
The  contrast  struck  Voltaire,  always  partial  to 
England,  and  always  eager  to  expose  the 
abuses  of  the  Parliaments  of  France.  Indeed 
he  seems  at  this  time  to  have  meditated  a  his 
tory  of  the  conquest  of  Bengal.  He  mentioned 
his  designs  to  Dr.  Moore  when  that  amusing 
writer  visited  him  at  Ferney.  Wedderburne 
took  great  interest  in  the  matter,  and  pressed 
Clive  to  furnish  materials.  Had  the  plan  been 
carried  into  execution,  we  have  no  doubt  that 
Voltaire  would  have  produced  a  book  contain 
ing  much  lively  and  picturesque  narrative, 
many  just  and  humane  sentiments  poignant 
ly  expressed,  many  grotesque  blunders,  many 
sneers  at  the  Mosaic  chronology,  much  scan 
dal  about  the  Catholic  missionaries,  and  much 
sublime  thcophilantkropy  stolen  from  the  New 
Testament,  and  put  into  the  mouths  of  virtuous 
and  philosophical  Brahmins. 

Clive  was  now  secure  in  the  enjoyment  of 
his  fortune  and  his  honours.  He  was  sur 
rounded  by  attached  friends  and  relations,  and 
he  had  not  yet  passed  the  season  of  vigorous 
bodily  and  mental  exertion.  But  clouds  had 
long  been  gathering  over  his  mind,  and  now 
settled  on  it  in  thick  darkness.  From  early 
youth  he  had  been  subject  to  fits  of  that  strange 
melancholy  "which  rejoiceth  exceedingly  and 
is  glad  when  it  can  find  the  grave."  While 
still  a  writer  at  Madras,  he  had  twice  attempt 
ed  to  destroy  himself.  Business  and  prospe 
rity  had  produced  a  salutary  effect  on  his 
spirits.  In  India,  while  he  was  occupied  by 
great  affairs,  in  England,  while  wealth  and 


rank  had  still  the  charm  of  novelty,  he  had 
borne  up  against  his  constitutional  misery. 
But  he  had  now  nothing  to  do,  and  nothing  to 
wish  for.  His  active  spirit  in  an  inactive  situ 
ation  drooped  and  withered  like  a  plant  in  an 
uncongenial  air.  The  malignity  with  which 
his  enemies  had  pursued  him,  the  indignity 
with  which  he  had  been  treated  by  the  com 
mittee,  the  censure,  lenient  as  it  was,  which 
the  House  of  Commons  had  pronounced,  the 
knowledge  that  he  was  regarded  by  a  large 
portion  of  his  countrymen  as  a  cruel  and  per 
fidious  tyrant,  all  concurred  to  irritate  and  de 
press  him.  In  the  mean  time,  his  temper  was 
tried  by  acute  physical  suffering.  During  his 
long  residence  in  tropical  climates,  he  had 
contracted  several  painful  distempers.  In  or 
der  to  obtain  ease  he  called  in  the  help  of  opi 
um;  and  he  was  gradually  enslaved  by  this 
treacherous  ally.  To  the  last,  however,  his 
genius  occasionally  flashed  through  the  gloom. 
It  was  said  that  he  would  sometimes,  after  sit 
ting  silent  and  torpid  for  hours,  rouse  himself 
to  the  discussion  of  some  great  question,  would 
display  in  full  vigour  all  the  talents  of  the  sol 
dier  and  the  statesman,  and  would  then  sink 
back  into  his  melancholy  repose. 

The  disputes  with  America  had  now  become 
so  serious,  that  an  appeal  to  the  sword  seemed 
inevitable ;  and  the  ministers  were  desirous 
to  avail  themselves  of  the  services  of  Clive. 
Had  he  still  been  what  he  was  when  he  raised 
the  siege  of  Patna,  and  annihilated  the  Dutch 
army  and  navy  at  the  mouth  of  the  Ganges,  it 
is  not  improbable  that  the  resistance  of  the 
Colonists  would  have  been  put  down,  and  that 
the  inevitable  separation  would  hive  be-eu  de 
ferred  for  a  few  years.  But  it  was  too  late.  His 
strong  mind  was  fast  sinking  under  many 
kinds  of  suffering.  On  the  22d  of  November, 
1774,  he  died  by  his  own  hand.  He  had  just 
completed  his  forty-ninth  year. 

In  the  awful  close  of  so  much  prosperity 
and  glory,  the  vulgar  saw  only  a  confirmation 
of  all  their  prejudices  ;  and  some  men  of  real 
piety  and  talents  so  far  forgot  the  maxims  both 
of  religion  and  of  philosophy,  as  confidently  to 
ascribe  the  mournful  event  to  the  just  ven 
geance  of  God  and  the  horrors  of  an  evil  con 
science.  It  is  with  very  different  feelings  that 
we  contemplate  the  spectacle  of  a  great  mind 
ruined  by  the  weariness  of  satiety,  by  the  pangs 
of  wounded  honour,  by  fatal  diseases,  and 
more  fatal  remedies. 

Clive  committed  great  faults;  and  we  have 
not  attempted  to  disguise  them.  But  his  faults, 
when  weighed  against  his  merits,  and  viewed 
in  connection  with  his  temptations,  do  not  ap 
pear  to  us  to  deprive  him  of  his  right  to  an 
honourable  place  in  the  estimation  of  pos 
terity. 

From  his  first  visit  to  India  dates  the  renown 
of  the  English  arms  in  the  East.  Till  he  ap 
peared,  his  countrymen  were  despised  as  mere 
pedlars,  while  the  French  were  revered  as  a 
people  formed  for  victory  and  command.  His 
courage  and  capacity  dissolved  the  charm. 
With  the  defence  of  Arcot  commences  that 
long  series  of  Oriental  triumphs  which  closes 
the  fall  of  Ghazni.  Nor  must  we  forget  that 
he  was  only  twenty-five  years  old  when  he  a/> 


344 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


proved  himself  ripe  for  military  command. 
This  is  a  rare  if  not  a  singular  distinction.  It 
is  true  that  Alexander,  Conde,  and  Charles  the 
Twelfth  won  great  battles  at  a  still  earlier  age ; 
but  those  princes  were  surrounded  by  veteran 
generals  of  distinguished  skill,  to  whose  sug 
gestions  must  be  attributed  the  victories  of  the 
Granicus,  of  Rocroi,  and  of  Narva.  Clive,  an 
inexperienced  youth,  had  yet  more  experience 
than  any  of  those  who  served  under  him.  He 
bad  to  form  himself,  lo  form  his  officers,  and 
to  form  his  army.  The  only  man,  as  far  as  we 
recollect,  who  at  an  equally  early  age  ever 
gave  equal  proof  of  talents  for  war,  was  Napo 
leon  Bonaparte. 

From  Clive's  second  visit  to  India  dates  the 
political  ascendency  of  the  English  in  that 
country.  His  dexterity  and  resolution  realized, 
in  the  course  of  a  few  months,  more  than  all 
the  gorgeous  visions  which  had  floated  before 
the  imagination  of  Dupleix.  Such  an  extent 
of  cultivated  territory,  such  an  amount  of  reve 
nue,  such  a  multitude  of  subjects,  was  never 
added  to  the  dominion  of  Rome  by  the  most 
successful  proconsul.  Nor  were  such  wealthy 
spoils  ever  borne  under  arches  of  triumph, 
down  the  Sacred  Way,  and  through  the  crowd 
ed  Forum,  to  the  threshold  of  Tarpeian  Jove. 
The  fame  of  those  who  subdued  Antiochus  and 
Tigranes  grows  dim  when  compared  with  the 
splendour  of  the  exploits  which  the  young 
English  adventurer  achieved  at  the  head  of  an 
army  not  equal  in  numbers  to  one-half  of  a 
Romat*  legion. 

From  Clive's  third  visit  to  India  dates  the 
parity  of  the  administration  of  our  Eastern 
empire.  When  he  landed  at  Calcutta  in  1765, 
lJwie.nl  \*as  regarded  as  a  place  to  which  Eng 


lishmen  were  sent  only  to  get  rich  by  any 
means,  in  the  shortest  possible  time.  He  first 
made  dauntless  and  unsparing  war  on  that  gi 
gantic  system  of  oppression,  extortion,  and  cor 
ruption.  In  that  war  he  manfully  put  to  hazard 
his  ease,  his  fame,  and  his  splendid  fortune. 
The  same  sense  of  justice  which  forbade  us 
lo  conceal  or  extenuate  the  faults  of  his  earlier 
days,  compels  us  to  admit  that  those  faults 
were  nobly  repaired.  If  the  reproach  of  the  Com 
pany  and  of  its  servants  has  been  taken  away — 
if  in  India  the  yoke  of  foreign  masters,  else 
where  the  heaviest  of  all  yokes,  has  been  found 
lighter  than  that  of  any  native  dynasty — if  to 
that  gang  of  public  robbers  which  once  spread 
terror  through  the  whole  plain  of  Bengal,  has 
succeeded  a  body  of  functionaries  not  more 
highly  distinguished  by  ability  and  diligence 
than  by  integrity,  disinterestedness,  and  public 
spirit — if  we  now  see  men  like  Munro,  Elphin- 
stone,  arid  Metcalfe,  after  leading  victorious 
armies,  after  making  and  deposing  kings,  re 
turn,  proud  of  their  honourable  poverty,  from 
a  land  which  once  held  out  to  every  greedy 
factor  the  hope  of  boundless  wealth — the  praise 
is  in  no  small  measure  due  to  Clive.  His  name 
stands  high  on  the  roll  of  conquerors.  But  it  is 
found  in  a  better  list — in  the  list  of  those  who 
have  done  and  suffered  much  for  the  happiness 
of  mankind.  To  the  warrior,  history  will  as 
sign  a  place  in  the  same  rank  with  Lucullus 
and  Trajan.  Nor  will  she  deny  to  the  reform 
er,  a  share  of  that  veneration  with  which 
France  cherishes  the  memory  of  Turgot,  and 
with  which  the  latest  generation  of  Hindoos 
will  contemplate  the  statue  of  Lord  William 
Bentinck. 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


34* 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  Sffi  WILLIAM  TEMPLE/ 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW  FOR  OCTOBER,  1838.] 


Mn.  COURTENAY  has  long  been  well  known 
to  politicians  as  an  industrious  and  useful  offi 
cial  man,  and  as  an  upright  and  consistent 
member  of  Parliament.  He  has  been  one  of 
the  most  moderate,  and,  at  the  same  time,  one 
of  the  least  pliant  members  of  the  Conservative 
party.  His  conduct  has,  on  some  questions, 
been  so  Whigish,  that  both  those  who  ap 
plauded  and  those  who  condemned  it  have 
questioned  his  claim  to  be  considered  as  a 
Tory.  But  his  Toryism,  such  as  it  is,  he  has 
held  fast  to  through  all  changes  of  fortune  and 
fashion ;  and  he  has  at  last  retired  from  public 
life,  leaving  behind  him,  to  the  best  of  our 
belief,  no  personal  enemy,  and  carrying  with 
him  the  respect  and  good-will  of  many  who 
strongly  dissent  from  his  opinions. 

This  book,  the  fruit  of  Mr.  Courtenay's  lei 
sure,  is  introduced  by  a  preface,  in  which  he 
informs  us,  that  the  assistance  furnished  to 
him  from  various  quarters  "  has  taught  him 
the  superiority  of  literature  to  politics  for  de 
veloping  the  kindlier  feelings,  and  conducing 
to  an  agreeable  life."  We  are  truly  glad  that 
Mr.  Courtenay  is  so  well  satisfied  with  his  new 
employment,  and  we  heartily  congratulate  him 
on  having  been  driven  by  events  to  make  an 
exchange  which,  advantageous  as  it  is,  few 
people  make  wht.e  they  can  avoid  it.  He  has 
little  reason,  in  our  opinion,  to  envy  any  of 
those  who  are  still  engaged  in  a  pursuit,  from 
which,  at  most,  they  can  only  expect  that,  by 
relinquishing  liberal  studies  and  social  plea 
sures, — by  passing  nights  without  sleep,  and 
summers  without  one  glimpse  of  the  beauty  of 
nature, — they  may  attain  that  laborious,  that 
invidious,  that  closely  watched  slavery  which 
is  mocked  with  the  name  of  Power. 

The  volumes  before  uy  are  fairly  entitled 
to  the  praise  of  diligence,  care,  good  sense,  and 
impartiality;  and  these  qualities  are  sufficient 
to  make  a  book  valuable,  but  not  quite  suffi 
cient  to  make  it  readable.  Mr.  Courtenay  has 
not  sufficiently  studied  the  arts  of  selection  and 
compression.  The  information  with  which  he 
furnishes  us  must  still,  we  apprehend,  be  con 
sidered  as  so  much  raw  material.  To  manu 
facture  it  will  be  highly  useful,  but  it  is  not  yet 
in  such  a  form  that  it  can  be  enjoyed  by  the 
idle  consumer.  To  drop  metaphor,  we  are 
afraid  that  this  work  will  be  less  acceptable  to 
those  who  read  for  the  sake  of  reading,  than  to 
those  who  read  in  order  to  write. 

We  cannot  help  adding,  though  we  are  ex 
tremely  unwilling  to  quarrel  with  Mr.  Cour 
tenay  about  politics,  that  the  book  would  not 
be  at  all  the  worse  if  it  contained  fewer  snarls 
against  the  Whigs  of  the  present  day.  Not 

*  Memoirs  "f  the  Life,  Works,  itnd  Correspondence  of 
Sir  William  Temple.    By  th«  Right  Hon.  THOMAS  PEHE- 
•RINK  CoimTKNAY.    2  vols.  bvo.  London.  1836. 
VOL.  HJ.— 44 


only  are  these  passages  out  of  place,  but 
of  them  are  intrinsically  such  that  they  wculfi 
become  the  editor  of  a  third-rate  party  rews- 
paper  better  than  a  gentleman  of  Mr.  Courte 
nay's  talents  and  knowledge.  For  exr.mple, 
we  are  told  that  "  it  is  a  remarkable  circum 
stance,  familiar  to  those  who  are  acquainted 
with  history,  but  suppressed  by  the  new  Whigs, 
that  the  liberal  politician  of  the  seventeenth 
century  and  the  greater  part  of  the  eighteenth, 
never  extended  their  liberality  to  the  native 
Irish  or  the  professors  of  the  ancient  religion." 
What  schoolboy  of  fourteen  is  ignorant  of  this 
remarkable  circumstance  1  What  Whig,  new 
or  old,  was  ever  such  an  idiot  as  to  think  that 
it  could  be  suppressed '!  Really,  we  might  as 
well  say  that  it  is  a  remarkable  circumstance, 
familiar  to  people  well  read  in  history,  but 
carefully  suppressed  by  the  clergy  of  the 
Established  Church,  that  in  the  fifteenth  cen 
tury  England  was  Catholic.  We  are  tempted 
to  make  some  remarks  on  another  passage, 
which  seems  to  be  the  peroration  of  a  speech 
intended  to  be  spoken  agahist  the  Reform  bill: 
but  we  forbear. 

We  doubt  whether  it  will  be  found  that  the 
memory  of  Sir  William  Temple  owes  much  to 
Mr.  Courtenay's  researches.  Temple  is  one 
of  those  men  whom  the  world  has  agreed  to 
praise  highly  without  knowing  much  about 
them,  and  who  are  therefore  more  likely  to 
lose  than  to  gain  by  a  close  examination.  Yet 
he  is  not  without  fair  pretensions  to  the  most 
honourable  place  among  the  statesmen  of  his 
time.  A  few  of  them  equalled  or  surpassed 
him  in  talents ;  but  they  were  men  of  no  good 
repute  for  honesty.  A  few  may  be  named  whose 
patriotism  was  purer,  nobler,  and  more  dis 
interested  than  his  ;  but  they  were  men  of  no 
eminent  ability.  Morally,  he  was  above  Shaftes- 
bury;  intellectually,  he  was  above  Russell. 

To  say  of  a  man  that  he  occupied  a  high 
position  in  times  of  misgovern ment,  cf  cor 
ruption,  of  civil  and  religious  faction,  and  that, 
nevertheless,  he  contracted  no  great  stain,  and 
bore  no  part  in  any  crime; — that  he  won  the 
esteem  of  a  profligate  court  and  of  a  tuibulent 
people,  without  being  guilty  of  any  great  sub 
serviency  to  either, — seems  to  be  very  high 
praise ;  and  all  this  may  with  truth  be  said  of 
Temple. 

Yet  Temple  is  not  a  man  to  oui  taste.    A 

temper  not  naturally  good,  but  under  strict 

command, — a  constant  regard  to  decorum, — a 

rare  caution  in  playing  that  mixed  game  of 

skill  and  hazard,  human  hie, — a.  disposition  to 

be  content  with  small  and  certain  winning* 

rather  than  go  on  doubling  the  stake, — these 

!  seem  to  us  to  be  the  most  remarkable  feature 

I  of  his   character.    This   sort  of  moderat:on, 

i  when  united,  a.<  in  him  it  was,  wi'.h  very  con 


246 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


siderahle  abilities,  is,  under  ordinary  circum-  \ 
stances,  scarcely  to  be  distinguished  from  the  , 
highest  and  purest  integrity;  and  yet  may  be  | 
perfectly  compatible  with  laxity  of  principle, 
with  coldness  of  heart,  and  with  the  most  in-  i 
tense  selfishness.  Temple,  we  fear,  had  not 
sufficient  warmth  and  elevation  of  sentiment 
to  deserve  the  name  of  a  virtuous  man.  He 
did  net  betray  or  oppress  his  country :  nay,  he 
Tendered  considerable  service  to  her;  but  he 
risked  nothing  for  her.  No  temptation  which 
either  the  King  or  the  Opposition  could  hold 
out  ever  induced  him  to  come  forward  as  the 
supporter  either  of  arbitrary  or  of  factious 
measures.  But  he  was  most  careful  not  to  give 
offence  by  strenuously  opposing  such  measures. 
He  never  put  himself  prominently  before  the 
public  eye,  except  at  conjunctures  when  he 
was  almost  certain  to  gain,  and  could  not  pos 
sibly  lose  ; — at  conjunctures  when  the  interest 
of  the  state,  the  views  of  the  court,  and  the 
passions  of  the  multitude  all  appeared  for  an 
instant  to  coincide.  By  judiciously  availing 
himself  of  several  of  these  rare  moments,  he 
succeeded  in  establishing  a  high  character  for 
wisdom  and  patriotism.  When  the  favourable 
crisis  was  passed,  he  never  risked  the  reputa 
tion  which  he  had  won.  He  avoided  the  great 
offices  of  state  which  a  caution  almost  pusilla 
nimous,  and  confined  himself  to  quiet  and  se 
cluded  departments  of  public  business,  in 
which  he  could  enjoy  moderate  but  certain  ad 
vantage  without  incurring  envy.  If  the  cir 
cumstances  of  the  country  became  such  that 
it  was  impossible  to  take  any  part  in  politics 
without  some  danger,  he  retired  to  his  Library 
and  his  Orchard;  and.  while  the  nation  groan 
ed  under  oppression,  or  resounded  with  tumult 
and  with  the  din  of  civil  arms,  amused  him 
self  by  writing  Memoirs  and  tying  up  Apricots. 
His  political  career  bore  some  resemblance  to 
the  military  career  of  Louis  XIV.  Louis,  lest 
his  royal  dignity  should  be  compromised  by 
failure,  never  repaired  to  a  siege,  till  it  had 
been  reported  to  him  by  the  most  skilful  offi 
cers  in  his  service  that  nothing  could  prevent 
the  fall  of  the  place.  When  this  was  ascer 
tained,  the  monarch,  in  his  helmet  and  cuirass, 
appeared  among  the  tents,  held  councils  of 
war,  dictated  the  capitulation,  received  the 
keys,  and  then  returned  to  Versailles  to  hear 
his  flatterers  repeat  that  Turenne  had  been 
beaten  at  Mariendal,  that  Conde  had  been 
forced  to  raise  the  siege  of  Arras,  and  that  the 
only  warrior  whose  glory  had  never  been  ob 
scured  by  a  single  check  was  Louis  the  Great! 
Yet  Conde  and  Turenne  will  always  be  con 
sidered  captains  of  a  very  different  order  from 
the  invincible  Louis  ;  and  we  must  own  that 
many  statesmen  who  have  committed  very 
great  faults,  appear  to  us  to  be  deserving  of 
more  esteem  than  the  faultless  Temple.  For 
in  truth  his  faultlessness  is  chiefly  to  be  as 
cribed  to  his  extreme  dread  of  all  responsibi 
lity; — tc  his  determination  rather  to  leave  his 
country  in  a  scrape  than  to  run  any  chance  of 
being  in  a  scrape  himself  He  seems  to  have 
been  averse  from  danger;  and  it  must  be  ad 
mitted  that  the  dangers  to  which  a  public  man 
was  exposed,  in  those  days  of  conflicting  ty 
ranny  and  sedition,  were  of  the  most  serious 


kind.  He  could  not  bear  discomfort,  bodily  or 
mental.  His  lamentations  when,  in  the  course 
of  his  diplomatic  journeys,  he  was  put  a  little 
out  his  way,  and  forced,  in  the  vulgar  phrase, 
to  rough  it,  are  quite  amusing.  He  talks  of 
riding  a  day  or  two  on  a  bad  Westphalian  road, 
of  sleeping  on  straw  for  one  night,  of  travelling 
in  winter  when  the  snow  lay  on  the  ground,  as 
if  he  had  gone  on  an  expedition  to  the  North 
Pole  or  to  the  source  of  the  Nile.  This  kind 
of  valetudinarian  effeminacy,  this  habit  of  cod 
dling  himself,  appears  in  all  parts  of  his  con 
duct.  He  loved  fame,  but  not  with  the  love  of 
an  exalted  and  generous  mind.  He  loved  it  as 
an  end,  not  at  all  as  a  means  ; — as  a  personal 
luxury,  not  at  all  as  an  instrument  of  advantage 
to  others.  He  scraped  it  together  and  treasured 
it  up  with  a  timid  and  niggardly  thrift;  and 
never  employed  the  hoard  in  any  enterprise, 
however  virtuous  and  honourable,  in  which 
there  was  hazard  of  losing  one  particle.  No 
wonder  if  such  a  person  did  little  or  nothing 
which  deserves  positive  blame.  But  much 
more  than  this  may  justly  be  demanded  of  a 
man  possessed  of  such  abilities  and  placed  in 
such  a  situation.  Had  Temple  been  brought 
before  Dante's  infernal  tribunal,  he  would  not 
have  been  condemned  to  the  deeper  recesses 
of  the  abyss.  He  would  not  have  been  boiled 
with  Dundee  in  the  crimson  pool  of  Bnlicame, 
or  hurled  wiih  Danby  into  the  seething  pitch 
of  Malebolge,  or  congealed  with  Churchill  in 
the  eternal  ice  of  Giudecca  ;  but  he  would  per 
haps  have  been  placed  in  a  dark  vestibule  next 
to  the  shade  of  that  inglorious  pontiff — 

"  Che  fece  per  viltate  il  gran  rifiuto." 

Of  course  a  man  is  not  bound  to  be  a  politi 
cian  any  more  than  he  is  bound  to  be  a  soldier; 
and  there  are  perfectly  honourable  ways  of 
quitting  both  politics  and  the  military  profes 
sion.  But  neither  in  the  one  way  of  life,  nor 
in  the  other,  is  any  man  entitled  to  take  all  the 
sweet  and  leave  all  the  sour.  A  man  who 
belongs  to  the  army  only  in  time  of  peace,— 
who  appears  at  reviews  in  Hyde  Park,  escorts 
the  sovereign  with  the  utmost  valour  and 
fidelity  to  and  from  the  House  of  Lords,  and  re 
tires  as  soon  as  he  thinks  it  likely  that  he  may 
be  ordered  on  an  expedition — is  justly  thought 
to  have  disgraced  himself.  Some  portion  of 
the  censure  due  to  such  a  holiday-soldier  may 
justly  fall  on  the  mere  holiday-politician,  who 
flinches  from  his  duties  as  soon  as  those  du 
ties  become  difficult  and  disagreeable ; — thai  is 
to  say,  as  soon  as  it  becomes  peculiarly  im 
portant  that  he  should  resolutely  perform  them. 

But  though  we  are  lar  indeed  from  consider 
ing  Temj,le  as  a  perfect  statesmen,  though  we 
place  him  below  many  statesmen  who  have 
committed  very  great  errors,  we  cannot  deny 
that,  when  compared  with  his  contemporaries, 
he  makes  a  highly  respectable  appearance. 
The  reaction  which  followed  the  victory  of  the 
popular  party  over  Charles  the  First,  had  pro 
duced  a  hurtful  effect  on  the  national  charac 
ter  ;  and  this  effect  was  most  discernible  in  the 
classes  and  in  the  places  which  had  been  mosi 
strongly  excited  by  the  recent  Revolution.  The 
deterioration  was  greater  in  London  than  in  the 
country,  and  was  greates tof  all  in  the  courtly  and 


SIR   WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


347 


official  circles.  Almost  all  that  remained  of  what 
had  been  good  and  noble  in  the  Cavaliers  and 
Roundheads  of  1642,  was  now  to  be  found  in 
the  middling  orders.  The  principles  and  feel 
ings  which  prompted  the  "Grand  Remon 
strance"  were  still  strong  among  the  sturdy 
yeomen,  and  the  decent  God-fearing  merchants. 
The  spirit  of  Derby  and  Capel  still  glowed  in 
many  sequestered  manor-houses ;  but  among 
those  political  leaders  who,  at  the  time  of  the 
Restoration,  were  still  young,  or  in  the  vigour 
of  manhood,  there  was  neither  a  Southampton 
nor  a  Vane,  neither  a  Falkland  nor  a  Hamp- 
den.  That  pure,  fervent,  and  constant  loyalty 
which,  in  the  preceding  reign,  had  remained 
unshaken  on  fields  of  disastrous  battle,  in 
foreign  garrets  and  cellars,  and  at  the  bar  of 
the  High  Court  of  Justice,  was  scarcely  to  be 
found  among  the  rising  courtiers.  As  little,  or 
still  less,  could  the  new  chiefs  of  parties  lay 
claim  to  the  great  qualities  of  the  statesmen 
who  had  stood  at  the  head  of  the  Long  Parlia 
ment.  Hampden,  Pym,  Vane,  Cromwell,  are 
discriminated  from  the  ablest  politicians  of 
the  succeeding  generation,  by  all  the  strong 
lineaments  which  distinguish  the  men  who 
produce  revolutions  from  the  men  whom  revo 
lutions  produce.  The  leader  in  a  great  change, 
the  man  who  stirs  up  a  reposing  community, 
and  overthrows  a  deeply-rooted  system,  may  be 
a  very  depraved  man  ;  but  he  can  scarcely  be 
destitute  of  some  moral  qualities  which  extort 
even  from  enemies  a  reluctant  admiration — 
fixedness  of  purpose,  intensity  of  will,  enthu 
siasm  which  is  not  the  less  fierce  or  perse 
vering,  because  it  is  sometimes  disguised  under 
the  semblance  of  composure,  and  which  bears 
down  before  it  the  forue  of  circumstances  and 
the  opposition  of  reluctant  minds.  These 
qualities,  variously  combined  with  all  sorts  of 
virtues  and  vices,  may  be  found,  we  think,  in 
most  of  the  authors  of  great  civil  and  religious 
movements, — in  Caesar,  in  Mohammed,  in 
Hildebrand,  in  Dominic,  in  Luther,  in  Robes 
pierre;  and  these  qualities  were  found,  in  no 
scanty  measure,  among  the  chiefs  of  the  party 
which  opposed  Charles  the  First.  The  cha 
racter  of  the  men  whose  minds  are  formed  in 
the  midst  of  the  confusion  which  follows  a 
great  revolution  is  generally  very  different. 
Heat,  the  natural  philosophers  tell  us,  produces 
rarefaction  of  the  air,  and  rarefaction  of  the  air 
produces  cold.  So  zeal  makes  revolutions, 
and  revolutions  make  men  zealous  for  nothing. 
The  politicians  of  whom  we  speak,  whatever 
may  be  their  natural  capacity  or  courage,  are 
almost  always  characterized  by  a  peculiar 
levity,  a  peculiar  inconstancy,  an  easy,  apa 
thetic  way  of  looking  at  the  most  solemn  ques 
tions,  a  willingness  to  leave  the  direction  of 
their  course  to  fortune  and  popular  opinion,  a 
notion  that  one  public  cause  is  pretty  nearly 
as  good  as  another,  and  a  firm  conviction  that 
it  is  much  better  to  be  the  hireling  of  the  worst 
cause  than  to  be  a  martyr  to  the  best. 

This  was  most  strikingly  the  case  with  the 
English  statesmen  of  the  generation  which  fol 
lowed  the  Restoration.  They  had  neither  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  Cavalier,  nor  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  Republican.  They  had  been  early  eman 
cipated  fiom  the  dominion  of  old  usages  and 


j  feelings;  yet  they  had  not  acquired  a  strong 
!  passion  for  innovation.  Accustomed  to  see  old 
establishments  shaking,  falling,  lying  in  ruins 
all  around  them, — to  live  under  a  succession 
of  constitutions,  of  which  the  average  dura 
tion  was  about  a  twelvemonth, — they  had  no 
religious  reverence  for  prescription; — nothing 
of  that  frame  of  mind  which  naturally  springs 
from  the  habitual  contemplatior  of  immemorial 
antiquity  and  immovable  stability.  Accustom 
ed,  on  the  other  hand,  to  see  change  after  change 
welcomed  with  eager  hope  and  ending  in  dis 
appointment, — to  see  shame  and  confusion  of 
face  follow  the  extravagant  hopes  and  predic 
tions  of  rash  and  fanatical  innovators — they 
had  learned  to  look  on  professions  of  public 
spirit,  and  on  schemes  of  reform,  with  distrust 
and  contempt.  They  had  sometimes  talked 
the  language  of  devoted  subjects — sometimes 
that  of  ardent  lovers  of  their  country.  But 
their  secret  creed  seems  to  have  been,  that 
loyalty  was  one  great  delusion,  and  patriotism 
another.  If  they  really  entertained  any  predi 
lection  for  the  monarchical  or  for  the  popular 
part  of  the  constitution, — for  Episcopacy  or  for 
Presbyterianism, — that  predilection  was  feeble 
and  languid;  and  instead  of  overcoming,  as  in 
the  times  of  their  fathers,  the  dread  of  exile,  con 
fiscation,  and  death,  was  rarely  of  proof  to  resist 
the  slightest  impulse  of  selfish  ambition  or  of 
selfish  fear.  Such  was  the  texture  of  the  Pres 
byterianism  of  Lauderdale,  and  of  the  specula 
tive  republicanism  of  Halifax.  The  sense  of 
political  honour  seemed  to  be  extinct.  With 
the  great  mass  of  mankind,  the  test  of  integrity 
in  a  public  man  is  consistency.  This  test, 
though  very  defective,  is  perhaps  the  best  that 
any,  except  very  acute  or  very  near  observers, 
are  capable  of  applying ;  and  does  undoubtedly 
enable  the  people  to  form  an  estimate  of  the 
characters  of  the  great,  which,  on  the  whole, 
approximates  to  correctness.  But  during  the 
latter  part  of  the  seventeenth  century,  incon 
sistency  had  necessarily  ceased  to  be  a  dis 
grace  ;  and  a  man  was  no  more  taunted  with 
it,  than  he  is  taunted  with  being  black  at  Tim- 
buctoo.  Nobody  was  ashamed  of  avowing 
what  was  common  to  him  with  the  whole 
nation.  In  the  short  space  of  about  seven 
years,  the  supreme  power  had  been  held  by  the 
Long  Parliament,  by  a  Council  of  Officers,  by 
Barebone's  Parliament,  by  a  Council  of  Officers 
again,  by  CL  Protector  according  to  the  Instru 
ment  of  Government,  by  a  Protector  according 
to  the  humble  petition  and  advice,  by  the  Long 
Parliament  again,  by  a  third  Council  of  Officers, 
by  the  Long  Parliament  a  third  time,  by  the 
Convention,  and  by  the  king.  In  such  times, 
consistency  is  so  inconvenient  to  a  man  who 
affects  it,  and  to  all  who  are  connected  with 
him,  that  it  ceases  to  be  regarded  as  a  virtue, 
and  is  considered  as  impracticable  obstinacy 
and  idle  scrupulosity.  Indeed,  in  such  times, 
a  good  citizen  may  be  bound  in  duty  to  serve 
a  succession  of  governments.  Blake  did  so 
in  one  profession,  and  Hale  in  another;  and 
the  conduct  of  both  has  been  approved  by  pos 
terity.  But  it  is  clear  that  when  inconsistency 
with  respect  to  the  most  important  public 
questions  has  ceased  to  be  a  reproach,  incon 
sistency  with  respect  to  questions  of  minor 


348 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


importance  is  not  likely  to   be  regarded  as  j 
rXshonouidble.    In  a  country  in  which  many: 
very  honest  people  had,  within  the  space  of  a  j 
Tew  months,  supported  the  government  of  the 
Protector,  that  of  the  Rump,  and  that  ol  the 
King,  a  man  was  not  likely  to  be  ashamed  of 
abandoning  his  party  for  a  place,  or  of  voting 
for  a  bill  which  he  had  opposed. 

The  public  men  of  the  times  which  followed 
the  Restoration  were  by  no  means  deficient  in 
courage  or  ability;  and  some  kinds  of  talent 
appear  to  have  been  developed  amongst  them 
to  a  remarkable — we  might  almost  say,  to  a 
morbid  and  unnatural  degree.  Neither  Thera- 
menes  in  ancient,  nor  Talleyrand  in  modern 
times,  had  a  finer  perception  of  all  the  pecu 
liarities  of  character,  and  of  all  the  indications 
of  coming  change,  than  some  of  our  country 
men  of  those  days.  Their  power  of  reading 
things  of  high  import,  in  signs  which  to  others 
were  invisible  or  unintelligible,  resembled 
magic.  But  the  curse  of  Reuben  was  upon 
them  all :  "  Unstable  as  water,  thou  shall  not 
excel." 

This  character  is  susceptible  of  innumerable 
modifications,  according  to  the  innumerable 
varieties  of  intellect  and  temper  in  which  it 
may  be  found.  Men  of  unquiet  minds  and 
violent  ambition  followed  a  fearfully  eccentric 
course — darted  wildly  from  one  extreme  to 
another — served  and  betrayed  all  parties  in 
turn — showed  their  unblushing  foreheads  al 
ternately  in  the  van  of  the  most  corrupt  admi 
nistrations  and  the  most  factious  oppositions — 
were  privy  to  the  most  guilty  mysteries,  first 
of  the  Cabal,  and  then  of  the  Rye-House  Plot 
— abjured  their  religion  to  win  their  sovereign's 
favour,  while  they  were  secretly  planning  his 
overthrow — shrived  themselves  to  Jesuits  with 
letters  in  cipher  from  the  Prince  of  Orange  in 
their  pockets — corresponded  with  the  Hague 
whilst  in  office  under  James — began  to  corres 
pond  with  St.  Germains  as  soon  as  they  had 
kissed  hands  for  office  under  William.  But 
Temple  was  not  one  of  these.  He  was  not 
destitute  of  ambition.  But  his  was  not  one  of 
those  souls  within  which  unsatisfied  ambition 
anticipates  the  tortures  of  hell,  gnaws  like  the 
worm  which  dieth  not,  and  burns  like  the  fire 
which  is  not  quenched.  His  principle  was  to 
make  sure  of  safety  and  comfort,  and  to  let 
greatness  come  if  it  would.  It  came :  he  en 
joyed  it:  and  in  the  very  first  moment  in  which 
it  could  no  longer  be  enjoyed  without  danger 
and  vexation,  he  contentedly  let  it  go.  He  was 
not  exempt,  we  think,  from  the  prevailing  politi 
cal  immorality.  His  mind  took  the  contagion, 
but  took  it  ad  modum  rccipientis ; — in  a  form  so 
mild  that  an  undiscerning  judge  might  doubt 
whether  it  were  indeed  the  same  fierce  pesti 
lence  that  was  raging  all  around.  The  malady 
partook  of  the  constitutional  languor  of  the 
patient.  The  general  corruption,  mitigated  by 
his  calm  and  unadventurous  temperament, 
showed  itself  in  omissions  and  desertions,  not 
in  positive  crimes;  and  his  inactivity,  though 
sometimes  timorous  and  selfish,  becomes  re- 
«>pec!able  Avhen  compared  with  the  malevolent 
and  perfidious  restlessness  of  Shaftesbury  and 
8ur.derlanl. 

Temple  sprang  from  a  family  which,  though 


ancient  and  honourable,  had,  before  his  time* 
been  scarcely  mentioned  in  our  history;  but 
which,  long  after  his  death,  produced  so' many 
eminent  men,  and  formed  such  distinguished 
alliances,  that  it  exercised,  in  a  regular  and 
constitutional  manner,  an  influence  in  the  state 
scarcely  inferior  to  that  which,  in  widely  differ 
ent  times,  and  by  widely  different  arts,  the 
house  of  Neville  attained  in  England,  and  that 
of  Douglas  in  Scotland.  During  the  latter 
years  of  George  II.,  and  through  the  whole 
reign  of  George  III.,  members  of  that  widely 
spread  and  powerful  connection  were  al.uost 
constantly  at  the  head  either  of  the  Government 
or  of  the  Opposition.  There  were  times  when 
the  "cousinhood,"  as  it  was  once  nicknamed, 
M'ould  of  itself  have  furnished  almost  all  the 
materials  necessary  for  the  construction  of  an 
efficient  cabinet.  Within  the  space  of  fifty 
years,  three  First  Lords  of  the  Treasury,  three 
Secretaries  of  State,  two  Keepers  of  the  Privy 
Seal,  and  four  First  Lords  of  the  Admiralty 
were  appointed  from  among  the  sons  and  grand 
sons  of  the  Countess  Temple. 

So  splendid  have  been  the  fortunes  of  the 
main  stock  of  the  Temple  family,  continued  by 
female  succession.  William  Temple,  the  first 
of  the  line  who  attained  to  any  great  historical 
eminence,  was  of  a  younger  branch.  His  fa 
ther,  Sir  John  Temple,  was  Master  of  the  Rolls 
in  Ireland,  and  distinguished  himself  among 
the  Privy  Councillors  of  that  kingdom  by  the 
zeal  with  which,  at  the  commencement  of  the 
struggle  between  the  crown  and  the  Long 
Parliament,  he  supported  the  popular  cause. 
He  was  arrested  by  order  of  the  Duke  of  Or- 
mond,  but  regained  his  liberty  by  an  exchange, 
repaired  to  England,  and  there  sat  in  the  House 
of  Commons  as  burgess  for  Chichester.  He  at 
tached  himself  to  the  Presbyterian  party,  and 
was  one  of  those  moderate  members  who,  at 
the  close  of  the  year  1648,  voted  for  treating 
with  Charles  on  the  basis  to  which  that  prince 
had  himself  agreed,  and  who  were,  in  conse 
quence,  turned  out  of  the  House,  with  small 
ceremony,  by  Colonel  Pride.  Sir  John  seems, 
however,  to  have  made  his  peace  with  the 
victorious  Independents ;  for,  in  1653,  he  re 
sumed  his  office  in  Ireland. 

Sir  John  Temple  was  married  to  a  sister  of 
the  celebrated  Henry  Hammond,  a  learned  and 
pious  divine,  who  took  the  side  of  the  king 
with  very  conspicuous  zeal  during  the  Civil 
War,  and  was  deprived  of  his  preferment  in  the 
church  after  the  victory  of  the  Parliament.  On 
account  of  the  loss  which  Hammond  sustained 
on  this  occasion,  he  has  the  honour  of  being 
designated,  in  the  cant  of  that  new  brood  of 
Oxonian  sectaries  who  unite  the  worst  parts  of 
the  Jesuit  to  the  worst  parts  of  the  Orange 
man,  as  Hammond,  Presbyter,  Doctor,  and 
Confessor. 

William  Temple,  Sir  John's  eldest  son,  was 

born  in  London,  in  the  year  1628.    He  received 

his  early  education  under  his  maternal  uncle, 

was  subsequently  sent  to  school   at  Bishop- 

I  Stortford,  and,  at  seventeen,  began  to  reside  at 

j  Emmanuel    College,  Cambridge,   where    the 

;  celebrated  Cud  worth  was  his  tutor.    The  times 

j  were  not  favourable  to  study.    The  Civil  War 

!  disturbed  even  the  quiet  cloisters  and  bowling. 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


greens  of  Cambridge,  produced  violent  revolu 
tions  in  the  government  and  discipline  of  the 
colleges,  and  unsettled  the  minds  of  the  stu 
dents.  Temple  forgot  at  Emmanuel  all  the  little 
Greek  which  he  had  brought  from  Bishop- 
Stortford,  and  never  retrieved  the  loss; — a  cir 
cumstance  which  would  hardly  be  worth  notic 
ing  but  for  the  almost  incredible  fact,  that  fifty 
years  later,  he  was  so  absurd  as  to  set  up  his 
own  authority  against  that  of  Bentley  on  ques 
tions  of  Greek  history  and  philology.  He  made 
no  proficiency  either  in  the  old  philosophy 
which  still  lingered  in  the  schools  of  Cam 
bridge,  or  in  the  new  philosophy  of  which 
Lord  Bacon  was  the  founder.  But  to  the  end 
of  his  life  he  continued  to  speak  of  the  former 
with  ignorant  admiration,  and  of  the  latter 
with  equally  ignorant  contempt. 

After  residing  at  Cambridge  two  years,  he 
departed  without  taking  a  degree,  and  set  out 
upon  his  travels.  He  seems  then  to  have  been 
a  lively,  agreeable  young  man  of  fashion,  not 
by  any  means  deeply  read,  but  versed  in  all 
the  superficial  accomplishments  of  a  gentle 
man,  and  acceptable  in  all  polite  societies.  In 
politics  he  professed  himself  a  Royalist.  His 
opinions  on  religious  subjects  seem  to  have 
been  such  as  might  be  expected  from  a  young 
man  of  quick  parts,  who  had  received  a  ram 
bling  education,  who  had  not  thought  deeply, 
who  had  been  disgusted  by  the  morose  austeri 
ty  of  the  Puritans,  and  who,  surrounded  from 
childhood  by  the  hubbub  of  conflicting  sects, 
might  easily  learn  to  feel  an  impartial  contempt 
for  them  all. 

On  his  road  to  France  he  fell  in  with  the  son 
and  daughter  of  Sir  Peter  Osborne.  Sir  Peter 
was  Governor  of  Guernsey  for  the  king,  and 
the  young  people  were,  like  the  father,  warm 
for  the  royal  cause.  At  an  inn  where  they 
stopped,  in  the  Isle  of  Wight,  the  brother 
amused  himself  with  inscribing  on  the  windows 
his  opinion  of  the  ruling  powers.  For  this  in 
stance  of  malignancy  the  whole  party  were  ar 
rested  and  brought  before  the  governor.  The 
sister,  trusting  to  the  tenderness  which,  even 
in  those  troubled  times,  scarcely  any  gentle 
man  of  any  party  ever  failed  to  show  where  a 
woman  was  concerned,  took  the  crime  on  her 
self,  and  was  immediately  set  at  liberty  with 
her  fe I  low-travellers. 

This  incident,  as  was  natural,  made  a  deep 
impression  on  Temple.  He  was  only  twenty. 
Dorothy  Osborne  was  twenty-one.  She  is  said 
to  have  been  handsome;  and  there  remains 
abundant  proof  that  she  possessed  an  ample 
share  of  the  dexterity,  the  vivacity,  and  the 
tenderness  of  her  sex.  Temple  soon  became, 
in  the  phrase  of  that  time,  her  servant,  and  she 
returned  his  regard.  But  difficulties  as  great 
as  ever  expanded  a  novel  to  the  fifth  volume,  op 
posed  their  wishes.  When  the  courtship  com 
menced,  the  father  of  the  hero  was  sitting  in 
the  Long  Parliament,  the  father  of  the  heroine 
was  holding  Guernsey  for  King  Charles. 
Even  when  the  war  ended,  and  Sir  Peter  Os 
borne  returned  to  his  seat  at  Chicksands,  the 
prospects  of  the  lovers  were  scarcely  less 
gloomy.  Sir  John  Temple  had  a  more  advan 
tageous  alliance  in  view  for  his  son.  Dorothy 
Osborne  was  in  the  mean  time  beseiged  by  as 


many  suitors  as  were  drawn  to  Belmont  uy  the 
fame  of  Portia.  The  most  distinguished  on. 
the  list  was  Henry  Cromwell.  Destitute  of  the 
capacity,  the  energy,  the  magnanimity  of  his 
illustrious  father,  destitute  also  of  the  meek 
and  placid  virtues  of  his  elder  brother,  this 
young  rnan  was  perhaps  a  more  formidable 
rival  in  love  than  either  of  them  would  have 
been.  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  speaking  the  senti 
ments  of  the  grave  and  aged,  describes  him  as 
an  "insolent  fool,"  and  a  "debauched  ungodly- 
Cavalier."  These  expressions  probably  mean 
that  he  was  one  who,  among  young  and  dissi 
pated  people,  would  pass  for  a  fine  gentleman. 
Dorothy  was  fond  of  dogs  of  larger  and  more 
formidable  breed  than  those  which  lie  on  mo 
dern  hearth-rugs ;  and  Henry  Cromwell  pro 
mised  that  the  highest  functionaries  at  Dublin 
should  be  set  to  work  to  procure  her  a  fine 
Irish  greyhound.  She  seems  to  have  felt  his 
attentions  as  very  flattering,  though  his  father 
was  then  only  Lord-General,  and  not  yet  Pro 
tector.  Love,  however,  triumphed  over  ambi 
tion,  and  the  young  lady  appears  never  to  have 
regretted  her  decision  ;  though,  in  a  letter  writ 
ten  just  at  the  time  when  all  England  was  ring 
ing  with  the  news  of  the  violent  dissolution  of 
the  Long  Parliament,  she  could  not  refrain 
from  reminding  Temple,  with  pardonable  va 
nity,  "how  great  she  might  have  been,  if  she 
had  been  so  wise  as  to  have  taken  hold  of  the 
offer  of  H.  C." 

Nor  was  it  only  the  influence  of  rivals;  that 
Temple  had  to  dread.  The  relations  of  his 
mistress  regarded  him  with  personal  dislike, 
and  spoke  of  him  as  an  unprincipled  adven 
turer,  without  honour  or  religion,  ready  to  ren 
der  services  to  any  party  for  the  sake  of  pre 
ferment.  This  is,  indeed,  a  very  distorted  view 
of  Temple's  character.  Yet  a  character,  even 
in  the  most  distorted  view  taken  of  it  by  the 
most  angry  and  prejudiced  minds,  generally 
retains  something  of  its  outline.  No  carica 
turist  ever  represented  Mr.  Pitt  as  a  Falstaff, 
or  Mr.  Fox  as  a  skeleton;  nor  did  any  libeller 
ever  impute  parsimony  to  Sheridan,  or  profu 
sion  to  Marlborougn.  It  must  be  allowed  that 
the  turn  of  mind  whicn  the  eulogists  of  Tem 
ple  have  dignified  with  the  appellation  of  phi 
losophical  indifference,  and  which,  however 
becoming  it  may  be  in  an  old  and  experienced 
statesman,  has  a  somewhat  ungraceful  appear 
ance  in  youth,  might  easily  appear  shocking  to 
a  family  who  were  ready  to  fight  or  suffer  mar 
tyrdom  for  their  exiled  king  and  their  perse 
cuted  church.  The  poor  girl  was  exceedingly 
hurt  and  irritated  by  these  imputations  on  her 
lover,  defended  him  warmly  behind  his  back, 
and  addressed  to  himself  some  very  tender  and 
anxious  admonitions,  mingled  with  assurances 
of  her  confidence  in  his  honour  and  virtue.  On 
one  occasion  she  was  most  highly  provoked  by 
the  way  in  which  one  of  her  brothers  spoke 
of  Temple:  "We  talked  ourselves  weary," 
she  says — "he  renounced  me,  and  I  defied 
him." 

Nearly  seven  years  did  this  arduous  wooing 
continue.  We  are  not  accurately  informed 
respecting  Temple's  movements  duiing  that 
time.  But  he  seems  to  have  led  a  rambling 
life,  sometimes  on  the  Continent,  sometimes  ID 
2G 


350 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Ireland,  sometimes  in  London.  He  made  him 
self  master  of  the  French  and  Spanish  lan 
guages,  and  amused  himself  by  writing  Essays 
and  Romances — an  employment  which  at  least 
served  the  purpose  of  forming  his  style.  The 
specimen  which  Mr.  Courtenay  has  preserved 
of  those  early  compositions  is  by  no  means 
contemptible.  Indeed,  there  is  one  passage 
on  Like  and  Dislike  which  could  have  been  pro 
duced  only  by  a  mind  habituated  carefully  to 
reflect  on  its  own  operations,  and  which  re 
minds  us  of  the  best  things  in  Montaigne. 

He  appears  to  have  kept  up  a  very  active  cor 
respondence  with  his  mistress.  His  letters  are 
lost,  but  hers  have  been  preserved;  and  many 
of  them  appear  in  these  volumes.  Mr.  Cour 
tenay  expresses  some  doubt  whether  his  read 
ers  will  think  him  justified  in  inserting  so 
large  a  number  of  these  epistles.  We  only 
wish  that  there  were  twice  as  many.  Very 
little  indeed  of  the  diplomatic  correspondence 
of  that  generation  is  so  well  worth  reading. 
There  is  a  vile  phrase  of  which  bad  historians 
are  exceedingly  fond — "  the  dignity  of  history." 
One  writer  is  in  possession  of  some  anecdotes 
which  would  illustrate  most  strikingly  the  ope 
ration  of  the  Mississippi  scheme  on  the  man 
ners  and  morals  of  the  Parisians.  But  he 
suppresses  those  anecdotes  because  they  are 
too  low  for  the  dignity  of  history.  Another  is 
strongly  tempted  to  mention  some  facts  indi 
cating  the  horrible  state  of  the  prisons  of  Eng 
land  two  hundred  years  ago.  But  he  hardly 
thinks  that  the  sufferings  of  a  dozen  felons 
pigging  together  on  bare  bricks  in  a  hole  fifteen 
feet  square  would  form  a  subject  suited  to  the 
dignity  of  history.  Another,  from  respect  for 
the  dignity  of  history,  publishes  an  account  of 
the  reign  of  George  II.,  without  ever  mention 
ing  Whitefield's  preaching  in  Moorfields.  How 
should  a  writer,  who  can  talk  about  senates, 
and  congresses  of  sovereigns,  and  pragmatic 
sanctions,  and  ravelines,  and  counterscarps, 
and  battles  where  ten  thousand  men  are  killed 
and  six  thousand  men  with  fifty  stands  of  co 
lours  and  eighty  guns  taken,  stoop  to  the  Stock- 
Exchange,  to  Newgate,  to  the  theatre,  to  the 
tabernacle  ] 

Tragedy  has  its  dignity  as  well  as  history ; 
and  how  much  the  tragic  art  has  owed  to  that 
.lignity  any  man  may  judge  who  will  compare 
the  majestic  Alexandrines  in  which  the  "  Seig 
neur  Oreste"  and  "  Madame  Andromaque"  utter 
their  complaints,  with  the  chattering  of  the  fool 
in  "  Lear,"  and  of  the  nurse  in  "  Romeo  and 
Juliet." 

That  an  historian  should  not  record  trifles, 
that  he  should  confine  himself  to  what  is  im 
portant,  is  perfectly  true.  But  many  writers 
seem  never  to  have  considered  on  what  the  his 
torical  importance  of  an  event  depends.  They 
seem  not  to  oe  aware  that  the  importance  of  a 
fact,  when  that  fact  is  considered  with  refer 
ence  to  its  immediate  effects,  and  the  import 
ance  of  the  same  fact,  when  that  fact  is  con 
sidered  as  part  of  the  materials  for  the  con 
struction  of  a  science,  are  two  very  different 
things.  The  quantity  of  good  or  evil  which  a 
transaction  produces  is  by  no  means  necessa 
rily  proportioned  to  the  quantity  of  light  which 
that  transaction  affords  as  to  the  way  in  which  i 


good  or  evil  may  hereafter  be  produced.  The 
poisoning  of  an  emperor  is  in  one  sense  a  far 
more  serious  matter  than  the  poisoning  of  a 
rat.  But  the  poisoning  of  a  rat  may  be  an  era 
in  chemistry;  and  an  emperor  may  be  poisoned 
by  such  ordinary  means,  and  with  such  ordi 
nary  symptoms,  that  no  scientific  journal  would 
notice  the  occurrence.  An  action  for  a  hun 
dred  thousand  pounds  is  in  one  sense  a  more 
momentous  affair  than  an  action  for  fifty 
pounds.  But  it  by  no  means  follows  that  the 
learned  gentlemen  who  report  the  proceedings 
of  the  courts  of  law  ought  to  give  a  fuller  ac 
count  of  an  action  for  a  hundred  thousand 
pounds  than  of  an  action  for  fifty  pounds.  For 
a  cause,  in  which  a  large  sum  is  at  stake,  rnay 
be  important  only  to  the  particular  plaintiff 
and  the  particular  defendant.  A  cause,  on  the 
other  hand,  in  which  a  small  sum  is  at  stake, 
may  establish  some  great  principle  interesting 
to  half  the  families  in  the  kingdom.  The  case 
is  exactly  the  same  with  that  class  of  subjects 
of  which  historians  treat.  To  an  Athenian,  in 
the  time  of  the  Pe'.oponnesian  war,  the  result 
of  the  battle  of  Delium  was  far  more  important 
than  the  fate  of  the  comedy  of  the  "  Knights." 
But  to  us  the  fact  that  the  comedy  of  the 
"  Knights"  was  brought  on  the  Athenian  stage 
with  success  is  far  more  important  than  the  fact 
that  the  Athenian  phalanx  gave  way  at  Delium. 
Neither  the  one  event  nor  the  other  has  any 
intrinsic  importance.  We  are  in  no  danger 
of  being  speared  by  the  Thebaris.  We  are  not 
quizzed  in  the  "Knights."  To  us,  the  import 
ance  of  both  events  consists  in  the  value  of 
the  general  truth  which  is  to  be  learned  from 
them.  What  general  truths  do  we  learn  from 
the  accounts  which  have  come  down  to  us  of 
the  battle  of  Delium  ?  Very  little  more  than 
this,  that  when  two  armies  fight,  it  is  not  im 
probable  that  one  of  them  will  be  very  soundly 
beaten — a  truth  which  it  would  not,  we  appre 
hend,  be  difficult  to  establish,  even  if  all  me 
mory  of  the  battle  of  Delium  were  lost  among 
men.  But  a  man  who  becomes  acquainted 
with  the  comedy  of  the  "  Knights,"  and  with 
the  history  of  that  comedy,  at  once  feels  his 
mind  enlarged.  Society  is  presented  to  him 
under  a  new  aspect.  He  may  have  read  and 
travelled  much.  He  may  have  visited  all  the 
countries  of  Europe,  and  the  civilized  nations 
of  the  East.  He  may  have  observed  the  man 
ners  of  many  barbarous  races.  But  here  is 
something  altogether  different  from  every  thing 
which  he  has  seen  either  among  polished  men 
or  among  savages.  Here  is  a  community,  po 
litically,  intellectually,  and  morally  unlike  any 
other  community  of  which  he  has  the  means 
of  forming  an  opinion.  This  is  the  really  pre 
cious  part  of  history, — the  corn  which  some 
threshers  carefully  sever  from  the  chaff,  for 
the  purpose  of  gathering  the  chaff  into  the 
garner,  and  flinging  the  corn  into  the  fire. 

Thinking  thus,  we  are  glad  to  learn  so  much, 
and  would  willingly  learn  more,  about  the 
loves  of  Sir  William  and  his  mistress.  In  the 
seventeenth  century,  to  be  sure,  Louis  A'lV. 
was  a  much  more  important  person  than  Tem 
ple's  sweetheart.  But  death  and  time  equalize 
all  things.  Neither  the  great  king,  nor  the 
beauty  of  Bedfordshire  —neither  the  gorgeous 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


paradise  of  Marli  nor  Mistress  Osborne's  fa- 
vourue  walk  "  in  the  common  that  lay  hard  by 
the  house,  where  a  great  many  young  wenches 
used  to  keep  sheep  and  cows  and  sit  in  the 
shade  singing  of  ballads," — is  any  thing  to  us. 
Louis  and  Dorothy  are  alike  dust.  A  cotton- 
mill  stands  on  the  ruins  of  Marli.  and  the  Os- 
bornes  have  ceased  to  dwell  under  the  ancient 
roof  of  the  Chicksands.  But  of  that  informa 
tion,  for  the  sake  of  which  alone  it  is  worth 
while  to  study  remote  events,  we  find  so  much 
in  the  love-letters  which  Mr.  Courtenay  has 
published,  that  we  would  gladly  purchase 
equally  interesting  billets  with  ten  times  their 
weight  in  state  papers  taken  at  random.  To  us 
surely  it  is  as  useful  to  know  how  the  young 
ladies  of  England  employed  themselves  a  hun 
dred  and  eighty  years  ago, — how  far  their 
minds  were  cultivated,  what  were  their  fa 
vourite  studies,  what  degree  of  liberty  was 
allowed  to  them,  and  what  use  they  made  of 
that  liberty,  what  accomplishments  they  most 
valued  in  men,  and  what  proofs  of  tenderness 
delicacy  permitted  them  to  give  to  favoured 
suitors, — as  to  know  all  about  the  seizure  of 
Tranche  Comte  and  the  treaty  of  Nimeguen. 
The  mutual  relations  of  the  two  sexes  seem  to 
us  to  be  at  least  as  important  as  the  mutual 
relations  of  any  two  governments  in  the  world  ; 
and  a  series  of  letters,  written  by  a  virtuous, 
amiable,  sensible  girl,  and  intended  for  the  eye 
of  her  lover  alone,  can  scarcely  fail  to  throw 
some  light  on  the  relations  of  the  sexes;  where 
as  it  is  perfectly  possible,  as  all  who  have 
made  any  historical  researches  can  attest,  to 
read  bale  after  bale  of  despatches  and  protocols 
without  catching  one  glimpse  of  light  about  the 
relations  of  governments. 

Mr.  Courtenay  proclaims  that  he  is  one  of 
Dorothy  Osborne's  devoted  servants,  and  ex 
presses  a  hope  that  the  publication  of  her  letters 
will  add  to  the  number.  We  must  declare  our 
selves  his  rival.  She  really  seems  to  have  been 
a  very  charming  young  woman — modest,  ge 
nerous,  affectionate,  intelligent,  and  sprightly, 
— a  royalist,  as  was  to  be  expected  from  her 
connections,  without  any  of  that  political  aspe 
rity  which  is  as  unwomanly  as  a  long  beard, — 
religious,  and  occasionally  gliding  into  a  very 
pretty  and  enduring  sort  of  preaching,  yet  not 
too  good  to  partake  of  such  diversions  as  Lon 
don  afforded  under  the  melancholy  rule  of  the 
Puritans,  or  to  giggle  a  little  at  a  ridiculous 
sermon  from  a  divine  who  was  thought  to  be 
one  of  the  great  lights  of  the  Assembly  at 
Westminster, — with  a  little  turn  for  coquetry, 
which  was  yet  perfectly  compatible  with  warm 
and  disinterested  attachment,  and  a  little  turn 
for  satire,  which  yet  seldom  passed  the  bounds 
of  good  nature.  She  loved  reading ;  but  her 
studies  were  not  those  of  Elizabeth  and  Lady 
Jane  Grey.  She  read  the  verses  of  Cowley 
and  Lord  Broghill,  French  Memoirs  recom 
mended  by  her  lover,  and  the  Travels  of  Fer 
nando  Mendez  Pinto.  But  her  favourite  books 
were  those  ponderous  French  Romances  which 
modern  readers  know  chiefly  from  the  pleasant 
satire  of  Charlotte  Lennox.  She  could  not, 
however,  help  laughing  at  the  vile  English  into 
which  they  were  translated.  Her  own  style  is 
verv  agreeable ;  n  )r  are  her  letters  at  all  the 


worse  for  some  passages  in  which  raillery  anil 
tenderness  are  mixed  in  a  very  engaging 
namby-pamby. 

When  at  last  the  constancy  of  the  lovers  had 
triumphed  over  all  the  obstacles  which  kins 
men  and  rivals  could  oppose  to  their  union,  a 
yet  more  serious  calamity  befell  them.  Poor 
Mistress  Osborne  fell  ill  of  the  small-pox,  and, 
though  she  escaped  with  life,  lost  all  her 
beauty.  To  this  most  severe  trial  the  affection 
and  honour  of  the  lovers  of  that  age  was  not 
unfrequently  subjected.  Our  readers  probably 
remember  what  Mrs.  Hutchinson  tells  us  of 
herself.  The  lofty  Cornelia-like  spirit  of  the 
aged  matron  seems  to  melt  into  a  long-forgotten 
softness  when  she  relates  how  her  beloved 
Colonel  "  married  her  as  soon  as  she  was  able 
to  quit  the  chamber,  when  the  priest  and  all 
that  saw  her  were  affrighted  to  look  on  hef. 
But  God,"  she  adds,  with  a  not  ungraceful  va 
nity,  "recompensed  his  justice  and  constancy, 
by  restoring  her  as  well  as  before."  Temple 
showed  on  this  occasion  the  same  "justice  and 
constancy"  which  did  so  much  honour  to 
Colonel  Hutchinson.  The  date  of  the  marriage 
is  not  exactly  known.  But  Mr.  Courtenay  sup 
poses  it  to  have  taken  place  about  the  end  of 
the  year  1654.  From  this  time  we  lose  sight 
of  Dorothy,  and  are  reduced  to  form  our  opi 
nion  of  the  terms  on  which  she  and  her  hus 
band  were,  from  very  slight  indications  which 
may  easily  mislead  us. 

Temple  soon  went  to  Ireland,  and  resided 
with  his  father,  partly  in  Dublin,  partly  in  the 
county  of  Carlow.  Ireland  was  probably  then 
a  more  agreeable  residence  for  the  higher 
classes,  as  compared  with  England,  than  it  has 
ever  been  before  or  since.  In  no  part  of  tha 
empire  were  the  superiority  of  Cromwell's 
abilities  and  the  force  of  his  character  so  sig 
nally  displayed.  He  had  not  the  power,  and 
probably  had  not  the  inclination,  to  govern  that 
island  in  the  best  way.  The  rebellion  of  the 
aboriginal  race  had  excited  in  England  a  strong 
religious  and  national  aversion  to  them  ;  nor 
is  there  any  reason  to  believe  that  the  Pro 
tector  was  so  far  beyond  his  age  as  to  be  free 
from  the  prevailing  sentiment.  He  had  van 
quished  them;  he  knew  that  they  were  in  his 
power ;  and  he  regarded  them  as  a  band  of 
malefactors  and  idolaters,  who  were  mercifully 
treated  if  they  were  not  smitten  with  the  edge 
of  the  sword.  On  those  who  resisted  he  had 
made  war  as  the  Hebrews  made  war  on  the 
Canaanites.  Drogheda  was  as  Jericho ;  and 
Wexford  as  Ai.  To  the  remains  of  the  old 
population  the  conqueror  granted  a  peace, 
such  as  that  which  Joshua  granted  to  the  Gi- 
beonites.  He  made  them  hewers  of  wood  and 
drawers  of  water.  But,  good  or  bad,  he  could 
not  be  otherwise  than  great.  Under  favourable 
circumstances,  Ireland  would  have  found  in 
I  him  a  most  just  and  beneficent  ruler.  She 
|  found  him  a  tyrant;  not  a  small,  teasing  tyrant 
;  such  as  those  who  have  so  long  been  her  curse 
'  and  her  shame, — but  one  of  those  awful  tyrants 
who,  at  long  intervals,  seem  to  be  sent  ou 
earth,  like  avenging  angels,  with  some  high 
commission  of  destruction  and  renovation.  He 
was  no  man  of  half  measures,  of  mean  affront* 
and  ungracious  concessions.  His  Protestant 


352 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


ascendency  was  not  an  ascendency  of  ribands, 
and  fiddles,  and  statues,  and  processions.  He 
would  never  have  dreamed  of  abolishing  penal 
laws  against  the  Irish  Catholics,  and  withhold 
ing  from  them  the  elective  franchise — of  giving 
them  the  elective  franchise,  and  excluding  them 
from  Parliament — of  admitting  them  to  Parlia 
ment,  and  refusing  to  them  a  full  and  equal 
participation  in  all  the  blessings  of  society  and 
government.  The  thing  most  alien  from  his 
clear  intellect  and  his  commanding  spirit  was 
petty  persecution.  He  knew  how  to  tolerate, 
and  he  knew  how  to  destroy.  His  administra 
tion  in  Ireland  was  an  administration  on  what 
are  now  called  Orange  principles, — followed  out 
most  ably,  most  steadily  and  undauntedly,  most 
unrelentingly,  to  every  extreme  consequence  to 
which  those  principles  lead;  and  it  would,if  con 
tinued,  inevitably  have  produced  the  effect  which 
he  contemplated. — an  entire  decomposition  and 
reconstruction  of  society.  He  had  a  great  and 
definite  object  in  view, — to  make  Ireland 
thoroughly  English — to  make  it  another  York 
shire  or  Norfolk.  Thinly  peopled  as  Ireland 
then  was,  this  end  was  not  unattainable ;  and 
there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  if  his  po 
licy  had  been  followed  during  fifty  years  this 
end  would  have  been  attained.  Instead  of  an 
emigration,  such  as  we  now  see  from  Ireland 
to  England,  there  was,  under  his  government, 
a  constant  and  large  emigration  from  England 
to  Ireland.  This  tide  of  population  ran  almost 
as  strongly  as  that  which  now  runs  from  Mas 
sachusetts  and  Connecticut  to  the  states  behind 
the  Ohio.  The  native  race  was  driven  back 
before  the  advancing  van  of  the  Anglo-Saxon 
population,  as  the  American  Indians  or  the 
tribes  of  Southern  Africa  are  now  driven  back 
before  the  white  settlers.  Those  fearful  phe 
nomena  which  have  almost  invariably  attended 
the  planting  of  civilized  colonies  in  uncivilized 
countries,  and  which  had  been  known  to  the 
nations  of  Europe  only  by  distant  and  ques 
tionable  rumour,  were  now  publicly  exhibited 
in  their  sight.  The  words,  "extirpation," 
"  eradication,"  were  often  in  the  mouths  of  the 
English  back-settlers  of  Leinster  and  Munster 
— cruel  words — yet,  in  their  cruelty,  containing 
more  mercy  than  much  softer  expressions 
which  have  since  been  sanctioned  by  universi 
ties,  and  cheered  by  Parliaments.  For  it  is  in 
truth  more  merciful  to  extirpate  a  hundred 
thousand  people  at  once,  and  to  fill  the  void 
with  a  well-governed  population,  than  to  mis 
govern  millions  through  a  long  succession  of 
generations.  We  can  much  more  easily  par 
don  tremendous  severities  inflicted  for  a  great 
object,  than  an  endless  series  of  paltry  vexa 
tions  and  oppressions  inflicted  for  no  rational 
object  at  all. 

Ireland  was  fast  becoming  English.  Civili 
sation  and  wealth  were  making  rapid  progress 
in  almost  every  part  of  the  island.  The  effects 
(if  that  iron  despotism  are  described  to  us  by  a 
hostile  witness  in  very  remarkable  language. 
•*  Which  is  more  wonderful,"  says  Lord  Cla 
rendon,  "  all  this  was  done  and  settled  within 
little  more  than  two  years,  to  that  degree  of 
perfection  that  there  were  many  buildings 
raised  for  beauty  as  well  as  use,  orderly  and 


enclosures  raised  throughout  the  kingdom, 
purchases  made  by  one  from  another  at  very 
valuable  rates,  a.nd  jointures  made  upon  mar 
riages,  aad  all  other  conveyances  and  settle 
ments  executed,  as  in  a  kingdom  at  peace  with 
in  itself,  and  where  no  doubt  could  be  made 
of  the  validity  of  titles." 

All  Temple's  feelings  about  Irish  questions 
were  those  of  a  colonist  and  a  member  of  the 
dominant  caste.  He  troubled  himself  as  little 
about  the  welfare  of  the  remains  of  the  old  Celtic 
population  as  an  English  farmer  on  the  Swan 
river  troubles  himself  about  the  New  Holland 
ers,  or  a  Dutch  boor  at  the  Cape  about  the  Caff'res. 
The  years  which  he  passed  in  Ireland  while  the 
Cromwellian  system  was  in  full  operation  he 
always  described  as  "years  of  great  satisfac 
tion."  Farming,  gardening,  county  business, 
and  studies  rather  entertaining  than  profound, 
occupied  his  time.  In  politics  he  took  no  part, 
and  many  years  after  "he  attributed  this  inac 
tion  to  his  love  of  the  ancient  constitution, 
which,  he  said,  "would  not  suffer  him  to  enter 
into  public  affairs  till  the  way  was  plain  for 
the  king's  happy  restoration."  It  does  not  ap 
pear,  indeed,  that  any  offer  of  employment  was 
made  to  him.  If  he  really  did  refuse  any  pre 
ferment,  we  may,  without  much  breach  of 
charity,  attribute  the  refusal  rather  to  the  cau 
tion  which,  during  his  whole  life,  prevented 
him  from  running  any  risk  than  to  the  fervour 
of  his  loyalty. 

In  1660  he  made  his  first  appearance  in  pub» 
lie  life.  He  sat  in  the  Convention  which,  in 
the  midst  of  the  general  confusion  that  pro* 
ceded  the  Restoration,  was  summoned  by  thv 
chiefs  of  the  army  of  Ireland  to  meet  in  Dub 
lin.  After  the  king's  return,  an  Irish  Parlia 
ment  was  regularly  convoked,  in  which  Tem 
ple  represented  the  county  of  Carlow.  The 
details  of  his  conduct  in  this  situation  are  not 
known  to  us.  But  we  are  told  in  general 
terms,  and  can  easily  believe,  that  he  showed 
great  moderation  and  great  aptitude  for  busi 
ness.  It  is  probable  that  he  also  distinguished 
himself  in  debate;  for  many  years  afterwards 
he  remarked,  that  "  his  friends  in  Ireland  used 
to  think  that,  if  he  had  any  talent  at  all,  it  lay 
in  that  way." 

In  May,  1663,  the  Irish  Parliament  was  pro 
rogued,  and  Temple  repaired  to  England  with 
his  wife.  His  income  amounted  to  about  five 
hundred  pounds  a  year,  a  sum  which  was  then 
sufficient  for  the  wants  of  a  family  mixing  in 
fashionable  circles.  He  passed  two  years  in 
London,  where  he  seems  to  have  led  that  easy, 
lounging  life  which  was  best  suited  to  his 
temper. 

He  was  not,  however,  unmindful  of  his  in 
terest.  He  had  brought  with  him  letters  of 
introduction  from  the  Duke  of  Orniond,  the 
Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  to  Clarendon,  and 
to  Henry  Bennet,  Lord  Arlington,  who  was 
Secretary  of  State.  Clarendon  was  at  the  head 
of  affairs.  But  his  power  was  visibly  declin 
ing,  and  was  certain  to  decline  more  and  more 
every  day.  An  observer  much  less  discerning 
than  Temple  might  easily  perceive  that  the 
Chancellor  was  a  man  who  belonged  to  a  by 
gone  world; — a  representative  of  a  past  age, 


regular  plai  lations  of  trees,  and  fences    and   of  obsolete  modes  of  thinking,  of  nnfaskio 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


353 


able  vices,  and  of  more  unfashionable  virtues. ! 
His  long  exile  had  made  him  a  stranger  in  the  ; 
country  of  his  birth.    His  mind,  heated  by  con 
flict  and  by  personal  suffering,  was  far  more  j 
set  against  popular  and  tolerant  courses  than  i 
it  had  been  at  the  time  of  the  breaking  out  of  j 
the  Civil  War.     He  pined  for  the  decorous  j 
tyranny  of  the  Old  Whitehall ;  for  the  days  of  | 
that  sainted  king  who  deprived  the  people  of 
their  money  and  their  ears,  but  let  their  wives 
and  their  daughters  alone;  and  could  scarcely 
reconcile  himself  to  a  court  with  a  mistress 
and  without  a  Star-Chamber.     By  taking  this 
course  he  made  himself  every  day  more  odious, 
both  to  the  sovereign,  who  loved  pleasure  much 
more  than  prerogative,  and  to  the  people,  who 
dreaded  royal   prerogative  much  more  than 
royal  pleasures;  and  was  at  last  more  detested 
by  the  court  than  any  chief  of  the  Opposition, 
and  more  detested  by  the  Parliament  than  any 
pander  of  the  court. 

Temple,  whose  great  maxim  was  to  offend 
no  party,  was  not  likely  to  cling  to  the  falling 
fortunes  of  a  minister  the  study  of  whose  life 
was  to  offend  all  parties.  Arlington,  whose 
influence  was  gradually  rising  as  that  of  Cla 
rendon  diminished,  was  the  most  useful  patron 
to  whom  a  young  adventurer  could  attach  him-  j 
self.  This  statesman,  without  virtue,  wisdom, 
or  strength  of  mind,  had  raised  himself  to 
greatness  by  superficial  qualities,  and  was  the 
mere  creature  of  the  time,  the  circumstances, 
and  the  company.  The  dignified  reserve  of 
manners  which  he  had  acquired  during  a  resi 
dence  in  Spain  provoked  the  ridicule  of  those 
who  considered  the  usages  of  the  French  court 
as  the  only  standard  of  good  breeding,  but 
served  to  impress  the  crowd  with  a  favourable 
opinion  of  his  sagacity  and  gravity.  In  situa 
tions  where  the  solemnity  of  the  Escurial 
would  have  been  out  of  place,  he  threw  it  aside 
without  difficulty,  and  conversed  with  great 
humour  and  vivacity.  While  the  multitude 
were  talking  of  "Bennet's  grave  looks,"*  his 
mirth  made  his  presence  always  welcome  in 
the  royal  closet.  While  in  the  antechamber 
Buckingham  was  mimicking  the  pompous 
Castilian  strut  of  the  Secretary  for  the  diver 
sion  of  Mistress  Stuart,  this  stately  Don  was 
ridiculing  Clarendon's  sober  counsels  to  the 
king  within,  till  his  majesty  cried  with  laugh 
ter  and  the  Chancellor  with  vexation.  There 
perhaps  never  was  a  man  whose  outward  de 
meanour  made  such  different  impressions  on 
different  people.  Count  Hamilton,  for  exam 
ple,  describes  him  as  a  stupid  formalist,  who 
had  been  made  Secretary  solely  on  account 
of  his  mysterious  and  important  looks.  Cla 
rendon,  on  the  other  hand,  represents  him  as  a 
man  whose  "  best  faculty  was  raillery,"  and 
who  was,  "  for  his  pleasant  and  agreeable  hu 
mour,  acceptable  unto  the  king."  The  truth 
seems  to  be  that,  destitute  as  he  was  of  all  the 
higher  qualifications  of  a  minister,  he  had  a 
wonderful  talent  for  becoming,  in  outward 
semblance,  all  things  to  all  men.  He  had  two 
aspects,  a  busy  and  serious  one  for  the  public, 
whom  he  wished  to  awe  into  respect,  and  a  gay 


*"  Hermet's  prave  looks  were  a  pretence,"  is  a  line 
in  one  of  the  best  political  poems  of  that  age. 
VOL.  III.— 45 


one  for  Charles,  who  thought  that  the  greatest 
service  which  could  be  rendered  to  a  prince  was 
to  amuse  him.  Yet  both  these  were  masks, 
which  he  laid  aside  when  they  had  served  their 
turn.  Long  after,  when  he  had  retired  to  his 
deer-park  and  fish-ponds  in  Suffolk,  and  had 
no  motive  to  act  the  part  either  of  the  hidalgo 
or  of  the  buffoon,  Evelyn,  who  was  neither  an 
unpractised  nor  an  undiscerning  judge,  con 
versed  much  with  him,  and  pronounced  him  to 
be  a  man  of  singularly  polished  manners,  and 
of  great  colloquial  powers. 

Clarendon,  proud  and  imperious  by  nature, 
soured  by  age  and  disease,  and  relying  on  his 
great  talents  and  services,  sought  out  no  new 
allies.  He  seems  to  have  taken  a  sort  of  mo 
rose  pleasure  in  slighting  and  provoking  all 
the  rising  talent  of  the  kingdom.  His  connec 
tions  were  almost  entirely  confined  to  the  small 
circle,  every  day  becoming  smaller,  of  old  Ca 
valiers  who  had  been  friends  of  his  youth  or 
companions  of  his  exile.  Arlington,  on  the 
other  hand,  beat  up  everywhere  for  recruits. 
No  man  had  a  greater  personal  following,  and 
no  man  exerted  himself  more  to  serve  his  ad 
herents.  It  was  a  kind  of  habit  with  him  to 
push  up  his  dependants  to  his  own  level,  and 
then  to  complain  bitterly  of  their  ingratitude 
because  they  did  not  choose  to  be  his  depend 
ants  any  longer.  It  was  thus  that  he  quarrelled 
with  two  successive  Treasurers,  Clifford  and 
Danly.  To  Arlington,  Temple  attached  him 
self,  and  was  not  sparing  of  warm  professions 
of  affection,  or  even,  we  grieve  to  say,  of  gross 
and  almost  profane  adulation.  In  no  long 
time  he  obtained  his  reward. 

England  was  in  a  very  different  situation, 
with  respect  to  foreign  powers,  from  that  which 
she  had  occupied  daring  the  splendid  adminis 
tration  of  the  Protector.  She  v/as  engeged  in 
war  with  the  United  Provinces,  then  governed 
with  almost  regal  power  by  the  Grand  Pen 
sionary,  John  De  Witt ;  and  though  no  war  had 
ever  cost  the  kingdom  so  much,  none  had 
ever  been  more  feebly  and  meanly  conducted. 
France  had  espoused  the  interest  of  the  States- 
General.  Denmark  seemed  likely  to  take  the 
same  side.  Spain,  indignant  at  the  close  poli 
tical  and  matrimonial  alliance  which  Charles 
had  formed  with  the  house  of  Braganza,  was 
not  disposed  to  lend  him  any  assistance.  The 
Great  Plague  of  London  had  suspended  trade, 
had  scattered  the  ministers  and  nobles,  had 
paralyzed  every  department  of  the  public  ser 
vice,  and  had  increased  the  gloomy  discontent 
which  misgovernment  had  begun  to  excite 
throughout  the  nation.  One  continental  ally 
England  possessed — the  Bishop  of  Minister;  a 
restless  and  ambitious  prelate,  bred  a  soldier, 
and  still  a  soldier  in  all  his  passions.  He  hated 
the  Dutch,  who  had  interfered  in  the  affairs  of 
his  see,  and  declared  himself  willing  to  risk 
his  little  dominions  for  the  chance  of  revenge. 
He  sent,  accordingly,  a  strange  kind  of  ambas 
sador  to  London — a  Benedictine  monk,  who 
spake  bad  English,  and  looked,  says  Lord  Cla 
rendon,  "like  a  carter."  This  person  brought 
j  a  letter  from  the  Bishop  offering  to  make  a» 
!  attack  by  land  on  the  Dutch  territory.  The 
I  English  ministers  eagerly  caught  at  the  pn«- 
j  posal,  and  promised  a  subsidy  of  500 ,000  r  t 
2o  2 


354 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


dollars  to  their  new  ally.  It  was  determined 
to  send  an  English  agent  to  Munster;  and 
Arlington,  to  whose  department  the  business 
belonged,  fixed  on  Temple  for  this  post. 

Temple  accepted  the  commission,  and  ac 
quitted  himself  to  the  satisfaction  of  his  em 
ployers,  though  the  whole  plan  ended  in  nothing ; 
and  the  Bishop,  after  pocketing  an  instalment 
of  his  subsidy,  made  haste  to  conclude  a  sepa 
rate  peace.  Temple,  at  a  later  period,  looked 
back  with  no  great  satisfaction  to  this  part  of 
his  life ;  and  excused  himself  for  undertaking 
a  negotiation  from  which  little  good  could  re 
sult,  by  saying  that  he  was  then  young  and 
very  new  in  business.  In  truth,  he  could 
hardly  have  been  placed  in  a  situation  where 
the  eminent  diplomatic  talents  which  he  pos 
sessed  could  have  appeared  to  less  advantage. 
He  could  not  bear  much  wine ;  and  none  but 
a  hard  drinker  had  any  chance  of  success  in 
Westphalian  society.  Under  all  these  disad 
vantages,  however,  he  gave  so  much  satisfac 
tion  that  he  was  created  a  baronet,  and  ap 
pointed  resident  at  the  viceregal  court  of 
Brussels. 

Brussels  suited  Temple  far  better  than  the 
palaces  of  the  boar-hunting  and  wine-bibbing 
princes  of  Germany.  He  now  occupied  the 
most  important  post  of  observation  in  which  a 
diplomatist  could  be  stationed.  He  was  placed 
in  the  territory  of  a  great  neutral  power,  be 
tween  the  territories  of  the  two  great  powers 
which  were  at  war  with  England.  From  this 
excellent  school  he  soon  came  forth  the  most 
accomplished  negotiator  of  his  age. 

In  the  mean  time  the  government  of  Charles 
had  suffered  a  succession  of  humiliating  disas 
ters.  The  extravagance  of  the  court  had  dis 
sipated  all  the  means  which  Parliament  had 
supplied  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on  offen 
sive  hostilities.  It  was  determined  to  wage 
only  a  defensive  war;  and  even  for  defensive 
war  the  vast  resources  of  England,  managed 
V  triflers  and  public  robbers,  were  found  in 
sufficient.  The  Dutch  insulted  the  British 
coasts,  sailed  up  the  Thames,  took  Sheerness, 
and  carried  their  ravages  to  Chatham.  The 
blaze  of  the  ships  burning  in  the  river  was  seen 
at  London ;  it  was  rumoured  that  a  foreign 
army  had  landed  at  Graves  end ;  and  military 
men  seriously  proposed  to  abandon  the  Tower. 
To  such  a  depth  of  infamy  had  maladministra 
tion  reduced  that  proud  and  victorious  nation 
which  a  few  years  before  had  dictated  its  plea 
sure  to  Mazarin,  to  the  States-General,  and  to 
the  Vatican.  Humbled  by  the  events  of  the 
war,  and  dreading  the  just  anger  of  Parlia 
ment,  the  English  Ministry  hastened  to  huddle 
up  a  peace  with  France  and  Holland  at  Breda. 

But  a  new  scene  wa^  now  about  to  open.  It 
had  already  been  for  some  time  apparent  to 
discerning  observers,  that  England  and  Holland 
were  threatened  by  a  common  danger,  much 
more  formidable  than  any  which  they  had 
reason  to  apprehend  from  each  other.  The 
old  enemy  of  their  independence  and  of  their 
religion  was  no  longer  to  be  dreaded.  The 
sceptre  had  passed  away  from  Spain.  That 
mighty  empire,  on  which  the  sun  never  set, 
which  had  crushed  the  liberties  of  Italy  and 
Germany,  which  had  occupied  Paris  with  its 


armies,  and  covered  the  British  seas  with  its 
sails,  was  at  the  mercy  of  every  spoiler ;  and 
Europe  saw  with  dismay  the  rapid  growth  of  a 
new  and  more  formidable  power.  Men  looked 
to  Spain,  and  saw  only  weakness  disguised  and 
increased  by  pride,— dominions  of  vast  bulk 
and  little  strength,  tempting,  unwieldy,  and  de 
fenceless, — an  empty  treasury, — a  haughty, 
sullen,  and  torpid  nation, — a  child  on  the 
throne, — factions  in  the  council, — ministers 
who  served  only  themselves,  and  soldiers  who 
were  terrible  only  to  their  countrymen.  Men 
looked  to  France,  and  saw  a  large  and  com 
pact  territory, — a  rich  soil, — a  central  situation, 
— a  bold,  alert,  and  ingenious  people, — large 
revenues, — numerous  and  discip.ined  troops, 
— an  active  and  ambitious  prince,  in  the  flower 
of  his  age,  surrounded  by  generals  of  unrivalled 
skill.  The  projects  of  Louis  could  be  counter 
acted  only  by  ability,  vigour,  and  union  on  the 
part  of  his  neighbours.  Ability  and  vigour 
had  hitherto  been  found  in  the  councils  of 
Holland  alone,  and  of  union  there  was  no  ap 
pearance  in  Europe.  The  question  of  Portu 
guese  independence  separated  England  from 
Spain.  Old  grudges,  recent  hostilities,  mari 
time  pretensions,  commercial  competition,  se 
parated  England  as  widely  from  the  United 
Provinces. 

The  great  object  of  Louis,  from  the  beginning 
to  the  end  of  his  reign,  was  the  acquisition  of 
those  large  and  valuable  provinces  of  the 
Spanish  monarchy  which  lay  contiguous  to  the 
eastern  frontier  of  France.  Already,  before  the 
conclusion  of  the  treaty  of  Breda,  he  had  in 
vaded  those  provinces.  He  now  pushed  on  his 
conquests  with  scarcely  any  resistance.  Fort 
ress  after  fortress  was  taken.  Brussels  itself 
was  in  danger;  and  Temple  thought  it  wise  to 
send  his  wife  and  children  to  England.  But 
his  sister,  Lady  Giffard,  who  had  been  some 
time  his  inmate,  and  who  seems  to  have  been 
a  more  important  personage  in  his  family  than 
his  wife,  still  remained  with  him. 

De  Witt  saw  the  progress  of  the  French 
arms  with  painful  anxiety.  But  it  was  not  in 
the  power  of  Holland  alone  to  save  Flanders ; 
and  the  difficulty  of  forming  an  extensive  co 
alition  for  that  purpose  appeared  almost  insu 
perable.  Louis,  indeed,  affected  moderation. 
He  declared  himself  willing  to  agree  to  a  com 
promise  with  Spain.  But  these  offers  were 
undoubtedly  mere  professions,  intended  to  quiet 
the  apprehensions  of  the  neighbouring  powers  ; 
and,  as  his  position  became  every  day  more 
and  more  advantageous,  it  was  to  be  expected 
that  he  would  rise  in  his  demands. 

Such  was  the  state  of  affairs  when  Temple 
obtained  from  the  English  Ministry  permission 
to  make  a  tour  in  Holland  incognito.  In  com 
pany  with  Lady  Giffard  he  arrived  at  the 
Hague.  He  was  not  charged  with  any  public 
commission,  but  he  availed  himself  of  this 
opportunity  of  introducing  himself  to  De  Witt. 
"  My  only  business,  sir,"  he  said,  "  is  to  see 
the  things  which  are  most  considerable  in  your 
country,  and  I  should  execute  my  design  very 
imperfectly  if  I  went  away  without  seeing 
you."  De  Witt,  who,  from  report,  had  formed 
a  high  opinion  of  Temple,  was  pleased  by  the 
compliment,  and  replied  with  a  frankness  an^ 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


355 


tx/rdiality  which  at  once  led  to  intimacy.  The 
two  statesmen  talked  calmly  over  the  causes 
which  had  estranged  England  from  Holland, 
congratulated  each  other  on  the  peace,  and  then 
began  to  discuss  the  new  dangers  which  me 
naced  Europe.  Temple,  who  had  no  authority 
to  say  any  thing  on  behalf  of  the  English  go 
vernment,  expressed  himself  very  guardedly. 
De  Witt,  who  was  himself  the  Dutch  govern 
ment,  had  no  reason  to  be  reserved.  He  openly 
declared  that  his  wish  was  to  see  a  general 
coalition  formed  for  the  preservation  of  Flan- 
lets.  His  simplicity  and  openness  amazed 
Temple,  who  had  been  accustomed  to  the  af 
fected  solemnity  of  his  patron,  the  Secretary, 
and  to  the  eternal  doublings  and  evasions 
which  passed  for  great  feats  of  statesmanship 
among  the  Spanish  politicians  at  Brussels. 
*  Whoever,"  he  wrote  to  Arlington,  "deals 
with  M.  De  Witt  must  go  the  same  plain  way 
that  he  pretends  to  in  his  negotiations,  without 
refining  or  colouring,  or  offering  shadow  for 
substance."  He  was  scarcely  less  struck  by 
the  modest  dwelling  and  frugal  table  of  the 
first  citizen  of  the  richest  state  in  the  world. 
While  Clarendon  was  amazing  London  with  a 
dwelling  more  sumptuous  than  the  palace  of 
his  master,  while  Arlington  was  lavishing  his 
ill-gotten  wealth  on  the  decoys  and  orange- 
gardens  and  interminable  conservatories  of 
Euston, — the  great  statesman  who  had  frus 
trated  all  their  plans  of  conquest,  and  the  roar 
of  whose  guns  they  had  heard  with  terror  even 
in  the  galleries  of  Whitehall,  kept  only  a  single 
servant,  walked  about  the  streets  in  the  plain 
est  garb,  and  never  used  a  coach  except  for 
visits  of  ceremony. 

Temple  sent  a  full  account  of  his  interview 
with  De  Witt  to  Arlington,  who,  in  consequence 
of  the  fall  of  the  Chancellor,  now  shared  with 
the  Duke  of  Buckingham  the  principal  direc 
tion  of  affairs.  Arlington  showed  no  disposition 
to  meet  the  advances  of  the  Dutch  minister. 
Indeed,  as  was  amply  proved  a  few  years  later, 
both  he  and  his  master  were  perfectly  willing 
to  purchase  the  means  of  misgoverning  England 
by  giving  up,  not  only  Flanders,  but  the  whole 
Continent  to  France.  Temple,  who  distinctly 
saw  tnat  a  moment  had  arrived  at  which  it  was 
possible  to  reconcile  his  country  with  Holland, 
— to  reconcile  Charles  with  the  Parliament, — 
to  bridle  the  power  of  Louis, — to  efface  the 
shame  of  the  late  ignominious  war, — to  restore 
England  to  the  same  place  in  Europe  which 
she  had  occupied  under  Cromwell,  became 
more  and  more  urgent  in  his  representations. 
Arlington's  replies  were  for  some  time  couched 
in  cold  and  ambiguous  terms.  But  the  events 
which  followed  the  meeting  of  the  Parliament, 
in  the  autumn  of  1667,  appear  to  have  produced 
an  entire  change  in  his  views.  The  discontent 
of  the  nation  was  deep  and  general.  The  ad 
ministration  was  attacked  in  all  its  parts.  The 
king  and  the  ministers  laboured,  not  unsuc 
cessfully,  to  throw  on  Clarendon  the  blame  of 
past  miscarriages ;  but  though  the  Commons 
were  resolved  that  the  late  Chancellor  should 
be  the  first  victim,  it  was  by  no  means  clear 
that  he  would  be  the  last.  The  Secretary  was 
personally  attacked  with  great  bitterness  in 
th*  course  of  the  debates.  One  of  the  resolu 


tions  of  the  Lower  House  against  Clarendon 
could  be  understood  only  as  a  censure  of  the 
foreign  policy  of  the  government,  as  too- fa 
vourable  to  France.  To  these  events  chiefly 
we  are  inclined  to  attribute  the  change  which 
at  this  crisis  took  place  in  the  measures  of 
England.  The  Ministry  seem  to  have  felt  that, 
if  they  wished  to  derive  any  advantage  from 
Clarendon's  downfall,  it  w'as  necessary  for 
them  to  abandon  what  was  supposed  to  be 
Clarendon's  system;  and  by  some  splendid  and 
popular  measure  to  win  the  confidence  of  the 
nation.  Accordingly,  in  December,  1667,  Tem 
ple  received  a  despatch  containing  instructions 
of  the  highest  importance.  The  plan  which  he 
had  so  strongly  recommended  was  approved  ; 
and  he  was  directed  to  visit  De  Witt  as 
speedily  as  possible,  and  to  ascertain  whether 
the  States  were  willing  to  enter  into  an  offen 
sive  and  defensive  league  with  England  against 
the  projects  of  France.  Temple,  accompanied 
by  his  sister,  instantly  set  out  for  the  Hague, 
and  laid  the  propositions  of  the  English  go 
vernment  before  the  Grand  Pensionary.  The 
Dutch  statesman  answered  with  his  character 
istic  straightforwardness,  that  he  was  fully 
ready  to  agree  to  a  defensive  alliance,  but  that 
it  was  the  fundamental  principle  of  the  foreign, 
policy  of  the  States  to  make  no  offensive  league 
under  any  circumstances  whatsoever.  With 
this  answer  Temple  hastened  from  the  Hague 
to  London,  had  an  audience  of  the  king,  re 
lated  what  had  passed  between  himself  and 
De  Witt,  exerted  himself  to  remove  the  unfa 
vourable  opinion  which  had  been  conceived 
of  the  Grand  Pensionary  at  the  English  court, 
and  had  the  satisfaction  of  succeeding  in  all 
his  objects.  On  the  evening  of  the  1st  of 
January,  1668,  a  council  was  held,  at  which 
Charles  declared  his  resolution  to  unite  with 
the  Dutch  on  their  own  terms.  Temple  and 
his  indefatigable  sister  immediately  sailed 
again  for  the  Hague,  and,  after  weathering  a 
violent  storm  in  which  they  were  very  nearly 
lost,  arrived  in  safety  at  the  place  of  their  des 
tination. 

On  this  occasion,  as  on  every  other,  the  deal 
ings  between  Temple  and  De  Witt  were  sin 
gularly  fair  and  open.  When  they  met,  Temple 
began  by  recapitulating  what  had  parsed  at 
their  last  interview.  De  Witt,  who  was  as 
little  given  to  lying  with  his  face  as  with  his 
tongue,  marked  his  assent  by  his  looks  while 
the  recapitulation  proceeded;  and  when  it  was 
concluded,  answered  that  Temple's  memory 
was  perfectly  correct,  and  thanked  him  for 
proceeding  in  so  exact  and  sincere  a  manner. 
Temple  then  informed  the  Grand  Pensionary 
that  the  King  of  England  had  determined  to 
close  with  the  proposal  of  a  defensive  alliance. 
De  Witt  had  not  expected  so  speedy  a  resolu 
tion,  and  his  countenance  indicated  surprise  as 
well  as  pleasure.  But  he  did  not  retract ;  and  it 
was  speedily  arranged  that  England  and  Hol- 
i  land  should  unite  for  the  purpose  of  compelling 
!  Louis  to  abide  by  the  compromise  which  he 
!  had  formerly  offered.  The  next  object  of  the 
j  two  statesmen  was  to  induce  another  govern 
ment  to  become  a  party  to  their  league.  The 
victories  of  Gustavus  and  Torstenson,  and 
the  political  talents  of  Oxenstiern,  had  ob 


356 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tallied  for  Sweden  a  consideration  in  Europe  ] 
disproportioned  to  her  real  power.  The 
Prin.ces  of  Northern  Germany  stood  in  great 
awe  of  her.  And  De  Witt  and  Temple 
agreed  that  if  she  could  be  induced  to  accede 
to  the  league,  "  it  would  be  too  strong  a  bar  for 
France  to  venture  on."  Temple  went  that 
same  evening  to  Count  Dona,  the  Swedish 
minister  at  the  Hague ;  took  a  seat  in  the  most 
unceremonious  manner;  and,  with  that  air  of 
frankness  and  good-will  by  which  he  often  suc 
ceeded  in  rendering  his  diplomatic  overtures 
acceptable,  explained  the  scheme  which  was 
in  agitation.  Dona  was  greatly  pleased  and 
flattered.  He  had  not  powers  which  would 
authorize  him  to  conclude  a  treaty  of  such 
importance.  But  he  strongly  advised  Temple 
and  De  Witt  to  do  their  part  without  delay,  and 
seemed  confident  that  Sweden  would  accede,  j 
The  ordinary  course  of  public  business  in  Hol 
land  was  too  slow  for  the  present  emergency  ; 
and  De  Witt  appeared  to  have  some  scruples 
about  breaking  through  the  established  forms. 
But  the  urgency  and  dexterity  of  Temple  pre 
vailed.  The  States-General  took  the  responsi 
bility  of  executing  the  treaty  with  a  celerity 
unprecedented  in  the  annals  of  the  federation, 
and  indeed  inconsistent  with  its  fundamental 
laws.  The  state  of  public  feeling  was,  how 
ever,  such  in  all  the  provinces,  that  this  irregu 
larity  was  not  merely  pardoned  but  applauded. 
When  the  instrument  had  been  formally  signed, 
the  Dutch  commissioners  embraced  the  Eng 
lish  plenipotentiary  with  the  warmest  expres 
sions  of  kindness  and  confidence.  "  At  Breda," 
exclaimed  Temple,  "  we  embraced  as  friends — 
here  as  brothers." 

This  memoralle  negotiation  occupied  only 
five  days.  De  Witt  complimented  Temple  in 
high  terms  on  having  effected  in  so  short  a 
time  what  must,  under  other  management, 
have  been  the  work  of  months ;  and  Temple, 
in  his  despatches,  >.poke  in  equally  high  terms 
of  De  Witt.  "I  must  add  these 'words  to  do 
M.  de  Witt  right,  that  I  found  him  as  plain,  as 
direct  and  square  in  the  course  of  this  business 
as  any  man  could  be,  though  often  stiff  in 
points  where  he  thought  any  advantage  could 
accrue  to  his  country ;  and  have  all  the  reason 
in  the  world  to  be  satisfied  with  him ;  and  for 
his  industry,  no  man  had  ever  more  I  am  sure. 
For  these  five  days  at  least,  neither  of  us  spent 
any  idle  hours,  neither  day  nor  night." 

Sweden  willingly  acceded  to  the  league, 
which  is  known  in  history  by  the  name  of  the 
Triple  Alliance ;  and  after  some  signs  of  ill- 
humour  on  the  part  of  France,  a  general  paci 
fication  was  the  result. 

The  Triple  Alliance  may  be  viewed  in  two 
lights — as  a  measure  of  foreign  policy,  and  as 
a  measure  of  domestic  policy — and  under  both 
aspects  it  seems  to  us  deserving  of  all  the 
praise  which  has  been  bestowed  upon  it. 

Dr.  Lingard,  who  is  undoubtedly  a  very  able 
and  well-informed  writer,  but  whose  great  fun 
damental  rule  of  judging  seems  to  be  that  the 
popular  opinion  on  an  historical  question  can 
not  possibly  be  correct,  speaks  very  slightingly 
of  that  celebrated  treaty;  and  Mr.  Courtenay, 
who  by  no  means  regards  Temple  with  that 
profound  veneration  which  is  generally  found 


in  biographers,  has  conceded,  in  cur  opinion, 
far  too  much  to  Dr.  Lingard. 

The  reasoning  of  Dr.  Lingard  is  simply  this . 
— The  Triple  Alliance  only  compelled  Louis 
to  make  peace  on  the  terms  on  which,  before 
the  alliance  was  formed,  he  had  offered  to 
make  peace.  How  can  it  then  be  said  that 
this  alliance  arrested  his  care<  r,  and  preserved 
Europe  from  his  ambition  1  Now,  this  reason- 
ing  is  evidently  of  no  force  at  all,  except  on 
the  supposition  that  Louis  would  have  held 
himself  bound  by  his  former  offers,  if  the  alli 
ance  had  not  been  formed:  and  if  Dr.  Lingard 
thinks  this  a  reasonable  supposition,  we  should 
be  disposed  to  say  to  him,  in  the  words  of  that 
great  politician,  Mrs.  Western — "Indeed,  bro 
ther,  you  would  make  a  fine  plenipo  to  ne 
gotiate  with  the  French.  They  would  soon 
persuade  you  that  they  take  towns  out  of  mere 
defensive  principles."  Our  own  impression 
is,  that  Louis  made  his  offer  only  in  order  to 
avert  some  such  measure  as  the  Triple  Alli 
ance,  and  adhered  to  it  only  in  consequence 
of  that  alliance.  He  had  refused  to  consent  to 
an  armistice.  He  had  made  all  his  arrange 
ments  for  a  winter  campaign.  In  the  very 
week  in  which  Temple  and  the  States  con 
cluded  their  agreement  at  the  Hague,  Franche 
Comte  was  attacked  by  the  French  armies ; 
and  in  three  weeks  the  whole  province  was 
conquered.  This  prey  Louis  was  compelled 
to  disgorge.  And  what  compelled  him  ?  Did 
the  object  seem  to  him  small  or  contemptible'? 
On  the  contrary,  the  annexation  of  Tranche 
Comte  to  his  kingdom  was  one  of  the  favourite 
projects  of  his  life.  Was  he  withheld  by  re 
gard  for  his  word  1  Did  he,  who  never  in  any 
other  transaction  of  his  reign  showed  the 
smallest  respect  for  the  most  solemn  obliga 
tions  of  public  faith, — who  violated  the  Treaty 
of  the  Pyrenees,  who  violated  the  Treaty  of 
Aix,  who  violated  the  Treaty  of  Nimeguen, 
who  violated  the  Partition  Treaty,  who  violated 
the  Treaty  of  Utrecht, — feel  himself  restrained 
by  his  word  on  this  single  occasion?  Can 
any  person  who  is  acquainted  with  his  charac 
ter,  and  with  his  whole  policy,  doubt,  that,  if 
the  neighbouring  powers  would  have  looked 
quietly  on,  he  would  instantly  have  risen  in 
his  demands?  How  then  stands  the  case? 
He  wished  to  keep  Franche  Comte.  It  was 
not  from  regard  to  his  word  that  he  ceded 
Franche  Comte.  Why,  then,  did  he  code 
Franche  Comte?  We  answer,  as  all  En  re  pe 
answered  at  the  time,  from  fear  of  the  Triple 
Alliance. 

But  grant  that  Louis  was  not  really  stopped 
in  his  progress  by  this  famous  league,  still  it 
I  is  certain  that  the  world  then,  and  long  after, 
I  believed  that  he  was  so  stopped ;  and  this  was 
|  the  prevailing  impression  in  France  as  well  as 
in  other  countries.     Temple,  therefore,  at  the 
very  least,  succeeded  in  raising  the  credit  of 
his  country,  and  lowering  the  credit  of  a  rival 
|  power.     Here  there  is   no  room  for  contro 
versy.    No  grubbing  among  old  state-papers 
will  ever  bring  to  light  any  document  which 
j  will  shake  these  facts— that  Europe  believed 
the  ambition  of  France  to  have  been  curbed 
by  the   three   powers;   that  England,  a  few 
months  before  the  least  amoMg  the  nations, 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


357 


forced  to  abandon  her  own  seas,  unable  to  de 
fend  the  mouths  of  her  own  rivers,  regained 
almost  as  high  a  place  in  the  estimation  of  her 
neighbours  as  she  had  held  in  the  times  of 
Elizabeth  and  Oliver ;— and  that  all  this  change 
of  opinion  was  produced  in  five  days  by  wise 
and  resolute  counsels,  without  the  tiring  of  a 
single  gun.  That  the  Triple  Alliance  effected 
this  will  hardly  be  disputed;  and  if  it  effected 
nothing  else,  it  must  still  be  regarded  as  a 
masterpiece  of  diplomacy. 

Considered  as  a  measure  of  domestic  policy, 
this  treaty  seems  to  be  equally  deserving  of 
approbation.  It  did  much  to  allay  discontents, 
to  reconcile  the  sovereign  with  a  people  who 
had,  under  his  wretched  administration,  be 
come  ashamed  of  him  and  of  themselves.  It 
was  a  kind  of  pledge  for  internal  good  govern 
ment.  The  foreign  relations  of  the  kingdom 
had  at  that  time  the  closest  connection  with 
our  domestic  policy.  From  the  Restoration, 
to  the  accession  of  the  house  of  Hanover, 
Holland  and  France  were  to  England  what 
the  right-hand  horseman  and  the  left-hand 
horseman  in  Burger's  fine  ballad  were  to 
Wildgraf, — the  good  and  the  evil  counsellor, — 
the  angel  of  light  and  the  angel  of  darkness. 
The  ascendency  of  France  was  inseparably 
connected  with  the  prevalence  of  tyranny  in 
domestic  affairs.  The  ascendency  of  Holland 
was  as  inseparably  connected  with  the  preva 
lence  of  political  liberty,  and  of  mutual  tolera 
tion  among  Protestant  sects.  How  fatal  and 
degrading  an  influence  Louis  was  destined  to 
exercise  "on  the  British  counsels,  how  great  a 
deliverance  our  country  was  destined  to  owe 
to  the  States,  could  not  be  foreseen  when  the 
Triple  Alliance  was  concluded.  Yet  even  then 
all  discerning  men  considered  it  as  a  good 
omen  for  the  English  constitution  and  the  re 
formed  religion,  that  the  government  had  at 
tached  itself  to  Holland,  and  had  assumed  a 
firm  and  somewhat  hostile  attitude  towards 
France.  The  fame  of  this  measure  was  the 
greater,  because  it  stood  so  entirely  alone.  It 
was  the  single  eminently  good  act  performed 
by  the  government  during  the  interval  between 
the  Restoration  and  the  Revolution.*  Every 
person  who  had  the  smallest  part  in  it,  and 
some  who  had  no  part  in  it  at  all,  battled  for  a 
share  of  the  credit.  The  most  close-fisted  re 
publicans  were  ready  to  grant  money  for  the 
purpose  of  carrying  into  effect  the  provisions 
of  this  popular  alliance ;  and  the  great  Tory 
poet  of  that  age,  in  his  finest  satires,  repeatedly 
spoke  with  reverence  of  the  "triple  bond." 

This  negotiation  raised  the  fame  of  Temple 
both  at  home  and  abroad  to  a  great  height, — to 
such  a  height,  indeed,  as  seems  to  have  excited 
the  jealousy  of  his  friend  Arlington.  While 
London  and  Amsterdam  resounded  with  accla 
mations  of  joy,  the  Secretary,  in  very  cold 
official  language,  communicated  to  his  friend 
the  approbation  of  the  king;  and  lavish  as  the 
government  was  of  titles  and  of  money,  its 
ablest  servant  was  neither  ennobled  nor  en 
riched. 


*"The  only  good  public  thins  that  hath  been  done 
*!nce  (he  kinsr  come  into  England."— PEPYS'  Diary, 
rtbrutry  14,  1667-8. 


Temple's  next  mission  was  to  Aix-la-Cha- 
pelle,  where  a  general  congress  met  for  the 
purpose  of  perfecting  the  work  of  the  Triple 
Alliance.  On  his  road  he  received  abundant 

g roofs  of  the  estimation  in  which  he  was  held, 
alutes  were  fired  from  the  walls  of  the  towns 
through  which  he  passed  ;  the  population, 
poured  forth  into  the  streets  to  see  him ;  and 
the  magistrates  entertained  him  with  speeches 
and  banquets.  After  the  close  of  the  negotia 
tions  of  Aix,  he  was  appointed  ambassador  at 
the  Hague.  But  in  both  these  missions  he  ex 
perienced  much  vexation  from  the  rigid,  and, 
indeed,  unjust  parsimony  of  the  government. 
Profuse  to  many  unworthy  applicants,  the 
ministers  were  niggardly  to  him  alone.  They 
secretly  disliked  his  politics ;  and  they  seem, 
to  have  indemnified  themselves  for  the  humi 
liation  of  adopting  his  measures  by  cutting 
down  his  salary  and  delaying  the  settlement 
of  his  outfit. 

At  the  Hague  he  was  received  with  cordiali 
ty  by  De  Witt,  and  with  the  most  signal  marks 
of  respect  by  the  States-General.  His  situa 
tion  was  in  one  point  extremely  delicate.  The 
Prince  of  Orange,  the  hereditary  chief  of  the 
faction  opposed  to  the  administration  of  De 
Witt,  was  the  nephew  of  Charles.  To  pre 
serve  the  confidence  of  the  ruling  party  with 
out  showing  any  want  of  respect  to  so  near  a 
relation  of  his  own  master  was  no  easy  task. 
But  Temple  acquitted  himself  so  well,  that  he 
appears  to  have  been  in  great  favour,  both 
with  the  Grand  Pensionary  and  with  the 
prince. 

In  the  main,  the  years  which  he  spent  at  the 
Hague  seem,  in  spite  of  some  pecuniary  diffi 
culties,  occasioned  by  the  ill-will  of  the  English 
ministers,  to  have  passed  very  agreeably.  He 
enjoyed  the  highest  personal  consideration. 
He  was  surrounded  by  objects  interesting  in 
the  highest  degree  to  a  man  of  his  observant 
turn  of  mind.  He  had  no  wearing  labour,  no 
heavy  responsibility,  and  if  he  had  no  oppor 
tunity  of  adding  to  his  high  reputation,  he  ran 
no  risk  of  impairing  it. 

Butevil  times  were  at  hand.  Though  Charles 
had  for  a  moment  deviated  into  a  wise  and 
dignified  policy,  his  heart  had  always  been 
with  France  ;  and  France  employed  every 
means  of  seduction  to  lure  him  back.  His 
impatience  of  control,  his  greediness  for  mo 
ney,  his  passion  for  beauty,  his  family  affec-. 
tions,  all  his  tastes,  all  his  feelings,  wers 
practised  on  with  the  utmost  dexterity.  His 
interior  cabinet  was  now  composed  of  men 
such  as  that  generation,  and  that  generation 
alone,  produced ;  of  men  at  whose  audn,- 
cious  profligacy  the  rats  of  our  own  time 
look  with  the  same  sort  of  admiring  despair 
with  which  our  sculptors  contemplate  the  The 
seus,  and  our  painters  the  Cartoons.  To  be  a 
real,  hearty,  deadly  enemy  of  the  liberties  and 
religion  of  the  nation  was,  in  that  dark  con 
clave,  an  honourable  distinction ;  a  distinction 
which  belonged  only  to  the  daring  and  impetu 
ous  Clifford.  His  associates  were  men  to 
whom  all  creeds  and  all  constitutions  were 
alike;  who  were  equally  ready  to  profess  amj 
to  persecute  the  faith  of  Geneva,  cf  Lambeth, 
and  of  Rome ;  who  were  equally  ready  to  be 


358 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tools  of  power  without  any  sense  of  loyalty, 
and  stirrers  of  sedition  without  any  zeal  for 
freedom. 

It  was  hardly  possible  even  for  a  man  so 
penetrating  as  De  Witt  to  foresee  to  what 
depths  of  wickedness  and  infamy  this  execra 
ble  administrator  would  descend.  Yet  many 
signs  of  the  great  wo  which  was  coming  on 
Europe — the  visit  of  the  Duchess  of  Orleans  to 
her  brother,  —  the  unexplained  mission  of 
Buckingham  to  Paris,— the  sudden  occupation 
of  Lorraine  by  the  French,  —  rendered  the 
Grand  Pensionary  uneasy ;  and  his  alarm  in 
creased  when  he  learned  that  Temple  had  re 
ceived  orders  to  repair  instantly  to  London. 
He  earnestly  pressed  for  an  explanation. 
Temple  very  sincerely  replied  that  he  hoped 
that  the  English  ministers  would  adhere  to  the 
principles  of  the  Triple  Alliance.  "I  can  an 
swer,"  he  said,  "  only  for  myself.  But  that  I 
can  do.  If  a  new  system  is  to  be  adopted,  I 
will  never  have  any  part  in  it.  I  have  told  the 
king  so  ;  and  I  will  make  my  words  good.  If 
I  return,  you  will  know  more ;  and  if  I  do  not 
return,  you  will  guess  more."  De  Witt  smiled, 
and  answered  that  he  would  hope  the  best; 
and  would  do  all  in  his  power  to  prevent 
others  from  forming  unfavourable  surmises. 

In  October,  1670,  Temple  reached  London; 
and  all  his  worst  suspicions  were  immediately 
more  than  confirmed.  He  repaired  to  the  Se 
cretary's  house,  and  was  kept  an  hour  and  a 
half  waiting  in  the  antechamber,  whilst  Lord 
Ashley  was  closeted  with  Arlington.  When 
at  length  the  doors  were  thrown  open,  Arling 
ton  was  dry  and  cold,  asked  trifling  questions 
about  the  voyage,  and  then,  in  order  to  escape 
from  the  necessity  of  discussing  business, 
called  in  his  daughter — an  engaging  little  girl 
of  three  years  old,  who  was  long  after  de 
scribed  by  poets  "as  dressed  in  all  the  bloom 
of  smiling  nature,"  and  whom  Evelyn,  one  of 
the  witnesses  of  her  inauspicious  marriage, 
mournfully  designated  as  "the  sweetest,  hope- 
fullest,  most  beautiful  child,  and  most  virtuous 
too."  Any  particular  conversation  was  impos 
sible  ;  and  Temple,  who,  with  all  his  constitu 
tional  or  philosophical  indifference,  was  suffi 
ciently  sensitive  on  the  side  of  vanity,  felt  this 
treatment  keenly.  The  next  day  he  offered 
himself  to  the  notice  of  the  king,  who  was 
snufling  up  the  morning  air,  and  feeding  his 
ducks  in  the  Mall.  Charles  was  civil,  but, 
like  Arlington,  carefully  avoided  all  conversa 
tion  on  politics.  Temple  found  that  all  his 
most  respectable  friends  were  entirely  ex 
cluded  from  the  secrets  of  the  inner  council ; 
and  were  awaiting  in  anxiety  and  dread  for 
what  those  mysterious  deliberations  might  pro 
duce.  At  length  he  obtained  a  glimpse  of 
light.  The  bold  spirit  and  fierce  passions  of 
Clifford  rendered  him  the  most  unfit  of  all 
men  to  be  the  keeper  of  a  momentous  secret. 
He  told  Temple,  with  great  vehemence,  that 
the  States  had  behaved  basely,  that  De  Witt 
was  a  rogue  and  a  rascal,  that  it  was  below  the 
King  of  England,  or  any  other  king,  to  have 
any  thing  to  do  with  such  wretches;  that  this 
ought  to  be  made  known  to  all  the  world,  and 
that  it  was  the  duty  of  the  minister  at  the 
Uague  to  declare  it  publicly.  Temple  com 


manded  his  temper  as  well  as  he  cculd,  am. 
replied,  calmly  and  firmly,  that  he  should 
make  no  such  declaration,  and  that  if  he  were 
called  upon  to  give  his  opinion  of  the  States 
and  their  ministers,  he  would  say  exactly  what 
he  thought. 

He  now  saw  clearly  that  the  tempest  was 
gathering  fast, — that  the  great  alliance  which 
he  had  framed,  arid  over  which  he  had  watch 
ed  with  parental  care,  was  about  to  be  dis 
solved,  —  that  times  were  at  hand  when  it 
would  be  necessary  for  him,  if  he  continued  in 
public  life,  either  to  take  part  decidedly  against 
the  court,  or  to  forfeit  the  high  reputation, 
which  he  enjoyed  at  home  and  abroad.  He 
began  to  make  preparations  for  retiring  alto 
gether  from  business.  He  enlarged  a  little 
garden  which  he  had  purchased  at  Sheen,  and 
laid  out  some  money  in  ornamenting  his  house 
there.  He  was  still  nominally  ambassador  to 
Holland;  and  the  English  ministers  continued 
some  months  to  flatter  the  States  with  the  hope 
that  he  would  speedily  return.  At  length,  in 
June,  1071,  the  designs  of  the  "Cabal"  were 
ripe.  The  infamous  treaty  with  France  had 
been  ratified.  The  season  of  deception  was 
past,  and  that  of  insolence  and  violence  had 
arrived.  Temple  received  his  formal  dismis 
sion,  kissed  the  king's  hand,  was  repaid  for  his 
services  with  some  of  those  vague  compliments 
and  promises  which  cost  so  little  to  the  cold 
heart,  the  easy  temper,  and  the  ready  tongue  of 
Charles,  and  quietly  withdrew  to  his  little  nest, 
as  he  called  it,  at  Sheen. 

There  he  amused  himself  with  gardening, 
which  he  practised  so  successfully  that  the 
fame  of  his  fruit  soon  spread  far  and  wide 
But  letters  were  his  chief  solace.  He  had,  as 
we  have  mentioned,  been  from  his  youth  in 
the  habit  of  diverting  himself  with  composi 
tion.  The  clear  and  agreeable  language  of  his 
despatches  had  early  attracted  the  notice  of  his 
employers;  and  before  the  peace  of  Breda,  he 
had,  at  the  request  of  Arlington,  published  a 
pamphlet  on  the  war,  of  which  nothing  is  now 
known,  except  that  it  had  some  vogue  at  the 
time,  and  that  Charles,  not  a  contemptible 
judge,  pronounced  it  to  be  very  well  written. 
He  had  also,  a  short  time  before  he  began  to 
reside  at  the  Hague,  written  a  treatise  on  the 
State  of  Ireland,  in  which  he  showed  all  the 
feelings  of  a  Cromwellian.  He  had  gradually 
formed  a  style  singularly  lucid  and  melodious, 
— superficially  deformed,  indeed,  by  Gallicisms 
and  Hispanicisms,  picked  up  in  travel,  or  in  ne 
gotiation, — but  at  the  bottom  pure  English, — 
generally  flowing  with  careless  simplicity,  but 
occasionally  rising  even  into  Ciceronian  mag 
nificence.  The  length  of  his  sentences  has  often 
been  remarked.  But  in  truth  this  length  is  only 
apparent.  A  critic  who  considers  as  one  sen 
tence  every  thing  that  lies  between  two  full  stops 
will  undoubtedly  call  Temple's  sentences  long. 
But  a  critic  who  examines  them  carefully  will 
find  that  they  are  not  swollen  by  parenthetical 
matter;  that  their  structure  is  scarcely  ever 
intricate;  that  they  are  formed  merely  by  accu 
mulation;  and  that,  by  the  simple  process  of 
leaving  out  conjunctions,  and  substituting  full 
stops  for  colons  and  semicolons,  they  m'ght 
without  any  alteration  in  the  orde;  of  th* 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


359 


words,  be  broKen  up  into  very  short  periods, 
with  no  sacrifice  except  that  of  euphony.  The 
long  sentences  of  Hooker  and  Clarendon,  on 
the  contrary,  are  really  long  sentences,  and 
cannot  be  turned  into  short  ones,  without 
being  entirety  taken  to  pieces. 

The  best  known  of  the  works  which  Temple 
composed  during  his  first  retreat  from  official 
business  are,  an  Essay  on  Government,  which 
seems  to  us  exceedingly  childish;  and  an  Ac 
count  of  the  United  Provinces,  which  we  think 
a  masterpiece  in  its  kind.  Whoever  com 
pares  these  two  pieces  will  probably  agree 
with  us  in  thinking  that  Temple  was  not  a 
very  deep  or  accurate  reasoner,  but  was  an 
excellent  observer, — that  he  had  no  call  to 
philosophical  speculation,  but  that  he  was 
qualified  to  excel  as  a  writer  of  Memoirs  and 
Travels. 

While  Temple  was  engaged  in  these  pur 
suits,  the  great  storm  which  had  long  been 
brooding  over  Europe  burst  with  such  fury  as 
for  a  moment  seemed  to  threaten  ruin  to  all 
free  governments  and  all  Protestant  churches. 
France  and  England,  without  seeking  for  any 
decent  pretext,  declared  war  against  Holland. 
The  immense  armies  of  Louis  poured  across 
the  Rhine,  and  invaded  the  territory  of  the 
United  Provinces.  The  Dutch  seemed  to  be 
paralyzed  with  terror.  Great  towns  opened 
their  gates  to  straggling  parties.  Regiments 
flung  down  their  arms  without  seeing  an  ene 
my.  Guelderland,  Overyssel,  Utrecht  were 
overrun  by  the  conquerors.  The  fires  of  the 
French  camp  were  seen  from  the  walls  of  Am 
sterdam.  In  the  first  madness  of  their  despair, 
the  devoted  people  turned  their  rage  against 
the  most  illustrious  of  their  icllow-citizens. 
De  Ruyter  was  saved  with  difficulty  from  as 
sassins.  De  Witt  was  torn  to  pieces  by  an  in 
furiated  rabble.  No  hope  was  left  to  the  Com 
monwealth,  save  in  the  dauntless,  the  ardent, 
the  indefatigable,  the  unconquerable  spirit 
which  glowed  under  the  frigid  demeanour  of 
the  young  Prince  of  Orange. 

That  great  man  rose  at  once  to  the  full  dig 
nity  of  his  part,  and  approved  himself  a  wor 
thy  descendant  of  the  line  of  heroes  who  had 
vindicated  the  liberties  of  Europe  against  the 
house  of  Austria.  Nothing  could  shake  his 
fidelity  to  his  country — not  his  close  connec 
tion  with  the  royal  family  of  England — not  the 
most  earnest  solicitations — not  the  most  tempt 
ing  offers.  The  spirit  of  the  nation, — that  spi 
rit  which  had  maintained  the  great  conflict 
against  the  gigantic  power  of  Philip — revived 
in  all  its  strength.  Counsels  such  as  are  in 
spired  by  a  generous  despair,  and  are  almost 
always  followed  by  a  speedy  dawn  of  hope, 
were  gravely  concerted  by  the  statesmen  of 
Holland.  To  open  their  dikes, — to  man  their 
ships, — to  leave  their  country,  with  all  its  mira 
cles  of  art  and  industry, — its  cities,  its  canals, 
its  villas,  its  pastures,  and  its  tulip  gardens, — 
buried  under  the  waves  of  the  German  ocean, 
—to  bear  to  a  distant  clime  their  Calvinistic 
faith  and  their  old  Batavian  liberties,  to  fix, 
perhaps  with  happier  auspices,  the  new  Stadt- 
house  of  their  Commonwealth,  under  other 
stars,  and  amidst  a  strange  vegetation,  in  the 
Spice-Islands  of  the  Eastern  seas, — such  were 


the  plans  which  they  had  the  spirit  to  form : 
and  it  is  seldom  that  men  who  have  the  spirit 
to  form  such  plans,  are  reduced  to  the  neces 
sity  of  executing  them. 

The  allies  had,  during  a  short  period,  ob 
tained  the  most  appalling  success.  This  was 
their  auspicious  moment.  They  neglected  to 
improve  it.  It  passed  away ;  and  it  returned 
no  more.  The  Prince  of  Orange  arrested  the 
progress  of  the  French  armies.  Louis  re 
turned  to  be  amused  and  flattered  at  Versailles. 
The  country  was  under  water.  The  winter 
approached.  The  weather  became  stormy 
The  fleets  of  the  combined  kings  could  no 
longer  keep  the  sea.  The  republic  had  ob 
tained  a  respite;  and  the  circumstances  were 
such  that  a  respite  was,  in  a  military  view 
important;  in  a  political  view,  almost  decisive. 

The  alliance  against  Holland,  formidable  as 
it  was,  was  yet  of  such  a  nature  that  it  could 
not  succeed  at  all  unless  it  succeeded  at  once. 
The  English  ministers  could  not  carry  on  the 
war  without  money.  They  could  legally  obtain 
money  only  from  the  Parliament;  and  mey  were 
most  unwilling  to  call  Parliament  together. 
The  measures  which  Charles  had  adopted  at 
home  were  even  more  unpopular  than  his 
foreign  policy.  He  had  bound  himself  by  a 
treaty  with  Louis  to  re-establish  the  Catholic 
religion  in  England  ;  and,  in  pursuance  of  this 
design,  he  had  entered  on  the  same  course 
which  his  brother  afterwards  pursued  with 
greater  obstinacy  to  a  more  fatal  end.  He  had 
annulled,  by  his  own  sole  authority,  the  laws 
against  Catholics  and  other  dissenters.  The 
matter  of  the  Declaration  of  Indulgence  exas 
perated  one  half  of  his  subjects,  and  the  man 
ner  the  other  half.  Liberal  men  would  have 
rejoiced  to  see  toleration  granted,  at  least  to 
all  Protestant  sects.  Many  High  Churchmen 
had  no  objection  to  the  king's  dispensing  power 
But  a  tolerant  act  done  in  an  unconstitutional 
way  excited  the  opposition  of  all  those  who 
were  zealous  either  for  the  Church  or  for  the 
privileges  of  the  people ;  that  is  to  say,  of 
ninety-nine  Englishmen  out  of  a  hundred. 
The  ministers  were,  therefore,  most  unwilling 
to  meet  the  Houses.  Lawless  and  desperate 
as  their  counsels  were,  the  boldest  of  them  had 
too  much  value  for  his  neck  to  think  of  resort 
ing  to  benevolence^,  privy  seals,  ship-money, 
or  any  of  the  other  unlawful  modes  of  extortion 
which  former  kings  had  employed.  The  au 
dacious  fraud  of  shutting  up  the  exchequer 
furnished  them  with  about  twelve  hundred 
thousand  pounds  : — a  sum  which,  even  in  bet 
ter  hands  than  theirs,  would  hardly  have  suf 
ficed  for  the  war-charges  of  a  single  year. 
And  this  was  a  step  which  could  never  be  re 
peated  ; — a  step  which,  like  most  breaches  of 
public  faith,  was  speedily  found  to  have  caused 
pecuniary  difficulties  greater  than  those  which 
it  removed.  All  the  money  that  could  bo 
raised  was  gone  ;  Holland  was  not  conquered; 
and  the  king  had  no  other  resource  but  in  a 
Parliament. 

Had  a  general  election  taken  place  at  this 
crisis,  it  is  probable  that  the  country  would 
have  sent  up  representatives  as  resolutely  hos 
tile  to  the  court  as  those  who  met  in  November 
1640;  that  the  whole  domestic  and  foreign 


360 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


policy  of  the  government  would  have  been  in 
stantly  changed  ;  and  that  the  members  of  the 
Cabal  would  have  expiated  their  crimes  on 
Tower  Hill.  But  the  House  of  Commons  was 
still  the  same  which  had  been  elected  twelve 
years  before,  in  the  midst  of  the  transports  of 
joy,  repentance,  and  loyalty  which  followed  the 
Restoration;  and  no  pains  had  been  spared  to 
attach  it  to  the  court  by  places,  pensions,  and 
bribes.  To  the  great  mass  of  the  people  it  was 
scarcely  less  odious  than  the  c-abinet.  Yet, 
though  it  did  not  immediately  proceed  to  those 
strong  measures  which  a  new  House  would  in 
all  probability  have  adopted,  it  was  sullen  and 
unmanageable  ;  and  undid,  slowly  indeed  and 
I?y  degrees,  but  most  effectually,  all  that  the 
Ministers  had  done.  In  one  session  it  anni 
hilated  their  system  of  internal  government. 
In  a  second  session,  it  gave  a  deathblow  to 
their  foreign  policy. 

The  dispensing  power  was  the  first  object 
of  attack.  The  Commons  would  not  expressly 
approve  the  war;  but  neither  did  they  as  yet 
expressly  condemn  it ;  and  they  were  even 
willing  to  grant  the  king  a  supply  for  the  pur 
pose  of  continuing  hostilities,  on  condition  that 
he  would  redress  internal  grievances,  among 
which  the  Declaration  of  Indulgence  had  a 
foremost  place. 

Shalicobury,  who  was  Chancellor,  saw  that 
ihe  game  was  up, — that  he  had  got  all  that 
was  to  be  got  by  siding  with  despotism  and 
Popery,  and  that  it  was  high  time  to  think  of 
being  a  demagogue  and  a  good  Protestant. 
The  Lord  Treasurer  Clifford  was  marked  out 
by  his  boldness,  by  his  openness,  by  his  zeal 
for  the  Catholic  religion,  by  something  which, 
compared  with  the  villany  of  his  colleagues, 
might  almost  be  called  honesty,  to  be  the  scape 
goat  of  the  whole  conspiracy.  The  king  came 
in  person  to  the  House  of  Peers  to  request  their 
lordships  to  mediate  between  him  and  the 
Commons  touching  the  Declaration  of  Indul 
gence.  He  remained  in  the  House  while  his 
speech  was  taken  into  consideration, — a  com 
mon  practice  with  him ; — for  the  debates 
amused  his  sated  mind,  and  were  sometimes, 
he  used  to  say,  as  good  as  a  comedy.  A  more 
sudden  turn  his  majesty  had  certainly  never 
seen  in  any  comedy  or  intrigue,  either  at  his 
own  playhouse  or  at  the  duke's,  than  that 
which  this  memorable  debate  produced.  The 
Lord  Treasurer  spoke  with  characteristic  ar 
dour  and  intrepidity  in  the  defence  of  the  De 
claration.  When  he  sat  down,  the  Lord 
Chancellor  rose  from  the  woolsack,  and  to 
the  amazement  of  the  king  and  of  the  House, 
attacked  Clifford — attacked  the  Declaration  for 
which  he  had  himself  spoken  in  council — gave 
up  the  whole  policy  of  the  cabinet — and 
declared  himself  on  the  side  of  the  House  of 
Commons.  Even  that  age  had  not  witnessed 
so  portentous  a  display  of  impudence. 

The  king,  by  the  advice  of  the  French  court, 
which  cared  much  more  about  the  war  on  the 
Continent  than  about  the  conversion  of  the 
English  heretics,  determined  to  save  his  fo 
reign  policy  at  the  expense  of  his  plans  in 
favour  of  the  Catholic  Church.  He  obtained  a 
supply;  and  in  return  for  this  concession  he 
cancelled  the  Declaration  of  Indulgence,  and 


made  a  formal  renunciation  of  the  dispensing 
power  before  he  prorogued  the  Houses. 

But  it  was  no  more  in  his  power  to  go  on. 
with  the  war  than  to  maintain  his  arbitrary 
system  at  home.  His  ministry,  betrayed  with 
in  and  fiercely  assailed  from  without,  went 
rapidly  to  pieces.  Clifford  threw  down  the 
white  staff,  and  retired  to  the  woods  of  Ugbrook, 
vowing,  with  bitter  tears,  that  he  would  never 
again  see  that  turbulent  city  and  that  perfidious 
court.  Shaftesbury  was  ordered  to  deliver  up 
the  great  seal ;  and  instantly  carried  over  his 
front  of  brass  and  his  tongue  of  poison  to  the 
ranks  of  the  Opposition.  The  remaining  mem 
bers  of  the  Cabal  had  neither  the  capacity  of 
the  late  Chancellor,  nor  the  courage  and  en 
thusiasm  of  the  late  Treasurer.  They  were  not 
only  unable  to  carry  on  their  foreign  projects, 
but  began  to  tremble  for  their  own  lands  and 
heads.  The  Parliament,  as  soon  as  it  again 
met,  began  to  murmur  against  the  alliance 
with  France  and  the  war  with  Holland ;  and 
the  murmur  gradually  swelled  into  a  fierce 
and  terrible  clamour.  Strong  resolutions  were 
adopted  against  Lauderdale  and  Buckingham. 
Articles  of  impeachment  were  exhibited  against 
Arlington.  The  Triple  Alliance  was  men 
tioned  with  reverence  in  every  debate;  and 
the  eyes  of  all  men  were  turned  towards  the 
quiet  orchard,  where  the  author  of  that  great 
league  was  amusing  himself  with  reading  and 
gardening. 

Temple  was  ordered  to  attend  the  king,  and 
was  charged  with  the  office  of  negotiating  a 
separate  peace  with  Holland.  The  Spanish 
ambassador  to  the  court  of  London  had  been 
empowered  by  the  States-General  to  treat  in 
their  name.  With  him  Temple  came  to  a 
speedy  agreement;  and  in  three  days  a  treaty 
was  concluded. 

The  highest  honours  of  the  State  were  now 
within  Temple's  reach.  After  the  retirement 
of  Clifford,  the  white  staff  had  been  delivered 
to  Thomas  Osborne,  soon  after  created  Earl 
of  Danby,  who  was  related  to  Lady  Temple, 
and  had,  many  years  earlier,  travelled  and 
played  tennis  with  Sir  William.  Danby  was 
an  interested  and  unscrupulous  man,  but  by  no 
means  destitute  of  abilities  or  of  judgment. 
He  was,  indeed,  a  far  better  adviser  than  any 
in  whom  Charles  had  hitherto  reposed  confi 
dence.  Clarendon  was  a  man  of  another 
generation,  and  did  not  in  the  least  understand 
the  society  which  he  had  to  govern.  The  mem 
bers  of  the  Cabal  were  ministers  of  a  foreign 
power,  and  enemies  of  the  Established  Church 
and  had  in  consequence  raised  against  them 
selves  and  their  master  an  irresistible  storm 
of  national  and  religious  hatred.  Danby  wish 
ed  to  strengthen  and  extend  the  prerogative ; 
but  he  had  the  sense  to  see  that  this  could  be 
done  only  by  a  complete  change  of  system. 
He  knew  the  English  people  and  the  House  of 
Commons ;  and  he  knew  that  the  course  which 
Charles  had  recently  taken,  if  obstinately  pur 
sued,  might  well  end  before  the  windows  of 
the  Banqueting  House.  He  saw  that  the  true 
policy  of  the  crown  was  to  ally  itself,  not  with 
the  feeble,  the  hated,  the  down-trodden  Ca 
tholics,  but  with  the  powerful,  the  wealthy,  the 
popular,  the  dominant  Church  of  England ;  to 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


361 


trust  for  aid,  not  to  a  foreign  prince  whose 
name  was  hateful  to  the  British  nation,  and 
whose  succours  could  be  obtained  only  on 
terms  of  vassalage,  but  to  the  old  Cavalier 
party,  to  the  landed  gentry,  the  clergy,  and  the 
universities.  By  rallying  round  the  throne  the 
whole  strength  of  the  Royalists  and  High- 
Churchmen,  and  by  using  without  stint  all  the 
resources  of  corruption,  he  flattered  himself 
that  he  could  manage  the  Parliament.  That 
he  failed  is  to  be  attributed  less  to  himself  than 
to  his  master.  Of  the  disgraceful  dealings 
which  were  still  kept  up  with  the  French 
court,  Danby  deserved  little  or  none  of  the 
blame,  though  he  suffered  the  whole  punish 
ment. 

Danby,  with  great  parliamentary  talents,  had 
paid  little  attention  to  foreign  politics;  and 
wished  for  the  help  of  some  person  on  whom 
he  could  rely  in  that  department.  A  plan  was 
accordingly  arranged  for  making  Temple  Se 
cretary  of  State.  Arlington  was  the  only  mem 
ber  of  the  Cabal  who  still  held  office  in  Eng 
land.  The  temper  of  the  House  of  Commons 
made  it  necessary  to  remove  him,  or  rather,  to 
require  him  to  sell  out;  for  at  that  time  the 
great  offices  of  state  were  bought  and  sold  as 
commissions  in  the  army  now  are.  Temple 
was  informed  that  he  should  have  the  seals 
if  he  would  pay  Arlington  six  thousand  pounds. 
The  transaction  had  nothing  in  it  discreditable, 
according  to  the  notions  of  that  age;  and  the 
investment  would  have  been  a  good  one  ;  for 
we  imagine  that  at  that  time  the  gains  which 
a  Secretary  of  State  might  make  without  doing 
any  thing  considered  as  improper,  were  very 
considerable.  Temple's  friends  offered  to  lend 
him  the  money;  but  he  was  fully  determined 
not  to  take  a  post  of  so  much  responsibility  in 
times  so  agitated,  and  under  a  prince  on  whom 
so  little  reliance  could  be  placed,  and  accepted 
the  embassy  to  the  Hague,  leaving  Arlington 
to  find  another  purchaser. 

Before  Temple  left  England  he  had  a  long 
audience  of  the  king,  to  whom  he  spoke  with 
great  severity  of  the  measures  adopted  by  the 
late  ministry.  The  king  owned  that  things  had 
turned  out  ill.  "  But,"  said  he,  "if  I  had  been 
well  served,  I  might  have  made  a  good  business 
of  it."  Temple  was  alarmed  at  this  language, 
and  inferred  from  it  that  the  system  of  the  Ca 
bal  had  not  been  abandoned,  but  only  sus 
pended.  He  therefore  thought  it  his  duty  to 
go,  as  he  expresses  it,  "  to  the  bottom  of  the 
matter."  He  strongly  represented  to  the  king 
the  impossibility  of  establishing  either  abso 
lute  government  or  the  Catholic  religion  in 
England;  and  concluded  by  repeating  an  ob 
servation  which  he  had  heard  at  Brussels  from 
M.  Gourville,  a  very  intelligent  Frenchman, 
well  known  to  Charles  :  "  A  king  of  England," 
said  Gourville,  "who  is  willing  to  be  the  man 
of  his  people,  is  the  greatest  king  in  the  world  : 
but  if  he  wishes  to  be  more,  by  heaven  he 
is  nothing  at  all!"  The  king  betrayed  some 
symptoms  of  impatience  during  this  lecture; 
but  at  last  laid  his  hand  kindly  on  Temple's 
shoulder,  and  said,  "  You  are  right,  and  so  is 
Gourville ;  and  I  will  be  the  man  of  my  people." 


Hague  in  July,  1674.  Holland  was  now  se 
cure,  and  France  was  surrounded  on  every 
side  by  enemies.  Spain  and  the  Empire  were 
in  arms  for  the  purpose  of  compelling  Louis  to 
abandon  all  that  he  had  acquired  since  the 
treaty  of  the  Pyrenees.  A  congress  for  the 
purpose  of  putting  an  end  to  the  war  was 
opened  at  Nimeguen  under  the  mediation  of 
England,  in  1675  ;  and  to  that  congress  Temple 
was  deputed.  The  work  of  conciliation,  how 
ever,  went  on  very  slowly.  The  belligerent 
powers  were  still  sanguine,  and  the  mediating 
power  was  unsteady  and  insincere. 

In  the  mean  time  the  Opposition  in  England 
became  more  and  more  formidable,  and  seem 
ed  fully  determined  to  force  the  king  into  a  war 
with  France.  Charles  was  desirous  of  making 
some  appointments  which  might  strengthen 
the  administration,  and  conciliate  the  confi 
dence  of  the  public.  No  man  was  more  esteem 
ed  by  the  nation  than  Temple  ;  yet  he  had  never 
been  concerned  in  any  opposition  to  any  go 
vernment.  In  July,  1677,  he  was  sent  for  from 
Nimeguen.  Charles  received  him  with  ca 
resses,  earnestly  pressed  him  to  accept  the  seals 
of  Secretary  of  State,  and  promised  to  bear  half 
the  charge  of  buying  out  the  present  holder. 
Temple  was  charmed  by  the  kindness  and  po 
liteness  of  the  king's  manner,  and  by  the  live 
liness  of  his  conversation ;  but  his  prudence 
was  not  to  be  so  laid  asleep.  He  calmly  and 
steadily  excused  himself.  The  king  affected  to 
treat  his  excuses  as  mere  jests,  and  gayly  said, 
"  Go,  get  you  gone  to  Sheen.  We  shall  have 
no  good  of  you  till  you  have  been  there ;  and 
when  you  have  rested  yourself,  come  up  again." 
Temple  withdrew,  and  stayed  two  days  at  his 
villa,  but  returned  to  town  in  the  same  mind 
and  the  king  was  forced  to  consent  at  least  to 
a  delay. 

But  while  Temple  thus  carefully  shunned 
the  responsibility  of  bearing  a  part  in  the  ge 
neral  direction  of  affairs,  he  gave  a  signal  proof 
of  that  never-failing  sagacity  which  enabled 
him  to  find  out  ways  of  distinguishing  himself 
without  risk.  He  had  a  principal  share  in 
bringing  about  an  event  which  was  at  the  time 
hailed  with  general  satisfaction,  and  which 
subsequently  produced  consequences  of  the 
highest  importance.  This  was  the  marriage 
of  the  Prince  of  Orange  and  the  Lady  Mary. 

In  the  following  year  Temple  returned  to 
the  Hague;  and  thence  he  was  ordered,  at  the 
close  of  1678,  to  repair  to  Nimeguen,  for  the 
purpose  of  signing  the  hollow  and  unsatip 
factory  treaty  by  which  the  distractions  of 
Europe  were  for  a  short  time  suspended.  He 
grumbled  much  at  being  required  to  sign  bad 
articles  which  he  had  not  frame  1,  and  still 
more  at  having  to  travel  in  very  cold  weather. 
After  all,  a  difficulty  of  etiquette  prevented  him 
from  signing,  and  he  returned  to  the  Hague. 
Scarcely  had  he  arrived  there  when  he  received 
intelligence  that  the  king,  whose  embarrass 
ments  \rere  now  far  greater  than  ever,  was 
fully  resolved  immediately  to  appoint  him  Se 
cretary  of  State.  He  a  third  time  declined  that 


high  post,  and  began  to  make  preparations  for 
a  journey  to  Italy;  thinking,  doubtless,  thai  he 

With  this  assurance  Temple  repaired  to  the  I  should  spend  his  time  mucb  more  pleasantly 

\ui.  IIL--46  2H 


362 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


among  pictures  and  ruins  than  in  such  a  whirl 
pool  of  political  and  religious  frenzy  as  was 
then  raging  in  London. 

But  the  king  was  in  extreme  necessity,  and 
was  no  longer  to  be  so  easily  put  off.  Temple 
received  positive  orders  to  repair  instantly  to 
England.  He  obeyed,  and  found  the  country 
in  a  state  even  more  fearful  than  that  which  he 
had  pictured  to  himself. 

Those  are  terrible  conjunctures,  when  the 
discontents  of  a  nation — not  light  and  capri 
cious  discontents,  but  disconcents  which  had 
been  steadily  increasing  during  a  long  series 
of  years — have  attained  their  full  maturity. 
The  discerning  few  predict  the  approach  of 
these  conjunctures,  but  predict  in  vain.  To 
the  many,  the  evil  season  comes  as  a  total 
eclipse  of  the  sun  at  noon  comes  to  a  people 
of  savages.  Society  which,  but  a  short  time 
before,  was  in  a  state  of  perfect  repose,  is  on  a 
sudden  agitated  with  the  most  fearful  convul 
sions,  and  seems  to  be  on  the  verge  of  disso 
lution  ;  and  the  rulers  who,  till  the  mischief 
was  beyond  the  reach  of  all  ordinary  remedies, 
had  never  bestowed  one  thought  on  its  exist 
ence,  stand  bewildered  and  panic-stricken, 
without  hope  or  resource,  in  the  midst  of  the 
confusion.  One  such  conjuncture  this  gene 
ration  has  seen.  God  grant  that  it  may  never 
see  another!  At  such  a  juncture  it  was  that 
Temple  landed  on  English  ground  in  the  be 
ginning  of  1679. 

The  Parliament  had  obtained  a  glimpse  of  the 
king's  dealings  with  France;  and  their  anger 
had  been  unjustly  directed  against  Danby, 
whose  conduct  as  to  that  matter  had  been,  on 
the  whole,  deserving  rather  of  praise  than  of 
censure.  The  Popish  Plot,  the  murder  of  God 
frey,  the  infamous  inventions  of  Oates,  the  dis 
covery  of  Colman's  letters,  had  excited  the 
nation  to  madness.  All  the  disaffections  which 
had  been  generated  by  eighteen  years  of  mis- 
government  had  come  to  the  birth  together. 
At  this  moment  the  king  had  been  advised  to 
dissolve  that  Parliament  which  had  been  elected 
just  after  his  restoration;  and  which,  though 
its  composition  had  since  that  time  been  greatly 
altered,  was  still  far  more  deeply  imbued  with 
the  old  Cavalier  spirit  than  any  that  had  pre 
ceded  or  that  was  likely  to  follow  it.  The  ge 
neral  election  had  commenced,  and  was  pro 
ceeding  with  a  degree  of  excitement  never  be 
fore  known.  The  tide  ran  furiously  against 
the  court.  It  was  clear  that  a  majority  of  the 
new  House  of  Commons  would  be — to  use  a 
•word  which  came  into  fashion  a  few  months 
later — decided  Whigs.  Charles  had  found  it 
necessary  to  yield  to  the  violence  of  the  public 
feeling.  The  Duke  of  York  was  on  the  point 
of  retiring  to  Holland.  "  I  never,"  says  Temple, 
who  had  seen  the  abolition  of  monarchy,  the 
dissolution  of  the  Long  Parliament,  the  fall  of 
the  Protectorate,  the  declaration  of  Monk  against 
the  Rump, — "  I  never  saw  greater  disturbance 
in  men's  minds." 

Th*.  king  now  with  the  utmost  urgency  be- 
kought  Temple  to  take  the  seals.  The  pecu 
niary  part  of  the  arrangement  no  longer  pre 
sented  any  difficulty;  and  Sir  William  was  not 
\uite  so  decided  in  his  refusal  as  he  had  for 
merly  been.  He  took  three  days  to  consider  the 


:  posture  of  affairs,  and  to  examine  his  own 

feelings;  and  he  came  to  the  conclusion  that 

j  "the  scene  was  unfit  for  such  an  actor  as  he 

;  knew  himself  to  be."     Yet  he  felt  that,  by  re- 

I  fusing  help  to  the  king  at  such  a  crisis  he 

j  might  give  much  offence  and  incur  much  cen- 

!  sure.     He  shaped  his  course  with  his  usua. 

dexterity.     He  affected  to  be  very  desirous  cf  a 

seat  in  Parliament ;  yet  he  contrived  to  be  an 

unsuccessful   candidate ;    and,   when  all  the 

writs   were   returned,  he  represented  that  it 

would  be  useless  for  him  to  take  the  seals  till 

he  could  procure  admittance  to  the  House  of 

Commons  ;  and  in  this  manner  he  succeeded 

in  avoiding  the  greatness  which  others  desired 

to  thrust  upon  him. 

The  Parliament  met;  and  the  violence  of  its 
proceedings  surpassed  all  expectation.  The 
Long  Parliament  itself,  with  much  greater  pro 
vocation,  had  at  its  commencement  been  less 
violent.  The  Treasurer  was  instantly  driven 
from  office,  impeached,  sent  to  the  Tower. 
Sharp  and  vehement  votes  were  passed  on  the 
subject  of  the  Popish  Plot.  The  Commons 
were  prepared  to  go  much  further, — to  wrest 
from  the  king  his  prerogative  of  mercy  in  cases 
of  high  political  crimes,  and  to  alter  the  suc 
cession  to  the  crown.  Charles  was  thoroughly 
perplexed  and  dismayed.  Temple  saw  him 
almost  daily,  and  thought  that  at  last  he  was 
impressed  with  a  deep  sense  of  his  errors,  and 
of  the  miserable  state  into  which  they  had 
brought  him.  Their  conferences  became  longer 
and  more  confidential :  and  Temple  began  to 
flatter  himself  with  the  hope  that  he  might  be 
able  to  reconcile  parties  at  home  as  he  had  re 
conciled  hostile  states  abroad, — that  he  might 
be  able  to  suggest  a  plan  which  should  allay 
all  heats,  efface  the  memory  of  all  past  griev 
ances, — secure  the  nation  from  misgovern- 
ment,  and  protect  the  crown  against  the  en 
croachments  of  Parliament. 

Temple's  plan  was,  that  the  existing  Privy 
Council,  which  consisted  of  fifty  members, 
should  be  dissolved — that  there  should  no 
longer  be  a  small  interior  council,  like  that 
which  is  now  designated  as  the  Cabinet, — that 
a  new  Privy  Council  of  thirty  members  should 
be  appointed, — and  that  the  king  should  pledge 
himself  to  govern  by  the  constant  advice  of 
this  body, — to  suffer  all  his  affairs  of  every 
kind  to  be  freely  debated  there,  and  not  to  re 
serve  any  part  of  the  public  business  for  a 
secret  committee. 

Fifteen  members  of  this  new  Council  were 
to  be  great  officers  of  state.  The  other  fifteen 
were  to  be  independent  noblemen  and  gentle 
men  of  the  greatest  weight  in  the  country.  In 
appointing  them  particular  regard  was  to  be 
had  to  the  amount  of  their  property.  The 
whole  annual  income  of  the  councillors  was 
estimated  at  £300,000.  The  annual  income 
of  all  the  members  of  the  House  of  Commons 
was  not  supposed  to  exceed  £400,000.  The 
appointment  of  wealthy  councillors  Temple 
describes  as  "  a  chief  regard,  necessary  to  this 
constitution." 

This  plan  was  the  subject  of  frequent  con 
versation  between  the  king  and  Temple.  After 
a  month  passed  in  discussion:?,  to  which  nc 
third  person  appears  tn  have  been  privy 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


303 


Charles  declared  himself  satisfied  of  the  expe 
diency  of  the  proposed  measure,  and  resolved 
to  carry  it  into  effect. 

It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  Temple  has 
left  us  no  account  of  these  conferences.  His 
torians  have,  therefore,  been  left  to  form  their 
own  conjectures  as  to  the  object  of  this  very 
extraordinary  plan, — "  this  constitution,"  as 
Temple  himself  calls  it.  And  we  cannot  say 
that  any  explanation  which  has  yet  been  given 
seems  to  us  quite  satisfactory.  Indeed,  almost 
all  the  writers  whom  we  have  consulted  appear 
to  consider  the  change  as  merely  a  change  of 
administration;  and,  so  considering  it,  they 
generally  applaud  it.  Mr.  Courtenay,  who  has 
evidently  examined  this  subject  with  more  at 
tention  than  has  often  been  bestowed  upon  it, 
seems  to  think  Temple's  scheme  very  strange, 
unintelligible,  and  absurd.  It  is  with  very 
great  diffidence  that  we  offer  our  own  solution 
of  what  we  have  always  thought  one  of  the 
great  riddles  of  English  history.  We  are 
strongly  inclined  to  suspect  that  the  appointment 
of  the  new  Privy  Council  was  really  a  much 
more  remarkable  event  than  has  generally 
been  supposed ;  and  that  what  Temple  had  in 
view  was  to  effect,  under  colour  of  a  change  of 
administration,  a  permanent  change  in  the 
constitution. 

The  plan,  considered  as  a  plan  for  the  forma 
tion  of  a  cabinet,  is  so  obviously  inconvenient 
that  we  cannot  easily  believe  this  to  have  been 
Temple's  chief  object.  The  number  of  the  new 
Council  alone  would  be  a  most  serious  objec 
tion.  The  largest  cabinets  of  modern  times 
have  not,  we  believe,  consisted  of  more  than 
fifteen  members.  Even  this  number  has  gene 
rally  been  thought  too  large.  The  Marquess 
Wellesley,  whose  judgment,  on  a  question  cf 
executive  administration,  is  entitled  to  as  much 
respect  as  that  of  any  statesman  that  England 
ever  produced,  expressed,  on  a  very  important 
occasion,*  his  conviction  that  even  thirteen 
was  an  inconveniently  large  number.  But  in 
a  cabinet  of  thirty  members,  what  chance 
could  there  be  of  finding  unity,  secrecy,  expe 
dition, — any  of  the  qualities  which  such  a  body 
ought  to  possess  1  If  indeed  the  members  of 
such  a  cabinet  were  closely  bound  together  by 
interest,  if  they  all  had  a  deep  stake  in  the  per 
manence  of  the  administration,  if  the  majority 
were  dependent  on  a  small  number  of  leading 
men,  the  thirty  might  perhaps  act  as  a  smaller 
number  would  act,  though  more  slowly,  more 
awkwardly,  and  with  more  risk  of  improper 
disclosures.  But  the  Council  which  Temple 
proposed  was  so  framed  that  if,  instead  of 
thirty  members,  it  had  contained  only  ten,  it 
would  still  have  leen  the  most  unwieldy  and 
discordant  cabinet  that  ever  sat.  One-half  of 
the  members  were  to  be  persons  holding  no 
office, — persons  who  had  no  motive  to  compro 
mise  their  opinions,  or  to  take  any  share  of  the 
responsibilty  of  an  unpopular  measure ; — per 
sons,  therefore,  who  might  be  expected,  as 
often  as  there  might  be  a  crisis  requiring  the 
most  cordial  co-operation,  to  draw  off  from  the 
rest,  and  to  throw  every  difficulty  in  the  way 
of  the  public  business.  The  circumstance  that 

*  In  the  negotiations  of  1812. 


they  were  men  of  enormous  private  wealth 
only  made  the  matter  worse.  The  House  of 
Commons  is  a  checking  body,  and  therefore  it 
is  desirable  that  it  should,  to  a  great  extent, 
consist  of  men  of  independent  fortune,  who 
receive  nothing  and  expect  nothing  from  the 
government.  But  with  executive  boards  the 
case  is  quite  different.  Their  business  is  not 
to  check,  but  to  act.  The  very  same  thinp-s, 
therefore,  which  are  the  virtues  of  Parliameirs, 
may  be  vices  in  Cabinets.  We  can  hardly 
conceive  a  greater  curse  to  the  country  than  an 
administration,  the  members  of  which  should 
be  as  perfectly  independent  of  each  other,  and 
as  little  under  the  necessity  of  making  mutual 
concessions,  as  the  representatives  of  London 
and  Devonshire  in  the  House  of  Commons  are, 
or  ought  to  be.  Now  Temple's  new  Council 
was  to  contain  fifteen  members,  who  were  to 
hold  no  offices,  and  the  average  amount  of 
whose  private  estates  was  ten  thousand 
pounds  a  year ;  an  income  which,  in  propor 
tion  to  the  wants  of  a  man  of  rank  of  that 
period,  was  at  least  equal  to  thirty  thousand  a 
year  in  our  own  time.  Was  it  to  be  expected 
that  such  men  would  gratuitously  take  on 
themselves  the  labour  and  responsibility  of 
ministers,  and  the  unpopularity  which  the  best 
ministers  must  sometimes  be  prepared  to 
brave  1  Could  there  be  any  doubt  that  an  op 
position  would  soon  be  formed  within  the  ca 
binet  itself,  and  that  the  consequence  would  be 
disunion,  altercation,  tardiness  in  operations, 
the  divulging  of  secrets,  every  thing  most  alien 
from  the  nature  of  an  executive  council  1 

Is  it  possible  to  imagine  that  considerations 
so  grave  and  so  obvious  should  have  altoge 
ther  escaped  the  notice  of  a  man  of  Temple's 
sagacity  and  experience  ?  One  of  two  things 
appears  to  us  to  be  certain, — either  that  his 
project  has  been  misunderstood,  or  that  his 
talents  for  public  affairs  have  been  overrated. 

We  lean  to  the  opinion  that  his  project  has 
been  misunderstood.  His  new  Council,  as  we 
have  shown,  would  have  been  an  exceedingly 
bad  cabinet.  The  inference  which  we  are  in 
clined  to  draw  is  this, — that  he  meant  his  Coun 
cil  to  serve  some  other  purpose  than  that  of  a 
mere  cabinet.  Barillon  used  four  or  five  words 
which  contain,  we  think,  the  key  of  the  whole 
mystery.  Mr.  Courtenay  calls  them  pithy  words, 
but  he  does  not,  if  we  are  right,  apprehend 
their  whole  force.  "  Ce  sent,"  said  Barillon, 
"  des  etats,  non  des  consiels." 

In  order  clearly  to  understand  what  we  ima 
gine  to  have  been  Temple's  views,  we  must 
remember  that  the  government  of  England  was 
at  that  moment,  and  had  been  during  nearly 
eighty  years,  in  a  state  of  transition.  A  change, 
not  the  less  real  nor  the  less  extensive  because 
disguised  under  ancient  names  and  forms,  was 
in  constant  progress.  The  theory  of  the  con» 
stitution — the  fundamental  laws  which  fix  the 
powers  of  the  three  branches  of  the  legislature 
— underwent  no  material  change  between  the 
time  of  Elizabeth  and  the  time  of  William  III. 
The  most  celebrated  laws  of  the  seventeenth 
century  on  those  rubjects — the  Petition  of 
Right — the  Declaration  of  Right — are  purely 
declaratory.  They  purport  to  be  merely  re 
citals  of  the  old  polity  of  England.  They  dc 


361 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


not  establish  free  government  as  a  salutary  : 
improvement,  but  claim  it  as  an  undoubted  j 
and  immemorial  inheritance.  Nevertheless, ! 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that,  during  the  period  | 
of  which  we  speak,  all  the  mutual  relations  of 
all  the  orders  of  the  state  did  practically  under 
go  an  entire  change.  The  letter  of  the  law 
might  be  unaltered,  but  at  the  beginning  of  the 
seventeenth  century  the  power  of  the  crown 
was,  in  fact,  decidedly  predominant  in  the 
state ;  and  at  the  end  of  that  century  the  power 
of  Parliament,  and  especially  of  the  Lower 
House,  had  become,  in  fact,  decidedly  predo 
minant.  At  the  beginning  of  the  century  the 
sovereign  perpetually  violated,  with  little  or  no 
opposition,  the  clear  privileges  of  Parliament. 
At  the  close  of  the  century  the  Parliament  had 
virtually  drawn  to  itself  just  as  much  as  it 
chose  of  the  prerogative  of  the  crown.  The 
sovereign  retained  the  shadow  of  that  autho 
rity  of  which  the  Tudors  had  held  the  sub 
stance.  He  had  a  legislative  veto  which  he 
never  ventured  to  exercise, — a  power  of  ap 
pointing  ministers  whom  an  address  of  the 
Commons  could  at  any  moment  force  him  to 
discard, — a  power  of  declaring  war,  which, 
without  parliamentary  support,  could  not  be 
carried  on  for  a  single  day.  The  Houses  of 
Parliament  were  now  not  merely  legislative 
assemblies — not  merely  checking  assemblies  : 
they  were  great  Councils  of  State,  whose  voice, 
when  loudly  and  firmly  raised,  was  decisive  on 
all  questions  of  foreign  and  domestic  policy. 
There  was  no  part  of  the  whole  system  of  go 
vernment  with  which  they  had  not  power  to 
interfere  by  advice  equivalent  to  command, 
and  if  they  abstained  from  intermeddling  with 
some  department  of  the  executive  administra 
tion,  they  were  withheld  from  doing  so  only  by 
their  own  moderation,  and  by  the  confidence 
which  they  reposed  in  the  ministers  of  the 
crown.  There  is  perhaps  no  other  instance 
in  history  of  a  change  so  complete  in  the  real 
constitution  of  an  empire,  unaccompanied  by 
any  corresponding  change  in  the  theoretical 
constitution.  The  disguised  transformation  of 
the  Roman  commonwealth  into  a  despotic  mo 
narchy,  under  the  loifg  administration  of  Au 
gustus,  is  perhaps  the  nearest  parallel. 

This  great  alteration  did  not  take  place  with 
out  strong  and  constant  resistance  on  the  part 
of  the  kings  of  the  house  of  Stuart.  Till  1642 
that  resistance  was  generally  of  an  open,  vio 
lent,  and  lawless  nature.  If  the  Commons 
refused  supplies,  the  sovereign  levied  a  "  be 
nevolence."  If  the  Commons  impeached  a 
favourite  minister,  the  sovereign  threw  the 

efs  of  the  Opposition  into  prison.  Of  these 
rts  to  keep  down  the  Parliament  by  des 
potic  force  without  the  pretext  of  law,  the  last, 
the  most  celebrated,  and  the  most  wicked,  was 
the  attempt  to  seize  the  five  members.  That 
attempt  was  the  signal  for  civil  war,  and  was 
followed  by  eighteen  years  of  blood  and  con 
fusion. 

The  days  of  trouble  passed  by;  the  exiles 
returned;  the  throne  was  again  set  up  in  its 
high  place  ;  the  peerage  and  the  hierarchy  re 
covered  their  ancient  splendour.  The  funda 
mental  laws  which  had.  been  recited  in  the 
Petition  of  Right  were  again  solemnly  recog 


nised.  The  theory  of  the  English  constitution 
was  the  same  on  the  day  when  the  hand  of 
Charles  II.  was  kissed  by  the  kneeling  Houses 
at  Whitehall  as  on  the  day  when  his  father  set 
up  the  royal  standard  at  Nottingham.  There 
was  a  short  period  of  doting  fondness,  an  hys- 
terica  passio  of  loyal  repentance  and  love.  But 
emotions  of  this  sort  are  transitory;  and  the 
interests  on  which  depends  the  progress  of 
great  societies  are  permanent.  The  transport 
of  reconciliation  was  soon  over,  and  the  old 
struggle  recommenced. 

The  old  struggle  recommenced; — but  not 
precisely  after  the  old  fashion.  The  sovereign 
was  not,  indeed,  a  man  whom  any  common 
warning  would  have  restrained  from  the  gross 
est  violations  of  law.  But  it  was  no  common 
warning  that  he  had  received.  All  round  him 
were  the  recent  signs  of  the  vengeance  of  an 
oppressed  nation, — the  fields  on  which  the 
noblest  blood  of  the  island  had  been  poured 
forth, — the  castles  shattered  by  the  cannon  of 
the  parliamentary  armies, — the  hall  where  sat 
the  stern  tribunal  to  whose  bar  had  been  led, 
through  lowering  ranks  of  pikemen,  the  cap 
tive  heir  of  a  hundred  kings, — the  stately  pilas 
ters  before  which  the  great  execution  had  been 
so  fearlessly  done  in  the  face  of  heaven  and 
earth.  The  restored  prince,  admonished  by 
the  fate  of  his  father,  never  ventured  to  attack 
his  Parliaments  with  open  and  arbitrary  vio 
lence.  It  was  at  one  time  by  muans  of  the 
Parliament  itself,  at  another  time  by  means 
o"  the  courts  of  law,  that  he  attempted  to  re 
gain  for  the  crown  its  old  predominance.  He 
began  with  great  advantages.  The  Parliament 
of  1661  was  called  while  the  nation  was  still 
full  of  joy  and  tenderness.  The  great  majority 
of  the  House  of  Commons  were  zealous  royal 
ists.  All  the  means  of  influence  which  the 
patronage  of  the  crown  afforded  were  used 
v/ithout  limit.  Bribery  was  reduced  to  a  sys 
tem.  The  king,  when  he  could  spare  money 
from  his  pleasures  for  nothing  else,  could  spare 
it  for  purposes  of  corruption.  While  the  defence 
of  the  coasts  was  neglected,  while  ships  rotted, 
while  arsenals  lay  empty,  while  turbulent  crowds 
of  unpaid  seamen  swarmed  in  the  streets  of  the 
seaports,  something  could  still  be  scraped  to 
gether  in  the  treasury  for  *he  members  of  the 
House  of  Commons.  The  gold  of  France  was 
largely  employed  for  the  same  purpose.  Yet 
it  was  found,  as  indeed  might  have  been  fore 
seen,  that  there  is  a  natural  limit  to  the  effect 
which  can  be  produced  by  means  like  these. 
There  is  one  thing  which  the  most  corrupt 
senates  are  unwilling  to  sell,  and  that  is  the 
power  which  makes  them  worth  buying.  The 
same  selfish  motives  which  induce  them  to 
take  a  price  for  a  particular  vote,  will  induce 
them  to  oppose  every  measure  of  which  the 
effect  would  be  to  lower  the  importance,  and 
consequently  the  price,  of  their  votes.  About 
the  income  of  their  power,  so  to  speak,  they 
are  quite  ready  to  make  bargains.  But  they 
are  not  easily  persuaded  to  part  with  any  frag 
ment  of  the  principal.  It  is  curious  to  observe 
how,  during  the  long  continuance  of  this  Par 
liament — the  pensionary  Parliament,  as  it  was 
nicknamed  by  contemporaries — though  every 
circumstance  seemed  to  be  favourable  to  tho 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


365 


crown,  the  power  of  the  crown  was  constantly 
sinking,  and  that  of  the  Commons  constantly 
rising.  The  meetings  of  the  Houses  were  more 
frequent  than  in  former  reigns ;  their  inter 
ference  was  more  harassing  to  the  government 
than  in  former  reigns;  they  had  begun  to  make 
peace,  to  make  war,  to  pull  down,  if  they  did 
not  set  up,  administrations.  Already  a  new 
class  of  statesmen  had  appeared,  unheard  of 
before  that  time,  but  common  ever  since.  Un 
der  the  Tudors  and  the  earlier  Stuarts,  it  was 
generally  by  courtly  arts  or  by  official  skill 
and  knowledge  that  a  politician  raised  himself 
to  power.  From  the  time  of  Charles  II.  down 
to  our  own  days  a  different  species  of  talent, 
parliamentary  talent,  has  been  the  most  valu 
able  of  all  the  qualifications  of  an  English 
statesman.  It  has  stood  in  the  place  of  all 
other  acquirements.  It  has  covered  ignorance, 
weakness,  rashness,  the  most  fatal  maladminis 
tration.  A  great  negotiator  is  nothing  when 
compared  with  a  great  debater ;  and  a  minis 
ter  who  can  make  a  successful  speech  need 
trouble  himself  little  about  an  unsuccessful 
expedition.  This  is  the  talent  which  has  made 
judges  without  law,  and  diplomatists  without 
French — which  has  sent  to  the  Admiralty  men 
who  did  not  know  the  stern  of  a  ship  from  her 
bowsprit,  and  to  the  India  Board  men  who  did 
not  know  the  difference  between  a  rupee  and 
a  pagoda— which  made  a  foreign  secretary  of 
Mr.  Pitt,  who,  as  George  II.  said,  had  never 
opened  Vattel — and  which  was  very  near  mak 
ing  a  chancellor  of  the  excheqier  of  Mr.  Sheri 
dan,  who  could  not  work  a  sum  in  long  divi 
sion.  This  was  the  sort  of  talent  which  raised 
Clifford  from  obscurity  to  the  head  of  affairs. 
To  this  talent  Danby — by  birth  a  simple  coun 
try  gentleman — owed  his  white  staff,  his  gar 
ter,  and  his  dukedom.  The  encroachment  of 
the  power  of  the  Parliament  on  the  power  of 
the  crown  resembled  a  fatality,  or  the  opera 
tion  of  some  great  law  of  nature.  The  will 
of  the  individual  on  the  throne  or  of  the  indi 
viduals  in  the  two  Houses  seemed  to  go  for  no- 
ihing.  The  king  might  be  eager  to  encroach, 
yet  something  constantly  drove  him  back.  The 
Parliament  might  be  loyal,  even  servile,  yet 
something  constantly  urged  them  forward. 

These  things  were  done  in  the  green  tree. 
What  then  was  likely  to  be  done  in  the  dry? 
The  Popish  Plot  and  the  general  election  came 
together,  and  found  a  people  predisposed  to  the 
most  violent  excitation.  The  composition  of 
the  House  of  Commons  was  changed.  The 
legislature  was  filled  with  men  who  leaned  to 
Republicanism  in  politics,  and  to  Presbyteri- 
anism  in  religion.  They  no  sooner  met  than 
they  commenced  a  series  of  attacks  on  the  go 
vernment,  which,  if  successful,  must  have 
made  them  supreme  in  the  state. 

Where  was  this  to  end!  To  us  who  have 
seen  the  solution,  the  question  presents  few 
difficulties.  But  to  a  statesman  of  the  age  of 
Charles  II. — to  a  statesman  who  wished,  with 
out  depriving  the  Parliament  of  its  privileges, 
to  maintain  the  monarch  in  his  old  supremacy 
—it  must  have  appeared  very  perplexing. 

Clarendon  had,  when  minister,  struggled, 
honestly  perhaps,  but,  as  was  his  wont,  obsti 
nately,  proudly,  and  offensively,  against  the 


growing  power  of  the  Commons.  He  was  for 
allowing  them  their  old  authority,  and  not  one 
atom  more.  He  would  never  have  claimed  for 
the  crown  a  right  to  levy  taxes  from  the  peo 
ple,  without  the  consent  of  Parliament.  But 
when  the  Parliament,  in  the  first  Dutch  war, 
most  properly  insisted  on  knowing  how  it  was 
that  the  money  which  they  had  voted  had  pro 
duced  so  little  effect,  and  began  to  inquire 
through  what  hands  it  had  passed,  and  on 
what  services  it  had  been  expended,  Clarendon 
considered  this  as  a  monstrous  innovation.  He 
told  the  king,  as  he  himself  says,  "  that  he 
could  not  be  too  indulgent  in  the  defence  of  the 
privileges  of  Parliament,  and  that  he  hoped  he 
would  never  violate  any  of  them ;  but  he  de 
sired  him  to  be  equally  solicitous  to  prevent  the 
excesses  in  Parliament,  and  not  to  suffer  them 
to  extend  their  jurisdiction  to  cases  they  have 
nothing  to  do  with ;  and  that  to  restrain  them 
within  their  proper  bounds  and  limits  is  as 
necessary  as  it  is  to  preserve  them  from  being 
invaded ;  and  that  this  was  such  a  new  en 
croachment  as  had  no  bottom."  This  is  a  sin 
gle  instance.  Others  might  easily  be  given. 

The  bigotry,  the  strong  passions,  the  haughty 
and  disdainful  temper,  which  made  Claren 
don's  great  abilities  a  source  of  almost  un 
mixed  evil  to  himself,  and  to  the  public,  had 
no  place  in  the  character  of  Temple.  To 
Temple,  however,  as  well  as  to  Clarendon,  the 
rapid  change  which  was  taking  place  in  the 
real  working  of  the  constitution  gave  great 
disquiet ;  particularly  as  he  had  never  sat  in 
the  English  Parliament,  and  therefore  regarded 
it  with  none  of  the  predilection  which  men  na 
turally  feel  for  a  body  to  which  they  belong, 
and  for  a  theatre  on  which  their  own  talents 
have  been  advantageously  displayed. 

To  wrest  by  force  from  the  House  of  Com 
mons  its  newly  acquired  powers  was  impossi 
ble;  nor  was  Temple  a  man  to  recommend 
such  a  stroke,  even  if  it  had  been  possible. 
But  was  it  possible  that  the  House  of  Com 
mons  might  be  induced  to  let  those  powers 
drop — that,  as  a  great  revolution  had  been  ef 
fected  without  any  change  in  the  outward  form 
of  the  government,  so  a^reat  counter-revolu 
tion  might  be  effected  in  the  same  manner — 
that  the  crown  and  the  Parliament  might  be 
placed  in  nearly  the  same  relative  position  in 
which  they  had  stood  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth, 
and  this  might  be  done  without  one  sword 
drawn,  without  one  execution,  and  with  the  ge 
neral  acquiescence  of  the  nation  ! 

The  English  people — it  was  probably  thus 
that  Temple  argued — will  not  bear  to  be  go 
verned  by  the  unchecked  power  of  the  sovc 
reign,  nor  ought  they  to  be  so  governed.  At 
present  there  is  no  check  but  the  Parliament. 
The  limits  which  separate  the  power  of  check 
ing  those  who  govern,  from  the  power  of  go 
verning,  are  not  easily  to  be  denned.  The 
Parliament,  therefore,  supported  by  the  nation,, 
is  rapidly  drawing  to  itself  all  the  povrers  of 
government.  If  it  were  possible  to  frame  some 
other  check  on  the  power  of  the  crown,  some 
check  which  might  be  less  galling  to  the  sove 
reign  than  that  by  which  he  is  now  constantly 
tormented,  and  yet  which  might  appear  to  th* 
people  to  be  a  tolerable  security  against  rnal 
2a  2 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


administration,  Parliaments  would  probably 
meddle  less  ;  and  they  would  be  less  supported 
by  public  opinion  in  their  meddling.  That 
the  king's  hands  may  not  be  rudely  tied  by 
others,  he  must  consent  to  tie  them  lightly 
himself.  That  the  executive  administration 
may  not  be  usurped  by  the  checking  body, 
something  of  the  character  of  a  checking  body 
must  be  given  to  the  body  which  conducts  the 
executive  administration.  The  Parliament  is 
now  arrogating  to  itself  every  day  a  larger 
share  of  the  functions  of  the  Privy  Council. 
We  must  stop  the  evil  by  giving  to  the  Privy 
Council  something  of  the  constitution  of  a 
Parliament.  Let  the  nation  see  that  all  the 
king's  measures  are  directed  by  a  cabinet 
composed  of  representatives  of  every  order  in 
the  state — by  a  cabinet  which  contains,  not 
placemen  alone,  but  independent  and  popular 
noblemen  and  gentlemen  who  have  large  es 
tates  and  no  salaries,  and  who  are  not  likely  to 
sacrifice  the  public  welfare,  in  which  they  have 
a  deep  stake,  and  the  credit  which  they  have 
attained  with  the  country,  to  the  pleasure  of  a 
court  from  which  they  receive  nothing.  When 
the  ordinary  administration  is  in  such  hands 
as  these,  the  people  will  be  quite  content  to  see 
the  Parliament  become  what  it  formerly  was — 
an  extraordinary  check.  They  will  be  quite 
willing  that  the  House  of  Commons  should 
meet  only  once  in  three  years  for  a  short  ses 
sion,  and  should  take  as  little  part  in  matters 
of  state  as  they  did  a  hundred  years  ago. 

Thus  we  believe  that  Temple  reasoned:  for 
on  this  hypothesis  his  scheme  is  intelligible; 
and  on  any  other  hypothesis  appears  t©  us,  as 
it  does  to  Mr.  Courtenay,  exceedingly  absurd 
and  unmeaning.  This  Council  was  strictly 
what  Barillon  called  it — an  assembly  of  states. 
There  are  the  representatives  of  all  the  great 
flections  of  the  community — of  the  Church,  of 
the  Law,  of  the  Peerage,  of  the  Commons. 
The  exclusion  of  one-half  of  the  councillors 
from  office  under  the  crown — an  exclusion 
which  is  quite  absurd  when  we  consider  the 
Council  merely  as  an  executive  board — be 
comes  at  once  perfectly  reasonable  when  we 
consider  the  Council  as  a  body  intended  to  re 
strain  the  crown,  as  well  as  to  exercise  the 
powers  of  the  crown — to  perform  some  of  the 
functions  of  a  Parliament,  as  well  as  the  func 
tions  of  a  cabinet.  We  see,  too,  why  Temple 
dwelt  so  much  on  the  private  wealth  of  the 
members — why  he  instituted  a  comparison 
between  their  united  income  and  the  united 
incomes  of  the  members  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  Such  a  parallel  would  have  been  idle 
in  the  case  of  a  mere  cabinet.  It  is  extremely 
significant  in  the  case  of  a  body  intended  to 
supersede  the  House  of  Commons  in  some 
very  important  functions. 

We  can  hardly  help  thinking  that  the  notion 
of  this  Parliament  on  a  small  scale  was  sug 
gested  to  Temple  by  what  he  had  himself  seen 
in  the  United  Provinces.  The  original  Assem 
bly  of  the  States-General  consisted,  as  he  tells 
us,  of  above  eight  hundred  persons.  But  this 
great  body  was  represented  by  a  smaller  coun 
cil  of  about  thirty,  which  bore  the  name  and 
exercised  the  powers  of  the  States-General. 
\t  last  the  real  States  altogether  ceased  to 


meet,  and  their  power,  though  still  a  part  of  the 
theory  of  the  constitution,  became  obsolete  in 
practice.  We  do  not,  of  course,  imagine  that 
Temple  either  expected  or  wished  that  Parlia 
ments  should  be  thus  disused ;  but  he  did  ex 
pect,  we  think,  that  something  like  what  had 
happened  in  Holland  would  happen  in  Eng 
land,  and  that  a  large  portion  of  the  functions 
lately  assumed  by  Parliament  would  be  quietly 
transferred  to  the  miniature  Parliament  which 
he  proposed  to  create. 

Had  this  plan,  with  some  modifications,  been 
tried  at  an  earlier  period,  in  a  more  composed 
state  of  the  public  mind,  and  by  a  better  sove 
reign,  we  are  by  no  means  certain  that  it  would 
not  have  effected  the  purpose  for  which  it  was 
designed.  The  restraint  imposed  on  the  king 
by  the  Council  of  Thirty,  whom  he  had  himself 
chosen,  would  have  been  feeble  indeed  when 
compared  with  the  restraint  imposed  by  Parlia 
ment.  But  it  would  have  been  more  constant. 
It  would  have  acted  every  year,  and  all  the 
year  round ;  and  before  the  Revolution  the  ses 
sions  of  Parliament  were  short  and  the  re 
cesses  long.  The  advice  of  the  Council  would 
probably  have  prevented  any  very  monstrous 
and  scandalous  measures;  and  would  conse 
quently  have  prevented  the  discontents  which 
followed  such  measures,  and  the  salutary  laws 
which  are  the  fruits  of  such  discontents.  We 
believe,  for  example,  that  the  second  Dutch 
war  would  never  have  been  approved  by  such 
a  Council  as  that  which  Temple  proposed. 
We  are  quite  certain  that  the  shutting  up  of  the 
Exchequer  would  never  even  have  been  men 
tioned  in  such  a  Council.  The  people,  pleased 
to  think  that  Lord  Russell,  Lord  Cavendish, 
and  Mr.  Powle,  unplaced  and  unpensioned, 
were  daily  representing  their  grievances,  and 
defending  their  rights  in  the  royal  presence, 
would  not  have  pined  quite  so  much  for  the 
meeting  of  Parliaments.  The  Parliament, 
when  it  met,  would  have  found  fewer  and  less 
glaring  abuses  to  attack.  There  would  have 
been  less  misgovernment  and  less  reform.  We 
should  not  have  been  cursed  with  the  Cabal,  or 
blessed  with  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act.  In  the 
mean  time,  the  Council  would,  unless  some  at 
least  of  its  powers  had  been  delegated  to  a 
smaller  body,  have  been  feeble,  dilatory,  di 
vided,  unfit  for  every  thing  which  requires 
secrecy  and  despatch,  and  peculiarly  unfit  for 
the  administration  of  war. 

The  Revolution  put  an  end,  in  a  very  differ 
ent  way,  to  the  long  contest  between  the  king 
and  the  Parliament.  From  that  time,  the 
House  of  Commons  has  been  predominant  in 
the  state.  The  cabinet  has  really  been,  from 
that  time,  a  committee  nominated  by  the  crown 
out  of  the  prevailing  party  in  Parliament. 
Though  the  minority  in  the  Commons  are  con 
stantly  proposing  to  condemn  executive  mea 
sures,  or  call  for  papers  which  may  enable  the 
House  to  sit  in  judgment  on  such  measures, 
these  propositions  are  scarcely  ever  carried; 
and  if  a  proposition  of  this  kind  is  carried 
against  the  government,  a  change  of  Ministry 
almost  necessarily  follows.  Growing  and 
struggling  power  always  gives  more  annoy 
ance  and  is  more  unmanageable  than  estab 
lished  power.  The  House  of  Commons  gave 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


361 


infinitely  more  trouble  to  the  ministers  of 
Charles  II.  than  to  any  minister  of  later  times ; 
for,  in  the  time  of  Charles  II.  the  House  was 
checking  ministers  in  whom  it  did  not  confide. 
Now  that  its  ascendency  is  fully  established,  it 
either  confides  in  ministers  or  turns  them  out. 
This  is  undoubtedly  a  far  better  state  of  things 
than  that  which  Temple  wished  to  introduce. 
The  modern  cabinet  is  a  far  better  Executive 
Council  than  his.  The  worst  House  of  Com 
mons  that  has  sat  since  the  Revolution  was  a 
far  more  efficient  check  on  misgovernment 
than  his  fifteen  independent  councillors  would 
have  been.  Yet,  every  thing  considered,  it 
seems  to  us  that  his  plan  was  the  work  of  an 
observant,  ingenious,  and  fertile  mind. 

On  this  occasion,  as  on  every  occasion  on 
which  he  came  prominently  forward,  Temple 
had  the  rare  good  fortune  to  please  the  public 
as  well  as  the  sovereign.  The  general  exulta 
tion  was  great  when  it  was  known  that  the  old 
Council,  made  up  of  the  most  odious  tools  of 
power,  was  dismissed — that  small  interior 
committees,  rendered  odious  by  the  recent 
memory  of  the  Cabal,  were  to  be  disused — and 
that  the  king  would  adopt  no  measure  till  it 
had  been  discussed  and  approved  by  a  body, 
of  which  one  half  consisted  of  independent 
gentlemen  and  noblemen,  and  in  which  such 
persons  as  Russell,  Cavendish,  and  Temple 
himself  had  seats.  Town  and  country  were  in 
a  ferment  of  joy.  The  bells  were  rung,  bon 
fires  were  lighted,  and  the  acclamations  of  Eng 
land  were  re-echoed  by  the  Dutch,  who  con 
sidered  the  influence  obtained  by  Temple  as  a 
certain  omen  of  good  for  Europe.  It  is,  indeed, 
much  to  the  honour  of  his  sagacity,  that  every 
one  of  his  great  measures  should,  in  such  times, 
have  pleased  every  party  which  he  had  any 
interest  in  pleasing.  This  was  the  case  with 
the  Triple  Alliance — with  the  Treaty  which 
concluded  the  Second  Dutch  War — Avith  the 
marriage  of  the  Prince  of  Orange — and,  finally, 
with  the  institution  of  this  new  Council. 

The  only  people  who  grumbled  were  those, 
popular  leaders  of  the  House  of  Commons  who 
were  not  among  the  thirty;  and  if  our  view  of 
the  measure  be  correct,  they  were  precisely  the 
people  who  had  good  reason  to  grumble.  They 
were  precisely  the  people  whose  activity  and 
whose  influence  the  new  Council  was  intended 
to  destroy. 

But  there  was  very  soon  an  end  of  the  bright 
hopes  and  loud  applauses  with  which  the  pub 
lication  of  this  scheme  had  been  hailed.  The 
perfidious  levity  of  the  king  and  the  ambition 
of  the  chiefs  of  parties  produced  the  instant, 
entire,  and  irremediable  failure  of  a  plan  which 
nothing  but  firmness,  public  spirit,  and  self- 
denial  on  the  part  of  all  concerned  in  it  could 
conduct  to  a  happy  issue.  Even  before  the 
project  was  divulged,  its  author  had  already 
found  reason  to  apprehend  that  it  would  fail. 
Considerable  difficulty  was  experienced  in 
framing  the  list  of  councillors.  There  were 
two  men  in  particular  about  whom  the  king  and 
Temple  could  not  agree, — two  men  deeply  taint 
ed  with  the  vices  common  to  the  English  states 
men  of  that  age,  but  unrivalled  in  talents,  address, 
and  influence.  These  were  the  Earl  of  Shaftes- 
bury,  and  George  Saville  Viscount  Halifax. 


It  was  a  favourite  exercise  among  the  Greek 
sophists  to  write  panegyrics  on  characters  pro 
verbial  for  depravity.  One  professor  of  rheto« 
ric  sent  to  Socrates  a  panegyric  on  Busiris; 
and  Isocrates  himself  wrote  another  which  has 
come  down  to  us.  It  is,  we  presume,  from  an 
ambition  of  the  same  kind  that  some  writers 
have  lately  shown  a  disposition  to  eulogize 
Shaftesbury.  But  the  attempt  is  vain.  The 
charges  against  him  rest  on  evidence  not  to  be 
invalidated  by  any  arguments  which  human 
wit  can  devise ;  or  by  any  information  which 
may  be  found  in  old  trunks  and  escrutoires. 

It  is  certain  that,  just  before  the  Restoration, 
he  declared  to  the  regicides  that  he  would  be 
damned,  body  and  soul,  rather  than  suffer  a 
hair  of  their  heads  to  be  hurt;  and  that,  just 
after  the  Restoration,  he  was  one  of  the  judges 
who  sentenced  them  to  death.  It  is  certain, 
that  he  was  a  principal  member  of  the  most 
profligate  administration  ever  known;  and 
that  he  was  afterwards  a  principal  member  of 
the  most  profligate  Opposition  ever  known.  It 
is  certain  that,  in  power,  he  did  not  scruple  to 
violate  the  great  fundamental  principle  of  ihe 
constitution,  in  order  to  exalt  the  Catholics; 
and  that,  out  of  power,  he  did  not  scruple  to 
violate  every  principle  of  justice,  in  order  to 
destroy  them.  There  were  in  that  age  honest 
men, — William  Penn  is  an  instance — who 
valued  toleration  so  highly,  that  they  would 
willingly  have  seen  it  established,  even  by  an. 
illegal  exertion  of  the  prerogative.  There 
were  many  honest  men  who  dreaded  arbitrary 
power  so  much,  that,  on  account  of  the  alliance 
between  Popery  and  arbitrary  power,  they 
were  disposed  to  grant  no  toleration  to  Papists- 
On  both  those  classes  we  look  with  indulgence, 
though  we  think  both  in  the  wrong.  Bui 
Shaftesbury  belonged  to  neither  class.  He 
united  all  that  was  worst  in  both.  From  the 
friends  of  toleration  he  borrowed  their  contempt 
for  the  constitution ;  and  from  the  friends  of 
liberty  their  contempt  for  the  rights  of  con 
science.  We  never  can  admit  that  his  conduct 
as  a  member  of  the  Cabal  was  redeemed  by 
his  conduct  as  a  leader  of  Opposition.  On  the 
contrary,  his  life  was  such,  that  every  part  of 
it,  as  if  by  a  skilful  contrivance,  reflects  infamy 
on  every  other.  We  should  never  have  known 
how  abandoned  a  prostitute  he  was  in  place, 
if  we  had  not  known  how  desperate  an  incen 
diary  he  was  out  of  it.  To  judge  of  htm  fairly 
we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the  Shaftesbury  who, 
in  office,  was  the  chief  author  of  the  Declara 
tion  of  Indulgence,  was  the  same  Shaftesbuiy 
who,  out  of  office,  excited  and  kept  up  the  sa 
vage  hatred  of  the  rabble  of  London  against 
the  very  class  to  whom  that  Declaration  of  In 
dulgence  was  intended  to  give  illegal  relief. 

It  is  amusing  to  see  the  excuses  that  are 
made  for  him.    We  will  give  two  specimens. 
It  is  acknowledged  that  he  was  one  of  the 
ministry  who    had    made   the   alliance   witl« 
|  France  against  Holland,  and  that  this  alliance 
:  was  most  pernicious.     What,  then,  is  the  de 
!  fence  1     Even  this— that  he  betrayed  his  mas 
•  ter's  counsels  to  the  Electors  of  Saxony  and 
!  Brandenburg,  and  tried  to  rouse  all  the  Pro 
testant  powers  of  Germany  to  defend  the  States. 
!  Again,  it  is  acknowledged  that  he  was  uerplf 


868 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


concerned  in  the  Declaration  of  Indulgence, 
and  that  his  conduct  on  that  occasion  was  not 
only  unconstitutional,  but  quite  inconsistent 
with  the  course  which  he  afterwards  took  re 
specting  the  professors  of  the  Catholic  faith. 
What,  then,  is  the  defence  1  Even  this — that 
he  meant  only  to  allure  concealed  Papists  to 
avow  themselves,  and  thus  to  become  open 
maiks  for  the  vengeance  of  the  public.  As 
often  as  he  is  charged  with  one  treason,  his 
advocates  vindicate  him  by  confessing  two. 
They  had  better  leave  him  where  they  find  him. 
For  him  there  is  no  escape  upwards.  Every 
outlet  by  which  he  can  creep  out  of  his  present 
position,  is  one  which  lets  him  down  into  a  still 
lower  and  fouler  depth  of  infamy.  To  white 
wash  an  Ethiopian  is  a  proverbially  hopeless 
attempt;  but  to  whitewash  an  Ethiopian  by 
giving  him  a  new  coat  of  blacking,  is  an  enter 
prise  more  extraordinary  still.  That  in  the 
course  of  Shaftesbury's  unscrupulous  and  re 
vengeful  opposition  to  the  court  he  rendered 
one  or  two  most  useful  services  to  his  country, 
we  admit.  And  he  is,  we  think,  fairly  entitled, 
if  that  be  any  glory,  to  have  his  name  eternally 
associated  with  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act,  in  the 
same  way  in  which  the  name  of  Henry  VIII.  is 
associated  with  the  reformation  of  the  Church, 
and  that  of  Jack  Wilkes  with  the  freedom  of 
the  press. 

While  Shafcesbury  was  still  living,  his  cha 
racter  was  elaborately  drawn  by  two  of  the 
greatest  writers  of  the  age, — by  Butler,  with 
characteristic  brilliancy  of  wit, — by  Dryden, 
with  even  more  than  characteristic  energy  and 
loftiness, — by  both  with  all  the  inspiration  of 
hatred.  The  sparkling  illustrations  of  Butler 
have  been  thrown  into  the  shade  by  the  bright 
er  glory  of  that  gorgeous  satiric  Muse,  who 
comes  sweeping  by  in  sceptred  pall,  borrowed 
from  her  more  august  sisters.  But  the  de 
scriptions  well  deserve  to  be  compared.  The 
reader  will  at  once  perceive  a  considerable 
difference  between  Butler's 

"politician, 

With  more  heads  than  a  beast  in  vision," 

and  the  Ahithophel  of  Dryden.  Butler  dwells 
on  Shaftesbury's  unprincipled  versatility;  on 
his  wonderful  and  almost  instinctive  skill  in 
discerning  the  approach  of  a  change  of  for 
tune  ;  and  in  the  dexterity  with  which  he  ex 
tricated  himself  from  the  snares  in  which  he 
left  his  associates  to  perish. 

"Our  state-artificer  foresaw 
Which  way  the  xvorld  began  to  draw. 
For  as  old  sinners  have  all  points 
O'  th'  compass  in  their  bones  and  joints, 
Ca?i  by  their  pangs  and  aches  find 
All  turns  and  changes  of  the  wind, 
And  better  than  by  Napier's  bones 
Feel  in  their  own  the  age  of  moons; 
So  guilty  sinners  in  a  state 
Can  by  their  crimes  prognosticate, 
And  in  their  consciences  feel  pain 
Some  days  before  a  shower  of  rain. 
He,  therefore,  wisely  cast  about 
All  ways  he  could  to  insure  his  throat." 

In  Dryden's  great  portrait,  on  the  contrary, 
violent  passion,  implacable  revenge,  boldness 
amounting  to  temerity,  are  the  most  striking  I 
features.     Ahithophel  is  one  of  the  "  great  wits  { 
lo  ma<?  IKSS  near  allied."     And  again — 


"A  daring  pilot  in  extremity, 

Pleased  with  the  danger  when  the  waves  went  hieh. 
He  sought  the  storms;  but  for  a  calm  unfit, 
Would  steer  too  nigh  the  sands  to  boast  his  wit."* 

The  dates  of  the  two  poems  will,  we  think, 
explain  this  discrepancy.  The  third  part  of 
Hudlbras  appeared  in  1678,  when  the  character 
of  Shafte«bury  had  as  yet  but  imperfectly  de 
veloped  itself.  He  had,  indeed,  been  a  traitor 
to  every  party  in  the  state;  but  his  treasons 
had  hitherto  prospered.  Whether  it  were  acci 
dent  or  sagacity,  he  had  timed  his  desertions 
in  such  a  manner  that -fortune  seemed  to  go  to 
and  fro  with  him  from  side  to  side.  The  ex 
tent  of  his  perfidy  was  known  ;  but  it  was  not 
till  the  Popish  Plot  furnished  him  with  a  ma 
chinery  which  seemed  sufficiently  powerful 
for  all  his  purposes,  that  the  audacity  of  his 
spirit  and  the  fierceness  of  his  malevolent 
passions  became  fully  manifest.  His  subse 
quent  conduct  showed  undoubtedly  great  abili 
ty,  but  not  ability  of  the  sort  for  which  he  had 
formerly  been  so  eminent.  He  was  now  head 
strong,  sanguine,  full  of  impetuous  confidence 
in  his  own  wisdom  and  his  own  good  luck. 
He  whose  fame  as  a  political  tactician  had 
hitherto  rested  chiefly  on  his  skilful  retreats, 
now  set  himself  to  break  down  all  the  bridges 
behind  him.  His  plans  were  castles  in  the 
air: — his  talk  was  rodomontade.  He  took  no 
thought  for  the  morrow; — he  treated  the  court 
as  if  the  king  were  already  a  prisoner  in  his 
hands; — he  built  on  the  favour  of  the  multi 
tude,  as  if  that  favour  were  not  proverbially 
inconstant.  The  signs  of  im  coming  reaction 
were  discerned  by  men  of  far  less  sagacity 
than  his  ;  and  scared  from  his  side  men  more 
consistent  than  he  had  ever  pretended  to  be. 
But  on  him  they  were  lost.  The  counsel  of 
A  hithophel, — that  counsel  which  was  as  if  a  man 
had  inquired  of  the  oracle  of  God, — was  turned 
into  foolishness.  He  who  had  become  a  by 
word  for  the  certainty  with  which  he  foresaw, 
and  the  suppleness  with  which  he  evaded  dan- 
ger,  now,  when  beset  on  every  side  with  snares 
and  death,  seemed  to  be  smitten  with  a  blind 
ness  as  strange  as  his  former  clearsightedness, 
and  turning  neither  to  the  right  p.or  to  the  left 
strode  straight  on  with  desperate  hardihood  tc 
his  doom.  Therefore,  after  having  early  ac- 


*  It  has  never,  we  believe,  been  remarked,  that  two 
of  the  most  striking  lines  in  the  description  of  Ahitho 
phel  are  borrowed,  and  from  a  most  oliscnre  quarter. 
In  Knolles'  History  of  the  Turks,  printed  more  than 
sixty  years  before  the  appearance  of  Absalom  and  Ahi 
thophel,  are  the  following  verses,  under  a  portrait  of  the 
Sultan  Mustapha  I.:— 

"Greatnesse  on  goodnesse  loves  to  slide,  not  stand, 
And  leaves  for  Fortune's  ice  Vertue's  firnic  land." 

Dryden's  words  are — 

"  But  wild  Ambition  loves  to  slide,  not  stand. 
And  Fortune's  ice  prefers  to  Virtue's  land." 

The  circumstance  is  the  more  remarkable,  because 
Dryden  has  really  no  couplet  more  intensely  Dryden- 
ian,  both  in  thought  and  expression,  than  this,  of  which 
the  whole  thought,  and  almost  the  whole  expression, 
are  stolen. 

As  we  are  on  this  subject,  we  cannot  refrain  from  ob 
serving  that  Mr.  Courtenay  has  done  Dryden  injustice, 
by  inadvertently  attributing  to  him  some  feeble  line* 
which  are  in  Tate's  part  of  Absalom  and  Abitliouuel. 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


36D 


quir?d,  and  long  preserved,  the  reputation  of 
infallible  wisdom  and  invariable  success,  he 
lived  to  see  a  mighty  ruin  wrought  by  his  own 
ungovernable  passions; — to  see  the  great  par 
ty  which  he  had  led,  vanquished,  and  scatter 
ed,  and  trampled  down; — to  see  all  his  own 
devilish  enginery  of  lying  witnesses,  partial 
sheriffs,  packe  1  juries,  unjust  judges,  blood 
thirsty  mobs,  ready  to  be  employed  against 
himself  and  his  most  devoted  followers; — to 
fly  from  that  proud  city  whose  favour  had  al 
most  raised  him  to  be  Mayor  of  the  Palace; — 
to  hide  himself  in  squalid  retreats;  to  cover 
his  gray  head  with  ignominious  disguises ; — 
and  he  died  in  hopeless  exile,  sheltered  by  a 
state  which  he  had  cruelly  injured  and  insult 
ed,  from  the  vengeance  of  a  mastei  whose  fa 
vour  he  had  purchased  by  one  series  of  crimes, 
and  forfeited  by  another. 

Halifax  had,  in  common  with  Shaftesbury, 
and  with  almost  all  the  politicians  of  that  age, 
a  very  loose  morality  where  the  public  were 
concerned;  but  in  his  case  the  prevailing  in 
fection  was  modified  by  a  very  peculiar  con 
stitution  both  of  heart  and  head  ; — by  a  temper 
singularly  free  from  gall,  and  by  a  refining 
and  skeptical  understanding.  He  changed 
his  course  as  often  as  Shaftesbury ;  but  he 
did  not  change  it  to  the  same  extent,  or  in  the 
same  direction.  Shaftesbury  was  the  very  re 
verse  of  a  trimmer.  His  disposition  led  him 
generally  to  do  his  utmost  to  exalt  the  side 
which  was  up,  and  to  depress  the  side  which 
was  down.  His  transitions  were  from  extreme 
to  extreme.  While  he  stayed  with  a  party,  he 
went  all  lengths  for  it: — when  he  quitted  it,  he 
went  all  lengths  against  it.  Halifax  was  em 
phatically  a  trimmer, — a  trimmer  both  by  in 
tellect  and  by  constitution.  Tht  nanae  was 
fixed  on  him  by  his  contemporaries  ;  and  he 
was  so  far  from  being  ashamed  of  it  that  he 
assumed  it  as  a  badge  of  honour.  He  passed 
from  faction  to  faction.  But  instead  of  adopt 
ing  and  inflaming  the  passions  of  those  whom 
he  joined,  he  tried  to  diffuse  among  them 
something  of  the  spirit  of  those  whom  he  had 
just  left.  While  he  acted  with  the  Opposition, 
he  was  suspected  of  being  a  spy  of  the  court; 
and  when  he  had  joined  the  court,  all  the  To 
ries  were  dismayed  by  his  republican  doc 
trines. 

He  \vanted  neither  arguments  nor  eloquence 
to  exhibit  what  was  commonly  regarded  as 
his  wavering  policy  in  the  fairest  light.  He 
trimmed,  he  said,  as  the  temperate  zone  trims 
between  intolerable  heat  and  intolerable  cold 
—as  a  good  government  trims  between  despot 
ism  and  anarchy — as  a  pure  church  trims  be 
tween  the  errors  of  the  Papists  and  those  of 
the  Anabaptists.  Nor  was  this  defence  by  any 
means  without  weight;  for  though  there  is 
abundant  proof  that  his  integrity  was  not  of 
strength  to  withstand  the  temptations  by  which 
his  cupidity  and  vanity  were  sometimes  as 
sailed,  yet  his  dislike  of  extremes,  and  a  for 
giving  and  compassionate  temper  which  seems 
to  have  been  natural  to  him,  preserved  him 
from  all  participation  in  the  worst  crimes  of 
his  time.  If  both  parties  accused  him  of  de 
serting  them,  both  were  compelled  to  admit 
that  '.hey  had  great  obligations  to  his  humani- 

VOL.  Ill— 47 


ty;  and  that,  though  an  uncertain  friend,  h* 
was  a  placable  enemy.  He  voted  in  favour 
of  Lord  Straflbrd,  the  victim  of  the  Whigs. 
He  did  his  utmost  to  save  Lord  Russell,  the 
victim  of  the  Tories.  And  on  the  whole,  we 
are  inclined  to  think  that  his  public  life,  though 
far  indeed  from  faultless,  has  as  few  great 
stains  as  that  of  any  politician  who  took  an 
active  part  in  affairs  during  the  troubled  and 
disastrous  period  of  ten  years  which  elapsed 
between  the  fall  of  Lord  Danby  and  the  Revo 
lution. 

His  mind  was  much  less  turned  to  particu 
lar  observations,  and  much  more  to  general 
speculation,  than  that  of  Shaftesbury.  Shaftes 
bury  knew  the  king,  the  Council,  the  Parlia 
ment,  the  city,  better  than  Halifax ;  but  Halifax 
would  have  written  a  far  better  treatise  on  po 
litical  science  than  Shaftesbury.  Shaftesbury 
shone  more  in  consultation,  and  Halifax  in 
controversy : — Shaftesbury  was  more  fertile  in 
expedients,  and  Halifax  in  arguments.  No 
thing  that  remains  from  the  pen  of  Shaftesbury 
will  bear  a  comparison  with  the  political  tracts 
of  Halifax.  Indeed,  very  little  of  the  prose  of 
that  age  is  so  well  worth  reading  as  the  "Cha 
racter  of  a  Trimmer,"  and  the  "Anatomy  of  an 
Equivalent."  What  particularly  strikes  us  in 
those  works,  is  the  writer's  passion  for  gene 
ralization.  He  was  treating  of  the  most  excit 
ing  subjects  in  the  most  agitated  times — he 
was  himself  placed  in  the  very  thick  of  the 
civil  conflict : — yet  there  is  no  acrimony,  no 
thing  inflammatory,  nothing  personal.  He  pre 
serves  an  air  of  cold  superiority, — a  certain 
philosophical  serenity,  which  is  perfectly  mar 
vellous, — he  treats  every  question  as  an  abstract 
question, — begins  with  the  widest  propositions 
— argues  those  propositions  on  general  grounds 
— and  often,  when  he  has  brought  out  his  theo 
rem,  leaves  the  reader  to  make  the  application, 
without  adding  an  allusion  to  particular  men  or 
to  passing  events.  This  speculative  turn  of  mind 
rendered  him  a  bad  adviser  in  cases  which  re 
quired  celerity.  He  brought  forward,  with  won 
derful  readiness  and  copiousness,  arguments, 
replies  to  those  arguments,  rejoinders  to  those 
replies,  general  maxims  of  policy,  and  analogous 
cases  from  history.  But  Shaftesbury  was  the 
man  for  a  prompt  decision.  Of  the  parliamen 
tary  eloquence  of  these  celebrated  rivals,  we 
can  judge  only  by  report;  and  so  judging,  we 
should  be  inclined  to  think  that,  though  Shaftes 
bury  was  a  distinguished  speaker,  the  superio 
rity  belonged  to  Halifax.  Indeed  the  readiness  of 
Halifax  in  debate,  the  extent  of  his  knowledge, 
the  ingenuity  of  his  reasoning,  the  liveliness 
of  his  expression,  and  the  silver  clearness  and 
sweetness  of  his  voice,  seem  to  have  made  the 
strongest  impression  on  his  contemporaries. 
By  Dryden  he  is  described  as 

"  Of  piercing  wit  and  presrnant  thought, 
Endued  by  nature  and  by  learning  taught 
To  move  assemblies." 

His  oratory  is  utterly  and  irretrievably  lost  to 
us,  like  that  of  Somers,  of  Bolingbroke,  of 
Charles  Townshend — of  many  others  wh« 
were  accustomed  to  rise  amidst  the  breathless 
expectation  of  senates,  and  to  sit  down  amidst 
reiterated  bursts  of  applause.  But  old  men 
who  lived  to  admire  the  eloquence  of  Pultons 


370 


MACAULAyS  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


in  its  meridian,  and  that  of  Pitt  in  its  splendid 
dawn,  still  murmured  that  they  had  heard  no 
thing  like  the  great  speeches  of  Lord  Halifax 
on  the  Exclusion  Bill.  Th^  power  of  Shaftes- 
bury  over  large  masses  was  unrivalled.  Ha 
lifax  was  disqualified  by  his  whole  character, 
moral  and  intellectual,  for  the  part  of  a  dema 
gogue.  It  was  in  small  circles,  and,  above  all, 
in  the  House  of  Lords,  that  his  ascendency  was 
felt. 

Shaftesbury  seems  to  have  troubled  himself 
very  little  about  theories  of  government.  Ha 
lifax  was,  in  speculation,  a  strong  republican, 
and  did  not  conceal  it.  He  ofien  made  here 
ditary  monarchy  and  aristocracy  the  subjects 
of  his  keen  pleasantry,  while  he  was  fighting 
the  battles  of  the  court,  and  obtaining  for  him 
self  step  after  step  in  the  peerage.  In  this  way 
he  attempted  to  gratify  at  once  his  intellectual 
vanity  and  his  more  vulgar  ambition.  He 
shaped  his  life  according  to  the  opinion  of  the 
multitude,  and  indemnified  himself  by  talking 
according  to  his  own.  His  colloquial  powers 
were  great;  his  perceptions  of  the  ridiculous 
exquisitely  fine ;  and  he  seems  to  have  had 
the  rare  art  of  preserving  the  reputation  of 
good-breeding  and  good-nature,  while  habitu 
ally  indulging  hif  ,trong  propensity  to  mockery. 

Temple  wished  to  put  Halifax  into  the  new 
Council,  and  to  leave  oat  Shaftesbury.  The 
king  objected  strongly  to  Halifax,  to  whom  he 
had  taken  a  great  dislike,  which  is  not  ac 
counted  for,  and  which  did  not  last  long. 
Temple  replied  that  Halifax  was  a  man  emi 
nent  both  by  his  station  and  by  his  abilities, 
and  would,  if  excluded,  do  every  thing  against 
the  new  arrangement,  that  could  be  done  by 
eloquence,  sarcasm,  and  intrigue.  All  who 
were  consulted  were  of  the  same  mind ;  and 
the  king  yielded,  but  not  till  Temple  had  al 
most  gone  on  his  knees.  The  point  was  no 
sooner  settled  than  his  majesty  declared  that 
he  would  have  Shaftesbury  too.  Temple  again 
had  recourse  to  entreaties  and  expostulation. 
Charles  told  him  that  the  enmity  of  Shaftesbury 
would  be  at  least  as  formidable  as  that  of  Hali 
fax;  and  this  was  true:  but  Temple  might 
have  replied  that  by  giving  power  to  Halifax 
they  gained  a  friend,  and  that  by  giving  power 
to  Shaftesbury  they  only  strengthened  an  ene 
my.  It  was  vain  to  argue  and  protest.  The 
king  only  laughed  and  jested  at  Temple's 
anger ;  and  Shafte  *bury  was  not  only  sworn 
of  the  Council,  bui  appointed  Lord  President. 

Temple  was  so  bitterly  mortified  by  this  step, 
that  he  had  at  one  time  resolved  to  have  nothing 
to  do  with  the  new  administration ;  and  se 
riously  thought  of  disqualifying  himself  from 
sitting  in  the  Council  by  omitting  to  take  the 
sacrament.  But  the  urgency  of  Lady  Temple 
and  Lady  Giffard  induced  him  to  abandon  that 
intention. 

The  Council  was  organized  on  the  21st  of 
April,  167(J ;  and  on  the  very  next  day  one  of 
the  fundamental  principles  on  which  it  had 
been  constructed  was  violated.  A  secret  com 
mittee,  or,  in  the  modern  phrase,  a  cabinet  of 
nine  members  was  formed.  But  as  this  com 
mittee  included  Shaftesbury  and  Monmouth, 
it  contained  within  itself  the  elements  of  as 
much  faction  as  would  have  sufficed  to  impede 


all  business.  Accordingly,  there  soon  arose  a 
small  interior  cabinet,  consisting  of  Essex, 
Sunderland,  Halifax,  and  Temple.  For  a  time 
perfect  harmony  and  confidence  subsisted  be-, 
tween  the  four.  But  the  meetings  of  the  thirty 
were  stormy.  Sharp  retorts  passed  between 
Shaftesbury  and  Halifax,  who  led  the  opposite 
parties.  In  the  Council,  Halifax  generally  had 
the  advantage.  But  it  soon  became  apparent 
that  Shaftesbury  still  had  at  his  back  the  ma 
jority  of  the  House  of  Commons.  The  discon 
tents,  which  the  change  of  ministry  had  for  a 
moment  quieted,  broke  forth  again  with  re 
doubled  violence ;  and  the  only  effect  which 
the  late  measures  appeared  to  have  produced 
was,  that  the  Lord  President,  with  all  the  dig 
nity  and  authority  belonging  to  his  high  place, 
stood  at  the  head  of  the  Opposition.  The  im 
peachment  of  Lord  Danby  was  eagerly  pro 
secuted.  The  Commons  were  determined  to 
exclude  the  Duke  of  York  from  the  throne. 
All  offers  of  compromise  were  rejected.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that  in  the 
midst  of  the  confusion,  one  inestimable  law, — 
the  only  benefit  which  England  has  derived 
from  the  troubles  of  that  period,  but  a  benefit 
which  may  well  be  set  off  against  a  great  mass 
of  evil, — the  Habeas  Corpus  Act,  was  pushed 
through  the  Houses,  and  received  the  royal 
assent. 

The  king,  finding  the  Parliament  as  trouble 
some  as  ever,  determined  to  prorogue  it ;  and 
he  did  so  without  even  mentioning  his  inten 
tion  to  the  Council  by  whose  advice  he  had 
pledged  himself,  only  a  month  before,  to  con 
duct  the  government.  The  councillors  were 
generally  dissatisfied,  and  Shaftesbury  swore 
with  great  vehemence  that  if  he  could  find  out 
who  the  secret  advisers  were  he  would  have 
their  heads. 

The  Parliament  rose :  London  was  deserted ; 
and  Temple  retired  to  his  villa,  whence,  on 
council  days,  he  went  to  Hampden  Court. 
The  post  of  Secretary  was  again  and  again 
pressed  on  him  by  his  master,  and  by  his  three 
colleagues  of  the  inner  cabinet.  Halifax,  in 
particular,  threatened  laughingly  to  burn  down. 
the  house  at  Sheen.  But  Temple  was  immo 
vable.  His  short  experience  of  English  politics 
had  disgusted  him ;  and  he  felt  himself  so 
much  oppressed  by  the  responsibility  under 
which  he  at  present  lay,  that  he  had  no  in 
clination  to  add  to  the  load. 

When  the  *erm  fixed  for  the  prorogation  had 
nearly  expired,  it  became  necessary  to  consider 
what  course  should  be  taken.  The  king  and 
his  four  confidential  advisers  thought  that  a 
new  Parliament  might  be  more  manageable, 
and  could  not  possibly  be  more  refractory  than 
that  which  they  now  had,  and  they  therefore 
determined  on  a  dissolution.  But  when  the 
question  was  proposed  at  Council,  the  majority, 
jealous,  it  should  seem,  of  the  small  directing 
knot,  and  unwilling  to  bear  the  unpopularity 
of  the  measures  of  government  while  excluded 
from  all  power,  joined  Shaftesbury,  and  the 
members  of  the  cabinet  were  left  alone  in  the 
minority.  The  king,  however,  had  made  up 
his  mind,  and  ordered  the  Parliament  to  be  in 
stantly  dissolved.  Temple's  Council  was  now 
nothing  more  than  an  ordinary  Privy  Council, 


SIR  WILLIAM   TEMPLE. 


371 


if  indeed  it  were  not  something  less;  and  though 
Temple  threw  the  blame  of  this  on.  the  king,  on 
Lord  Shaftesbury,  on  everybody  but  himself,  it 
is  evident  that  the  failure  of  his  plan  is  to  be 
traced  to  its  own  inherent  defects.  His  Council 
was  loo  large  to  transact  business  which  re 
quired  expedition,  secrecy,  and  cordial  co 
operation.  A  cabinet  was  therefore  formed 
within  the  Council.  The  cabinet  and  the  ma 
jority  of  the  Council  differed ;  and,  as  was  to 
be  expected,  the  cabinet  carried  their  point. 
Four  votes  outweighed  six-and-twenty.  This 
being  the  case,  the  meetings  of  the  thirty  were 
not  only  useless,  but  positively  obnoxious. 

At  the  ensuing  election,  Temple  was  chosen 
for  the  University  of  Cambridge.  The  only 
objection  that  was  made  to  him  by  the  mem 
bers  of  that  learned  body  was,  that"  in  his  little 
work  on  Holland  he  had  expressed  great  ap 
probation  of  the  tolerant  policy  of  the  States  ; 
and  this  blemish,  however  serious,  was  over 
looked  in  consideration  of  his  high  reputation, 
and  of  the  strong  recommendations  with  which 
he  was  furnished  by  the  court. 

During  the  summer  he  remained  at  Sheen, 
and  amused  himself  with  rearing  melons ;  leav 
ing  to  the  three  other  members  of  the  inner 
cabinet  the  whole  direction  of  public  affairs. 
Some  unexplained  cause  began,  about  this  time, 
to  alienate  them  from  him.  They  do  not  ap 
pear  to  have  been  made  angry  by  any  part  of 
his  conduct,  or  to  have  disliked  him  personally. 
But  they  had,  we  suspect,  taken  the  measure 
of  his  mind,  and  satisfied  themselves  that  he 
was  not  a  man  for  that  troubled  time,  and  that 
he  would  be  a  mere  encumbrance  to  them : 
living  themselves  for  ambition,  they  despised 
his  love  of  ease.  Accustomed  to  deep  stakes 
in  the  game  of  political  hazard,  they  despised 
his  piddling  play.  They  looked  on  his  cautious 
measures  with  the  sort  of  scorn  with  which  the 
gamblers  at  the  ordinary,  in  Sir  Walter  Scott's 
novel,  regarded  Nigel's  practice  of  never  touch 
ing  a  card  but  when  he  was  certain'  to  win. 
He  soon  found  that  he  was  left  out  of  their  se 
crets.  The  king  had,  about  this  time,  a  dan 
gerous  attack  of  illness.  The  Duke  of  York, 
on  receiving  the  news,  returned  from  Holland. 
The  sudden  appearance  of  the  detested  Popish 
successor  excited  anxiety  throughout  the  coun 
try.  Temple  was  greatly  amazed  and  disturbed. 
He  hastened  up  to  London  and  visited  Essex, 
who  professed  to  be  astonished  and  mortified, 
but  could  not  disguise  a  sneering  smile.  Temple 
then  saw  Halifax,  who  talked  to  him  much 
about  the  pleasures  of  the  country,  the  anxie 
ties  of  office,  and  the  vanity  of  all  human  things, 
but  carefully  avoided  politics,  and  when  the 
duke's  return  was  mentioned,  only  sighed,  shook 
his  head,  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and  lifted  up 
his  eyes  and  hands.  In  a  short  time  Temple 
found  that  his  two  friends  had  been  quizzing 
him;  and  that  they  had  themselves  sent  for  the 
duke  in  order  that  his  Royal  Highness  might, 
if  the  king  should  die,  be  on  the  spot  to  frustrate 
the  designs  of  Monmouth. 

He  was  soon  convinced,  by  a  still  stronger 
proof,  that  though  he  had  not  exactly  offended 
his  master,  or  his  colleagues,  in  the  cabinet,  he 
had  ceased  to  enjoy  their  confidence.  The 
result  of  the  general  election  had  been 


decidedly  unfavourable  to  the  government; 
and  Shaftesbury  impatiently  expected  the  day 
when  the  Houses  were  to  meet.  The  king, 
guided  by  the  advice  of  the  inner  cabinet,  de 
termined  on  a  step  of  the  highest  importance. 
He  told  the  Council  that  he  had  resolved  to 
prorogue  the  new  Parliament  for  a  year,  and 
requested  them  not  to  object;  for  he  had,  he 
said,  considered  the  subject  fully,  and  had 
made  up  his  mind.  All  who  were  not  in  the 
secret  were  thunderstruck — Temple  as  much 
as  any.  Several  members  rose  and  entreated 
to  be  heard  against  the  prorogation.  But  the 
king  silenced  them,  arid  declared  that  his  reso 
lution  was  unalterable.  Temple,  greatly  hurl 
at  the  manner  in  which  both  himself  and  the 
Council  had  been  treated,  spoke  with  great 
spirit.  He  would  not,  he  said,  disobey  the  king 
by  objecting  to  a  measure  on  which  his  ma 
jesty  was  determined  to  hear  no  argument; 
but  he  would  most  earnestly  entreat  his  ma 
jesty,  if  the  present  Council'  was  incompetent 
to  advise  him,  to  dissolve  it  and  select  another ; 
for  it  was  absurd  to  have  councillors  who  did 
not  counsel,  and  who  were  summoned  only  to 
be  silent  witnesses  of  the  acts  of  others.  The 
king  listened  courteously.  But  the  members 
of  the  cabinet  resented  this  reproof  highly; 
and  from  that  day  Temple  was  almost  as  much 
estranged  from  them  as  from  Shaftesbury. 

He  wished  to  retire  altogether  from  business. 
But  just  at  this  time,  Lord  Russell,  Lord  Ca 
vendish,  and  some  other  councillors  of  the  po 
pular  parly,  waited  on  the  king  in  a  body,  de 
clared  their  strong  disapprobation  of  his  mea 
sures,  and  requested  to  be  excused  from  at 
tending  any  more  at  Council.  Temple  feared 
that  if,  at  this  moment,  he  also  were  to  with 
draw,  he  might  be  supposed  to  act  in  concert 
with  those  decided  opponents  of  the  court,  and 
to  have  determined  on  taking  a  course  hostile 
to  the  government.  He  therefore  continued  to 
go  occasionally  to  the  board,  but  he  had  no 
longer  any  real  share  in  the  direction  of  public 
affairs. 

At  length  the  long  term  of  the  prorogation- 
expired.  In  October,  1680,  the  Houses  met; 
and  the  great  question  of  the  Exclusion  was 
revived.  Few  parliamentary  contests  in  our 
history  appear  to  have  called  forth  a  greater 
display  of  talent ;  none  certainly  ever  called 
forth  more  violent  passions.  The  whole  nation 
was  convulsed  by  party  spirit.  The  gentlemen 
of  every  county,  the  traders  of  every  town,  the 
boys  at  every  public  school,  were  divided  into 
exclusionists  and  abhorrers.  The  book-stalls 
were  covered  with  tracts  on  the  sacredness  of 
hereditary  right,  on  the  omnipotence  of  Parlia 
ment,  on  the  dangers  of  a  disputed  succession, 
and  on  the  dangers  of  a  Popish  reign.  It  was 
in  the  midst  of  this  ferment  that  Temple  took 
his  seat,  for  the  first  time,  in  the  House  of 
Commons. 

The  occasion  was  a  very  great  one.  His 
talents,  his  long  experience  of  affairs,  his  un 
spotted  public  character,  tho  high  posts  whicJi 
he  had  filled,  seemed  to  mark  him  out  as  a  man 
on  whom  much  would  depend.  He  acted  like 
himself.  He  saw  that,  if  he  supported  the  Ex 
elusion,  he  made  the  king  and  the  heir-pre 
sumptive  his  enemies;  and  that,  if  he  opposed 


372 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


it,  he  made  himself  an  object  of  hatred  to  the  | 
unscrupulous  and  turbulent  Shaftesbury.  He  j 
neither  supported  nor  opposed  it.  He  quietly 
absented  himself  from  the  House.  Nay,  he 
took  care,  he  tells  us,  never  to  discuss  the 
question  in  any  society  whatever.  Lawrence 
Hyde,  afterwards  Earl  of  Rochester,  asked  him 
why  he  did  not  attend  in  his  place.  Temple  re 
plied  that  he  acted  according  to  Solomon's  ad 
vice,  neither  to  oppose  the  mighty,  nor  go  about 
to  stop  the  current  of  a  river.  The  advice,  what 
ever  its  value  may  be,  is  not  to  be  found  either 
in  the  canonical  or  apocryphal  writings  ascrib 
ed  to  Solomon.  But  Temple  was  much  in  the 
habit  of  talking  about  books  which  he  had 
never  read ;  and  one  of  those  books,  we  are 
afraid,  was  his  Bible.  Hyde  answered,  "You 
are  a  wise  and  a  quiet  man."  And  this  might 
be  true.  But  surely  such  wise  and  quiet  men 
have  no  call  to  be  members  of  Parliament  in 
critical  times. 

A  single  session  was  quite  enough  for 
Temple.  When  the  Parliament  was  dissolved, 
and  another  summoned  at  Oxford,  he  obtained 
an  audience  of  the  king,  and  begged  to  know 
whether  his  majesty  wished  him  to  continue 
in  Parliament.  Charles,  who  had  a  singularly 
quick  eye  for  the  weaknesses  of  all  who  came 
near  him,  had  no  doubt  seen  through  and 
through  Temple,  and  rated  the  parliamentary 
support  of  so  cool  and  guarded  a  friend  at  its 
proper  value.  He  answered  good-naturedly, 
but  we  suspect  a  little  contemptuously, "I doubt, 
as  things  stand,  your  coming  into  the  House 
will  not  do  much  good.  I  think  you  may  as 
well  let  it  alone."  Sir  William  accordingly  in 
formed  his  constituents  that  he  should  not  again 
apply  for  their  suffrages  •,  and  set  off  for  Sheen, 
resolving  never  again  to  meddle  with  public 
affairs.  He  soon  found  that  the  king  was  dis 
pleased  with  him.  Charles,  indeed,  in  his  usual 
easy  way,  protested  that  he  was  not  angry, — 
not  at  all.  But  in  a  few  days  he  struck  Temple's 
name  out  of  the  list  of  privy  councillors.  Why 
this  was  done  Temple  declares  himself  unable 
to  comprehend.  But  surely  it  hardly  required 
his  long  and  extensive  converse  with  the  world 
to  teach  him  that  there  are  conjunctures  when 
men  think  that  all  who  are  not  with  them  are 
against  them, — that  there  are  conjunctures 
when  a  lukewarm  friend,  who  will  not  put  him 
self  the  least  out  of  his  way,  Avho  wiil  make  no 
exertion,  who  will  run  no  risk,  is  more  distaste 
ful  than  an  enemy.  Charles  had  hoped  that 
the  fair  character  of  Temple  would  add  credit 
to  an  unpopular  and  suspected  government. 
But  his  majesty  soon  found  that  this  fair  cha 
racter  resembled  pieces  of  furniture  which  we 
have  seen  in  the  drawing-rooms  of  very  precise 
old  ladies,  which  are  a  great  deal  too  white  to 
be  used.  This  exceeding  niceness  was  alto- 
gethi  r  out  of  season.  Neither  party  wanted  a 
man  who  was  afraid  of  taking  a  part,  of  in 
curring  abuse,  of  making  enemies.  There 
were  probably  many  good  and  moderate  men. 
who  would  have  hailed  the  appearance  of  a 
respectable  mediator.  But  Temple  was  not  a 
mediator.  He  was  merely  a  neutral. 

At  last,  however,  he  had  escaped  from  pub 
lic,  life,  and  found  himself  at  liberty  to  follow 
bis  favourite  pursuits.  His  fortune  was  easy. 


He  had  about  fifteen  hundred  a  year,  besides 
the  Mastership  of  the  Rolls  in  Ireland;  an 
office  in  which  he  had  succeeded  his  father,  and 
which  was  then  a  mere  sinecure  for  life, 
requiring  no  residence.  His  reputation  both 
as  a  negotiator  and  a  writer  stood  high.  He 
resolved  to  be  safe,  to  enjoy  himself,  and  to  let 
the  world  take  its  course ;  and  he  kept  his  re 
solution. 

Darker  times  followed.  The  Oxford  Parlia 
ment  was  dissolved.  The  Tories  were  triumph 
ant.  A  terrible  vengeance  was  inflicted  on  the 
chiefs  of  the  Opposition.  Temple  learned  in 
his  retrea.1  the  disastrous  fate  of  several  of  his 
old  colleagues  in  Council.  Shaftesbury  fled  to 
Holland.  Russell  died  on  the  scaffold.  Essex 
added  a  yet  sadder  and  more  fearful  story  to 
the  bloody  chronicles  of  the  Tower.  Monmouth 
clung  in  agonies  of  supplication  round  the 
knees  of  the  stern  uncle  whom  he  had  wronged, 
and  tasted  a  bitterness  worse  than  that  of  death, 
— the  bitterness  of  knowing  that  he  had  hum 
bled  himself  in  vain.  A  tyrant  trampled  on  the 
liberties  and  religion  of  the  realm.  The  na 
tional  spirit  swelled  high  under  the  oppression. 
Disaffection  spread  even  to  the  strongholds  of 
loyalty, — to  the  cloisters  of  Westminster,  to  the 
schools  of  Oxford,  to  the  guardroom  of  the 
household  troops,  to  the  very  hearth  and  bed 
chamber  of  the  sovereign.  But  the  troubles 
which  agitated  the  whole  society  did  not  reach 
the  quiet  orangery  in  which  Temple  loitered 
away  several  years  without  once  seeing  the 
smoke  of  London.  He  now  and  then  appeared 
in  the  circle  at  Richmond  or  Windsor.  But 
the  only  expressions  which  he  is  recorded  to 
have  used  during  those  perilous  times,  were 
that  he  would  be  a  good  subject,  but  that  he 
had  done  with  politics. 

The  Revolution  came.  Temple  remained 
strictly  neutral  during  the  short  struggle  ;  and 
then  transferred  to  the  new  settlement  the  same 
languid  sort  of  loyalty  which  he  had  felt  for 
his  former  masters.  He  paid  court  to  William 
at  Windsor,  and  William  dined  with  him  at 
Sheen.  But  in  spite  of  the  most  pressing  soli 
citations,  he  refused  to  become  Secretary  of 
State.  The  refusal  evidently  proceeded  only 
from  his  dislike  of  trouble  and  danger ;  and 
not,  as  some  of  his  admirers  would  have  us 
believe,  from  any  scruple  of  conscience  or 
honour.  For  he  consented  that  his  son  should 
take  the  office  of  Secretary  at  War  under  the 
new  sovereigns.  That  unfortunate  young  man 
destroyed  himself  within  a  week  after  his  ap 
pointment,  from  vexation  at  finding  that  his 
advice  had  led  the  king  into  some  improper 
steps  with  regard  to  Ireland.  He  seems  to  have 
inherited  his  father's  extreme  sensibility  to 
failure;  without  that  singular  prudence  which 
kept  his  father  out  of  all  situations  in  v/hich 
any  serious  failure  was  to  be  apprehended. 
The  blow  fell  heavy  on  the  family.  They  re 
tired  in  deep  dejection  to  Moor  Park,  which  they 
now  preferred  to  Sheen,  on  account  of  the  great 
er  distance  from  London.  In  that  spot,*  then 
very  secluded,  Temple  passed  the  remainder 


*  Mr.  Conrtenay  (vol.  ii.  p.  160)  confounds  Moor  Park 
in  Surrey,  where  Temple  resided,  with  the  Moor  Park 
in  Hertfordshire,  which  he  praises  in  tlie  essay  on  Gar 
dening. 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


373 


tif  his  life.  The  air  agreed  with  him.  The 
soil  was  fruitful,  and  well  suited  to  an  experi 
mental  farmer  and  gardener.  The  grounds 
were  laid  out  with  the  angular  regularity 
which  Sir  William  had  admired  in  the  flower 
beds  of  Haarlem  and  the  Hague.  A  beautiful 
rivulet,  flowing  from  the  hills  of  Surrey,  bound 
ed  the  domain.  But  a  straight  canal  which, 
bordered  by  a  terrace,  intersected  the  garden, 
was  probably  more  admired  by  the  lovers  of 
the  picturesque  in  that  age.  The  house  was 
small,  but  neat  and  well  furnished ;— the 
neighbourhood  very  thinly  peopled.  Temple 
had  no  visiters,  except  a  few  friends  who  were 
willing  to  travel  twenty  or  thirty  miles  in 
order  to  see  him;  and  now  and  then  a  foreigner 
whom  curiosity  brought  to  have  a  look  at  the 
author  of  the  Triple  Alliance. 

Here,  in  May,  1694,  died  Lady  Temple. 
From  the  time  of  her  marriage  we  know  little 
of  her,  except  that  her  letters  were  always 
greatly  admired,  and  that  she  had  the  honour 
to  correspond  constantly  with  Queen  Mary. 
Lady  Giffard,  who,  as  far  as  appears,  had  al 
ways  been  on  the  best  terms  with  her  sister- 
in-law,  still  continued  to  live  with  Sir  William. 

But  there  were  other  inmates  of  Moor  Park 
to  whom  a  far  higher  interest  belongs.  An 
eccentric,  uncouth,  disagreeable,  young  Irish 
man,  who  had  narrowly  escaped  plucking  at 
Dublin,  attended  Sir  William  as  an  amanuen 
sis,  for  twenty  pounds  a  year  and  his  board, — 
dined  at  the  second  table,  wrote  bad  verses  in 
praise  of  his  employer,  and  made  love  to  a 
very  pretty,  dark-eyed  young  girl,  who  waited 
on  Lady  Giffard.  Little  did  Temple  imagine 
that  the  coarse  exterior  of  his  dependant  con 
cealed  a  genius  equally  suited  to  politics  and 
to  letters ; — a  genius  destined  to  shake  great 
kingdoms,  to  stir  the  laughter  and  the  rage  of 
millions,  and  to  leave  10  posterity  memorials 
which  can  perish  only  with  the  English  lan 
guage.  Little  did  he  think  that  the  flirtation 
in  his  servants'  hall,  which  he  perhaps  scarcely 
deigned  to  make  the  subject  of  a  jest,  was  the 
beginning  of  a  long  unprosperous  love,  which 
was  to  be  as  widely  famed  as  the  passion  of 
Petrarch,  or  of  Abelard.  Sir  William's  secre 
tary  was  Jonathan  Swift — Lady  Giffard's  wait 
ing-maid  was  poor  Stella. 

Swift  retained  no  pleasing  recollections  of 
Moor  Park.  And  we  may  easily  suppose  a 
situation  like  his  to  have  been  intolerably 
painful  to  a  mind  haughty,  irascible,  and  con 
scious  of  pre-eminent  ability.  Long  after, 
when  he  stood  in  the  Court  of  Requests  with  a 
circle  of  gartered  peers  round  him,  or  punned 
and  rhymed  with  cabinet  ministers  over  Secre 
tary  St.  John's  Mount-Pulciano,  he  remembered, 
with  deep  and  sore  feeling,  how  miserable  he 
used  to  be  for  days  together  when  he  suspected 
that  Sir  William  had  taken  something  ill.  He 
could  hardly  believe  that  he,  the  same  Swift 
who  chid  the  Lord  Treasurer,  rallied  the  Cap 
tain  General,  and  confronted  the  pride  of  the 
Duke  of  Buckinghamshire  with  pride  still 
more  inflexible,  could  be  the  same  being  who 
had  passed  nights  of  sleepless  anxiety,  in 
musing  over  a  cross  look  or  a  testy  word  of  a 
patron!  "Faith,"  he  wrote  to  Stella,  with  bitter 
levity  "  Sir  William  spoiled  a  fine  gentleman." 


Yet  in  justice  to  Temple  we  must  say,  that 
there  is  no  reason  to  think  that  Swift  was  more 
unhappy  at  Moor  Park  than  he  would  have  been 
in  a  similar  situation  under  any  roof  in  Eng 
land.  We  think  also  that  the  obligations  which 
the  mind  of  Swift  owed  to  that  of  Temple  were 
not  inconsiderable.  Every  judicious  reader 
must  be  struck  by  the  peculiarities  which  dis 
tinguish  Swift's  political  tracts  from  all  similar 
works  produced  by  mere  men  of  letters.  Let 
any  person  compare,  for  example,  the  conduct 
of  the  Allies,  or  the  Letter  to  the  October  Club, 
with  Johnson's  False  Alarm,  or  Taxation  no 
Tyranny,  and  he  will  be  at  once  struck  by  the 
difference  of  which  we  speak.  He  may  possi 
bly  think  Johnson  a  greater  man  than  Swift. 
He  may  possibly  prefer  Johnson's  style  to 
Swift's.  But  he  will  at  once  acknowledge  that 
Johnson  writes  like  a  man  who  has  never  been 
out  of  his  study.  Swift  writes  like  a  man  who 
has  passed  his  whole  life  in  the  midst  of  pub 
lic  business,  and  to  whom  the  most  important 
affairs  of  state  are  as  familiar  as  his  weekly 
bills. 

41  Turn  him  to  any  cause  of  policy, 
The  Gordian  knot  of  it  he  will  unloose, 
Familiar  as  his  garter." 

The  difference,  in  short,  between  a  political 
pamphlet  by  Johnson,  and  a  political  pamphlet 
by  Swift,  is  as  great  as  the  difference  between 
an  account  of  a  battle  by  Doctor  Southey  and 
the  account  of  the  same  battle  by  Colonel  Na 
pier.  It  is  impossible  to  doubt  that  the  supe 
riority  of  Swift  is  to  be,  in  a  great  measure, 
attributed  to  his  long  and  close  connection  with 
Temple. 

Indeed,  remote  as  the  alleys  and  flower-pots 
of  Moor  Park  were  from  the  haunts  of  the  busy 
and  the  ambitious,  Swift  had  ample  opportuni 
ties  of  becoming  acquainted  with  the  hidden 
causes  of  many  great  events.  William  was  in 
the  habit  of  consulting  Temple,  and  occasion 
ally  visited  him.  Of  what  passed  between 
them  very  little  is  known.  It  is  certain,  how 
ever,  that  when  the  Triennial  Bill  had  been 
carried  through  the  two  Houses,  his  majesty, 
who  was  exceedingly  unwilling  to  pass  it,  sent 
the  Earl  of  Portland  to  learn  Temple's  opinion. 
Whether  Temple  thought  the  bill  in  itself  a 
good  one  does  not  appear ;  but  he  clearly  saw 
how  imprudent  it  must  be  in  a  prince,  situated 
as  William  was,  to  engage  in  an  altercation 
with  his  Parliament;  and  directed  Swift  10 
draw  up  a  paper  on  the  subject,  which,  how 
ever,  did  not  convince  the  king. 

The  chief  amusement  of  Temple's  declining 
years  \vas  literature.  After  his  final  retreat 
from  business,  he  wrote  his  very  agieeable 
memoirs;  corrected  and  transcribed  many  of 
his  letters;  and  published  several  miscella 
neous  treatises,  the  best  of  which,  we  think,  is 
that  on  Gardening.  The  style  of  his  essays  is, 
on  the  whole,  excellent, — almost  always  pleas 
ing,  and  now  and  then  stately  and  splendid 
The  matter  is  generally  of  much  less  value  ;  as 
our  readers  will  readily  believe  when  we  in 
form  them  that  Mr.  Courtenay — a  biograpner, 
— that  is  to  say,  a  literary  vassal,  bound  by  the 
(  immemorial  law  of  his  tenure  to  render  ho- 
1  mage,  aids,  reliefs,  and  all  other  custrmary 
31 


374 


MAOAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


services  to  his  lord, — avows  that  he  cannot 
give  an  opinion  about  the  essay  on  "Heroic 
Virtue/'  because  he  cannot  read  it  without 
skipping ; — a  circumstance  which  strikes  us 
as  peculiarly  strange,  when  we  consider  how 
long  Mr.  Courtenay  was  at  the  India  Board, 
and  how  many  thousand  paragraphs  of  the 
copious  official  eloquence  of  the  East  he  must 
have  perused. 

One  of  Sir  William's  pieces,  however,  de 
serves  notice,  not,  indeed,  on  account  of  its 
intrinsic  merit,  but  on  account  of  the  light 
which  it  throws  on  some  curious  weaknesses 
of  his  character;  and  on  account  of  the  extra 
ordinary  effect  which  it  produced  on  the  re 
public  of  letters. 

A  most  idle  and  contemptible  controversy  j 
had  arisen  in  France  touching  the  comparative  j 
merit  of  the  ancient  and  modern  writers.     It 
was  certainly  not  to  be  expected  that,  in  that 
age,  the  question  would  be  tried  according  to 
those   large  and  philosophical   principles   of 
criticism  which  guided  the  judgments  of  Les- 


in  tolerable  order  by  his  discretion,  now,  when 
he  had  long  lived  in  seclusion,  and  had  become 
accustomed  to  regard  himself  as  by  far  the  first 
man  of  his  circle,  rendered  him  blind  to  his 
own  deficiencies.  In  an  evil  hour  he  pub 
lished  an  "Essay  on  Ancient  and  Modern 
Learning."  The  style  of  this  treatise  is  very 
good— the  matter  ludicrous  and  contemptible 
to  the  last  degree.  There  we  read  how  Lycur- 
gus  travelled  into  India,  and  brought  the  Spar 
tan  laws  from  that  country — how  Orpheus  and 
Musseus  made  voyages  in  search  of  knowledge, 
and  how  Orpheus  attained  to  a  depth  of  learn 
ing  which  has  made  him  renowned  in  all  suc 
ceeding  ages — how  Pythagoras  passed  twenty- 
two  years  in  Egypt,  and,  after  graduating  there, 
spent  twelve  years  more  at  Babylon,  where  the 
Magi  admitted  him  ad  cundcm — how  the  ancient 
Brahmins  lived  two  hundred  years — how  the 
earliest  Greek  philosophers  foretold  earth* 
quakes  and  plagues,  and  put  down  riots  by 
magic — and  how  much  Ninus  surpassed  in 
abilities  any  of  his  successors  on  the  throne  of 

A  „._ :  A  rrn 3 _     i  f*  i 


sing  and  of  Herder.     But  it  might  have  been    Assyria.     The  moderns,  ne  owns,  have  found 


expected,  that  those  who  undertook  to  decide 


the  point    would  at  least 
read  and  understand  the 


take  the  trouble  to 
authors  on   whose 


merits  they  were  to  pronounce.  Now,  it  is  no 
exaggeration  to  say  that,  among  the  disputants 
who  clamoured,  some  for  the  ancients,  and 
some  for  the  moderns,  very  few  were  decently 
acquainted  with  either  ancient  or  modern 
literature,  and  not  a  single  one  was  well  ac 
quainted  with  both.  In  Racine's  amusing  pre 
face  to  the  "  Iphigenie,"  the  reader  may  find 
noticed  a  most  ridiculous  mistake,  into  which 
one  of  the  champions  of  the  moderns  fell  about 
a  passage  in  the  Alcestis  of  Euripides.  An 
other  writer  blames  Homer  for  mixing  the  four 
Greek  dialects — Doric,  Ionic,  ^Eolic,  and  Attic 
—just,  says  he,  as  if  a  French  poet  were  to  put 
Gascon  phrases  and  Picard  phrases  into  the 
midst  of  his  pure  Parisian  writing.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  the 
defenders  of  the  ancients  were  entirely  unac 
quainted  with  the  greatest  productions  of  later 
times ;  nor,  indeed,  were  the  defenders  of  the 
moderns  better  informed.  The  parallels  which 
were  instituted  in  the  course  of  this  dispute 
are  inexpressibly  ridiculous.  Balzac  was  se 
lected  as  the  rival  of  Cicero.  Corneille  was 
declared  to  unite  the  merits  of  ^Eschylus, 
Sophocles,  and  Euripides.  We  should  like  to 
gee  a  "  Prometheus"  after  Corneille's  fashion. 
The  "Provincial  Letters,"  masterpieces  un 
doubtedly  of  reasoning,  wit,  and  eloquence, 
were  pronounced  to  be  superior  to  all  the 
writings  of  Plato,  Cicero,  and  Lucian  together, 
—particularly  in  the  art  of  dialogue — an  art  in 
which,  as  it  happens,  Plato  far  excelled  all 
men,  and  in  which  Pascal,  great  and  admira 
ble  in  other  respects,  is  notoriously  deficient. 

This  childish  controversy  spread  to  Eng 
land;  and  some  mischievous  demon  suggested 
vu  Temple  the  thought  of  undertaking  the  de 
fence  of  the  ancients.  As  to  his  qualifications 
for  the  task,  it  is  sufficient  to  say,  that  he  knew 
not  a  word  of  Greek.  But  his  vanity,  which, 
when  he  was  engaged  in  the  conflicts  of  active 


cut  the  circulation  of  the  blood ;  but,  on  the 
other  hand,  they  have  quite  lost  the  art  of  ma 
gic  ;  nor  can  any  modern  fiddler  enchant  fishes, 
fowls,  and  serpents  by  his  performance.  He 
tells  us  that  "  Thales,  Pythagoras,  Democritus, 
Hippocrates,  Plato,  Aristotle,  and  Epicurus 
made  greater  progresses  in  the  several  empires 
of  science  than  any  of  their  successors  have 
since  been  able  to  reach;"  which  is  as  much 
as  if  he  had  said  that  the  greatest  names  in 
British  science  are  Merlin,  Michael  Scott,  Dr. 
Sydenham,  and  Lord  Bacon.  Indeed,  the  man 
ner  in  which  he  mixes  the  historical  and  the 
fabulous  reminds  us  of  those  classical  diction 
aries,  intended  for  the  use  of  schools,  in  which 
Narcissus,  the  lover  of  himself,  and  Narcissus, 
the  freedman  of  Claudius — Pollux,  the  son  of 
Jupiter  and  Leda,  and  Pollux,  the  author  of  the 
Onomasticon — are  ranged  under  the  same 
heading,  and  treated  as  personages  equally 
real.  The  effect  of  this  arrangement  resembles 
that  which  would  be  produced  by  a  dictionary 
of  modern  names,  consisting  of  such  articles 
as  the  following: — "Jones,  William,  an  emi 
nent  Orientalist,  and  one  of  the  Judges  of  the 
Supreme  Court  of  Judicature  in  Bengal — Davy, 
a  fiend  who  destroys  ships — Thomas,  a  found 
ling,  brought  up  by  Mr.  Airworthy."  It  is  from 
such  sources  as  these  that  Temple  seems  to 
have  learned  all  that  he  knew  about  the  an 
cients.  He  puts  the  story  of  Orpheus  between 
the  Olympic  games  and  the  battle  of  Arbelaj 
as  if  we  had  exactly  as  much  reason  for  be 
lieving  that  Orpheus  led  beasts  with  his  lyre, 
as  we  have  for  believing  that  there  were  races 
at  Pisa,  or  that  Alexander  conquered  Darius. 

He  manages  little  better  when  he  comes  to 
the  moderns.  He  gives  us  a  catalogue  of  those 
whom  he  regards  as  the  greatest  wits  of  later 
times,  It  is  sufficient  to  say  that,  in  his  list  of 
Italians,  he  has  omitted  Dante,  Petrarch,  Ari« 
osto,  and  Tasso ;  in  his  list  of  Spaniards,  Lope 
and  Calderon ;  in  his  list  of  French,  Pascal, 
Bossuet,  Moliere,  Corneille,  Racine,  and  Boi« 
leau;  and  in  his  list  of  English,  Chaucer» 


»ife,  and  surrounded  by  rivals,  had  been  kept  |  Spenser,  Shakspeare,  and  Milto.n 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


375 


In  the  midst  of  all  this  vast  mass  of  absurdity 
*ne  paragraph  stands  out  pre-eminent.  The 
doctrine  of  Temple — not  a  very  comfortable 
one — is,  that  the  human  race  is  constantly  de 
generating  ;  and  that  the  oldest  books  in  every 
kind  are  the  best.  In  confirmation  of  this  doc 
trine,  he  remarks  that  the  Fables  of  JSsop  are 
the  best  fables,  and  the  letters  of  Phalaris  the 
best  letters  in  the  world.  On  the  merit  of  the 
letters  of  Phalaris  he  dwells  with  great  warmth 
and  with  extraordinary  felicity  of  language. 
Indeed,  we  could  hardly  select  a  more  favour 
able  specimen  of  the  graceful  and  easy  ma 
jesty  to  which  his  style  sometimes  rises  than 
this  unlucky  passage.  He  knows,  he  says, 
that  some  learned  men,  or  men  who  pass  for 
learned,  such  as  Politian,  have  doubted  the 
genuineness  of  these  letters.  But  of  these 
doubts  he  speaks  with  the  greatest  contempt. 
Now  it  is  perfectly  certain,  first,  that  the  letters 
are  very  bad ;  secondly,  that  they  are  spuri 
ous  ;  and  thirdly,  that,  whether  they  be  bad  or 
good,  spurious  or  genuine,  Temple  could  know 
nothipg  of  the  matter ;  inasmuch  as  he  was  no 
mor'  able  to  construe  a  line  of  them  than  to 
decipher  an  Egyptian  obelisk. 

This  Essay,  silly  as  it  is,  was  exceedingly 
well  received,  both  in  England  and  on  the 
Continent.  And  the  reason  is  evident.  The 
classical  scholars,  who  saw  its  absurdity, 
were  generally  on  the  side  of  the  ancients, 
and  were  inclined  rather  to  veil  than  to  expose 
the  blunders  of  an  ally ;  the  champions  of  the 
moderns  were  generally  as  ignorant  as  Temple 
himself;  and  the  multitude  were  charmed  by 
his  flowing  and  melodious  diction.  He  was 
doomed,  however,  to  smart,  as  he  well  de 
served,  for  his  vanity  and  folly. 

Christchurch  at  Oxford  was  then  widely  and 
justly  celebrated  as  a  place  where  the  lighter 
parts  of  classical  learning  were  cultivated 
with  success.  With  the  deeper  mysteries  of 
philology  neither  the  instructors  nor  the  pupils 
had  the  smallest  acquaintance.  They  fancied 
themselves  Scaligers,  as  Bentley  scornfully 
said,  as  soon  as  they  could  write  a  copy  of 
Latin  verses  with  only  two  or  three  small 
faults.  From  this  college  proceeded  a  new 
edition  of  the  Letters  of  Phalaris,  which  were 
rare,  and  had  been  in  request  since  the  appear 
ance  of  Temple's  Essay.  The  nominal  editor 
was  Charles  Boyle,  a  young  man  of  noble 
family  and  promising  parts;  but  some  older 
members  of  the  society  lent  their  assistance. 
While  this  work  was  in  preparation,  an  idle 
quarrel,  occasioned,  it  should  seem,  by  the 
negligence  and  misrepresentations  of  a  book 
seller,  arose  between  Boyle  and  the  king's 
librarian,  Richard  Bentley.  Boyle,  in  the  pre 
face  to  his  edition,  inserted  a  bitter  reflection 
on  Bentley.  Bentley  revenged  himself  by 
proving  that  the  Epistles  of  Phalaris  were  for 
geries  ;  and  in  his  remarks  on  this  subject 
treated  Temple,  not  indecently,  but  with  no 
great  reverence. 

Temple,  who  was  quite  unaccustomed  to 
any  but  the  most  respectful  usage,  who,  even 
while  engaged  in  politics,  had  always  shrunk 
from  all  rude  collision,  and  had  generally 
succeeded  in  avoiding  it,  and  whose  sensitive- 


icss  had  been  increased  by  many  years  of  se 
clusion  and  flattery,  —  was  moved  to  the  most 
iolent  resentment;  complained,  very  unjust* 
y,  of  Bentley's  foul-mouthed  raillery,  and  de- 
jlared  that  he  had  commenced  an  answer,  but 
lad  laid  it  aside,  "  having  no  mind  to  enter  the 
ists  with  such  a  mean,  dull,  unmannerly  pe 
dant."  Whatever  may  be  thought  of  the  tem- 
)er  which  Sir  William  showed  on  this  occa* 
sion,  we  cannot  too  highly  applaud  his  discre- 
ion  in  not  finishing  and  publishing  his  answer, 
which  would  certainly  have  been  a  most  ex- 
raordinary  performance. 

He  was   not,  however,  without   defenders. 
Like  Hector,  when  struck  down  prostrate  by 
Ajax,  he  was  in  an  instant  covered  by  a  thick 
rowd  of  shields  — 

"ovrif  edvvriaaro  Troipiei/a  Xawv 
Qvraaai  ovds  /3a^eiv  wpiv  yap  irepifitiaav  apjorot, 

j  TK,  KUI  A.tvcias,  xai  610$  'Ayr/vwp, 


Christchurch  was  up  in  arms;  and  though 
that  college  seems  then  to  have  been  almost 
destitute  of  severe  and  accurate  learning,  no 
academical  society  could  show  a  greater  array 
of  orators,  wits,  politicians,  —  bustling  adven 
turers,  who  united  the  superficial  accomplish 
ments  of  the  scholar  with  the  manners  and  arts 
of  the  man  of  the  world,  and  this  formidable 
body  resolved  to  try  how  far  smart  repartees, 
well  turned  sentences,  confidence,  pufllng,  and 
intrigue  could,  on  the  question  whether  a 
Greek  book  w*ere  or  were  not  genuine,  supply 
the  place  of  a  little  knowledge  of  Greek. 

Out  came  the  reply  to  Bentley,  bearing  th« 
name  of  Boyle,  but  in  truth  written  by  Atter- 
bury,  with  the  assistance  of  Smalridge  and 
others.  A  most  remarkable  book  it  is,  and 
often  reminds  us  of  Goldsmith's  observation, 
that  the  French  would  be  the  best  cooks  in  the 
world  if  they  had  any  butcher's  meat,  for  that 
they  can  make  ten  dishes  out  of  a  nettle  top. 
It  really  deserves  the  praise,  whatever  that 
praise  may  be  worth,  of  being  the  best  book 
ever  written  by  any  man  on  the  wrong  side  of 
a  question  of  which  he  was  profoundly  igno 
rant.  The  learning  of  the  confederacy  is  that 
of  a  schoolboy,  and  not  of  an  extraordinary 
schoolboy;  but  it  is  used  with  the  skill  and 
address  of  most  able,  artful,  and  experienced 
men  ;  it  is  beaten  out  to  the  very  thinnest  leaf, 
and  is  disposed  in  such  a  way  as  to  seem  ten 
times  larger  than  it  is.  The  dexterity  with 
which  they  avoid  grappling  with  those  parts 
of  the  subject  with  which  they  know  them 
selves  to  be  incompetent  to  deal  is  quite  won 
derful.  Now  and  then,  indeed,  they  commit 
disgraceful  blunders,  for  which  old  Busby,  un 
der  whom  they  had  studied,  would  have  whip 
ped  them  all  round.  But  this  circumstance 
only  raises  our  opinion  of  the  talents  which 
made  such  a  fight  with  such  scanty  means. 
Let  our  readers,  who  are  not  acquainted  with 
the  controversy,  imagine  a  Frenchman  who 
had  acquired  just  English  enough  to  read  tho 
Spectator  with  a  dictionary,  coming  forward  to 
defend  the  genuineness  of  "Rowleys  Poems" 
against  Percy  and  Farmer;  and  they  will  havn 
some  notion  of  the  feat  which  Atterbury  had 


376 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ihe  audacity  to  undertake,  and  which,  for  a 
time,  it  was  really  thought  that  he  had  per 
formed. 

The  illusion  was  soon  dispelled.  Bentley's 
answer  forever  settled  the  question,  and  es 
tablished  his  claim  to  the  first  place  amongst 
classical  scholars.  Nor  do  those  do  him  jus 
tice  who  represent  the  controversy  as  a  battle 
between  wit  and  learning.  For,  though  there 
is  a  lamentable  deficiency  of  learning  on  the 
side  of  Boyle,  there  is  no  want  of  wit  on  the 
side  of  Bentley.  Other  qualities  too,  as  valua 
ble  as  either  wit  or  learning,  appear  conspi 
cuously  in  Bentley's  book ; — a  rare  sagacity, 
an  unrivalled  power  of  combination,  a  perfect 
mastery  of  all  the  weapons  of  logic.  He  was 
greatly  indebted  to  the  furious  outcry  which 
the  misrepresentations,  sarcasms,  and  intrigues 
of  his  opponents  had  raised  against  him; — an 
outcry  in  which  fashionable  and  political  cir 
cles  joined,  and  which  was  re-echoed  by  thou 
sands  who  did  not  know  whether  Phalaris 
ruled  in  Sicily  or  in  Siam.  His  spirit,  daring 
even  to  rashness — self-confident,  even  to  neg 
ligence — and  proud,  even  to  insolent  ferocity, 
— was  awed  for  the  first  and  for  the  last  time 
—  awed,  not  into  meanness  or  cowardice, 
but  into  wariness  and  sobriety.  For  once  he 
ran  no  risks;  he  left  no  crevice  unguarded; 
he  wantoned  in  no  paradoxes  ;  above  all,  he 
returned  no  railing  for  the  railing  of  his  ene 
mies.  In  almost  every  thing  that  he  has  writ 
ten  we  can  discover  proofs  of  genius  and 
learning.  But  it  is  only  here  that  his  genius 
and  .earning  appear  to  have  been  constantly 
under  the  guidance  of  good  sense  and  good 
temper.  Here  we  find  none  of  that  besotted 
reliance  on  his  own  powers  and  on  his  own 
luck,  which  he  showed  when  he  undertook  to 
edite  Milton ;  none  of  that  perverted  ingenuity 
which  deforms  so  many  of  his  notes  on  Ho 
race  ;  none  of  that  disdainful  carelessness  by 
which  he  laid  himself  open  to  the  keen  and 
dexterous  thrusts  of  Middleton ;  none  of  that 
extravagant  vaunting  and  savage  scurrility  by 
which  he  afterwards  dishonoured  his  studies 
and  his  profession,  and  degraded  himself  al 
most  to  the  level  of  De  Paucs. 

Temple  did  not  live  to  witness  the  utter  and 
irreparable  defeat  of  his  champions.  He  died, 
indeed,  at  a  fortunate  moment,  just  after  the 
appearance  of  Boyle's  book,  and  while  all 
England  was  laughing  at  the  way  in  which  the 
Christchurch  men  had  handled  the  pedant.  In 
Beyle's  book,  Temple  was  praised  in  the  high 
est  terms,  and  compared  to  Memmius — not  a 
very  happy  comparison  ;  for  the  only  particu 
lar  information  which  we  have  about  Mem 
mius  is,  that  in  agitated  times  he  thought  it 
his  duty  to  attend  exclusively  to  politics ;  and 
that  his  friends  could  not  venture,  except  when 
the  republic  was  quiet  and  prosperous,  to  in 
trude  on  him  with  their  philosophical  and 
poetical  productions.  It  is  on  this  account, 
that  Lucretius  puts  up  the  exquisitely  beauti 
ful  prayer  for  peace  with  which  his  poem 
opens : 

"Xam  neqne  nos  agere  hoc  patriot  tempore  iniquo 
Possum  us  leque  animo,  nee  Mernmii  clara  propago 
Talibus  in  rebus  coimouni  deesse  saluti." 


This  description  is  surely  by  no  means  ap« 
plicable  to  a  statesman  who  had,  through  the 
whole  course  of  his  life,  carefully  avoided  ex 
posing  himself  in  seasons  of  trouble :  who  had. 
repeatedly  refused,  in  the  most  critical  con. 
junctures,  to  be  Secretary  of  State;  and  who 
now,  in  the  midst  of  revolutions,  plots,  foreign 
and  domestic  wars,  was  quietly  writing  non 
sense  about  the  visits  of  Lycurgus  to  the  Bran. 
mins,  and  the  tunes  which  Arion  played  to  the 
Dolphin. 

We  must  not  omit  to  mention  that,  while  the 
controversy  about  Phalaris  was  raging,  Swift, 
in  order  to  show  his  zeal  and  attachment, 
wrote  the  "Bailie  of  the  Books ;"— the  earliest 
piece  in  which  his  peculiar  talents  are  discern 
ible.  We  may  observe,  that  the  bitter  dislike 
of  Bentley.  bequeathed  by  Temple  to  Swift, 
seems  to  have  been  communicated  by  Swift  to 
Pope,  to  Arbuthnot,and  to  others  who  continued 
to  tease  the  great  critic,  long  after  he  had 
shaken  hands  very  cordially  both  with  Boyle 
and  Atterbury. 

Sir  William  Temple  died  at  Moor  Park  in 
January,  1699.  He  appeared  to  have  suffered 
no  intellectual  decay.  His  heart  was  buried 
under  a  sun-dial  which  still  stands  in  his  fa 
vourite  garden.  His  body  was  laid  in  West 
minster  Abbey  by  the  side  of  his  wife  ;  and  a 
place  hard  by  was  set  apart  for  Lady  Giffard, 
who  long  survived  him.  Swift  was  his  literary 
executor,  and  superintended  the  publication  of 
his  Letters  and  Memoirs,  not  without  some 
acrimonious  contests  with  the  family. 

Of  Temple's  character  little  more  remains 
to  be  said.  Burnet  aor.nccs  haii  of  noklmg  ir 
religious  opinions,  and  corrupting  everybody 
who  came  near  him.  But  the  vague  assertion 
of  so  rash  and  partial  a  writer  as  Burnet,  about 
a  man  with  whom,  as  far  as  we  know,  he 
never  exchanged  a  word,  is  of  very  little 
weight.  It  is,  indeed,  by  no  means  improbable 
that  Temple  may  have  been  a  free-thinker. 
The  Osbornes  thought  him  so  when  he  was  a 
very  young  man.  And  it  is  certain  that  a 
large  proportion  of  the  gentlemen  of  rank  and 
fashion  who  made  their  entrance  into  society 
while  the  Puritan  party  was  at  the  height  of 
power,  and  while  the  memory  of  the  reign  of 
that  party  was  still  recent,  conceived  a  strong 
disgust  for  all  religion.  The*  imputation  was 
common  between  Temple  and  all  the  most  dis 
tinguished  courtiers  of  the  age.  Rochester 
and  Buckingham  were  open  scoffers,  and  Mul- 
grave  very  little  better.  Shaflesbury,  thoush 
more  guarded,  was  supposed  to  agree  with 
them  in  opinion.  All  the  three  noblemen  who 
\vere  Temple's  colleagues  during  the  short 
time  of  his  continuance  in  the  cabinet,  were 
of  very  indifferent  repute  as  to  orthodoxy. 
Halifax,  indeed,  was  generally  considered  as 
an  atheist;  but  he  solemnly  denied  the  charge; 
and,  indeed,  the  truth  seems  to  be,  that  he  was 
more  religiously  disposed  than  most  of  the 
statesmen  of  that  age ;  though  two  impulses 
which  were  unusually  strong  in  him, — a  pas 
sion  for  ludicrous  images,  and  a  passion  for 
subtle  speculations, — sometimes  prompted  him 
to  talk  on  serious  subjects  in  a  manner  which 
gave  great  and  just  offence.  It  is  not  even 


SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE. 


unlikely  that  Temple,  who  seldom  went  below 
the  surface  of  any  question,  may  have  been 
infected  with  the  prevailing  skepticism.  All 
that  we  can  say  on  the  subject  is,  that  there  is 
no  trace  of  impiety  in  his  works;  and  that  the 
ease  with  which  he  carried  his  election  for  a 
university,  where  the  majority  of  the  voters 
were  clergymen,  though  it  proves  nothing  as 
to  his  opinions,  must,  we  think,  be  considered 
as  proving  that  he  was  not,  as  Burnet  seems 
to  insinuate,  in  the  habit  of  talking  atheism  to 
all  who  came  near  him. 

Temple,  however,  will  scarcely  carry  with 
him  any  great  accession  of  authority  to  the 
side  either  of  religion  or  of  infidelity.  He 
was  no  profound  thinker.  He  was  merely  a 
man  of  lively  parts  and  quick  observation, 
—a  man  of  the  world  amongst  men  of  let 
ters, — a  man  of  letters  amongst  men  of  the 
world.  Mere  scholars  were  dazzled  by  the 
ambassador  and  cabinet  councillor ;  mere  po 
liticians  by  the  essayist  and  historian.  But 
neither  as  a  Avriter  nor  as  a  statesman  can  we 
allot  to  him  any  very  high  place.  As  a  man, 


he  seems  to  us  to  have  been  excessively  self 
ish,  but  very  sober,  wary,  and  far-sighted  in 
his  selfishness; — to  have  known  better  than 
most  people  know  what  he  really  wanted  in, 
life  ;  and  to  have  pursued  what  he  wanted  with 
much  more  than  ordinary  steadiness  and  sa 
gacity  ; — never  suffering  himself  to  be  drawn, 
aside  either  by  bad  or  by  good  feelings.  It 
was  his  constitution  to  dread  failure  moie  than 
he  desired  success, — to  prefer  security,  com 
fort,  repose,  leisure,  to  the  turmoil  and  anxiety 
which  are  inseparable  from  greatness  ; — and 
this  natural  languor  of  mind,  when  contrasted 
with  the  malignant  energy  of  the  keen  and 
restless  spirits  among  whom  his  lot  was  cast, 
sometimes  appears  to  resemble  the  moderation, 
of  virtue.  But  we  must  own,  that  he  seems 
to  us  to  sink  into  littleness  and  meanness  when, 
we  compare  him — we  do  not  say  wilh  any  high 
ideal  standard  of  morality, — but  with  many  of 
those  frail  men  who,  aiming  at  noble  ends,  but 
often  drawn  from  the  right  path  by  strong  pas 
sions  and  strong  temptations,  have  left  to  r-os 
terity  a  doubtful  and  checkered  fame 


VOL.  m.~48 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


CHURCH  AND  STATE; 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW  FOR  APRIL,  1839.] 


THE  author  of  this  volume  is  a  yo'u'irg  man 
of  unblemished  character  and  of  distinguished 
parliamentary  talents,  the  rising  hope  of  those 
stern  and  unbending  Tories,  who  follow,  re 
luctantly  and  mutinously,  a  leader,  whose  ex 
perience  and  eloquence  are  indispensable  to 
them,  but  whose  cautious  temper  and  moderate 
opinions  they  abhor.  It  would  not  be  at  all 
strange  if  Mr.  Gladstone  were  one  of  the  most 
unpopular  men  in  England.  But  we  believe 
that  we  do  him  no  more  than  justice  when  we 
say,  that  his  abilities  and  his  demeanour  have 
obtained  for  him  the  respect  and  good-will  of 
all  parties.  His  first  appearance  in  the  cha 
racter  of  an  author  is  therefore  an  interesting 
event;  and  it  is  natural  that  the  gentle  wishes 
of  the  public  should  go  with  him  to  his  trial. 

We  are  much  pleased,  without  any  reference 
to  the  soundness  or  unsoundness  of  Mr.  Glad 
stone's  theories,  to  see  a  grave  and  elaborate 
treatise  on  an  important  part  of  the  philosophy 
of  government  proceed  from  the  pen  of  a 
young  man  who  is  rising  to  eminence  in  the 
House  of  Commons.  There  is  little  danger 
that  people  engaged  in  the  conflicts  of  active 
life  will  be  too  much  addicted  to  general  spe 
culation.  The  opposite  vice  is  that  which 
most  easily  besets  them.  The  times  and  tides 
of  business  and  debate  tarry  for  no  man.  A 
politician  must  often  talk  and  act  before  he  has 
thought  and  read.  He  may  be  very  ill-informed 
respecting  a  questicu  ;  all  his  notions  about  it 
may  be  vague  and  inaccurate  ;  but  speak  he 
must ;  and  if  he  is  a  man  of  talents,  of  tact, 
and  of  intrepidity,  ne  soon  finds  that,  even 
under  such  circumstances,  it  is  possible  to 
speak  successfully.  He  finds  that  there  is  a 
great  difference  between  the  effect  of  written 
words,  which  are  perused  and  reperused  in  the 
stillness  of  the  closet,  and  the  effect  of  spoken 
words,  which,  set  off  by  the  graces  of  utterance 
and  gesture,  vibrate  for  a  single  moment  on  the 
ear.  He  finds  that  he  may  blunder  without 
much  chance  of  being  detected,  that  he  may 
reason  sophistically,  and  escape  unrefuted. 
He  finds  that,  even  on  knotty  questions  of 
trade  and  legislation,  he  can,  without  reading 
ten  pages,  or  thinking  ten  minutes,  draw  forth 
loud  plaudits,  and  sit  down  with  the  credit  of 
having  made  an  excellent  speech.  Lysias, 
says  Plutarch,  wrote  a  defence  for  a  man  who 
•was  to  be  tried  before  one  of  the  Athenian  tri 
bunals.  Long  before  the  defendant  had  learn 
ed  the  speech  by  heart,  he  became  so  much 
dissatisfied  with  it,  that  he  went  in  great  dis 
tress  to  the  author.  "I  was  delighted  with 
your  speech  the  first  time  I  read  it ;  but  I  liked 


*  'Die  State  in  its  relations  with  the  CJiurch.  By  W.  E. 
GLADSTONE,  Esq.,  Student  of  Christchtirch,  and  M.  .P. 
for  Newark  8vo.  Second  Edition.  London.  1S39. 


it  less  the  second  time,  and  still  less  the  third 
time  ;  and  now  it  seems  to  me  to  be  no  defence 
at  all."  "  My  good  friend,"  said  Lysias,  "  you 
quite  forget  that  the  judges  are  to  hear  it  only 
once."  The  case  is  the  same  in  the  English 
Parliament.  It  would  be  as  idle  in  an  orator 
to  waste  deep  meditation  and  long  research  on 
his  speeches,  as  it  would  be  in  the  manager  of 
a  theatre  to  adorn  all  the  crowd  of  courtiers 
and  ladies  who  cross  over  the  stage  in  a  pro 
cession  with  real  pearls  and  diamonds.  It  is 
not  by  accuracy  or  profundity  that  men  become 
the  masters  of  great  assemblies.  And  why  be 
at  the  charge  of  providing  logic  of  the  best 
quality,  when  a  very  inferior  article  will  be 
equally  acceptable  1  Why  go  as  deep  into  a 
question  as  Burke,  only  in  order  to  be,  like 
Burke,  coughed  down,  or  *eft  speaking  to  green 
benches  and  red  boxes  1  This  has  long  ap 
peared  to  us  to  be  the  most  serious  of  the  evils 
which  are  to  be  set  off  against  the  many  bless 
ings  of  popular  government.  It  is  a  fine  and 
true  saying  of  Bacon,  that  reading  makes  a 
full  man,  talking  a  ready  man,  and  writing  an 
exact  man.  The  tendency  of  institutions  like 
those  of  England  is  to  encourage  readiness  in 
public  men,  at  the  expense  both  of  fulness  and 
of  exactness.  The  keenest  and  most  vigorous 
minds  of  every  generation,  minds  often  admi 
rably  fitted  for  the  investigation  of  truth,  are 
habitually  employed  in  producing  arguments, 
such  as  no  man  of  sense  would  ever  put  intc  a 
treatise  intended  for  publication, — arguments 
which  are  just  good  enough  to  be  used  once, 
when  aided  by  fluent  delivery  and  pointed  lan 
guage.  The  habit  of  discussing  questions  in 
this  way  necessarily  reacts  on  the  intelligence 
of  our  ablest  men,  particularly  of  those  who 
are  introduced  into  Parliament  at  a  very  early 
age,  before  their  minds  have  expanded  to  full 
maturity.  The  talent  for  debate  is  developed 
in  such  men  to  a  degree  which,  to  the  multi 
tude,  seems  as  marvellous  as  the  perform 
ances  of  an  Italian  improvisatore.  But  they  are 
fortunate,  indeed,  if  they  retain  unimpaired  the 
faculties  which  are  required  for  close  reason 
ing  or  for  enlarged  speculation.  Indeed,  we 
should  sooner  expect  a  great  original  work  on 
political  science — such  a  work,  for  example, 
as  the  "  Wealth  of  Nations" — from  an  apothe 
cary  in  a  country  town,  or  from  a  minister  in 
the  Hebrides,  than  from  a  statesman  who,  ever 
since  he  was  one-and-twenty,  had  been  a  dis 
tinguished  debater  in  the  House  of  Commons. 
We  therefore  hail  with  pleasure,  though  as 
suredly  not  with  unmixed  pleasure,  the  appear 
ance  of  this  work.  That  a  young  politician 
should,  in  the  intervals  afforded  by  his  parlia 
mentary  avocations,  have  constructed  and  pro 
pounded,  with  much  study  and  mental  toil,  an 
original  theory  on  a  great  problem  in  politics, 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


379 


Is  a  circumstance  which,  abstracted  from  all 
consideration  of  the  soundness  or  unsoundness 
of  his  opinions,  must  be  considered  as  highly 
creditable  to  him.  We  certainly  cannot  wish 
that  Mr.  Gladstone's  doctrines  may  become 
fashionable  among  public  men.  But  we  hearti 
ly  wish  that  his  laudable  desire  to  penetrate 
beneath  the  surface  of  questions,  and  to  arrive, 
by  long  and  intent  meditation,  at  the  knowledge 
of  great  general  laws,  were  much  more  fashion 
able  than  we  at  all  expect  it  to  become. 

Mr.  Gladstone  seerns  to  us  to  be,  in  many 
respects,  exceedingly  well  qualified  for  philo 
sophical  investigation.  His  mind  is  of  large 
grasp  ;  nor  is  he  deficient  in  dialectical  skill. 
But  he  does  not  give  his  intellect  fair  play. 
There  is  no  want  of  light,  but  a  great  want 
of  what  Bacon  would  have  called  dry  light. 
Whatever  Mr.  Gladstone  sees  is  refracted  and 
distorted  by  a  false  medium  of  passions  and 
prejudices.  His  style  bears  a  remarkable  ana 
logy  to  his  mode  of  thinking,  and  indeed  exer 
cises  great  influence  on  his  mode  of  thinking. 
His  rhetoric,  though  often  good  of  its  kind, 
darkens  and  perplexes  the  logic  which  it  should 
illustrate.  Half  his  acuteness  and  diligence, 
with  a  barren  imagination  and  a  scanty  voca 
bulary,  Avould  have  saved  him  from  almost  all 
his  mistakes.  He  has  one  gift  most  dangerous 
to  a  speculator,  —  a  vast  command  of  a  kind 
of  language,  grave  and  majestic,  but  of  vague 
and  uncertain  import,  —  of  a  kind  of  language 
which  affects  us  much  in  the  same  way  in 
which  the  lofty  diction  of  the  chorus  of  Clouds 
affected  the  simple-hearted  Athenian. 


y»j  TO 


wg  tspov,  KO.I  oeftvov,  KCLI 


When  propositions  have  been  established, 
and  nothing  remains  but  to  amplify  and  deco 
rate  them,  this  dim  magnificence  may  be  in 
place.  But  if  it  is  admitted  into  a  demonstra 
tion,  it  is  very  much  worse  than  absolute  non 
sense  ;  —  just  as  that  transparent  haze  through 
which  the  sailor  sees  capes  and  mountains  of 
false  sizes  and  in  false  bearings,  is  more  dan 
gerous  than  utter  darkness.  Now,  Mr.  Glad 
stone  is  fond  of  employing  the  phraseology  of 
which  we  speak  in  those  parts  of  his  work 
which  require  the  utmost  perspicuity  and  pre 
cision  of  which  human  language  is  capable, 
and  in  this  way  he  deludes  first  himself,  and 
then  his  readers.  The  foundations  of  his 
theory,  which  ought  to  be  buttresses  of  ada 
mant,  are  made  out  of  the  flimsy  materials 
which  are  fit  only  for  perorations.  This  fault 
is  one  which  no  subsequent  care  or  industry 
can  correct.  The  more  strictly  Mr.  Gladstone 
reasons  on  his  premises,  the  more  absurd  are 
the  conclusions  which  he  brings  out;  and 
when  at  last  his  good  sense  and  good  nature 
recoil  from  the  horrible  practical  inferences  to 
which  his  theory  leads,  he  is  reduced  some 
times  to  take  refuge  in  arguments  inconsistent 
with  his  fundamental  doctrines;  and  some 
times  to  escape  from  the  legitimate  conse 
quences  of  his  false  principles  under  cover 
of  equally  false  history. 

It  would  be  unjust  not  to  say  that  this  book, 
though  not  a  good  book,  shows  more  talent 
than  many  good  books.  It  contains  some  elo 
quent  and  ingenious  passages.  It  bears  the 


signs  of  much  patient  thought.  It  is  written 
throughout  with  excellent  taste  and  excellent 
temper;  nor  is  it,  so  far  as  we  have  observed, 
disfigured  by  one  expression  unworthy  of  a 
gentleman,  a  scholar,  or  a  Christian.  But  the 
doctrines  which  are  put  forth  in  it  appear  to 
us,  after  full  and  calm  consideration,  to  be 
false  ;  to  be  in  the  highest  degree  pernicious  ; 
to  be  such  as,  if  followed  out  in  practice  to 
their  legitimate  consequences,  would  inevita 
bly  produce  the  dissolution  of  society;  and  for 
this  opinion  we  shall  proceed  to  give  our  rea 
sons  with  that  freedom  which  the  importance 
of  the  subject  requires,  and  which  Mr.  Glad 
stone  both  by  precept  and  by  example  invites  us 
to  use,  but,  we  hope,  without  rudeness,  and,  we 
are  sure,  without  malevolence. 

Before  we  enter  on  an  examination  of  this 
theory,  we  wish  to  guard  ourselves  against 
one  misconception.  It  is  possible  that  some 
persons  who  have  read  Mr.  Gladstone's  book 
carelessly,  and  others  who  have  merely  heard 
in  conversation  or  seen  in  a  newspaper  that 
the  member  for  Newark  has  written  in  defence 
of  the  Church  of  England  against  the  support 
ers  of  the  Voluntary  System,  may  imagine  that 
we  are  writing  in  defence  of  the  Voluntary  Sys 
tem,  and  that  we  desire  the  abolition  of  the 
Established  Church.  This  is  not  the  case.  It 
would  be  as  unjust  to  accuse  us  of  attacking 
the  Church  because  we  attack  Mr.  Gladstone's 
doctrines,  as  it  would  be  to  accuse  Locke  of 
wishing  for  anarchy  because  he  refuted  Fil- 
mer's  patriarchal  theory  of  government ;  or  to 
accuse  Blackstone  of  recommending  the  con 
fiscation  of  ecclesiastical  property  because  he 
denied  that  the  right  of  the  rector  to  tithe  was 
derived  from  the  Levitical  law.  It  is  to  be 
observed  that  Mr.  Gladstone  rests  his  case  on 
entirely  new  grounds,  and  does  not  differ  mora 
widely  from  us  than  from  some  of  those  who 
have  hitherto  been  considered  as  the  most 
illustrious  champions  of  the  Church.  He  is 
not  content  with  the  "Ecclesiastical  Polity," 
and  rejoices  that  the  latter  part  of  that  cele 
brated  work  "  does  not  carry  with  it  the  weight 


of  Hooker's   plenary  authority."     He   is  not 
content  with  Bishop  Warburton's  "j 
Church  and  State."     "r 


Alliance  of 

The  propositions  of  that 
work  generally,"  he  says,  "are  to  be  received 
with  qualification;"  and  he  agrees  with  Boling- 
broke  in  thinking  that  Warburton's  whole  the 
ory  rests  upon  a  fiction.  He  is  still  less  satis 
fied  with  Paley's  "Defence  of  the  Church/' 
which  he  pronounces  to  be  "tainted  by  the 
original  vice  '  false  ethical  principles,"  and 
"  full  of  the  S'  .Is  of  evil."  He  conceives  that 
Dr.  Chalmers  as  taken  a  partial  view  of  the 
subject,  and  "  .t  forth  much  questionable  mat 
ter."  In  truth  m  almost  every  point  on  which 
we  are  oppose  to  Mr.  Gladstone,  we  have  on 
our  side  the  au  Jrity  of  some  divine,  eminent 
as  a  defender  of  "isting  establishments. 

Mr.  Gladstone  whole  theory  rests  on  this 
great  fundament  proposition — that  the  Pro 
pagation  of  Religious  Truth  is  one  of  the  prn- 
cipal  ends  of  government,  as  government.  lf 
Mr.  Gladstone  has  not  proved  this  proposition, 

;  his  system  vanishes  at  once. 

We  are  desirous,  before  we  enter  on  the  dis 

;  cussion  of  this  important  qu\  stion,  to  point  out 


380 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


clearly  a  distinction  which,  though  very  obvi 
ous,  seems  to  be  overlooked  by  many  excel 
lent  people.  In  their  opinion,  to  say  that  the 
ends  of  government  are  temporal  and  not  spi 
ritual,  is  tantamount  to  saying  that  the  tempo 
ral  welfare  of  man  is  of  more  importance  than 
his  spiritual  welfare.  But  this  is  an  entire 
mistake.  The  question  is  not  whether  spiritual 
interests  be  or  be  not  superior  in  importance 
to  temporal  interests,  but  whether  the  machi 
nery  which  happens  at  any  moment  to  be  em 
ployed  for  the  purpose  of  protecting  certain 
temporal  interests  of  a  society,  be  necessarily 
such  a  machinery  as  is  fitted  to  promote  the 
spiritual  interests  of  that  society.  It  is  certain 
that  without  a  division  of  duties  the  world 
could  not  go  on.  It  is  of  very  much  more  im 
portance  that  men  should  have  food  than  that 
they  should  have  pianofortes.  Yet  it  by  no 
means  follows  that  every  pianoforte-maker 
ought  to  add  the  business  of  a  baker  to  his 
own ;  for  if  he  did  so,  we  should  have  both  much 
worse  music  and  much  worse  bread.  It  is  of 
much  more  importance  that  the  knowledge 
of  religious  truth  should  be  widely  diffused 
than  that  the  art  of  sculpture  should  flourish 
among  us.  Yet  it  by  no  means  follows  that 
the  Royal  Academy  ought  to  unite  with  its  pre 
sent  functions  those  of  the  Society  for  promot 
ing  Christian  Knowledge,  to  distribute  theolo 
gical  tracts,  to  send  forth  missionaries,  to  turn 
out  Nollekens  for  being  a  Catholic,  Bacon  for 
being  a  Methodist,  and  Flaxman  for  being  a 
Swedenborgian.  For  the  effect  of  such  folly 
would  be  that  we  should  have  the  worst  possi 
ble  Academy  of  Arts,  and  the  worst  possible 
Society  for  the  Promotion  of  Christian  Know 
ledge.  The  community,  it  is  plain,  would  be 
thrown  into  universal  confusion,  if  it  were 
supposed  to  be  the  duty  of  every  association 
which  is  formed  for  one  good  object  to  pro 
mote  every  other  good  object. 

As  to  some  of  the  ends  of  civil  government, 
all  people  are  agreed.  That  it  is  designed  to 
protect  our  persons  and  our  property, — that  it 
is  designed  to  compel  us  to  satisfy  our  wants, 
not  by  rapine,  but  by  industry, — that  it  is  de 
signed  to  compel  us  to  decide  our  differences, 
not  by  the  strong  hand,  but  by  arbitration, — 
that  it  is  designed  to  direct  our  whole  force,  as 
that  of  one  man,  against  any  other  society 
which  may  offer  us  injury, — these  are  propo 
sitions  which  will  hardly  be  disputed. 

Now  these  are  matters  in  which  man,  with 
out  any  reference  to  any  higher  being  or  to 
any  future  state,  is  very  deeply  interested. 
Every  man,  be  he  idolater,  Mohammedan,  Jew, 
Papist,  Socinian,  Deist,  or  Atheist,  naturally 
loves  life,  shrinks  from  pain,  desires  those 
comforts  which  can  be  enjoyed  only  in  com 
munities  where  property  is  secure.  To  be 
murdered,  to  be  tortured,  to  be  robbed,  to  be 
sold  into  slavery,  to  be  exposed  to  the  outrages 
of  gangs  of  foreign  banditti  calling  themselves 
patriots — these  are  evidently  evils  from  which 
men  of  every  religion  and  men  of  no  religion 
•wish  to  b"  "protected ;  and  therefore  it  will 
hardly  be  disputed  that  men  of  every  religion 
and  of  no  religion  have  thus  far  a  common 
interest  in  being  well  governed. 

But  the  hopes  and  fears  of  man  are  not 


limited  to  this  short  life  and  to  this  visible 
world.  He  finds  himself  surrounded  by  the 
signs  of  a  power  and  wisdom  higher  than  his 
own ;  and,  in  all  ages  and  nations,  men  of  all 
orders  of  intellect,  from  Bacon  and  Newton 
down  to  the  rudest  tribes  of  cannibals,  have 
believed  in  the  existence  of  some  superior 
mind.  Thus  far  the  voice  of  mankind  is  al 
most  unanimous.  But  whether  there  be  one 
God  or  many — what  may  be  his  natural  and 
what  his  moral  attributes — in  what  relation 
his  creatures  stand  to  him — whether  he  have 
ever  disclosed  himself  to  u«  by  any  other  reve 
lation  than  that  which  is  vritten  in  all  the 
parts  of  the  glorious  and  well-ordered  world 
which  he  has  made — whether  his  revelation 
be  contained  in  any  permanent  record — how 
that  record  should  be  interpreted,  and  whether 
it  have  pleased  him  to  appoint  any  unerring 
interpreter  on  earth— these  are  questions  re- 
spec;ing  which  there  exists  the  widest  diver 
sity  of  opinion,  and  respecting  which  the  great 
majority  of  our  race  has,  ever  since  the  dawn 
of  regular  history,  been  deplorably  in  error. 

Now  here  are  two  great  objects : — One  is  the 
protection  of  the  persons  and  estates  of  citi 
zens  from  injury ;  the  other  is  the  propagation 
of  religious  truth.  No  two  objects  more  en 
tirely  distinct  can  well  be  imagined.  The 
former  belongs  wholly  to  the  visible  and  tangi 
ble  world  in  which  we  live ;  the  latter  belongs 
to  that  higher  world  which  is  beyond  the  reach 
of  our  senses.  The  former  belongs  to  this 
life  ;  the  latter  to  that  which  is  to  come.  Men 
Mrho  are  perfectly  agreed  as  to  the  importance 
of  the  former  object,  and  as  to  the  way  of  at 
taining  it,  differ  as  widely  as  possible  respect 
ing  the  latter  object.  We  must  therefore  pause 
before  we  admit  that  the  persons,  be  they  Avho 
they  may,  who  are  intrusted  with  power  for 
the  promotion  of  the  former  object,  ought  al 
ways  to  use  that  power  for  the  promotion  of 
the  latter  object. 

Mr.  Gladstone  conceives  that  the  duties  of 
governments  are  paternal ; — a  doctrine  which 
we  will  not  believe  till  he  can  show  us  some 
government  which  loves  its  subjects  as  a  fa 
ther  loves  a  child,  and  which  is  as  superior  in 
intelligence  to  its  subjects  as  a  father  is  supe 
rior  to  a  child.  He  tells  us,  in  lofty,  though 
somewhat  indistinct  language,  that  "Govern 
ment  occupies  in  moral  the  place  of  TJ  ^r*v  in 
physical  science."  If  government  be  indeed 
TO  TTAV  in  moral  science,  we  do  not  understand 
why  rulers  should  not  assume  all  the  functions 
which  Plato  assigned  to  them.  Why  should 
they  not  lake  away  the  child  from  the  mother, 
select  the  nurse,  regulate  the  school,  overlook 
the  play-ground,  fix  the  hours  of  labour  and  of 
recreation,  prescribe  what  ballads  shall  be 
sung,  what  tunes  shall  be  played,  what  books 
shall  be  read,  what  physic  shall  be  swallowed ! 
— why  should  not  they  choose  our  wives,  limit 
our  expenses,  and  stint  us  to  a  certain  number 
of  dishes,  of  glasses  of  wine,  and  of  cups  of 
tea?  Plato,  whose  hardihood  in  speculation 
was  perhaps  more  wonderful  than  any  olner 
peculiarity  of  his  extraordinary  mind,  and  who 
shrank  from  nothing  to  which  his  principles 
led,  went  this  whole  length.  Mr.  Gladstone  is 
not  so  intrepid.  He  contents  himself  Av.th  lay- 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


381 


ing  down  this  proposition — that,  whatever  be  j 
the  body  which  in  any  community  is  employed 
to  protect  the  persons  and  property  of  men, 
that  body  ought  also,  in  its  corporate  capacity, 
to  profess  a  religion,  to  employ  its  power  for 
the  propagation  of  that  religion,  and  to  require 
conformity  to  that  religion,  as  an  indispensable  j 
qualification  for  all  civil  office.  He  distinctly 
declares  that  he  does  not  in  this  proposition 
confine  his  view  to  orthodox  governments,  or 
even  to  Christian  governments.  The  circum 
stance  that  a  religion  is  false  does  not,  he  tells 
us,  diminish  the  obligation  of  governors,  as 
such,  to  uphold  it.  If  they  neglect  to  do  so, 
«we  cannot,"  he  says,  "but  regard  the  fact  as 
aggravating  the  case  of  the  holders  of  such 
creed."  "  I  do  not  scruple  to  affirm,"  he  adds, 
"that  if  a  Mohammedan  conscientiously  be 
lieves  his  religion  to  come  from  God,  and  to 
teach  divine  truth,  he  must  believe  that  truth  to 
be  beneficial,  and  beneficial  beyond  all  other 
things  to  the  soul  of  man  ;  and  he  must,  there 
fore,  and  ought  to  desire  its  extension,  and  to 
use  for  its  extension  all  proper  and  legitimate 
means;  and  that,  if  such  Mohammedan  be  a 
prince,  he  ought  to  count  among  those  means 
the  application  of  whatever  influence  or  funds 
he  may  lawfully  have  at  his  disposal  for  such 
purposes." 

Surely  this  is  a  hard  saying.  Before  we  ad 
mit  that  the  Emperor  Julian,  in  employing  his 
power  for  the  extinction  of  Christianity,  was 
doing  no  more  than  his  duty — before  we  admit 
that  the  Arian,  Theodoric,  would  have  com 
mitted  a  crime  if  he  had  suffered  a  single  be 
liever  in  the  divinity  of  Christ  to  hold  any  civil 
employment  in  Italy — before  we  admit  that  the 
Dutch  government  is  bound  to  exclude  from 
office  all  members  of  the  Church  of  England ; 
the  King  of  Bavaria  to  exclude  from  office  all 
Protestants ;  the  Great  Turk  to  exclude  from 
office  all  Christians;  the  King  of  Ava  to  ex 
clude  from  office  all  who  hold  the  unity  of 
God — we  think  oiirselves  entitled  to  demand 
very  full  and  accurate  demonstration.  When 
the  consequences  of  a  doctrine  are  so  startling, 
we  may  well  require  that  its  foundations  shall 
be  very  solid. 

The  following  paragraph  is  a  specimen  of 
the  arguments  by  which  Mr.  Gladstone  has,  as 
he  conceives,  established  his  great  fundamen 
tal  proposition : 

"We  may  state  the  same  proposition  in  a 
more  general  form,  in  which  it  surely  must 
command  universal  assent.  Wherever  there 
is  power  in  the  universe,  that  power  is  the 
property  of  God,  the  King  of  that  universe — 
his  property  of  right,  however  for  a  time  with- 
holden  or  abused.  Now  this  property  is,  as  i 
were,  realized,  is  used  according  to  the  will  of 
the  owner,  when  it  is  used  for  the  purposes  he 
has  ordained,  and  in  the  temper  of  mercy,  jus 
tice,  truth,  and  faith,  which  he  has  taught  us 
But  those  principles  never  can  be  truly,  never 
can  be  permanently,  entertained  in  the  human 
breast,  except  by  a  continual  reference  to  their 
source,  and  the  supply  of  the  divine  grace 
The  powers,  therefore,  that  dwell  in  individu 
als  acting  as  a  government,  as  well  as  those 
that  dwell  in  individuals  acting  for  themselves, 


can  only  be  secured  for  right  uses  by  applying 


Here  are  propositions  of  vast  and  indefinite 
extent,  conveyed  in  language  which  has  a  cer 
tain  obscure  dignity  and  sanctity, — attractive, 
we  doubt  not,  to  many  minds.  But  the  mo 
ment  that  we  examine  these  propositions 
closely, — the  moment  that  we  bring  them  to 
the  test  by  running  over  but  a  very  few  of  the 
particulars  which  are  included  in  them,  we 
find  them  to  be  false  and  extravagant.  This 
doctrine  which  "must  surely  command  uni 
versal  assent"  is,  that  every  association  of 
human  beings,  which  exercises  any  power 
whatever, — that  is  to  say,  every  association 
of  human  beings, — is  bound,  as  such  associa 
tion,  to  profess  a  religion.  Imagine  the  effect 
which  would  follow  if  this  principle  were 
really  in  force  during  four-and-twenty  hours. 
Take  one  instance  out  of  a  million : — A  stage 
coach  company  has  power  over  its  horses. 
This  power  is  the  property  of  God.  It  is  used 
according  to  the  will  of  God  \vhen  it  is  used 
with  mercy.  But  the  principle  of  mercy  can 
never  be  truly  or  permanently  entertained  in 
the  human  breast  without  continual  reference 
to  God.  The  powers,  therefore,  that  dwell  in 
individuals  acting  as  a  stage-coach  company, 
can  only  be  secured  for  right  uses  by  applying 
to  them  a  religion.  Every  stage-coach  cnrn- 
pany  ought,  therefore,  in  its  collective  capacity, 
to  profess  some  one  faith — to  have  its  articles, 
and  its  public  worship,  and  its  tests.  That  this 
conclusion,  and  an  infinite  number  of  conclu 
sions  equally  strange,  follow  of  necessity  from 
Mr.  Gladstone's  principle,  is  as  certain  as  it  is 
that  two  and  two  make  four.  And  if  the  legiti 
mate  conclusions  be  so  absurd,  there  must  be 
something  unsound  in  the  principle. 

We  will  quote  another  passage  of  the  same 
sort : — 

"  Why,  then,  we  now  come  to  ask,  should 
the  governing  body  in  a  state  profess  a  religion] 
Fa-st,  because  it  is  composed  of  individual 
men;  and  they,  being  appointed  to  act  in  a  defi 
nite  moral  capacity,  must  sanctify  their  acts 
done  in  that  capacity  by  the  offices  of  religion; 
inasmuch  as  the  acts  cannot  otherwise  be  ac 
ceptable  to  God,  or  any  thing  but  sinful  and 
punishable  in  themselves.  And  whenever  we 
turn  our  face  away  from  God  in  our  conduct, 
we  are  living  atheis.ically In  fulfil 
ment,  then,  of  his  obligations  as  an  individual, 
the  statesman  must  be  a  worshipping  man. 
But  his  acts  are  public — the  powers  and  in 
struments  with  which  he  works  are  public- 
acting  under  and  by  the  authority  of  the  law, 
he  moves  at  his  word  ten  thousand  subject 
arms  ;  and  because  such  energies  are  thus  es 
sentially  public,  and  wholly  out  of  the  range 
of  mere  individual  agency,  they  must  be  sanc 
tified  not  only  by  the  private  personal  prayers 
and  piety  of  those  who  fill  public  situations, 
but  also  by  public  acts  of  the  men  composing 
the  public  body.  They  must  offer  prayer  and 
praise  in  their  public  and  collective  character 
— in  that  character  wherein  they  constitute  the 
organ  of  the  nation,  and  wield  its  collected 
force.  Whenever  there  is  a  reasoning  agency 


382 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


there  is  a  moral  duty  and  responsibility  in 
volved  in  it  The  governors  are  reasoning 
agents  for  tne  nation,  in  their  conjoint  acts  as 
such.  And  therefore  there  must  be  attached  to 
this  agency,  as  that  without  which  none  of  our 
responsibilities  can  be  met,  a  religion.  And 
this  religion  must  be  that  of  the  conscience  of 
the  governor,  or  none." 

Here  again  we  find  propositions  of  immense 
extent,  and  of  sound  so  orthodox  and  solemn, 
that  many  good  people,  we  doubt  not,  have 
been  greatly  edified  by  it.  But  let  us  examine 
the  words  closely,  and  it  will  immediately  be 
come  plain,  that  if  these  principles  be  once  ad 
mitted,  there  is  an  end  of  all  society.  No  com 
bination  can  be  formed  for  any  purpose  of 
mutual  help, — for  trade,  for  public  works,  for 
the  relief  of  the  sick  or  the  poor,  for  the  promo 
tion  of  art  or  science,  unless  the  members  of 
the  combination  agree  in  their  theological 
opinions.  Take  any  such  combination  at  ran 
dom—the  London  and  Birmingham  Railway 
Company,  for  example — and  observe  to  what 
consequences  Mr.  Gladstone's  arguments  in 
evitably  lead.  "  Why  should  the  Directors  of 
the  Railway  Company,  in  their  collective  ca 
pacity,  profess  a  religion  1  First,  because  the 
direction  is  composed  of  individual  men  ap 
pointed  to  act  in  a  definite  moral  capacity — 
bound  to  look  carefully  to  the  property,  the 
limbs,  and  the  lives  of  their  fellow  creatures — 
bound  to  act  diligently  for  their  constituents — 
bound  to  govern  their  servants  with  humanity 
and  justice — bound  to  fulfil  with  fidelity  many 
important  contracts.  They  must,  therefore, 
sanctify  their  acts  by  the  offices  of  religion,  or 
these  acts  will  be  sinful  and  punishable  in 
themselves.  In  fulfilment,  then,  of  his  obliga 
tions  as  an  individual,  the  Director  of  the  Lon 
don  and  Birmingham  Railway  Company  must 
be  aworshipping  man.  But  his  acts  are  public. 
He  acts  for  a  body.  He  moves  at  his  word  ten 
thousand  subject  arms.  And  because  these 
energies  are  out  of  the  range  of  his  mere  indi 
vidual  agency,  they  must  be  sanctified  by  pub 
lic  acts  of  devotion.  The  Railwav  Directors 
must  offer  prayer  and  praise  in  their  public 
and  collective  character,  in  that  character 
wherewith  they  constitute  the  organ  of  the 
Company,  and  wield  its  collected  power. 
Wherever  there  is  reasoning  agency,  there  is 
moral  responsibility.  The  Directors  are  rea 
soning  agents  for  the  Company.  And  there 
fore  there  must  be  attached  to  this  agency,  as 
that  without  which  none  of  our  responsibilities 
can  be  met — a  religion.  And  this  religion 
must  be  that  of  the  conscience  of  the  Director 
himself,  or  none.  There  must  be  public  wor 
ship  and  a  test.  No  Jew,  no  Socinian,  no 
Presbyterian,  no  Catholic,  no  Quaker,  must  be 
permitted  to  be  the  organ  of  the  Company,  and 
to  wield  its  collected  force."  Would  Mr.  Glad 
stone  really  defend  this  proposition  1  We  are 
sure  that  he  would  not;  but  we  are  sure  that 
to  this  proposition,  and  to  innumerable  similar 
propositions,  his  reasoning  inevitably  leads. 

Again,— 

"  National  will  and  agency  are  indisputably 
one,  binding  either  a  dissentient  minority  of  the 
subject  body,  in  a  manner  that  nothing  but  the 


recognition  of  the  doctrine  of  national  person 
ality  can  justify.  National  honour  and  good 
faith  are  words  in  every  one's  mouth.  How 
do  they  less  imply  a  personality  in  nations 
than  the  duty  towards  God,  for  which  we  now 
contend?  They  are  strictly  and  essentially 
distinct  from  the  honour  and  good  faith  of  the 
individuals  composing  the  nation.  France  is 
a  person  to  us,  and  we  to  her.  A  wilful  injury 
done  to  her  is  a  moral  act,  and  a  moral  act 
quite  distinct  from  the  acts  of  all  the  individu 
als  composing  the  nation.  Upon  broad  facts 
like  these  we  may  rest,  without  resorting  to  the 
more  technical  proof  which  the  laws  afford  in 
their  manner  of  dealing  with  corporations.  If, 
then,  a  nation  have  unity  of  will,  have  pervad 
ing  sympathies,  have  the  capability  of  reward 
and  suffering  contingent  upon  its  acts,  shall 
we  deny  its  responsibility  ;  its  need  of  religion 

to  meet  that  responsibility  1 A  nation, 

then,  having  a  personality,  lies  under  the  obli 
gation,  like  the  individuals  composing  its  go 
verning  body,  of  sanctifying  the  acts  of  that 
personality  by  the  offices  of  religion,  and  thus 
we  have  a  new  and  imperative  ground  for  the 
existence  of  a  state  religion." 

A  new  ground,  certainly,  but  whether  very 
imperative  may  be  doubted.  Is  it  not  perfectly 
clear,  that  this  argument  applies  with  exactly 
as  much  force  to  every  combination  of  human 
beings  for  a  common  purpose,  as  to  govern 
ments  1  Is  there  any  such  combination  in  the 
world,  whether  technically  a  corporation  or  not, 
which  has  not  this  collective  personality  from 
which  Mr.  Gladstone  deduces  such  extraordi 
nary  consequences  1  Look  at  banks,  insurance 
offices,  dock  companies,  canal  companies, 
gas  companies,  hospitals,  dispensaries,  asso 
ciations  for  the  relief  of  the  poor,  associations 
for  apprehending  malefactors,  associations  of 
medical  pupils  for  procuring  subjects,  associa 
tions  of  country  gentlemen  for  keeping  fox 
hounds,  book  societies,  benefit  societies,  clubs 
of  all  ranks,  from  those  which  have  lined  Pall- 
Mail  and  St.  James's  Street  with  their  palaces, 
down  to  the  "  Free-and-easy"  which  meets  in 
the  shabby  parlour  of  a  village  inn.  Is  there 
a  single  one  of  these  combinations  to  which 
Mr.  Gladstone's  argument  will  not  apply  as 
well  as  to  the  State?  In  all  these  combina 
tions — in  the  Bank  of  England,  for  example, 
or  in  the  Athenceum  Club — the  will  and  agency 
of  the  society  are  one,  and  bind  the  dissentient 
minority.  The  Bank  and  the  Athenaeum  have 
a  good  faith  and  a  justice  different  from  the 
good  faith  and  justice  of  the  individual  mem 
bers.  The  Bank  is  a  person  to  those  who 
deposit  bullion  with  it.  The  Athenaeum  is  a 
person  to  the  butcher  and  the  wine-merchant. 
If  the  Athenneum  keeps  money  at  the  Bank, 
the  two  societies  are  as  much  persons  to  each 
other  as  England  and  France.  Either  society 
may  increase  in  prosperity;  either  may  fall 
into  difficulties.  If,  then,  they  have  this  unity 
of  will ;  if  they  are  capable  of  doing  and  suffer 
ing  good  and  evil,  can  we,  to  use  Mr.  Glad 
stone's  words,  "deny  their  responsibility,  or 
their  need  of  a  religion  to  meet  that  responsi 
bility  1"  Joint-stock  banks,  therefore,  and 
clubs,  "  having  a  personality,  lie  under  the  no 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


333 


cessity  of  sanctifying  that  personality,  by  the  j  It  will  hardly  be  denied  that  the  security  of 
offices  of  religion";"  and  thus  we  have  "  a  new  j  the  persons  and  property  of  men  is  a  good  ob- 
and  imperative  ground"  for  requiring  all  the  j  ject,  and  that  the  best  way,  indeed  the  only  way, 
directors  and  clerks  of  joint-stock  banks,  and  of  promoting  that  object  is  to  combine  men 


together  in  certain  great  corporations — which 
are  called  states.  These  corporations  are  very 
variously,  and,  for  the  most  part,  very  imperfect- 


all  the  officers  of  clubs,  to  qualify  by  taking  the 
sacrament. 

The  truth  is,  that  Mr.  Gladstone  has  fallen 

into  an  error  very  common  among  men  of  less  |  ly  organized.  Many  of  them  abound  with  fright- 
talents  than  his  own.  It  is  not  unusual  for  a  j  ful  abuses.  But  it  seems  reasonable  to  believe 
person  who  is  eager  to  prove  a  particular  pro- 1  that  the  worst  that  ever  existed  was,  on  the 

'     whole,  preferable  to  complete  anarchy. 

Now,  reasoning  from  analogy,  we  should 


position,  to  assume  a  major  of  huge  extent, 
which  includes  that  particular  proposition, 
without  ever  reflecting  that  it  includes  a  great 
deal  more.  The  fatal  facility  with  which  Mr. 
Gladstone  multiplies  expressions  stately  and 
sonorous,  but  of  indeterminate  meaning,  emi 
nently  qualifies  him  to  practise  this  sleight  on 
himself  and  on  his  readers.  He  lays  down 
broad  general  doctrines  about  power,  when  the 
only  power  of  which  he  is  thinking  is  the  power 
of  governments, — about  conjoint  action,  when 
the  only  conjoint  action  of  which  he  is  think 
ing  is  the  conjoint  action  of  citizens  in  a  state. 
He  first  resolves  on  his  conclusion.  He  then 
makes  a  major  of  most  comprehensive  dimen 
sions;  and,  having  satisfied  himself  that  it  con 
tains  his  conclusion,  never  troubles  himself 
about  what  else  it  may  contain.  And  as  soon 
as  we  examine  it,  we  find  that  it  contains  an 
infinite  number  of  conclusions,  every  one  of 
which  is  a  monstrous  absurdity. 

It  is  perfectly  true,  that  it  would  be  a  very 
good  thing  if  all  the  members  of  all  the  asso 
ciations  in  the  world  were  men  of  sound  reli 
gious  views.  We  have  no  doubt  that  a  good 
Christian  will  be  under  the  guidance  of  Chris 
tian  principles,  in  his  conduct  as  director  of  a 
canal  company  or  steward  of  a  charity  dinner. 
If  he  were — to  recur  to  a  case  which  we  before 
put— a  member  of  a  stage-coach  company,  he 
would,  in  that  capacity,  remember  that  "a  right 
eous  man  regardeth  the  life  of  his  beast."  But  it 
does  not  follow  that  every  association  of  men 
must,  therefore,  as  such  association,  profess  a  re 
ligion.  It  is  evident  that  many  great  and  useful 
objects  can  be  attained  in  this  world  only  by 
co-operation.  It  is  equally  evident  that  there 
cannot  be  efficient  co-operation,  if  men  proceed 
on  the  principle  that  they  must  not  co-operate 
for  one  object  unless  they  agree  about  other  ob 
jects.  Nothing  seems  to  us  more  beautiful  or 
admirable  in  our  social  system,  than  the  faci 
lity  with  which  thousands  of  people,  who  per 
haps  agree  only  on  a  single  point,  combine 
their  energies  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  that 
single  point.  We  see  daily  instances  of  this. 
Two  men,  one  of  them  obstinately  prejudiced 
against  missions,  the  other  president  of  a  mis 
sionary  society,  sit  together  at  the  board  of  an 
hospital,  and  heartily  concur  in  measures  for 
the  health  and  comfort  of  the  patients.  Two 
men,  one  of  whom  is  a  zealous  supporter  and 
the  other  a  zealous  opponent  of  the  system  pur 
sued  in  Lancaster's  schools,  meet  at  the  Men 
dicity  Society,  and  act  together  with  the  utmost 
cordiality.  The  general  rule  we  take  to  be  un 
doubtedly  this,  that  it  is  lawful  and  expedient 
for  men  to  unite  in  an  association  for  the  pro 
motion  of  a  good  object,  though  they  may 
differ  with  respect  to  other  objects  of  a  still 
higuer  importance. 


say  that  these  great  corporations  would,  like 
all  other  associations,  be  likely  to  attain  their 
end  most  perfectly  if  that  end  were  kept,  singly 
in  view;  and  that  to  refuse  the  services  of 
those  who  are  admirably  qualified  to  promote 
that  end,  because  they  are  not  also  qualified  to 
promote  some  other  end,  however  excellent, 
seems  at  first  sight  as  unreasonable  as  it  would 
be  to  provide,  that  nobody  who  was  not  a  fellow 
of  the  Antiquarian  Society  should  be  a  go 
vernor  of  the  Eye  Infirmary ;  or  that  nobody 
who  was  not  a  member  of  the  Society  for  pro 
moting  Christianity  among  the  Jews  should  be 
a  trustee  of  the  Theatrical  Fund. 

It  is  impossible  to  name  any  collection  of  hu 
man  beings  to  which  Mr.  Gladstone's  reasonings 
would  apply  more  strongly  than  to  an  army. 
Where  shall  we  find  more  complete  unity  of 
action  than  in  an  armyl  Where  else  do  so 
many  human  beings  implicitly  obey  one  ruling 
mind?  What  other  mass  is  there  which  moves 
so  much  like  one  man?  Where  is  such  tre 
mendous  power  intrusted  to  those  who  com 
mand  ?  Where  is  so  awful  a  responsibility 
laid  upon  them  ?  If  Mr.  Gladstone  has  made 
out,  as  he  conceives,  an  imperative  necessity 
for  a  state  religion,  much  more  has  he  made 
it  out  to  be  imperatively  necessary  that  every 
army  should,  in  its  collective  capacity,  profess  a 
religion.  Is  he  prepared  to  adopt  this  conse 
quence  ? 

On  the  morning  of  the  13th  of  August,  in 
the  year  1704,  two  great  captains,  equal  in  au 
thority,  united  by  close  private  and  public  ties, 
but  of  different  creeds,  prepared  for  a  battle, 
on  the  event  of  which  were  staked  the  liberties 
of  Europe.  Marlborough  had  passed  a  part 
of  the  night  in  prayer,  and  before  daybreak 
received  the  sacrament  according  to  the  rites 
of  the  Church  of  England.  He  then  Las- 
tened  to  join  Eugene,  who  had  probably  just 
confessed  himself  to  a  Popish  priest.  The 
generals  consulted  together,  formed  their  plan 
in  concert,  and  repaired  each  to  his  own  post. 
Marlborough  gave  orders  for  public  prayers. 
The  English  chaplains  read  the  service  at 
the  head  of  the  English  regiments.  The 
Calvinistic  chaplains  of  the  Dutch  army, 
with  heads  on  which  hand  of  bishop  had 
never  been  laid,  poured  forth  their  supplica 
tions  in  front  of  their  countrymen.  In  the 
mean  time  the  Danes  would  listen  to  their  Lu 
theran  ministers ;  and  Capuchins  mignt  en 
courage  the  Austrian  squadrons,  and  pray  to 
the  Virgin  for  a  blessing  on  the  arms  of  the 
Holy  Roman  Empire.  The  battle  commences, 
and  these  men  of  various  religions  all  act  like 
members  of  one  body.  The  Catholic  and  the 
Protestant  generals  exert  themselves  to 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  to  surpass  each  other.  Before  sunset  the 
Empire  is  saved.  France  has  lost  in  a  day 
the  fruits  of  eighty  years  of  intrigue  and  of 
victory.  And  the  allies,  after  conquering  toge 
ther,  return  thanks  to  God  separately,  each  af 
ter  his  own  form  of  worship.  Now,  is  this 
practical  atheism?  Would  any  man  in  his 
senses  say,  that,  because  the  allied  army  had 
unity  of  action  and  a  common  interest,  and 
because  a  heavy  responsibility  lay  on  its 
chiefs,  it  was  therefore  imperatively  necessary 
that  the  army  should,  as  an  army,  have  one 
established  religion — that  Eugene  should  be 
deprived  of  his  command  for  being  a  Catholic 
—that  all  the  Dutch  and  Austrian  colonels 
should  be  broken  for  not  subscribing  the  Thir 
ty-nine  Articles  ?  Certainly  not — the  most  ig 
norant  grenadier  on  the  field  of  battle  would 
have  seen  the  absurdity  of  such  a  proposition. 
"I  know,"  he  would  have  said,  "  that  the  Prince 
of  Savoy  goes  to  mass,  and  that  our  Corporal 
John  cannot  abide  it;  but  what  has  the  mass  to 
do  with  taking  the  village  of  Blenheim'?  The 
prince  wants  to  beat  the  French,  and  so  does 
Corporal  John.  If  we  stand  by  each  other,  we 
shall  most  likely  beat  them.  If  we  send  ?11 
the  Papists  and  Dutch  away,  Tallard  will  have 
every  man  of  us."  Mr.  Gladstone  himself,  we 
imagine,  would  admit  that  our  honest  grenadier 
had  the  best  oi'  the  argument ;  and  if  so,  what 
fellows  ?  Even  this  :  that  all  Mr.  Gladstone's 
general  principles  about  power,  and  responsi 
bility,  and  personality,  and  conjoint  action, 
must  be  given  up ;  and  that,  if  his  theory  is  to 
stand  at  all,  it  must  stand  on  some  other  foun 
dation. 

We  have  now,  we  conceive,  shown  that  it 
may  be  proper  to  form  men  into  combinations 
for  important  purposes,  which  combinations 
shall  have  unity  and  common  interests,  and 
shall  be  under  the  direction  of  rulers  intrusted 
with  great  powor  and  lying  under  solemn  re 
sponsibility  ;  and  yet  that  it  may  be  highly  im 
proper  that  these  combinations  should,  as  such, 
profess  any  one  system  of  religious  belief,  or 
perform  any  joint  act  of  religious  worship. 
How,  then,  is  it  proved  that  this  may  not  be  the 
case  with  some  of  those  great  combinations 
which  we  call  States  ?  We  firmly  believe  that 
it  is  the  case  with  some  states.  We  firmly 
believe  that  there  are  communities  in  which 
it  would  be  as  absurd  to  mix  up  theology  with 
government,  as  it  would  have  been  in  the 
right  wing  of  the  allied  army  at  Blenheim  to 
commence  a  controversy  with  the  left  wing,  in 
the  middle  of  the  battle,  about  purgatory  and 
the  worship  of  images. 

It  is  the  duty,  Mr.  Gladstone  tells  us,  of  the 
persons,  be  they  who  they  may,  who  hold  su 
preme  power  in  the  state,  to  employ  that 
power  in  order  to  promote  whatever  they  may 
deem  to  be  theological  truth.  Now,  surely,  be 
fore  he  can  call  on  us  t«j  admit  this  proposition, 
h^  is  bound  to  prove  that  these  persons  are 
likelj  to  do  more  good  than  harm  by  so  em 
ploying  Aeir  po\ver.  The  first  question  is, 
whether  a  government,  proposing  to  itself  the 
propagation  of  religious  truth,  as  one  of  its 
principal  ends,  is  more  likely  to  lead  the  peo 
ple  right  than  to  lead  them  wrong?  Mr. Glad 


stone  evades  this  question,  and  perhaps  it  was 
his  wisest  course  to  do  so. 

"If,"  says  he,  "the  government  be  good,  let 
it  have  its  natural  duties  and  powers  at  its 
command ;  but,  if  not  good,  let  it  be  made  so. 

We  follow,  therefore,  the  true  course 

in  looking  first  for  the  true  <JW,  or  abstract  con 
ception  of  a  government,  of  course  with  allow 
ance  for  the  evil  and  frailty  that  are  in  man, 
and  then  in  examining  whether  there  be  com 
prised  in  that  ih*  a  capacity  and  consequent 
duty  on  the  part  of  a  government  to  lay  down 
any  laws,  or  devote  any  means  for  the  pur 
poses  of  religion, — in  short,  to  exercise  a 
choice  upon  religion." 

Of  course,  Mr.  Gladstone  has  a  perfect  right 
to  argue  any  abstract  question ;  provided  that 
he  will  constantly  bear  in  mind  that  it  is  only 
an  abstract  question  that  he  is  arguing.  Whe 
ther  a  perfect  government  would  or  would  not 
be  a  good  machinery  for  the  propagation  of 
religious  truth,  is  certainly  a  harmless,  and 
may,  for  aught  we  know,  be  an  edifying  sub 
ject  of  inquiry.  But  it  is  very  important  that 
we  should  remember,  that  there  is  not,  and 
never  has  been,  any  such  government  in  the 
world.  There  is  no  harm  at  all  in  inquiring 
what  course  a  stone  thrown  into  the  air  would 
take,  if  the  law  of  gravitation  did  not  operate, 
But  the  consequences  would  be  unpleasant,  if 
the  inquirer,  as  soon  as  he  had  finished  his 
calculation,  were  to  begin  to  throw  stones  about 
in  all  directions,  without  considering  that  his 
conclusion  rests  on  a  false  hypothesis ;  and 
that  his  projectiles,  instead  of  flying  away 
through  infinite  space,  will  speedily  return  in 
parabolas,  and  break  the  windows  and  heads 
of  his  neighbours. 

It  is  very  easy  to  say  that  governments  are 
good,  or,  if  not  good,  ought  to  be  made  so.  But 
what  is  meant  by  good  government  ?  And  how 
are  all  the  bad  governments  in  the  world  to  be 
made  good?  And  of  what  value  is  a  theory 
which  is  true  only  on  a  supposition  in  the 
highest  degree  extravagant? 

We  do  not  admit  that,  if  a  government  were, 
for  all  its  temporal  ends,  as  perfect  as  human 
frailty  allows,  such  government  would,  there 
fore,  be  necessarily  qualified  to  propagate  true 
religion.  For  we  see  that  the  fitness  of  govern 
ments  to  propagate  true  religion  is  by  no  means 
proportioned  to  their  fitness  for  the  temporal 
ends  of  their  institution.  Looking  at  indivi 
duals,  we  see  that  the  princes  under  whose 
rule  nations  have  been  most  ably  protected 
from  foreign  and  domestic  disturbance,  and 
have  made  the  most  rapid  advances  in  civiliza 
tion,  have  been  by  no  means  good  teachers  of 
divinity.  Take,  for  example,  the  best  French 
sovereign, — Henry  the  Fourth,  a  king  who  re 
stored  order,  terminated  a  terrible  civil  war 
brought  the  finances  into  an  excellent  condi 
tion,  made  his  country  respected  throughout 
Europe,  and  endeared  himself  to  the  great  bod* 
of  the  people  whom  he  ruled.  Yet  this  man 
was  twice  a  Huguenot,  and  twice  a  Papist. 
He  was,  as  Davila  hints,  strongly  suspected  of 
having  no  religion  at  all  in  theory;  and  was 
certainly  not  much  under  religious  restraints 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


385 


in  his  practice.  Take  the  Czar  Peter, — the 
Empress  Catharine, — Frederick  the  Great.  It 
will  surely  not  be  disputed  that  these  sove 
reigns,  with  all  their  faults,  were,  if  we  con 
sider  them  with  reference  merely  to  the  tempo 
ral  ends  of  government,  far  above  the  average 
of  merit.  Considered  as  theological  guides, 
Mr.  Gladstone  would  probably  put  them  below 
the  most  abject  drivellers  of  the  Spanish 
branch  of  the  house  of  Bourbon.  Again,  when 
we  pass  from  individuals  to  systems,  we  by  no 
means  find  that  the  aptitude  of  governments  for 
propagating  religious  trutli  is  proportioned  to 
their  aptitude  for  secular  functions.  Without 
being  blind  admirers  either  of  the  French  or 
of  American  institutions,  we  think  it  clear  that 
the  persons  and  property  of  citizens  are  better 
protected  in  France  and  in  New  England,  than 
in  almost  any  society  that  now  exists,  or  that 
has  ever  existed, — very  much  better,  certainly, 
than  under  the  orthodox  rule  of  Constantine  or 
Theodosius.  But  neither  the  government  of 
France  nor  that  of  New  England  is  so  organized 
as  to  be  fit  for  the  propagation  of  theological 
doctrines.  Nor  do  we  think  it  improbable, 
that  the  most  serious  religious  errors  might 
prevail  in  a  state,  which,  considered  merely 
with  reference  to  temporal  objects,  might  ap 
proach  far  nearer  than  any  that  has  ever  been 
known  to  the  di*.  of  what  a  state  should  be. 

But  we  shall  leave  this  abstract  question, 
and  look  at  the  world  as  we  find  it.  Does, 
then,  the  way  in  which  governments  generally 
obtain  their  power,  make  it  at  all  probable  that 
they  will  be  more  favourable  to  orthodoxy  than 
to  heterodoxy  ?  A  nation  of  barbarians  pours 
down  on  a  rich  and  un warlike  empire,  enslaves 
the  people,  portions  out  the  land,  and  blends 
the  institutions  which  it  finds  in  the  cities  with 
those  which  it  has  brought  from  the  woods.  A 
handful  of  daring  adventurers  from  a  civilized 
nation,  wander  to  some  savage  country,  and 
reduce  the  aboriginal  race  to  bondage.  A  suc 
cessful  general  turns  his  arms  against  the 
state  which  he  serves.  A  society  made  brutal 
by  oppression,  rises  madly  on  its  masters, 
sweeps  away  all  old  laws  and  usages,  and, 
when  its  first  paroxysm  of  rage  is  over,  sinks 
down  passively  under  any  form  of  polity  which 
may  spring  out  of  the  chaos.  A  chief  of  a 
party,  as  at  Florence,  becomes  imperceptibly 
a  sovereign  and  the  founder  of  a  dynasty.  A 
captain  of  mercenaries,  as  at  Milan,  seizes  on 
a  city,  and  by  the  sword  makes  himself  its 
ruler.  An  elective  senate,  as  at  Venice,  usurps 
permanent  and  hereditary  power.  It  is  in  events 
such  as  these  that  governments  have  generally 
origi  lated ;  and  \ve  can  see  nothing  in  such 
even.s  to  warrant  us  in  believing  that  the  go 
vernments  thus  called  into  existence  will  be 
peculiarly  well  fitted  to  distinguish  between  re 
ligious  truth  and  heresy. 

When,  again,  we  look  at  the  constitutions  of 
governments  which  have  become  settled,  we 
find  no  great  security  for  the  orthodoxy  of 
rulers.  One  magistrate  holds  power  because 
his  name  was  drawn  out  of  a  purse  ;  another, 
because  his  father  held  it  before  him.  There 
are  representative  systems  of  all  sorts, — large 
constituent  bodies,  small  constituent  bodies, 
universal  suffrage,  high  pecuniary  qualifica- 

VOL.  III.— 49 


\  tions.    We  see  that,  for  the  temporal  ends  of 

I  government,  some  of  these  constitutions  are 

!  very  skilfully  constructed,  and  that  the  very 

worst  of  them  is  preferable  to  anarchy.     But 

it  passes  our  understanding  to   comprehend 

what  connection  any  one  of  them  has  with 

theological  truth. 

And  how  stands  the  fact  1  Have  not  almost 
all  the  governments  in  the  world  always  been 
in  the  wrong  on  religious  subjects  1  Mr.  Glad 
stone,  we  imagine,  would  say,  that,  except  in 
the  time  of  Constantine,  of  Jovian,  and  of  a 
very  few  of  their  successors,  and  occasionally 
in  England  since  the  Reformation,  no  govern 
ment  has  ever  been  sincerely  friendly  to  the 
pure  and  apostolical  Church  of  Christ.  If, 
therefore,  it  be  true  that  every  ruler  is  bound 
in  conscience  to  use  his  power  for  the  propa 
gation  of  his  own  religion,  it  will  follow,  that 
for  one  ruler  who  has  been  bound  in  conscience 
to  use  his  power  for  the  propagation  of  truth, 
a  thousand  have  been  bound  in  conscience  to 
use  their  power  for  the  propagation  of  false 
hood.  Surely  this  is  a  conclusion  from  which 
common  sense  recoils.  Surely,  if  experience 
shows  that  a  certain  machine,  when  used  to 
produce  a  certain  effect,  does  not  produce  that 
effect  once  in  a  thousand  times,  but  produces, 
in  the  vast  majority  of  cases,  an  effect  directly 
contrary  j  we  cannot  be  wrong  in  saying,  that  it 
is  not  a  machine  of  which  the  principal  end  is 
to  be  so  used. 

If,  indeed,  the  magistrate  would  content  him 
self  with  laying  his  opinions  and  reasons  before 
the  people,  and  would  leave  the  people,  uncor- 
rupted  by  hope  or  fear,  to  judge  for  themselves, 
we  should  see  little  reason  to  apprehend  that 
his  interference  in  favour  of  error  would  be 
seriously  prejudicial  to  the  interests  of  truth. 
Nor  do  we,  as  will  hereafter  be  seen,  >bject  tot 
his  taking  this  course,  when  it  is  compatible 
with  the  efficient  discharge  of  his  more  espe 
cial  duties.  But  this  will  not  satisfy  Mr.  Glad 
stone.  He  would  have  the  magistrate  resort 
to  means  which  have  great  tendency  to  make 
malcontents,  to  make  hypocrites,  to  make  care 
less  nominal  conformists,  but  no  tendency 
whatever  to  produce  honest  and  rational  con 
viction.  It  seems  to  us  quite  clear  that  aa 
inquirer  who  has  no  wish,  except  to  know  the 
truth,  is  more  likely  to  arrive  at  the  truth  than? 
an  inquirer  who  knows  that,  if  he  decides  one 
way,  he  shall  be  rewarded,  and  that,  if  he  de 
cides  the  other  way,  he  shall  be  punished. 
Now,  Mr.  Gladstone  would  have  government* 
propagate  their  opinions  by  excluding  all  dis 
senters  from  all  civil  offices.  That  is  to  say, 
he  would  have  governments  propagate  their 
opinions  by  a  process  which  has  no  reference 
whatever  to  the  truth  or  falsehood  of  those^ 
opinions,  by  arbitrarily  uniting  certain  worldlv 
advantages  with  one  set  of  doctrines,  and  cer 
tain  worldly  inconveniences  with  another  sel 
j  It  is  of  the  very  nature  of  argument  to  serve 
j  the  interest  of  truth ;  but  if  rewards  and  pu 
i  nishments  serve  the  interest  of  truth,  it  is  by 
;  mere  accident.  It  is  very  much  easier  to  finJ 
I  arguments  for  the  Divine  authority  of  the  Gos 
pel  than  for  the  Divine  authority  of  the  Koran. 
But  it  is  just  as  easy  to  bribe  or  rack  a  Jew 
;  into  Mohammedanism  as  into  Christianity. 
2K 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


From  racks,  indeed,  and  from  all  penalties 
directed  against  the  persons,  the  property,  and 
the  liberty  of  heretics,  the  humane  spirit  of 
Mr.  Gladstone  shrinks  with  horror.  He  only 
maintains  that  conformity  to  the  religion  of 
the  state  ought  to  be  an  indispensable  qualifi 
cation  for  office;  and  he  would  think  it  his 
duty,  if  he  had  the  power,  to  revive  the  Test 
Act,  to  enforce  it  rigorously,  and  to  extend  it 
to  important  classes  who  were  formerly  exempt 
from  its  operation. 

This  is  indeed  a  legitimate  consequence  of 
his  principles.  But  why  stop  here  1  Why  not 
roast  Dissenters  at  slow  fires '?  All  the  general 
reasonings  on  which  this  theory  rests  evidently 
lead  to  a  sanguinary  persecution.  If  the  pro 
pagation  of  religious  truth  be  a  principal  end 
of  government,  as  government;  if  it  be  the 
duty  of  a  government  to  employ  for  that  end  its 
constitutional  power ;  if  the  constitutional 
power  of  governments  extends,  as  it  most  un 
questionably  does,  to  the  making  of  laws  for 
the  burning  of  heretics ;  if  burning  be,  as  it 
most  assuredly  is,  in  many  cases,  a  most  ef 
fectual  mode  of  suppressing  opinions — why 
should  we  not  burn?  If  the  relation  in  which 
government  ought  to  stand  to  the  people  be,  as 
Mr.  Gladstone  tells  us,  a  paternal  relation,  we 
are  irresistibly  led  to  the  conclusion  that  per 
secution  is  justifiable.  For  the  right  of  propa 
gating  opinions  by  punishment  is  one  which 
belongs  to  parents  as  clearly  as  the  right  to 
give  instruction.  A  boy  is  compelled  to  attend 
family  worship  ;  he  is  forbidden  to  read  irreli 
gious  books  ;  if  he  will  not  learn  his  catechism, 
he  is  sent  to  bed  without  his  supper;  if  he 
plays  truant  at  church-time,  a  task  is  set  him. 
If  he  should  display  the  precocity  of  his  talents 
by  expressing  impious  opinions  before  his 
brothers  and  sisters,  we  should  not  much  blame 
his  father  for  cutting  short  the  controversy 
with  a  horsewhip.  All  the  reasons  which  lead 
us  to  think  that  parents  are  peculiarly  fitted  to 
conduct  the  education  of  their  children,  and 
that  education  is  a  principal  end  of  the  parental 
relation,  lead  us  also  to  think,  that  parents 
ought  to  be  allowed  to  use  punishment,  if  ne 
cessary,  for  the  purpose  of  forcing  children, 
who  are  incapable  of  judging  for  themselves, 
to  receive  religious  instruction  and  to  attend 
religious  worship.  Why,  then,  is  this  preroga 
tive  of  punishment,  so  eminently  paternal,  to 
be  withheld  from  a  paternal  government]  It 
seems  to  us,  also,  to  be  the  height  of  absurdity 
to  employ  civil  disabilities  for  the  propagation 
of  an  opinion,  and  then  to  :  hrink  from  employ 
ing  other  punishments  for  the  same  purpose. 
For  nothing  can  be  clearer  than  that  if  you 
punish  at  all,  you  ought  to  punish  enough. 
The  pain  caused  by  punishment  is  pure  un 
mixed  evil,  and  never  ought  to  be  inflicted  ex 
cept  for  the  sake  of  some  good.  It  is  mere 
foolish  cruelty  to  provide  penalties  which  tor 
ment  the  criminal  without  preventing  the 
crime.  Now  it  is  possible,  by  sanguinary  per 
secution  unrelentingly  inflicted,  to  suppress 
opinions.  In  this  way  the  Albigenses  were  put 
down.  In  *his  way  the  Lollards  were  put 
down.  In  this  way  the  fair  promise  of  the  Re 
formation  was  blighted  in  Italy  and  Spain.  But 
VP  may  safely  defy  Mr.  Gladstone  to  point  out 


a  single  instance  in  which  the  system  which 
he  recommends  has  succeeded. 

And  why  should  he  be  so  tender-hearted  1 
What  reason  can  he  give  for  hanging  a  mur 
derer,  and  suffering  a  heresiarch  to  escape 
without  even  a  pecuniary  mulct  1  Is  the  here 
siarch  a  less  pernicious  member  of  society 
than  the  murderer!  Is  not  the  loss  of  one  soul 
a  greater  evil  than  the  extinction  of  many 
lives  1  And  the  number  of  murders  committed 
by  the  most  profligate  bravo  that  ever  let  out 
his  poniard  to  hire  in  Italy,  or  by  the  most  sa 
vage  buccanier  that  ever  prowled  on  the 
Windward  Station,  is  small  indeed,  when  com 
pared  with  the  number  of  souls  which  have 
been  caught  in  the  snares  of  one  dexterous 
heresiarch.  If,  then,  the  heresiarch  causes 
infinitely  greater  evils  than  the  murderer,  why 
is  he  not  as  proper  an  object  of  penal  legisla 
tion  as  the  murderer  ?  We  can  give  a  reason, 
— a  reason,  short,  simple,  decisive,  and  con 
sistent.  We  do  not  extenuate  the  evil  \vhich 
the  heresiarch  produces  ;  but  we  say  that  it  is 
not  evil  of  that  sort  against  which  it  is  the  end 
of  government  to  guard.  But  how  Mr.  Glad 
stone,  who  considers  the  evil  which  the  here 
siarch  produces  as  evil  of  the  sort  against 
which  it  is  the  end  of  government  to  guard,  can 
escape  from  the  obvious  consequences  of  his 
doctrine,  we  do  not  understand.  The  world  is 
full  of  parallel  cases.  An  orange-woman  stops, 
up  the  pavement  with  her  wheelbarrow,  and  a 
policeman  takes  her  into  custody.  A  miser 
who  has  amassed  a  million,  suffers  an  old 
friend  and  benefactor  to  die  in  a  workhouse, 
and  cannot  be  questioned  before  any  tribunal 
for  his  baseness  and  ingratitude.  Is  this  be 
cause  legislators  think  the  orange-woman's 
conduct  worse  than  the  miser's?  Not  at  all. 
It  is  because  the  stopping  up  of  the  pathway  is 
one  of  the  evils  against  which  it  is  the  busi 
ness  of  the  public  authorities  to  protect  so 
ciety,  and  heartlessness  is  not  one  of  those 
evils.  It  would  be  the  height  of  folly  to  say, 
that  the  miser  ought,  indeed,  to  be  punished, 
but  that  he  ought  to  be  punished  less  severely 
than  the  orange-woman. 

The  heretical  Constantius  persecutes  A  thana- 
sius;  and  why  not?  Shall  Coesar  execute  the 
robber  who  has  taken  one  purse,  and  spare  the 
wretch  who  has  taught  millions  to  rob  the 
Creator  of  his  honour,  and  lo  bestow  it  on  the 
creature  ?  The  orthodox  Theodosius  perse 
cutes  the  Arians,  and  with  equal  reason.  Shall 
an  insult  offered  to  the  Caesarean  majesty  be 
expiated  by  death,  and  shall  there  be  no  penalty 
for  him  who  degrades  to  the  rank  of  a  creature 
the  Almighty,  the  infinite  Creator?  We  have 
a  short  answer  for  both  :  "  To  Ccesar  the  things 
which  are  Caesar's.  Coesar  is  appointed  foi 
the  punishment  of  robbers  and  rebels.  He  is 
not  appointed  for  the  purpose  of  either  propa 
gating  or  exterminating  the  doctrine  of  consub 
stantiality  of  the  Father  and  the  Son."  "Nci 
so,"  says  Mr.  Gladstone.  "  Caesar  is  bound  in 
conscience  to  propagate  whatever  he  thinks  to 
be  the  truth  as  to  this  question.  Constantius  is 
bound  to  establish  the  Arian  worship  through 
out  the  empire,  and  to  displace  the  bravest 
captains  of  his  legions,  and  the  ablest  ministers 
of  his  Treasury,  if  they  hord  the  Nicene  faith. 


CHURCH  AND   STATE. 


387 


Theodosius  is  equally  bound  to  turn  out  every 
public  servant  whom  his  Arian  predecessors 
have  put  in.  But  if  Constantius  lays  on 
Athanasius  a  fine  of  a  single  aureus,  if  Theodo 
sius  imprisons  an  Arian  presbyter  for  a  week, 
'his  is  most  unjustifiable  oppression."  Our 
readers  will  be  curious  to  know  how  this  dis- 
.inction  is  made  out. 

The  reasons  which  Mr.  Gladstone  gives 
against  persecution  affecting  life,  limb,  and 
property,  may  be  divided  into  two  classes; 
first,  reasons  which  can  be  called  reasons  only 
by  extreme  courtesy,  and  which  nothing  but 
the  most  deplorable  necessity  would  ever  have 
induced  a  man  of  his  abilities  to  use;  and,  se 
condly,  reasons  which  are  really  reasons,  and 
which  have  so  much  force,  that  they  not  only 
completely  prove  his  exception,  but  completely 
upset  his  general  rule.  His  artillery  on  this 
occasion  is  composed  of  two  sets  of  pieces, — 
pieces  which  will  not  go  off  at  all,  and  pieces 
which  go  off  with  a  vengeance,  and  recoil  with 
most  crushing  effect  upon  himself. 

"We,  as  fallible  creatures,"  says  Mr.  Glad 
stone,  "  have  no  right,  from  any  bare  specula 
tions  of  our  own,  to  administer  pains  and 
penalties  to  our  fellow-creatures,  whether  on 
social  or  religious  grounds.  We  have  the  right 
to  enforce  the  laws  of  the  land  by  such  pains 
and  penalties,  because  it  is  expressly  given  by 
Him  who  has  declared  that  the  civil  rulers  are 
to  bear  the  sword  or  the  punishment  of  evil 
doers,  and  for  the  encouragement  of  them  that 
do  well.  And  so,  in  things  spiritual,  had  it 
pleased  God  to  give  to  the  Church  or  to  the 
State  this  power,  to  be  permanently  exercised 
over  their  members,  or  mankind  at  large,  we 
should  have  the  right  to  use  it;  but  it  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  so  received,  and,  conse 
quently,  it  should  not  be  exercised." 

We  should  be  sorry  to  think  that  the  security 
of  our  lives  and  property  from  persecution 
rested  on  no  better  ground  than  this.  Is  not  a 
teacher  of  heresy  an  evildoer  1  Has  not  heresy 
been  condemned  in  many  countries,  and  in  our 
own  among  them,  by  the  laws  of  the  land, 
which,  as  Mr.  Gladstone  says,  it  is  justifiable 
to  enforce  by  penal  sanctions]  If  a  heretic  is 
not  specially  mentioned  in  the  text  to  which 
Mr.  Gla.dstone  refers,  neither  is  an  assassin,  a 
kidnapper,  or  a  highwayman.  And  if  the 
silence  of  the  New  Testament  as  to  all  inter 
ference  of  government  to  slop  the  progress  of 
heresy  be  a  reason  for  not  fining  or  imprison 
ing  heretics,  it  is  surely  just  as  good  a  reason 
for  not  excluding  them  from  office. 

"  God,"  says  Mr.  Gladstone,  "  has  seen  fit  to 
authorize  the  employment  of  force  in  the  one 
case  and  not  in  the  other ;  for  it  was  with  re 
gard  to  chastisement  inflicted  by  the  sword  for 
an  insult  offered  to  himself,  that  the  Redeemer 
declared  his  kingdom  not  to  be  of  this  world; 

meaning,  apparently  in  an  especial  manner, 
that  it  should  be  otherwise  than  after  this 
•world's  fashion,  in  respect  to  the  sanctions  by 
v/hich  its  laws  should  be  maintained." 

Now  here,  Mr.  Gladstone,  quoting  from  me- 
«nory,  has  fallen  into  an  error.  The  very  re 
markable  words  which  he  cites  do  not  appear 


to  have  had  any  reference  to  the  wound  inflicted 
by  Peter  on  Malchus.  They  were  addressed  to 
Pilate,  in  answer  to  the  question,  "  Art  thou  the 
King  of  the  Jews  1"  We  cannot  help  saying, 
that  we  are  surprised  that  Mr.  Gladstone  should 
not  have  more  accurately  verified  a  quotation 
on  which,  according  to  him,  principally  de 
pends  the  right  of  a  hundred  millions  of  his 
fellow-subjects,  idolaters  and  Dissenters,  tc 
their  property,  their  liberty,  and  their  lives. 

Mr.  Gladstone's  interpretations  of  Scripture 
are  lamentably  destitute  of  one  recommenda 
tion,  which  he  considers  as  of  the  highest  va 
lue:— they  are  by  no  means  in  accordance 
with  the  general  precepts  or  practice  of  the 
Church,  from  the  time  when  the  Christians 
became  strong  enough  to  persecute  down  to  a 
very  recent  period.  A  dogma  favourable  to 
toleration  is  certainly  not  a  dogma  "quod  sem 
per,  quod  ubique,  quod  omnibus?'  Bossuet  was 
able  to  say,  we  fear  with  too  much  truth,  that 
on  one  point  all  Christians  had  long  been 
unanimous, — the  right  of  the  civil  magistrate 
to  propagate  truth  by  the  sword ;  that  even 
heretics  had  been  orthodox  as  to  this  right,  and 
that  the  Anabaptists  and  Socinians  were  the 
first  whc  called  it  in  question.  We  will  not 
pretend  to  say  what  is  the  best  explanation  of 
the  text  under  consideration  ;  but  we  are  sure 
Mr.  Gladstone's  is  the  worst.  According  to 
him,  government  ought  to  exclude  Dissenters 
from  office,  but  not  to  fine  them,  because 
Christ's  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world.  We  do 
not  see  why  the  line  may  not  be  drawn  at  a 
hundred  other  places  as  well  as  at  that  which 
he  has  chosen.  We  do  not  see  why  Lord  Cla 
rendon,  in  recommending  the  act  of  1664 
against  conventicles,  might  not  have  said,  "It 
hath  been  thought  by  some  that  this  classis  of 
men  might  with  advantage  be  not  only  im 
prisoned,  but  pilloried.  But  methinks,  my 
lords,  we  are  inhibited  from  the  punishment 
of  the  pillory  by  that  scripture,  'My  kingdom 
is  not  of  this  world.'  "  Archbishop  Laud,  when 
he  sate  on  Burton  in  the  Star-Chamber,  might 
have  said,  "I  pronounce  for  the  pillory;  and, 
indeed,  I  could  wish  that  all  such  wretches 
were  delivered  to  the  fire,  but  that  our  Lord 
hath  said  that  his  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world."  And  Gardiner  might  have  written  to 
the  Sheriff  of  Oxfordshire,  "See  that  execution, 
be  done  without  fail  on  Master  Ridley  and 
Master  Latimer,  as  you  will  answer  the  same 
to  the  queen's  grace  at  your  peril.  But  if  they 
shall  desire  to  have  some  gunpowder  for  the 
shortening  of  their  torment,  I  see  not  but  that 
you  grant  it,  as  it  is  written,  Regnum  mcum  non 
est  de  hoc  mundo ;  that  is  to  say,  'My  kingdom 
is  not  of  this  world.' " 

But  Mr.  Gladstone  has  other  arguments 
against  persecution, — arguments  which  are  of 
so  much  weight,  that  they  are  decisive,  not  only 
against  persecution,  but  against  his  whole 
theory.  "The  government,"  he  says,  "is  in 
competent  to  exercise  minute  and  constant  su 
pervision  over  religious  opinion."  And  henca 
he  infers,  that  a  "government  exceeds  its  pro 
vince  when  it  comes  to  adapt  a  scale  of  punish 
ments  to  variations  in  religious  opinion,  ac 
cording  to  their  respective  degrees  of  variation 
from  the  established  creed.  To  decline  afford 


388 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ing  countenance  to  sects  is  a  single  and  simple 
rr.lo.  To  punish  their  professors,  according  to 
their  several  errors,  even  were  there  no  other 
objection,  is  one  for  which  the  state  may  assume 
functions  wholly  ecclesiastical,  and  for  which 
it  is  not  intrinsically  firjtf." 

This  is,  in  our  opinion,  quite  true,  but  how 
does  it  agree  with  Mr.  Gladstone's  theory! 
What !  The  government  incompetent  to  exer 
cise  even  such  a  degree  of  supervision  over 
religious  opinion  as  is  implied  by  the  punish 
ment  of  the  most  deadly  heresy !  The  govern 
ment  incompetent  to  measure  even  the  grossest 
deviations  from  the  standard  of  truth !  The 
government  not  intrinsically  qualified  to  judge 
of  the  comparative  enormity  of  any  theological 
errors  !  The  government  so  ignorant  on  these 
subjects,  that  it  is  compelled  to  leave,  not 
merely  subtle  heresies, — discernible  only  by 
the  eye  of  a  Cyril  or  a  Bucer, — but  Socinianism, 
I>eism,  Mohammedanism,  Idolatry,  Atheism, 
iinpunished  !  To  whom  does  Mr.  Gladstone  as 
sign  the  office  of  selecting  a  religion  for  the 
state,  from  among  hundreds  of  religions,  every 
one  of  which  lays  claim  to  truth  ?  Even  to  this 
same  government,  which  he  now  pronounces 
to  be  so  unfit  for  theological  investigations, 
that  it  cannot  venture  to  condemn  a  man  for 
worshipping  a  lump  of  stone  with  a  score  of 
heads  and  hands  !  We  do  not  remember  ever 
to  have  fallen  in  with  a  more  extraordinary 
instance  of  inconsistency.  When  Mr.  Glad 
stone  wishes  to  prove  that  the  government 
ought  to  establish  and  endow  a  religion,  and  to 
fence  it  with  a  test  act, — government  is  TO  KM 
in  the  moral  world.  Those  who  would  confine 
it  to  secular  ends  take  a  low  view  of  its  nature. 
A  religion  musi  be  attached  to  its  agency;  and 
this  religion  must  be  that  of  the  conscience  of 
the  governor,  or  none.  It  is  for  him  to  decide 
between  Papists  and  Protestants,  Jansenists 
and  Molinists,  Arminians  and  Calvinists, 
Episcopalians  and  Presbyterians,  Sabellians 
and  Tritheists,  Homoosians  and  Homoiousians, 
Nestorians  and  Eutychians,  Monotheliles  and 
Monophysites,  Predobaptists  and  Anabaptists. 
It  is  for  him  to  rejudge  the  Acts  of  Nice  and 
Rimini,  of  Ephesus  and  Chalcedon,  of  Con 
stantinople  and  St.  John  Lateran,  of  Trent  and 
Dort.  It  is  for  him  to  arbitrate  betweeen  the 
Greek  and  the  Latin  procession,  and  to  deter 
mine  whether  that  mysterious  flioquc  shall  or 
shall  not  have  a  place  in  the  national  creed. 
When  he  has  made  up  his  mind,  he  is  to  tax 
the  whole  community,  in  order  to  pay  people 
to  teach  his  opinion,  whatever  it  may  be.  He 
is  to  rely  on  his  own  judgment,  though  it  may 
be  opposed  to  that  of  nine-tenths  of  the  society. 
He  is  to  act  on  his  own  judgment,  at  the  risk 
of  exciting  the  most  formidable  discontents. 
He  is  to  inflict,  perhaps  on  a  great  majority 
of  the  population,  what,  whether  Mr.  Gladstone 
may  choose  to  call  it  persecution  or  not,  will 
always  be  felt  as  persecution  by  those  who 
suffer  it.  He  is  on  account  of  differences, 
often  too  slight  for  vulgar  comprehension,  to 
deprive  the  state  of  the  services  of  the  ablest 
men.  He  is  to  cleoase  and  enfeeble  the  com 
munity  which  he  governs,  from  an  empire  into 
a  sect.  In  our  own  country,  for  example,  mil- 
of  Catholics,  millions  of  Protestant  Dis 


senters,  are  to  be  excluded  from  all  power  and 
honours.  A  great  hostile  fleet  is  on  the  sea: 
but  Nelson  is  not  to  command  in  the  Channel 
if  in  the  mystery  of  the  Trinity  he  confounds 
the  persons !  An  invading  army  has  landed 
in  Kent;  but  the  Duke  of  Wellington  is  not  to 
be  at  the  head  of  our  forces  if  he  divides  the 
substance  !  And,  after  all  this,  Mr.  Gladstone 
tells  us  that  it  would  be  wrong  to  imprison  a 
Jew,  a  Mussulman,  or  a  Budhist,  for  a  day; 
because  really  a  government  cannot  under 
stand  these  matters,  and  ought  not  to  meddle 
,with  questions  which  belong  to  the  Church. 
A  singular  theologian,  indeed,  this  government! 
— so  learned  that  it  is  competent  to  exclude 
Grotius  from  office  for  being  a  Semi-Pelagian, 
— so  unlearned  that  it  is  incompetent  to  fine  a 
Hindoo  peasant  a  rupee  for  going  on  a  pil 
grimage  to  Juggernaut! 

"To  solicit  and  persuade  one  another,"  says 
Mr.  Gladstone,  "  are  privileges  which  belong 
to  us  all ;  and  the  wiser  and  better  man  is 
bound  to  advise  the  less  wise  and  good :  but 
he  is  not  only  not  bound,  he  is  not  allowed, 
speaking  generally,  to  coerce  him.  It  is  untrue, 
then,  that  the  same  considerations  which  bind 
a  government  to  submit  a  religion  to  the  free 
choice  of  the  people,  would  therefore  justify 
their  enforcing  its  adoption." 

Granted.  But  it  is  true  that  all  the  same 
considerations  which  would  justify  a  govern 
ment  in  propagating  a  religion  by  means  of 
civil  disabilities,  would  justify  the  propagating 
of  that  religion  by  penal  laws.  To  solicit!  Is 
it  solicitation  to  tell  a  Catholic  duke,  that  he 
must  abjure  his  religion  or  walk  out  of  the 
House  of  Lords  ?  To  persuade !  Is  it  per 
suasion  to  tell  a  barrister  of  distinguished  elo 
quence  and  learning,  that  he  shall  grow  old  in. 
his  stuff  gown  while  his  pupils  are  seated  above 
him  in  ermine,  because  he  cannot  digest  the 
damnatory  clauses  of  the  Athanasian  creed? 
Would  Mr.  Gladstone  think,  that  a  religious 
system  which  he  considers  as  false — Socinian 
ism,  for  example — was  submitted  to  his  free 
choice,  if  it  were  submitted  in  these  terms. 
"  If  you  obstinately  adhere  to  the  faith  of  the 
Nicene  fathers,  you  shall  not  be  burned  in. 
Smithfield — you  shall  not  be  sent  to  Dorchester 
jail — you  shall  not  even  pay  double  land  tax. 
But  you  shall  be  shut  out  from  all  situations 
in  which  you  might  exercise  your  talents  with 
honour  to  yourself  and  advantage  to  the  coun 
try.  The  House  of  Commons,  the  bench  of 
magistracy,  are  not  for  such  as  you.  You  shall 
see  younger  men,  your  inferiors  in  station  and 
talents,  rise  to  the  highest  dignities  and  attract 
the  ga/e  of  nations,  while  you  are  doomed  to 
neglect  and  obscurity.  If  you  have  a  son  of 
the  highest  promise — a  son  such  as  other  fa 
thers  would  contemplate  with  delight — thedeve- 
lopement  of  his  fine  talents  and  of  his  generous 
ambition  shall  be  a  torture  to  you.  You  shall 
look  on  him  as  a  being  doomed  to  lead,  as  you 
have  led,  the  abject  life  of  a  Roman,  or  a  Nea 
politan,  in  the  midst  of  the  great  English  people. 
All  those  high  honours,  so  much  more  precious 
than  the  most  costly  gifts  of  despots,  with 
which  a  free  country  decorates  its  illustrious 
citizens,  shall  be  to  him,  as  they  have  be^n  tit 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


383 


you,  objects,  not  of  hope  and  virtuous  emula 
tion,  but  of  hopeless,  envious  pining.  Educate 
him,  if  you  wish  him  to  feel  his  degradation. 
Educate  him,  if  you  wish  to  stimulate  his  crav 
ing  for  what  he  never  must  enjoy.  Educate 
him,  if  you  would  imitate  the  barbarity  of  that 
petty  Celtic  tyrant  who  fed  his  prisoners  on 
salted  food  till  they  called  eagerly  for  drink, 
and  then  let  down  an  empty  cup  into  the  dun 
geon,  and  left  them  to  die  of  thirst."  Is  this  to  so 
licit,  to  persuade,  to  submit  religion  to  the  free 
choice  of  man  1  Would  a  fine  of  a  thousand 
pounds — would  imprisonment  in  Newgate  for 
six  months,  under  circumstances  not  disgrace 
ful—give  Mr.  Gladstone  the  pain  which  he 
would  feel,  if  he  were  to  be  told  that  he  was  to 
be  dealt  with  in  the  way  in  which  he  would 
himself  deal  with  more  than  one-half  of  his 
countrymen  ? 

We  are  not  at  all  surprised  to  find  such  in 
consistency  even  in  a  man  of  Mr.  Gladstone's 
talents.  The  truth  is,  that  every  man  is,  to  a 
great  extent,  the  creature  of  the  age.  It  is  to 
no  purpose  that  he  resists  the  influence  which 
the  vast  mass,  in  which  he  is  but  an  atom, 
must  exercise  on  him.  He  may  try  to  be  a 
man  of  the  tenth  century:  but  he  cannot 
Whether  he  will  or  no,  he  must  be  a  man  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  He  shares  in  the  mo 
tion  of  the  moral  as  well  as  in  that  of  the  phy 
sical  world.  He  can  no  more  be  as  intolerant 
as  he  would  have  been  in  the  days  of  the  Tu- 
dors,  than  he  can  stand  in  the  evening  exactly 
where  he  stood  in  the  morning.  The  globe 
goes  round  from  west  to  east;  and  he  must  go 
round  with  it.  When  he  says  that  he  is  where 
he  was,  he  means  only  that  he  has  moved  at 
the  same  rate  with  all  around  him.  When  he 
says  that  he  has  gone  a  good  way  to  the  west 
ward,  he  means  only  that  he  has  not  gone  to 
the  eastward  quite  so  rapidly  as  his  neigh 
bours.  Mr.  Gladstone's  book  is,  in  this  re- 
£pect,  a  very  gratifying  performance.  It  is  the 
measure  of  what  a  man  can  do  to  be  left  be 
hind  by  the  world.  It  is  the  strenuous  effort 
of  a  very  vigorous  mind  to  keep  as  far  in  the 
rear  of  the  general  progress  as  possible.  And 
yet,  with  the  most  intense  exertion,  Mr.  Glad 
stone  cannot  help  being,  on  some  important 
points,  greatly  in  advance  of  Locke  himself; 
and  with  whatever  admiration  he  may  regard 
Laud,  it  is  well  for  him,  we  can  tell  him,  that 
he  did  not  write  in  the  days  of  that  zealous  pri 
mate,  who  would  certainly  have  refuted  the 
expositions  of  Scripture  which  we  have  quoted 
by  one  of  the  keenest  arguments  that  can  be 
addressed  to  human  ears. 

This  is  not  the  only  instance  in  which  Mr. 
Gladstone  has  shrunk  in  a  very  remarkable 
manner  from  the  consequences  of  his  own 
theory.  If  there  be  in  the  whole  world  a  state 
to  which  this  theory  is  applicable,  that  state  is 
the  British  Empire  in  India.  Even  we,  who 
detest  paternal  governments  in  general,  shall 
admit  that  the  duties  of  the  governments  of 
India  are,  to  a  considerable  extent,  paternal. 
There  the  superiority  of  the  governors  to  the 
governed  in  moral  science  is  unquestionable. 
The  conversion  of  the  whole  people  to  the 
worst  form  that  Christianity  ever  wore  in  the 


darkest  ages  would  be  a  most  happy  event.  It 
is  not  necessary  that  a  man  should  be  a  Chris 
tian  to  wish  for  the  propagation  of  Christianity 
in  India.  It  is  sufficient  that  he  should  be  a 
European  not  much  below  the  ordinary  Euro 
pean  level  of  good  sense  and  humanity.  Com 
pared  with  the  importance  of  the  interests  at 
stake,  all  those  Scotch  and  Irish  questions 
which  occupy  so  large  a  portion  of  Mr.  Glad 
stone's  book  sink  into  insignificance.  In  no 
part  of  the  world,  since  the  days  of  Theodosius, 
has  so  large  a  heathen  population  been  subject 
to  a  Christian  government.  In  no  part  of  the 
world  is  heathenism  more  cruel,  more  licen 
tious,  more  fruitful  of  absurd  rites  and  perni 
cious  laws.  Surely,  if  it  be  the  duty  of 
government  to  use  its  power  and  its  revenue 
in  order  to  bring  seven  millions  of  Irish  Ca 
tholics  over  to  the  Protestant  Church,  it  is  a 
fortiori  the  duty  of  the  government  to  use  its 
power  and  its  revenue  in  order  to  make  se 
venty  millions  of  idolaters  Christians.  If  it  be 
a  sin  to  suffer  John  Howard  or  William  Penn 
to  hold  any  office  in  England,  because  they  are 
not  in  communion  with  the  Established  Church, 
surely  it  must  be  a  crying  sin  indeed  to  admit 
to  high  situations  men  who  bow  down,  in  tem 
ples  covered  with  emblems  of  vice,  to  the 
hideous  images  of  sensual  or  malevolent  gods 
But  no.  Orthodoxy,  it  seems,  is  more  shock 
ed  by  the  priests  of  Rome  than  by  the  priests 
of  Kalee.  The  plain  red  brick  building — 
Adullam's  Cave,  or  Ebenezer  Chapel— where 
uneducated  men  hear  a  half  educated  man  talk 
of  the  Christian  law  of  love,  and  the  Christian 
hope  of  glory,  is  unworthy  of  the  indulgence 
which  is  reserved  for  the  shrine  where  the 
Thug  suspends  a  portion  of  the  spoils  of  mur 
dered  travellers  ;  and  for  the  car  which  grinds 
its  way  through  the  bones  of  self-immolated 
pilgrims.  "It  would  be,"  says  Mr.  Gladstone, 
"an  absurd  exaggeration  to  maintain  it  as  the 
part  of  such  a  government  as  that  of  the  Bri 
tish  in  India  to  bring  home  to  the  door  of  every 
subject  at  once  the  ministrations  of  a  new  and 
totally  unknown  religion."  The  government 
ought  indeed  to  desire  to  propagate  Chris 
tianity.  But  the  extent  to  which  they  must 
do  so  must  be  "  limited  by  the  degree  in  which 
the  people  are  found  willing  to  receive  it." 
He  proposes  no  such  limitation  in  the  case  of 
Ireland.  He  would  give  the  Irish  a  Protestant 
Church  whether  they  like  it  or  not.  •'  We  be 
lieve,"  says  he,  "  that  that  which  we  pluce 
before  them  is,  whether  they  know  it  or  not, 
calculated  to  be  beneficial  to  them ;  and  that, 
if  they  know  it  not  now,  they  will  know  it 
when  it  is  presented  to  them  fairly.  Shall  we, 
then,  purchase  their  applause  at  the  expense 
of  their  substantial,  nay,  their  spiritual  in 
terests?" 

And  why  does  Mr.  Gladstone  allow  to  *he 

Hindoo  a   privilege   which   he  denies  to  tne 

Irishman?     Why  does  he  reserve  his  greatest 

liberality  for  the  most  monstrous  errors  ?    Why 

does  he  pay  most  respect  to  the  opinion  of  the 

i  least  enlightened  people?     Why  does  he  with 

;  hold  the  right  to  exercise  paternal  authority 

]  from  that  one  government  which  is  fittei  »>   ex 

i  ercise  paternal  authority  than  any  government 

SK2 


390 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


Jiat  ever  existed  in  the  world?     We  will  give 
the  reason  in  his  own  words. 

"In  British  India,"  he  says,  "  a  small  num 
ber  of  persons  advanced  to  a  higher  grade  of 
civilization,  exercise  the  powers  of  govern 
ment  over  an  immensely  greater  number  of 
less  cultivated  persons,  not  by  coercion,  but 
under  free  stipulation  with  the  governed. 
Now,  the  rights  of  a  government,  in  circum 
stances  thus  peculiar,  obviously  depend  nei 
ther  upon  the  unrestricted  theory  of  paternal 
principles,  nor  upon  any  primordial  or  ficti 
tious  contract  of  indefinite  powers,  but  upon 
an  express  and  known  treaty,  matter  of  posi 
tive  agreement,  not  of  natural  ordinance." 

Where  Mr.  Gladstone  has  seen  this  treaty 
we  cannot  guess;  for,  though  he  calls  it  a 
"kno-.vn  treaty,"  we  will  stake  our  credit  that 
it  is  quite  unknown  both  at  Calcutta  and  Ma 
dras,  both  in  Leadenhall  Street  and  Cannon 
Row — that  it  is  not  to  be  found  in  any  of  the 
enormous  folios  of  papers  relating  to  India 
which  fill  the  book-cases  of  members  of  Par 
liament — that  it  has  utterly  escaped  the  re 
searches  of  all  the  historians  of  our  Eastern 
empire — that,  in  the  long  and  interesting  de 
bates  of  1813  on  the  admission  of  missionaries 
to  India,  debates  of  which  the  most  valuable 
part  has  been  excellently  preserved  by  the 
care  of  the  speakers,  no  allusion  to  this  im 
portant  instrument  is  to  be  found.  The  truth 
is,  that  this  treaty  is  a  nonentity.  It  is  by  co 
ercion,  it  is  by  the  sword,  and  not  by  free  s'J- 
pulation  with  the  governed,  that  England  rules 
India ;  nor  is  England  bound  by  any  contract 
whatever  not  to  deal  with  Bengal  as  she  deals 
with  Ireland.  She  may  set  up  a  Bishop  of 
Patna  and  a  Dean  of  Hoogley — she  may  grant 
away  the  public  revenue  for  the  maintenance 
of  prebendaries  of  Benares  and  canons  of 
Moorshedabad — she  may  divide  the  country 
into  parishes,  and  place  a  rector  with  a  stipend 
in  every  one  of  them,  without  infringing  any 
positive  agreement.  If  there  be  such  a  treaty, 
Mr.  Gladstone  can  have  no  difficulty  in  making 
known  its  date,  its  terms,  and,  above  all,  the 
precise  extent  of  the  territory  within  which  we 
have  sinfully  bound  ourselves  to  be  guilty  of 
practical  atheism.  The  last  point  is  of  great 
importance.  For  as  the  provinces  of  our  In 
dian  empire  were  accjjiired  at  different  times, 
and  in  very  different  ways,  no  single  treaty, 
indeed  no  ten  treaties,  will  justify  the  system 
pursued  by  our  government  there. 

The  plain  state  of  the  case  is  this :  No  man 
m  his  senses  would  dream  of  applying  Mr. 
Gladstone's  theory  to  India,  because,  if  so  ap 
plied,  it  would  inevitably  destroy  our  empire, 
and,  with  our  empire,  the  best  chance  of  spread 
ing  Christianity  among  the  natives.  This  Mr. 
Gladstone  felt.  In  some  way  or  other  his 
theory  was  to  be  saved,  and  the  monstrous 
consequences  avoided.  Of  intentional  misre 
presentation  we  are  quite  sure  that  he  is  in 
capable.  But  we  cannot  acquit  him  of  that 
unconscious  disingenuousness  from  which  the 
most  upright  man,  when  strongly  attached  to 
an  f  pinion,  is  seldom  wholly  free.  We  believe 
that  he  recoiled  from  the  ruinous  consequences 


which  his  system  would  produce  if  tried  in 
India,  but  that  he  did  not  like  to  say  so  lest  he 
should  lay  himself  open  to  the  charge  of  sacri 
ficing  principle  to  expediency,  a  word  which  is 
held  in  the  utmost  abhorrence  by  all  his  school. 
Accordingly  he  caught  at  the  notion  of  a  treaty 
— a  notion  which  must,  we  think,  have  origi 
nated  in  some  rhetorical  expression  which  he 
has  imperfectly  understood.  There  is  one  ex 
cellent  way  of  avoiding  the  drawing  of  a  false 
conclusion  from  a  false  major,  and  that  is  by 
having  a  false  minor.  Inaccurate  history  is  an 
admirable  corrective  of  unreasonable  theory. 
And  thus  it  is  in  the  present  case.  A  bad  ge 
neral  rule  is  laid  down  and  obstinately  main 
tained,  wherever  the  consequences  are  not  too 
monstrous  for  human  bigotry.  But  when  they 
become  so  horrible  that  even  Christchurch 
shrinks — that  even  Oriel  stands  aghast — the 
rule  is  evaded  by  means  of  a  fictitious  con 
tract.  One  imaginary  obligation  is  set  up 
against  another.  Mr.  Gladstone  first  preaches 
to  governments  the  duty  of  undertaking  an  en 
terprise  just  as  rational  as  the  Crusades — and 
then  dispenses  them  from  it  on  the  ground  of  a 
treaty  which  is  just  as  authentic  as  the  dona 
tion  of  Constantine  to  Pope  Sylvester.  His 
system  resembles  nothing  so  much  as  a  forged 
bond  with  a  forged  release  endorsed  on  the 
back  of  it. 

With  more  show  of  reason  he  rests  the 
claims  of  the  Scotch  Church  on  a  contract. 
He  considers  that  contract,  however,  as  most 
unjustifiable,  and  speaks  of  the  setting  up  of 
the  Kirk  as  a  disgraceful  blot  on  the  reign  of 
William  the  Third.  Surely  it  would  be  amus 
ing,  if  it  were  not  melancholy,  to  see  a  man 
of  virtue  and  abilities  unsatisfied  with  the  ca 
lamities  which  one  church,  constituted  on  false 
principles,  has  brought  upon  the  empire,  and 
repining  that  Scotland  is  not  in  the  same  state 
with  Ireland — that  no  Scottish  agitator  is  rais 
ing  rent  and  putting  county  members  in  and 
out — that  no  Presbyterian  association  is  divid 
ing  supreme  power  with  the  government — that 
no  meetings  of  precursors  and  repealers  are 
covering  the  side  of  the  Calton  Hill — that 
twenty-five  thousand  troops  are  not  required 
to  maintain  orderon  the  north  of  theTvveed  —that 
he  anniversary  of  the  battle  of  Both  well  Bridge 
is  not  regularly  celebrated  by  insult,  riot,  and 
murder.  We  could  hardly  find  a  stronger  argu 
ment  against  Mr.  Gladstone's  system  than  that 
which  Scotland  furnishes.  The  policy  which 
has  been  followed  in  that  country  has  been 
directly  opposed  to  the  policy  which  he  recom 
mends.  And  the  consequence  is  that  Scotland, 
having  been  one  of  the  rudest,  one  of  the  poor 
est,  one  of  the  most  turbulent  countries  in  Eu 
rope,  has  become  one  of  the  most  highly  civil 
ized,  one  of  the  most  flourishing,  one  of  the 
most  tranquil.  The  atrocities  which  were  of 
common  occurrence  while  an  unpopularchurch 
was  dominant  are  unknown.  In  spite  of  a  mu 
tual  aversion  as  bitter  as  ever  separated  one 
people  from  another,  the  two  kingdoms  which 
compose  our  island  have  been  indissolubly 
joined  together.  Of  the  ancient  national  feel 
ing  there  remains  just  enough  to  be  ornamental 
and  useful ;  just  enough  to  inspire  the  poet  and 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


391 


to  kindle  a  generous  and  friendly  emulation  in 
the  bosom  of  the  soldier.  But  for  all  the  ends 
of  government  the  nations  are  one.  And  why 
are  they  so]  The  answer  is  simple.  The  na 
tions  are  one  for  all  the  ends  of  government, 
because  in  their  union  the  true  ends  of  govern 
ment  alone  were  kept  in  sight.  The  nations 
are  one  because  the  churches  are  two. 

Such  is  the  union  of  England  with  Scotland,  a 
union  which  resembles  the  union  of  the  limbs  of 
one  healthful  and  vigorous  body,  all  moved  by 
one  will,  all  co-operating  for  common  ends.  The 
system  of  Mr.  Gladstone  would  have  produced 
a  union  which  can  be  compared  only  to  that 
which  is  the  subject  of  a  wild  Persian  fable. 
King  Zohak — we  tell  the  story  as  Mr.  Southey 
tells  it  to  us — gave  the  devil  leave  to  kiss  his 
shoulders.  Instantly  two  serpents  sprang  out, 
•who,  in  the  fury  of  hunger,  attacked  his  head, 
and  attempted  to  get  at  his  brain.  Zohak 
pulled  them  away,  and  tore  them  with  his  nails. 
But  he  found  that  they  were  inseparable  parts 
of  himself,  and  that  what  he  was  lacerating 
was  his  own  flesh.  Perhaps  we  might  be  able 
to  find,  if  we  looked  round  the  world,  some  po- 
'litical  union  like  this — some  hideous  monster 
of  a  state,  cursed  with  one  principle  of  sensa 
tion  and  two  principles  of  volition — self-loath 
ing  and  self-torturing — made  up  of  parts  which 
are  driven  by  a  frantic  impulse  to  inflict  mu 
tual  pain,  yet  are  doomed  to  feel  whatever  they 
inflict — which  are  divided  by  an  irreconcilable 
hatred,  yet  are  blended  in  an  indissoluble  iden 
tity.  Mr.  Gladstone,  from  his  tender  concern 
for  Zohak,  is  unsatisfied  because  the  devil  has 
as  yet  kissed  only  one  shoulder — because  there 
is  not  a  snake  mangling  and  mangled  on  the 
left  to  keep  in  countenance  his  brother  on  the 
right. 

But  we  must  proceed  in  our  examination 
of  his  theory. 

Having,  as  he  conceives,  proved  that  it  is 
the  duty  of  every  government  to  profess  some 
religion  or  other,  right  or  wrong,  and  to  esta 
blish  that  religion,  he  then  comes  to  the  ques 
tion  what  religion  a  government  ought  to  pre 
fer,  and  he  decides  this  question  in  favour  of 
the  form  of  Christianity  established  in  Eng 
land.  The  Church  of  England  is,  according  to 
him,  the  pure  Catholic  Church  of  Christ,  which 
possesses  the  apostolical  succession  of  minis 
ters,  and  within  whose  pale  is  to  be  found  that 
unity  which  is  essential  to  truth.  For  her  de 
cisions  he  claims  a  degree  of  reverence  far 
beyond  what  she  has  ever,  in  any  of  her  for 
mularies,  claimed  for  herself;  far  beyond  what 
the  moderate  school  of  Bossuet  demands  for  the 
Pope,  and  scarcely  short  of  what  the  most  bi 
goted  Catholic  would  ascribe  to  Pope  and  Ge 
neral  Council  together.  To  separate  from  her 
communion  is  schism.  To  reject  her  tradi 
tions  of  interpretations  of  Scripture  is  sinful 
presumption. 

Mr.  Gladstone  pronounces  the  right  of  pri 
vate  judgment,  as  it  is  generally  understood 
throughout  Pn-iestant  Europe,  to  be  a  mon 
strous  abuse.  He  declares  himself  favourable, 
indeed,  to  the  exercise  of  private  judgment 
after  a  fashion  of  his  own.  We  have,  accord 
ing  to  him,  a  right  to  judge  all  the  doctrines 


;  of  the  Church  of  England  to  be  sound,  but  not 
i  to  judge  any  of  them  to  be  unsound.  He  has 
no  objection,  he  assures  us,  to  active  inquiry 
into  religious  questions;  on  the  contrary,  he 
thinks  it  highly  desirable,  as  long  as  it  does 
not  lead  to  diversity  of  opinion ; — which  is  as 
much  as  if  he  were  to  recommend  the  use  of 
fire  that  will  not  burn  down  houses,  or  of 
brandy  that  will  not  make  men  drunk.  He 
conceives  it  to  be  perfectly  possible  for  men 
to  exercise  their  intellects  vigorously  and  free 
ly  on  theological  subjects,  and  yet  to  come  to 
exactly  the  same  conclusions  with  each  cither 
and  with  the  Church  of  England.  And  for  this 
opinion  he  gives,  as  far  as  we  have  been  able 
to  discover,  no  reason  whatever,  except  that 
everybody  who  vigorously  and  freely  exercises 
his  understanding  on  Euclid's  Theorems  as 
sents  to  them.  "The  activity  of  private  judg 
ment,"  he  truly  observes,  "and  the  unity  and 
strength  of  conviction  in  mathematics  vary 
directly  as  each  other."  On  this  unquestion 
able  fact  he  constructs  a  somewhat  question 
able  argument.  Everybody  who  freely  in 
quires  agrees,  he  says,  with  Euclid.  But  the 
Church  is  as  much  in  the  right  as  Euclid. 
Why,  then,  should  not  every  free  inquirer 
agree  with  the  Church]  We  could  put  many 
similar  questions.  Either  the  affirmative  or 
the  negative  of  the  proposition  that  King 
Charles  wrote  Icon  Basilikc  is  as  true  as  that 
two  sides  of  a  triangle  are  greater  than  the 
third  side.  Why,  then",  do  Dr.  Wordsworth  and 
Mr.  Hallam  agree  in  thinking  two  sides  of  a 
triangle  greater  than  the  third  side  and  yet 
differ  about  the  genuineness  of  the  Icon  Hasi- 
like?  The  state  of  the  exact  sciences  proves, 
says  Mr.  Gladstone,  that,  as  respects  religion, 
"  the  association  of  these  two  ideas,  activity 
of  inquiry  and  variety  of  conclusion,  is  a  fal 
lacious  one."  We  might  just  as  well  turn  the 
argument  the  other  way,  and  infer,  from  the 
variety  of  religious  opinions,  that  there  must 
necessarily  be  hostile  mathematical  sects,  some 
affirming  and  some  denying  that  the  square  of 
the  hvpothenusc  is  equal  to  the  squares  of  the 
sides.  But  we  do  not  think  either  the  one 
analogy  or  the  other  of  the  smallest  value. 
Our  way  of  ascertaining  the  tendency  of  free 
inquiry  is  simply  to  open  our  eyes  and  look  at 
the  world  in  which  we  live,  and  there  we  see 
that  free  inquiry  on  mathematical  subjects  pro 
duces  unity,  and  that  free  inquiry  on  moral 
subjects  produces  discrepancy.  There  would 
undoubtedly  be  less  discrepancy  if  inquirers 
were  more  diligent  and  candid.  But  cliscre 
pancy  there  will  be  among  the  most  diligent 
and  candid  as  long  as  the  constitution  of  the 
human  mind  and  the  nature  of  moral  evidence 
continue  unchanged.  That  we  have  not  free 
dom  and  unity  together  is  a  very  sad  thing, 
and  so  it  is  that  we  have  not  wings.  But  we 
are  just  as  likely  to  see  the  one  defect  removed 
as  the  other.  It  is  not  only  in  religion  that 
discrepancy  is  found.  It  is  the  same  with  al! 
matters  Avhich  depend  on  moral  evidence- 
with  judicial  questions,  for  example,  and  with 
political  questions.  All  the  judges  ma>'  woik 
a  sum  in  the  rule  of  three  on  the  same  pnnci 
pie,  and  bring  out  the  same  conclusion.  Bin 


392 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


Jt  does  not  follow  that,  however  honest  and  I 
laborious  they  may  be,  they  will  be  of  one  ' 
mind  on  the  Douglas  case.     So  it  is  vain  to  I 
hope   that  there   may  be  a  free   constitution 
under  which  every  representative  will  be  una 
nimously  elected,  and  every  law  unanimously 
passed;  and  it  would  be  ridiculous  fora  states 
man  to  stand  wondering  and  bemoaning  him 
self  because  people  who  agree  in  thinking  that 
two  and  two  make  four  cannot  agree  about  the 
new  poor  law  or  the  administration  of  Canada. 

There  are  two  intelligible  and  consistent 
courses  which  may  be  followed  with  respect 
to  the  exercise  of  private  judgment ; — that  of 
the  Romanist,  who  interdicts  it  because  of  its 
inevitable  inconveniences ;  and  that  of  the 
Protestant,  who  permits  it  in  spite  of  its  inevi 
table  inconveniences.  Both  are  more  reason 
able  than  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  would  have  free 
private  judgments  without  its  inevitable  incon 
veniences.  The  Romanist  produces  repose  by 
means  of  stupefaction.  The  Protestant  en 
courages  activity,  though  he  knows  that  where 
there  is  much  activity,  there  will  be  some 
aberration.  Mr.  Gladstone  wishes  for  the 
unity  of  the  fifteenth  century  with  the  active 
and  searching  spirit  of  the  sixteenth.  He 
might  as  well  wish  to  be  in  two  places  at 
once. 

When  Mr.  Gladstone  says  that  Ave  "actually 
require  discrepancy  of  opinion — require  and 
demand  error,  falsehood,  blindness,  and  plume 
ourselves  on  such  discrepancy  as  attesting  a 
freedom  which  is  only  valuable  when  used  for 
unity  in  the  truth,"  he  expresses  himself  with 
more  energy  than  precision.  Nobody  loves 
discrepancy  for  the  sake  of  discrepancy.  But 
a  person  who  conscientiously  believes  that 
free  inquiry  is,  on  the  whole,  beneficial  to 
the  interests  of  truth,  and  that,  from  the  imper 
fection  of  the  human  faculties,  wherever  there 
is  much  free  inquiry  there  will  be  some  dis 
crepancy, — may,  without  impropriety,  consider 
such  discrepancy,  though  in  itself  an  evil,  as 
a  sign  of  good.  That  there  are  fifty  thousand 
thieves  in  London  is  a  very  melancholy  fact. 
But,  looked  at  in  one  point  of  view,  it  is  a  rea 
son  for  exultation.  For  what  other  city  could 
maintain  fifty  thousand  thieves  '?  What  must 
be  the  mass  of  wealth  where  the  fragments 
gleaned  by  lawless  pilfering  rise  to  so  large  an 
amount  1  St.  Kilda  would  not  support  a  single 
pickpocket.  The  quantity  of  theft  is,  to  a  cer 
tain  extent,  an  index  of  the  quantity  of  useful 
industry  and  judicious  speculation.  And  just 
as  we  may,  from  the  great  number  of  rogues 
in  a  town,  infer  that  much  honest  gain  is  made 
there ;  so  may  we  often,  from  the  quantity  of 
error  in  a  community,  draw  a  cheering  infer 
ence  as  to  the  degree  in  which  the  public  mind 
is  turned  to  those  inquiries  which  alone  can 
lead  to  rational  convictions  of  truth. 

Mr.  Gladstone  seems  to  imagine  that  most 
Protestants  think  it  possible  for  the  same  doc 
trine  to  be  at  once  true  and  false ;  or  that  they 
ihink  it  immaterial  whether,  on  a  religious 
nuestion,  a  man  comes  to  a  true  or  false  con 
clusion.  If  there  be  any  Protestants  who  hold 
notions  so  absurd,  we  abandon  them  to  his  cen- 
inre. 


The  Protestant  doctrine  touching  the  right 
of  private  judgment — that  doctrine,  which  is 
the  common  foundation  of  the  Anglican,  the 
Lutheran,  and  the  Calvinistic  Churches — that 
doctrine  by  which  every  sect  of  Dissenters  vin 
dicates  its  separation — we  conceive  not  to  be 
this,  fhat  opposite  opinions  may  both  be  true; 
ncr  this,  that  truth  and  falsehood  are  both 
equally  good;  nor  yet  this,  that  all  speculative 
error  is  necessarily  innocent: — but  this,  :hat 
there  is  on  the  face  of  the  earth  no  visible 
body  to  whose  decrees  men  are  bound  to  sub 
mit  their  private  judgment  on  points  of  faith. 

Is  there  always  such  a  visible  body  1  Was 
there  such  a  visible  body  in  the  year  1500  1  If 
not,  why  are  we  to  believe  that  there  is  such  a 
body  in  the  year  18391  If  there  was  such  a 
body  in  1500,  what  was  it?  Was  it  the  Church 
of  Romel  And  how  can  the  Church  of  Eng 
land  be  orthodox  now  if  the  Church  of  Rome 
was  orthodox  then? 

"In  England,"  says  Mr.  Gladstone,  "the 
case  was  widely  different  from  that  of  the  Con 
tinent.  Her  reformation  did  not  destroy,  but 
successfully  maintained,  the  unity  and  succes 
sion  of  the  Church  in  her  apostolical  ministry.4 
We  have,  therefore,  still  among  us  the  ordain 
ed  hereditary  witnesses  of  the  truth,  conveying 
it  to  us  through  an  unbroken  series  from  our 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  and  his  apostles.  This  is 
to  us  the  ordinary  voice  of  authority;  of  au 
thority  equally  reasonable  and  equally  true, 
whether  we  will  hear,  or  whether  we  will  for 
bear." 

Mr.  Gladstone's  reasoning  is  not  so  clear  as 
might  be  desired.  We  have  among  us,  he 
says,  ordained  hereditary  witnesses  of  the 
truth,  and  their  voice  is  to  us  the  voice  of  au 
thority.  Undoubtedly,  if  there  are  witnesses 
of  the  truth,  their  voice  is  the  voice  of  autho 
rity.  But  this  is  little  more  than  saying  that 
the  truth  is  the  truth.  Nor  is  truth  more  true 
because  it  comes  in  an  unbroken  series  from 
the  apostles.  The  Nicene  faith  is  not  more 
true  in  the  mouth  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canter 
bury,  than  in  that  of  a  Moderator  of  the  Gene 
ral  Assembly.  If  our  respect  for  the  authority 
of  the  Church  is  to  be  only  consequent  upon 
our  conviction  of  the  truth  of  her  doctrines,  we 
come  at  once  to  that  monstrous  abuse, — the 
Protestant  exercise  of  private  judgment.  But 
if  Mr.  Gladstone  means  that  we  ought  to  be 
lieve  that  the  Church  of  England  speaks  the 
truth,  because  she  has  the  apostolical  succes 
sion,  we  greatly  doubt  whether  such  a  doctrine 
can  be  maintained.  In  the  first  place,  what 
proof  have  we  of  the  fact?  We  have,  indeed, 
heard  it  said  that  Providence  would  certainly 
have  interfered  to  preserve  the  apostolical  suc 
cession  of  the  true  Church.  But  this  is  an  ar 
gument  fitted  for  understandings  of  a  different 
kind  from  Mr.  Gladstone's.  He  will  hardly 
tell  us  that  the  Church  of  England  is  the  true 
Church  because  she  has  the  succession ;  and 
that  she  has  the  succession  because  she  is  the 
true  Church. 

What  evidence,  then,  have  we  for  the  fact 
of  the  apostolical  succession?  And  here  we 
may  easily  defend  the  truth  against  Oxlord 
with  the  same  arguments  with  which,  in  old 


CHURCH  AND   STATE. 


393 


times,  the  truth  was  defended  by  Oxford  against 
Rome.  In  this  stage  of  our  combat  with  Mr. 
Gladstone,  we  need  few  weapons  except  those 
xvhich  we  find  in  the  well-furnished  and  well- 
ordered  armoury  of  Chillingworth. 

The  transmission  of  orders  from  the  apos 
tles  to  an  English  clergyman  of  the  present 
day,  must  have  been  through  a  very  great 
number  of  intermediate  persons.  Now  it  is 
probable  that  no  clergyman  in  the  Church  of 
England  can  trace  up  his  spiritual  genealogy 
from  bishop  to  bishop,  even  so  far  back  as 
the  time  of  the  Reformation.  There  remains 
fifteen  or  sixteen  hundred  years  during  which 
the  history  of  the  transmission  of  his  orders  is 
buried  in  utter  darkness.  And  whether  he  be 
a  priest  by  succession  from  the  apostles,  de 
pends  on  the  question,  whether,  during  that 
long  period,  some  thousands  of  events  took 
place,  any  one  of  which  may,  without  any  gross 
improbability,  be  supposed  not  to  have  taken 
place.  We  have  not  a  tittle  of  evidence  to  any 
one  of  these  events.  We  do  not  even  know 
the  names  or  countries  of  the  men  to  whom  it 
was  taken  for  granted  that  these  events  hap 
pened.  We  do  not  know  whether  the  spiritual 
ancestors  of  any  one  of  our  contemporaries 
were  Spanish  or  Armenian,  Arian  or  Ortho 
dox.  In  the  utter  absence  of  all  particular 
evidence,  we  are  surely  entitled  to  require  that 
there  should  be  very  strong  evidence  indeed, 
that  the  strictest  regularity  was  observed  in 
every  generation ;  and  that  episcopal  func 
tions  were  exercised  by  none  who  were  not 
bishops  by  succession  from  the  apostles.  But 
we  have  no  such  evidence.  In  the  first  place, 
we  have  not  full  and  accurate  information 
touching  the  polity  of  the  Church  during  the 
century  that  followed  the  persecution  of  Nero. 
That,  during  this  period,  the  overseers  of  all 
the  little  Christian  societies  scattered  through 
the  Roman  empire  held  their  spiritual  autho 
rity  by  virtue  of  holy  orders  derived  from  the 
apostles,  cannot  be  proved  by  contemporary 
testimony,  or  by  any  testimony  which  can  be 
regarded  as  decisive.  The  question,  whether 
the  primitive  ecclesiastical  constitution  bore  a 
greater  resemblance  to  the  Anglican  or  to  the 
Calvinistic  model  has  been  fiercely  disputed. 
It  is  a  question  on  which  men  of  eminent 
parts,  learning,  and  piety  have  differed,  and  do 
to  this  day  differ  very  widely.  It  is  a  question 
on  which  at  least  a  full  half  of  the  ability  and 
erudition  of  Protestant  Europe  has,  ever  since 
the  Reformation,  been  opposed  to  the  Anglican 
pretensions.  Mr.  Gladstone  himself,  we  are 
persuaded,  would  have  the  candour  to  allow  j 
that,  if  no  evidence  were  admitted  but  that  < 
which  is  furnished  by  the  genuine  Christian 
literature  of  the  first  two  centuries,  judgment 
would  not  go  in  favour  of  prelacy.  And  if  he 
looked  at  the  subject  as  calmly  as  he  would 
look  a:  a  controversy  respecting  the  Roman 
Comitia  or  the  Anglo-Saxon  Witenagemote,  he 
would  probably  think  that  the  absence  of  con 
temporary  evidence  during  so  long  a  period 
was  a  defect  which  later  attestations,  however 
numerous,  could  but  very  imperfectly  supply. 

It  is  surely  impolitic  to  rest  the  doctrines  of 
the  English  Church  on  ai  historical  theory, 

VOL.  III.— 50 


which,  to  ninety-nine  Protestants  out  of  a  hun 
dred,  would  seem  much  more  questionable 
than  any  of  those  doctrines.  Nor  is  this  all. 
Extreme  obscurity  overhangs  the  history  of 
the  middle  ages ;  and  the  facts  which  are  dis 
cernible  through  that  obscuri'v  prove  that  the 
Church  was  exceedingly  ill  regulated.  We 
read  of  sees  of  the  highest  dignity  openly 
sold — transferred  backwards  and  forwards  by 
popular  tumult — bestowed  sometimes  by  a  pro 
fligate  woman  on  her  paramour — sometimes 
by  a  warlike  baron  on  a  kinsman,  still  a  strip 
ling.  We  read  of  bishops  of  ten  years  old — of 
bishops  of  five  years  old — of  many  popes  who 
were  mere  boys,  and  who  rivalled  the  frantic 
dissoluteness  of  Caligula — nay,  of  a  female 
pope.  And  though  this  last  story,  once  be 
lieved  throughout  all  Europe,  has  been  dis 
proved  by  the  strict  researches  of  modern 
criticism,  the  most  discerning  of  those  who 
reject  it  have  admitted  that  it  is  not  intrinsi 
cally  improbable.  In  our  own  island,  it  was 
the  complaint  of  Alfred  that  not  a  single  priest, 
south  of  the  Thames,  and  very  few  on  the 
north,  could  read  either  Latin  or  English.  And 
this  illiterate  clergy  exercised  their  ministry 
amidst  a  rude  and  half  heathen  population,  in 
which  Danish  pirates,  unchristened,  or  chris 
tened  by  the  hundred  on  a  field  of  battle,  were 
mingled  with  a  Saxon  peasantry  scarcely  bet 
ter  instructed  in  religion.  The  state  of  Ireland 
was  still  worse.  "Tota  ilia  per  universam 
Hiberniam  dissolutio  ecclesiastics  discipline, 
— ilia  ubique  pro  consuetudine  Christiana 
soeva  subintroducta  barbaries" — are  the  ex 
pressions  of  St.  Bernard.  We  are,  therefore, 
at  a  loss  to  conceive  how  any  clergyman  can 
feel  confident  that  his  orders  have  come  down 
correctly.  Whether  he  be  really  a  successor 
of  the  apostles  depends  on  an  immense  num 
ber  of  such  contingencies  as  these, — whether 
under  King  Ethelwolf,  a  stupid  priest  might 
not,  while  baptizing  several  scores  of  Danish 
prisoners  who  had  just  made  their  option  be 
tween  the  font  and  the  gallows,  inadvertently 
omit  to  perform  the  rite  on  one  of  these  grace 
less  proselytes  1 — whether,  in  the  seventh  cen 
tury,  an  impostor,  who  had  never  received 
consecration,  might  not  have  passed  himself 
off  as  a  bishop  on  a  rude  tribe  of  Scots  ? — 
whether  a  lad  of  twelve  did  really,  by  a  cere 
mony  huddled  over  when  he  was  too  drunk  to 
know  what  he  was  about,  convey  the  episcopa. 
character  to  a  lad  often] 

Since  the  first  century,  not  less,  in  all  proba 
bility,  than  a  hundred  thousand  persons  have 
exercised  the  functions  of  bishops.  That  many 
of  these  have  not  been  bishops  by  apostolical 
succession  is  quite  certain.  Hooker  admits 
that  deviations  from  the  general  rule  have 
been  frequent,  and  with  a  boldness  worthy 
of  his  high  and  statesmanlike  intellect,  pro 
nounces  them  to  have  been  often  justifiable. 
"There  may  be,"  says  he,  "sometimes  very 
just  and  sufficient  reason  to  allow  ordination 
made  without  a  bishop.  Where  the  Church 
must  needs  have  some  ordained,  and  neither 
hath  nor  can  have  possibly  a  bishop  to  ordain, 
in  case  of  such  necessity  the  ordinary  institu 
tion  of  God  hath  given  oftentimes,  and  may  £ive 


394 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


place.  And  therefore  we  are  not  simply  with 
out  exception  to  urge  a  lineal  descent  of  power 
from  the  apostles  by  continued  succession  of 
bishops  in  every  effectual  ordination."  There 
can  be  little  doubt,  we  think,  that  the  succes 
sion,  if  it  ever  existed,  has  often  been  inter 
rupted  in  ways  much  less  respectable.  For 
example,  let  us  suppose — and  we  are  sure  that 
no  person  will  think  the  supposition  by  any 
means  improvable — that,  in  the  third  century, 
a  man  of  no  principle  and  some  parts,  who 
has,  in  the  course  of  a  roving  and  discredita 
ble  life,  been  a  catechumen  at  Antioch,  and 
has  there  become  familiar  with  Christian 
usages  and  doctrines,  afterwards  rambles  to 
Marseilles,  where  he  finds  a  Christian  society, 
rich,  liberal,  and  simple-hearted.  He  pretends 
to  be  a  Christian,  attracts  notice  by  his  abilities 
and  affected  zeal,  and  is  raised  to  the  episcopal 
dignity  without  having  ever  been  baptized. 
That  such  an  event  might  happen,  nay,  was 
very  likely  to  happen,  cannot  well  be  disputed 
by  any  one  who  has  read  the  life  of  Peregrinus. 
The  very  virtues,  indeed,  which  distinguished 
the  early  Christians,  seem  to  have  laid  them 
open  to  those  arts  which  deceived 

"Uriel,  thonsrh  Regent  of  the  Sun,  and  held 
The  sharpest-sighted  spirit  of  all  in  Heaven." 

Now,  this  unbaptized  impostor  is  evidently 
no  successor  of  the  apostles.  He  is  not  even 
a  Christian ;  and  all  orders  derived  through 
such  a  pretended  bishop  are  altogether  invalid. 
Do  we  know  enough  of  the  state  of  the  world 
and  of  the  Church  in  the  third  century,  to  be 
able  to  say  with  confidence  that  there  were  not 
at  that  time  twenty  such  pretended  bishops  1 
Every  such  case  makes  a  break  in  the  apos 
tolic  succession. 

Now,  suppose  that  a  break,  such  as  Hooker 
admits  to  have  been  both  common  and  justifi 
able,  or  such  as  we  have  supposed  to  be  pro 
duced  by  hypocrisy  and  cupidity,  were  found 
in  the  chain  which  connected  the  apostles 
with  any  of  the  missionaries  who  first  spread 
Christianity  in  the  wilder  parts  of  Europe — 
who  can  say  how  extensive  the  effect  of  this 
single  break  may  be  1  Suppose  that  St.  Pa 
trick,  for  example,  if  ever  there  was  such  a 
man,  or  Theodore  of  Tarsus,  who  is  said  to 
have  consecrated  in  the  seventh  century  the 
first  bishops  of  many  English  sees,  had  not  the 
true  apostolical  orders,  is  it  not  conceivable 
that  such  a  circumstance  may  affect  the  orders 
of  many  clergymen  now  living?  Even  if  it 
were  possible,  which  it  assuredly  is  not,  to 
prove  that  the  Church  had  the  apostolical  or 
ders  in  the  third  century,  it  would  be  impossi 
ble  to  prove  that  those  orders  were  not  in  the 
twelfth  century  so  far  lost  that  no  ecclesiastic 
tould  be  certain  of  the  legitimate  descent  of 
his  own  spiritual  character.  And  if  this  were 
so,  no  subsequent  precautions  could  repair  the 
evil. 

(Thillinsrworth  states  the  conclusion  at  \vhich 
he  had  arrived  on  this  subject  in  these  very 
remarkable  word;, — "That of  ten  thousand  pro 
bables  no  one  should  be  false ;  that  of  ten  thou 
sand  requisites,  whereof  any  one  may  fail,  not 
one  should  be  wanting,  this  to  me  is  extremely 


improbable,  and  even  cousin-german  to  impos 
sible.  So  that  the  assurance  hereof  is  like  a 
machine  composed  of  an  innumerable  multi 
tude  of  pieces,  of  which  it  is  strangely  unlikely 
but  some  will  be  out  of  order;  and  yet,  if  any 
piece  be  so,  the  whole  fabric  falls  of  necessity 
to  the  ground:  and  he  that  shall  put  them  to 
gether,  and  maturely  consider  all  the  possible 
ways  of  lapsing  and  nullifying  a  priesthood  in 
ihe  Church  of  Rome,  will  be  very  inclinable  to 
think  that  it  is  a  hundred  to  one,  that  among  a 
hundred  seeming  priests,  there  is  not  one  true 
one;  nay,  that  it  is  not  a  thing  very  improba 
ble  that,  amongst  those  many  millions  which 
make  up  the  Romish  hierarchy,  there  are  not 
twenty  true."  We  do  not  pretend  to  know  to 
what  precise  extent  the  canonists  of  Oxford 
agree  with  those  of  Rome  as  to  the  circum 
stances  which  nullify  orders.  We  will  not, 
therefore,  go  so  far  as  Chillingxvorth.  We 
only  say  that  we  see  no  satisfactory  proof  of 
the  fact,  that  the  Church  of  England  possesses 
the  apostolical  succession.  And,  after  all,  if 
Mr.  Gladstone  could  prove  the  apostolical  suc 
cession,  what  would  the  apostolical  succession 
prove?  He  says  that  "  we  have  among  us  the 
ordained  hereditary  witnesses  of  the  truth,  con 
veying  it  to  us  through  an  unbroken  series  from 
our  Lord  Jesus  Chr'.st  and  his  apostles."  Is 
this  the  fact?  Is  there  any  doubt  that  the  or 
ders  of  the  Church  of  England  are  generally 
derived  from  the  Church  of  Rome  ?  Does  not 
the  Church  of  England  declare,  does  not  Mr. 
Gladstone  himself  admit,  that  the  Church  of 
Rome  teaches  much  error  and  condemns  much 
truth  ?  And  is  it  not  quite  clear,  that  as  far  as 
the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of  England  differ 
from  those  of  the  Church  of  Rome,  so  far  the 
Church  of  England  conveys  the  truth  through 
a  broken  series  ? 

That  the  Reformers,  lay  and  clerical,  of  the 
Church  of  England,  corrected  all  that  required 
correction  in  the  doctrines  of  the  Church  of 
Rome,  and  nothing  more,  may  be  quite  true. 
But  we  never  can  admit  the  circumstance,  that 
the  Church  of  England  possesses  the  apostoli 
cal  succession  as  a  proof  that  she  is  thus  per- 
feet.  No  stream  can  rise  higher  than  its  foun 
tain.  The  succession  of  ministers  in  the 
Church  of  England,  derived  as  it  is  through 
the  Church  of  Rome,  can  never  prove  more 
for  the  Church  of  England  than  it  proves  for 
the  Church  of  Rome.  But  this  is  not  all.  The 
Arian  Churches  which  once  predominated  in 
the  kingdoms  of  the  Ostrogoths,  the  Visigoths, 
the  Burgundians,  the  Vandals,  and  the  Lom 
bards,  were  all  Episcopal  Churches,  and  all 
had  a  fairer  claim  than  that  of  England  to  the 
apostolical  succession,  as  being  much  nearer 
to  the  apostolical  times.  In  the  East,  the 
Greek  Church,  which  is  at  variance  on  points 
of  faith  with  all  the  Western  Churches,  has 
an  equal  claim  to  this  succession.  The  Nes- 
torian,  the  Eutychian,  the  Jacobite  Churches- 
all  heretical,  all  condemned  by  Councils  of 
which  even  Protestant  divines  have  generally 
spoken  with  respect — had  an  equal  claim  to  the 
apostolical  succession.  Now  if,  of  teachers 
having  apostolical  orders,  a  vast  majority  have 
taught  much  error,— if  a  large  proportion  have 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


395 


taught  deadly  heresy — !f,  on  the  other  hand,  as 
Mr.  Gladstone  himself  admits,  churches  not 
having  apostolical  orders — that  of  Scotland, 
for  example — have  been  nearer  to  the  standard 
of  orthodoxy  than  the  majority  of  teachers  who 
have  had  apostolical  orders — how  can  he  pos 
sibly  call  upon  us  to  submit  our  private  judg 
ment  to  the  authority  of  a  Church,  on  the 
ground  that  she  has  these  orders  1 

Mr.  Gladstone  dwells  much  on  the  import 
ance  of  unity  in  doctrine.  Unity,  he  tells  us, 
is  essential  to  truth.  And  this  is  most  unques 
tionable.  But  when  he  goes  on  to  tell  us  that 
this  unity  is  the  characteristic  of  the  Church 
of  England,  that  she  is  one  in  body  and  in 
spirit,  we  are  compelled  to  differ  from  him 
widely.  The  apostolical  succession  she  may 
or  may  not  have.  But  unity  she  most  certainly 
has  not,  and  never  has  had.  It  is  a  matter  of 
perfect  notoriety,  that  her  formularies  are 
framed  in  such  a  manner  as  to  admit  to  her 
highest  offices  men  who  differ  from  each  other 
more  widely  than  a  very  high  Churchman  dif 
fers  from  a  Catholic,  or  a  very  low  Church 
man  from  a  Presbyterian  ;  and  that  the  general 
leaning  of  the  Church,  with  respect  to  some 
important  questions,  has  been  sometimes  one 
way  and  sometimes  another.  Take,  for  ex 
ample,  the  questions  agitated  between  the  Cal- 
vinists  and  the  Arminians.  Do  we  find  in  the 
Church  of  England,  with  respect  to  those  ques 
tions,  that  unity  which  is  essential  to  Jruth  1 
Was  it  ever  found  in  the  Church  ?  Is  it  not 
certain  that,  at  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
the  rulers  of  the  Church  held  doctrines  as  Cal- 
vinistic  as  ever  were  held  by  any  Cameronian, 
and  not  only  held  them,  but  persecuted  every 
body  who  did  not  hold  them  7  And  is  it  not 
equally  certain,  that  the  rulers  of  the  Church 
have,  in  very  recent  times,  considered  Calvin 
ism  as  a  disqualification  for  high  preferment, 
if  not  for  holy  orders  1  Look  at  Archbishop 
Whitgift's  Lambeth  Articles — Articles  in  which 
the  doctrine  of  reprobation  is  affirmed  in  terms 
strong  enough  for  William  Huntington,  S.  S. 
And  then  look  at  the  eighty-seven  questions 
which  Bishop  Marsh,  within  our  own  memory, 
propounded  to  candidates  for  ordination.  We 
should  be  loath  to  say  that  either  of  these  cele 
brated  prelates  had  intruded  into  a  Church 
whose  doctrines  he  abhorred,  and  deserved  to 
be  stripped  of  his  gown.  Yet  it  is  quite  cer 
tain,  that  one  or  the  other  of  them  must  have 
been  very  greatly  in  error.  John  Wesley 
again,  and  Cowper's  friend,  John  Newton, 
were  both  presbyters  of  this  Church.  Both 
were  men  of  talents.  Both  we  believe  to  have 
been  men  of  rigid  integrity — men  who  would 
not  have  subscribed  a  Confession  of  Faith 
which  thev  disbelieved  for  the  richest  bishop 
ric  in  the  empire.  Yet,  on  the  subject  of  pre 
destination,  Newton  was  strongly  attached  to 
doctrines  which  Wesley  designated  as  "  blas 
phemy,  which  might  make  the  ears  of  a  Chris 
tian  to  tingle."  Indeed,  it  will  not  be  disputed 
that  the  clergy  of  the  Established  Church  are 
divided  as  to  these  questions,  and  that  her  for 
mularies  are  not  found  practically  to  exclude 
even  scrupulously  honest  men  of  both  sides 
from  her  altars.  It  is  notorious  that  some  of 


her  most  distinguished  rulers  ihink  this  lati 
tude  a  good  thing,  and  would  be  sorry  to  see 
it  restricted  in  favour  of  either  opinion.  And 
herein  we  most  cordially  agree  with  them. 
But  what  becomes  of  the  unity  of  the  Church, 
and  of  that  truth  to  which  unity  is  essential  1 
Mr.  Gladstone  telte  us  that  the  Regium  Donum, 
was  given  originally  to  orthodox  Presbyterian 
ministers,  but  that  part  of  it  is  now  received 
by  their  heterodox  successors.  "  This,"  he 
says,  "serves  to  illustrate  the  difficulties  in 
which  governments  entangle  themselves,  when 
they  covenant  with  arbitrary  systems  of  opi 
nion,  and  not  with  the  Church  alone.  The 
opinion  passes  away,  but  the  gift  remains." 
But  is  it  not  clear,  that  if  a  strong  Supralapsan 
had,  under  Whitgift's  primacy,  left  a  large 
estate  at  the  disposal  of  the  bishops  for  eccle 
siastical  purposes,  in  the  hope  that  the  rulers 
of  the  Church  would  abide  by  the  Lambeth 
Articles,  he  would  really  have  been  giving  his 
substance  for  the  support  of  doctrines  which 
he  detested  1  The  opinion  would  have  passed 
away,  and  the  gift  would  have  remained. 

This  is  only  a  single  instance.  What  wide 
differences  of  opinion  respecting  the  operation 
of  the  sacraments  are  held  by  bishops  and 
presbyters  of  the  Church  of  England — all  men 
who  have  conscientiously  declared  their  assent 
to  her  articles — all  men  who  are,  according  to 
Mr.  Gladstone,  ordained  hereditary  witnesses 
of  the  truth — all  men  whose  voices  make  up 
what  he  tells  us  is  the  voice  of  true  and  rea 
sonable  authority  !  Here,  again,  the  Church 
has  not  unity;  and  as  unity  is  the  essential 
condition  of  truth,  the  Church  has  not  the 
truth. 

Nay,  take  the  very  question  which  we  are 
discussing  with  Mr.  Gladstone.  To  what  ex 
tent  does  the  Church  of  England  allow  of  the 
right  of  private  judgment?  What  degree  of 
authority  does  she  claim  for  herself  in  virtue 
of  the  apostolical  succession  of  her  ministers? 
Mr.  Gladstone,  a  very  able  and  a  very  honest 
man,  takes  a  view  of  this  matter  widely  dif 
fering  from  the  view  taken  by  others  whom  he 
will  admit  to  be  as  able  and  honest  as  himself. 
People  who  altogether  dissent  from  him  on  this 
subject  eat  the  bread  of  the  Church,  preach  in 
her  pulpits,  dispense  her  sacraments,  confer 
her  orders,  and  carry  on  that  apostolic  suc 
cession,  the  nature  and  importance  of  which, 
according  to  him,  they  do  not  comprehend. 
Is  this  unity  ?  Is  this  truth  ? 

It  will  be  observed  that  we  are  not  putting 
cases  of  dishonest  men,  who,  for,  the  sake  of 
lucre,  falsely  pretend  to  believe  in  the  doc 
trines  of  an  establishment.  We  are  putting 
ases  of  men  as  upright  as  ever  lived,  who, 
differing  on  theological  questions  of  the  highest 
importance,  and  avowing  that  difference,  are 
yet  priests  and  prelates  of  the  same  Church 
We  therefore  say,  that,  on  some  points  which 
Mr.  Gladstone  himself  thinks  of  vital  import 
ance,  the  Church  has  either  not  spoken  at  all, 
or,  what  is  for  all  practical  purposes  the  same 
thing,  has  not  spoken  in  language  to  be  under 
stood  even  by  honest  and  sagacious  divines. 
The  religion  of  the  Church  of  England  is  so 
far  from  exhibiting  that  unity  of  doctrio- 


SUG 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Mr.  Gladstone  represents  as  her  dis-  I 
linguishing  glory,  that  it  is,  in  fact,  a  bundle  j 
of  religious  systems  without  number.     It  com-  i 
prises  the  religious  system  of  Bishop  Tomline  ! 
and  the  religious  system  of  John  Newton,  and  j 
all   the  religious  systems  which  lie  between  j 
them.     It  comprises   the  religious  system  of  i 
Mr.  Newman  and  the  religious  system  of  the  i 
Archbishop  of  Dublin,  and  all  the  religious  j 
systems  which  lie  between  them.      All  these 
different  opinions  are  held,  avowed,  preached, 
printed,  within  the  pale  of  the  Church,  by  men 
of  unquestioned  integrity  and  understanding. 

Do  we  make  this  diversity  a  topic  of  re 
proach  to  the  Church  of  England?  Far  from 
it.  We  would  oppose  with  all  our  power  every  j 
attempt  :o  narrow  her  basis.  Would  to  God  ! 
that  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  a  good  king  | 
and  a  good  primate  had  possessed  the  power 
as  well  as  the  will  to  widen  it.  It  was  a  noble 
enterprise,  worthy  of  William  and  of  Tillotson. 
But  what  becomes  of  all  Mr.  Gladstone's  elo 
quent  exhortations  to  unity  1  Is  it  not  mere 
mockery  to  attach  so  much  importance  to  unity 
in  form  and  name,  where  there  is  so  little  in 
substance — to  shudder  at  the  thought  of  two 
churches  in  alliance  with  one  state,  and  to  en 
dure  with  patience  the  spectacle  of  a  hundred 
sects  battling  within  one  church  1  And  is  it 
not  clear  that  Mr.  Gladstone  is  bound,  on  all 
his  own  principles,  to  abandon  the  defence  of 
a  church  in  which  unity  is  not  found  ?  Is  it 
not  ck:ar  that  he  is  bound  to  divide  the  House 
of  Commons  against  every  grant  of  money 
which  may  be  proposed  for  the  clergy  of  the 
Established  Church  in  the  colonies]  He  ob 
jects  to  the  vote  for  Maynooth,  because  it  is 
monstrous  to  pay  one  man  to  teach  truth,  and 
another  to  denounce  that  truth  as  falsehood. 
But  it  is  a  mere  chance  whether  any  sum 
which  he  votes  for  the  English  Church  in  any 
dependency  will  go  to  the  maintenance  of  an 
Arminian  or  a  Calvinist,  of  a  man  like  Mr. 
Froude  or  of  a  man  like  Dr.  Arnold.  It  is  a 
mere  chance,  therefore,  whether  it  will  go  to 
support  a  teacher  of  truth,  or  one  who  will  de 
nounce  that  truth  as  falsehood. 

This  argument  seems  to  us  at  once  to  dispose 
of  all  that  part  of  Mr.  Gladstone's  book  which 
respects  grants  of  public  money  to  dissenting 
bodies.  All  such  grants  he  condemns.  But 
surely  if  it  be  wrong  to  give  the  money  of 
the  public  for  the  support  of  those  who  teach 
any  false  doctrine,  it  is  wrong  to  give  that 
money  for  the  support  of  the  ministers  of  the 
Established  *Church.  For  it  is  quite  certain 
that,  whether  Calvin  or  Arminius  be  in  the 
right,  whether  Laud  or  Burnet  be  in  the  right, 
a  great  deal  of  false  doctrine  is  taught  by  the 
ministers  of  the  Established  Church.  If  it  be 
said  that  the  points  on  which  the  clergy  of  the 
Church  differ  ought  to  be  passed  over,  for  the 
sake  of  the  many  important  points  on  which 
they  agree,  why  may  not  the  same  argument 
be  maintained  with  respect  to  other  sects  which 
hold  in  common  with  the  Church  of  England 
the  fundamental  doctrines  of  Christianity? 
The  principle,  that  a  ruler  is  bound  in  con 
science  to  propagate  religious  truth,  and  to 
propagate  no  religious  doctrine  which  is  un 
true,  is  abandoned  as  soon  as  it  is  admitted 


that  a  gentlemen  of  Mr.  Gladstone's  opinions 
may  lawfully  vote  the  public  money  to  a  chap 
lain  whose  opinions  are  those  of  Paley  or  of 
Simeon.  The  question  then  becomes  one  of 
degree.  Of  course,  no  individual  and  ro  go 
vernment  can  justifiably  propagate  error  for 
the  sake  of  propagating  error.  But  both  indi 
viduals  and  governments  must  work  with  such 
machinery  as  they  have;  and  no  human  ma 
chinery  is  to  be  found  which  will  impart  truth 
without  some  alloy  of  error.  We  have  shown 
irrefragably,  as  we  think,  that  the  Church  of 
England  does  not  afford  such  a  machinery. 
The  question  then  is,  with  what  degree  of  im 
perfection  in  our  machinery  must  we  put  up? 
And  to  this  question  we  do  not  see  how  any 
general  answer  can  be  given.  We  must  be 
guided  by  circumstances.  It  would,  for  exam 
ple,  be  very  criminal  in  a  Protestant  to  con 
tribute  to  the  sending  of  Jesuit  missionaries 
among  a  Protestant  population.  But  we  do 
not  conceive  that  a  Protestant  would  be  to 
blame  for  giving  assistance  to  Jesuit  mission 
aries  who  might  be  engaged  in  converting  the 
Siamese  to  Christianity.  That  tares  are  mixed 
with  the  wheat  is  matter  of  regret;  but  it  is 
better  that  wheat  and  tares  should  grow  toge 
ther  than  that  the  promise  of  the  year  should 
be  blighted. 

Mr.  Gladstone,  we  see  with  deep  regret,  cen 
sures  the  British  government  in  India  for  dis 
tributing  a  small  sum  among  the  Catholic 
priests  who  minister  to  the  spiritual  wants  of 
our  Irish  soldiers.  Now,  let  us  put  a  case  to 
him.  A  Protestant  gentleman  is  attended  by 
a  Catholic  servant,  in  a  part  of  the  country 
where  there  is  no  Catholic  congregation  within 
many  miles.  The  servant  is  taken  ill,  and  is 
given  over.  He  desires,  in  great  trouble  of 
mind,  to  receive  the  last  sacraments  of  his 
Church.  His  master  sends  oft' a  messenger  in 
a  chaise-and-four,  with  orders  to  bring  a  con 
fessor  from  a  town  at  a  considerable  distance. 
Here  a  Protestant  lays  out  money  for  the  pur 
pose  of  causing  religious  instruction  and  con 
solation  to  be  given  by  a  Catholic  priest. 

Has  he  committed  a  sin  ?     Has  he  not  acted 
like  a   good   master  and   a  good  Christian] 
Would  Mr.  Gladstone  accuse  him  of  "  laxity  of 
religious    principle,"   of   "confounding   truth 
with  falsehood,"  of  "considering  the  support 
of  religion  as  a  boon  to  an  individual,  not  as  a 
homage  to  truth?"     But  how  if  this  servant 
had,  for  the  sake  of  his  master,  undertaken  a 
journey  which  removed  him  from  the  place 
where  he  might  easily  have  obtained  a  reli 
gious  attendance?     How  if  his  death  were  oc 
casioned  by  a  wound  received  in  defending 
his    master?       Should  we  not    then  say  that 
the  master  had  only  fulfilled  a  sacred  obliga.- 
tion  of  duty.       Now,  Mr.  Gladstone  himself 
owns  that  "nobody  can  think  that  the  person 
ality  of  the  state  is  more  stringent,  or  entails 
stronger  obligations,  than  that  of  the  individu- 
|  al."     How  then  stands  the  case  of  the  Indian 
j  government?     Here  is  a  poor  fellow,  enlisted 
j  in  Clare  or  Kerry,  sent  over  fifteen  thousand 
|  miles  of  sea,  quartered  in  a  depressing  and 
1  pestilential  climate.     He  fights  for  the  govern- 
|  ment;  he  conquers  for  it:  he  is  wounded;  he 
i  is  laid  on  his  pallet,  withering  away  with  fever, 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


397 


under  that  terrible  sun,  without  a  friend  near 
him.  He  pines  for  the  consolations  of  that  re 
ligion  which,  neglected  perhaps  in  the  season 
of  health  and  vigour,  now  comes  back  to  his 
mind,  associated  with  all  the  overpowering 
recollections  of  his  earlier  days,  and  of  the 
home  which  he  is  never  to  see  again.  And 
because  the  state  for  which  he  dies  sends  a 
priest  of  his  own  faith  to  stand  at  his  bedside, 
and  to  tell  him,  in  language  which  at  once  com 
mands  his  love  and  confidence,  of  the  common 
Father,  of  the  common  Redeemer,  of  the  com 
mon  hope  of  immortality, — because  the  state 
for  which  he  dies  does  not  abandon  him  in  his 
last  moments  to  the  care  of  heathen  attendants, 
or  employ  a  chaplain  of  a  different  creed  to 
vex  his  departing  spirit,  with  a  controversy 
about  the  Council  of  Trent, — Mr.  Gladstone 
finds  that  India  presents  a  "melancholy  pic 
ture,"  and  that  there  is  "a  large  allowance  of 
false  principle"  in  the  system  pursued  there. 
Most  earnestly  do  we  hope  that  our  remarks 
may  induce  Mr.  Gladstone  to  reconsider  this 
part  of  his  work,  and  may  prevent  him  from 
expressing  in  that  high  assembly  in  which  he 
must  always  be  heard  with  attention,  opinions 
so  unworthy  of  his  character. 

We  have  now  said  almost  all  that  we  think 
it  necessary  to  say  respecting  Mr.  Gladstone's 
theory.  And  perhaps  it  would  be  safest  for  us 
to  stop  here.  It  is  much  easier  to  pull  down 
than  to  build  up.  Yet,  that  we  may  give  Mr. 
Gladstone  his  revenge,  we  will  state  concisely 
our  own  views  respecting  the  alliance  of 
Church  and  State. 

We  set  out  in  company  with  Warburton, 
and  remain  with  him  pretty  sociably  till  we 
come  to  his  contract,  a  contract  which  Mr. 
Gladstone  very  properly  designates  as  a  fic 
tion.  We  consider  the  primary  end  of  govern 
ment  as  a  purely  temporal  end — the  protection 
of  the  persons  and  property  of  men. 

Wre  think  that  government,  like  every  other 
contrivance  of  human  wisdom,  from  the  high 
est  to  the  lowest,  is  likely  to  answer  its  main 
end  best  when  it  is  constructed  with  a  single 
view  to  that  end.  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  loves 
Plato,  will  not  quarrel  with  us  for  illustrating 
our  proposition,  after  Plato's  fashion,  from  the 
most  familiar  objects.  Take  cutlery,  for  ex 
ample.  A  blade  which  is  designed  both  to 
shave  and  to  carve  will  certainly  not  shave  so 
well  as  a  razor  or  carve  so  well  as  a  carving- 
knife.  An  academy  of  painting,  which  should 
also  be  a  bank,  would,  in  all  probability,  ex 
hibit  very  bad  pictures  and  discount  very  bad 
bills.  A  gas  company,  which  should  also  be 
an  infant  school  society,  would,  we  apprehend, 
light  the  streets  ill,  and  teach  the  children 
On  this  principle,  we  think  that  government 
should  be  organized  solely  with  a  view  to  its 
main  end;  and  that  no  part  of  its  efficiency  for 
that  end  should  be  sacrificed  in  order  to  pro 
mote  any  other  end  however  excellent. 

But  does  it  follow  from  hence  that  govern 
ments  ought  never  to  promote  any  other  end 
than  their  main  end!  In  nowise.  Though 
it  is  desirable  that  every  institution  should 
have  a  main  end,  and  should  be  so  formed  as 
to  be  in  the  highest  degree  efficient  for  that 


main  end ;  yet  if,  without  any  sacrifice  of  its 
efficiency  for  that  end,  it  can  promote  any 
other  good  end,  it  ought  to  do  so.  Thus,  the 
end  for  which  an  hospital  is  built  is  the  relief 
of  tht  sick,  not  the  beautifying  of  the  street. 
To  sacrifice  the  health  of  the  sick  to  splen 
dour  of  architectural  effect — to  place  the  build 
ing  in  a  bad  air  only  that  it  may  present  a  more 
commanding  front  to  a  great  public  place — to 
make  the  wards  hotter  or  cooler  than  they 
ought  to  be,  in  order  that  the  columns  and 
windows  of  the  exterior  may  please  the  pass 
ers-by,  would  be  monstrous.  But  if,  without 
any  sacrifice  of  the  chief  object,  the  hospital 
can  be  made  an  ornament  to  the  metropolis,  it 
would  be  absurd  not  to  make  it  so. 

In  the  same  manner,  if  a  government  can, 
without  any  sacrifice  of  its  main  end,  promote 
any  other  good  end,  it  ought  to  do  so.  The  en 
couragement  of  the  fine  arts,  for  example,  is  by 
no  means  the  main  end  of  government;  and  it 
would  be  absurd,  in  constituting  a  government, 
to  bestow  a  thought  on  the  question,  whether  it 
would  be  a  government  likely  to  train  Ra 
phaels  and  Domenichinos.  But  it  by  no  means 
follows  that  it  is  improper  for  a  government 
to  form  a  national  gallery  of  pictures.  The 
same  may  be  said  of  patronage  bestowed  on 
learned  men — of  the  publication  of  archives  • 
of  the  collecting  of  Libraries,  menageries,  plants, 
fossils,  antiques — of  journeys  and  voyages  foi 
purposes  of  geographical  discovery  or  astro 
nomical  observation.  It  is  not  for  these  ends 
that  government  is  constituted.  But  it  may 
well  happen  that  a  government  may  have  at 
its  command  resources  \vhich  will  enable  it, 
without  any  injury  to  its  main  end,  to  serve 
these  collateral  ends  far  more  effectually  than 
any  individual  or  any  voluntary  association, 
could  do.  If  so,  government  ought  to  serve 
these  collateral  ends. 

It  is  still  more  evidently  the  duty  of  govern 
ment  to  promote — always  in  subordination  to 
its  main  end — every  thing  which  is  useful  as  a 
means  for  the  attaining  of  that  main  end.  The 
improvement  of  steam  navigation,  for  example, 
is  by  no  means  a  primary  object  of  govern 
ment.  But  as  steam-vessels  are  useful  for  the 
purpose  of  national  defence,  and  for  the  pur 
pose  of  facilitating  intercourse  between  distant 
provinces,  and  thereby  consolidating  the  force 
of  the  empire,  it  may  be  the  bounden  duty  of 
government  to  encourage  ingenious  men  to 
perfect  an  invention  which  so  directly  tends  to 
make  the  state  more  efficient  for  its  great  pri 
mary  end. 

Now,  on  both  these  grounds,  the  instruction 
of  the  people  may  with  propriety  engage  the 
care  of  the  government.  That  the  people 
should  be  well  educated  is  in  itself  a  good 
thing;  and  the  state  ought  therefore  to  promote 
this  object,  if  it  can  do  so  without  any  sacrifice 
of  its  primary  object.  The  education  of  the 
people,  conducted  on  those  principles  of  mo 
rality  which  are  common  to  all  the  forms  of 
Christianity,  is  highly  valuable  as  a  means  of 
promoting  the  main  end  for  which  government 
exists;  and  is  on  this  ground  an  object  well 
deserving  the  attention  of  rulers.  We*  will  noc 
at  present  go  into  the  general  question  of  evlti- 
2L 


308 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ration,  bin  will  confine  our  remarks  to  the 
subject  which  is  more  immediately  before  us, 
namely,  the  religious  instruction  of  the  people. 

We  may  illustrate  our  view  of  the  policy 
which  governments  ought  to  pursue  with  re 
spect  to  religious  instruction,  by  recurring  to 
the  analogy  of  an  hospital.  Religious  instruc 
tion  is  not  the  main  end  for  which  an  hospital 
is  built;  and  to  introduce  into  an  hospital  any 
regulations  prejudicial  to  the  health  of  the  pa 
tients,  on  the  plea  of  promoting  their  spiritual 
improvement — to  send  a  ranting  preacher  to  a 
man  who  has  just  been  ordered  by  the  physi 
cian  to  lie  quiet  and  try  to  get  a  little  sleep — to 
impose  a  strict  observance  of  Lent  on  a  con 
valescent  who  has  been  advised  to  eat  heartily 
of  nourishing  food — to  direct,  as  the  bigoted 
Pius  the  Fifth  actually  did,  that  no  medical  as 
sistance  should  be  given  to  any  person  who  de 
clined  spiritual  attendance — would  be  the  most 
extravagant  folly.  Yet  it.  by  no  means  follows 
that  it  would  not  be  right  to  have  a  chaplain  to 
attend  the  sick,  and  to  pay  such  a  chaplain  out 
of  the  hospital  funds.  Whether  it  will  be  pro 
per  to  have  such  a  chaplain  at  all,  and  of  what 
religious  persuasion  such  a  chaplain  ought  to 
be,  must  depend  on  circumstances.  There 
may  be  a  town  in  which  it  would  be  impossible 
to  set  up  a  good  hospital  without  the  help  of 
people  of  different  opinions.  And  religious 
parties  may  run  so  high  that,  though  people  of 
different  opinions  are  willing  to  contribute  for 
the  relief  of  the  sick,  they  will  not  concur  in 
the  choice  of  any  one  chaplain.  The  High 
Churchmen  insist  that,  if  there  is  a  paid  chap 
lain,  he  shall  be  a  High  Churchman.  The 
Evangelicals  stickle  for  an  Evangelical.  Here 
it  would  evidently  be  absurd  and  cruel  to  let  a 
useful  and  humane  design,  about  which  all  are 
agreed,  fall  to  the  ground,  because  all  cannot 
agree  about  something  else.  The  governors 
must  either  appoint  two  chaplains,  and  pay 
them  both,  or  they  must  appoint  none ;  and 
every  one  of  them  must,  in  his  individual  ca 
pacity,  do  what  he  can  for  the  purpose  of  pro 
viding  the  sick  with  such  religious  instruction 
and  consolation  as  will,  in  his  opinion,  be  most 
useful  to  them. 

We  should  say  the  same  of  government. 
Government  is  not  an  institution  for  the  pro 
pagation  of  religion,  any  more  than  St.  George's 
Hospital  is  an  institution  for  the  propagation 
of  religion.  And  the  most  absurd  and  perni 
cious  consequences  would  follow,  if  govern 
ment  should  pursue,  as  its  primary  end,  that 
which  can  never  be  more  than  its  secondary 
end;  though  intrinsically  more  important  than 
its  primary  end.  Cut  a  government  which  con 
siders  the  religious  instruction  of  the  people 
as  a  secondary  end,  and  follows  out  that  prin 
ciple  faithfully,  will,  we  think,  be  likely  to  do 
much  good,  and  little  harm. 

We  will  rapidly  run.  over  some  of  the  conse 
quences  to  which  this  principle  leads,  and 
point  out  how  it  solves  some  problems  which, 
on  Mr.  Gladstone's  hypothesis,  admit  of  no  sa 
tisfactory  solution. 

All  persecution  directed  against  the  persons 
c«r  property  of  men  is,  on  our  principle,  obvi- 
*usiy  ii; defensible.  For  the  protection  of  the 


persons  and  property  of  men  being  the  primary 
end  of  government,  and  religious  instruction 
only  a  secondary  end,  to  secure  the  people 
from  heresy  by  making  their  lives,  their  limbs, 
or  their  estates  insecure,  would  be  to  sacrifice 
the  primary  end  to  the  secondary  end.  It  would 
be  as  absurd  as  it  would  be  in  the  governors 
of  an  hospital  to  direct  that  the  wounds  of  all 
Arian  and  Socinian  patients  should  be  dressed 
in  such  a  way  as  to  make  them  fester. 

Again,  on  our  principles,  all  civil  disabilities 
on  account  of  religious  opinions  are  indefensi 
ble.  For  all  such  disabilities  make  govern 
ment  less  efficient  for  its  main  end:  they  limit 
its  choice  of  able  men  for  the  administration 
and  defence  of  the  state  :  they  alienate  from  it 
the  hearts  of  the  sufferers;  they  deprive  it  of  a 
part  of  its  effective  strength  in  all  contests  with 
foreign  nations.  Such  a  course  is  as  absurd 
as  it  would  be  in  the  governors  of  an  hospital  to 
reject  an  able  surgeon  because  he  is  a  Univer 
sal  Restitutionist,  and  to  send  a  bungler  tc 
operate  because  he  is  perfectly  orthodox. 

Again,  on  our  principles,  no  government 
ought  to  press  on  the  people  religious  instruc 
tion,  however  sound,  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
excite  among  them  discontents  dangerous  to 
public  order.  For  here  again  government 
would  sacrifice  its  primary  end,  to  an  end  in 
trinsically  indeed  of  the  highest  importance, 
but  still  only  a  secondary  end  of  government, 
as  government.  This  rule  at  once  disposes  of 
the  difficulty  about  India — a  difficulty  of  which 
Mr.  Gladstone  can  get  rid  only  by  putting  in  an 
imaginary  discharge  in  order  to  set  aside  an 
imaginary  obligation.  There  is  assuredly  no 
country  where  it  is  more  desirable  that  Chris 
tianity  should  be  propagated.  But  there  is  no 
country  in  which  the  government  is  so  com 
pletely  disqualified  for  the  task.  By  using 
our  power  in  order  to  make  proselytes,  we 
should  produce  the  dissolution  of  society,  and 
bring  utter  ruin  on  all  those  interests  for  the 
protection  of  which  government  exists.  Here 
the  secondary  end  is,  at  present,  inconsistent 
with  the  primary  end,  and  must  therefore  be 
abandoned.  Christian  instruction  given  by 
individuals  and  voluntary  societies  may  do 
much  good.  Given  by  the  government,  it 
would  do  unmixed  harm.  At  the  same  time, 
we  quite  agree  with  Mr.  Gladstone  in  thinking 
that  the  English  authorities  in  India  ought  not 
to  participate  in  any  idolatrous  rite;  and  in 
deed  we  are  fully  satisfied,  that  all  such  parti 
cipation  is  not  only  unchristian,  but  also  unwise 
and  most  undignified. 

Supposing  the  circumstances  of  a  country  to 
be  such,  that  the  government  may  with  pro 
priety,  on  our  principles,  give  religious  instruc 
tion  to  a  people :  the  next  question  is,  what 
religion  shall  be  taught?  Bishop  Warbnrton. 
answers,  the  religion  of  the  majority.  And  we 
so  far  agree  with  him,  that  we  can  scarcely 
conceive  any  circumstances  in  which  it  would 
be  proper  to  establish,  as  the  one  exclusive 
religion  of  the  state,  the  religion  of  the  mino 
rity.  Such  a  preference  could  hardly  be  given 
without  exciting  most  serious  discontent,  and 
endangering  those  interests  the  protection  of 
which  is  the  first  object  of  government.  Bu' 


CHURCH  AND  STATE. 


399 


we  never  can  admit  that  a  ruler  can  be  justi 
fied  in  assisting  to  spread  a  system  of  opinions 
solely  because  that  system  is  pleasing  to  the 
majority.  On  the  other  hand,  we  cannot  agree  • 
with  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  would  of  course  I 
answer  that  the  only  religion  which  a  ruler 
ought  to  propagate,  is  the  religion  of  his  own  i 
conscience.  In  truth,  this  is  an  impossibility. ! 
And,  as  we  have  shown,  Mr.  Gladstone  himself, 
whenever  he  supports  a  grant  of  money  to  the 
Church  of  England,  is  really  assisting  to  pro 
pagate,  not  the  precise  religion  of  his  own 
conscience,  but  some  one  or  more,  he  knows 
not  how  many  or  which,  of  the  innumerable 
religions  which  lie  between  the  confines  of 
Pelagianism  and  those  of  Antinomianism,  and 
between  the  confines  of  Popery  and  those  of 
Presbyterianism.  In  our  opinion,  that  reli 
gious  instruction  which  the  ruler  ought,  in  his 
public  capacity,  to  patronise,  is  the  instruction 
from  which  he,  in  his  conscience,  believes  that 
the  people  will  learn  most  good  with  the  small 
est  mixture  of  evil.  And  thus  it  is  not  neces 
sarily  his  own  religion  that  he  vrill  select.  He 
will,  of  course,  believe  that  his  own  religion  is 
unmixedly  good.  But  the  question  which  he 
has  to  consider  is,  not  how  much  good  his  reli 
gion  contains,  but  how  much  good  the  people 
will  learn,  if  instruction  is  given  them  in  that 
religion.  He  may  prefer  the  doctrines  and 
government  of  the  Church  of  England  to  those 
of  the  Church  of  Scotland.  But  if  he  knows 
that  a  Scotch  congregation  will  listen  with  deep 
attention  and  respect  while  an  Erskine  or  a 
Chalmers  set  before  them  the  fundamental  doc 
trines  of  Christianity,  and  that  the  glimpse  of  a 
cassock  or  a  single  line  of  a  liturgy  would  be 
the  signal  for  hooting  and  riot,  and  would  pro 
bably  bring  stools  and  brick-bats  about  the  ears 
of  the  minister;  he  acts  wisely  if  he  conveys 
religious  knowledge  to  the  Scotch  rather  by 
means  of  that  imperfect  Church,  as  he  may 
think  it,  from  which  they  will  learn  much,  than 
by  means  of  that  perfect  Church,  from  which 
they  will  learn  nothing.  The  only  end  of 
teaching  is,  that  men  may  learn  ;  and  it  is  idle 
to  talk  of  the  duty  of  teaching  truth  in  ways 
which  only  cause  men  to  cling  more  firmly  to 
falsehood. 

On  these  principles  we  conceive  that  a 
statesman,  who  might  be  far,  indeed,  from  re 
garding  the  Church  of  England  with  the  reve 
rence  which  Mr.  Gladstone  feels  for  her,  might 
yet  firmly  oppose  all  attempts  to  destroy  her. 
Such  a  statesman  may  be  far  too  well  acquaint 
ed  with  her  origin  to  look  upon  her  with 
superstitious  awe.  He  may  know  that  she 
sprang  from  a  compromise  huddled  up  between 
the  eager  zeal  of  reformers  and  the  selfishness 
« f  greedy,  ambitious,  and  time-serving  politi 
cians.  He  may  find  in  every  page  of  her  annals 
ample  cause  for  censure.  He  may  feel  that  he 
could  not,  with  ease  to  his  conscience,  sub 
scribe  to  all  her  articles.  He  may  regret  that 
all  the  attempts  which  have  been  made  to  open 
her  gates  to  large  classes  of  nonconformists 
should  have  failed.  Her  episcopal  polity  he 
may  consider  as  of  purely  human  institution. 
He  cannot  defend  her  on  the  ground  that  she 
posserses  the  apostolical  succession ;  for  he 


does  not  know  whether  that  succession  may 
not  be  altogether  a  fable.  He  cannot  defend 
her  on  the  ground  of  her  unity;  for  he  knows 
that  her  frontier  sects  are  much  more  remote 
from  each  other,  than  one  frontier  is  from  th* 
Church  of  Rome,  or  the  other  from  the  Church 
of  Geneva.  But  he  may  think  that  she  teaches 
more  truth  with  less  alloy  of  error  than  would 
be  taught  by  those  who,  if  she  were  swept 
away,  would  occupy  the  vacant  space.  He 
may  think  that  the  eflect  produced  by  her 
beautiful  services  and  by  her  pulpits  on  the 
national  mind,  is,  on  the  whole,  highly  benefi 
cial.  He  may  think  that  her  civilizing  in 
fluence  is  usefully  felt  in  remote  districts.  He 
may  think  that,  if  she  were  destroyed,  a  large 
portion  of  those  who  now  compose  her  con 
gregations  would  neglect  all  religious  duties  ; 
and  that  a  still  larger  part  would  fall  under  the 
influence  of  spiritual  mountebanks,  hungry  for 
gain,  or  drunk  with  fanaticism.  While  he 
would  with  pleasure  admit  that  all  the  quali 
ties  of  Christian  pastors  are  to  be  found  in 
large  measure  within  the  existing  body  of  dis 
senting  ministers,  he  would  perhaps  be  inclined 
to  think  that  the  standard  of  intellectual  and 
moral  character  among  that  exemplary  class 
of  men  may  have  been  raised  to  its  present 
hight  point  and  maintained  there  by  the  indirect 
influence  of  the  Establishment.  And  he  may 
be  by  no  means  satisfied  that,  if  the  Church 
were  at  once  swept  away,  the  place  of  our 
Sumners  and  Whateleys  would  be  supplied  by 
Doddridges  and  Halls.  He  may  think  that  the 
advantages  which  we  have  described  are  ob 
tained,  or  might,  if  the  existing  system  were 
slightly  modified,  be  obtained,  without  any  sa 
crifice  of  the  paramount  objects  which  all 
governments  ought  to  have  chiefly  in  view. 
Nay,  he  may  be  of  opinion  that  an  institution 
so  deeply  fixed  in  the  hearts  and  minds  of  mil  • 
lions,  could  not  be  subverted  without  loosening 
and  shaking  all  tho  foundations  of  civil  society 
With  at  least  equal  ease  he  would  find  reason 
for  supporting  the  Church  of  Scotland.  Noi 
would  he  be  under  the  necessity  of  resorting 
to  any  contract  to  justify  the  connection  of 
two  religious  establishments  with  one  govern 
ment.  He  would  think  scruples  on  that  head 
frivolous  in  any  person  who  is  zealous  for  a 
Church,  of  which  both  Dr.  Herbert  Marsh  and 
Dr.  Daniel  Wilson  are  bishops.  Indeed,  he 
would  gladly  follow  out  his  principles  much 
further.  He  would  have  been  willing  to  vote 
in  1825  for  Lord  Francis  Egerton's  resolution, 
that  it  is  expedient  to  give  a  public  mainte 
nance  to  the  Catholic  clergy  of  Ireland ;  and 
he  would  deeply  regret  that  no  such  measure 
was  adopted  in  1829. 

In  this  way,  we  conceive,  a  statesman 
might,  on  our  principles,  satisfy  himself  that  it 
would  be  in  the  highest  degree  inexpedient  to 
abolish  the  Church,  either  of  England  or  of 
Scotland.  • 

But,  if  there  were,  in  any  part  of  the  world,  a 
national  church  regarded  as  heretical  by  four- 
fifths  of  the  nation  committed  to  its  care— a 
church  established  and  maintained  by  ths 
sword — a  church  producing  twice  as  many 
riots  as  conversions — a  church  which,  though 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


possessing  great  wealth  and  power,  and  though  I 
long  backed  by  persecuting  laws,  had,  in  the 
course  of  many  generations,  been  found  unable 
to  propagate  its  doctrines,  and  barely  able  to 
maintain  its  ground — a  church  so  odious,  that 
fraud  and  violence,  when  used  against  its  clear 
rights  of  property,  were  generally  regarded  as 
fair  play — a  church,  whose  ministers  were 
preaching  to  desolate  walls,  and  with  difficulty 
obtaining  their  lawful  subsistence  by  the  help 
of  bayonets — such  a  church,  on  our  principles, 
could  not,  we  must  own,  be  defended.  We 
should  say  that  the  state  which  allied  itself 
with  such  a  church,  postponed  the  primary  end 
of  government  to  the  secondary ;  and  that  the 
consequences  had  been  such  as  any  sagacious 
observer  would  have  predicted.  Neither  the 
primary  nor  the  secondary  end  is  attained. 
The  temporal  and  spiritual  interests  of  the 
people  suffer  alike.  The  minds  of  men,  in 
stead  of  being  drawn  to  the  church,  are  alien 
ated  from  the  state.  The  magistrate,  after 
sacrificing  order,  peace,  union,  all  the  interests 
which  it  is  his  first  duty  to  protect,  for  the  pur 
pose  of  promoting  pure  religion,  is  forced,  after 
the  experience  of  centuries,  to  admit  that  he 
has  really  been  promoting  error.  The  sounder 
the  doctrines  of  such  a  church — the  more  ab 
surd  and  noxious  the  superstition  by  which 
those  doctrines  are  opposed — the  stronger  are 


the  arguments  against  the  policy  which  has  de* 
pnved  a  good  cause  of  its  natural  advantages. 
Those  who  preach  to  rulers  the  duty  of  em 
ploying  power  to  propagate  truth  would  do 
well  to  remember  that  falsehood,  though  no 
match  for  truth  alone,  has  often  been  found 
more  than  a  match  for  truth  and  power  to 
gether. 

A  statesman,  judging  on  our  principles, 
would  pronounce  without  hesitation,  that  a 
church,  such  as  we  have  last  described,  never 
ought  to  have  been  set  up.  Further  than  this 
we  will  not  venture  to  speak  for  him.  He 
would  doubtless  remember  that  the  world  is 
full  of  institutions  which,  though  they  never 
ought  to  have  been  set  up,  yet  having  been  set 
up,  ought  not  to  be  rudely  pulled  down ;  and 
that  it  is  often  wise  in  practice  to  be  content 
with  the  mitigation  of  an  abuse  which,  looking 
at  it  in  the  abstract,  we  might  feel  impatient  to 
destroy. 

We  have  done ;  and  nothing  remains  but 
that  we  part  from  Mr.  Gladstone  with  the  cour 
tesy  of  antagonists  who  bear  no  malice.  We 
dissent  from  his  opinions,  but  we  admire  his 
talents;  we  respect  his  integrity  and  benevo 
lence  ;  and  we  hope  that  he  will  not  suffer 
political  avocations  so  entirely  to  engross  Irim, 
as  to  leave  him  no  leisure  for  literature  And  phi 
losophy. 


RANKE'S  HISTORY   OF   THE   POPES. 


401 


RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  POPES.* 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  OCTOBER,  1840.] 


IT  is  hardly  necessary  for  us  to  say,  that  this 
is  an  excellent  book  excellently  translated. 
The  original  work  of  Professor  Ranke  is  known 
and  esteemed  wherever  German  literature  is 
studied ;  and  has  been  found  interesting  even 
in  a  most  inaccurate  and  dishonest  French 
version.  It  is,  indeed,  the  work  of  a  mind  fit 
ted  both  for  minute  researches  and  for  large 
speculations.  It  is  written  also  in  an  admi 
rable  spirit,  equally  remote  from  levity  and 
bigotry  ;  serious  and  earnest,  yet  tolerant  and 
impartial.  It  is,  therefore,  with  the  greatest 
pleasure  that  we  now  see  it  take  its  place 
among  the  English  classics.  Of  the  transla 
tion  we  need  only  say,  that  it  is  such  as  might 
be  expected  from  the  skill,  the  taste,  and  the 
scrupulous  integrity  of  the  accomplished  lauy, 
who,  as  an  interpreter  between  the  mind  of 
Germany  and  the  mind  of  Britain,  has  already 
deserved  so  well  of  both  countries. 

The  subject  of  this  book  has  always  appear 
ed  to  us  singularly  interesting.  How  it  was 
that  Protestanism  did  so  much,  yet  did  no 
more — how  it  was  that  the  Church  of  Rome, 
having  lost  a  large  part  of  Europe,  not  only 
ceased  to  lose,  but  actually  regained  nearly 
half  of  what  she  had  lost — is  certainly  a  most 
curious  and  important  question ;  and  on  this 
question  Professor  Ranke  has  thrown  far  more 
light  than  any  other  person  who  has  written 
on  it. 

There  is  not,  and  there  never  was,  on  this 
earth,  a  work  of  human  policy  so  well  deserv 
ing  of  examination  as  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  The  history  of  that  Church  joins  to 
gether  the  two  great  ages  of  human  civiliza 
tion.  No  other  institution  is  left  standing 
which  carries  the  mind  back  to  the  times  when 
the  smoke  of  sacrifice  rose  from  the  Pantheon, 
and  when  camelopards  and  tigers  bounded  in 
the  Flavian  amphitheatre.  The  proudest  royal 
houses  are  but  of  yesterday,  when  compared 
with  the  line  of  the  Supreme  Pontiffs.  That 
line  we  trace  back  in  an  unbroken  series,  from 
the  Pope  who  crowned  Napoleon  in  the  nine 
teenth  century,  to  the  Pope  who  crowned  Pepin 
in  the  eighth  ;  and  far  beyond  the  time  of  Pepin 
the  august  dynasty  extends,  till  it  is  lost  in  the 
twilight  of  fable.  The  republic  of  Venice  came 
next  in  antiquity.  But  the  republic  of  Venice 
was  modern  when  compared  with  the  Papacy; 
and  the  republic  of  Venice  is  gone,  and  the 
Papacy  remains.  The  Papacy  remains,  not 
in  decay,  not  a  mere  antique ;  but  full  of  hie 
and  youthful  vigour.  The  Catholic  Church  is 


*  The  Ecclesiastical  and  Political  History  of  the  Popes 
«/  tionie,  during  the  Sixteenth  and  Seventeenth  Centuries. 
By  LEOPOLD  RANKS,  Professor  in  the  University  of 
Berlin  :  Translated  from  tlie  German,  by  SARAH  AUS 
TIN.  3  vo!s.  8vo.  London.  1840. 
VOL.  III.— 51 


still  sending  forth  to  the  furthest  ends  of  tk* 
world  missionaries  as  zealous  as  those  who 
landed  in  Kent  with  Augustin ;  and  still  con 
fronting  hostile  kings  with  the  same  spirit  with 
which  she  confronted  Attila.  The  number  of 
her  children  is  greater  than  in  any  former  age. 
Her  acquisitions  in  the  New  World  have  more 
than  compensated  her  for  what  she  has  lost  ia 
the  Old.  Her  spiritual  ascendency  extend 
over  the  vast  countries  which  lie  between  the 
plains  of  the  Missouri  and  Cape  Horn — coun 
tries  which,  a  century  hence,  may  not  impro 
bably  contain  a  population  as  large  as  that 
which  now  inhabits  Europe.  The  member* 
of  her  community  are  certainly  not  fewer  than; 
a  hundred  and  fifty  millions;  and  it  will  ba 
difficult  to  show  that  all  the  other  Christian 
sects  united  amount  to  a  hundred  and  twenty 
millions.  Nor  do  we  see  any  sign  which  indi 
cates  that  the  term  of  her  long  dominion  is 
approaching.  She  saw  the  commencement  of 
all  the  governments,  and  of  all  the  ecclesiasti 
cal  establishments,  that  now  exist  in  the  world; 
and  we  feel  no  assurance  that  she  is  not  des 
tined  to  see  the  end  of  them  all.  She  was 
great  aud  respected  before  the  Saxon  had  set 
foot  on  Britain — before  the  Frank  had  passed 
the  Rhine — when  Grecian  eloquence  still  nou 
rished  at  Antioch — when  idols  were  still  \vor> 
shipped  in  the  temple  of  Mecca.  And  she  may 
still  exist  in  undiminished  vigour  when  some 
traveller  from  New  Zealand  shall,  in  the  midst 
of  a  vast  solitude,  take  his  stand  on  a  brokea 
arch  of  London  Bridge  to  sketch  the  ruins  of 
St.  Paul's. 

We  often  hear  it  said  that  the  world  is  con 
stantly  becoming  more  and  more  enlightened, 
and  that  this  enlightening  must  be  favourable 
to  Protestantism,  and  unfavourable  to  Catho 
licism.  We  wish  that  we  could  think  so.  But 
we  see  great  reason  to  doubt  whether  this  be  * 
well-founded  expectation.  We  see  that  during 
the  last  two  hundred  and  fifty  years,  the  huraatt 
mind  has  been  in  the  highest  degree  active- 
that  it  has  made  great  advances  in  everj* 
branch  of  natural  philosophy — that  it  has  pro 
duced  innumerable  inventions  tending  to  pro 
mote  the  convenience  of  life — that  medicine, 
surgery,  chemistry,  engineering,  have  beeiw 
very  greatly  improved — that  government,  po- 
lice,  and  law  have  been  improved,  though  not 
quite  to  the  same  extent.  Yet  we  see  thai, 
during  these  two  hundred  and  fifty  years,  Pro' 
testantism  has  made  no  conquests  worth  speak 
ing  of.  Nay,  we  believe  that,  as  far  as  thena 
has  been  a  change,  that  change  has  been  m 
favour  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  We  cannot* 
therefore,  feel  confident  that  the  progress  w» 
knowledge  will  necessarily  be  fatal  to  a  sy»- 
tem  which  has,  to  say  the  least,  stood  i^ 
2  L  2 


402 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ground  in  spite  of  the  immense  progress  which 
knowledge  has  made  since  the  days  of  Queen 
Elizabeth. 

Indeed,  the  argument  which  we  are  consi 
dering  seems  to  us  to  be  founded  on  an  entire 
mistake.  There  are  branches  of  knowledge, 
Mrith  respect  to  which  the  law  of  the  human 
mind  is  progress.  In  mathematics,  when  once 
a  proposition  has  been  demonstrated,  it  is 
never  afterwards  contested.  Every  fresh  story 
s  as  solid  a  basis  for  a  new  superstructure  as 
the  original  foundation  was.  Here,  therefore, 
there  is  a  constant  addition  to  the  stock  of 
truth.  In  the  inductive  sciences  again,  the 
law  is  progress.  Every  day  furnishes  new 
facts,  and  thus  brings  theory  nearer  and  nearer 
to  perfection.  There  is  no  chance  that  either 
in  the  purely  demonstrative,  or  in  the  purely 
experimental  sciences,  the  world  will  ever  go 
back  or  even  remain  stationary.  Nobody 
ever  heard  of  a  reaction  against  Taylor's  theo 
rem,  or  of  a  reaction  against  Harvey's  doc 
trine  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood. 

But  with  theology  the  case  is  very  different. 
As  respects  natural  religion — revelation  being 
for  the  present  altogether  left  out  of  the  ques 
tion — it  is  not  easy  to  see  that  a  philosopher 
of  the  present  day  is  more  favourably  situated 
than  Thales  or  Simonides.  He  has  before  him 
just  the  same  evidences  of  design  in  the  struc 
ture  of  the  universe  which  the  early  Greeks 
had.  We  say  just  the  same;  for  the  discove 
ries  of  modern  astronomers  and  anatomists 
have  really  added  nothing  to  the  force  of  that 
argument  which  a  reflecting  mind  finds  in 
every  beast,  bird,  insect,  fish,  leaf,  flower,  and 
shell.  The  reasoning  by  which  Socrates,  in 
Xenophon's  hearing,  confuted  the  little  atheist 
Aristodemus,  is  exactly  the  reasoning  of  Pa- 
ley's  "Natural  Theology."  Socrates  makes 
precisely  the  same  use  of  the  statues  of  Poly- 
cletus  and  the  pictures  of  Zeuxis,  which  Paley 
makes  of  the  watch.  As  to  the  other  great 
question — the  question,  what  becomes  of  man 
after  death — we  do  not  see  that  a  highly  edu 
cated  European,  left  to  his  unassisted  reason, 
is  more  likely  to  be  in  the  right  than  a  Black- 
foot  Indian.  Not  a  single  one  of  the  many 
sciences  in  which  we  surpass  the  Blackfoot 
Indians,  throws  the  smallest  light  on  the  state 
of  the  soul  after  the  animal  life  is  extinct.  In 
truth,  all  the  philosophers,  ancient  and  modern, 
who  have  attempted,  without  the  help  of  reve 
lation  to  prove  the  immortality  of  man,  from 
Plato  down  to  Franklin,  appear  to  us  to  have 
iailed  deplorably. 

Then,  again,  all  the  great  enigmas  which 
perplex  the  natural  theologian  are  the  same  in 
all  ages.  The  ingenuity  of  a  people  just 
emeiiging  from  barbarism  is  quite  sufficient  to 
propound  them.  The  wisdom  of  Locke  or 
Clarke  is  quite  unable  to  solve  them.  It  is  a 
Mistake  to  imagine  that  subtle  speculations 
touching  the  Divine  attributes,  the  origin  of  evil, 
the  necessity  of  human  actions,  the  foundation 
of  moral  obligation,  imply  any  high  degree  of 
intellectual  culture.  Such  speculations,  on 
the  contrary,  are  in  a  peculiar  manner  the  de 
light  of  intelligent  children  and  of  half-civil- 
md  men.  The  number  of  boys  is  not  small 


who,  at  fourteen,  have  thought  enough  e* 
these  questions  to  be  fully  entitled  to  the 
praise  which  Voltaire  gives  to  Zadig,  "II  en 
savait  ce  qu'on  en  a  su  dans  tous  les  ages, 
c'est-a-dire,  fort  peu  de  chose."  The  book  of 
Job  shows,  that  long  before  letters  and  arts 
were  known  to  Ionia,  these  vexing  questions 
were  debated  with  no  common  skill  and  elo 
quence,  under  the  tents  of  the  Idumean  Emirs; 
nor  has  human  reason,  in  the  course  of  three 
thousand  years,  discovered  any  satisfactory 
solution  of  the  riddles  which  perplexed  Eliphaz 
and  Zophar. 

Natural  theology,  then,  is  not  a  progressive 
science.  That  knowledge  of  our  origin,  and 
of  our  destiny  which  we  derive  from  revela 
tion,  is  indeed  of  very  different  clearness,  and 
very  different  importance.  But  neither  is  re 
vealed  religion  of  the  nature  of  a  progressive 
science.  All  Divine  truth  is,  according  to  the 
doctrine  of  the  Protestant  churches,  recorded 
in  certain  books.  It  is  equally  open  to  all  who 
in  any  age  can  read  those  books ;  nor  can  all 
the  discoveries  of  all  the  philosophers  in  the 
world  add  a  single  verse  to  any  of  these  books. 
It  is  plain,  therefore,  that  in  divinity  there  can 
not  be  a  progress  analogous  to  that  which  is 
constantly  taking  place  in  pharmacy,  geology, 
and  navigation.  A  Christian  of  the  fifth  cen 
tury  with  a  Bible  is  on  a  par  with  a  Christian 
of  the  nineteenth  century  with  a  Bible,  candour 
and  natural  acuteness  being,  of  course,  sup 
posed  equal.  It  matters  not  at  all  that  the 
compass,  printing,  gunpowder,  steam,  gas,  vac 
cination,  and  a  thousand  other  discoveries  and 
inventions  which  were  unknown  in  the  fifth 
century  are  familiar  to  the  nineteenth.  None 
of  these  discoveries  and  inventions  have  the 
smallest  bearing  on  the  question  whether  man 
is  justified  by  faith  alone,  or  whether  the  invo 
cation  of  saints  is  an  orthodox  practice.  It 
seems  to  us,  therefore,  that  we  have  no  secu 
rity  for  the  future  against  the  prevalence  of 
any  theological  error  that  has  ever  prevailed 
in  time  past  among  Christian  men.  We  are 
confident  that  the  world  will  never  go  back  to 
the  solar  system  of  Ptolemy;  nor  is  our  confi 
dence  in  the  least  shaken  by  the  circumstance 
that  even  so  great  a  man  as  Bacon  rejected 
the  theory  of  Galileo  with  scorn ;  for  Bacon 
had  not  all  the  means  of  arriving  at  a  sound 
conclusion  which  are  within  our  reach,  and 
which  secure  people,  who  would  not  have  been 
worthy  to  mend  his  pens,  from  falling  into  his 
mistakes.  But  we  are  very  differently  affected 
when  we  reflect  that  Sir  Thomas  More  was 
ready  to  die  for  the  doctrine  of  transubstantia- 
tion.  He  was  a  man  of  eminent  talents.  He 
had  all  the  information  on  the  subject  that  we 
have,  or  that,  while  the  world  lasts,  any  human 
being  will  have.  The  text  "  This  is  my  body," 
was  in  his  New  Testament  as  it  is  in  ours. 

The  absurdity  of  the  literal  interpretation 
was  as  great  and  as  obvious  in  the  sixteenth 
century  as  it  is  now.  No  progress  that  sci 
ence  has  made  or  will  make  can  add  to  what 
seems  to  us  the  overwhelming  force  of  the  ar 
gument  against  the  real  presence.  We  are 
therefore  unable  to  understand  why  what  Sir 
Thomas  More  believed  respecting  transubstau- 


RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE   TOPES. 


103 


tiation  may  not  be  believed  to  the  end  of  time 
by  men  equal  in  abilities  and  honesty  to  Sir 
Thomas  More.  But  Sir  Thomas  More  is  one 
of  the  choice  specimens  of  human  wisdom  and 
virtue,  and  the  doctrine  of  transub.stantiation 
is  a  kind  of  proof  charge.  A  faith  which  stands 
that  test  will  stand  any  test.  The  prophesies 
of  Brothers  and  the  miracles  of  Prince  Hohen- 
lohe  sink  to  trifles  in  the  comparison.  One  re 
servation,  indeed,  must  be  made.  The  books 
and  traditions  of  a  sect  may  contain,  mingled 
with  propositions  strictly  theological,  other  pro 
positions  purporting  to  rest  on  the  same  autho 
rity  which  relate  to  physics.  If  new  discover 
ies  should  throw  discredit  on  the  physical  pro 
positions,  the  theological  propositions,  unless 
they  can  be  separated  from  the  physical  pro 
positions,  will  share  in  their  discredit.  In  this 
way,  undoubtedly,  the  progress  of  science  may 
indirectly  serve  the  cause  of  religious  truth. 
The  Hindoo  mythology,  for  example,  is  bound 
up  with  a  most  absurd  geography.  Every 
young  Brahmin,  therefore,  who  learns  geogra 
phy  in  our  colleges,  learns  to  smile  at  the  Hin 
doo  mythology.  If  Catholicism  has  not  su'J&r- 
ed  to  an  equal  degree  from  the  Papal  decision 
that  the  sun  goes  round  the  earth,  this  is  be 
cause  all  intelligent  Catholics  now  hold,  with 
Pascal,  that  in  deciding  the  point  at  all  the 
Church  exceeded  her  powers,  and  was,  there 
fore,  justly  left  destitute  of  that  supernatural 
assistance  which,  in  the  exercise  of  her  legiti 
mate  functions,  the  promise  of  her  Founder 
authorized  her  to  expect. 

This  reservation  affects  not  at  all  the  truth 
of  our  proposition,  that  divinity,  properly  so 
called,  is  not  a  progressive  science.  A  very 
common  knowledge  of  history,  a  very  little  ob 
servation  of  life,  will  suffice  to  prove  that  no 
learning,  no  sagacity,  affords  a  security  against 
the  greatest  errors  on  subjects  relating  to  the 
invisible  world.  Bayle  and  Chillingvvorth,  two 
of  the  most  skeptical  of  mankind,  turned  Ca- 
thoHcs  from  sincere  conviction.  Johnson,  in- 
cr^dulous  on  all  other  points,  was  a  ready 
believer  in  miracles  and  apparitions.  He 
would  not  believe  in  Ossian,  but  he  believed 
in  the  second  sight.  He  would  not  believe  in 
the  earthquake  of  Lisbon,  but  he  believed  in 
the  Cock  Lane  Ghost. 

For  these  reasons  we  have  ceased  to  wonder  at 
any  vagaries  of  superstition.  We  have  seen  men, 
not  of  mean  intellect  or  neglected  education, 
but  qualified  by  their  talents  and  acquirements 
to  attain  eminence  either  in  active  or  speculative 
pursuits,  well-read  scholars,  expert  logicians, 
keen  observers  of  life  and  manners,  prophe 
sying,  interpreting,  talking  unknown  tongues, 
working  miraculous  cures,  coming  down  with 
messages  from  God  to  the  Houses  of  Commons. 
We  have  seen  an  old  woman,  with  no  talents 
beyond  the  cunning  of  a  fortune-teller,  and 
with  the  education  of  a  scullion,  exalted  into 
a  prophetess,  and  surrounded  by  tens  of  thou 
sands  of  devoted  followers,  many  of  whom 
were,  in  station  and  knowledge,  immeasurably 
her  superiors;  and  all  this  in  the  nineteenth 
century,  and  all  this  in  London.  Yet  why  not] 
For  of  the  dealings  of  God  with  man  no  more 
has  been  revealed  to  the  nineteenth  century 


jthan  to  the  first,  or  to  London  than  to  the  wild- 
jest  parish  in  the  Hebrides.  It  is  true  that,  in 
those  things  which  concern  this  life  and  this 
world,  man  constantly  becomes  wiser.  But  it 
is  no  less  true  that,  as  respects  a  higher  power 
and  a  future  state,  man,  in  the  language  of 
Goethe's  scoffing  fiend, 

"bleibt  stets  von  gleichem  schlag, 
Und  ist  so  wunderlich  als  wie  am  ersten  tag." 

The  history  of  Catholicism  strikingly  illus 
trates  these  observations.  During  the  last 
seven  centuries  the  public  mind  of  Europe  has 
made  constant  progress  in  every  department 
of  secular  knowledge.  But  in  religion  we  can 
trace  no  constant  progress.  The  ecclesiasti 
cal  history  of  that  long  period  is  the  history 
of  movement  to  and  fro.  Four  times  since  the 
authority  of  the  Church  of  Rome  was  esta 
blished  in  Western  Christendom  has  the  hu 
man  intellect  risen  up  against  her  yoke.  Twice 
she  remained  completely  victorious.  Twice  she 
came  forth  from  the  conflict  bearing  the  marks 
of  cruel  wounds,  but  with  the  principle  of  life 
still  strong  within  her.  When  we  reflect  on 
the  tremendous  assaults  which  she  has  sur 
vived,  we  find  it  difficult  to  conceive  in  what 
way  she  is  to  perish. 

The  first  of  these  insurrections  broke  out  in 
the  region  where  the  beautiful  language  of  Of 
was  spoken.  That  country,  singularly  favour 
ed  by  nature,  was,  in  the  twelfth  century,  the 
most  flourishing  and  civilized  part  of  Western 
Europe.  It  was  in  nowise  a  part  of  France. 
It  had  a  distinct  political  existence,  a  distinct 
national  character,  distinct  usages,  and  a  dis 
tinct  speech.  The  soil  was  fruitful  and  well 
cultivated;  and  amidst  the  cornfields  and  vine 
yards  arose  many  rich  cities,  each  of  which 
was  a  little  republic  ;  and  many  stately  castles, 
each  of  which  contained  a  miniature  of  an  im 
perial  court.  It  was  there  that  the  spirit  of 
chivalry  first  laid  aside  its  terrors,  first  took  a 
humane  and  graceful  form,  first  appeared  as 
the  inseparable  associate  of  art  and  literature, 
of  courtesy  and  love.  The  other  vernacular 
dialects  which,  since  the  fifth  century,  had 
sprung  up  in  the  ancient  provinces  of  the  Ro 
man  empire,  were  still  rude  and  imperfect. 
The  sweet  Tuscan,  the  rich  and  energetic  Eng 
lish,  were  abandoned  to  artisans  and  shep 
herds.  No  clerk  had  ever  condescended  to 
use  such  barbarous  jargon  for  the  teaching  of 
science,  for  the  recording  of  great  events,  or 
for  the  painting  of  life  arid  manners.  But  the 
language  of  Provence  was  already  the  lan- 
i  guage  of  the  learned  and  polite,  and  was  em- 
I  ployed  by  numerous  writers,  studious  of  all  the 
arts  of  composition  and  versification. 

A  literature  rich  in  ballads,  in  war-songs, 
in  satire,  and,  above  all,  in  amatory  poetry, 
amused  the  leisure  of  the  knights  and  ladies 
whose  fortified  mansions  adorned  the  banks 
of  the  Rhone  and  Garonne.  With  civilizatiou 
had  come  freedom  of  thought.  Use  had  taken 
away  the  horror  with  which  misbelievers  went 
elsewhere  regarded.  No  Norman  or  Breton 
ever  saw  a  Mussulman,  except  to  give  and  re 
ceive  blows  on  some  Syrian  field  of  battle.  Uut 
the  people  of  the  rich  countries  which  lay  uu« 


404 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


der  the  Pyrenees  lived  in  habits  of  courteous 
and  profitable  intercourse  with  the  Moorish 
kingdoms  of  Spain,  and  gave  a  hospitable  wel 
come  to  skilful  teachers  and  mathematicians, 
who,  in  the  schools  of  Cordova  and  Granada, 
had  become  versed  in  all  the  learning  of  the 
Arabians.  The  Greek,  still  preserving,  in  the 
midst  of  political  degradation,  the  ready  wit 
and  the  inquiring  spirit  of  his  fathers,  still  able 
to  read  the  most  perfect  of  human  composi 
tions,  still  speaking  the  most  powerful  and 
flexible  of  human  languages,  brought  to  the 
marts  of  Narbonne  and  Toulouse,  together  with 
the  drugs  and  silks  of  remote  climates,  bold  and 
subtle  theories,  long  unknown  to  the  ignorant 
and  credulous  West.  The  Paulician  theology 
— a  theology  in  which,  as  it  should  seem,  many 
of  the  doctrines  of  the  modern  Calvinists  were 
mingled  with  some  doctrines  derived  from  the 
ancient  Manichees, — spread  rapidly  through 
Provence  and  Languedoc.  The  clergy  of  the 
Catholic  Church  were  regarded  with  loathing 
and  contempt.  "Viler  than  a  priest," — "I 
would  as  soon  be  a  priest," — became  prover 
bial  expressions.  The  Papacy  lost  all  autho 
rity  with  all  classes,  from  the  great  feudal 
princes  down  to  the  cultivators  of  the  soil. 

The  danger  to  the  hierarchy  was  indeed 
formidable.  Only  one  transalpine  nation  had 
emerged  from  barbarism,  and  that  nation  had 
thrown  off  all  respect  for  Rome.  Only  one  of 
the  vernacular  languages  of  Europe  had  yet 
been  extensively  employed  for  literary  pur 
poses,  and  that  language  was  a  machine  in 
the  hands  of  heretics.  The  geographical  po 
sition  of  the  sectaries  made  the  danger  pecu 
liarly  formidable.  They  occupied  a  central 
region  communicating  directly  with  France, 
with  Italy,  and  with  Spain.  The  provinces 
which  were  still  untainted  were  separated 
from  each  other  by  this  infected  district.  Un 
der  these  circumstances,  it  seemed  probable 
that  a  single  generation  would  suffice  to  spread 
the  reformed  doctrine  to  Lisbon,  to  London, 
and  to  Naples.  But  this  was  not  to  be.  Rome 
cried  for  help  to  the  warriors  of  northern 
France.  She  appealed  at  once  to  their  super 
stition  and  to  their  cupidity.  To  the  devout 
believers  she  promised  pardons  as  ample  as 
those  with  which  she  had  rewarded  the  deliver 
ers  of  the  holy  Sepulchre.  To  the  rapacious 
and  profligate  she  offered  the  plunder  of  fertile 
plains  and  wealthy  cities.  Unhappily,  the  in 
genious  and  polished  inhabitants  of  the  Lan- 
guedocian  provinces  were  far  better  qualified 
to  enrich  and  embellish  their  country  than  to 
defend  it.  Eminent  in  the  arts  of  peace,  un 
rivalled  in  the  "gay  science,"  elevated  above 
many  vulgar  superstitions,  they  wanted  that 
iron  courage,  and  that  skill  in  martial  exer 
cises,  which  distinguished  the  chivalry  of  the 
region  beyond  the  Loire,  and  were  ill-fitted  to 
face  enemies,  who,  in  every  country  from  Ire 
land  to  Palestine,  had  been  victorious  against 
tenfold  odds.  A  war, distinguished  even  among 
wars  of  religion  by  its  merciless  atrocity,  de 
stroyed  the  Albigensian. heresy;  and  with  that 
heresy  the  prosperity,  the  civilization,  the  lite 
rature,  the  national  existence,  of  what  was  once 
i&e  most  ooulent  and  enlightened  part  of  the 


1  great  European  family.  Rome,  in  tLe  mean 
I  time,  warned  by  that  fearful  danger  from  which 
j  the  exterminating  swords  of  her  crusaders  had 
narrowly  saved  her,  proceeded  to  revise  and 
to  strengthen  her  whole  system  of  polity.  Af 
this  period  were  instituted  the  order  of  Francis, 
the  order  of  Dominic,  the  tribunal  of  the  Inqai 
1  sition.  The  new  spiritual  police  was  every- 
where.  No  alley  in  a  great  city,  no  hamlet  on 
a  remote  mountain,  was  unvisited  by  the  beg 
ging  friar.  The  simple  Catholic,  who  was 
content  to  be  no  wiser  than  his  fathers,  found, 
wherever  he  turned,  a  friendly  voice  to  encou 
rage  him.  The  path  of  the  heretic  was  beset 
by  innumerable  spies;  and  the  Church,  lately 
in  danger  of  utter  subversion,  now  appeared 
to  be  impregnably  fortified  by  the  love,  the 
reverence,  and  the  terror  of  mankind. 

A  century  and  a  half  passed  away,  and  then 
came  the  second  great  rising  up  of  the  human 
intellect  against  the  spiritual  domination  of 
Rome.  During  the  two  generations  which  fol 
lowed  the  Albigensian  crusade,  the  power  of  the 
Papacy  had  been  at  the  height.  Frederick  II. 
— the  ablest  and  most  accomplished  of  the  long 
line  of  German  Consars — had  in  vain  exhaust 
ed  all  the  resources  of  military  and  political 
skill  in  the  attempt  to  defend  the  rights  of  the 
civil  power  against  the  encroachments  of  the 
Church.  The  vengeance  of  the  priesthood 
had  pursued  his  house  to  the  third  generation. 
Manfred  had  perished  on  the  field  of  battle; 
Conradin  on  the  scaffold.  Then  a  turn  look 
place.  The  secular  authority,  long  unduly 
depressed,  regained  the  ascendant  with  start 
ling  rapidity.  The  change  is  doubtless  to  be 
ascribed  chiefly  to  the  general  disgust  excited 
by  the  way  in  which  the  Church  had  abused 
its  power  and  its  success. 

But  something  must  be  attributed  to  the 
character  and  situation  of  individuals.  The 
man  who  bore  the  chief  part  in  effecting  this 
revolution  was  Philip  IV.  of  France,  surnamed 
the  Beautiful — a  despot  by  position,  a  despot 
by  temperament,  stern,  implacable,  and  un^ 
scrupulous,  equally  prepared  for  violence  and 
for  chicanery,  and  surrounded  by  a  devoted 
band  of  men  of  the  sword,  and  of  men  of  law. 
The  fiercest  and  most  high-minded  of  the  Ro 
man  Pontiffs,  while  bestowing  kingdoms,  and 
citing  great  princes  to  his  judgment-seat,  Avas 
seized  in  his  palace  by  armed  men,  and  so 
foully  outraged  that  he  died  mad  with  rage 
and  terror.  "Thus,"  sang  the  great  Floren 
tine  poet,  "was  Christ  in  the  person  of  his 
vicar,  a  second  time  seized  by  ruffians,  a  se 
cond  time  mocked,  a  second  time  drenched 
with  the  vinegar  and  the  gal!."*  The  seat  of 
the  Papal  court  was  carried  beyond  the  Alps, 
and  the  Bishops  of  Rome  became  dependants 
of  France.  Then  came  the  great  schism  of 
the  West.  Two  Popes,  each  with  a  doubtful 
title,  made  all  Europe  ring  with  their  mutual 
invectives  and  anathemas.  Rome  cried  out 
against  the  corruptions  of  Avignon  ;  and  Avig« 
non,  with  equal  justice,  recriminated  on  Rome. 
The  plain  Christian  people,  brought  up  in  the 
belief  that  it  was  a  sacred  duty  to  be  in  corn* 


*  Purffatorio,  xx.  87. 


RANKE'S  HISTORY   OF   THE   POPES. 


405 


munion  with  the  Head  of  the  Church,  were  j 
unable  to  discover,  amidst  conflicting  testimo 
nies  and  conflicting  arguments,  to  which  of 
fhe  t\vo  worthless  priests  who  were  cursing 
an  '   Deviling  each  other,  the  headship  of  the  j 
Church  rightfully  belonged.     It  was  nearly  at  I 
this  juncture  that  the  voice  of  John  Wickliffe  | 
began  to  make  itself  heard.    The  public  mind  j 
of  England   was   soon   stirred   to   its   inmost 
depths;  and  the  influence  of  the  new  doctrines  j 
was  soon  felt,  even  in  the  distant  kingdom  of 
Bohemia.     In.  Bohemia,  indeed,  there  had  long 
been  a  predisposition  to  heresy.     Merchants 
from  the  Lower  Danube  were  often  seen  in  the 
fairs  of  Prague;  and  the  Lower  Danube  was 
peculiarly  the  seat  of  the  Paulician  theology. 
The  Church,  torn  by  schism,  and  fiercely  as 
sailed  at  once  in  England  and  the  German 
empire,  was  in  a  situation  scarcely  less  peril 
ous  than  at  the  crisis  which  preceded  the  Albi- 
gensian  crusade. 

But  this  danger  also  passed  by.  The  civil 
power  gave  its  strenuous  support  to  the 
Church;  and  the  Church  made  some  show 
of  reforming  itself.  The  council  of  Constance 
put  an  end  to  the  schism.  The  whole  Catholic 
world  was  again  united  under  a  single  chief, 
and  rules  were  laid  down  which  seemed  to 
make  it  improbable  that  the  power  of  that 
chief  would  be  grossly  abused.  The  most  dis 
tinguished  teachers  of  the  new  doctrine  were 
put  to  death.  The  English  government  put 
down  the  Lollards  with  merciless  rigour;  and, 
in  the  next  generation,  no  trace  of  the  second 
great  revolt  against  the  Papacy  could  be  found, 
except  among  the  rude  population  of  the 
mountains  of  Bohemia. 

Another  century  went  by;  and  then  began 
the  third  and  the  most  memorable  struggle  for 
spiritual  freedom.  The  times  were  changed. 
The  great  remains  of  Athenian  and  Roman 
genius  were  studied  by  thousands.  The  Church 
had  no  longer  a  monopoly  of  learning.  The 
powers  of  the  modern  languages  had  at  length 
been  developed.  The  invention  of  printing 
hau  given  new  facilities  to  the  intercourse  of 
mind  with  mind.  With  such  auspices  com 
menced  the  great  Reformation. 

We  will  attempt  to  lay  before  our  readers, 
in  a  short  compass,  what  appears  to  us  to  be 
the  real  history  of  the  contest,  which  began 
with  the  preaching  of  Luther  against  the  in 
dulgences,  and  which  may,  in  one  sense,  be 
said  to  have  been  terminated,  a  hundred  and 
thirty  years  later,  by  the  treaty  of  Westphalia. 

In  the  northern  parts  of  Europe,  the  victory 
of  Protestantism  was  rapid  and  decisive.  The 
dominion  of  the  Papacy  was  felt  by  the  nations 
of  Teutonic  blood  as  the  dominion  of  Italians, 
of  foreigners,  of  men  alien  in  language,  man 
ners,  and  intellectual  constitution.  The  large 
jurisdiction  exercised  by  the  spiritual  tribu 
nals  of  Rome  seemed  to  be  a  degrading  badge 
of  servitude.  The  sums  which,  under  a  thou 
sand  pretexts,  were  exacted  by  a  distant  court, 
were  regarded  both  as  a  humiliating  and  as  a 
ruinous  tribute.  The  character  of  that  court 
excited  the  scorn  and  disgust  of  a  grave, 
earnest,  sincere,  and  devout  people.  The  new 
the,  logy  spread  with  a  rapidity  never  known  i 


before.  All  ranks,  all  varieties  of  character, 
joined  the  ranks  of  the  innovators.  Sove 
reigns  impatient  to  appropriate  to  themselves 
the  prerogatives  of  the  Pope — nobles  desirous 
to  share  the  plunder  of  abbeys — suitors  exas 
perated  by  the  extortions  of  the  Roman  Camera 
— patriots  impatient  of  a  foreign  rule — good 
men  scandalized  by  the  corruptions  of  the 
Church — bf.d  men  desirous  of  the  license  in 
separable  from  great  moral  revolutions — wise 
men  eager  in  the  pursuit  of  truth — weak  men 
allured  by  the  glitter  of  novelty — all  were 
found  on  one  side.  Alone,  among  the  north 
ern  nations,  the  Irish  adhered  to  the  ancient 
faith ;  and  the  cause  of  this  seems  to  have 
been,  that  the  national  feeling  which,  in  hap 
pier  countries,  was  directed  against  Rome,  was 
in  Ireland  directed  against  England.  In  fifty 
years  from  the  day  in  which  Luther  publicly 
renounced  communion  with  the  Church  of 
Rome,  and  burned  the  bull  of  Leo  before  the 
gates  of  Wittenberg,  Protestantism  attained 
its  highest  ascendency — an  ascendency  which 
it  soon  lost,  and  which  it  never  regained. 
Hundreds,  who  could  well  remember  Brother 
Martin  a  devout  Catholic,  lived  to  see  the  revo 
lution  of  which  he  was  the  chief  author,  victo 
rious  in  half  the  states  of  Europe.  In  England, 
Scotland,  Denmark,  Sweden,  Livonia,  Prussia, 
Saxony,  Hesse,  Wurtemberg,  the  Palatinate,  in 
several  cantons  of  Switzerland,  in  the  Northern 
Netherlands,  the  Reformation  had  completely 
triumphed;  and  in  all  the  other  countries  on 
this  side  of  the  Alps  and  the  Pyrenees,  it 
seemed  on  the  point  of  triumphing. 

But  while  this  mighty  work  was  proceeding 
in  the  north  of  Europe,  a  revolution  of  a  very 
different  kind  had  taken  place  in  the  south. 
The  temper  of  Italy  and  Spain  was  widely  dif 
ferent  from  that  of  Germany  and  England.  As 
the  national  feeling  of  the  Teutonic  nations 
impelled  them  to  throw  off  the  Italian  supre 
macy,  so  the  national  feeling  of  the  Italians 
impelled  them  to  resist  any  change  which  might 
deprive  their  country  of  the  honour  and  ad 
vantage  of  being  the  seat  of  the  government  of 
the  Universal  Church.  It  was  in  Italy  that  the 
tributes  were  spent,  of  which  foreign  nations 
so  bitterly  complained.  It  was  to  adorn  Italy 
that  the  traffic  in  indulgences  had  been  carried 
to  that  scandalous  excess  which  had  roused 
the  indignation  of  Luther.  There  was  among 
the  Italians  both  much  piety  and  much  im 
piety  ;  but  with  very  few  exceptions,  neither 
the  piety  nor  the  impiety  took  the  turn  of  Pro- 
testaniism.  The  religious  Italians  desired  a 
reform  of  morals  and  discipline,  but  not  a  re 
form  of  doctrine,  and  least  of  all  a  schism. 
The  irreligious  Italians  simply  disbelieved 
Christianity,  without  hating  it.  They  looked  at 
it  as  artists,  or  as  statesmen  ;  and  so  looking 
at  it,  they  liked  it  better  in  the  established  form, 
than  in  any  other.  It  was  to  them  what  the 
Pagan  worship  was  to  Trajan  and  Pliny. 
Neither  the  spirit  of  Savanarola,  nor  that  of 
Machiavelli,  had  any  thing  in  common  with  that 
of  the  religious  or  political  Protestants  uf  tne 
north. 

Spain  again  was,  with  respect  to  the  Catholic 
Church,  in  a  situation  very  different  from  that 


406 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  the  Teutonic  nations.  Italy  was,  in  fact,  a 
part  of  the  empire  of  Charles  V. ;  and  the 
court  of  Rome  was,  on  many  important  occa 
sions,  his  tool.  He  had  not,  therefore,  like  the 
distant  princes  of  the  north,  a  strong  selfish 
motive  for  attacking  the  Papacy.  In  fact,  the 
very  measures  which  provoked  the  Sovereign 
of  England  to  renounce  all  connection  with 
Rome,  were  dictated  by  the  Sovereign  of  Spain. 
The  feelings  of  the  Spanish  people  concurred 
with  the  interest  of  the  Spanish  government. 
The  attachment  of  the  Castilian  to  the  faith  of 
his  ancestors  was  peculiarly  strong  and  ardent. 
With  that  faith  were  inseparably  bound  up  the 
institutions,  the  independence,  and  the  glory  of 
his  country.  Between  the  day  when  the  last 
Gothic  king  was  vanquished  on  the  banks  of 
the  Xeres,  and  the  day  when  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella  entered  Granada  in  triumph,  nearly 
eight  hundred  years  had  elapsed  ;  and  during 
those  years  the  Spanish  nation  had  been  en 
gaged  in  a  desperate  struggle  against  misbe 
lievers.  The  crusades  had  been  merely  an 
episode  in  the  history  of  other  nations.  The 
existence  of  Spain  had  been  one  long  crusade. 
After  fighting  Mussulmans  in  the  Old  World, 
she  began  to  fight  heathens  in  the  New.  It  was 
under  the  authority  of  a  Papal  bull  that  her 
children  steered  into  unknown  seas.  It  was 
under  the  standard  of  the  cross  that  they  march 
ed  fearlessly  into  the  heart  of  great  kingdoms. 
It  was  with  the  cry  of  "Saint  James  for  Spain!" 
that  they  charged  armies  which  outnumbered 
them  a  hundredfold.  And  men  said  that  the 
Saint  had  heard  the  call,  and  had  himself  in 
arms,  on  a  gray  war-horse,  led  the  onset  before 
which  the  worshippers  of  false  gods  had  given 
way.  After  the  battle,  every  excess  of  rapa 
city  or  cruelty  was  sufficiently  vindicated  by 
the  plea  that  the  sufferers  were  unbaplized. 
Avarice  stimulated  zeal.  Zeal  consecrated 
avarice.  Proselytes  and  gold  mines  were 
sought  with  equal  ardour.  In  the  very  year  in 
which  the  Saxons,  maddened  by  the  exactions 
of  Rome,  broke  loose  from  her  yoke,  the  Spa 
niards,  under  the  authority  of  Rome,  made 
themselves  masters  of  the  empire  and  of  the 
treasures  of  Montezuma.  Thus  Catholicism, 
which,  in  the  public  mind  of  Northern  Europe, 
was  associated  with  spoliation  and  oppression, 
was,  in  the  public  mind  of  Spain,  associated 
with  liberty,  victory,  dominion,  wealth,  and 
glory. 

It  is  not,  therefore,  strange  that  the  effect  of 
the  great  outbreak  of  Protestantism  in  one  part 
of  Christendom  should  have  been  to  produce 
an  equally  violent  outbreak  of  Catholic  zeal  in 
another.  Two  reformations  were  pushed  on 
at  once  with  equal  energy  and  effect — a  refor 
mation  of  doctrine  in  the  North — a  reformation 
O'l  manner?  and  discipline  in  the  South.  In 
the  course  of  a  single  generation,  the  whole 
spirit  of  the  Church  of  Rome  underwent  a 
change.  From  the  halls  of  the  Vatican  to  the 
most  secluded  hermitage  of  the  Apennines,  the 
£ieat  revival  was  everywhere  felt  and  seen. 
All  the  institutions  anciently  devised  for  the 
propagation  and  defence  of  the  faith,  were  fur 
bished  up  and  made  efficient.  New  engines 
cif  still  more  formidable  power  were  construct 


ed.  Everywhere  old  religious  communities 
were  remodelled,  and  new  religious  communi 
ties  called  into  existence.  Within  a  year  after 
the  death  of  Leo,  the  order  of  Carnaldoli  was 
purified.  The  Capuchins  restored  the  old 
Franciscan  discipline — the  midnight  prayer 
and  the  life  of  silence.  The  Barnabites  and 
the  society  of  Somasca  devoted  themselves  to 
the  relief  and  education  of  the  poor.  To  the 
Theatine  order  a  still  higher  interest  belongs. 
Its  great  object  was  the  same  with  that  cf  our 
early  Methodists — to  supply  the  deficiencies 
of  the  parochial  clergy. 

The  Church  of  Rome,  wiser  than  the  Church 
of  England,  gave  every  countenance  to  the 
good  work.  The  members  of  the  new  brother 
hood  preached  to  great  multitudes  in  the  streets 
and  in  the  fields,  prayed  by  the  beds  of  the  sick, 
and  administered  the  last  sacraments  to  the 
dying.  Foremost  among  them  in  zeal  and  de 
votion  was  Gian  Pietro  Caraffa,  afterwards 
Pope  Paul  the  Fourth.  In  the  convent  of  the 
Theatines  at  Venice,  under  the  eye  of  Caraffa, 
a  Spanish  gentleman  took  up  his  abode,  tended 
the  poor  in  the  hospitals,  went  about  in  rags, 
starved  himself  almost  to  death,  and  often  sal 
lied  into  the  streets,  mounted  on  stones,  and, 
waving  his  hat  to  invite  the  passers-by,  began 
to  preach  in  a  strange  jargon  of  mingled 
Castilian  and  Tuscan.  The  Theatines  were 
among  the  most  zealous  and  rigid  of  men  ;  but 
to  this  enthusiastic  neophyte  their  discipline 
seemed  lax,  and  their  movements  sluggish  ;  for 
his  own  mind,  naturally  passionate  and  ima 
ginative,  had  passed  through  a  training  which 
had  given  to  all  his  peculiarities  a  morbid  in 
tensity  and  energy.  In  his  early  life  he  had 
been  the  very  prototype  of  the  hero  of  Cer 
vantes.  The  single  study  of  the  young  Hidalgo 
had  been  chivalrous  romance ;  and  his  exist 
ence  had  been  one  gorgeous  day-dream  of  prin 
cesses  rescued  and  infidels  subdued.  He  had 
chosen  a  Dulcinea,  "no  countess,  no  duchess" 
— these  are  his  own  words — "but  one  of  far 
higher  station  ;"  and  he  flattered  himself  with 
the  hope  of  laying  at  her  feet  the  keys  of  Moor 
ish  castles  and  the  jewelled  turbans  of  Asiatic 
kings.  In  the  midst  of  these  visions  of  martial 
glory  and  prosperous  love,  a  severe  woum! 
stretched  him  on  a  bed  of  sickness.  His  con 
stitution  was  shattered,  and  he  was  doomed  to 
be  a  cripple  for  life.  The  palm  of  strength, 
grace,  and  skill  in  knightly  exercises,  was  no 
longer  for  him.  He  could  no  longer  hope  to 
strike  down  gigantic  soldans,  or  to  find  favour 
in  the  sight  of  beautiful  women.  A  new  vision 
then  arose  in  his  mind,  and  mingled  itself  with 
his  old  delusions  in  a  manner  which,  to  most 
Englishmen,  must  seem  singular;  but  which 
those  who  know  how  close  was  the  union  be 
tween  religion  and  chivalry  in  Spain,  will  be 
at  no  loss  to  understand.  He  would  still  be  a 
soldier — he  would  still  be  a  knight-errant ;  but 
the  soldier  and  knight-errant  of  the  spouse  of 
Christ.  He  would  smite  the  Great  Red  Dragon. 
He  would  be  the  champion  of  the  Woman 
clothed  with  the  Sun.  He  would  break  the 
charm  under  which  false  prophets  held  the 
souls  of  men  in  bondage.  His  restless  spirit 
led  him  to  the  Syrian  deserts,  and  to 


lANKE'S  HISTORY    OF   THE   POPES. 


407 


nf  «hc  Hoi}'  Stpuk.lyre.  Thence  he  wandered 
b*ick  *o  the  fdrtnest  w°st,  and  asionishcd  the 
Convsnu:  -of  vipaiu  anu  the  schools  of  France  by 
hies  penance  ana  vigils.  Th^  same  lively  ima 
gination  which  had  been  employed  in  picturing 
the.  tumult  of  unreal  battles,  and  the  charms 
of  unreal  queens,  now  peopled  his  solitude 
with  saints  and  angels.  The  Holy  Virgin  de 
scended  to  commune  with  him.  He  saw  the 
Saviour  face  to  face  with  the  eye  of  flesh.  Even 
those  mysteries  of  religion  which  are  the  hard 
est  trial  of  faith,  were  in  his  case  palpable  to 
sight.  It  is  difficult  to  relate  without  a  p.tying 
smile,  that,  in  the  sacrifice  of  the  mass,  he  saw 
transubstantiation  take  place;  and  that,  as  he 
stood  praying  on  the  steps  of  St.  Dominic,  he 
saw  the  Trinity  in  Unity,  and  wept  aloud  with 
joy  and  wonder.  Such  was  the  celebrated 
Ignatius  Loyola,  who  in  the  great  Catholic  re 
action,  bore  the  same  share  which  Luther  bore 
in  the  great  Protestant  movement. 

Dissatisfied  with  the  system  of  the  Theatines, 
the  enthusiastic  Spaniard  turned  his  face  to 
wards  Rome.  Poor,  obscure,  without  a  patron, 
without  recommendations,  he  entered  the  city 
where  now  two  princely  temples,  rich  with 
paintings  and  many-coloured  marble,  comme 
morate  his  great  services  to  the  Church  ;  where 
his  form  stands  sculptured  in  massive  silver; 
where  his  bones,  enshrined  amidst  jewels,  are 
placed  beneath  the  altar  of  God.  His  activity 
and  zeal  bore  down  all  opposition  ;  and  under 
his  rule  the  order  of  Jesuits  began  to  exist,  and 
grew  rapidly  to  the  full  measure  of  its  gigantic 
powers.  With  what  vehemence,  with  what 
policy,  with  what  exact  discipline,  with  what 
dauntless  courage,  with  what  self-denial,  with 
what  forgetfulness  of  the  dearest  private  ties, 
with  what  intense  and  stubborn  devotion  to  a 
single  end,  with  what  unscrupulous  laxity  and 
versatility  in  the  choice  of  means,  the  Jesuits 
fought  the  battles  of  their  church,  is  written  in 
every  page  of  the  annals  of  Europe  during 
several  generations.  In  the  order  of  Jesus 
was  concentrated  the  quintessence  of  the  Catho 
lic  spirit :  and  the  history  of  the  order  of  Jesus 
is  the  history  of  the  great  Catholic  reaction. 
That  order  possessed  itself  at  once  of  all  the 
strongholds  which  command  the  public  mind 
— of  the  pulpit,  of  the  press,  of  the  confessional, 
of  the  academies.  Wherever  the  Jesuit  preach 
ed  the  church  was  too  small  for  the  audience. 
The  name  of  Jesuit  on  a  title-page  secured  the 
circulation  of  a  book.  It  was  in  the  ears  of 
the  Jesuit  that  the  powerful,  the  noble,  and  the 
beautiful  breathed  the  secret  history  of  their 
lives.  It  was  at  the  feet  of  the  Jesuit  that  the 
youth  of  the  higher  and  middle  classes  were 
brought  up  from  the  first  rudiments  to  the 
courses  of  rhetoric  and  philosophy.  Literature 
and  science,  lately  associated  with  infidelity 
or  with  heresy,  now  became  the  allies  of  ortho 
doxy. 

Dominant  in  the  south  of  Europe,  the  great 
order  soon  went  forth  conquering  and  to  con 
quer.  In  spite  of  oceans  and  deserts,  of  hunger 
and  pestilence,  of  spies  and  penal  laws,  of 
dungeons  and  racks,  of  gibbets  andquartering- 
blocks,  Jesuits  were  to  be  found  under  every 
disguise,  and  in  every  country — scholars,  phy- 


|  sicians,  merchants,  serving-men;  in  the  hostile 

'  court  of  Sweden,  in  the  old  manor-houses  of 

|  Cheshire,  among  the  hovels  of  Connaught; 

arguing,  instructing,  consoling,  stealing  away 

the  hearts  of  the  young,  animating  the  courage 

of  the  timid,  holding  up  the  crucifix  before  the 

eyes  of  the  dying.  •« 

Nor  was  it  less  their  office  to  plot  against  the 
thrones  and  lives  of  apostate  kings,  to  spread 
evil  rumours,  to  raise  tumults,  to  inflame  civil 
wars,  to  arm  the  hand  of  the  assassin.  Inflexi 
ble  in  nothing  but  in  their  fidelity  to  the  Church, 
they  were  equally  ready  to  appeal  in  her  cause 
to  the  spirit  of  loyalty  and  to  the  spirit  of  freedom. 
Extreme  doctrinesofobedienceand  extreme  doc 
trines  of  liberty — the  right  of  rulers  to  misgovern 
the  people,  the  right  of  every  one  of  the  people 
to  plunge  his  knife  in  the  heart  of  a  bad  ruler- 
were  inculcated  by  the  same  man  according  as 
he  addressed  himself  to  the  subject  of  Philip 
or  the  subject  of  Elizabeth.  Some  described 
these  men  as  the  most  rigid,  others  as  the  most 
indulgent  of  spiritual  directors.  And  both  de 
scriptions  were  correct.  The  truly  devout 
listened  with  awe  to  the  high  and  saintly  mo 
rality  of  the  Jesuit.  The  gay  cavalier  who  had 
run  his  rival  through  the  body,  the  frail  beauty 
who  had  forgotten  her  marriage-vow,  found  in 
the  Jesuit  an  easy  well-bred  man  of  the  world, 
tolerant  of  the  little  irregularities  of  people  of 
fashion.  The  confessor  was  strict  or  lax, 
according  to  the  temper  of  the  penitent.  His 
first  object  was  to  drive  no  person  out  of  the 
pale  of  the  Church.  Since  there  were  bad 
people,  it  was  better  that  they  should  be  bad 
Catholics  than  bad  Protestants.  If  a  person 
was  so  unfortunate  as  to  be  a  bravo,  a  libertine, 
or  a  gambler,  that  was  no  reason  for  making 
him  a  heretic  too. 

The  Old  World  was  not  wide  enough  for 
this  strange  activity.  The  Jesuits  invaded  all 
the  countries  which  the  great  maritime  disco 
veries  of  the  preceding  age  had  laid  open  to 
European  enterprise.  In  the  depths  of  the 
Peruvian  mines,  at  the  marts  of  the  African 
slave-caravans,  on  the  shores  of  the  Spice 
Islands,  in  the  observatories  of  China,  they 
were  to  be  found.  They  made  converts  in 
regions  which  neither  avarice  nor  curiosity 
had  tempted  any  of  their  countrymen  tc  enter; 
and  preached  and  disputed  in  tongues  of  which 
no  other  native  of  the  West  understood  a  word. 
The  spirit  which  appeared  so  eminently  in 
this  order,  animated  the  whole  Catholic  world. 
The  court  of  Rome  itself  was  purified.  During 
the  generation  which  preceded  the  Reforma 
tion,  that  court  had  been  a  scandal  to  the 
Christian  name.  Its  annals  are  black  with 
treason,  murder,  and  incest.  Even  its  more 
respectable  members  were  utterly  unfit  to  be 
ministers  of  religion.  They  were  men  like 
Leo  X.;  men  who,  with  the  Latin  ity  of  the 
Augustan  age,  had  acquired  its  atheistical  and 
scoffing  spirit.  They  regarded  these  Christian 
mysteries  of  which  they  were  stewards,  just  as 
the  Augur  Cicero  and  the  Pontifex  Maximus 
Caesar  regarded  the  Sibylline  books  and  the 
pecking  of  the  sacred  chickens.  Among  them 
selves  they  spoke  of  the  Incarnation,  the 
i  Eucharist,  and  the  Trinity,  in  the  same  tone  in 


408 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


which  Cotta  and  Velleius  talked  of  the  oracle 
of  Delphi,  or  of  the  voice  of  Faunus  in  the 
mountains.  Their  years  glided  by  in  a  soft 
dream  of  sensual  and  intellectual  voluptuous 
ness.  Choice  cookery,  delicious  wines,  lovely 
women,  hounds,  falcons,  horses,  newly-disco 
vered  manuscripts  of  the  classics,  sonnets  and 
burlesque  romances  in  the  sweetest  Tuscan — 
just  as  licentious  as  a  fine  sense  of  the  grace 
ful  would  permit;  plates  from  the  hand  of  a 
Benvenuto,  designs  for  palaces  by  Michel 
Angelo,  frescoes  by  Raphael,  busts,  mosaics, 
and  gems  just  dug  up  from  among  the  ruins 
of  ancient  temples  and  villas ; — these  things 
were  the  delight  and  even  the  serious  business 
of  their  lives.  Letters  and  the  fine  arts  un 
doubtedly  owe  much  to  this  not  inelegant  sloth. 
But  when  the  great  stirring  of  the  mind  of  Europe 
began — when  doctrine  after  doctrine  was  as 
sailed — when  nation  after  nation  withdrew 
from  communion  with  the  successor  of  St. 
Peter,  it  was  felt  that  the  Church  could  not 
be  safely  confided  to  chiefs  whose  highest 
praise  was,  that  they  were  good  judges  of  Latin 
compositions,  of  paintings,  and  of  statues, 
whose  severest  studies  had  a  Pagan  character, 
and  who  were  suspected  of  laughing  in  secret 
at  the  sacraments  which  they  administered, 
and  of  believing  no  more  of  the  Gospel  than  of 
the  Morgante  Maggiorc.  Men  of  a  very  different 
class  now  rose  to  the  direction  of  ecclesiastical 
affairs — men  whose  spirit  resembled  that  of 
Dun stan  and  of  Becket.  The  Roman  Pontiffs 
exhibited  in  their  own  persons  all  the  austerity 
of  the  early  anchorites  of  Syria.  Paul  IV. 
brought  to  the  Papal  throne  the  same  fervent 
zeal  which  had  carried  him  into  the  Theatine 
convent.  Pius  V.,  under  his  gorgeous  vest 
ments,  wore  day  and  night  the  hair-shirt  of  a 
simple  friar;  walked  barefoot  in  the  streets  at  the 
head  of  processions;  found,  even  in  the  midst 
of  his  most  pressing  avocations,  time  for  pri 
vate  prayer ;  often  regretted  that  the  public 
duties  of  his  station  were  unfavourable  to 
growth  in  holiness ;  and  edified  his  flock  by  in 
numerable  instances  of  humility,  charity,  and 
forgiveness  of  personal  injuries  ;  while,  at  the 
*ame  time,  he  upheld  the  authority  of  his  see, 
and  the  unadulterated  doctrines  of  his  churcb, 
with  all  the  stubbornness  and  vehemence  of 
Hildebrand.  Gregory  XIII.  exerted  himself 
not  only  to  imitate  but  to  surpass  Pius  in  the 
severe  virtues  of  his  sacred  profession.  As 
was  the  head,  such  were  the  members.  The 
change  in  the  spirit  of  the  Catholic  world  may 
be  traced  in  every  walk  of  literature  and  of  art. 
It  will  be  at  once  perceived  by  every  person 
who  compares  the  poem  of  Tasso  with  that  of 
Ariosto,  or  the  monuments  of  Sixtus  V.  with 
those  of  Leo  X. 

But  it  was  not  on  moral  influence  alone  that 
the  Catholic  Church  relied.  The  civil  sword 
in  Spain  and  Italy  was  unsparingly  employed 
in  her  support.  The  Inquisition  was  armed 
with  npw  powers  and  inspired  with  a  new 
energy.-1  If  Protestantism,  or  the  semblance  of 
Protestantism,  showed  itself  in  any  quarter,  it 
was  instantly  rnet,  not  by  petty,  teasing  perse 
cution,  but  by  persecution  of  that  sort  which 
bows  down  and  crushes  all  but  a  very  few  se 


lect  spirits.  Whoever  was  suspected  of  heresy, 
whatever  his  rank,  his  learning,  or  his  reputa 
tion,  was  to  purge  himself  to  the  satisfaction 
of  a  severe  and  vigilant  tribunal,  or  to  die  by 
fire.  Heretical  books  were  sougnt  out  and 
destroyed  with  the  same  unsparing  rigour. 
Works  which  were  once  in  every  house  were 
so  effectually  suppressed  that  no  copy  of  them 
now  is  to  be  found  in  the  most  extensive  libra 
ries.  One  book  in  particular,  entitled  "Of  the 
benefits  of  the  death  of  Christ,"  had  this  fate. 
It  Avas  written  in  Tuscan,  was  many  times  re 
printed,  and  was  eagerly  read  in  every  part  of 
Italy.  But  the  Inquisitors  detected  in  it  the 
Lutheran  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith 
alone.  They  prpscribed  it :  and  it  is  now  as 
utterly  lost  as  the  second  decade  of  Livy. 

Thus,  while  the  Protestant  Reformation  pro 
ceeded  rapidly  at  one  extremity  of  Europe,  the 
Catholic  revival  went  on  as  rapidly  at  the 
other.  About  half  a  century  after  the  great 
separation,  there  were  throughout  the  north, 
Protestant  governments  and  Protestant  nations. 
In  the  south  were  governments  and  nations 
actuated  by  the  most  intense  zeal  for  the  an 
cient  church.  Between  these  two  hostile 
regions  lay,  geographically  as  well  as  morally, 
a  great  debatable  land.  In  France,  Belgium, 
Southern  Germany,  Hungary,  and  Poland,  the 
contest  was  still  undecided.  The  governments 
of  those  countries  had  not  renounced  their 
connection  with  Rome ;  but  the  Protestants 
were  numerous,  powerful,  bold,  and  active.  In 
France  they  formed  a  commonwealth  within 
the  realm,  held  fortresses,  were  able  to  bring 
great  armies  into  the  field,  and  had  treated 
with  their  sovereign  on  terms  of  equality.  In 
Poland,  the  king  was  still  a  Catholic;  but  the 
Protestants  had  the  upper  hand  in  the  Diet, 
filled  the  chief  offices  in  the  administration,  and, 
in  the  large  towns,  took  possession  of  the  parish 
churches.  "  It  appeared,"  says  the  Papal 
nuncio,  "  that  in  Poland,  Protestantism  would 
completely  supersede  Catholicism."  In  Ba 
varia,  the  state  of  things  was  nearly  the  same. 
The  Protestants  had  a  majority  in  the  Assem 
bly  of  the  States,  and  demanded  from  the  duke 
concessions  in  favour  of  their  religion,  as  the 
price  of  their  subsidies.  In  Transylvania,  the 
house  of  Austria  was  unable  to  prevent  the 
Diet  from  confiscating,  by  one  sweeping  de 
cree,  the  estates  of  the  church.  In  Austria 
Proper  it  was  generally  said  that  only  one- 
thirteenth  part  of  the  population  could  be 
counted  on  as  good  Catholics.  In  Belgium  the 
adherents  of  the  new  opinions  were  reckoned 
by  hundreds  of  thousands. 

The  history  of  the  two  succeeding  genera 
tions  is  the  history  of  the  great  struggle  be 
tween  Protestantism  possessed  of  the  north  of 
Europe,  and  Catholicism  possessed  of  the 
south,  for  the  doubtful  territory  which  lay  be 
tween.  All  the  weapons  of  carnal  and  of  spi 
ritual  warfare  were  employed.  Both  sides  may 
boast  of  great  talents  and  of  great  virtues. 
Bofh  have  to  blush  for  many  follies  and  crimes. 
At  first,  the  chances  seemed  to  be  decidedly  in 
favour  of  Protestantism ;  but  the  victory  re 
mained  with  the  Church  of  Rome.  On  every 
point  she  was  successful.  If  we  overleap 


RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE   POPES 


409 


another  half  century,  we  find  her  victorious 
and  dominant  in  France,  Belgium,  Bavaria, 
Bohemia,  Austria,  Poland,  and  Hungary.  Nor 
has  Protestantism,  in  the  course  of  two  hun 
dred  years,  been  able  to  reconquer  any  por 
tion  of  what  it  then  lost. 

It  is,  moreover,  not  to  be  dissembled  that  this 
wonderful  triumph  of  the  Papacy  is  to  be 
chiefly  attributed,  not  to  the  force  of  arms,  but 
to  a  great  reflux  in  public  opinion.  During  the 
first  half  century  after  the  commencement  of 
the  lie  format  km,  the  current  of  feeling,  in  the 
countries  on  this  side  of  the  Alps  and  of  the 
Pyrenees,  ran  impetuously  towards  the  new 
doctrines.  Then  the  'ide  turned,  and  rushed 
as  fiercely  in  the  opposite  direction.  Neither 
during  the  one  period,  nor  during  the  other, 
did  much  depend  upon  the  event  of  battles  or 
sieges.  The  Protestant  movement  was  hardly 
checked  for  an  instant  by  the  defeat  at  Muhl- 
berg.  The  Catholic  reaction  went  on  at  full 
speed  in  spite  of  the  destruction  of  the  Armada. 
It  is  difficult  to  say  whether  the  violence  of  the 
first  blow  or  of  the  recoil  was  the  greater. 
Fifty  years  after  the  Lutheran  separation,  Ca 
tholicism  could  scarcely  maintain  itself  on 
the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean.  A  hundred 
years  after  the  separation,  Protestantism  could 
scarcely  maintain,  itself  on  the  shores  of  the 
Baltic.  The  causes  of  this  memorable  turn  in 
human  affairs  well  deserve  to  be  investigated. 

The  contest  between  the  two  parties  bore 
Some  resemblance  to  the  fencing  match  in 
Shakspeare — "Laertes  wounds  Hamlet;  then, 
in  sen  filing,  they  change  rapiers,  and  Hamlet 
wounds  Laertes."  The  war  between  Luther 
and  Leo  was  a  war  between  firm  faith  and  un 
belief,  between  zeal  and  apathy,  between 
energy  arid  indolence,  between  seriousness  and 
frivolity,  between  a  pure  morality  and  vice. 
Very  different  was  the  war  which  degenerate 
Protestantism  had  to  wage  against  regenerate 
Catholicism.  To  the  debauchees,  the  poison 
ers,  the  atheists,  who  had  worn  the  tiara  during 
the  generation  which  preceded  the  Reforma 
tion,  had  succeeded  Popes,  who,  in  religious 
fervour  and  severe  sanctity  of  manners,  might 
bear  a  comparison  with  Cyprian  or  Ambrose. 
The  order  of  Jesuits  alone  could  show  many 
men  not  inferior  in  sincerity,  constancy,  cou 
rage,  and  austerity  of  life,  to  the  apostles  of  the 
Reformation. 

But  while  danger  had  thus  called  forth  in 
the  bosom  of  the  Church  of  Rome  many  of  the 
highest  qualities  of  the  Reformers,  the  Reform 
ed  Churches  had  contracted  some  of  the  cor 
ruptions  which  had  been  justly  censured  in  the 
Church  of  Rome.  They  had  become  lukewarm 
and  worldly.  Their  great  old  leaders  had  been 
borne  to  the  grave,  and  had  left  no  successors. 
Among  the  Protestant  princes  there  was  little 
or  no  hearty  Protestant  feeling.  Elizabeth 
herself  was  a  Protestant  rather  from  policy 
than  from  firm  conviction.  James  I.,  in  order 
to  effect  his  favourite  object  of  marrying  his 
son  into  one  of  the  great  continental  houses, 
was  ready  to  make  immense  concessions  to 
Rome,  and  even  to  admit  a  modified  primacy 
in  the  Pope.  Henry  IV.  twice  abjured  the  re 
formed  doctrines  from  interested  motives.  The 

VOL.  III.— 5 


1  Elector  of  Saxony — the  natural  head  of  the 
j  Protestant  party  in  Germany— submitted  to 
become,  at  the  most  important  crisis  of  the 
struggle,  a  tool  in  the  hands  of  the  Papists. 
Among  the  Catholic  sovereigns,  on  the  other 
hand,  we  find  a  religious  zeal  often  amounting 
to  fanaticism.  Philip  II.  was  a  Papist  in  a 
very  different  sense  from  that  in  which  Eliza 
beth  was  a  Protestant.  Maximilian  of  Bava 
ria,  brought  up  under  the  teaching  of  the 
Jesuits,  was  a  fervent  missionary  wielding  the 
powers  of  a  prince.  The  Emperor  Ferdinand 
II.  deliberately  put  his  throne  to  hazard  over 
and  over  again,  rather  than  make  the  smallest 
concession  to  the  spirit  of  religious  innovation. 
Sigismund  of  Sweden  lost  a  crown  which  he 
might  have  preserved  if  he  would  have  re 
nounced  the  Catholic  faith.  In  short,  every 
where  on  the  Protestant  side  we  see  languor, 
everywhere  on  the  Catholic  side  we  see  ardour 
and  devotion. 

Not  only  was  there,  at  tnis  time,  a  much 
more  intense  zeal  among  the  Catholics  than 
among  the  Protestants;  but  the  whole  zeal  of 
the  Catholics  was  directed  against  the  Protes 
tants,  while  almost  the  whole  zeal  of  the  Pro 
testants  was  directed  against  each  other. 
Within  the  Catholic  Church  there  were  no  se 
rious  disputes  on  points  of  doctrine.  The  de 
cisions  of  the  Council  of  Trent  were  received; 
and  the  Jansenian  controversy  nad  not  yet 
arisen.  The  whole  force  of  Rome  was,  there 
fore,  effective  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on 
the  war  against  the  Reformation.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  force  which  ought  to  have 
fought  the  battle  of  the  Reformation  was  ex 
hausted  in  civil  conflict.  While  Jesuit  preach 
ers,  Jesuit  confessors,  Jesuit  teachers  of  youth, 
overspread  Europe,  eager  to  expend  ever/ 
faculty  of  their  minds  and  every  drop  of  their 
blood  in  the  cause  of  their  church,  Protestant 
doctors  were  confuting,  and  Protestant  rulers 
were  punishing  sectaries  who  were  just  as 
good  Protestants  as  themselves — 

"  Cumqne  superba  foret  BABYLON  spnlinnda  tropaeis, 
Bella  geri  placuit  nullos  habitura  iriumplios." 

In  the  Palatinate,  a  Calvinistic  prince  per 
secuted  the  Lutherans.  In  Saxony,  a  Lutheran 
persecuted  the  Calvinists.  In  Sweden  every 
body  who  objected  to  any  of  the  articles  of  the 
Confession  of  Augsburg  was  banished.  In 
Scotland,  Melville  was  disputing  with  other 
Protestants  on  questions  of  ecclesiastical  go 
vernment.  In  England,  the  jails  were  filled 
with  men  who,  though  zealous  for  the  Refor 
mation,  did  not  exactly  agree  with  the  court  or 
all  points  of  discipline  and  doctrine.  Some 
were  in  ward  for  denying  the  tenet  of  reproba 
tion  ;  some  for  not  wearing  surplices.  The 
Irish  people  might  at  that  time  have  been,  in 
all  probability,  reclaimed  from  Poperv,  at  the 
expense  of  half  the  zeal  and  activity  which 
Whitgift  employed  in  oppressing  Puritans,  and 

I  Martin  Marprelate  in  reviling  bishops. 
*  As  the  Catholics  in  zeal  and  in  union  had  & 
great  advantage  over  the  Protestants,  so  had 

i  they  also  an  inhi.-'tely  superior  organization 

Iln  truth,  Protestanism,  for  aggressive  purposes, 
had  no  organization    at  all.    The   Reformed 
2M 


410 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Churches  were  mere  national  Churches.  The 
Church  of  England  existed  for  England  alone. 
It  was  an  institution  as  purely  local  as  the 
Court  of  Common  Pleas,  and  was  utterly  with 
out  any  machinery  for  foreign  operations. 
The  Church  of  Scotland,  in  the  same  manner, 
existed  for  Scotland  alone.  The  operations  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  on  the  other  hand,  took 
in  the  whole  world.  Nobody  at  Lambeth,  or  at 
Edinburgh,  troubled  himself  about  what  was 
doing  in  Poland  or  Bavaria.  But  at  Rome,  Cra 
cow  and  Munich  were  objects  of  as  much  in 
terest  as  the  purlieus  of  St.  John  Lateran.  Our 
island,  the  head  of  the  Protestant  interest,  did 
not  send  out  a  single  missionary  or  a  single 
instructor  of  youth  to  the  scene  of  the  great 
spiritual  war.  Not  a  single  seminary  was 
established  here  for  the  purpose  of  furnishing 
a  supply  of  such  persons  to  foreign  countries. 
On  the  other  hand,  Germany,  Hungary,  and 
Poland  were  filled  with  able  and  active  Ca 
tholic  emissaries  of  Spanish  or  Italian  birth ; 
and  colleges  for  the  instruction  of  the  northern 
youth  were  founded  at  Rome.  The  spiritual 
force  of  Protestantism  was  a  mere  local  militia, 
which  might  be  useful  in  case  of  an  invasion, 
out  could  not  be  sent  abroad,  and  could  there 
fore  make  no  conquests.  Rome  had  such  a 
local  militia;  but  she  had  also  a  force  dis 
posable  at  a  moment's  notice  for  foreign  ser 
vice,  however  dangerous  or  disagreeable.  It' 
it  was  thought  at  head-quarters  that  a  Jesuit 
at  Palermo  was  qualified  by  his  talents  and 
character  to  withstand  the  Reformers  in  Li 
thuania,  the  order  was  instantly  given  and 
instantly  obeyed.  In  a  month,  the  faithful 
servant  of  the  Church  was  preaching,  cate 
chising,  confessing,  beyond  the  Niemen. 

It  is  impossible  to  deny  that  the  polity  of  the 
Church  of  Rome  is  the  very  masterpiece  of 
human  wisdom.  In  truth,  nothing  but  such  a 
polity  could,  against  such  assaults,  have  borne 
up  such  doctrines.  The  experience  of  twelve 
hundred  eventful  years,  the  ingenuity  and  pa 
tient  care  of  forty  generations  of  statesmen, 
have  improved  it  to  such  perfection,  that 
among  the  contrivances  of  political  abilities  it 
occupies  the  highest  place.  The  stronger  our 
conviction  that  reason  and  Scripture  were  de 
cidedly  on  the  side  of  Protestantism,  the  greater 
is  the  reluctant  admiration  with  which  we  re 
gard  that  system  of  tactics  against  which  rea 
son  and  Scripture  were  arrayed  in  vain. 

If  we  went  at  large  into  this  most  interesting 
subject,  we  should  fill  volumes.  We  will, 
therefore,  at  present  advert  to  only  one  im 
portant  part  of  the  policy  of  the  Church  of 
Rome.  She  thoroughly  understands,  what  no 
other  Church  has  ever  understood,  how  to  deal 
\vith  enthusiasts.  In  some  sects — particularly 
in  infant  sects— enthusiasm  is  suffered  to  be 
rampant.  In  other  sects — particularly  in  sects 
long  established  and  richly  endowed — it  is  re 
garded  with  aversion.  The  Catholic  Church 
neither  submits  to  enthusiasm  nor  pioscribes 
it,  but  uses  it.  She  considers  it  as  a  great 
moving  force  which  in  itself,  like  the  muscular 
powers  of  a  fine  horse,  is  neither  good  nor 
evil,  but  which  may  be  so  directed  as  to  pro- 
Jucc  great  good  or  great  evil;  and  she  as- 


|  sumes  the  direction  to  herself.  It  would  b« 
absurd  to  run  down  a  horse  like  a  wolf.  It 
would  be  still  more  absurd  to  let  him  run  wild, 
breaking  fences  and  trampling  down  passen 
gers.  The  rational  course  is  to  subjugate  his 
will,  without  impairing  his  vigour — to  teach 
him  to  obey  the  rein,  and  then  to  urge  him  to 
full  speed.  When  once  he  knows  his  master, 
he  is  valuable  in  proportion  to  his  strength  and 
spirit.  Just  such  has  been  the  system  of  the 
Church  of  Rome  with  regard  to  enthusiasts. 
She  knows  that  when  religious  feelings  have 
obtained  the  complete  empire  of  the  mind, 
they  impart  a  strange  energy,  that  they  raise 
men  above  the  dominion  of  pain  and  pleasure, 
that  obloquy  becomes  glory,  that  death  itself  is 
contemplated  only  as  the  beginning  of  a  higher 
and  happier  life.  She  knows  that  a  person  in 
this  state  is  no  object  of  contempt.  He  may  be 
vulgar,  ignorant,  visionary,  extravagant;  but 
he  will  do  and  suffer  things  which  it  is  for  her 
interest  that  somebody  should  do  and  suffer, 
yet  from  which  calm  and  sober-minded  men 
would  shrink.  She  accordingly  enlists  him  in 
her  service,  assigns  to  him  some  forlorn  hope, 
in  which  intrepidity  and  impetuosity  are  more 
wanted  than  judgment  and  self-command,  and 
sends  him  forth  with  her  benedictions  and  her 
applause. 

In  England  it  not  unfrequently  happens  that 
a  tinker  or  coal-heaver  hears  a  sermon,  or  falls 
in  with  a  tract,  which  alarms  him  about  the 
state  of  his  soul.  If  he  be  a  man  of  excitable 
nerves  and  strong  imagination,  he  thinks  him 
self  given  over  to  the  Evil  Power.  He  doubts 
whether  he  has  not  committed  the  unpardon 
able  sin.  He  imputes  every  wild  fancy  that 
springs  up  in  his  mind  to  the  whisper  of  a 
fiend.  His  sleep  is  broken  by  dreams  of  the 
great  judgment-seat,  the  open  books,  and  the 
unquenchable  fire.  If,  in  order  to  escape  from 
these  vexing  thoughts,  he  flies  to  amusement 
or  to  licentious  indulgence,  the  delusive  relief 
only  makes  his  misery  darker  and  more  hope 
less.  At  length  a  turn  takes  place.  He  is  re< 
conciled  to  his  offended  Maker.  To  borrow 
the  fine  imagery  of  one  who  had  himself  been 
thus  tried,  he  emerges  from  the  Valley  of  the 
Shadow  of  Death,  from  the  dark  land  of  gins 
and  snares,  of  quagmires  and  precipices,  of 
evil  spirits  and  ravenous  beasts.  The  sun 
shine  is  on  his  path.  He  ascends  the  De 
lectable  Mountains,  and  catches  from  their 
summit  a  distant  view  of  the  shining  city 
which  is  the  end  of  his  pilgrimage.  Then 
arises  in  his  mind  a  natural,  and  surely  not  a 
censurable  desire,  to  impart  to  others  the 
thoughts  of  which  his  own  heart  is  full — to 
warn  the  careless,  to  comfort  thos»;  who  are 
troubled  in  spirit.  The  impulse  Avhich  urges 
him  to  devote  his  whole  life  to  the  teaching  of 
religion,  is  a  strong  passion  in  the  guise  of  a 
duty.  He  exhorts  his  neighbours;  and  if  he 
be  a  man  of  strong  parts,  he  often  does  so 
with  great  effect.  He  pleads  as  if  he  were 
pleading  for  his  life,  with  tears  and  pathetic 
gestures,  and  burning  words ;  and  he  soon 
finds  with  delight,  not  perhaps  wholly  unmixed 
with  the  alloy  of  human  infirmity,  that  his  rude 
eloquence  rouses  and  melts  hearers  who  sleep 


RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE   POPES. 


411 


very  composedly  while  the  rector  preaches  on 
the  apostolical  succession.  Zeal  for  God,  love 
for  his  fellow-creatures,  pl-easure  in  the  exer 
cise  of  his  newly  discovered  powers,  impel 
him  to  become  a  preacher.  He  has  no  quarrel 
with  the  establishment,  no  objection  to  its  for 
mularies,  its  government,  or  its  vestments. 
He  would  gladly  be  admitted  among  its  hum 
blest  ministers.  But,  admitted  or  rejected,  his 
vocation  is  determined.  His  orders  have  come 
down  to  him,  not  through  a  long  and  doubtful 
series  of  Arian  and  Papist  bishops,  but  direct 
from  on  high.  His  commission  is  the  same 
that  on  the  Mountain  of  Ascension  was  given 
to  the  Eleven.  Nor  will  he,  for  lack  of  human 
credentials,  spare  to  deliver  the  glorious  mes 
sage  with  which  he  is  charged  by  the  true 
Head  of  the  Church.  For  a  man  thus  minded, 
there  is  within  the  pale  of  the  establishment  no 
place.  He  has  been  at  no  college  ;  he  cannot 
construe  a  Greek  author,  nor  write  a  Latin 
theme  ;  and  he  is  told  that,  if  he  remains  in  the 
communion  of  the  Church,  he  must  do  so  as  a 
hearer,  and  that,  if  he  is  resolved  to  be  a 
teacher,  he  must  begin  by  being  a  schismatic. 
His  choice  is  soon  made.  He  harangues  on 
Tower  Hill  or  in  Smithfield.  A  congregation 
is  formed.  A  license  is  obtained.  A  plain 
brick  building,  with  a  desk  arid  benches,  is  run 
up,  and  named  Ebenezer  or  Bethel.  In  a  few 
weeks  the  Church  has  lost  forever  a  hundred 
families,  not  one  of  which  entertained  the  least 
scruple  about  her  articles,  her  liturgy,  her  go- 
verment,  or  her  ceremonies. 

Far  different  is  the  policy  of  Rome.  The 
ignorant  enthusiast,  whom  the  Anglican  Church 
makes  an  enemy,  and,  whatever  the  learned 
and  polite  may  think,  a  most  dangerous  enemy, 
the  Catholic  Church  makes  a  champion.  She 
bids  him  nurse  his  beard,  covers  him  with  a 
gown  and  hood  of  coarse  dark  stuff',  ties  a  rope 
round  his  waist,  and  sends  him  forth  to  leach 
in  her  name.  He  costs  her  nothing.  He  takes 
not  a  ducat  away  from  the  revenues  of  her 
beneficed  clergy.  He  lives  by  the  alms  of 
those  who  respect  his  spiritual  character,  and 
are  grateful  for  his  instructions.  He  preaches, 
not  exactly  in  the  style  of  Massillon,  but  in  a 
way  which  moves  the  passions  of  uneducated 
hearers;  and  all  his  influence  is  employed  to 
strengthen  the  Church  of  which  he  is  a  minis 
ter.  To  that  Church  he  becomes  as  strongly 
attached  as  any  of  the  cardinals,  whose  scarlet 
carriages  and  liveries  crowd  the  entrance  of 
the  palace  on  the  Quirinal.  In  this  way  the 
Church  of  Rome  unites  in  herself  all  the 
strength  of  establishment  and  all  the  strength 
of  dissent.  With  the  utmost  pomp  of  a  domi 
nant  hierarchy  above,  she  has  all  the  energy 
of  the  voluntary  system  below.  It  would  be 
easy  to  mention  very  recent  instances  in  which 
the  hearts  of  hundreds  of  thousands,  estranged 
from  her  by  the  selfishness,  sloth,  and  coward 
ice  of  the  beneficed  clergy,  have  been  brought 
back  by  the  zeal  of  the  begging  friars. 

Even  for  female  agency  there  is  a  place  in 
her  system.  To  devout  women  she  assigns 
spiritual  functions,  dignities,  and  magistracies. 
In  our  country,  if  a  noble  lady  is  moved  by 
more  than  ordinary  zeal  for  the  propagation  of 


religion,  the  chance  is,  that  though  she  may 
disapprove  of  no  one  doctrine  or  ceremony  of 
the  Established  Church,  she  will  end  by  giving 
her  name  to  a  new  sch.sm.  If  a  pious  and 
benevolent  woman  enters  the  cells  of  a  prison, 
to  pray  with  the  most  unhappy  and  degraded 
of  her  own  sex,  she  does  so  without  any  au 
thority  from  the  Church.  No  line  of  action  is 
traced  out  for  her;  and  it  is  well  if  the  Ordi 
nary  does  not  complain  of  her  intrusion,  and 
if  the  Bishop  does  not  shake  his  head  at  such 
irregular  benevolence.  At  Rome,  the  Countess 
of  Huntingdon  would  have  a  place  in  the  ca 
lendar  as  St.  Selina,  and  Mrs.  Fry  would  be 
foundress  and  first  Superior  of  the  Blessed 
Order  of  Sisters  of  the  Jails. 

Place  Ignatius  Loyola  at  Oxford.  He  is 
certain  to  become  the  head  of  a  formidable  se 
cession.  Place  John  Wesley  at  Rome.  He  is 
certain  to  be  the  first  General  of  a  new  society 
devoted  to  the  interests  and  honour  of  the 
Church.  Place  St.  Theresa  in  London.  Her 
restless  enthusiasm  ferments  into  madness,  not 
untinctured  with  craft.  She  becomes  the  pro 
phetess,  the  mother  of  the  faithful,  holds  dispu 
tations  with  the  devil,  issues  sealed  pardons  to 
her  adorers,  and  lies  in  of  the  Shiloh.  Place 
Joanna  Southcote  at  Rome.  She  founds  an 
order  of  barefooted  Carmelites,  every  one  of 
whom  is  ready  to  suffer  martyrdom  for  the 
Church ; — a  solemn  service  is  consecrated  to 
her  memory: — and  her  statue,  placed  over  the 
holy  water,  strikes  the  eye  of  every  stranger 
who  enters  St.  Peter's. 

We  have  dwelt  long  on  this  subject,  because 
we  believe,  that  of  the  many  causes  to  which 
the  Church  of  Rome  owed  her  safety  and  her 
triumph  at  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century, 
the  chief  was  the  profound  policy  with  which 
she  used  the  fanaticism  of  such  persons  as  St 
Ignatius  and  St.  Theresa. 

The  Protestant  party  was  now,  indeed,  van 
quished  and  humbled.  In  France,  so  strong 
had  been  the  Catholic  reaction,  that  Henry  IV. 
found  it  necessary  to  choose  between  his  reli 
gion  and  his  crown.  In  spite  of  his  clear  here 
ditary  right,  in  spile  of  his  eminent  personal 
qualities,  he  saAv  that,  unless  he  reconciled 
himself  to  Ihe  Church  of  Rome,  he  could  not 
count  on  the  fidelity  even  of  those  gallant 
gentlemen  whose  impetuous  valour  had  turned 
the  tide  of  battle  at  Ivry.  In  Belgium,  Poland, 
and  Southern  Germany,  Catholicism  had  ob 
tained  a  complete  ascendant.  The  resistance 
of  Bohemia  was  put  down.  The  Palatinate 
was  conquered.  Upper  and  Lower  Saxony- 
were  overflowed  by  Catholic  invaders.  The 
King  of  Denmark  stood  forth  as  the  Protector 
of  the  Reformed  Churches ;  he  was  defeated, 
driven  out  of  the  empire,  and  attacked  in  his 
own  possessions.  The  armies  of  the  house 
of  Austria  pressed  on,  subjugated  Pomerania, 
and  were  stopped  in  their  progress  only  by  ih*» 
ramparts  of  Stralsund. 

And  now  again  the  tide  turned.  Two  vie. 
lent  outbreaks  of  religious  feeling  in  opposite 
directions  had  given  a  character  to  the  hisrory 
of  a  whole  century.  Protestanlism  had  at  firs* 
driven  back  Catholicism  to  the  Alps  and  the 
Pyrenees.  Catholicism  had  ral);ed,  ar.d  hart 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


driven  back  Protestantism  even  to  the  German 
Ocean.  Then  the  great  southern  reaction  be 
gan  to  slacken,  as  the  great  northern  movement 
had  slackened  before.  The  zeal  of  the  Catho- 
'ics  became  cool;  their  union  was  dissolved. 
The  paroxysm  of  religious  excitement  was 
over  on  both  sides.  The  one  party  had  de 
generated  as  far  from  the  spirit  of  Loyola  as 
the  other  from  the  spirit  of  Luther.  During 
three  generations,  religion  had  been  the  main 
spring  of  politics.  The  revolutions  and  civil 
wars  of  France,  Scotland,  Holland,  Sweden, 
the  long  struggle  between  Philip  and  Elizabeth, 
the  bloody  competition  for  the  Bohemian  crown, 
all  originated  in  theological  disputes. 

But  a  great  change  now  took  place.  The 
contest  which  was  raging  in  Germany  lost  its 
religious  character.  It  was  now,  on  the  one  side, 
jess  a  contest  for  the  spiritual  ascendency  of 
the  Church  of  Rome  than  for  the  temporal  as 
cendency  of  the  house  of  Austria.  On  the 
other,  it  was  less  a  contest  for  the  reformed 
doctrine  than  for  national  independence.  Go 
vernments  began  to  form  themselves  into  new 
combinations,  in  which  community  of  political 
interest  was  far  more  regarded  than  communi 
ty  of  religious  belief.  Even  at  Rome  the  pro 
gress  of  the  Catholic  arms  was  observed  with 
very  mixed  feelings.  The  Supreme  Pontiff 
was  a  sovereign  prince  of  the  second  rank,  and 
was  anxious  about  the  balance  of  power,  as 
well  as  about  the  propagation  of  truth.  It  was 
known  that  he  dreaded  the  rise  of  a  universal 
monarchy  even  more  than  he  desired  the  pros 
perity  of  the  Universal  Church.  At  length  a 
great  event  announced  to  the  world  that  the 
war  of  sects  had  ceased,  and  that  the  war  of 
states  had  succeeded.  A  coalition,  including 
Calvinists,  Lutherans,  and  Catholics,  was 
formed  against  the  house  of  Austria.  At  the 
head  of  that  coalition  were  the  first  statesman 
and  first  warrior  of  the  age;  the  former  a 
prince  of  the  Catholic  Church,  distinguished 
by  the  vigour  and  success  with  which  he  had 
put  down  the  Huguenots — the  lattera  Protestant 
king,  who  owed  his  throne  to  the  revolution 
caused  by  haired  of  Popery.  The  alliance  of 
Richelieu  and  Gustavus  marks  the  time  at 
which  the  great  religious  struggle  terminated. 
The  war  Avhich  followed  was  a  war  for  the 
equilibrium  of  Europe.  When,  at  length,  the 
peace  of  Westphalia  was  concluded,  it  appear 
ed  that  the  Church  of  Rome  remained  in  full 
possession  of  a  vast  dominion,  which  in  the 
middle  of  the  preceding  century  she  seemed 
to  be  on  the  point  of  losing.  No  part  of  Eu 
rope  remained  Protestant,  except  that  part 
which  had  become  thoroughly  Protestant  be 
fore  the  generation  which  heard  Luther  preach 
had  passed  away. 

Since  that  time  there  has  been  no  religious 
war  between  Catholics  and  Protestants  as  such. 
In  the  time  of  Cromwell,  Protestant  England 
was  united  with  Catholic  France,  then  govern 
ed  by  a  priest,  against  Catholic  Spain.  William 
the  Third,  the  eminently  Protestant  hero,  was 
at  the  head  of  a  coalition  which  included  many 
Catholic  powers,  and  which  was  secretly  fa 
voured  even  by  Rome,  against  the  Catholic 
fiouis  In  the  time  of  Anne,  Protestant  Eng 


land  and  Protestant  Holland  joined  with  Catho- 
j  lie  Savoy  and  Catholic  Portugal,  for  the  pur- 
|  pose  of  transferring  the  crown  of  Spain  from 
one  bigoted  Catholic  to  another. 

The  geographical  frontier  between  the  two 
religions  has  continued  to  run  almo.n  pre- 
cisely  where  it  ran  at  the  close  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War ;  nor  has  Protestantism  given  any 
proofs  of  that  "expansive  power"  which  has 
been  ascribed  to  it.  But  the  Protestant  boasts, 
and  most  justly,  that  wealth,  civilization,  and 
intelligence  have  increased  far  more  on  the 
northern  than  on  the  southern  side  of  the 
boundary ;  that  countries  so  little  favoured  by 
nature  as  Scotland  and  Prussia  are  now  among 
the  most  flourishing  and  best  governed  portions 
of  the  world — while  the  marble  palaces  of 
Genoa  are  deserted — while  banditti  infest  the 
beautiful  shores  of  Campania — while  the  fertile 
sea-coast  of  the  Pontifical  State  is  abandoned 
to  buffaloes  and  wild  boars.  It  cannot  be 
doubted,  that  since  the  sixteenth  century,  the 
Protestant  nations — fair  allowance  being  made 
for  physical  disadvantages — have  made  de 
cidedly  greater  progress  than  their  neighbours. 
The  progress  made  by  those  nations  in  which 
Protestantism,  though  not  finally  successful,  yet 
maintained  a  long  struggle,  and  left  permanent 
traces,  kas  generally  been  considerable.  But 
when  we  come  to  the  Catholic  Land,  to  the 
part  of  Europe  in  which  the  first  spark  of  re 
formation  was  trodden  out  as  soon  as  it  appear 
ed,  and  from  which  proceeded  the  impulse 
which  drove  Protestantism  back,  we  find,  at 
best,  a  very  slow  progress,  and  on  the  whole  a 
retrogression.  Compare  Denmark  and  Por 
tugal.  When  Luther  began  to  preach,  the 
superiority  of  the  Portuguese  was  unquestion 
able.  At  present  the  superiority  of  the  Danes 
is  no  less  so.  Compare  Edinburgh  and  Flo 
rence.  Edinburgh  has  owed  less  to  climate, 
to  soil,  and  to  the  fostering  care  of  rulers,  than 
any  capital,  Protestant  or  Catholic.  In  all 
these  respects,  Florence  has  been  singularly 
happy.  Yet  whoever  knows  what  Florence 
and  Edinburgh  were  in  the  generation  pre 
ceding  the  Reformation,  and  what  they  are 
now,  will  acknowledge  that  some  great  cause 
has,  during  the  last  three  centuries,  operated 
to  raise  one  part  of  the  European  family,  and 
to  depress  the  other.  Compare  the  history  of 
England  and  that  of  Spain  during  the  last  cen 
tury.  In  arms,  arts,  sciences,  letters,  com 
merce,  agriculture,  the  contrast  is  most  strik 
ing.  The  distinction  is  not  confined  to  this 
side  of  the  Atlantic.  The  colonies  planted  by 
England  in  America  have  immeasurably  out 
grown  in  power  those  planted  by  Spain.  Yet 
we  have  no  reason  to  believe  that,  at  the  be 
ginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the  Castilian 
was  in  any  respect  inferior  to  the  Englishman. 
Our  firm  belief  is,  that  the  North  owes  its 
great  civilization  and  prosperity  chiefly  to  the 
moral  effect  of  the  Protestant  Reformation ; 
and  that  the  decay  of  the  Southern  countries 
of  Europe  is  to  be  mainly  ascribed  to  the  great 
Catholic  revival. 

About  a  hundred  years  after  the  final  settle 
ment  of  the  boundary  line  between  Protestant 
ism  and  Catholicism,  began  to  appear  the 


RANKE'S  HISTORY    OF   THE   POPES. 


413 


signs  of  the  fourth  great  peril  of  the  Church 
of  Rome.  The  storm  which  was  now  rising 
against  her  was  of  a  very  different  kind  from 
those  which  had  preceded  it.  Those  who  had 
formerly  attacked  her  had  questioned  only  a 
part  of  her  doctrines.  A  school  was  now 
growing  up  which  rejected  the  whole.  The 
Albigenses,  the  Lollards,  the  Lutherans,  the 
Calvinists,  had  a  positive  religious  system, 
and  were  strongly  attached  to  it.  The  creed 
of  the  new  sectaries  was  altogether  negative. 
They  took  one  of  their  premises  from  the 
Catholics,  and  one  from  the  Protestants. 
From  the  former  tne7  borrowed  the  principle, 
that  Catholicism  was  the  only  pure  and  ge 
nuine  Christianity.  With  the  latter  they  held 
that  some  parts  of  the  Catholic  system  were 
contrary  to  reason.  The  conclusion  was  ob 
vious.  Two  propositions,  each  of  which  sepa 
rately  is  compatible  with  the  most  exalted 
piety,  formed,  when  held  in  conjunction,  the 
groundwork  of  a  system  of  irreligion.  The 
doctrine  of  Bossuet,  that  transubstantiation  is 
affirmed  in  the  Gospel,  and  the  doctrine  of 
Tillotson,  that  transubstantiation  is  an  absurd 
ity,  when  put  together,  produced  by  logical  ne 
cessity  the  inferences  of  Voltaire. 

Had  the  sect  which  was  rising  at  Paris  been 
a  sect  of  mere  scoffers,  it  is  very  improbable 
that  it  would  have  left  deep  traces  of  its  exist 
ence  in  the  institutions  and  manners  of  Eu 
rope.  Mere  negation — mere  Epicurean  infi 
delity,  as  Lord  Bacon  most  justly  observes — 
has  never  disturbed  the  peace  of  the  world.  It 
furnishes  no  motive  for  action.  It  inspires  no 
enthusiasm.  It  has  no  missionaries,  no  cru 
saders,  no  martyrs.  If  the  Patriarch  of  the 
Holy  Philosophical  Church  had  contented 
himself  with  making  jokes  about  Saul's  asses 
and  David's  wives,  and  with  criticising  the 
poetry  of  Ezekiel  in  the  same  narrow  spirit  in 
which  he  criticised  that  of  Shakspeare,  the 
Church  would  have  had  little  to  fear.  But  it  is 
due  to  him  and  to  his  compeers  to  say,  that  the 
real  secret  of  their  strength  lay  in  the  truth 
which  was  mingled  with  their  errors,  and  in 
the  generous  enthusiasm  which  was  hidden 
under  their  flippancy.  They  M^ere  men  who, 
with  all  their  faults,  moral  and  intellectual, 
sincerely  and  earnestly  desired  the  improve 
ment  of  the  condition  of  the  human  race — 
whose  blood  boiled  at  the  sight  of  cruelty  and 
injustice — who  made  manful  war,  with  every 
iaculty  which  they  possessed,  on  what  they 
considered  as  abases — and  who  on  many  sig 
nal  occasions  placed  themselves  gallantly  be 
tween  the  powerful  and  the  oppressed.  While 
they  assailed  Christianity  with  a  rancour  and 
an  unfairness  disgraceful  to  men  who  call 
themselves  philosophers,  they  yet  had,  in  far 
greater  measure  than  their  opponents,  that 
chanty  towards  men  of  all  classes  and  races 
•which  Christianity  enjoins.  Religious  perse 
cution,  judicial  torture,  arbitrary  imprison 
ment,  the  unnecessary  multiplication  of  capital 
punishments,  the  delav  and  chicanery  of  tri 
bunals,  the  exactions  of  farmers  of  the  revenue, 
slavery,  the  slave  trade,  were  the  constant  sub 
jects  of  their  lively  satire  and  eloquent  disqui 
sitions.  When  an  innocent  man  was  broken 


\  on  the  wheel  at  Toulouse — when  a  youth, 
!  guilty  only  of  an  indiscretion,  was  burned  ai 
!  Abbeville — when  a  brave  officer,  borne  down 
I  by  public  injustice,  was  dragged,  with  a  gag  in, 
!  his  mouth,  to  die  on  the  Place  de  Greve,  a 
voice  instantly  went  forth  from  the  banks  of 
Lake  Leman,  which  made  itself  heard  from 
Moscow  to  Cadiz,  and  which  sentenced  Ihe 
unjust  judges  to  the  contempt  and  detestation 
of  all  Europe.  The  really  efficient  weapons 
with  which  the  philosophers  assailed  the  evan 
gelical  faith  were  borrowed  from  the  evangeli 
cal  morality.  The  ethical  and  dogmatical 
parts  of  the  Gospel  were  unhappily  turned 
against  each  other.  On  the  one  side  was  a 
church  boasting  of  the  purity  of  a  doctrine  de 
rived  from  the  apostles ;  but  disgraced  by  the 
massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  by  the  murder 
of  the  best  of  kings,  by  the  war  of  the  Ceven- 
nes,  by  the  destruction  of  Port-Royal.  On  the 
other  side  was  a  sect  laughing  at  the  Scrip 
tures,  shooting  out  the  tongue  at  the  sacra 
ments,  but  ready  to  encounter  principalities 
and  powers  in  the  cause  of  justice,  mercy,  and 
toleration. 

Irreligion,  accidentally  associated  with  phi 
lanthropy,  triumphed  for  a  time  over  religion 
accidentally  associated  with  political  and  so 
cial  abuses.  Every  thing  gave  way  to  the 
zeal  and  activity  of  the  new  reformers.  In 
France,  every  man  distinguished  in  letters 
was  found  in  their  ranks.  Every  year  ga<re 
birth  to  works  in  which  the  fundamental  prin 
ciples  of  the  Church  were  attacked  with  argu 
ment,  invective,  and  ridicule.  The  Church 
made  no  defence,  except  by  acts  of  power. 
Censures  were  pronounced — editions  were 
seized — insults  were  offered  to  the  remains  of 
infidel  writers  ;  but  no  Bossuet,  no  Pascal, 
came  forth  to  encounter  Voltaire.  There  ap 
peared  not  a  single  defence  of  the  Catholic 
doctrine  which  produced  any  considerable  ef 
fect,  or  which  is  now  even  remembered.  A 
bloody  and  unsparing  persecution,  like  that 
which  put  down  the  Albigenses,  might  have 
put  down  the  philosophers.  But  the  time  for 
De  Montforts  and  Dominies  had  gone  by.  The 
punishments  which  the  priests  were  still  able 
to  inflict  were  sufficient  to  irritate,  but  not  suf 
ficient  to  destroy.  The  war  was  between 
power  on  the  one  side,  and  wit  on  the  other, 
and  the  power  was  under  far  more  restraint 
than  the  wit.  Orthodoxy  soon  became  a  badge 
of  ignorance  and  stupidity.  It  was  as  neces 
sary  to  the  character  of  an  accomplished  man 
that  he  should  despise  the  religion  of  his  coun 
try,  as  that  he  should  know  his  letters.  The 
new  doctrines  spread  rapidly  through  Christen 
dom.  Paris  was  the  capital  of  the  whole  con 
tinent.  French  was  everywhere  the  language 
of  polite  circles.  The  literary  glory  of  Italy 
and  Spain  had  departed.  That  of  Germany 
had  not  yet  dawned.  1  he  teachers  of  France 
were  the  teachers  of  Europe.  The  Parisian 
opinions  spread  fast  among  the  educateu 
classes  beyond  the  Alps ;  nor  could  the  vigi- 
|  lance  of  the  Inquisition  prevent  the  contraband 
I  importation  of  the  new  heresy  into  Castile  anct 
j  Portugal.  Governments — e*ren  arbitrary  go- 
!  vernments— saw  with  pleasure  the  progre** 
2  M  2 


414 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


of  this  philosophy.    Numerous  reforms,  gene-  | 
rally  laudable    sometimes  hurried  on  without  j 
sullicip'it  regard  to  time,  to  place,  and  to  public  j 
feeling,  showed  the  extent  of  its   influence,  j 
The  rulers  of  Prussia,  of  Russia,  of  Austria, 
and  of  many  smaller  states,  were  supposed  to 
be  among  the  initiated. 

The  Church  of  Rome  was  still,  in  outward 
show,  as  stately  and  splendid  as  ever ;  but  her 
foundation  was  undermined.  No  state  had 
quitted  her  communion,  or  confiscated  her  re 
venues;  but  the  reverence  of  the  people  was 
everywhere  departing  from  her. 

The  first  great  warning  stroke  was  the  fall 
of  that  society  which,  in  the  conflict  with  Pro 
testantism,  had  saved  the  Catholic  Church 
from  destruction.  The  order  of  Jesus  had 
never  recovered  from  the  injury  received  in 
the  struggle  with  Port-Royal.  It  was  now  still 
more  rudely  assailed  by  the  philosophers.  Its 
spirit  was  broken;  its  reputation  was  tainted. 
Insulted  by  all  the  men  of  genius  in  Europe, 
condemned  by  the  civil  magistrate,  feebly  de- 
feuded  by  the  chiefs  of  the  hierarchy,  it  fell — 
and  great  was  the  fall  of  it. 

The  movement  went  on  with  increasing 
speed.  The  first  generation  of  the  new  sect 
passed  away.  The  doctrines  of  Voltaire  were 
inherited  and  exaggerated  by  successors,  who 
bore  to  him  the  same  relation  which  the  Ana 
baptists  bore  to  Luther,  or  the  Fifth-Monarchy 
men  to  Pym.  At  length  the  Revolution  came. 
Down  went  the  old  Church  of  France,  with  all 
its  pomp  and  wealth.  Some  of  its  priests  pur 
chased  a  maintenance  by  separating  them 
selves  from  Rome,  and  by  becoming  the  au 
thors  of  a  fresh  schism.  Some,  rejoicing  in 
the  new  license,  flung  away  their  sacred  vest 
ments,  proclaimed  that  their  whole  life  had 
been  an  imposture,  insulted  and  persecuted 
the  religion  of  which  they  had  been  ministers, 
and  distinguished  themselves  even  in  the  Ja 
cobin  Club  and  the  Commune  of  Paris,  by  the 
excess  of  their  impudence  and  ferocity.  Others, 
more  faithful  to  their  principles,  were  butch 
ered  by  scores  without  a  trial,  drowned,  shot, 
hung  on  lamp-posts.  Thousands  fled  from 
their  country  to  take  sanctuary  under  the  shade 
of  hostile  altars.  The  churches  were  closed  ; 
the  beils  were  silent;  the  shrines  were  plun 
dered;  the  silver  crucifixes  were  melted  down. 
Buffoons,  dressed  in  copes  and  surplices,  came 
dancing  the  carmagnole  even  to  the  bar  of  the 
Convention.  The  bust  of  Marat  was  substi 
tuted  for  the  statues  of  the  martyrs  of  Chris 
tianity.  A  prostitute,  seated  in  state  in  the 
chancel  of  Notre  Dame,  received  the  adoration 
of  thousands,  who  exclaimed  that  at  length, 
for  'he  first  time,  those  ancient  Gothic  arches 
had  resounded  with  the  accents  of  truth.  The 
ii<;w  unbelief  was  as  intolerant  as  the  old  su 
perstition.  To  show  reverence  for  religion 
was  to  incur  the  suspicion  of  disaffection.  It 
was  not  without  imminent  danger  that  the 
priest  baptized  the  infant,  joined  the  hands  of 
lovers,  or  listened  to  the  confession  of  the 
riyinsr  The  absurd  worship  of  the  Goddess  of 
Reason  was,  indeed,  of  short  duration*  but  the 
deism  of  Robespierre  and  Lepaux  was  not  less 
nostiie  to  the  Catholic  faith  that  the  atheism  of 
Cloot/  and  Chaumette. 


Nor  were  the  calamities  of  the  Church  con 
fined  to  France.  The  revolutionary  spirit,  at 
tacked  by  all  Europe,  beat  all  Europe  back, 
became  conqueror  in  its  turn,  and,  not  satisfied 
with  the  Belgian  cities  and  the  rich  domains 
of  the  spiritual  electors,  went  raging  over  the 
Rhine  and  through  the  passes  of  the  Alps. 
Throughout  the  whole  of  the  great  war  against 
Protestantism,  Italy  and  Spain  had  been  the 
Dase  of  the  Catholic  operations.  Spain  was 
now  the  obsequious  vassal  of  the  infidels.  Italy 
was  subjugated  by  them.  To  her  ancient  prin 
cipalities  succeeded  the  Cisalpine  republic,  and 
the  Ligurian  republic,  and  the  Parthenopean, 
republic.  The  shrine  of  Loretto  was  stripped, 
of  the  treasures  piled  up  by  the  devotion  of  six 
hundred  years.  The  convents  of  Rome  were 
pillaged.  The  tricoloured  flag  floated  on  the 
top  of  the  castle  of  St.  Angelo.  The  successor 
of  St.  Peter  was  carried  away  captive  by  the 
unbelievers.  He  died  a  prisoner  in  their  hands; 
and  even  the  honours  of  sepulture  were  long 
withheld  from  his  remains, 

It  is  not  strange  that  in  the  year  1799,  even 
sagacious  observers  should  have  thought  that, 
at  length,  the  hour  of  the  Church  of  Rome  was 
come.  An  infidel  power  ascendant — the  Pope 
dying  in  captivity — the  most  illustrious  pre 
lates  of  France  living  in  a  foreign  country  on 
Protestant  alms — the  noblest  edifices  which 
the  munificence  of  former  ages  had  consecrat 
ed  to  the  worship  of  God,  turned  into  temples 
of  victory,  or  into  banqueting-houses  for  poli 
tical  societies,  or  into  Theophilanthropic  cha 
pels — such  signs  might  well  be  supposed  to  in 
dicate  the  approaching  end  of  that  long  domi 
nation. 

But  the  end  was  not  yet.  Again  doomed  to 
death,  the  milk-white  hind  was  still  fated  not 
to  die.  Even  before  the  funeral  rites  had  been 
performed  over  the  ashes  of  Pius  the  Sixth,  a 
great  reaction  had  commenced,  which  after  the 
lapse  of  more  than  forty  years  appears  to  be 
still  in  progress.  Anarchy  had  its  day.  A 
new  order  of  things  rose  out  of  the  confusion — 
new  dynasties,  new  laws,  new  titles ;  and 
amidst  them  emerged  the  ancient  religion. 

The  Arabs  had  a  fable  that  the  Great  Pyra 
mid  was  built  by  antediluvian  kings,  and  alone, 
of  all  the  works  of  men,  bore  the  weight  of  the 
flood.    Such  as  this  was  the  fate  of  the  Papacy. 
It  had  been  buried  under  the  great  inundation ; 
but  its   deep  foundations  had   remained  un 
shaken  ;   and,  when  the  waters  abated,  it  ap 
peared  alone  amidst  the  ruins  of  a  world  which 
had  passed  away.     The  republic  of  Holland 
was  gone,  and  the  empire  of  Germany,  and  the 
Great  Council  of  Venice,  and  the  old  Helvetian 
League,  and  the  house  of  Bourbon,  and  the 
Parliaments  and  aristocracy  of  France.  Europe 
was  full  of  young  creations — a  French  empire, 
a  kingdom    of  Italy,  a  Confederation   of  the 
;  Rhine.  Nor  had  the  late  events  affected  only  ter- 
i  ritorial  limits  and  political  institutions.  The  dis- 
j  tribution  of  property,  the  composition  and  spirit 
|  of  society,  had,  through  great  part  of  Catholic 
j  Europe,  undergone  a  complete  change.     But 
i  the  unchangeable  Church  was  still  there.  Some 
future  historian,  as  able  and  temperate  as  Pro- 
I  fessor  Ranke,  will,  we  hope,  trace  the  progress 
I  of  the  Catholic  revival  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 


KANKE'S   HISTORY  OF  THE   POPES. 


415 


Jury.     We  feel  that  we  are  drawing  too  near  [ 
cur  own  time;  and  that,  if  we  go  on,  we  shall  j 
be  in  danger  of  saying  much  which  may  be  I 
supposed  to  indicate,  and  which  will  certainly 
excite,  angry  feelings.  We  will,  therefore, make 
only  one  observation,  which,  in  our  opinion,  is 
deserving  of  serious  attention. 

During  the  eighteenth  century,  the  influence 
of  the  Church  of  Rome  was  constantly  on  the 
decline.  Unbelief  made  extensive  conquests 
in  all  the  Catholic  countries  of  Europe,  and  in 
some  countries  obtained  a  complete  ascend 
ency.  The  Papacy  was  at  length  brought  so 
low  as  to  be  an  object  of  derision  to  infidels, 
and  of  pity  rather  than  of  hatred  to  Protestants. 
During  the  nineteenth  century,  this  fallen 
Church  has  been  gradually  rising  from  her 
depressed  state,  and  reconquering  her  old  do 
minion.  No  person  who  calmly  reflects  on 
what,  within  the  last  few  years,  has  passed  in 
Spain,  in  Italy,  in  South  America,  in  Ireland, 
in  the  Netherlands,  in  Prussia,  even  in  France, 
can  duubt  that  her  power  over  the  hearts  and 
minds  of  men  is  now  greater  than  it  was  when 
the  "Encyclopaedia"  and  the  "Philosophical 
Dictionary"  appeared.  It  is  surely  remarkable, 
that  neither  the  moral  revolution  of  the  eight 
eenth  century,  nor  the  moral  counter-revolu 
tion  of  the  nineteenth,  should,  in  any  per 
ceptible  degree,  have  added  to  the  domain  of 
Protestantism.  During  the  former  period,  what 
ever  was  lost  to  Catholicism  was  lost  also  to 
Christianity;  during  the  latter,  whatever  was 
regained  by  Christianity  in  Catholic  countries, 
was  regained  also  by  Catholicism.  We  should 
naturally  have  expected  that  many  minds,  on 
the  way  from  superstition  to  infidelity,  or  on 
the  way  back  from  infidelity  to  superstition, 
would  have  stopped  at  an  intermediate  point. 
Between  the  doctrines  taught  in  the  schools  of 


the  Jesuits,  and  those  which  were  maintained 
at  the  little  supper  parties  of  the  Baron  Hoi- 
bach,  there  is  a  vast  interval,  in  which  the 
human  mind,  it  should  seem,  might  find  for 
itself  some  resting-place  more  satisfactory  than 
either  of  the  two  extremes.  And  at  the  time 
of  the  Reformation,  millions  found  such  a  rest 
ing-place.  Whole  nations  then  renounced 
Popery  without  ceasing  to  believe  in  a  first 
cause,  in  a  future  life,  or  in  the  Divine  authority 
of  Christianity.  In  the  last  century,  on  the 
other  hand,  when  a  Catholic  renounced  his  be 
lief  in  the  real  presence,  it  was  a  thousand  to 
one  that  he  renounced  his  belief  in  the  Gospe] 
too;  and  when  the  reaction  took  place,  \\itk 
belief  in  the  Gospel  came  back  belief  in  the 
real  presence. 

We  by  no  means  venture  to  deduce  from 
these  phenomena  any  general  law:  but  we 
think  it  a  most  remarkable  fact,  that  no  Chris 
tian  nation,  which  did  not  adopt  the  principles 
of  the  Reformation  before  the  end  of  the  six 
teenth  century,  should  ever  have  adopted  them 
Catholic  communities  have,  since  that  time, 
become  infidel  and  become  Catholic  again 
but  none  has  become  Protestant. 

Here  we  close  this  hasty  sketch  of  one  of  the 
most  important  portions  of  the  history  of  man 
kind.  Our  readers  will  have  great  reason  to 
feel  obliged  to  us  if  we  have  interested  them 
sufficiently  to  induce  them  to  peruse  Professor 
Ranke's  book.  We  will  only  caution  them 
against  the  French  translation — a  performance 
which,  in  our  opinion,  is  just  as  discreditable 
to  the  moral  character  of  the  person  from  whom 
it  proceeds,  as  a  false  affidavit  or  a  forged  bit- 
of  exchange  would  have  been:  and  advisf. 
them  to  study  either  the  original,  or  the  English 
version,  in  which  the  sense  and  spirit  cf  tht 
original  are  admirably  preserved. 


MACAULAY?S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


COWLEY  AND  MILTON.' 


"  Referre  sermones  Denrum  et 
Magna  modis  tenuare  parvis." 

HORACE. 


i  HAVE  thought  it  good  to  set  down  in  writing 
a  memorable  debate,  wherein  I  was  a  listener, 
and  two  men  of  pregnant  parts  and  great  repu 
tation  discourses;  hoping  that  my  friends  will 
not  be  displeased  to  have  a  record  both  of  the 
strange  times  through  which  I  have  lived,  and 
of  the  famous  men  with  whom  I  have  con 
versed.  It  chanced  in  the  warm  and  beautiful 
spring  of  the  year  1665,  a  little  before  the  sad 
dest  summer  that  ever  London  saw,  that  I  went 
to  the  Bo wling-Green  at  Piccadilly,  whither  at 
that  lime  the  best  gentry  made  continual  resort. 
There  I  met  Mr.  Cowley,  who  had  lately  left 
Barnelms.  There  was  then  a  house  preparing 
forhirnatChertsey,andtill  it  should  be  finished 
he  had  come  up  for  a  short  time  to  London,  that 
he  might  urge  a  suit  to  his  Grace  of  Bucking 
ham  touching  certain  lands  of  her  majesty's 
whereof  he  requested  a  lease.  I  had  the  ho 
nour  to  be  familiarly  acquainted  with  that 
worthy  gentleman  and  most  excellent  poet, 
whose  death  hath  been  deplored  with  as  gene 
ral  a  consent  of  all  powers  that  delight  in  the 
woods,  or  in  verse,  or  in  love,  as  was  of  old 
that  of  Daphnis  or  of  Callus. 

After  some  talk,  which  it  is  not  material  to 
sei  down  at  large,  concerning  his  suit  and  his 
vexations  at  the  court,  where  indeed  his  ho 
nesty  did  him  more  harm  than  his  parts  could 
do  him  good,  I  entreated  him  to  dine  with  me 
at  my  lodgings  in  the  Temple,  which  he  most 
courteously  promised.  And  that  so  eminent  a 
guest  might  not  lack  a  better  entertainment 
than  cooks  or  vintners  can  provide,  I  sent  to 
the  house  of  Mr.  John  Milton,  in  the  Artillery 
Walk,  to  beg  that  he  would  also  be  my  guest. 
For,  though  he  had  been  secretary,  first  to  the 
Council  of  State,  and  after  that  to  the  Protector, 
and  Mr.  Cowley  had  held  the  same  post  under 
Lord  St.  Albans  in  his  banishment,  I  hoped, 
notwithstanding,  that  they  would  think  them 
selves  rather  united  by  their  common  art  than 
divided  by  their  different  factions.  And  so  in 
deed  it  proved.  For  while  we  sate  at  table 
Ihey  talked  freely  of  many  men  and  things,  as 
well  ancient  as  modern,  with  much  civility. 
Nay,  Mr.  Milton,  who  seldom  tasted  wine,  both 
because  of  his  singular  temperance,  and  be 
cause  of  his  gout,  did  more  than  once  pledge 
Mr.  Cowley,  who  was  indeed  no  hermit  in  diet. 
At  last,  being  heated,  Mr.  Milton  begged  that  I 
would  open  the  windows.  "Nay,"  said  I,  "if 
you  desire  fresh  air  and  coolness,  what  should 
hinder  us,  as  the  evening  is  fair,  from  sailing 


*  A  C.-ntersalion  beticcrn  Mr.  Abraham  Cowley  and  Mr.  \ 
Jokn  MiltDTi,  (oueliinfr  the.  Great,  Cinil  War. — Set  down  by  I 
a  Gentleman  of  the  Middle  Temple. 


an  hour  on  the  river."  To  this  they  b..m  cheer 
fully  consented,  and  forth  we  walked,  Mr.  Cow 
ley  and  I  leading  Mr.  Milton  between  us,  to  the 
Temple  Stairs.  There  we  took  a  boat,  and 
thence  we  rowed  up  the  river. 

The  wind  was  pleasant;  the  evening  fine; 
the  sky,  the  earth,  and  the  water  beautiful  to 
look  upon.  But  Mr.  Cowley  and  I  held  our 
peace,  and  said  nothing  of  the  gay  sights  around 
us,  lest  we  should  too  feelingly  remind  Mr. 
Milton  of  his  calamity;  whereof,  however,  he 
needed  no  monitor,  for  soon  he  said,  sadly, 
"Ah,  Mr.  Cowley,  you  are  a  happy  man.  What 
would  I  now  give  for  one  more  look  at  the  sun, 
and  the  waters,  and  the  gardens  of  this  fair 
city1?" 

"I  know  not,"  said  Mr.  Cowley,  "whether 
we  ought  not  rather  to  envy  you  for  that  which 
makes  you  to  envy  others ;  and  that  especially 
in  this  place,  where  all  eyes  which  are  nol 
closed  in  blindness  ought  to  become  fountains 
of  tears.  What  can  we  look  upon  which  is  not 
a  memorial  of  change  and  sorrow,  of  fair 
things  vanished,  and  evil  things  done?  When 
I  see  the  gate  of  Whitehall,  and  the  stately  pil 
lars  of  the  Banqueting  House,  I  cannot  choose 
but  think  of  what  I  have  seen  there  in  former 
days,  masques,  and  pageants,  and  dances,  and 
smiles,  and  the  waving  of  graceful  heads,  and 
the  bounding  of  delicate  feet.  And  then  I  turn 
to  thoughts  of  other  things,  which  even  to  re 
member  makes  me  blush  and  weep; — of  the 
great  black  scaffold,  and  the  axe  and  the  block, 
which  were  placed  before  those  very  windows; 
and  the  voice  seems  to  sound  in  mine  ears,  the 
lawless  and  terrible  voice  which  cried  out  that 
the  head  of  a  king  was  the  head  of  a  traitor. 
There  stands  Westminster  Hail,  which  who 
can  look  upon  and  not  tremble  to  think  how 
time,  and  change,  and  death  confound  the 
counsels  of  the  wise,  and  beat  down  the  wea 
pons  of  the  mighty?  How  have  I  seen  it  sur 
rounded  with  tens  of  thousands  of  petitioners 
crying  for  justice  and  privilege  !  How  have  I 
heard  it  shake  with  fierce  and  proud  words, 
which  made  the  hearts  of  the  people  to  burn 
within  them  !  Then  it  is  blockaded  by  dra 
goons  and  cleared  by  pikemen.  And  they  who 
have  conquered  their  master  go  forth  trembling 
at  the  word  of  their  servanc.  And  yet  a  little 
while,  and  the  usurper  comes  forth  from  it,  in 
his  robe  of  ermine,  with  the  golden  staff  in  one 
hand  and  the  Bible  in  the  other,  amidst  the 
roaring  of  the  guns  and  the  shouting  of  the 
people.  And  yet  again  a  little  while,  and  the 
doors  arc  thronged  with  multitudes  in  black, 
and  the  hearse  and  the  plumes  come  forth,  and 
the  tyrant  is  borne,  in  more  than  royal  pomp 


COWLEY  AND  MILTON. 


417 


to  a  royal  sepulchre.  A  few  days  more,  and 
his  head  is  fixed  to  rot  on  the  pinnacles  of  that 
very  hall  where  he  sat  on  a  throne  in  his  life, 
and  lay  in  state  after  his  death.  When  I  think 
on  all  these  things,  to  look  round  me  makes 
me  sad  at  heart.  True  it  is  that  God  hath  re 
stored  to  us  our  old  laws,  and  the  rightful  line 
of  our  kings.  Yet,  how  I  know  not,  but  it 
seems  to  me  that  something  is  wanting, — that 
our  court  hath  not  the  old  gravity,  nor  our  peo 
ple  the  old  loyalty.  These  evil  times,  like  the 
great  deluge,  have  overwhelmed  and  confused 
all  earthly  things.  And,  even  as  those  waters, 
though  at  last  they  abated,  yet,  as  the  learned 
write,  destroyed  all  trace  of  the  Garden  of 
Eden,  so  that  its  place  hath  never  yet  been 
found,  so  hath  this  opening  of  all  the  flood 
gates  of  political  evil  effaced  all  marks  of  the 
ancient  political  paradise." 

"Sir,  by  your  favour,"  said  Mr.  Milton, 
"though,  from  many  circumstances  both  of 
body  and  fortune,  I  might  plead  fairer  excuses 
for  despondency  than  yourself,  I  yet  look  not 
so  sadly  either  on  the  past  or  on  the  future. 
That  a  deluge  hath  passed  over  this  our  nation 
I  deny  not.  But  I  hold  it  not  to  be  such  a  de 
luge  as  that  of  which  you  speak,  but  rather  a 
blessed  flood,  'tike  those  of  the  Nile,  which  in 
its  overflow  doth  indeed  wash  away  ancient 
landmarks,  and  confound  boundaries,  and 
sweep  away  dwellings,  yea,  doth  give  birth  to 
many  foul  and  dangerous  reptiles.  Yet  hence 
is  the  fulness  of  the  granary,  the  beauty  of  the 
garden,  the  nurture  of  all  living  things. 

"I  remember  well,  Mr.  Cowley,  what  you 
have  said  concerning  these  things  in  your  Dis 
course  of  the  Government  of  Oliver  Cromwell, 
which  my  friend  Elwood  read  to  me  last  year. 
Truly,  for  elegance  and  rhetoric,  that  essay  is 
to  be  compared  with  the  finest  tractates  of  Iso- 
crates  and  Cicero.  But  neither  that  nor  any 
other  book,  nor  events  which  with  other  men 
have,  more  than  any  book,  weight  and  autho 
rity,  have  altered  my  opinion  that,  of  all  the 
assemblies  that  ever  were  in  this  world,  the 
best  and  the  most  useful  was  our  Long  Parlia 
ment.  I  speak  not  this  as  wishing  to  provoke 
debate,  which  neither  yet  do  I  decline." 

Mr.  Cowley  was,  as  I  could  see,  a  little  net 
tled.  Yet,  as  he  was  a  man  of  a  kind  disposi 
tion  and  a  most  refined  courtesy,  he  put  a  force 
to  himself,  and  answered,  with  more  vehemence 
and  quickness,  indeed,  than  was  his  wont,  yet 
not  uncivilly.  "Surely,  Mr.  Milton,  you  speak 
not  as  you  think.  I  am  indeed  one  of  those 
who  believe  that  God  hath  reserved  to  himself 
the  censure  of  kings,  and  that  their  crimes  and 
oppressions  are  not  to  be  resisted  by  the  hands 
of  their  subjects.  Yet  can  I  easily  find  excuse 
for  the  violence  of  such  as  are  stung  to  mad 
ness  by  grievous  tyranny.  But  what  shall  we 
say  for  these  men?  Which  of  their  just  de 
mands  was  not  granted?  Which  even  of  their 
cruel  and  unreasonable  requisitions,  so  as  it 
were  not  inconsistent  with  all  law  and  order, 
was  refused?  Had  they  not  sent  Straffbrd  to 
the  block  and  Laud  to  the  Tower?  Had  they 
not  destroyed  the  Courts  of  the  High  Commis 
sion  and  the  Star-Chamber?  Had  they  not  re 
versed  the  proceedings  confirmed  by  the  voices 
of  the  judges  of  England  in  the  matter  of  ship- 

VOL.  1II.-5J 


j  money?  Had  they  not  taken  from  the  king  hiy 
ancient  and  most  lawful  power  touching  the 
order  of  knighthood?  Had  they  not  provided 
that,  after  their  dissolution,  triennial  parlia 
ments  should  be  holden,  and  that  their  own 
power  should  continue  till  of  their  great  con- 
de:»cension  they  should  be  pleased  to  resign  it 
themselves?  What  more  could  they  ask? 
Was  it  not  enough  that  they  had  taken  from 
their  king  all  his  oppressive  powers,  and  many 
that  were  most  salutary  ?  Was  it  not  enough 
that  they  had  filled  his  council-board  with  his 
enemies,  and  his  prisons  with  his  adherents! 
Was  it  not  enough  that  they  had  raised  a  furi 
ous  multitude  to  shout  and  swagger  daily  under 
the  very  windows  of  his  royal  palace  f  Was 
it  not  enough  that  they  had  taken  from  him 
the  most  blessed  prerogative  of  princely  mercy; 
that,  complaining  of  intolerance  themselves, 
they  had  denied  all  toleration  to  others ;  that 
they  had  urged  against  forms  scruples  childish 
as  those  of  any  formalist;  that  they  had  per 
secuted  the  least  remnant  of  the  Popish  rites 
with  the  fiercest  bitterness  of  the  Popish  spi 
rit?  Must  they  besides  all  this  have  full  power 
to  command  his  armies  and  to  massacre  his 
friends? 

"  For  military  command,  it  was  never  known 
in  any  monarchy,  nay,  in  any  well  ordered 
republic,  that  it  was  committed  to  the  debates 
of  a  large  and  unsettled  assembly.  For  their 
other  requisition,  that  he  should  give  up  to 
their  vengeance  all  who  had  defended  the 
rights  of  his  crown,  his  honour  must  have 
been  ruined  if  he  had  complied.  Is  it  not 
therefore  plain  that  they  desired  these  things 
only  in  order  that,  by  refusing,  his  majesty 
might  give  them  a  pretence  for  war? 

"Men  have  often  risen  up  against  fraud, 
against  cruelty,  against  rapine.  But  when  be 
fore  was  it  known  that  concessions  were  met 
with  importunities,  graciousness  with  insults, 
the  open  palm  of  bounty  with  the  clenched  fist 
of  malice  ?  Was  it  like  trusty  delegates  of  the 
Commons  of  England  and  faithful  stewards  of 
their  liberty  and  their  wealth,  to  engage  them 
for  such  causes  in  civil  war,  which,  both  to 
liberty  and  to  wealth,  is  of  all  things  the  most 
hostile.  Evil  indeed  must  be  the  disease  which 
is  not  more  tolerable  than  such  a  medicine. 
Those  who,  even  to  save  a  nation  from  tyrants, 
excite  it  to  civil  war,  do  in  general  but  minis 
ter  to  it  the  same  miserable  kind  of  relief 
wherewith  the  wizards  of  Pharaoh  mocked  the 
Egyptian.  \\e  read  that  when  Moses  had 
turned  their  waters  into  blood,  those  impious 
magicians,  intending  not  benefit  to  the  thirst* 
ing  people,  but  vain  and  emulous  ostentation 
of  their  own  art,  did  themselves  also  change 
into  blood  the  water  which  the  plague  had 
spared.  Such  sad  comfort  do  those  who  stir 
up  war  minister  to  the  oppressed.  But  here 
where  was  the  oppression?  What  was  the 
favour  which  had  not  been  granted?  What 
was  the  evil  which  had  not  been  removed* 
What  further  could  they  desire?" 

"These  questions,"  said  Mr.  Milton,  austere 
ly,  "have  indeed  often  deceived  the  ignorant, 
but  that  Mr.  Cowley  should  have  H^en  so  be 
guiled,  I  marvel.  You  ask  what  more  th» 
Parliament  could  desire  ?  I  will  answer  you 


418 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


in  one  word,  security.  What  are  votes,  and 
statutes,  and  resolutions  ]  They  have  no  eyes  I 
to  see,  no  hands  to  strike  and  avenge.  They  ; 
must  have  some  safeguard  from  without. ! 
Many  things,  therefore,  which  in  themselves  j 
were  perad  venture  hurtful,  was  this  Parlia- ! 
ment  constrained  to  ask,  lest  otherwise  good  | 
Jaws  and  precious  rights  should  be  without 
defence.  Nor  did  they  want  a  great  and  sig 
nal  example  of  this  danger.  I  need  not  remind 
you  that,  many  years  before,  the  two  houses 
had  presented  to  the  king  the  Petition  of  Right, 
wherein  were  set  down  all  the  most  valuable 
privileges  of  the  people  of  this  realm.  Did 
not  Charles  accept  it]  Did  he  not  declare  it 
to  be  lawl  Was  it  not  as  fully  enacted  as 
ever  were  any  of  those  bills  of  the  Long  Par 
liament  concerning  which  you  spoke?  And 
were  those  privileges  therefore  enjoyed  more 
fully  by  the  people]  No:  the  king  did  from 
that  time  redouble  his  oppressions  as  if  to 
avenge  himself  for  the  shame  of  having  been 
compelled  to  renounce  them.  Then  were  our 
estates  laid  under  shameful  impositions,  our 
houses  ransacked,  our  bodies  imprisoned. 
Then  was  the  steel  of  the  hangman  blunted 
with  mangling  the  ears  of  harmless  men. 
Then  our  very  minds  were  fettered,  and  the 
iron  entered  into  our  souls.  Then  we  were 
compelled  to  hide  cur  hatred,  our  sorrow,  and 
our  scorn,  to  laugh  with  hidden  faces  at  the 
mummery  of  Laud,  to  curse  under  our  breath 
the  tyranny  of  Wentworth.  Of  old  time  it  was 
well  and  nobly  said  by  one  of  our  kings,  that 
an  Englishman  ought  to  be  free  as  his  thoughts. 
Our  prince  reversed  the  maxim;  he  strove  to 
make  our  thoughts  as  much  slaves  as  our 
selves.  To  sneer  at  a  Romish  pageant,  to 
miscall  a  lord's  crest,  were  crimes  for  which 
there  was  no  mercy.  These  were  all  the  fruits 
which  we  gathered  from  those  excellent  laws 
of  the  former  Parliament,  from  these  solemn 
promises  of  the  king.  Were  we  to  be  deceived 
again  1  Were  we  again  to  give  subsidies,  and 
receive  nothing  but  promises  ]  Were  we  asrain 
to  make  wholesome  statutes,  and  then  leave 
them  to  be  broken  daily  and  hourly,  until  the 
oppressor  should  have  squandered  another 
supply,  and  should  be  ready  for  another  per 
jury]  You  ask  what  they  could  desire  which 
he  had  not  already  granted.  Let  me  ask  of 
you  another  question.  What  pledge  could  be 
given  which  he  had  not  already  violated] 
From  the  first  year  of  his  reign,  whenever  he 
had  need  of  the  purses  of  his  Commons  to  sup 
port  the  revels  of  Buckingham  or  the  proces 
sions  of  Laud,  he  had  assured  them,  that  as  he 
was  a  gentleman  and  a  king,  he  would  sacred 
ly  preserve  their  rights.  He  had  pawned  those 
solemn  pledges,  and  pawned  them  again  and 
again;  but  when  had  he  redeemed  them] 
'Upon  my  faith,' — 'Upon  my  sacred  word,' — 
*  Upon  the  honour  of  a  prince,' — came  so  easi 
ly  from  his  lips  and  dwelt  so  short  a  time  on 
his  mind,  that  they  were  as  l;Hle  to  be  trusted 
a«  the  'By  these  hilts'  of  an  Alsatian  dicer. 

"Therefore  it  is  that  I  praise  this  Parlia 
ment  for  what  else  I  might  have  condemned. 
If  what  he  had  granted  had  been  granted 
graciously  and  readily,  if  what  he  had  before 
promissd  had  been  faithfully  observed,  they 


could  not  be  defended.  It  was  because  he  had 
never  yielded  the  worst  abuse  without  a  long 
struggle,  and  seldom  without  a  large  bribe;  it 
was  because  he  had  no  sooner  disentangled 
himself  from  his  troubles  than  he  forgot  his 
promises  ;  and,  more  like  a  villanous  huckster 
than  a  great  king,  kept  both  the  prerogative 
and  the  large  price  which  had  been  paid  to 
him  to  forego  it;  it  was  because  of  these  things 
that  it  was  necessary  and  just  to  bind  with 
forcible  restraints  one  who  could  be  bound 
neither  by  law  nor  honour.  Nay,  even  while 
he  was  making  those  very  concessions  of 
which  you  speak,  he  betrayed  his  deadly 
hatred  against  the  people  and  their  friends. 
Not  only  did  he,  contrary  to  all  that  ever  was 
deemed  lawful  in  England,  order  that  members 
of  the  Commons  House  of  Parliament  should 
be  impeached  of  high  treason  at  the  bar  of  the 
Lords  ;  thereby  violating  both  the  trial  by  jury 
and  the  privileges  of  the  House;  but,  not  con 
tent  with  breaking  the  law  by  his  ministers, 
he  went  himself  armed  to  assail  it.  In  the 
birth-place  and  sanctuary  of  freedom,  in  the 
House  itself,  nay,  in  the  very  chair  of  the 
Speaker,  placed  for  the  protection  of  free 
speech  and  privilege,  he  sat,  rolling  his  eyes 
round  the  benches,  searching  for  those  whose 
blood  he  desired,  and  singling  out  his  opposers 
to  the  slaughter.  This  most  foul  outrage  fails. 
Then  again  for  the  old  arts.  Then  come 
gracious  messages.  Then  come  courteous 
speeches.  Then  is  again  mortgaged  his  own 
forfeited  honour.  He  will  never  again  violate 
the  laws.  He  will  respect  their  rights  as  if 
they  were  his  own.  He  pledges  the  dignity  of 
his  crown ;  that  crown  which  had  been  com 
mitted  to  him  for  the  weal  of  his  people,  and 
which  he  never  named,  but  that  he  might  the 
more  easily  delude  and  oppress  them. 

"The  power  of  the  sword,  I  grant  you,  was 
not  one  to  be  permanently  possessed  by  parlia 
ment.  Neither  did  that  parliament  demand  it 
as  a  permanent  possession.  They  asked  it 
only  for  temporary  security.  Nor  can  I  see 
on  what  conditions  they  could  safely  make 
peace  with  that  false  and  wicked  king,  save 
such  as  would  deprive  him  of  all  power  to  in 
jure. 

"  For  civil  war,  that  it  is  an  evil  I  dispute 
not.  But  that  it  is  the  greatest  of  evils,  that 
I  stoutly  deny.  It  doth  indeed  appear  to  the 
misjudging  to  be  a  worse  calamity  than  bad 
government,  because  its  miseries  are  collected 
together  within  a  short  space  and  time,  and 
may  easily  at  one  view  be  taken  in  and  per 
ceived.  But  the  misfortunes  of  nations  ruled 
by  tyrants,  being  distributed  over  many  centu 
ries,  and  many  places,  as  they  are  of  greater 
weight  and  number,  so  are  they  of  less  dis 
play.  When  the  devil  of  tyranny  hath  gone 
into  the  body  politic  he  departs  not  but  with 
struggles,  and  foaming,  and  great  convulsions. 
Shall  he,  therefore,  vex  it  forever,  lest,  in  go 
ing  out,  he  for  a  moment  tear  and  rend  it] 
Truly  this  argument  touching  the  evils  of  war 
would  better  become  my  friend  Elwood,  or 
some  other  of  the  people  called  Quakers,  than 
a  courtier  and  a  cavalier.  It  applies  no  more 
to  this  war  than  to  all  others,  as  well  foreign 
as  domestic,  and,  in  this  war,  no  more  to  the 


COWLEY  AND  MILTON. 


419 


houses  than  to  the  king;  nay  not  so  much, 
since  he  by  a  little  sincerity  and  moderation 
might  have  rendered  that  needless  which 
their  duty  to  God  and  man  then  enforced  them 
to  do." 

"  Pardon  me,  Mr.  Milton,"  said  Mr.  Cowley, 
"  I  grieve  to  hear  you  speak  thus  of  that  good 
king.  Most  unhappy  indeed  he  was,  in  that  he 
reigned  at  a  time  when  the  spirit  of  the  then 
living  generation  was  for  freedom,  and  the  pre 
cedents  of  former  ages  for  prerogative.  His 
case  was  like  to  that  of  Christopher  Columbus, 
when  he  sailed  forth  on  an  unknown  ocean, 
and  found  that  the  compass  whereby  he  shaped 
his  course  had  shifted  from  the  north  pole 
whereto  before  it  had  constantly  pointed.  So 
it  was  with  Charles.  His  compass  varied, 
and  therefore  he  could  not  tack  aright.  If  he 
had  been  an  absolute  king  he  would,  doubtless, 
like  Titus  Vespasian,  have  been  called  the  de 
light  of  the  human  race.  If  he  had  been  a 
Doge  of  Venice,  or  a  Stadtholder  of  Holland, 
he  would  never  have  outstepped  the  laws.  But 
he  lived  when  our  government  had  neither 
clear  definitions  nor  strong  sanctions.  Let, 
therefore,  his  faults  be  ascribed  to  the  time. 
Of  his  virtues  the  praise  is  his  own. 

"  Never  was  there  a  more  gracious  prince, 
or  a  more  proper  gentleman.  In  every  plea 
sure  he  was  temperate,  in  conversation  mild 
and  grave,  in  friendship  constant,  to  his  ser 
vants  liberal,  to  his  queen  faithful  and  loving, 
in  battle  brave,  in  sorrow  and  captivity  re 
solved,  in  death  most  Christian  and  forgiving. 

"  For  his  oppressions,  let  us  look  at  the  for 
mer  history  of  this  realm.  James  was  never 
accounted  a  tyrant.  Elizabeth  is  esteemed  to 
have  been  the  mother  of  her  people.  Were 
they  less  arbitrary  ?  Did  they  never  lay  hands 
on  the  purses  of  their  subjects  but  by  Act  of 
Parliament]  Did  they  never  confine  insolent 
and  disobedient  men  but  in  due  course  of  law  ? 
Was  the  court  of  Star-Chamber  less  active  ? 
Were  the  ears  of  libellers  more  safe  1  I  pray 
yon,  let  not  King  Charles  be  thus  dealt  with. 
It  was  enough  that  in  his  life  he  was  tried  for 
an  alleged  breach  of  laws  which  none  had 
ever  heard  named  till  they  were  discovered  for 
his  destruction.  Let  not  his  fame  be  treated  as 
was  his  sacred  and  anointed  body.  Let  not 
his  memory  be  tried  by  principles  found  out 
ex  post  fiii-to.  Let  us  not  judge  by  the  spirit  of 
one  generation  a  man  whose  disposition  had 
been  formed  by  the  temper  and  fashion  of  an 
other." 

"Nay,  but  conceive  me,  Mr.  Cowley,"  said 
Mr.  Milton,  "inasmuch  as,  at  the  beginning  of 
his  reign,  he  imitated  those  who  had  governed 
before  him,  I  blame  him  not.  To  expect  that 
kings  will,  of  their  own  free  choice,  abridge 
their  prerogative,  were  argument  of  but  slender 
wisdom.  Whatever,  therefore,  lawless,  unjust, 
or  cruel,  he  either  did  or  permitted  during  the 
first  .ears  of  his  reign,  I  pass  by.  But  for 
wha.  was  done  after  that  he  had  solemnly 
given  his  consent  to  the  Petition  of  Right, 
•where  shall  we  find  defence?  Let  it  be  sup 
posed,  which  yet  I  concede  not,  that  the  tyranny 
of  his  father  and  of  Queen  Elizabeth  had  been 
no  less  rigorous  than  was  his.  But  had  his 
father,  had  that  queen  sworn,  like  him,  to  ab 


stain  from  those  rigours  ?  Had  they,  like  him, 
for  good  and  valuable  considerations,  aliened 
their  hurtful  prerogatives'?  Surely  not:  for 
whatever  excuse  you  can  plead  for  him,  he  had 
wholly  excluded  himself.  The  borders  of 
countries,  we  know,  are  mostly  the  seats  of 
perpetual  wars  and  tumults.  It  was  the  same 
with  the  undefined  frontiers,  which  of  old  se 
parated  privilege  and  prerogative.  They  were 
the  debatable  land  of  our  polity.  It  was  no 
marvel  if,  both  on  the  one  side  and  on  the 
other,  inroads  were  often  made.  But  when 
treaties  have  been  concluded,  spaces  mea 
sured,  lines  drawn,  landmarks  set  up,  that 
which  before  might  pass  for  innocent  error  or 
just  reprisal, becomes  robbery,  perjury,  deadly 
sin.  He  knew  not,  you  say,  which  of  his 
powers  were  founded  on  ancient  law,  and 
which  only  on  vicious  example.  But  had  he 
not  read  the  Petition  of  Right]  Had  not  pro 
clamation  been  made  from  his  throne;  Soit 
fait  cornme  il  est  desire  ? 

''For  his  private  virtues  they  are  beside  the 
question.  Remember  you  not,"  and  Mr.  Milton 
smiled,  but  somewhat  sternly,  "  what  Dr.  Caius 
saith  in  the  Merry  Wives  of  Shakspeare  1 
'  What  shall  the  honest  man  do  in  my  closet? 
There  is  no  honest  man  that  shall  come  in  my 
closet.'  Even  so  say  I.  There  is  no  good 
man  who  shall  make  us  his  slaves.  If  he  break 
his  word  to  his  people,  is  it  a  sufficient  defence 
that  he  keeps  it  to  his  companions  1  If  he 
oppress  and  extort  all  day,  shall  he  be  held 
blameless  because  he  prayeth  at  night  and 
morning?  If  he  be  insatiable  in  plunder  and 
revenge,  shall  we  pass  it  by  because  in  meat 
and  dvink  he  is  temperate]  If  he  have  lived 
like  a  tyrant,  shall  he  be  forgotten  because  he 
hath  died  like  a  martyr? 

"He  was  a  man,  as  I  think,  who  had  such 
a  semblance  of  virtues  as  might  make  his  vices 
most  dangerous.  He  was  not  a  tyrant  after  our 
wonted  English  model.  The  second  Richard, 
and  the  second  and  fourth  Edwards,  and  the 
eighth  Harry,  were  men  profuse,  gay,  boister 
ous  ;  lovers  of  women  and  of  wine,  of  no  out 
ward  sanctity  or  gravity.  Charles  was  a  ruler 
after  the  Italian  fashion  ;  grave,  demure,  of  a 
solemn  carriage,  and  sober  diet*,  as  constant 
at  prayers  as  a  priest,  as  heedless  of  oaths  as 
an  atheist." 

Mr.  Cowley  answered  somewhat  sharply: 
"1  am  sorry,  sir,  to  hear  you  speak  thus.  I 
had  hoped  that  the  vehemence  of  spirit  which 
was  caused  by  these  violent  times  h?,d  no'jr 
abated.  Yet,  sure,  Mr.  Milton,  whatever  ytta 
may  think  of  the  character  of  King  Charles, 
you  will  not  still  justify  his  murder." 

"Sir,"  said  Mr.  Milton,  "I  must  have  been 
of  a  hard  and  strange  nature,  if  the  vehemence 
which  was  imputed  to  me  in  my  younger  day* 
had  not  been  diminished  by  the  afflictions 
wherewith  it  has  pleased  Almighty  God  to 
chasten  mine  age.  I  will  not  now  defend  all 
that  I  may  heretofore  have  written.  But  this 
I  say,  that  I  perceive  not  wherefore  a  king 
should  be  exempted  from  all  punishment.  Is 
it  just  that  where  most  is  given  least  should  be 
required  ?  or  politic,  that  where  there  is  th« 
greatest  power  to  injure  there  should  no  dan 
ger  to  restrain  ?  But,  you  will  say,  there  is  no 


420 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


such  law.  Such  a  law  there  is.  There  is  the 
law  of  self-preservation  written  by  God  him 
self  on  our  hearts.  There  is  the  primal  com 
pact  and  bond  of  society,  not  graven  on  stone, 
nor  sealed  with  wax,  nor  put  down  on  parch 
ment,  nor  set  forth  in  any  express  form  of 
words  by  men  when  of  old  they  came  together; 
but  implied  in  the  very  act  that  they  came 
together,  presupposed  in  all  subsequent  law, 
not  to  be;  repealed  by  any  authority,  not  invali 
dated  by  being  omitted  in  any  code;  inasmuch 
as  from  thence  are  all  codes  and  all  authority. 

"  Neither  do  I  well  see  wherefore  you  cava 
liers,  and,  indeed,  many  of  us  whom  you  mer 
rily  call  Roundheads,  distinguish  between  those 
who  fought  against  King  Charles,  and  special 
ly  after  the  second  commission  given  to  Sir 
Thomas  Fairfax,  and  those  who  condemned 
him  to  death.  Sure,  if  his  person  were  invio 
lable,  it  was  as  wicked  to  lift  the  sword  against 
it  at  Naseby  as  the  axe  at  Whitehall.  If  his 
life  might  justly  be  taken,  why  not  in  course 
of  trial  as  well  as  by  right  of  war  ? 

"  Thus  mirch  in  general  as  touching  the 
right.  But  for  the  execution  of  King  Charles 
in  particular,  I  will  not  now  undertake  to  de 
fend  it.  Death  is  inflicted,  not  that  the  culprit 
may  die,  but  that  the  state  may  be  thereby  ad 
vantaged.  And,  from  all  that  I  know,  I  think 
that  the  death  of  King  Charles  hath  more  hin 
dered  than  advanced  the  liberties  of  England. 

"  First,  he  left  an  heir.  He  was  in  captivity. 
The  hdr  was  in  freedom.  He  was  odious  to 
the  Scots.  The  heir  was  favoured  by  them. 
To  kill  the  captive,  therefore,  whereby  the 
heir,  in  the  apprehension  of  all  royalists,  be 
came  forthwith  king ;  what  was  it  in  truth  but 
to  set  their  captive  free,  and  to  give  him  besides 
other  great  advantages  ? 

"  Next,  it  was  a  deed  most  odious  to  the  peo 
ple,  and  not  only  to  your  party,  but  to  many 
among  ourselves  ;  and  as  it  is  perilous  for  any 
government  to  outrage  the  public  opinion,  so 
most  was  it  perilous  for  a  government  which 
had  from  that  opinion  alone  its  birth,  its  nur 
ture,  and  its  defence. 

"  Yet,  doth  not  this  properly  belong  to  our 
dispute  ;  nor  can  these  faults  be  justly  charged 
upon  that  most  renowned  Parliament  For,  as 
you  know,  the  high  court  of  justice  was  not 
established  until  the  House  had  been  purged 
of  such  members  as  were  adverse  to  the  army, 
and  brought  wholly  under  the  control  of  the 
chief  officers." 

"And  who,"  said  Mr.  Cowley,  "levied  the 
army  ?  Who  commissioned  those  officers  ? 
Was  not  the  fate  of  the  Commons  as  justly 
de^rved  as  was  that  of  Diomedes,  who  was 
devoured  by  those  horses  whom  he  had  him- 
sruf  taught  to  feed  on  the  flesh  and  blood  of 
ni»m  !  How  could  they  hope  that  others  would 
respect  laws  which  they  themselves  insulted; 
that  swords  which  had  been  drawn  against  the 
prerogatives  of  the  king  would  be  put  up  at  an 
ordinance  of  the  Commons?  It  was  believed 
of  old,  that  there  were  some  devils  easily 
raised,  but  never  to  be  laid  ;  insomuch,  that  if 
a  magician  called  them  up,  he  should  be  forced 
to  find  them  always  some  employment;  for, 
though  they  would  do  all  his  bidding,  yet,  if  he 
'eft  i hem  but  for  one  moment  without  some 


|  work  of  evil  to  perform,  they  would  turn  their 
'claws  against  himself.  Such  a  fiend  is  aa 
army.  They  who  evoke  it  cannot  dismiss  it. 
They  are  at  once  its  masters  and  its  slaves. 
Let  them  not  fail  to  find  for  it  task  after  task 
of  blood  and  rapine.  Let  them  not  leave  it  for 
a  moment  in  repose,  lest  it  tear  them  in  pieces. 

"Thus  was  it  with  this  famous  assembly. 
They  formed  a  force  which  they  could  neither 
govern  nor  resist.  They  made  it  powerful. 
They  made  it  fanatical.  As  if  military  inso 
lence  were  not  of  itself  sufficiently  dangerous, 
they  heightened  it  with  spiritual  pride, — they 
encouraged  their  soldiers  to  rave  from  the 
tops  of  tubs  against  the  men  of  Belial,  till 
every  trooper  thought  himself  a  prophet.  They 
taught  them  to  abuse  popery,  till  every  drum 
mer  fancied  that  he  was  as  infallible  as  a 
pope. 

"  Then  it  was  that  religion  changed  her  na 
ture.  She  was  no  longer  the  parent  of  arts 
and  letters,  of  wholesome  knowledge,  of  inno 
cent  pleasures,  of  blessed  household  smiles. 
In  their  place  came  sour  faces,  whining  voices, 
the  chattering  of  fools,  the  yells  of  madmen. 
Then  men  fasted  from  meat  and  drink,  who 
fasted  not  from  bribes  and  blood.  Then  men 
frowned  at  stage-plays,  who  smiled  at  massa 
cres.  Then  men  preached  against  painted 
faces,  who  felt  no  remorse  for  their  own  most 
painted  lives.  Religion  had  been  a  pole-star 
to  light  and  to  guide.  It  was  now  more  like  to 
that  ominous  star  in  the  book  of  the  Apocalypse, 
which  fell  from  heaven  upon  the  fountains  and 
rivers,  and  changed  them  into  wormwood;  for 
even  so  did  it  descend  from  its  high  and  ce 
lestial  dwelling-place  to  plague  this  earth  and 
to  turn  into  bitterness  all  that  was  sweet,  and 
into  poison  all  that  was  nourishing. 

"Therefore  it  was  not  strange  that  such 
things  should  follow.  They  who  had  closed 
the  barriers  of  London  against  the  king  could 
not  defend  them  against  their  own  creatures. 
They  who  had  so  stoutly  cried  for  privilege, 
when  that  prince,  most  unadvisedly  no  doubt, 
came  among  them  to  demand  their  members, 
durst  not  wag  their  fingers  when  Oliver  filled 
their  hall  with  soldiers,  gave  their  mace  to  a 
corporal,  put  their  keys  in  his  pocket,  and 
drove  them  forth  with  base  terms,  borrowed 
half  from  the  conventicle  and  half  from  the 
ale-house.  Then  were  we,  like  the  trees  of  the 
forest  in  holy  writ,  given  over  to  the  rule  of 
the  bramble  ;  then  from  the  basest  of  the  shrubs 
came  forth  the  fire  which  devoured  the  Cedars 
of  Lebanon.  We  bowed  down  before  a  man  of 
mean  birth,  of  ungraceful  demeanour,  of  stam 
mering  and  most  vulgar  utterance,  of  scanda 
lous  and  notorious  hypocrisy.  Our  laws  were 
made  and  unmade  at  his  pleasure;  the  consti 
tution  of  our  Parliaments  changed  by  his  writ 
and  proclamation;  our  persons  imprisoned; 
our  property  plundered;  our  lands  and  houses 
overrun  with  soldiers ;  and  the  great  charter 
itself  was  but  argument  for  a  scurrilous  jest; 
and  for  all  this  we  may  thank  that  Parliament; 
for  never,  unless  they  had  so  violently  shaken 
the  vessel,  could  such  foul  dregs  have  risen  to 
the  top." 

Then  answered  Mr.  Milton:  "What  you 
have  now  said  comprehends  so  great  a  number 


COWLEY  AND  MILTON. 


421 


of  subject:?,  that  it  would  require,  not  an  even 
ing's  sail  on  thp  Thames,  but  rather  a  voyage 
to  the  Indies,  accurately  to  treat  of  all ;  yet,  in 
as  few  words  as  I  may,  I  will  explain  my  sense 
of  these  matters. 

44  First,  as  to  the  army.  An  army,  as  you 
have  well  set  forth,  is  always  a  weapon  dan 
gerous  to  those  who  use  it;  yet  he  who  falls 
among  thieves  spares  not  to  fire  his  musque- 
toon  because  he  may  be  slain  if  it  burst  in  his 
hand.  Nor  must  states  refrain  from  defending 
themselves,  lest  their  defenders  should  at  last 
turn  against  them.  Nevertheless,  against  this 
danger  statesmen  should  carefully  provide; 
and,  that  they  may  do  so,  they  should  take  es 
pecial  care  that  neither  the  officers  nor  the  sol 
diers  do  forget  that  they  are  also  citizens.  I 
do  believe  that  the  English  army  would  have 
continued  to  obey  the  Parliament  with  all  duty, 
but  for  one  act,  which,  as  it  was  in  intention, 
in  seeming,  and  in  immediate  effect,  worthy  to 
be  compared  with  the  most  famous  in  history, 
so  was  it,  in  its  final  consequence,  most  inju 
rious.  I  speak  of  that  ordinance  called  the 
self-denying,  and  of  the  new  model  of  the  army. 
By  those  measures  the  Commons  gave  up  the 
command  of  their  forces  into  the  hands  of  men 
who  were  not  of  themselves.  Hence,  doubtless, 
derived  no  small  honour  to  that  noble  assem 
bly,  which  sacrificed  to  the  hope  of  public  good 
the  assurance  of  private  advantage.  And,  as  to 
the  conduct  of  the  war,  the  scheme  prospered. 
Witness  the  battle  of  Naseby,  and  the  memo 
rable  exploits  of  Fairfax  in  the  west;  but  there 
by  the  Parliament  lost  that  hold  on  the  soldiers 
and  that  power  to  control  them,  which  they  re 
tained  while  every  regiment  was  commanded 
by  their  own  members.  Politicians  there  be, 
who  would  wholly  divide  the  legislative  from 
the  executive  power.  In  the  golden  age  this 
may  have  succeeded;  in  the  millennium  it 
may  succeed  again.  But  where  great  armies 
and  great  taxes  are  required,  there  the  execu 
tive  government  must  always  hold  a  great  au 
thority,  which  authority,  that  it  may  not  oppress 
and  destroy  the  legislature,  must  be  in  some 
manner  blended  with  it.  The  leaders  of  fo 
reign  mercenaries  have  always  been  most 
dangerous  to  a  country.  The  officers  of  native 
armies,  deprived  of  the  civil  privileges  of  other 
men,  are  as  much  to  be  feared.  This  was  the 
great  error  of  that  parliament,  and  though  an 
error  it  were,  it  was  an  error  generous,  vir 
tuous,  and  more  to  be  deplored  than  censured. 
"  Hence  came  the  power  of  the  army  and  its 
leaders,  and  especially  of  that  most  famous 
leader,  whom  both  in  our  conversation  to-day, 
and  in  that  discourse  whereon  I  before  touched, 
you  have,  in  my  poor  opinion,  far  too  roughly 
handled.  Wherefore  you  speak  contemptibly 
of  his  parts  I  know  not;  but  I  suspect  that  you 
are  not  free  from  the  error  common  to  studious 
and  speculative  men.  Because  Oliver  was  an 
ungraceful  orator,  and  never  said,  either  in 
public  or  private,  any  thing  memorable,  you 
will  have  it  that  he  was  of  a  mean  capacity. 
Sure,  this  is  unjust.  Many  men  have  there  been 
ignorant  of  letters,  without  wit,  without  elo 
quence,  who  yet  had  the  wisdom  to  devise,  and 
the  courage  to  perform  that  which  they  lacked 
language  to  explain.  Such  men  often,  in 


troubled  times,  nave  worked  out  the  deliver, 
ance  of  nations  and  theii  own  greatness,  not  l>y 
logic,  not  by  rhetoric,  but  by  wariness  in  suc« 
cess,  by  calmness  in  danger,  by  fierce  and 
stubborn  resolution  in  all  adversity.  The 
hearts  of  men  are  their  books ;  events  are  their 
tutors  ;  great  actions  are  their  eloquence  ;  and 
such  a  one,  in  my  judgment,  was  his  late 
Highness,  who,  if  none  were  to  treat  his  name 
scornfully  now,  who  shook  not  at  the  sound  of 
it  while  he  lived,  would,  by  very  few,  be  men 
tioned  otherwise  than  with  reverence.  His 
own  deeds  shall  avouch  him  for  a  great  states 
man,  a  great  soldier,  a  true  lover  of  his  coun 
try,  a  merciful  and  generous  conqueror. 

"  For  his  faults,  let  us  reflect  that  they  who 
seem  to  lead  are  oftentimes  most  constrained 
to  follow.  They  who  will  mix  with  men,  and 
specially  they  who  will  govern  them,  must,  in, 
many  things,  obey  them.  They  who  will  yield 
to  no  such  conditions  may  be  hermits,  but 
cannot  be  generals  and  statesmen.  If  a  man. 
will  walk  straight  forward  without  turning  to 
the  right  or  the  left,  he  must  walk  in  a  desert, 
and  not  in  Cheapside.  Thus  was  he  enforced 
to  do  many  things  which  jumped  not  with  his 
inclination  nor  made  for  his  honour;  because 
the  army,  on  which  alone  he  could  depend  for 
power  arid  life,  might  not  otherwise  be  con 
tented.  And  I,  for  mine  own  part,  marvel  less 
that  he  sometimes  was  fain  to  indulge  their 
violence  than  that  he  could  so  often  restrain  it- 
"  In  that  he  dissolved  the  parliament,  I  praisa 
him.  It  then  was  so  diminished  in  numbers, 
as  well  by  the  death  as  by  the  exclusion  of 
members,  that  it  was  no  longer  the  same  as 
sembly  ;  and  if  at  that  time  it  had  made  itself 
perpetual,  we  should  have  been  governed,  not 
by  an  English  House  of  Commons,  but  by  a 
Venetian  Council. 

"If  in  his  following  rule  he  overstepped  the 
laws,  I  pity  rather  than  condemn  him.  He 
may  be  compared  to  that  Moeandius  of  Samos, 
of  whom  Herodotus  saith,  in  his  Thalia,  that 
wishing  to  be  of  all  men  the  most  just,  he  was 
not  able ;  for  after  the  death  of  Polycrates  he 
offered  freedom  to  the  people,  and  not  till  cer 
tain  of  them  threatened  to  call  him  to  a  reckon 
ing  for  what  he  had  formerly  done,  did  he 
change  his  purpose,  and  make  himself  a  tyrant, 
lest  he  should  be  treated  as  a  criminal. 

"  Such  was  the  case  of  Oliver.  He  gave  to 
his  country  a  form  of  government  so  free  and 
admirable,  that,  in  near  six  thousand  years, 
human  wisdom  hath  never  devised  any  more 
excellent  contrivance  for  human  happiness. 
To  himself  he  reserved  so  little  power  that  it 
would  scarcely  have  sufficed  for  his  safety,  and 
it  is  a  marvel  that  it  could  suffice  for  his  ambi 
tion.  When,  after  that,  he  found  that  the  mfm- 
bers  of  his  Parliament  disputed  his  right  even 
to  that  small  authority  which  he  had  kept, 
when  he  might  have  kept  all,  then  indeed  [ 
own  that  he  began  to  govern  by  the  sword 
those  who  would  not  suffer  him  to  govern  oy 
the  law. 

"  But  for  the  rest,  what  sovereign  was  eve** 
more  princely  in  pardoning  injuries,  in  con 
quering  enemies,  in  extending  the  dominion* 
and  the  renown  of  his  people?  What  sea, 
what  shore  did  he  not  mark  with  imperlsaable 


422 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


memorials  of  his  friendship  or  his  vengeance? 
The  gold  of  Spain,  the  steel  of  Sweden,  the  ten 
thousand  sails  of  Holland,  availed  nothing 
against  him.  While  every  foreign  state  trem 
bled  at  our  arms,  we  sat  secure  from  all  as 
sault.  War,  which  often  so  strangely  troubles 
both  husbandry  and  commerce,  never  silenced 
the  song  of  our  reapers,  or  the  sound  of  our 
looms.  Justice  was  equally  administered  ;  God 
was  freely  worshipped. 

"Now  look  at  that  which  we  have  taken  in 
exchange.  With  the  restored  king  have  come 
over  to  us  vices  of  every  sort,  and  most  the 
basest  and  most  shameful — lust,  without  love 
—servitude,  without  loyalty, — foulness  of 
speech — dishonesty  of  dealing — grinning  con 
tempt  of  all  things  good  and  generous.  The 
throne  is  surrounded  by  men  whom  the  former 
Charles  would  have  spurned  from  his  footstool. 
The  altar  is  served  by  slaves  whose  knees  are 
supple  to  every  being  but  God.  Rhymers, 
whose  books  the  hangman  should  burn,  pan 
ders,  actors,  and  buffoons,  these  drink  a  health 
and  throw  a  main  with  the  king ;  these  have 
stars  on  their  breasts  and  gold  sticks  in  their 
hands ;  these  shut  out  from  his  presence  the 
best  and  bravest  of  those  who  bled  for  his 
house.  Even  so  doth  God  visit  those  who 
know  not  how  to  vabe  freedom.  He  gives 
them  over  to  the  tyranny  which  they  have  de 
sired,  "iVJ.  TTJLVTt;  tTX.V^UVTX.1  QdLTlXMs" 

"I  will  not,"  said  Mr.  Cowley,  "dispute  with 
you  on  this  argument;.  But  if  it  be  as  you  say, 
how  can  you  maintain  that  England  hath  been 
so  greatly  advantaged  by  the  rebellion?" 

"Understand  me  rightly,  sir,"  said  Mr.  Mil 
ton.  "  This  nation  is  not  given  over  to  slavery 
and  vice.  We  tasted,  indeed,  the  fruits  of 
liberty  before  they  had  well  ripened.  Their 
flavour  was  harsh  and  bitter,  and  we  turned 
from  them  with  loathing  to  the  sweeter  poisons 
of  servitude.  This  is  but  for  a  time.  England 
is  sleeping  on  the  lap  of  Dalilah,  traitorously 
chained,  but  not  yet  shorn  of  strength.  Let  the 
cry  be  once  heard — the  Philistines  be  upon 
thee;  and  at  once  that  sleep  will  be  broken,  and 
those  chains  will  be  as  flax  in  the  fire.  The 
great  Parliament  hath  left  behind  it  in  our 
hearts  and  minds  a  hatred  of  tyrants,  a  just 
knowledge  of  our  rights,  a  scorn  of  vain  and 
deluding  names ;  and  that  the  revellers  of 
Whitehall  shall  surely  find.  The  sun  is  dark 
ened,  but  it  is  only  for  a  moment:  it  is  but  an 
eclipse ;  though  all  birds  of  evil  omen  have 
begun  to  scream,  and  all  ravenous  beasts  have 
gone  forth  to  prey,  thinking  it  to  be  midnight. 
Wo  to  them  if  they  be  abroad  when  the  rays 
again  shine  forth. 

"The  king  hath  judged  ill.  Had  he  been 
wise  he  would  have  remembered  that  he  owed 
his  restoration  only  to  confusions  which  had 
wearied  us  out,  and  made  us  eager  for  repose. 
He  would  have  known  that  the  folly  and  per 
fidy  of  a  prince  would  restore  to  the  good  old 
cause  many  hearts  which  had  been  alienated 
ihenr-e  by  the  turbulence  of  factions ;  for,  ir  I 
know  aught  of  history,  or  of  the  heart  of  man, 
he  will  soon  learn  that  the  last  champion  of 
the  people  was  not  destroyed  when  he  mur 
dered  Vane,  nor  seduced  when  he  beguiled 
Fairfax." 


I  Mr.  Cowley  seemed  to  me  not  to  take  much 
I  amiss  what  Mr.  Milton  had  said  touching  that 
I  thankless  court,  which  had  indeed  but  poorly 
|  requited  his  own  good  service.  He  only  said, 
j  therefore,  "Another  rebellion  !  Alas!  alas! 
|  Mr.  Milton.  If  there  be  no  choice  but  between 
|  despotism  and  anarchy,  I  prefer  despotism." 

"  Many  men,"  said  Mr.  Milton,  "have  floridly 
and  ingeniously  compared  anarchy  and  despot 
ism  ;  but  they  who  so  amuse  themselves  do  but 
look  at  separate  parts  of  that  which  is  truly 
one  great  whole.  Each  is  the  cause  and  the 
effect  of  the  other; — the  evils  of  either  are  the 
evils  of  both.  Thus  do  states  move  on  in  the 
same  eternal  cycle,  which,  from  the  remotest 
point,  brings  them  back  again  to  the  same  sad 
starting-post:  and  till  both  those  who  govern 
and  those  who  obey  shall  learn  and  mark  this 
great  truth,  men  can  expect  little  through  the 
future,  as  they  have  known  little  through  the 
past,  save  vicissitude  of  extreme  evils,  alter 
nately  producing  and  produced. 

"When  will  rulers  learn,  that  where  liberty 
is  not,  security  and  order  can  never  be  ?  We 
talk  of  absolute  power,  but  all  power  hath 
limits,  which,  if  not  fixed  by  the  moderation  of 
the  governors,  will  be  fixed  by  the  force  of  the 
governed.  Sovereigns  may  send  their  opposers 
to  dungeons  ;  they  may  clear  out  a  senate- 
house  with  soldiers;  they  may  enlist  armies 
of  spies ;  they  may  hang  scores  of  the  disaf 
fected  in  chains  at  every  cross-road  ;  but  what 
power  shall  stand  in  that  frightful  time  when 
rebellion  hath  become  a  less  evil  than  endur 
ance  ?  Who  shall  dissolve  that  terrible  tribu 
nal,  which,  in  the  hearts  of  the  oppressed, 
denounces  against  the  oppressor  the  doom  of 
its  wild  justice?  Who  shall  repeal  the  law  of 
self-defence?  What  arms  or  discipline  shall 
resist  the  strength  of  famine  and  despair?  How 
often  were  the  ancient  Ccesars  dragged  from 
their  golden  palaces,  stripped  of  their  purple 
robes,  mangled,  stoned,  defiled  Avith  filth, 
pierced  with  hooks,  hurled  into  the  Tiber! 
How  often  have  the  Eastern  Sultans  perished 
by  the  sabres  of  their  own  Janissaries,  or  the 
bow-strings  of  their  own  mates  !  For  no  power 
which  is  not  limited  by  laws  can  ever  be  pro 
tected  by  them.  Small,  therefore,  is  the  wis 
dom  of  those  who  would  fly  to  servitude  as  if  it 
were  a  refuge  from  commotion ;  for  anarchy- 
is  the  sure  consequence  of  tyranny.  That  go 
vernments  may  be  safe,  nations  must  be  free. 
Their  passions  must  have  an  outlet  provided, 
lest  they  make  one. 

"  When  I  was  at  Naples,  I  went  with  Signor 
Manso,  a  gentleman  of  excellent  parts  and 
breeding,  who  had  been  the  intimate  friend  of 
hat  famous  poet  Torquato  Tasso,  to  see  the 
turning  mountain  Vesuvius.  I  wondered  how 
the  peasants  could  venture  to  dwell  so  fear- 
essly  and  cheerfully  on  its  sides,  when  the 
ava  was  flowing  from  its  summit,  but  Manso 
smiled,  and  told  me  that  when  the  fire  descends 
freely  they  retreat  before  it  without  haste  or 
icar.  They  can  tell  how  fast  it  will  move,  and 
low  far ;  and  they  know,  moreover,  that  though 
t  may  work  some  little  damage,  it  will  soon 
cover  the  fields  over  which  it  hath  passed  with 
rich  vinevards  and  sweet  flowers.  But.  when 
flames  are  pent  up  in  the  mountain,  then  it  is 


COWLEY  AND  MILTON 


433 


that  they  have  reason  to  fear;  then  it  is  that 
•she  earth  sinks  and  the  sea  swells;  then  cities 
are  swallowed  up,  and  their  place  knoweth 
them  no  more.  So  it  is  in  politics  :  where  the 
people  are  most  closely  restrained,  there  it 
gives  the  greatest  shocks  to  peace  and  order; 
therefore  would  I  say  to  all  kings,  let  your  de 
magogues  lead  crowds,  lest  they  lead  armies; 
let  them,  bluster,  lest  they  massacre ;  a  little 
turbulence  is,  as  it  were,  the  rainbow  of  the 
state ;  it  shows  indeed  that  there  is  a  passing 
shower,  but  it  is  a  pledge  that  there  shall  be  no 
deluge." 

"  This  is  true,"  said  Mr.  Cowley :  "  yet  these 
admonitions  are  not  less  needful  to  subjects 
than  to  sovereigns." 

"  Surely,"  said  Mr.  Milton,  "  and,  that  I  may 
end  this  long  debate  with  a  few  words  in  which 
\ve  shall  both  agree,  I  hold  that  as  freedom  is 
the  only  safeguard  of  governments,  so  are  order 
and  moderation  generally  necessary  to  preserve 
freedom.  Even  the  vainest  opinions  of  men 
are  not  to  be  outraged  by  those  who  propose  to 
themselves  the  nappiness  of  men  for  their  end, 
and  who  must  work  with  the  passions  of  men 
for  their  means.  The  blind  reverence  for 
things  ancient  is  indeed  so  foolish  that  it  might 
make  a  \vise  man  laugh,  if  it  were  not  also 
sometimes  so  mischievous  that  it  would  rather 
make  a  good  man  weep.  Yet,  since  it  may 
not  be  wholly  cured,  it  must  be  discreetly  in 
dulged,  and  therefore  those  who  would  amend 
*v:l  laws  should  consider  rather  how  much  it 


may  be  safe  to  spare,  than  how  much  it  may 
be  possible  to  change.  Have  you  not  heard 
that  men  who  have  been  shut  up  for  many 
years  in  dungeons  shrink  if  they  see  the  light, 
and  fall  down  if  their  irons  be  struck  off.  And, 
so,  when  nations  have  long  been  in  the  house 
of  bondage,  the  chains  which  have  crippled 
them  are  necessary  to  support  them,  the  dark 
ness  which  hath  weakened  their  sight  is  neces 
sary  to  preserve  it.  Therefore  release  them 
not  too  rashly,  lest  they  curse  their  freedom 
and  pine  for  their  prison. 

"I  think,  indeed,  that  the  renowned  Parlia 
ment  of  which  we  have  talked  so  much  did 
show,  until  it  became  subject  to  the  soldiers,  a 
singular  and  admirable  moderation,  in  such 
times  scarcely  to  be  hoped^and  most  worthy 
to  be  an  example  to  all  that  shall  come  after. 
But  on  this  argument  I  have  said  enough;  and 
I  will  therefore  only  pray  to  Almighty  God  that 
those  who  shall,  in  future  times,  stand  forth  in 
defence  of  our  liberties,  as  well  civil  as  reli 
gious,  may  adorn  the  good  cause  by  mercy, 
prudence,  and  soberness,  to  the  glory  of  his 
name  and  the  happiness  and  honour  of  the 
English  people." 

And  so  ended  thatdiscourse;  and  not  long  after 
we  were  set  on  shore  again  at  the  Temple  Gar 
dens,  and  there  parted  company:  and  the  same 
evening  I  took  notes  of  what  had  been  said, 
which  I  have  here  more  fully  set  down,  from 
regard  both  to  the  fame  of  the  men,  and  th« 
importance  of  the  subject-matter. 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ON  MITFOBD'S  HISTORY  OF  GREECE. 


THIS  is  a  book  which  enjoys  a  great  and  in 
creasing  popularity;  but,  while  it  has  attracted 
a  considerable  share  of  the  public  attention, 
it  has  been  little  noticed  by  the  critics.  Mr. 
Mitford  has  almost  succeeded  in  mounting, 
unperceived  by  those  whose  office  it  is  to  watch 
such  aspirants,  to  a  high  place  among  histo 
rians.  He  has  taken  a  seat  on  the  dais  without 
being  challenged  by  a  single  seneschal.  To 
oppose  the  progress  of  his  fame  is  now  almost 
a  hopeless  enterprise.  Had  he  been  reviewed 
with  candid  severity,  when  he  had  published 
only  his  first  volume,  his  work  would  either 
have  deserved  its  reputation,  or  would  never 
have  obtained  it.  "Then,"  as  Indra  says  of 
Keharna,  "then  was  the  time  to  strike."  The 
time  was  neglected ;  and  the  consequence  is, 
that  Mr.  Mitford,  like  Kehama,  has  laid  his 
rictorious  hand  on  the  literary  Amreeta,  and 
teems  about  to  taste  the  precious  elixir  of  im 
mortality.  I  shall  venture  to  emulate  the  cou 
rage  of  the  honest  Glendoveer — 

"When  now 

He  saw  the  Amreeta  in  Kehama's  hand, 
An  impulse  that  defied  all  self-command, 

In  that  extremity, 

Btnncr  him,  and  he  resolved  to  seize  the  cup 
And  dare  the  Rajah's  force  in  geeva's  sisht. 
Forward  he  sprung  to  tempt  the  unequal  fray." 

In  plain  words,  I  shall  offer  a  few  considera 
tions,  which  may  tend  to  reduce  an  overpraised 
writer  to  his  proper  level. 

The  principal  characteristic  of  this  historian, 
the  origin  of  his  excellencies  and  his  defects, 
is  a  love  of  singularity.  He  has  no  notion  of 
going  with  a  multitude  to  do  either  good  or 
evil.  An  exploded  opinion,  or  an  unpopular 
person,  has  an  irresistible  charm  for  him. 
The  same  perverseness  may  be  traced  in  his 
diction.  His  style  would  never  have  been  ele 
gant,  but  it  might  at  least  have  been  manly 
and  perspicuous ;  and  nothing  but  the  most 
elaborate  care  could  possibly  have  made  it  so 
bad  as  it  is.  It  is  distinguished  by  harsh 
phrases,  strange  collocations,  occasional  sole 
cisms,  frequent  obscurity,  and,  above  all,  by  a 
peculiar  oddity,  which  can  no  more  be  de 
scribed  than  it  can  be  overlooked.  Nor  is  this 
all.  Mr.  Mitford  piques  himself  on  spelling 
better  than  any  of  his  neighbours;  and  this  not 
only  in  ancient  names,  which  he  mangles  in 
defiance  both  of  custom  and  of  reason,  but  in 
the  most  ordinary  word:,  of  the  English  lan 
guage.  It  is,  in  itself,  a  matter  perfectly  indif 
ferent  whether  we  call  a  foreigner  by  the  name 
which  he  bears  in  his  own  language,  or  by  that 
which  corresponds  to  it  in  ours;  whether  we 
say  Lorenzo  de  Medici,  or  Lawrence  de  Medici, 
Jean  Chauvin,  or  John  Calvin.  In  such  cases, 
established  usage  is  considered  as  law  by  all 
writers  except  M  r.  Mitford.  If  he  were  always 
consistent  with  himself,  he  might  be  excused 
SOT  sometimes  disagreeing  with  his  neighbours ; 
but  he  proceeds  on  no  principle  but  that  of 


being  unlike  the  rest  of  the  world.  Every 
child  has  heard  of  Linnaeus,  therefore  Mr.  Mit 
ford  calls  him  Linne;  Rousseau  is  known  all 
over  Europe  as  Jean  Jacques,  therefore  Mr. 
Mitford  bestows  on  him  the  strange  appellation 
of  John  James. 

Had  Mr.  Mitford  undertaken  a  history  of  any 
other  country  than  Greece,  this  propensity 
would  have  rendered  his  work  useless  and 
absurd.  His  occasional  remarks  on  the  affairs 
of  ancient  Rome  and  modern  Europe  are  full 
of  errors;  but  he  writes  of  times,  with  respect 
to  which  almost  every  other  writer  has  been  in 
the  wrong,  and,  therefore,  by  resolutely  deviat 
ing  from  his  predecessors,  he  is  often  in  the 
right. 

Almost  all  the  modern  historians  of  Greece 
have  shown  the  grossest  ignorance  of  the  most 
obvious  phenomena  of  human  nature.  In  their 
representations  the  generals  and  statesmen  of 
antiquity  are  absolutely  divested  of  all  indi 
viduality.  They  are  personifications;  they 
are  passions,  talents,  opinions,  virtues,  vices, 
but  not  men.  Inconsistency  is  a  thing  of  which 
these  writers  have  no  notion.  That  a  man 
may  have  been  liberal  in  his  youth  and  ava 
ricious  in  his  age,  cruel  to  one  enemy  and 
merciful  to  another,  is  to  them  utterly  incon 
ceivable.  If  the  facts  be  undeniable,  they  sup 
pose  some  strange  and  deep  design,  in  order  to 
explain  what,  as  every  one  who  has  observed 
his  own  mind  knows,  needs  no  explanation  at 
all.  This  is  a  mode  of  writing  very  accept 
able  to  the  multitude,  who  have  always  been  ac 
customed  to  make  gods  and  demons  out  of  men 
very  little  better  or  worse  than  themselves;  but  it 
appears  contemptible  to  all  who  have  watched 
the  changes  of  human  character — to  all  who 
have  observed  the  influence  of  time,  of  circum- 
tances,  and  of  associates,  on  mankind — to  all 
who  have  seen  a  hero  in  the  gout,  a  democrat 
n  the  church,  a  pedant  in  love,  or  a  philosopher 
n  liquor.  This  practice  of  painting  in  nothing 
3ut  black  and  white  is  unpardonable  even  in 
he  drama.  It  is  the  great  fault  of  Alfieri;  and 
low  much  it  injures  the  effect  of  his  composi- 
ions  will  be  obvious  to  every  one  who  will 
compare  his  Rosmunda  with  the  Lady  Macbeth 
of  Shakspeare.  The  one  is  a  wicked  woman; 
the  other  is  a  fiend.  Her  only  feeling  is  hatred; 
all  her  words  are  curses.  We  are  at  once 
shocked  and  fatigued  by  the  spectacle  of  such 
raving  cruelty,  excited  by  no  provocation,  re 
peatedly  changing  its  object,  and  constant  in 
nothing  but  in  its  inextinguishable  thirst  foi 
blood. 

In  history  this  error  is  far  more  disgraceful. 
Indeed,  there  is  no  fault  which  so  completely 
ruins  a  narrative  in  the  opinion  of  a  judicious 
reader.  We  know  that  the  line  of  demarcation 
between  good  and  bad  men  is  so  faintly  marked 
as  often  to  elude  the  most  careful  investigation 
of  those  who  have  the  best  opportunities  for 


MITFORD'S  GREECE. 


425 


judging.  Public  men,  above  all,  are  surround 
ed  with  so  many  temptations  and  difficulties, 
that  some  doubt  must  almost  always  hang  over 
their  real  dispositions  and  intentions.  The 
lives  of  Pym,  Cromwell,  Monk,  Clarendon, 
Marlborough.Burnet,  Walpole,  are  well  known 
to  us.  We  are  acquainted  with  their  actions, 
their  speeches,  their  writings;  we  have  abun 
dance  of  letters  and  well-authenticated  anec 
dotes  relating  to  them:  yet  what  candid  man 
will  venture  very  positively  to  say  which  of 
them  were  honest  and  which  of  them  were  dis 
honest  men.  It  appears  easier  to  pronounce 
decidedly  upon  the  great  characters  of  antiqui 
ty,  next  because  we  have  greater  means  of  dis 
covering  truth,  but  simply  because  we  have 
less  means  of  detecting  error.  The  modern 
historians  of  Greece  have  forgotten  this.  Their 
heroes  and  villains  are  as  consistent  in  all  their 
sayings  and  doings  as  the  cardinal  virtues  and 
the  deadly  sins  in  an  allegory.  We  should  as 
soon  expect  a  good  action  from  Giant  Slay-good 
in  Bunyan  as  from  Dionysius;  and  a  crime  of 
Epaminondas  would  seem  as  incongruous  as 
a  f (tux-pas  of  the  grave  and  comely  damsel, 
called  Discretion,  who  answered  the  bell  at  the 
door  cf  the  house  Beautiful. 

This  error  was  partly  the  cause  and  partly 
the  effect  of  the  high  estimation  in  which  the 
later  ancient  writers  have  been  held  by  modern 
scholars.  Those  French  and  English  authors 
who  have  treated  of  the  affairs  of  Greece  have 
generally  turned  with  contempt  from  the  simple 
and  natural  narrations  of  Thucydides  and 
Xenophon  to  the  extravagant  representations 
of  Plutarch,  Diodorus,  Curtius,  and  other  ro 
mancers  of  the  same  class, — men  who  de 
scribed  military  operations  without  ever  having 
handled  a  sword,  and  applied  to  the  seditions 
of  little  republics  speculations  formed  by  ob 
servation  on  an  empire  which  covered  half  the 
known  world.  Of  liberty  they  knew  nothing. 
It  was  to  them  a  great  mystery, — a  superhuman 
enjoyment.  They  ranted  about  liberty  and 
patriotism,  from  the  same  cause  which  leads 
monks  to  talk  more  ardently  than  other  men 
about  love  and  women.  A  wise  man  values 
political  liberty,  because  it  secures  the  persons 
and  the  possessions  of  citizens;  because  it  tends 
to  prevent  the  extravagance  of  rulers  and  the 
corruption  of  judges;  because  it  gives  birth  to 
useful  sciences  and  elegant  arts ;  because  it 
excites  the  industry  and  increases  the  comforts 
of  all  classes  of  society.  These  theorists  ima 
gined  that  it  possessed  something  eternally  and 
intrinsically  good,  distinct  from  the  blessings 
•which  it  generally  produced.  They  considered 
it,  not  as  a  means, but  as  an  end;  an  end  to  be 
attained  at  any  cost.  Their  favourite  heroes 
are  those  who  have  sacrificed,  for  the  mere 
name  of  freedom,  the  prosperity — the  security 
— the  justice — from  which  freedom  derives  its 
value. 

There  is  another  remarkable  characteristic 
t>r  these  writers,  in  which  their  modern  wor 
shippers  have  carefully  imitated  them, — a 
great  fondness  for  good  stories.  The  most  es 
tablished  facts,  dates,  arid  characters  are  never 
suffered  to  come  into  competition  with  a  splen 
did  saying  or  a  romantic  exploit.  The  early 
Historians  have  left  us  natural  and  simple  de- 

VOL.  111.— 64 


scriptions  of  the  great  events  which  they  wit 
nessed,  and  the  great  men  with  whom  they  as 
sociated.  When  we  read  the  account  which 
Plutarch  and  Rollin  have  given  of  the  same 
period,  we  scarcely  know  our  old  acquaintance 
again  ;  we  are  utterly  confounded  by  the  melo 
dramatic  effect  of  the  narration  and  the  sublime 
coxcombry  of  the  characters. 

These  are  the  principal  errors  into  which 
the  predecessors  of  Mr.  Mitford  have  fallen; 
and  from  most  of  these  he  is  free.  His  faults 
are  of  a  completely  different  description,  li  :s 
to  be  hoped  that  the  students  of  history  may 
now  be  saved,  like  Dorax  in  Dryden's  play,  by 
swallowing  two  conflicting  poisons,  each  of 
which  may  serve  as  an  antidote  to  the  other. 

The  first  and  most  important  difference  be 
tween  Mr.  Mitford  and  those  who  have  pre 
ceded  him.  is  in  his  narration.  Here  the  ad 
vantage  lies,  for  the  most  part,  on  his  side. 
His  principle  is  to  follow  the  contemporary 
historians,  to  look  with  doubt  on  all  statements 
which  are  not  in  some  degree  confirmed  by 
them,  and  absolutely  to  reject  all  which  are 
contradicted  by  them.  While  he  retains  the 
guidance  of  some  writer  in  whom  he  can  place 
confidence,  he  goes  on  excellently.  When  he 
loses  it,  he  falls  to  the  level,  or  perhaps  below 
the  level  of  the  writers  whom  he  so  much  de 
spises  :  he  is  as  absurd  as  they,  and  very  much 
duller.  It  is  really  amusing  to  observe  how 
he  proceeds  with  his  narration,  when  he  has 
no  better  authority  than  poor  Diodorus.  He 
is  compelled  to  relate  something;  yet  he  be 
lieves  nothing.  He  accompanies  every  fact 
with  a  long  statement  of  objections.  His  ac 
count  of  the  administration  of  Dionysius  is  in 
no  sense  a  history.  It  ought  to  be  entitled-^ 
"  Historic  doubts  as  to  certain  events  alleged 
to  have  taken  place  in  Sicily." 

This  skepticism,  however,  like  that  of  some 
great  legal  characters  almost  as  skeptical  as 
himself,  vanishes  whenever  his  political  par 
tialities  interfere.  He  is  a  vehement  admirer 
of  tyranny  and  oligarchy,  and  considers  no 
evidence  as  feeble  which  can  be  brought  for 
ward  in  favour  of  those  formo  of  government* 
Democracy  he  hates  with  a  perfect  hatred,  a 
hatred  which,  in  the  first  volume  of  his  history, 
appears  only  in  his  epistles  and  reflections, 
but  which,  in  those  parts  where  he  has  less 
reverence  for  his  guides,  and  can  venture  to 
take  his  own  way,  completely  distorts  even  his 
narration. 

In  taking  up  these  opinions,  I  have  no  doult 
that  Mr.  Mitford  was  influenced  by  the  same 
love  of  singularity  which  led  him  to  spell 
island  without  an  s,  and  to  place  two  dots  over 
the  last  letter  of  idea.  In  truth,  preceding 
historians  have  erred  so  monstrously  on  the 
other  side,  that  even  the  worst  parts  of  Mr. 
Mitford's  book  may  be  useful  as  a  corrective. 
For  a  young  gentleman  who  talks  much  about 
his  country,  tyrannicide,  and  Epaminondas, 
this  work,  diluted  in  a  sufficient  quantity  ol 
Rollin  and  Barthelemi,  may  be  a  very  useful 
remedy. 

The  errors  of  both  parties  arise  from  an 
ignorance  or  a  neglect  of  the   fundamental 
principles  of  political  science.      The  writers 
on  one  side  imagine  popular  government  to  b 
2x2 


426 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


always  a  blessing ;  Mr.  Mitford  omits  no  op-  j 
portunity  of  assuring  us  that  it  is  always  a  ! 
curse.    The  fact  is,  that  a  good  government, ' 
IIKC  a  good  coal,  is  that  which  ftis  the  body  for  ! 
•which  it  is  designed.    A  man  who,  upon  ab-  j 
stract  principles,  pronounces  a  constitution,  to  ! 
"be  good,  without  an  exact  knowledge  of  the  | 
people  who  are  to  be  governed  by  it,  judges  as  | 
absurdly  as  a  tailor  who  should  measure  the  I 
Bclvidere  Apollo  for  the  clothes  of  all  his  cus-  I 
•joiners.     The  demagogues  who  wished  to  see 
Portugal  a  republic,  and  the  wise  critics  who 
revile  the  Virginians  for  not  having  instituted 
a  pet  rage,  appear  equally  ridiculous  to  all  men 
of  sense  and  candour. 

That  is  the  best  government  which  desires 
to  make  the  people  happy,  and  knows  how  to 
male  them  happy.  Neither  the  inclination 
nor  the  knowledge  will  suffice  alone,  and  it  is 
diffic  ill  to  find  them  together. 

Pure  democracy,  and  pure  democracy  alone, 
satisfies  the  former  condition  of  this  great  pro 
blem.  That  the  governors  may  be  solicitous 
only  for  ihe  interests  of  the  governed,  it  is  ne 
cessary  that  the  interests  of  the  governors  and 
the  governed  should  be  the  same.  This  cannot, 
be  often  the  case  where  power  is  intrusted  to 
one  or  to  a  few.  The  privileged  part  of  the 
community  will  doubtless  derive  a  certain  de 
gree  of  advantage  from  the  general  prosperity 
of  tlr  >  state  ;  but  they  will  derive  a  greater  from 
oppression  and  exaction.  The  king  will  desire 
a  useless  war  for  his  glory,  or  a  parr-aux-cet  fs 
for  his  pleasure.  The  nobles  will  demand  mo 
nopolies  au'l  leltres-de-cnchet.  In  proportion  as 
the  number  of  governors  is  increased  the  evil 
is  diminished.  There  are  fewer  to  contribute, 
and  more  to  receive.  The  dividend  which  each 
can  obtain  of  the  public  plunder  becomes  less 
and  less  tempting.  But  the  interests  of  the 
subjects  and  the  rulers  never  absolutely  coin 
cide  till  the  subjects  themselves  become  the 
rulers  ;  that  is,  till  the  government  be  either 
immediately  or  mediately  democratical. 

But  this  is  not  enough.  "Will  without 
power,"  said  the  sagacious  Casimir  to  Milor 
Beefington,  "is  like  children  playing  at  sol 
diers."  The  people  will  always  be  desirous  to 
promote  their  own  interests ;  but  it  may  be 
doubted,  whether,  in  any  community,  they  were 
ever  sufficiently  educated  to  understand  them. 
Even  in  this  island,  where  the  multitude  have 
long  been  better  informed  than  in  any  other 
part  of  Europe,  the  rights  of  the  many  have 
generally  been  asserted  against  themselves  by 
the  patriotism  of  the  few.  Free  trade,  one  of 
the  greatest  blessings  which  a  government  can 
confer  on  a  people,  is  in  almost  every  country 
unpopular.  It  may  be  well  doubted,  whether 
a  liberal  policy  with  regard  to  our  commercial 
relations,  would  find  any  support  from  a  Par 
liament  elected  by  universal  suffrage.  The  re 
publicans  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic  have 
recently  adopted  regulations,  of  which  the  con 
sequences  will,  before  long,  show  us, 

"  TIovv  nations  sink,  by  darling  schemes  oppressed, 
When  vengeance  listens  to  the  fool's  request." 

The  people  are  to  be  governed  for  their  own 
good;  and,  that  they  may  be  governed  for  their 
own  good,  they  must  not  be  governed  by  their 
own  ignorance.  There  are  countries  in  which 


it  would  be  as  absurd  to  establish  popular  go 
vernments,  as  to  abolish  all  restraints  in  a 
school,  or  to  untie  all  the  strait-waistcoats  in  a 
mad-house. 

Hence  it  may  be  concluded,  that  the  happiest 
state  of  society  is  that  in  which  supreme  power 
resides  in  the  whole  body  of  a  well-informed 
people.  This  is  an  imaginary,  perhaps  an  un 
attainable  state  of  things.  Yet,  in  some  mea 
sure,  we  may  approximate  to  it;  and  he  alone 
deserves  the  name  of  a  great  statesman,  whose 
principle  it  is  to  extend  the  power  of  the 
people  in  proportion  to  the  extent  of  their 
knowledge,  and  to  give  them  every  facility  for 
obtaining  such  a  degree  of  knowledge  as  may 
render  it  safe  to  trust  them  with  absolute  power. 
In  the  mean  time,  it  is  dangerous  to  praise  or 
condemn  constitutions  in  the  abstract;  since, 
from  the  despotism  of  St.  Petersburgh  to  the 
democracy  of  Washington,  there  is  scarcely  a 
form  of  government  which  might  not,  at  least 
in  some  hypothetical  case,  be  the  best  possible. 

If,  however,  there  be  any  form  of  go\  eminent 
which  in  all  ages  and  nations  has  always  been, 
and  must  always  be  pernicious,  it  is  certainly 
that  which  Mr.  Mitford,  on  his  usual  principle 
of  being  wiser  than  all  the  rest  of  the  world, 
has  taken  under  his  especial  patronage — pure 
oligarchy.  This  is  closely  and  indeed  inse 
parably  connected  with  another  of  his  eccentric 
tastes,  a  marked  partiality  for  Lacedonmon,  and 
a  dislike  of  Athens.  Mr.  Mitlbrd's  book  has, 
I  suspect,  rendered  these  sentiment,  in  some 
degree  popular;  and  I  shall,  therefore,  examine 
them  at  some  length. 

The  shades  in  the  Athenian  character  strike 
the  eye  more  rapidly  than  those  in  the  Lace- 
dcemonian  ;  not  because  they  are  darker,  but 
because  they  are  on  a  brighter  ground.  The 
law  of  ostracism  is  an  instance  of  thts.  Nothing 
can  be  conceived  more  odious  than  the  practice 
of  punishing  a  citizen,  simply  and  professedly, 
for  his  eminence ; — and  nothing  in  the  insti 
tutions  of  Athens  is  more  frequently  or  more 
justly  censured.  Lacedoemon  was  free  from 
this.  And  why?  Lacedsemon  did  not  need  it. 
Oligarchy  is  an  ostracism  of  itself, — an  ostra 
cism  not  occasional,  but  permanent, — not  du 
bious,  but  certain.  Her  laws  prevented  the 
development  of  merit,  instead  of  attacking  its 
maturity.  They  did  not  cut  down  the  plant  in 
its  high  and  palmy  state,  but  cursed  the  soil 
with  eternal  sterility.  In  spite  of  the  law  of 
ostracism,  Athens  produced,  within  a  hundred 
and  fifty  years,  the  greatest  public  men  that 
ever  existed.  Whom  had  Sparta  to  ostracize  1 
She  produced,  at  most,  four  eminent  men,  Bra- 
sidas,  Gylippus,  Lysander,  and  Agesilaus.  Of 
these,  not  one  rose  to  distinction  within  her 
jurisdiction.  It  was  only  when  they  escaped 
from  the  region  within  which  the  influence  of 
aristocracy  withered  every  thing  good  and 
noble  ;  it  was  only  when  they  ceased  to  be  La- 
cedremonians  that  they  became  great  men, 
Brasidas,  among  the  cities  of  Thrace,  was 
strictly  a  democratical  leader,  the  favourite 
minister  and  general  of  the  people.  The  same 
may  be  said  of  Gylippus,  at  Syracuse.  Lysarx 
der,  in  the  Hellespont,  and  Agesilaus,  in  Asia, 
j  were  liberated  for  a  time  from  the  hateful  re- 
I  straints  imposed  by  the  constitution  of  Lycur 


MITFORD'S  GREECE. 


427 


gus.  Both  acquired  fame  abroad,  and  both  re 
turned  to  be  watched  and  depressed  at  home. 
This  is  not  peculiar  to  Sparta.  Oligarchy, 
wherever  it  has  existed,  has  always  stunted 
the  growth  of  genius.  Thus  it  was  at  Rome, 
till  about  a  century  before  the  Christian  era; 
we  read  of  abundance  of  consuls  and  dictators 
who  won  battles  and  enjoyed  triumphs,  but  we 
look  in  vain  for  a  single  man  of  the  first  order 
of  intellect, — for  a  Pericles,  a  Demosthenes,  or 
a  Hannibal.  The  Gracchi  formed  a  strong  de- 
mocratical  party  ;  Marius  revived  it ;  the  foun 
dations  of  the  old  aristocracy  were  shaken ; 
and  two  generations  fertile  in  really  great  men 
appeared. 

Venice  is  a  still  more  remarkable  instance  : 
in  her  history  we  see  nothing  but  the  state ; 
aristocracy  had  destroyed  every  s^.ed  of  genius 
and  virtue.  Her  dominion  was  like  herself, 
lofty  and  magnificent,  but  founded  on  filth  and 
weeds.  God  forbid  that  there  should  ever  again 
exist  a  powerful  and  civilized  state,  which, 
after  existing  through  thirteen  hundred  eventful 
years,  shall  not  bequeath  to  mankind  the  me 
mory  of  one  great  name  or  one  generous  action. 

Many  writers,  and  Mr.  Mitford  among  the 
number,  have  admired  the  stability  of  the  Spar 
tan  institutions ;  in  fact,  there  is  little  to  ad 
mire,  and  less  to  approve.  Oligarchy  is  the 
weakest  and  most  stable  of  governments,  and 
it  is  stable  because  it  is  weak.  It  has  a  sort 
of  valetudinarian  longevity;  it  lives  in  the  ba 
lance  of  Sanctorius ;  it  takes  no  exercise,  it 
exposes  itself  to  no  accident,  it  is  seized  with 
a  hypochondriac  alarm  at  every  new  sensation, 
it  trembles  at  every  breath,  it  lets  blood  for 
every  inflammation,  and  thus,  without  ever  en 
joying  a  day  of  health  or  pleasure,  drags  on 
its  existence  to  a  doting  and  debilitated  old 
age. 

The  Spartans  purchased  for  their  govern 
ment  a  prolongation  of  its  existence,  by  the 
sacrifice  of  happiness  at  home  and  dignity 
abroad.  They  cringed  to  the  powerful ;  they 
trampled  on  the  weak ;  they  massacred  their 
Helots  ;  they  betrayed  their  allies ;  they  con 
trived  to  be  a  day  too  late  for  the  battle  of  Ma 
rathon  ;  they  attempted  to  avoid  the  battle  of 
Salamis ;  they  suffered  the  Athenians,  to  whom 
they  owed  their  lives  and  liberties,  to  be  a 
second  time  driven  from  their  country  by  the 
Persians,  that  they  might  finish  their  own  for 
tifications  on  the  Isthmus  ;  they  attempted  to 
take  advantage  of  the  distress  to  which  exer 
tions  in  their  cause  had  reduced  their  preser 
vers,  in  order  to  make  them  their  slaves  ;  they 
strove  to  prevent  those  who  had  abandoned 
their  walls  to  defend  them,  from  rebuilding 
them  to  defend  themselves;  they  commenced 
the  Peloponnesian  war  in  violation  of  their  en 
gagements  with  Athens;  they  abandoned  it  in 
vicJ'ation  of  their  engagements  with  their  allies; 
they  gave  up  to  the  sword  whole  cities,  which 
had  placed  themselves  under  their  protection  ; 
they  bartered  for  advantages  confined  to  them 
selves,  the  interest,  the  freedom,  and  the  lives 
of  those  who  had  served  them  most  faithfully; 
they  took  with  equal  complacency,  and  equal 
infamy,  the  stripes  of  Elis  and  the  bribes  of 
Persia;  they  never  showed  either  resentment 
or  gra'itude,  they  abstained  from  no  injury, 


and  they  revenged  none.  Above  all,  they  looked 
on  a  citizen  who  served  them  well  as  their 
deadliest  enemy.  These  are  the  arls  which 
protract  the  existence  of  governments. 

Nor  were  the  domestic  institutions  of  Lace- 
daemon  less  hateful  or  less  contemptible  than 
her  foreign  policy.  A  perpetual  interference 
with  every  part  of  the  system  of  human  life,  a 
constant  struggle  against  nature  and  ?ea(on, 
characterized  all  her  laws.  To  violate  even 
prejudices  which  have  taken  deep  rooi  in  the 
minds  of  a  people  is  scarcely  expedient;  to 
think  of  extirpating  natural  appetites  and  pas 
sions  is  frantic:  trie  external  symptoms  may 
be  occasionally  repressed,  but  the  feeling  still 
exists,  and,  debarred  from  its  natural  objects, 
preys  on  the  disordered  mind  and  body  of  its 
victim.  Thus  it  is  in  convents — thus  jt  is 
among  ascetic,  sects — thus  it  was  among  the 
Lacedaemonians.  Hence  arose  that  madness, 
or  violence  approaching  to  madness,  which,  in 
spite  of  every  external  restraint,  often  appeared 
among  the  most  distinguished  citizens  of  Spaita. 
Cleomenes  terminated  his  career  of  raving 
cruelty,  by  cutting  himself  to  pieces.  Pausa- 
nias  seems  to  have  been  absolutely  insane  :  he 
formed  a  hopeless  and  profligate  scheme  ;  he 
betrayed  it  by  the  ostentation  of  his  behaviour 
and  the  imprudence  of  his  measures  ;  and  he 
alienated,  by  his  insolence,  all  who  might  have 
served  or  protected  him.  Xenophon,  a  warm 
admirer  of  Lacedcemon,  furnishes  us  with  the 
strongest  evidence  to  this  effect.  It  is  impos 
sible  not  to  observe  the  brutal  and  senseless 
fury  which  characterizes  almost  every  Spartan 
with  whom  he  was  connected.  Clearchus 
nearly  lost  his  life  by  his  cruelty.  Chirisophus 
deprived  his  army  of  the  services  of  a  faithful 
guide  by  his  unreasonable  and  ferocious  se 
verity.  But  it  is  needless  to  multiply  instances. 
Lycurgus,  Mr.  Mitford's  favourite  legislator, 
founded  his  whole  system  on  a  mistaken  prin 
ciple.  He  never  considered  that  governments 
were  made  for  men,  and  not  men  for  govern 
ments.  Instead  of  adapting  the  constitution  to 
the  people,  he  distorted  the  minds  of  the  people 
to  suit  the  constitution,  a  scheme  worthy  of  the 
Laputan  Academy  of  Projectors.  And  this  ap 
pears  to  Mr.  Mitford  to  constitute  his  peculiar 
title  to  admiration.  Hear  himself:  "  What  to 
modern  eyes  most  strikingly  sets  that  extra 
ordinary  man  above  all  other  legislators  is,  that 
in  so  many  circumstances,  apparently  out  of 
the  reach  of  law,  he  controlled  and  formed  to 
his  own  mind  the  wills  and  habits  of  his  peo 
ple."  I  should  suppose  that  this  gentleman  had 
the  advantage  receiving  his  education  under 
the  ferula  of  Dr.  Pangloss  ;  for  his  metaphysics 
are  clearly  those  of  the  castle  of  Thundcr-ten- 
tronckh,  "  Remarquez  bien  que  les  nez  ort  ete 
faits  pour  porter  des  lunettes,  aussi  avons  LCUS 
des  lunettes.  Les  jambes  sont  visiblemetit  in 
stitutees  pour  etre  chaussees,  et  nous  avons 
des  chausses.  Les  cochons  etant  faits  pour 
elre  manges,  nous  mangeons  du  pore  touto 
i'annee." 

At  Athens  the  laws  did  not  constantly  in 
terfere  with  the  tastes  of  the  people.  The 
children  were  not  taken  from  their  parents  by 
that  universal  step-mother,  the  state.  They 
were  not  starved  into  thieves,  or  ';ortured  into 


4*8 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


bullies;  there  was  no  established  table  at 
which  every  one  must  dine,  no  established 
Style  in  which  every  one  must  converse.  An  : 
Athenian  might  eat  whatever  he  could  afford1 
to  buy,  and  talk  as  long  as  he  could  find  peo-  j 
pie  to  listen.  The  government  did  not  tell  the  j 
people  what  opinions  they  were  to  hold,  or 
what  songs  they  were  to  sing.  Freedom  pro 
duce  1  excellence.  Thus  philosophy  took  its 
origin.  Thus  were  produced  those  models  of 
poetry,  of  oratory,  and  of  the  arts,  which 
scarcely  fall  short  of  the  standard  of  ideal  ex 
cellence.  Nothing  is  more  conducive  to  hap 
piness  than  the  free  exercise  of  the  mind,  in 
pursuits  congenial  to  it.  This  happiness,  as 
suredly,  was  enjoyed  far  more  at  Athens  than 
at  Sparta.  The  Athenians  are  acknowledged 
even  by  their  enemies  to  have  been  distin 
guished,  in  private  life,  by  their  courteous  and 
amiable  demeanour.  Their  levity,  at  least, 
was  better  than  Spartan  sullenness,  and  their 
impertinence,  than  Spartan  insolence.  Even 
in  courage  it  may  be  questioned  whether  they 
were  inferior  to  the  Lacedaemonians.  The 
great  Athenian  historian  has  reported  a  re 
markable  observation  of  the  great  Athenian 
minister.  Pericles  maintained  that  his  coun 
trymen,  without  submitting  to  the  hardships 
of  a  Spartan  education,  rivalled  all  the  achieve 
ments  of  Spartan  valour,  and  that  therefore 
the  pleasures  and  amusements  which  they  en 
joyed  were  to  be  considered  as  so  much  clear 
gain.  The  infantry  of  Athens  was  certainly 
not  equal  to  that  of  Lacedcemon ;  but  this 
seems  to  have  been  caused  merely  by  want  of 
practice :  the  attention  of  the  Athenians  was 
diverted  from  the  discipline  of  the  phalanx  to 
that  of  the  trireme.  The  Lacedaemonians,  in 
spite  of  all  their  boasted  valour,  were,  from 
the  same  cause,  timid  and  disorderly  in  naval 
action. 

But  we  are  told  that  crimes  of  great  enormity 
were  perpetrated  by  the  Athenian  government 
and  the  democracies  under  its  protection.  It 
is  true  that  Athens  too  often  acted  up  to  the 
full  extent  of  the  laws  of  war,  in  an  age  when 
those  laws  had  not  been  mitigated  by  causes 
which  have  operated  in  later  times.  This  ac 
cusation  is,  in  fact,  common  to  Athens,  to  La- 
cedaernon,  to  all  the  states  of  Greece,  and  to  all 
states  similarly  situated.  Where  communities 
are  very  large,  the  heavier  evils  of  war  are  felt 
but  by  few.  The  ploughboy  sings,  the  spin 
ning-  wheel  turns  round,  the  wedding-day  is 
fixed,  whether  the  last  battle  were  lost  or  won. 
In  little  states  it  cannot  be  thus;  every  man 
feels  in  his  own  property  and  person  the  effect 
of  a  war.  Every  man  is  a  soldier,  and  a  sol 
dier  fighting  for  his  nearest  interests.  His 
own  trees  have  been  cut  down — his  own  corn 
has  been  burnt — his  own  house  has  been  pil- 
iaged —  his  own  relations  have  been  killed. 
How  can  he  entertain  towards  the  enemies  of 
his  country  the  same  feelings  with  one  who 
has  suffered  nothing  from  them,  except  per 
haps  the  addition  of  a  small  sum  to  the  taxes 
which  he  pays?  Men  in  such  circumstances 
cannot  be  generous.  They  have  too  much  at 
stake  t  It  is  when  they  are,  if  I  may  so  express 
myself,  playing  for  love,  it  is  when  war  is  a  ' 
mere  game  at  chess,  it  is  when  they  are  con-  i 


tending  for  a  remote  colony,  a  frontier  town, 
the  honours  of  a  flag,  a  salute  or  a  title,  that 
they  can  make  fine  speeches,  and  do  good 
offices  to  their  enemies.  The  Black  Prince 
•waited  behind  the  chair  of  his  captive;  Y'illars 
interchanged  repartees  with  Eugene ;  George 
II.  sent  congratulations  to  Louis  XV.,  during  a 
war,  upon  occasion  of  his  escape  from  the  at 
tempt  of  Damien  ;  and  these  things  are  fine 
and  generous,  and  very  gratifying  to  the  author 
of  the  Broad  Stone  of  Honour,  and  all  the  other 
wise  men  who  think,  like  him,  that  God  made 
the  world  only  for  the  use  of  gentlemen.  But 
they  spring  in  general  from  utter  heartlessness. 
No  war  ought  ever  to  be  undertaken  but  under 
circumstances  which  render  all  interchange  of 
courtesy  between  the  combatants  impossible. 
It  is  a  bad  thing  that  men  should  hate  each 
other,  but  it  is  far  worse  that  they  should  con 
tract  the  habit  of  cutting  one  another's  throats 
without  hatred.  War  is  never  lenient  but 
where  it  is  wanton;  when  men  are  compelled 
to  fight  in  self-defence,  they  must  hate  and 
avenge;  this  may  be  bad,  but  it  is  human  na 
ture,  it  is  the  clay  as  it  came  from  the  hand  of 
the  potter. 

It  is  true  that  among  the  dependencies  of 
Athens,  seditions  assumed  a  character  more 
ferocious  than  even  in  France,  during  the 
reign  of  terror — the  accursed  Saturnalia  of  an 
accursed  bondage.  It  is  true  that  in  Athens 
itself,  where  such  convulsions  were  scarcely 
known,  the  condition  of  the  higher  orders  was 
disagreeable;  that  they  were  compelled  to 
contribute  large  sums  for  the  service  or  the 
amusement  of  the  public,  and  that  they  were 
sometimes  harassed  by  vexatious  informers. 
Whenever  such  cases  occur,  Mr.  Mitlbrd's 
skepticism  vanishes.  The  "if,"  the  "but," 
the  "it  is  said,"  the  "if  we  may  believe,"  with 
which  he  qualifies  every  charge  against  a 
tyrant  or  an  aristocracy,  are  at  once  abandon 
ed.  The  blacker  the  story,  the  firmer  is  his 
belief;  and  he  never  fails  to  inveigh  with 
hearty  bitterness  against  democracy  as  the 
source  of  every  species  of  crime. 

The  Athenians,  I  believe,  possessed  more 
liberty  than  was  good  for  them  Yet  I  will 
venture  to  assert,  that  while  the  splendour,  the 
intelligence,  and  the  energy  of  that  great  peo 
ple  were  peculiar  to  themselves,  the  crimes 
with  which  they  are  charged  arose  from 
causes  which  were  common  to  them  with 
every  other  state  which  then  existed.  The 
violence  of  faction  in  that  age  sprang  from  a 
cause  which  has  always  been  fertile  in  every 
political  and  moral  evil,  domestic  slavery. 

The  effect  of  slavery  is  completely  to  dis 
solve  the  connection  which  naturally  exists 
between  the  higher  and  lower  classes  of  l."ee 
citizens.  The  rich  spend  their  w<  alth  in  pur 
chasing  and  maintaining  slaves.  There  is  no 
demand  for  the  labour  of  the  poor;  the  fable 
of  Menenius  ceases  to  be  applicable;  the  belly 
communicates  no  nutriment  to  the  members; 
there  is  an  atrophy  in  the  body  politic.  The 
two  parties,  therefore,  proceed  to  extremities 
utterly  unknown  in  countries  where  they  have 
mutually  need  of  each  other.  In  Rome  the 
oligarchy  was  too  powerful  to  be  subverted  by 
force ;  and  neither  the  tribunes  nor  the  popular 


MITFORD'S  GREECE. 


429 


assemblies,  though  constitutionally  omnipo 
tent,  could  maintain  a  successful  contest 
against  men  who  possessed  the  whole  property 
of  the  state.  Hence  the  necessity  for  measures 
tending  to  unsettle  the  whole  frame  of  society, 
and  to  take  away  every  motive  of  industry; 
the  abolition  of  debts,  and  the  Agrarian  laws 
—•propositions  absurdly  condemned  by  men 
who  do  not  consider  the  circumstances  from 
which  they  sprung.  They  were  the  desperate 
remedies  of  a  desperate  disease.  In  Greece 
the  oligarchal  interest  was  not  in  general  so 
deeply  rooted  as  at  Rome.  The  multitude, 
therefore,  often  redressed,  by  force,  grievances 
which,  a.i  Rome,  were  commonly  attacked  un 
der  the  forms  of  the  constitution.  They  drove 
out  or  massacred  the  rich,  and  divided  their 
property.  If  the  superior  union  or  military 
skill  of  the  rich  rendered  them  victorious,  they 
took  measures  equally  violent,  disarmed  ail 
in  whom  they  could  not  confide,  often  slaugh 
tered  great  numbers,  and  occasionally  ex 
pelled  the  whole  commonalty  from  the  city, 
and  remained,  with  their  slaves,  the  sole  in 
habitants. 

From  such  calamities  Athens  and  Lacedce- 
mon  alone  were  almost  completely  free.  At 
Athens,  the  purses  of  the  rich  were  laid  under 
regular  contribution  for  the  support  of  the 
poor;  and  this,  rightly  considered,  was  as 
much  a  favour  to  the  givers  as  to  the  re 
ceivers,  since  no  other  measure  could  possibly 
have  saved  their  houses  from  pillage,  and 
their  persons  from  violence.  It  is  singular 
that  Mr.  Mitford  should  perpetually  reprobate 
a  policy  which  was  the  best  that  could  be  pur 
sued  in  such  a  state  of  things,  and  which  alone 
saved  Athens  from  the  frightful  outrages  which 
were  perpetrated  at  Corcyra. 

Lacedaamon,  cursed  with  a  system  of  slave 
ry  more  odious  than  has  ever  existed  in  any 
other  country,  avoided  this  evil  by  almost 
totally  annihilating  private  property.  Lycur- 
gus  began  by  an  Agrarian  law.  He  abolished 
all  professions  except  that  of  arms  ;  he  made 
the  whole  of  his  community  a  standing  army, 
every  member  of  which  had  a  common  right 
to  the  services  of  a  crowd  of  miserable  bond 
men  ;  he  secured  the  state  from  sedition  at  the 
expense  of  the  Helots.  Of  all  the  parts  of  his 
system  this  is  the  most  creditable  to  his  head, 
and  the  most  disgraceful  to  his  heart. 

These  considerations,  and  many  others  of 
equal  importance,  Mr.  Mitford  has  neglected; 
but  he  has  a  yet  heavier  charge  to  answer. 
He  has  made  not  only  illogical  inferences,  but 
false  statements.  While  he  never  states,  with 
out  qualifications  and  objections,  the  charges 
which  the  earliest  and  best  historians  have 
brought  against  his  favourite  tyrants,  Pisistra- 
tus,  Hippias,  and  Gelon,  he  transcribes,  with 
out  any  hesitation,  the  grossest  abuse  of  the 
least  authoritative  writers  against  every  de 
mocracy  and  every  demagogue.  Such  an  ac 
cusation  should  not  be  made  without  being 
supported;  and  I  will  therefore  select  one  out 
of  many  passages  which  will  fully  substantiate 
the  charge,  and  convict  Mr.  Mitford  of  wilful 
misrepresentation,  or  of  negligence  scarcely 
less  culpable.  Mr.  Mitford  is  speaking  of  one 
of  the  greatest  men  that  ever  lived,  Demos 


thenes,  and  comparing  him   with   his  rival, 
^Eschines.     Let  him  speak  for  himself. 

"In  earliest  youth  Demosthenes  earned  an 
opprobrious  nickname  by  the  effeminacy  of 
his  dress  and  manner."  Does  Mr.  Mitford 
know  that  Demosthenes  denied  this  charge, 
and  explained  the  nickname  in  a  perfectly  dif 
ferent  manner?*  And  if  he  knew  it,  shouM 
he  not  have  stated  it?  He  proceeds  thus:— 
"On  emerging  from  minority,  by  the  Athenian 
law,  at  five-and-twenty,  he  earned  another  op- 
probious  nickname  by  a  prosecution  of  ins 
guardians,  which  was  considered  as  a  dis 
honorable  attempt  to  extort  money  from  them." 
In  the  first  place.  Demosthenes  was  riot  five-- 
and-twenty  years  of  age.  Mr.  Mitford  mijjht 
have  learnt  from  so  common  a  book  as  the 
Archasologia  of  Archbishop  Potter,  that,  at 
twenty,  Athenian  citizens  were  freed  from  the 
control  of  their  guardians,  and  began  to  ma 
nage  their  own  property.  The  very  speech  of 
Demosthenes  against  his  guardians  proves 
most  satisfactorily  that  he  was  under  twenty. 
In  his  speech  against  Midias,  he  says,  that 
when  he  undertook  that  prosecution  he  was 
quite  a  boy.f  His  youth  might,  therefore,  ex 
cuse  the  step,  even  if  it  had  been  considered, 
as  Mr.  Mitford  says,  a  dishonourable  attempt 
to  extort  money.  But  who  considered  it  as 
such?  Not  the  judges,  who  condemned  the 
guardians.  The  Athenian  courts  of  justice 
were  not  the  purest  in  the  world;  but  their  de 
cisions  were  at  least  as  likely  to  be  just  as  the 
abuse  of  a  deadly  enemy.  Mr.  Mitford  ref  s 
for  confirmation  of  his  statement  to  ^Esch  3 
and  Plutarch.  ^Eschines  by  no  means  beats 
him  out,  and  Plutarch  directly  contradicts  him. 
"Not  long  afte/V  says  Mr.  Mitford,  "  he  took 
blows  publicly  in  the  theatre  (I  preserve  the 
orthography,  if  it  can  be  so  called,  of  this  his 
torian)  from  a  petulant  youth  of  rank  named 
Meidias."  Here  are  two  disgraceful  mistakes. 
In  the  first  place,  it  was  long  after;  eight  years 
at  the  very  least,  probably  much  more.  In  the 
next  place,  the  petulant  youth,  of  whom  Mr. 
Mitford  speaks,  was  fifty  years  old.*  Really 
Mr.  Mitford  has  less  reason  to  censure  the 
carelessness  of  his  predecessors  than  to  re 
form  his  own.  After  this  monstrous  inaccu 
racy  with  regard  to  facts,  we  may  be  able  to 
judge  what  degree  of  credit  ought  to  be  given 
to  the  vague  abuse  of  such  a  writer.  "The 
cowardice  of  Demosthenes  in  the  field  after 
wards  became  notorious."  Demosthenes  was 
a  civil  character;  war  was  not  his  business. 
In  his  time  the  division  between  military  and 
political  offices  was  beginning  to  be  strongly 
marked;  yet  the  recollection  of  the  days  when 
every  citizen  was  a  soldier  was  still  recent. 
In  such  states  of  society  a  certain  degree  of 
disrepute  always  attaches  to  sedentary  men  ; 
but  that  any  leader  of  the  Athenian  democracy 
could  have  been,  as  Mr.  Mitford  says  of  De 
mosthenes,  a  few  lines  before,  remarkable  for 


*  See  the  speech  of  jEschines  against  TimarchuB 


t  Whopver  will  read  the  speech  of  Demoxthenei 
asainst  Midias  will  find  the  statements  in  the  n-xt  con 
firmed,  and  will  'nave,  moreover,  ihe  pleasure  of  be 
coming  acquainted  with  one  of  the  finest  composition* 
in  the  world,. 


4  '50 


MACAULAVS  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


"  an  extraordinary  deficiency  of  personal  cou 
rage"  is  absolutely  impossible.  What  merce 
nary  warrior  of  the  time  exposed  his  life  to 
greater  or  more  constant  perils'?  Was  there 
a  single  soldier  at  Choeronea  who  had  more 
cause  to  tremble  for  his  safety  than  the  orator, 
"vho,  in  case  of  defeat,  could  scarcely  hope  for 
i.  ercy  from  the  people  whom  he  had  misled, 
01  the  prince  whom  he  had  opposed!  Were 
not  the  ordinary  fluctuations  of  popular  feeling 
enough  'o  deter  any  coward  from  engaging  in 
political  conflicts!  Isocrates,  whom  Mr.  Mit 
ford  extols  because  he  constantly  employed  all 
the  flowers  of  his  schoolboy  rhetoric  to  deco 
rate  oligarchy  and  tyranny,  avoided  the  judi 
cial  and  political  meetings  of  Athens  from 
mere  timidity,  and  seems  to  have  hated  de 
mocracy  only  because  he  durst  not  look  a 
popular  assembly  in  the  face.  Demosthenes 
•was  a  man  of  a  feeble  constitution  ;  his  nerves 
were  weak,  but  his  spirit  was  high ;  and  the 
energy  and  enthusiasm  of  his  feelings  sup 
ported  him  through  life  and  in  death. 

So  much  for  Demosthenes.  Now  for  the 
orator  of  aristocracy.  I  do  not  wish  to  abuse 
JSschines.  He  may  have  been  an  honest 
man.  He  was  certainly  a  great  man  ;  and  I 
feel  a  reverence,  of  which  Mr.  Mitford  seems 
to  have  no  notion,  for  great  men  of  every  party. 
But  when  Mr.  Mitford  says,  that  the  private 
character  of  /Eschines  was  without  stain,  does 
he  remember  what  JEschines  has  himself  con 
fessed  in  his  speech  against  Tirnarchus!  I 
can  make  allowances,  as  well  as  Mr.  Mitford, 
for  persons  who  lived  under  a  different  system 
of  laws  and  morals ;  but  let  them  be  made  im 
partially.  If  Demosthenes  is  to  be  attacked, 
on  account  of  some  childish  improprieties, 
proved  only  by  the  assertion  of  an  antagonist, 
what  shall  we  say  of  those  maturer  vices 
which  that  antagonist  has  himself  acknow 
ledged!  "Against  the  private  character  of 
^Eschines,"  says  Mr.  Mitford,  "Demosthenes 
seems  not  to  have  had  an  insinuation  to  op 
pose."  Has  Mr.  Mitford  ever  read  the  speech 
of  Demosthenes  on  the  embassy  !  Or  can  he 
have  forgotten,  what  was  never  forgotten  by 
any  one  else  who  ever  read  it,  the  story  which 
Demosthenes  relates  with  such  terrible  energy 
of  language  concerning  the  drunken  brutality 
of  his  rival !  True  or  false,  here  is  something 
more  than  an  insinuation ;  and  nothing  can 
vindicate  the  historian  who  hac  "T'?rluoked  it 
from  the  charge  of  negligence  or  of  partiality. 
But  ^Eschines  denied  the  story.  Arid  did  not 
Demosthenes  also  deny  the  story  respecting 
his  childish  nickname,  Avhich  Mr.  Mitford  has 
nevertheless  told  without  any  qualification ! 
But  the  judges,  or  some  part  of  them,  showed, 
oy  tneir  clamour,  their  disbelief  of  the  relation 
of  Demosthenes.  And  did  not  the  judges,  who 
tried  the  cause  between  Demosthenes  and  his 
guardians  indicate,  in  a  much  clearer  manner, 
their  approbation  of  the  prosecution!  But 
Demos'henes  was  a  demagogue,  and  is  to  be 
slandered.  -<£schines  was  an  aristocrat,  and 
is  to  be  panegyrized.  Is  this  a  history,  or  a 
party-pamphlet! 

These  passages,  all  selected  from  a  single 
wage   ;."  Mr.  Mitford' s  work,  may  give  some 


notion  to  those  readers  who  have  not  the 
means  of  comparing  his  statements  with  the 
original  authorities,  of  his  extreme  partiality 
and  carelessness.  Indeed,  whenever  this  his 
torian  mentions  Demosthenes,  he  violates  all 
the  laws  of  candour  and  even  of  decency;  he 
weighs  no  authorities  ;  he  makes  no  allow 
ances;  he  forgets  the  best-authenticated  facts 
in  the  history  of  the  times,  and  the  most  gene 
rally  recognised  principles  of  human  nature. 
The  opposition  of  the  great  orator  to  the  policy 
of  Philip,  he  represents  as  neither  more  nor 
less  than  deliberate  villany.  I  hold  almost  the 
same  opinion  with  Mr.  Mitford  respecting  the 
character  and  the  views  of  that  great  and  ac 
complished  prince.  But  am  I,  therefore,  to 
pronounce  Demosthenes  profligate  and  insin 
cere!  Surely  not;  do  we  not  perpetually  see 
men  of  the  greatest  talents  and  the  purest  inten 
tions  misled  by  national  or  factious  prejudices? 
The  most  respectable  people  in  England  were, 
little  more  than  forty  years  ago,  in  the  habit 
of  uttering  the  bitterest  abuse  against  Wash 
ington  and  Franklin.  It  is  certainly  to  be  re 
gretted  that  men  should  err  so  grossly  in  their 
estimate  of  character.  But  no  person  who 
knows  any  thing  of  human  nature  will  impute 
such  errors  to  depravity. 

Mr.  Mitford  is  not  more  consistent  with  him 
self  than  with  reason.  Though  he  is  the  ad 
vocate  of  all  oligarchies,  he  is  also  a  warm 
admirer  of  all  kings;  and  of  all  citizens  who 
raised  themselves  to  that  species  of  sovereign 
ty  which  the  Greeks  denominated  tyranny.  If 
monarchy,  as  Mr.  Mitford  hoids,  be  in  itself  a 
blessing,  democracy  must  be  a  better  form  of 
government  than  aristocracy,  which  is  always 
opposed  to  the  supremacy,  and  even  to  the 
eminence  of  individuals.  On  the  other  hand, 
it  is  but  one  step  that  separates  the  demagogue 
and  the  sovereign. 

If  this  article  had  not  extended  itself  to  so 
great  a  length,  I  should  offer  a  few  observa 
tions  on  some  other  peculiarities  of  this  writer, 
— his  general  preference  of  the  Barbarians  to 
the  Greeks, — his  predilection  for  Persians,  Car 
thaginians,  Thracians,  for  all  nations,  in  short, 
except  that  great  and  enlightened  nation  of 
which  he  is  the  historian.  But  I  will  confine 
myself  to  a  single  topic. 

Mr.  Mitford  has  remarked,  with  truth  and 
spirit,  that  "any  history  perfectly  written,  but 
especially  a  Grecian  history  perfectly  written, 
should  be  a  political  institute  for  all  nations." 
It  has  not  occurred  to  him  that  a  Grecian  his 
tory,  perfectly  written,  should  also  be  a  com 
plete  record  of  the  rise  and  progress  of  poetry, 
philosophy,  and  the  arts.  Here  his  work  is 
extremely  deficient.  Indeed,  though  it  may 
seem  a  strange  thing  to  say  of  a  gentleman 
who  has  published  so  many  quartos,  Mr.  Mit 
ford  seems  to  entertain  a  feeling,  bordering  on 
contempt,  for  literary  and  speculative  pur 
suits.  The  talents  of  action  almost  exclusively 
attract  his  notice,  and  he  talks  with  verv  com 
placent  disdain  of  the  "idle  learned."  Homer, 
indeed,  he  admires,  but  principally,  I  am 
afraid,  because  he  is  convinced  that  Homer 
could  neither  read  nor  write.  He  could  not 
[  avoid  speaking  of  Socrates ;  but  he  has  been 


MITFORD'S   GREECE. 


431 


far  more  solicitous  to  trace  his  death  to  politi 
cal  causes,  and  to  deduce  from  it  consequences 
unfavourable  to  Athens  and  to  popular  go 
vernment,  than  to  throw  light  on  the  character 
arid  doctrines  of  the  wonderful  man, 

"From  whose  mouth  issued  forth 
Mellifluous  streams  that  watered  all  the  schools 
Of  Academics,  old  and  new,  with  those 
Snniamed  Peripatetics,  and  the  sect 
Epicurean,  and  th«  Stoic  severe." 

He  dnes  not  seem  to  be  aware  that  Demos 
thenes  was  a  great  orator;  he  represents  him 
sometimes  as  an  aspiring  demagogue,  some 
times  as  an  adroit  negotiator,  and  always  as  a 
great  rogue.  But  that  in  which  the  Athenian 
excelled  all  men  of  all  ages,  that  irresistible 
eloquence,  which,  at  the  distance  of  more  than 
two  thousand  years,  stirs  our  blood  and  brings 
tears  into  our  eyes,  he  passed  by  with  a  few 
phrases  of  commonplace  commendation.  The 
origin  of  the  drama,  the  doctrines  of  the  so 
phists,  the  course  of  Athenian  education,  the 
state  of  the  arts  and  sciences,  the  whole  do 
mestic  system  of  the  Greeks,  he  has  almost 
completely  neglected.  Yet  these  things  will 
appear,  to  a  reflecting  man,  scarcely  less 
worthy  of  attention  than  the  taking  of  Sphac- 
teria,  or  the  discipline  of  the  targeteers  of 
Iphicrates. 

This,  indeed,  is  a  deficiency  hy  no  means 
peculiar  to  Mr.  Mitford.  Most  people  seem  to 
imagine  that  a  detail  of  public  occurences — 
the  operation  of  sieges — the  changes  of  admi 
nistrations — the  treaties — the  conspiracies — the 
rebellions — is  a  complete  history.  Differences 
of  definition  are  logically  unimportant,  but 
practically  they  sometimes  produce  the  most 
momentous  effects:  thus  it  has  been  in  the 
present  case;  historians  have,  almost  without 
exception,  confined  themselves  to  the  public 
transactions  of  states,  and  have  left  to  the 
negligent  administration  of  writers  of  fiction 
a  province  at  least  equally  extensive  and 
valuable. 

All  wise  statesmen  have  agreed  to  consider 
the  prosperity  or  adversity  of  nations  as  made 
up  of  the  happiness  or  misery  of  individuals, 
and  to  reject  as  chimerical  all  notions  of  a 
public  interest  of  the  community,  distinct  from 
the  interest  of  the  component  parts.  It  is  there 
fore  strange  that  those  whose  ofiiof,  it  is  to 
supply  statesmen  with  examples  and  warnings, 
should  iimit,  as  too  mean  for  the  dignity  of  his 
tory,  circumstances  which  exert  the  most  ex 
tensive  influence  on  the  state  of  society.  In 
general,  the  under  current  of  human  life  flows 
steadily  on,  unruffled  by  the  storms  which  agi 
tate  the  surface.  The  happiness  of  the  many 
commonly  depends  on  causes  independent  of 
victories  or  defeats,  of  revolutions  or  restora 
tions, — causes  which  can  be  regulated  by  no 
laws,  and  which  are  recorded  in  no  archives. 
These  causes  are  the  things  which  it  is  of 
main  importance  to  us  to  know,  not  how  the 
Lacedaemonian  phalanx  was  broken  at  Leuc- 
tra — not  whether  Alexander  died  of  poison  or 
by  disease.  History,  without  these,  is  a  shell 
without  a  kernel;  and  such  is  almost  all  the 
history  which  is  oxtant  in  the  world.  Paltry 
skirmishes  and  plots  are  reported  with  absurd 


and  useless  minutenes-*  hut  improvements 
the  most  essential  to  the  comforts  of  human 
life  extend  themselves  over  the  world,  and  in 
troduce  themselves  into  every  cottage,  before 
any  annalist  can  condescend  from  the  dignity 
of  writing  about  generals  and  ambassadors,  to 
take  the  least  notice  cf  them.  Thus  the  pro 
gress  of  the  most  salutary  inventions  and  dis 
coveries  is  buried  in  impenetrable  mystery, 
mankind  are  deprived  of  a  most  useful  species 
of  knowledge,  and  their  benefactors  of  iheir 
honest  feme.  In  the  mean  time  every  child 
knows  by  heart  the  dates  ar.d  adventures  of  a 
long  line  of  barbarian  kings.  The  history  of 
nations,  in  the  sense  in  which  I  use  the  word, 
is  often  best  studied  in  works  not  professedly 
historical.  Thucydides,  as  far  as  he  goes,  is 
an  excellent  writer,  yet  he  affords  us  far  less 
knowledge  of  the  most  important  particulars 
relating  to  Athens,  than  Plato  or  Aristophanes. 
The  little  treatise  of  Xenophon  in  Domestic 
Economy  contains  more  historical  information 
than  all  the  seven  books  of  his  Hellanics. 
The  same  may  be  said  of  the  Satires  of  Ho 
race,  of  the  Letters  of  Cicero,  of  the  novels  of 
Le  Sage,  of  the  memoirs  of  Marmontel.  Many 
others  might  be  mentioned,  but  these  sufli 
ciently  illustrate  my  meaning. 

I  would  hope  that  there  may  yet  appear  a 
writer  who  may  despise  the  present  narrow 
limits,  and  assert  the  rights  of  history  over 
every  part  of  her  natural  domain.  Should 
such  a  writer  engage  in  that  enterprise,  in 
which  I  cannot  but  consider  Mr.  Mitford  as 
having  failed,  he  will  record,  indeed,  all  that 
is  interesting  and  important  in  military  and 
political  transactions;  but  he  will  not  think 
any  thing  too  trivial  for  the  gravity  of  history, 
which  is  not  too  trivial  to  promote  or  diminish 
the  happiness  of  man.  He  will  portray  in 
vivid  colours  the  domestic  society,  the  man 
ners,  the  amusements,  the  conversation  of  the 
Greeks.  He  will  not  disdain  to  discuss  the 
state  of  agriculture,  of  the  mechanical  arts,  and 
of  the  conveniences  of  life.  The  progress  of 
painting,  of  sculpture,  and  of  architecture,  will 
form  an  important  part  of  his  plan.  But  above 
all,  his  attention  will  be  given  to  the  history  of 
that  splendid  literature  from  which  has  sprung 
all  the  strength,  the  'wisdom,  the  freedom,  and 
the  giory  of  the  western  world. 

Of  the  indifference  which  Mr.  Mitford  shows 
on  this  subject,  I  will  not  speak,  for  I  cannot 
speak  with  fairness.  It  is  a  subject  in  which 
I  love  to  forget  the  accuracy  of  a  judge,  in  ths 
veneration  of  a  worshipper  and  the  gratitude 
of  a  child.  If  we  consider  merely  the  subtlety 
of  disquisition,  the  force  of  imagination,  the 
perfect  energy  and  elegance  of  expression, 
which  characterize  the  great  works  of  Athe 
nian  genius,  we  must  pronounce  them  intrin 
sically  most  valuable;  but  what  shall  we  say 
when  we  reflect  that  from  hence  have  sprung, 
directly  or  indirectly,  all  the  noblest  creations 
of  the  human  intellect;  that  from  hence  were 
the  vast  accomplishments  and  xhe  brilliant 
fancy  of  Cicero,  the  withering  fire  of  Juvenal; 
the  plastic  imagination  of  Dante;  the  humour 
of  Cervantes;  the  comprehension  of  Bacon; 
the  wit  of  Butler;  the  supreme  and  uni versa. 


432 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


excellence  of  Shakspeare  1  All  the  triumphs 
of  truth  and  genius  over  prejudice  and  power, 
in  every  country  and  in  every  age,  have  been 
the  triumphs  of  Athens.  Wherever  a  few 
great  minds  have  made  a  stand  against  vio 
lence  and  fraud,  in  the  cause  of  liberty  and 
reason,  there  has  been  her  spirit  in  the  midst 
of  them;  inspiring,  encouraging,  consoling  ; — 
by  the  lonely  lamp  of  Erasmus  ;  by  the  restless 
bed  of  Pascal ;  in  the  tribune  of  Mirabeau  ;  in 
the  cell  of  Galileo ;  on  the  scaffold  of  Sidney. 
But  who  shall  estimate  her  influence  on  pri 
vate  happiness]  Who  shall  say  how  many 
thousands  have  been  made  wiser,  happier,  and 
better,  by  those  pursuits  in  which  she  has 
taught  mankind  to  engage;  to  how  many  the 
studies  which  took  their  rise  from  her  have 
been  wealth  in  poverty, — liberty  in  bondage, — 
health  m  sickness, — society  in  solitude.  Her 
power  is  indeed  manifested  at  the  bar ;  in  the 
senate  ;  in  the  field  of  battle  ;  in  the  schools  of 
philosophy.  But  these  are  not  her  glory. 
Wherever  literature  conso'es  sorrow,  or  as 
suages  pain, — wherever  it  brings  gladness  to 
eyes  which  fail  with  wakefulness  and  tears, 
and  ache  for  the  dark  house  and  the  long  sleep, 
— there  is  exhibited,  in  its  noblest  form,  the 
immortal  influence  of  Athens. 

The  dervise,  in  the  Arabian  tale,  did  not  he 
sitate  to  abandon  to  his  comrade  the  camels 
with  their  load  of  jewels  and  gold,  while  he  re 
tamed  the  casket  of  that  mysterious  juice, 
irhich  enabled  him  to  behold  at  one  gUnce  all 


the  hidden  riches  of  the  universe.  Surely  it  is 
no  exaggeration  to  say,  that  no  external  advan 
tage  is  to  be  compared  with  that  purification 
of  the  intellectual  eye,  which  gives  us  to  con 
template  the  infinite  wealth  of  the  mental 
world;  all  the  hoarded  treasures  of  the  pri 
meval  dynasties,  all  the  shapeless  ore  of  its 
yet  unexplored  mines.  This  is  the  gift  of 
Athens  to  man.  Her  freedom  and  her  power 
have  for  more  than  twenty  centuries  been  an 
nihilated;  her  people  have  degenerated  into 
timid  slaves;  her  language  into  a  barbarous 
jargon;  her  temples  have  been  given  up  to  the 
successive  depredations  of  Romans,Turks,  and 
Scotchmen;  but  her  intellectual  empire  is  im 
perishable.  And,  when  those  who  have  rival 
led  her  greatness  shall  have  shared  her  fate : 
when  civilization  and  knowledge  shall  have 
fixed  their  abode  in  distant  continents;  when  the 
sceptre  shall  have  passed  away  from  England ; 
when,  perhaps,  travellers  from  distant  regions 
shall  in  vain  labour  to  decipher  on  some 
mouldering  pedestal  the  name  of  our  proudest 
chief;  shall  hear  savage  hymns  chanted  to 
some  misshapen  idol  over  the  ruined  dome  of 
our  proudest  temple:  and  shall  see  a  single 
naked  fisherman  wash  his  nets  in  the  river  of 
the  ten  thousand  masts, — her  influence  and  her 
glory  will  still  survive, — fresh  in  eternal  youth, 
exempt  from  mutability  and  decay, immortal  as 
the  intellectual  principle  from  which  they  de 
rived  their  origin,  and  over  which  they  exer- 
cise  their  control 


fcND  OP  VOL. 


ATHENIAN   ORATORS- 


433 


ON  THE  ATHENIAN  OBATOKS. 


To  the  famous  orators  repair, 

Those  ancient,  whose  resistless  eloquence 

Wielded  at  will  that  fierce  democratic, 

Shook  the  arsenal,  and  thundered  over  Greece 

To  Macedon  and  Artaxerxes'  throne. 

MILTON. 


THE  celebrity  of  the  great  classical  writers 
is  confined  within  no  limits,  except  those 
which  separate  civilized  from  savage  man. 
Their  works  are  the  common  property  of  every 
polished  nation.  They  have  furnished  sub 
jects  for  the  painter,  and  models  for  the  poet. 
In  the  minds  of  the  educated  classes  through 
out  Europe,  their  names  are  indissolubly  asso 
ciated  with  the  endearing  recollections  of 
childhood, — the  old  school-room, — the  dog 
eared  grammar, — the  first  prize, — the  tears  so 
often  shed  and  so  quickly  dried.  So  great  is 
the  veneration  with  which  they  are  regarded, 
that  even  the  editors  and  commentators,  who 
perform  the  lowest  menial  offices  to  their  me 
mory,  are  considered,  like  the  equerries  and 
chamberlains  of  sovereign  princes,  as  entitled 
to  a  high  rank  in  the  table  of  literary  prece 
dence.  It  is,  therefore,  somewhat  singular  that 
their  productions  should  so  rarely  have  been 
examined  on  just  and  philosophical  principles 
of  criticism. 

The  ancient  writers  themselves  afford  us  but 
little  assistance.  When  they  particularize, 
they  are  commonly  trivial :  when  they  would 
generalize,  they  become  indistinct.  An  excep 
tion  must,  indeed,  be  made  in  favour  of  Aris 
totle.  Both  in  analysis  and  in  combination, 
that  great  man  was  without  a  rival.  No  phi 
losopher  has  ever  possessed,  in  an  equal  de 
gree,  the  talent  either  of  separating  established 
systems  into  their  primary  elements,  or  of  con 
necting  detached  phenomena  in  harmonious 
systems.  He  was  the  great  fashioner  of  the 
intellectual  chaos:  he  changed  its  darkness 
into  light,  and  its  discord  into  order.  He 
brought  to  literary  researches  the  same  vigour 
and  amplitude  of  mind,  to  which  both  physical 
and  metaphysical  science  are  so  greatly  in 
debted.  His  fundamental  principles  of  criti 
cism  are  excellent.  To  cite  only  a  single  in 
stance; — the  doctrine  which  he  established, 
that  poetry  is  an  imitative  art,  when  justly  un 
derstood  is  to  the  critic  what  the  compass  is  to 
the  navigator.  With  it  he  may  venture  upon 
the  most  extensive  excursions.  Without  it  he 
must  creep  cautiously  along  the  coast,  or  lose 
himself  in  a  trackless  expanse,  and  trust,  at 
best,  to  the  guidance  of  an  occasional  star.  It 
is  a  discovery  which  changes  a  caprice  into  a 
science. 

The  general  propositions  of  Aristotle  are 
valuable.  But  the  merit  of  the  superstructure 
bears  no  proportion  to  that  of  the  foundation. 
This  is  partly  to  be  ascribed  to  the  character 
of  the  philosopher,  who,  though  qualified  to  do 

VOL.  IV.— 55 


all  that  could  be  done  by  the  resolving  and 
combining  powers  of  the  understanding,  seems 
not  to  have  possessed  much  of  sensibility  or 
imagination.  Partly,  also,  it  may  be  attributed 
to  the  deficiency  of  materials.  The  great  works 
of  genius  which  then  existed  were  not  either 
sufficiently  numerous  or  sufficiently  varied  to  , 
enable  any  man  to  form  a  perfect  code  of  litera 
ture.  To  require  that  a  critic  should  conceive 
classes  of  composition  which  had  never  ex 
isted,  and  then  investigate  their  principles, 
would  be  as  unreasonable  as  the  demand  of 
Nebuchadnezzar,  who  expected  his  magicians 
first  to  tell  him  his  dream,  and  then  to  inter 
pret  it. 

With  all  his  deficiencies  Aristotle  was  the 
most  enlightened  and  profound  critic  of  anti 
quity.  Dionysius  was  far  from  possessing  the 
same  exquisite  subtlety,  or  the  same  vast  com 
prehension.  But  he  had  access  to  a  much 
greater  number  of  specimens,  and  he  had  de 
voted  himself,  as  it  appears,  more  exclusively 
to  the  study  of  elegant  literature.  His  parti 
cular  judgments  are  of  more  value  than  his 
general  principles.  He  is  only  the  historian 
of  literature.  Aristotle  is  its  philosopher. 

Quintilian  applied  to  general  literature  the 
same  principles  by  which  he  had  been  accus 
tomed  to  judge  of  the  declamations  of  his  pu 
pils.  He  looks  for  nothing  but  rhetoric,  and 
rhetoric  not  of  the  highest  order.  He  speaks 
coldly  of  the  incomparable  works  of  JEschylus. 
He  admires,  beyond  expression,  those  inex 
haustible  mines  of  commonplaces,  the  plays  of 
Euripides.  He  bestows  a  few  vague  words  on, 
the  poetical  character  of  Homer.  He  then 
proceeds  to  consider  him  merely  as  an  ora 
tor.  An  orator  Homer  doubtless  was,  and  a 
great  orator.  But  surely  nothing  is  more  re 
markable,  in  his  admirable  works,  than  an  art 
with  which  his  oratorical  powers  are  made 
subservient  to  the  purposes  of  poetry.  Nor 
can  I  think  Quintilian  a  great  crilic  in  his  own 
province.  Just  as  are  many  of  his  remarks, 
beautiful  as  are  many  of  his  illustrations,  we 
can  perpetually  detect  in  his  thoughts  that 
flavour  which  the  soil  of  despotism  generally 
communicates  to  all  the  fruits  of  genius.  Elo 
quence  was,  in  his  time,  liitle  more  than  a. 
condiment  which  served  to  stimulate  in  a  des 
pot  the  jaded  appetite  for  panegyric,  an  arnuso 
ment  for  the  travelled  nobles  and  the  olue 
stocking  matrons  of  Rome.  It  is,  therefore, 
with  him,  rather  a  sport  than  a  war:  it  is  a 
contest  of  foils,  not  of  swords.  He  appears  u* 
I  think  more  of  the  grace  of  the  attitude  'han  of 
20 


434 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  direction  and  vigour  of  the  thrust.  It  must 
be  acknowledged,  in  justice  to  Quintilian,  that 
this  is  an  error  to  which  Cicero  has  too  often 
given  the  sanction,  both  of  his  precept  and  his 
example. 

Longinus  seems  to  have  had  great  sensibi 
lity  but  little  discrimination.  He  gives  us  elo 
quent  sentences,  but  no  principles.  It  was 
happily  said  that  Montesquieu  ought  to  have 
changed  the  name  of  his  book  from  L'esprit  des 
Lois  to  L'  esprit  sur  les  Lois.  In  the  same  man 
ner  the  philosopher  of  Palmyra  ought  to  have 
entitled  his  famous  work,  not  "Longinus  on 
the  Sublime,"  but  "The  Sublimities  of  Longi 
nus."  The  origin  of  the  sublime  is  one  of  the 
most  curious  and  interesting  subjects  of  in 
quiry  that  can  occupy  the  attention  of  a  critic. 
In  our  own  country  it  has  been  discussed  with 
great  ability,  and,  I  think,  with  very  little  suc 
cess,  by  Burke  and  Dugald  Stewart.  Longinus 
dispenses  himself  from  all  investigations  of 
this  nature,  by  telling  his  friend  Terentianus 
that  he  already  knows  every  thing  that  can  be 
said  upon  the  question.  It  is  to  be  regretted 
that  Terentianus  did  not  impart  some  of  his 
knowledge  to  his  instructor,  for  from  Longi 
nus  we  learn  only  that  sublimity  means  height 
—  or  elevation.*  This  name,  so  commodiously 
vague,  is  applied  indifferently  to  the  noble 
prayer  of  Ajax  in  the  Iliad,  and  to  a  passage 
of  Plato  about  the  human  body,  as  full  of  con 
ceits  as  an  ode  of  Cowley.  Having  no  fixed 
standard,  Longinus  is  right  only  by  accident. 
He  is  rather  a  fancier  than  a  critic. 

Modern  writers  have  been  prevented  by  many 
causes  from  supplying  the  deficiencies  of  thei'r 
classical  predecessors.  At  the  time  of  the  re 
vival  of  literature  no  man  could,  without  great 
and  painful  labour,  acquire  an  accurate  and 
elegant  knowledge  of  the  ancient  languages. 
And,  unfortunately,  those  grammatical  and 
philological  studies,  without  which  it  was  im 
possible  to  understand  the  great  works  of 
Athenian  and  Roman  genius,  have  a  tendency 
to  contract  the  views  and  deaden  the  sensibili 
ty  of  those  who  follow  them  with  extreme  as 
siduity.  A  powerful  mind  which  has  been  long 
employed  in  such  studies,  may  be  compared 
to  the  gigantic  spirit  in  the  Arabian  tale,  -who 
was  persuaded  to  contract  himself  to  small 
dimensions  in  order  to  enter  within  the  en 
chanted  vessel,  and,  when  his  prison  had  been 
closed  upon  him,  found  himself  unable  to  es 
cape  from  the  narrow  boundaries  to  the  mea 
sure  of  which  he  had  reduced  his  stature. 
When  the  means  have  long  been  the  objects 
of  application,  they  are  naturally  substituted 
for  the  end.  It  was  said  by  Eugene  of  Savoy, 
that  the  greatest  generals  have  commonly  been 
those  who  have  been  at  once  raised  to  com 
mand,  and  introduced  to  the  great  operations 
of  war  without  being  employed  in  the  petty 
calculations  and  mancsuvres  which  employ  the 
time  of  an  inferior  officer.  In  literature  the 
principle  is  equally  sound.  The  great  tactics 
of  criticism  will,  in  general,  be  best  understood 
hy  those  who  have  not  had  much  practice  in 
drilling  syllables  and  particles. 

I  remember  to  have  observed  among  the 


*  'A.Kpori]f  KCLI 


rig  \oywv  sort  ra 


French  Anas  a  ludicrous  instance  of  this.  A 
scholar,  doubtless  of  great  learning,  recom 
mends  the  study  of  some  long  Latin  treatise, 
of  which  I  now'f'rget  the  name,  on  the  reli 
gion,  manners,  government,  and  language  of 
the  early  Greeks.  "For  there,"  savs  he,  "you 
will  learn  every  thing  of  importance  that  is 
contained  in  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey,  without  the 
trouble  of  reading  two  such  tedious  books.'* 
Alas !  it  had  not  occurred  to  the  poor  gentle 
man  that  all  the  knowledge  to  which  he  had 
attached  so  much  value  was  useful  only  as  it 
illustrated  the  great  poems  which  he  despised, 
and  would  be  as  worthless  for  any  other  pur 
pose  as  the  mythology  of  Caffraria  or  the  vo 
cabulary  of  Otaheite. 

Of  those  scholars  who  have  disdained  tc 
confine  themselves  to  verbal  criticism,  few 
have  been  successful.  The  ancient  languages 
have,  generally,  a  magical  influence  on  their 
faculties.  They  were  "fools  called  into  a  cir 
cle  by  Greek  invocations."  The  Iliad  and 
^Eneid  were  to  them  not  books,  but  curiosities, 
or  rather  relics.  They  no  more  admired  those 
works  for  their  merits,  than  a  good  Catholic 
venerates  the  house  of  the  Virgin  at  Loretto 
for  its  architecture.  Whatever  was  classical 
was  good.  Homer  was  a  great  poet,  and  so  was 
Callimachus.  The  epistles  of  Cicero  were  fine, 
and  so  were  those  of  Phalaris.  Even  with  re 
spect  to  questions  of  evidence,  they  fell  into  the 
same  error.  The  authority  of  all  narrations, 
written  in  Greek  or  Latin,  was  the  same  with 
them.  It  never  crossed  their  minds  that  the 
lapse  of  five  hundred  years,  or  the  distance  of 
five  hundred  leagues,  could  affect  the  accuracy 
of  a  narration, — that  Livy  could  be  a  less  vera 
cious  historian  than  Poly bi us, — or  that  Plu 
tarch  could  know  less  about  the  friends  of  Xe- 
nophon  than  Xenophon  himself.  Deceived  by 
the  distance  of  time,  they  seem  to  consider  all 
the  classics  as  contemporaries;  just  as  I  have 
known  people  in  England,  deceived  by  the  dis 
tance  of  place,  take  it  for  granted  that  all  per 
sons  who  live  in  India  are  neighbours,  and  ask 
an  inhabitant  of  Bombay  about  the  health  of  an 
acquaintance  at  Calcutta.  It  is  to  be  hoped 
that  no  barbarian  deluge  will  ever  again  pass 
over  Europe.  But  should  such  a  calamity  hap 
pen,  it  seems  not  improbable  that  some  future 
Rollin  or  Gillies  will  compile  a  history  of  Eng 
land  from  Miss  Porter's  Scottish  Chiefs,  Miss 
Lee's  Recess,  and  Sir  Nathaniel  Wraxall's  Me 
moirs. 

It  is  surely  time  that  ancient  literature 
should  be  examined  in  a  different  manner, 
without  pedantical  prepossessions,  but  with  a 
just  allowance,  at  the  same  time,  for  the  differ 
ence  of  circumstances  and  manners.  I  am  far 
from  pretending  to  the  knowledge  or  ability 
which  such  a  task  would  require.  All  that  I 
mean  to  offer  is  a  collection  of  desultory  re 
marks  upon  a  most  interesting  portion  of  Greek 
literature. 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  any  compositions 
which  have  ever  been  produced  in  the  world 
are  equally  perfect  in  their  kind  with  the  great 
Athenian  orations.  Genius  is  subject  to  the 
same  laws  which  regulate  the  production  of 
cotton  and  molasses.  The  supply  adjusts  itself 
to  the  demand.  The  Quantity  may  be  dimi 


ATHENIAN  ORATORS. 


435 


nished  by  restrictions  and  multiplied  by  boun 
ties.  The  singular  excellence  to  which  elo 
quence  attained  at  Athens  is  to  be  mainly  at 
tributed  to  the  influence  which  it  exerted  there. 
In  turbulent  times,  under  a  constitution  purely 
democratic,  among  a  people  educated  exactly 
to  that  point  at  which  men  are  most  suscepti 
ble  of  strong  and  sudden  impressions,  acute, 
but  not  sound  reasoners,  warm  in  their  feel 
ings,  unfixed  in  their  principles,  and  passionate 
admirers  of  fine  composition,  oratory  received 
such  encouragement  as  it  has  never  since  ob 
tained. 

The  taste  and  knowledge  of  the  Athenian 
people  was  a  favourite  object  of  the  contemptu 
ous  derision  of  Samuel  Johnson;  a  man  who 
knew  nothing  of  Greek  literature  beyond  the 
common  school-books,  and  who  seems  to  have 
brought  to  what  he  had  read  scarcely  more 
than  the  discernment  of  a  common  schoolboy. 
He  used  to  assert,  with  that  arrogant  absurdity 
which,  in  spite  of  his  great  abilities  and  vir 
tues,  renders  him  perhaps  the  most  ridiculous 
character  in  literary  history,  that  Demosthenes 
spoke  to  a  people  of  brutes, — to  a  barbarous 
people, — that  there  could  have  been  no  civi 
lization  before  the  invention  of  printing.  John 
son  was  a  keen  but  a  very  narrow-minded  ob 
server  of  mankind.  He  perpetually  confound 
ed  their  general  nature  with  their  particular 
circumstances.  He  knew  London  intimately. 
The  sagacity  of  his  remarks  on  its  society  is 
perfectly  astonishing.  But  Fleet  Street  was 
the  world  to  him.  He  saw  that  Londoners  who 
did  not  read  were  profoundly  ignorant,  and  he 
inferred  that  a  Greek  who  had  few  or  no  books 
must  have  been  as  uninformed  as  one  of  Mr. 
Th  rale's  draymen. 

There  seems  to  be,  on  the  contrary,  every 
reason  to  believe  that  in  general  intelligence 
the  Athenian  populace  far  surpassed  the  lower 
orders  of  any  commnnity  that  has  ever  existed. 
It  must  be  considered  that  to  be  a  citizen  was 
to  be  a  legislator — a  soldier — a  judge — one  up 
on  whose  voice  might  depend  the  fate  of  the 
wealthiest  tributary  state,  of  the  most  eminent 
public  man.  The  lowest  offices,  both  of  agri 
culture  and  of  trade,  were  in  common  per 
formed  by  slaves.  The  commonwealth  sup 
plied  its  meanest  members  with  the  support 
of  life,  the  opportunity  of  leisure,  and  the 
means  of  amusement.  Books  were,  indeed, 
few,  but  they  were  excellent,  and  they  were 
accurately  known.  It  is  not  by  turning  over 
libraries,  but  by  repeatedly  perusing  and  in- 
'tently  contemplating  a  few  great  models,  that 
the  mind  is  best  disciplined.  A  man  of  letters 
must  now  read  much  that  he  soon  forgets,  and 
much  trom  which  he  learns  nothing  worthy  to 
be  remembered.  The  best  works  employ,  in 
general,  but  a  small  portion  of  his  time.  De 
mosthenes  is  said  to  have  transcribed,  six 
times,  the  History  of  Thucydides.  If  he  had 
been  a  young  politician  of  the  present  age,  he 
might  in  the  same  space  of  time  have  skimmed 
innumerable  newspapers  and  pamphlets.  I  do 
not  condemn  that  desultory  mode  of  study 
which  the  state  of  things  in  our  day  renders  a 
matter  of  necessity.  But  I  may  be  allowed  to 
doubt  whether  the  changes  on  which  the  ad 
mirers  of  modern  institutions  delight  to  dwell 


have  improved  our  condition  as  much  in  reality 
as  in  appearance.  Rumford,  it  is  said,  pro 
posed  to  the  Elector  of  Bavaria  a  scheme  for 
feeding  his  soldiers  at  a  much  cheaper  rate 
than  formerly.  His  plan  was  simply  to  com 
pel  them  to  masticate  their  food  thoroughly. 
A  small  quantity  thus  eaten  would,  according 
to  that  famous  projector,  afford  more  suste 
nance  than  a  large  meal  hastily  devoured.  I 
do  not  know  how  Rumford's  proposition  was 
received ;  but  to  the  mind,  I  believe,  it  will  be 
found  more  nutritious  to  digest  a  page  than  to 
devour  a  volume. 

Books,  however,  were  the  least  part  of  the 
education  of  an  Athenian  citizen.  Let  us,  for 
a  moment,  transport  ourselves,  in  thought,  to 
that  glorious  city.  Let  us  imagine  that  we  are 
entering  its  gates,  in  the  time  of  its  power  and 
glory.  A  crowd  is  assembled  round  a  portico. 
All  are  gazing  with  delight  at  the  entablature, 
for  Phidias  is  putting  up  the  frieze.  We  turn 
into  another  street;  a  rhapsodist  is  reciting 
there;  men,  women,  children,  are  thronging 
round  him;  the  tears  are  running  down  their 
cheeks  ;  their  eyes  are  fixed  ;  their  very  breath 
is  still;  for  he  is  telling  how  Priam  fell  at  the 
feet  of  Achilles,  and  kissed  those  hands, — the 
terrible, — the  murderous, — vrhich  had  slain  so 
many  of  his  sons.*  We  enter  the  public 
place  ;  there  is  a  ring  of  youths,  all  leaning  for 
ward,  with  sparkling  eyes,  and  gestures  of  ex 
pectation.  Socrates  is  pitted  against  the  fa 
mous  Atheist,  from  Ionia,  and  has  just  brought 
him  to  a  contradiction  in  terms.  But  we  are 
interrupted.  The  herald  is  crying — "  Room 
for  the  Prytanes."  The  general  assembly  i^ 
to  meet.  The  people  are  swarming  in  on  every 
side.  Proclamation  is  made — "Who  wishes  to 
speak."  There  is  a  shout,  and  a  clapping  of 
hands:  Pericles  is  mounting  the  stand.  Then 
for  a  play  of  Sophocles  ;  and  away  to  sup  with 
Aspasia.  I  know  of  no  modern  university  which 
has  so  excellent  a  system  of  education. 

Knowledge  thus  acquired,  and  opinions  thus 
formed,  were,  indeed,  likely  to  be,  in  some  re 
spects,  defective.  Propositions,  which  are 
advanced  in  discourse,  generally  result  from  a 
partial  view  of  the  question,  and  cannot  be 
kept  under  examination  long  enough  to  be 
corrected.  Men  of  great  conversational  pow 
ers  almost  universally  practise  a  sort  of  lively 
sophistry  and  exaggeration,  which  deceives, 
for  the  moment,  both  themselves  and  their 
auditors.  Thus  we  see  doctrines,  which  can 
not  bear  a  close  inspection,  triumph  perpe 
tually  in  drawing-rooms,  in  debating  socie 
ties,  and  even  in  legislative  or  judicial  assem 
blies.  To  the  conversational  education  of  the 
Athenians,  I  am  inclined  to  attribute  the  great 
looseness  of  reasoning,  which  is  remarkable  in 
most  of  their  scientific  writings.  Even  the 
most  illogical  of  modern  writers  would  stand 
perfectly  aghast  at  the  puerile  fallacies  which 
seem  to  have  deluded  some  of  the  greatest  men 
of  antiquity.  Sir  Thomas  Lethbridge  would 
stare  at  the  political  economy  of  Xenophoii 
and  the  author  of  Soirees  de  Petersbourg  would 
be  ashamed  of  some  of  the  metaphysical  argu- 


*  KOI  KVfft  x««p<if, 
Setvas,  avtpoQovovs,  ai  01  Trr\taf  uravov  via; 


436 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ments  of  Plato.  But  the  very  circumstances 
which  retarded  the  growth  of  science,  were 
peculiarly  favourable  to  the  cultivation  of  elo 
quence.  From  the  early  habit  of  taking  a  share 
in  animated  discussion,  the  intelligent  student 
would  derive  that  readiness  of  resource,  that 
copiousness  of  language,  and  that  knowledge 
of  the  temper  and  understanding  of  an  audi 
ence,  which  are  far  more  valuable  to  an  orator 
than  the  greatest  logical  powers. 

Horace  has  prettily  compared  poems  to  those 
paintings  of  which  the  effect  varies  as  the 
spectator  changes  his  stand.  The  same  re 
mark  applies  with  at  least  equal  justice  to 
speeches.  They  must  be  read  with  the  temper 
of  those  to  whom  they  were  addressed,  or  they 
must  necessarily  appear  to  offend  against  the 
laws  of  taste  and  reason;  as  the  finest  picture, 
seen  in  a  light  different  from  that  for  which  it 
was  designed,  will  appear  fit  only  for  a  sign. 
This  is  perpetually  forgotten  by  those  who 
criticise  oratory.  Because  they  are  reading  at 
leisure,  pausing  at  every  line,  reconsidering 
every  argument,  they  forget  that  the  hearers 
were  hurried  from  point  to  point  too  rapidly  to 
detect  the  fallacies  through  which  they  were 
conducted;  that  they  had  no  time  to  disentan 
gle  sophisms,  or  to  notice  slight  inaccuracies 
of  expression  ;  that  elaborate  excellence,  either 
of  reasoning  or  of  language,  would  have  been 
absolutely  thrown  away.  To  recur  to  the  ana 
logy  of  the  sister  art,  these  connoisseurs  ex 
amine  a  panorama  through  a  microscope,  and 
quarrel  with  a  scene-painter  because  he  does 
not  give  to  his  work  the  exquisite  finish  of 
Gerard  Dow. 

Oratory  is  to  be  estimated  on  principles  dif 
ferent  from  those  which  are  applied  to  other 
productions.  Truth  is  the  object  of  philosophy 
and  history.  Truth  is  the  object  even  of  those 
works  which  are  peculiarly  called  works  of 
fiction,  but  which,  in  fact,  bear  the  same  rela 
tion  to  history  which  algebra  bears  to  arith 
metic.  The  merit  of  poetry,  in  its  wildest 
forms,  still  consists  in  its  truth, — truth  con- 
reyed  to  the  understanding,  not  directly  by  the 
words,  but  circuilously  by  means  of  imagina 
tive  associations,  which  serve  as  its  con 
ductors.  The  object  of  oratory  alone  is  not 
truth,  but  persuasion.  The  admiration  of  the 
multitude  does  not  make  Moore  a  greater  poet 
than  Coleridge,  or  Beattie  a  greater  philoso 
pher  than  Berkeley.  But  the  criterion  of  elo 
quence  is  different.  A  speaker,  who  exhausts 
the  whole  philosophy  of  a  question,  who  dis 
plays  every  grace  of  style,  yet  produces  no 
effect  on  his  audience,  may  be  a  great  essayist, 
a  great  statesman,  a  great  master  of  composi 
tion,  but  he  is  not  an  orator.  If  he  miss  the 
mark,  it  makes  no  difference  whether  he  have 
taken  aim  too  high  or  too  low. 

The  effect  of  the  great  freedom  of  the  press 
in  England  has  been,  in  a  great  measure,  to 
destroy  this  distinction,  and  to  leave  among  us 
little  of  what  I  call  Oratory  Proper.  Our  le 
gislators,  our  cand-idates,  on  great  occasions 
even  our  advocates,  address  themselves  less 
to  the  audience  than  to  the  reporters.  They 
think  less  of  the  few  hearers  than  of  the  innu 
merable  readers.  At  Athens,  the  case  was 
different  •  there  the  only  object  of  the  speaker 


was  immediate  convictien  and  persuasion, 
He,  therefore,  who  would  justly  appreciate  the 
merit  of  the  Grecian  orators,  should  place  him 
self,  as  nearly  as  possible,  in  the  situation  of 
their  auditors  :  he  should  divest  himself  of  his 
modern  feelings  and  acquirements,  and  make 
the  prejudices  and  interests  of  the  Atheniaa 
citizens  his  own.  He  who  studies  their  works 
in  this  spirit  will  find  that  many  of  those  things 
which,  to  an  English  reader,  appear  to  be 
blemishes, — the  frequent  violation  of  these 
excellent  rules  of  evidence,  by  which  our 
courts  of  law  are  regulated, — the  introduction, 
of  extraneous  matter, — the  reference  to  con 
siderations  of  political  expediency  in  judicial 
investigations, — the  assertions,  without  proof, 
— the  passionate  entreaties, — the  furious  in 
vectives, — are  really  proofs  of  the  prudence 
and  address  of  the  speakers.  He  must  not 
dwell  maliciously  on  arguments  or  phrases, 
but  acquiesce  in  his  first  impressions.  It  re 
quires  repeated  perusal  and  reflection  to  de 
cide  rightly  on  any  other  portion  of  literature. 
But  with  respect  to  works  of  which  the  merit 
depends  on  their  instantaneous  effect,  the  most 
hasty  judgment  is  likely  to  be  best. 

The  history  of  eloquence  at  Athens  is  re 
markable.  From  a  very  early  period  great 
speakers  had  nourished  there.  Pisistratus  and 
Themistocles  are  said  to  have  owed  much  of 
their  influence  to  their  talents  for  debate.  \V> 
learn,  with  more  certainty,  that  Pericles  ^ja* 
distinguished  by  extraordinary  oratorical  pow 
ers.  The  substance  of  some  of  his  speeches  i. 
transmitted  to  us  by  Thucydides,  and  that  ex 
cellent  writer  has  doubtless  faithfully  reported 
the  general  line  of  his  arguments.  But  the 
manner,  which  in  oratory  is  of  at  least  at 
much  consequence  as  the  matter,  was  of  no 
importance  to  his  narration.  It  is  evident  thai 
he  has  not  attempted  to  preserve  it.  Through 
out  his  work,  every  speech  on  every  subject, 
whatever  may  have  been  the  character  or  the 
dialect  of  the  speaker,  is  in  exactly  the  same 
form.  The  grave  King  of  Sparta,  the  furious 
demagogue  of  Athens,  the  general  encouraging 
his  army,  the  captive  supplicating  for  his  life, 
all  are  represented  as  speakers  in  one  unvaried 
style, — a  style  moreover  wholly  unfit  for  ora 
torical  purposes.  His  mode  of  reasoning  is 
singularly  elliptical, — in  reality  most  consecu 
tive,  yet  in  appearance  often  incoherent.  His 
meaning,  in  itself  is  sufficiently  perplexing,  is 
compressed  into  the  fewest  possible  words. 
His  great  fondness  for  antithetical  expression 
has  not  a  little  conduced  to  this  effect.  Every 
one  must  have  observed  how  much  more  the 
sense  is  condensed  in  the  verses  of  Pope  and 
his  imitators,  who  never  ventured  to  continue 
the  same  clause  from  couplet  to  couplet,  than 
in  those  of  poets  who  allow  themselves  that 
license.  Every  artificial  division,  which  is 
strongly  marked,  and  which  frequently  recurs, 
has  the  same  tendency.  The  natural  and  per 
spicuous  expression  which  spontaneously  rises 
to  the  mind,  will  often  refuse  to  accommodate 
itself  to  such  a  form.  It  is  necessary  either  to 
expand  it  into  weakness,  or  to  compress  it  into 
almost  impenetrable  density.  The  latter  is 
generally  the  choice  of  an  able  man,  and  wa» 
assuredly  the  choice  of  Thucydides. 


ATHENIAN   ORATORS. 


437 


I'  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say  that  such 
speeches  could  never  have  been  delivered. 
They  are  perhaps  among  the  most  difficult  pas 
sages  in  the  Greek  language,  and  would  pro 
bably  have  been  scarcely  more  intelligible  to 
an  Athenian  auditor  than  to  a  modern  reader. 
Their  obscurity  was  acknowledged  by  Cicero, 
who  was  as  intimate  with  the  literature  and 
language  of  Greece  as  the  most  accomplished 
of  its  natives,  and  who  seems  to  have  held  a 
respectable  rank  among  the  Greek  authors. 
The  difficulty  to  a  modern  reader  lies,  not  in 
the  words,  but  in  the  reasoning.  A  dictionary 
is  of  far  less  use  in  studying  them,  than  a  clear 
head  and  a  close  attention  to  the  context.  They 
are  valuable* to  the  scholar,  as  displaying,  be 
yond  almost  any  other  compositions,  the  powers 
of  the  finest  languages : — they  are  valuable  to 
the  philosopher,  as  illustrating  the  morals  and 
manners  of  a  most  interesting  age  ; — they 
abound  in  just  thought  and  energetic  expres 
sion.  But  they  do  not  enable  us  to  form  any 
accurate  opinion  on.  the  merits  of  the  early 
Greek  orators. 

Though  it  cannot  be  doubted,  that,  before  the 
Persian  wars,  Athens  had  produced  eminent 
speakers,  yet  the  period  during  which  elo 
quence  most  flourished  among  her  citizens  was 
by  no  means  that  of  her  greatest  power  and 
glory.  It  commenced  at  the  close  of  the  Pelo- 
ponnesian  war.  In  fact,  the  steps  by  which 
Athenian  oratory  approached  to  its  finished 
excellence,  seem  to  have  been  almost  contem 
poraneous  with  those  by  which  the  Athenian 
character  and  the  Athenian  empire  sunk  to  de 
gradation.  At  the  time  when  the  little  com 
monwealth  achieved  those  victories  which 
twenty-five  eventual  centuries  have  left  un 
equalled,  eloquence  was  in  its  infancy.  The 
deliverers  of  Greece  became  its  plunderers  and 
oppressors.  Unmeasured  exaction,  atrocious 
vengeance,  the  madness  of  the  multitude,  the 
tyranny  of  the  great,  filled  the  Cyclades  with 
tears,  and  blood,  and  mourning.  The  sword 
unpeopled  whole  islands  in  a  day.  The  plough 
passed  over  the  ruins  of  famous  cities.  The 
imperial  republic  sent  forth  her  children  by 
thousands  to  pine  in  the  quarries  of  Syracuse, 
or  to  feed  the  vultures  of  JGgospotami.  She 
was  at  length  reduced  by  famine  and  slaughter 
to  humble  herself  before  her  enemies,  and  to 
purchase  existence  by  the  sacrifice  of  her  em 
pire  and  her  laws.  During  these  disastrous 
and  gloomy  years,  oratory  was  advancing 
towards  its  highest  excellence.  And  it  was 
when  the  moral,  the  political,  the  military  cha 
racter  of  the  people  was  most  utterly  degraded; 
it  was  when  the  viceroy  of  a  Macedonian  so 
vereign  gave  law  to  Greece,  that  the  courts  of 
Athens  witnessed  the  most  splendid  contest  of 
eloquence  that  the  world  has  ever  known. 

The  causes  of  this  phenomenon  it  is  not,  I 
think,  difficult  to  assign.  The  division  of  la 
bour  operates  on  the  productions  of  the  orator 
as  it  does  on  those  of  the  mechanic.  It  wa.. 
remarked  by  the  ancients,  that  the  Pentathlete, 
who  divided  his  attention  between  several  exer 
cises,  though  he  could  not  vie  with  a  boxer  in 
the  use  of  a  cestus,  or  with  one  who  had  con 
fined  his  attention  to  running  in  the  contest  of 


the  stadium,  yet  enjoyed  far  greater  genera, 
vigour  and  health  than  either.  It  is  the  same 
with  the  mind.  The  superiority  in  technical 
skill  is  often  more  than  compensated  by  the 
nferiority  in  general  intelligence.  And  this  is 
peculiarly  the  case  in  politics.  States  have 
always  been  best  governed  by  men  who  have 
taken  a  wide  view  of  public  affairs,  and  who 
have  rather  a  general  acquaintance  with  many 
sciences  than  a  perfect  mastery  of  one.  The 
union  of  the  political  and  military  departments 
in  Greece  contributed  not  a  little  to  the  splen 
dour  of  its  early  history.  After  their  separa 
tion  more  skilful  generals  and  greater  speakers 
appeared; — but  the  breed  of  statesmen  dwindled 
and  became  almost  extinct.  Themistocles  or 
Pericles  would  have  been  no  match  for  De 
mosthenes  in  the  assembly,  or  Iphicrates  in  the 
field.  But  surely  they  were  incomparably 
better  fitted  than  either  for  the  supreme  direc 
tion  of  affairs. 

There  is  indeed  a  remarkable  coincidence 
between  the  progress  of  the  art  of  war,  and 
that  of  the  art  of  oratory,  among  the  Greeks. 
They  both  advanced  to  perfection  by  contem 
poraneous  steps,  and  from  similar  causes.  The 
early  speakers,like  the  early  warriors  of  Greece, 
were  merely  a  militia.  It  was  found,  that  in 
both  employments,practice  and  discipline  gave 
superiority.*  Each  pursuit,  therefore,  became 
first  an  art,  and  then  a  trade.  In  proportion  as 
the  professors  of  each  became  more  expert  in 
their  particular  craft,  they  became  less  respect 
able  in  their  general  character.  Their  skill 
had  been  obtained  at  too  great  expense  to  be 
employed  only  from  disinterested  views.  Thus, 
the  soldiers  forgot  that  they  were  citizens,  and 
the  orators  that  they  were  statesmen.  I  know 
not  to  what  Demosthenes  and  his  famous  con 
temporaries  can  be  so  justly  compared  as  to 
those  mercenary  troops,  who,  in  their  time, 
overran  Greece;  or  those  who,  from  similar 
causes,  were  some  centuries  ago  the  scourge 
of  the  Italian  republics, — perfectly  acquainted 
with  every  part  of  their  profession,  irresistible 
in  the  field,  powerful  to  defend  or  to  destroy, 
but  defending  without  love,  and  destroying 
without  hatred.  We  may  despist  *he  charac- 


*  It  has  often  occurred  to  me,  that  to  the  circum 
stances  mentioned  in  the  text,  is  to  he  referred  one  of 
the  most  remarkahle  events  in  Grecian  history.  I  mean 
the  silent  hut  rapid  downfall  of  the  Lacedaemonian 
power.  Bonn  after  the  termination  of  the  Peloponnesian 
war,  the  strength  of  Lacedsemon  began  to  decline.  Ill 
military  discipline,  its  social  institutions  were  the  same. 
Agesilaus,  during  whose  reign  the  change  took  place, 
w;is  the  ablest  of  its  kings.  Yet  the  Spartan  armies 
|  were  frequently  defeated  in  pitched  battles,  -an  oc 
currence  considered  impossible  in  the  earlier  ages  of 
Greece.  They  are  allowed  to  have  fought  most  bravely, 
yet  they  were  no  longer  attended  by  the  success  to  which 
they  had  formerly  been  accustomed.  IS'o  solution  of 
these  circumstances  is  offered,  as  far  as  I  know,  by  any 
ancient  author.  The  real  cause,  1  conceive,  was  this. 
The  Lacedaemonians,  alone  among  the  Greeks,  formed 
a  permanent  standing  army.  While  the  citizens  of  other 
commonwealths  were  engaged  in  agriculture  and  trade, 
they  had  no  employment  whatever  but  the  study  of 
military  discipline  Hence,  during  the  Persian  and  Pe- 
loponit£sian  wars,  they  had  that  advantage  over  their 
neighbours  which  regular  troops  always  possess  over 
militia.  This  advantage  they  lost  when  other  ptatei 
began,  at  a  later  period,  to  employ  mercenary  force*, 
who  were  probably  as  superior  lo  them  in  the  art  of  wax 
as  they  had  hitherto  been  to  their  antagonists. 


438 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ters  of  these  political  Condottieri,  but  it  is  im 
possible  to  examine  the  system  of  their  tactics 
without  being  amazed  at  its  perfection. 

I  had  intended  to  proceed  to  this  examination, 
and  to  consider  separately  the  remains  of  Ly- 
sias,  of  JEschines,  of  Demosthenes,  and  of  Iso- 
crates,  who  though,  strictly  speaking,  he  was 
rather  a  pamphleteer  than  an  orator,  deserves, 
on  many  accounts,  a  place  in  such  a  disquisi 
tion.  The  length  of  my  prolegomena  and  di 
gressions  compels  me  to  postpone  this  part  of 
the  subject  to  another  occasion.  A  magazine 
is  certainl}  a  delightful  invention  for  a  very 
idle  or  a  very  busy  man.  He  is  not  compelled 
to  complete  his  plan  or  to  adhere  to  his  subject. 


He  may  ramble  as  far  as  he  is  inclined,  and 
stop  as  soon  as  he  is  tired.  No  one  takes  the 
trouble  to  recollect  his  contradictory  opinions 
or  his  unredeemed  pledges.  He  may  be  as 
superficial,  as  inconsistent,  and  as  careless  as 
he  chooses.  Magazines  resemble  those  little 
angels,  who,  according  to  the  pretty  Rabinical 
tradition,  are  generated  every  morning  by  the 
brook  which  rolls  over  the  flowers  of  Paradise, 
— whose  life  is  a  song, — who  warble  till  sunset, 
and  then  sink  back  without  regret  into  nothing 
ness.  Such  spirits  have  nothing  to  do  with  the 
delecting  spear  of  Ithuriel  or  the  victorious 
sword  of  Michael.  It  is  enough  for  them  to 
please  and  be  forgotten. 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE  RESTORATION.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  JANUARY,  1841.] 


WE  have  a  kindness  for  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt. 
We  form  our  judgment  of  him,  indeed,  only 
from  events  of  universal  notoriety — from  his 
own  works,  and  from  the  works  of  other  wri 
ters,  who  have  generally  abused  him  in  the 
most  rancorous  manner.  But,  unless  we  are 
greatly  mistaken,  he  is  a  very  clever,  a  very 
honest,  and  a  very  good-natured  man.  We 
can  clearly  discern,  together  with  many  merits, 
many  serious  faults,  both  in  his  writings  and 
in  his  conduct.  But  we  really  think  that  there 
is  hardly  a  man  living  whose  merits  have 
been  so  grudgingly  allowed,  and  whose  faults 
have  been  so  cruelly  expiated. 

In  some  respects,  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt  is  excel 
lently  qualified  for  the  task  which  he  has  now 
undertaken.  His  style,  in  spite  of  its  manner 
ism — nay,  partly  by  reason  of  its  mannerism 
— is  well  suited  for  light,  garrulous,  desultory 
ana,  half  critical,  half  biographical.  We  do 
not  always  agree  with  his  literary  judgments; 
but  we  find  in  him  what  is  very  rare  in  our 
time — the  power  of  justly  appreciating  and 
heartily  enjoying  good  things  of  very  different 
kinds.  He  can  adore  Shakspeare  and  Spenser 
without  denying  poetical  genius  to  the  author 
of  "Alexander's  Feast;"  or  fine  observation, 
rich  fancy,  and  exquisite  humour  to  him  who 
imagined  "  Will  Honeycomb"  and  "Sir  Roger 
de  Coverley."  He  has  paid  particular  atten 
tion  to  the  history  of  the  English  drama,  from 
the  age  of  Elizabeth  down  to  our  own  time, 
and  has  every  right  to  be  heard  with  respect 
on  that  subject. 

The  plays  to  which  he  now  acts  as  intro 
ducer  are,  with  few  exceptions,  such  as,  in  the 
opinion  of  many  very  respectable  people, 
ought  not  tc  be  reprinted.  In  this  opinion  we 
can  i>y  no  means  concur.  We  cannot  wish 
that  aii/  work  or  class  of  worlrs  which  has  ex 
ercised  a  great  influence  on  the  human  mind, 


*  Tne  Dramatic  Wnrks  of  WYCHERLFY,  CONGREVE, 
VANRIUOH,  and  F*RQUHAR.  With  Biographical  and 
Critical  Notices.  By  LEIGH  HUNT.  8vo.  London.  1840. 


and  which  illustrates  the  character  of  an  im 
portant  epoch  in  letters,  politics,  and  morals, 
should  disappear  from  the  world.  If  we  err  in 
this  matter,  we  err  with  the  gravest  men  and 
bodies  of  men  in  the  empire,  and  especially 
with  the  Church  of  England,  and  with  the 
great  schools  of  learning  which  are  connected 
with  her.  The  whole  liberal  education  of  our 
countrymen  is  conducted  on  the  principle,  that 
no  book  which  is  valuable,  either  by  reason  of 
the  excellence  of  its  style,  or  by  reason  of  the 
light  which  it  throws  on  the  history,  polity, 
and  manners  of  nations,  should  be  withheld 
from  the  student  on  account  of  its  impurity. 
The  Athenian  Comedies,  in  which  there  are 
scarcely  a  hundred  lines  together  without 
some  passage  of  which  Rochester  would  have 
been  ashamed,  have  been  reprinted  at  the  Pitt 
Press  and  the  Clarendon  Press,  under  the  di 
rection  of  syndics  and  delegates  appointed  by 
the  Universities;  and  have  been  illustrated 
with  notes  by  reverend,  very  reverend,  and 
right  reverend  commentators. 

Every  year  the  most  distinguished  young 
men  in  the  kingdom  are  examined  by  bishops 
and  professors  of  divinity  in  the  Lysistrata  of 
Aristophanes  and  the  Sixth  Satire  of  Juvenal. 
There  is  certainly  something  a  little  ludicrous 
in  the  idea  of  a  conclave  of  venerable  fathers 
of  the  church  rewarding  a  lad  for  his  intimate 
acquaintance  with  writings,  compared  with 
which  the  loosest  tale  in  Prior  is  modest. 
But  for  our  own  part  we  have  no  doubt  that 
the  great  societies  which  direct  the  education 
of  the  English  gentry  have  herein  judged 
wisely.  It  is  unquestionable  that  an  extensive 
acquaintance  with  ancient  literature  enlarges 
and  enriches  the  mind.  It  is  unquestionable 
that  a  man  whose  mind  has  been  thus  en 
larged  and  enriched,  is  /ikely  to  be  far  mora 
useful  to  the  state  and  to  the  church,  than  one 
who  is  unskilled,  or  little  skilled  in  classical 
learning.  On  the  other  hand,  we  find  it  diffi 
cult  to  believe  that,  in  a  world  so  full  of  tempta- 
i  tion  as  this,  any  gentleman,  whose  life  would 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE   RESTORATION. 


439 


have  been  virtuous  if  he  had  not  read  Aristo 
phanes  and  Juvenal,  will  be  made  vicious  by 
reading  them.  A  man  who,  exposed  to  all  the 
influences  of  such  a  state  of  society  as  that  in 
which  we  live,  is  yet  afraid  of  exposing  himself 
to  the  influences  of  a  few  Greek  or  Latin  verses, 
acts,  we  think,  much  like  the  felon  who  begged 
the  sheriffs  to  let  him  have  an  umbrella  held 
over  his  head  from  the  door  of  Newgate  to  the 
gallows,  because  it  was  a  drizzling  morning, 
and  he  was  apt  to  take  cold. 

The  virtue  which  the  world  wants  is  a 
healthful  virtue,  not  a  valetudinarian  virtue — 
a  virtue  which  can  expose  itself  to  the  risks 
inseparable  from  all  spirited  exertion — not  a 
virtue  which  keeps  out  of  the  common  air  for 
fear  of  infection,  and  eschews  the  common  food 
as  too  stimulating.  It  would  be  indeed  absurd 
to  attempt  to  keep  men  from  acquiring  those 
qualifications  which  fit  them  to  play  their  part 
in  life  with  honour  to  themselves  and  advan 
tage  to  their  country,  for  the  sake  of  preserving 
a  delicacy  which  cannot  be  preserved — a  deli 
cacy  which  a  walk  from  Westminster  to  'he 
Temple  is  sufficient  to  destroy. 

But  we  should  be  justly  chargeable  with 
gross  inconsistency,  if,  while  we  defend  the 
policy  which  invites  the  youth  of  our  country 
to  study  such  writers  as  Theocritus  and  Catul 
lus,  we  were  to  set  up  a  cry  against  a  new 
edition  of  the  "  Country  Wife,"  or  the  "  Way 
of  the  World."  The  immoral  English  writers 
of  the  seventeenth  century  are  indeed  much 
less  excusable  than  those  of  Greece  and  Rome. 
But  the  worst  English  writings  of  the  seven 
teenth  century  are  decent,  compared  with  much 
that  has  been  bequeathed  to  us  by  Greece  and 
Rome.  Plato,  we  have  little  doubt,  was  a  much 
betterman  than  Sir  George  Etherege.  But  Plato 
has  written  things  at  which  Sir  George  Etherege 
would  have  shuddered.  Buckhurst  and  Sed- 
ley,  ev^n  in  those  wild  orgies  at  the  Cock  in 
Bow  Street,  for  which  they  were  pelted  by  the 
rabble  and  fined  by  the  Court  of  King's  Bench, 
would  never  have  dared  to  hold  such  discourse 
as  passed  between  Socrates  and  Phasdrus  on 
that  fine  summer  day,  under  the  plane-tree, 
while  the  fountain  warbled  at  their  feet,  and 
the  cicadas  chirped  overhead.  If  it  be,  as  we 
think  it  is,  desirable  that  an  English  gentle- 
nan  should  be  well  informed  touching  the 
government  and  the  manners  of  little  common 
wealths,  which  both  in  place  and  time  are  far 
removed  from  us — whose  independence  has 
been  more  than  two  thousand  years  extinguish 
ed,  whose  language  has  not  been  spoken  for 
ages,  and  whose  ancient  magnificence  is  attest 
ed  only  by  a  few  broken  columns  and  friezes — 
much  more  must  it  be  desirable  that  he  should 
be  intimately  acquainted  with  the  history  of 
the  public  mind  of  his  own  country;  and  with 
the  causes,  the  nature,  and  the  extent  of  those 
revolutions  of  opinion  and  feeling,  which, 
during  the  last  two  centuries,  have  alternately 
raised  and  depressed  the  standard  of  our  na 
tional  morality.  And  knowledge  of  this  sort  is 
to  be  very  sparingly  gleaned  from  parliament 
ary  debates,  from  state  papers,  and  from  the 
works  of  grave  historians.  It  must  either  not 
be  acquired  at  all,  or  it  must  be  acquired  by 
tne  perusal  of  the  Jight  literature  which  has  at 


various  periods  been  fashionable.  We  are 
therefore  by  no  means  disposed  to  condemn 
this  publication,  though  we  certainly  cannot 
recommend  the  handsome  volume*  before  us 
as  an  appropriate  Christmas  present  for  young 
ladies. 

We  have  said  that  we  think  the  present  pub 
lication  perfectly  justifiable.  But  we  can  by 
no  means  agree  with  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt,  who 
seems  to  hold  that  there  is  little  or  no  ground 
for  the  charge  of  immorality  so  often  brought 
against  the  literature  ot  the  Restoration.  We 
do  not  blame  him  for  not  bringing  to  the  judg 
ment-seat  the  merciless  rigour  of  Lord  Angelo ; 
but  we  really  think  that  such  flagitious  and 
impudent  offenders  as  those  who  are  now  at 
the  bar,  deserved  at  least  the  gentle  rebuke  of 
Escalus.  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt  treats  the  whole 
matter  a  little  too  much  in  the  easy  style  of 
Lucio,  and  perhaps  his  exceeding  lenity  dis 
poses  us  to  b*s  somewhat  too  severe. 

And  yet  it  is  not  easy  to  be  too  severe.  For, 
in  truth,  this  part  of  our  literature  is  a  disgrace 
to  our  language  and  our  national  character. 
It  is  clever,  indeed,  and  very  entertaining;  but 
it  is,  in  the  most  emphatic  sense  of  the  words, 
"  earthly,  sensual,  devilish."  Its  indecency, 
though  perpetually  such  as  is  condemned,  not 
less  by  the  rules  of  good  taste  than  by  those  of 
morality,  is  not,  in  our  opinion,  so  disgraceful 
a  fault  as  its  singularly  inhuman  spirit.  We 
have  here  Belial,  not  as  when  he  inspired  Ovid 
and  Ariosto,  "graceful  and  humane,"  but  with 
the  iron  eye  and  cruel  sneer  of  Mephistopheles. 
We  find  ourselves  in  a  world,  in  which  the 
ladies  are  like  very  profligate,  impudent  and 
unfeeling  men,  and  in  which  the  men  are  too 
bad  for  any  place  but  Pandemonium  or  Nor 
folk  Island.  We  are  surrounded  by  foreheads 
of  bronze,  hearts  like  the  nether  millstone,  and 
tongues  set  on  fire  of  hell. 

Dryden  defended  or  excused  his  own  of 
fences,  and  those  of  his  contemporaries,  by 
pleading  the  example  of  the  earlier  English 
dramatists:  and  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt  seems  to 
think  that  there  is  force  in  the  plea.  We  al 
together  differ  from  this  opinion.  The  crime 
charged  is  not  mere  coarseness  of  expression. 
The  terms  which  are  delicate  in  one  age  be 
come  gross  in  the  next.  The  diction  of  the 
English  version  of  the  Pentateuch,  is  some 
times  such  as  Addison  would  not  have  ventur 
ed  to  imitate;  and  Addison,  the  standard  of 
purity  in  his  own  age,  used  many  phrases 
which  are  now  proscribed.  Whether  a  thing 
shall  be  designated  by  a  plain  noun-substan 
tive,  or  by  a  circumlocution,  is  mere  matter  of 
fashion.  Morality  is  not  at  all  interested  in 
the  question.  But  morality  is  deeply  interested 
in  this — that  what  is  immoral  shall  not  be  pre 
sented  to  the  imagination  of  the  young  anil 
susceptible  in  constant  connection  w:*h  what 
is  attractive.  For  every  person  who  n&s  ob 
served  the  operation  of  the  law  of  association 


*  Mr.  Moxon,  its  publisher,  is  well  entitled  to  com 
rneiHiation  and  support  for  having,  by  a  series  of corres 
ponding  Reprints,  (comprising  the  works  of  the  elder 
Dramatists,)— executed  in  a  compendious  but  very  come 
ly  form,  and  accompanied  with  useful  prolegomena — put 
it  in  the  power  of  any  one  desiimis  of  such  an  acqni«i- 
tion  to  procure,  at  a  comparatively  small  cost,  the  no 
blest  Dramatic  Library  in  the  world 


440 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


in  his  own  mind,  and  in  the  minds  of  others, 
knows,  that  whatever  is  constantly  presented 
to  the  imagination  in  connection  with  what  is 
attractive,  will  commonly  itself  become  at 
tractive.  There  is  undoubtedly  a  great  deal  of 
indelicate  writing  in  Fletcher  and  Massinger; 
and  more  than  might  be  wished  even  in  Ben 
Jonson  and  Shakspeare,  who  are  compara 
tively  pure.  But  it  is  impossible  to  trace  in 
their  plays  any  systematic  attempt  to  associate 
vit  Tith  those  things  which  men  value  most 
and  desire  most,  and  virtue  with  every  thing 
ridiculous  and  degrading.  And  such  a  syste 
matic  attempt  we  find  in  the  whole  dramatic 
literature  of  the  generation  which  followed  the 
return  of  Charles  the  Second.  We  will  take, 
a--}  an  instance  of  what  we  mean,  a  single  sub 
ject  of  the  highest  importance  to  the  happiness 
of  mankind — conjugal  fidelity.  We  can  at 
present  hardly  call  to  mind  a  single  English 
play,  written  before  the  Civil  War,  in  which  the 
character  of  a  seducer  of  married  women  is 
represented  in  a  favourable  light.  We  re 
member  many  plays  in  which  such  persons 
are  baffled,  exposed,  covered  with  derision,  and 
insulted  by  triumphant  husbands.  Such  is  the 
fate  of  Falstaff,  with  all  his  wit  and  knowledge 
of  the  world.  Such  is  the  fate  of  Brisac  in 
Fletcher's  "Elder  Brother"— and  of  Ricardo 
and  Ubaldo,  in  Massinger's  "  Picture."  Some 
times,  as  in  the  "Fatal  Dowry,"  and  "Love's 
Cruelty,"  the  outraged  honour  of  families  is 
repaired  by  a  bloody  revenge.  If  now  and 
then  the  lover  is  represented  as  an  accom 
plished  man,  and  the  husband  as  a  person  of 
weak  or  odious  character,  this  only  makes 
the  triumph  of  female  virtue  the  more  signal ; 
as  in  Jonson's  Celia  and  Mrs.  Fitzdottrel,  and 
in  Fletcher's  Maria.  In  general  we  will  ven 
ture  to  say,  that  the  dramatists  of  the  age  of 
Elizabeth  and  James  the  First,  either  treat  the 
breach  of  the  marriage-vow  as  a  serious  crime 
— or,  if  they  treat  it  as  a  matter  for  laughter, 
turn  the  laugh  against  the  gallant. 

On  the  contrary,  during  the  forty  years 
which  followed  the  Restoration,  the  whole  body 
of  the  dramatists  invariably  represent  adultery 
— we  do  not  say  as  a  peccadillo — we  do  not 
say  as  an  error  which  the  violence  of  passion 
may  excuse — but  as  the  calling  of  a  fine  gen 
tleman — as  a  grace  without  which  his  cha 
racter  would  be  imperfect.  It  is  as  essential 
to  his  breeding  and  to  his  place  in  society  that 
he  should  make  love  to  the  wives  of  his  neigh 
bours,  as  that  he  should  know  French,  or  that 
he  should  have  a  sword  at  his  side.  In  all  this 
there  is  no  passion,  and  scarcely  any  thing 
that  can  be  called  preference.  The  hero  in 
trigues,  just  as  he  wears  a  wig;  because,  if 
he  did  not,  he  would  be  a  queer  fellow,  a  city 
prig,  perhaps  a  Puritan.  All  the  agreeable 
qualities  are  always  given  to  the  gallant.  All 
Ihe  contempt  and  aversion  are  the  portion  of 
the  unfortunate  husband.  Take  Dryden  for 
example;  and  compare  Woodall  with  Brain- 
oiek,  or  Lorenzo  with  Gomez.  Take  Wycher- 
ley,  and  compare  Homer  with  Pinch  wife. 
Take  Vanbrugh,  and  compare  Constant  with 
Sir  John  Brute.  Take  Farquhar,  and  com 
pare  Archer  with  Squire  Sullen.  Take  Con- 
greve,  and  compare  Belmour  with  Fondlewife, 


!  Careless  with  Sir  Paul  Plyant,  or  Scandal  with 

Foresight.     In  all  these  cases,  and  in  many 

j  more  which   might  be  named,  the  dramatist 

I  evidently  does  his  best  to   make   the  person. 

who  commits  the  injury  graceful,  sensible  and 

spirited ;  and  the  person  who  suffers  it  a  fool 

or  a  tyrant,  or  both. 

Mr.  Charles  Lamb,  indeed,  attempted  to  set 
up  a  defence  for  this  way  ol  writing.  The  dra 
matists  of  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeenth 
century  are  not,  according  to  him,  to  be  tried 
by  the  standard  of  morality  which  exists,  and 
ought  to  exist  in  real  life.  Their  world  is  a 
conventional  world.  Their  heroes  and  he 
roines  belong,  not  to  England,  not  to  Christen 
dom,  but  to  an  Utopia  of  gallantry,  to  a  Fairy 
land,  where  the  Bible  and  Burns's  Justice  are 
unknown — where  a  prank,  which  on  this  earth 
would  be  rewarded  with  the  pillory,  is  merely 
matter  for  a  peal  of  elfish  laughter.  A  real 
Homer,  a  real  Careless  would,  it  is  admitted, 
be  exceedingly  bad  men.  But  to  predicate 
morality  or  immorality  of  the  Horner  of  Wy- 
cherly,  and  the  Careless  of  Congreve,  is  as 
absurd  as  it  would  be  to  arraign  a  sleeper  for 
his  dreams.  They  belong  "  to  the  regions  of 
pure  comedy,  where  no  cold  moral  reigns— 
when  we  are  amongst  them  we  are  amongst  a 
chaotic  people.  We  are  not  to  judge  them  by 
our  usages.  No  reverend  institutions  are  in 
sulted  by  their  proceedings,  for  they  have  none 
among  them.  No  peace  of  families  is  violated, 
for  no  family  ties  exist  among  them.  There 
is  neither  right  or  wrong — gratitude  or  its  op 
posite — claim  or  duty — paternity  or  sonship." 
This  is,  we  believe,  a  fair  summary  of  Mr. 
Lamb's  doctrine.  We  are  sure  that  we  do  not 
wish  to  represent  .him  unfairly.  For  we  ad 
mire  his  genius  /  we  love  the  kind  nature 
which  appears  in  all  his  writings :  and  we 
cherish  his  memory  as  much  as  if  we  had 
known  him  personally.  But  we  must  plainly 
say  that  his  argument,  though  ingenious,  is 
altogether  sophistical. 

Of  course  we  perfectly  understand  that  it  is 
possible  for  a  writer  to  create  a  conventional 
world  in  which  things  forbidden  by  the  Deca 
logue  and  the  Statute  Book  shall  be  lawful, 
and  yet  that  the  exhibition  may  be  harmless,  or 
even  edifying.  For  example,  we  suppose  that 
the  most  austere  critics  would  not  accuse  Fe- 
nelon  of  impiety  and  immorality,  on  account 
of  his  Telemachus  and  his  Dialogues  of  the 
Dead.  In  Telemachus  and  the  Dialogues  of 
the  Dead,  we  have  a  false  religion,  and  conse 
quently  a  morality  which  is  in  some  points 
incorrect,  We  have  a  right  and  a  wrong, 
differing  from  the  right  and  the  wrong  of  real 
life.  It  is  represented  as  the  first  duty  of  men 
to  pay  honour  to  Jove  and  Minerva.  Philo- 
cles,  who  employes  his  leisure  in  making 
graven  images  of  these  deities,  is  extolled  for 
his  piety  in  a  way  which  contrasts  singularly 
with  the  expressions  of  Isaiah  on  the  same 
subject.  The  dead  are  judged  by  Minos,  and 
rewarded  with  lasting  happiness  for  actions 
which  Fenelon  would  have  been  the  first  to 
pronounce  splendid  sins.  The  same  may  be 
said  of  Mr.  Southey's  Mohammedan  and  Hin 
doo  heroes  and  heroines.  In  Thalaba,  to  speak 
in  derogation  of  «he  Arabian  Imposter  is  bias- 


COMIC   DEAMATISTS   OF   THE   RESTORATION. 


441 


phemy — to  drink  wine  is  a  crime — to  perform 
ablutions,  and  to  pay  honour  to  the  holy  cities, 
are  works  of  merit.  In  the  Curse  of  Kehama, 
Kailyal  is  commended  for  her  devotion  to  the 
statue  of  Mariataly,  the  goddess  of  the  poor. 
But  certainly  no  person  will  accuse  Mr.Southey 
of  having  promoted  or  intended  to  promote 
either  Islamism  or  Brahminism. 

It  is  easy  to  see  why  the  conventional  worlds 
of  Fenelon  and  Mr.  Southey  are  unobjectiona 
ble.  In  the  first  place,  they  are  utterly  unlike 
the  real  world  in  which  we  live.  The  state  of 
society,  the  Jaws  even  of  the  physical  world, 
are  so  different  from  those  with  which  we  are 
familiar,  that  we  cannot  be  shocked  at  finding 
the  morality  also  very  different.  But  in  truth, 
the  morality  of  these  conventional  worlds  dif 
fers  from  the  morality  of  the  real  world,  only 
in  points  where  there  is  no  danger  that  the 
real  worlds  will  ever  go  wrong.  The  gene 
rosity  and  docility  of  Telemachus,  the  forti 
tude,  the  modesty,  the  filial  tenderness  of  Kail 
yal,  are  virtues  of  all  ages  and  nations.  And 
there  was  very  little  danger  that  the  Dauphin 
would  worship  Minerva,  or  that  an  English 
damsel  would  dance  with  a  bucket  on  her  head 
before  the  statue  of  Mariataly. 

The  case  is  widely  different  with  what  Mr. 
Charles  Lamb  calls  the  conventional  world  of 
Wycherley  and  Congreve.  Here  the  costume, 
and  manners,  the  topics  of  conversation,  are 
those  of  the  real  town,  and  of  the  passing  day. 
The  hero  is  in  all  superficial  accomplishments 
exactly  the  fine  gentleman,  whom  every  youth 
in  the  pit  would  gladly  resemble.  The  heroine 
is  the  fine  lady,  whom  every  youth  in  the  pit 
would  gladly  marry.  The  scene  is  laid  in  some 
place  which  is  as  well  known  to  the  audience 
as  their  own  houses,  in  St.  James's  Park,  or 
Hyde  Park,  or  Westminster  Hall.  The  lawyer 
bustles  about  with  his  bag,  between  the  Com 
mon  Pleas  and  the  Exchequer.  The  Peer  calls 
for  his  carriage  to  go  to  the  House  of  Lords  on 
a  private  bill.  A  hundred  little  touches  are 
employed  to  make  the  fictitious  world  appear 
like  the  actual  world.  And  the  immorality  is 
of  a  sort  which  never  can  be  out  of  date,  and 
which  all  the  force  of  religion,  law,  and  public 
opinion  united  can  but  imperfectly  restrain. 

In  the  name  of  art,  as  well  as  in  the  name 
of  virtue,  we  protest  against  the  principle  that 
the  world  of  pure  comedy  is  one  into  which  no 
moral  enters.  If  comedy  be  an  imitation,  un 
der  whatever  conventions,  of  real  life,  how  is 
it  possible  that  it  can  have  no  reference  to  the 
great  rule  which  directs  life,  and  to  feelings 
which  are  called  forth  by  every  incident  of 
life  1  If  what  Mr.  Charles  Larnb  says  were 
correct,  the  inference  would  be,  that  these  dra 
matists  did  not  in  the  least  understand  the  very 
first  principles  of  their  craft.  Pure  landscape 
painting  into  which  no  light  or  shade  enters, 
pure  portrait  [ dinting  into  which  no  expres 
sion  enters,  are  phrases  less  at  variance  with 
sound  criticism  than  pure  comedy  into  which 
no  moral  enters. 

But  it  is  not  thu  fact,  that  the  world  of  these 
dramatists  is  a.  world   into  which  no   moral 
enters.     Morality  constantly  enters  into   that 
world,  a    sound    morality,  and  an    unsound  j 
morality;  the  sound  morality  to  be  insulted. 

VOL.  IV.— 5t 


derided,  associated  with  every  thing  mean  and 
hateful ;  the  unsound  morality  to  be  set  off  to 
every  advantage,  and  inculcated  by  all  me 
thods  direct  and  indirect.  It  is  not  the  fact, 
that  none  of  the  inhabitants  of  this  conven 
tional  world  feel  reverence  for  sacred  institu 
tions,  and  family  ties.  Fondlewife,  Pinch  wife, 
every  person  in  short  of  narrow  understand 
ing  and  disgusting  manners,  expresses  that 
reverence  strongly.  The  heroes  and  heroines 
too,  have  a  moral  code  of  their  own,  an  ex 
ceedingly  bad  one;  but  not,  as  Mr.  Charles 
Lamb  seems  to  think,  a.  code  existing  only  in, 
the  imagination  of  dramatists.  It  is,  on  the 
contrary,  a  code  actually  received,  and  obeyed 
by  great  numbers  of  people  We  need  not  go 
to  Utopia  or  Fairiland  to  find  them.  They  are 
near  at  hand.  Every  night  some  of  them  play 
at  the  "hells"  in  the  Quadrant,  and  others  pace 
the  piazza  in  Covent-garden.  Without  flying 
to  Nephelococcygia,  or  to  the  Court  of  Queen 
Mab,  we  can  meet  with  sharpers,  bullies,  hard 
hearted  impudent  debauchees,  and  women 
worthy  of  such  paramours.  The  morality  of 
the  " Country  Wife"  and  the  "Old  Bachelor," 
is  the  morality,  not,  as  Mr.  Charles  Lamb 
maintains,  of  an  unreal  world,  but  of  a  world 
which  is  a  great  deal  too  real.  It  is  the  mo 
rality,  not  of  a  chaotic  people,  but  of  low 
town-rakes,  and  of  those  ladies  whom  the 
newspapers  call  "dashing  Cyprians."  And 
the  question  is  simply,  whether  a  man  of 
genius,  who  constantly  and  systematically  en 
deavours  to  make  this  sort  of  character  attrac 
tive,  by  uniting  it  with  beauty,  grace,  dignity, 
spirit,  a  high  social  position,  popularity,  litera 
ture,  wit,  taste,  knowledge  of  the  world,  brilliant 
success  in  every  undertaking,  does  or  does  not 
make  an  ill  use  of  his  powers.  We  own  that 
we  are  unable  to  understand  how  this  question 
can  be  answered  in  any  way  but  one. 

It  must,  indeed,  be  acknowledged,  in  justice 
to  the  writers  of  whom  we  have  spoken  thus 
severely,  that  they  were,  to  a  great  extent,  the 
creatures  of  their  age.  And  if  it  be  asked 
why  that  age  encouraged  immorality  which  no 
other  age  would  have  tolerated,  we  have  no 
hesitation  in  answering  that  this  great  depra 
vation  of  the  national  taste  was  the  effect  of 
the  prevalence  of  Puritanism  under  the  Com 
mon  wealth. 

To  punish  public  outrages  on  morals  and 
religion  is  unquestionably  within  the  compe 
tence  of  rulers.  But  when  a  government,  not 
content  with  requiring  decency,  requires  sanc 
tity,  it  oversteps  the  bounds  which  mark  its 
functions.  And  it  may  be  laid  down  as  a  uni 
versal  rule,  that  a  government  which  attempts 
more  than  it  ought  will  perform  less.  A  law 
giver  who,  in  order  to  protect  distressed  bor 
rowers,  limits  the  rate  of  interest,  either  makes 
it  impossible  for  the  objects  of  his  care  to  bor 
row  at  all,  or  places  them  at  the  mercy  of  the 
worst  class  of  usurers.  A  lawgiver  who, 
from  tenderness  for  labouring  men,  fixes  the 
hours  of  their  \*ork  and  the  amount  of  their 
wages,  is  certain  to  make  them  far  more 
wretched  than  he  found  them.  And  so  a  go 
vernment  which,  not  content  with  repressing 
scandalous  excesses,  demands  from  its  sub 
jects  fervent  and.  austere  piety,  will  soon  dis 


442 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


cover  that,  while  attempting  to  render  an 
impossible  service  to  the  cause  of  virtue,  it 
has  in  truth  only  promoted  vice. 

For  what  are  the  means  by  which  a  govern 
ment  can  effect  its  ends  1  Two  only,  rewards 
and  punishments;— powerful  means,  indeed, 
for  influencing  the  exterior  act,  but  altogether 
impotent  for  the  purpose  of  touching  the  heart. 
A  public  functionary  who  is  told  that  he  will 
be  advanced  if  he  is  a  devout  Catholic,  and 
turned  out  of  his  place  if  he  is  not,  will  proba 
bly  go  to  mass  every  morning,  exclude  meat 
from  his  table  on  Fridays,  shrive  himself  regu 
larly,  and  perhaps  let  his  superiors  know  that 
he  wears  a  hair  shirt  next  to  his  skin.  Under 
a  Puritan  government,  a  person  who  is  apprized 
that  piety  is  essential  to  thriving  in  the  world, 
will  be  strict  in  the  observance  of  the  Sunday, 
or,  as  he  will  call  it,  Sabbath,  and  will  avoid  a 
theatre  as  if  it  were  plague-stricken.  Such  a 
show  of  religion  as  this,  the  hope  of  gain  and 
the  fear  of  loss  will  produce,  at  a  week's 
notice,  in  any  abundance  which  a  government 
may  require.  But  under  this  show,  sensuality, 
ambition,  avarice,  and  hatred  retain  unimpaired 
power ;  and  the  seeming  convert  has  only  added 
to  the  vices  of  a  man  of  the  world  all  the  still 
darker  vices  which  are  engendered  by  the  con 
stant  practice  of  dissimulation.  The  truth 
cannot  be  long  concealed.  The  public  dis 
covers  that  the  grave  persons  who  are  proposed 
to  it  as  patterns,  are  more  utterly  destitute  of 
moral  principle  and  of  moral  sensibility  than 
avowed  libertines.  It  sees  that  these  Pharisees 
are  further  removed  from  real  goodness  than 
publicans  and  harlots.  And,  as  usual,  it  rushes 
to  the  extreme  opposite  to  that  which  it  quits. 
It  considers  a  high  religious  profession  as  a 
sure  mark  of  meanness  and  depravity.  On 
the  very  first  day  on  which  the  restraints  of 
fear  is  taken  away,  and  on  which  men  can 
venture  to  say  what  they  feel,  a  frightful  peal 
of  blasphemy  and  ribaldry  proclaims  that  the 
short-sighted  policy  which  aims  at  making  a 
nation  of  saints  has  made  a  nation  of  scoffers. 

It  was  thus  in  France  about  the  beginning 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  Louis  the  Four 
teenth  in  his  old  age  became  religious,  and  de 
termined  that  his  subjects  should  be  religious 
too — shrugged  his  shoulders  and  knitted  his 
brows  if  he  observed  at  his  levee  or  near  his 
dinner-table  any  gentleman  who  neglected  the 
duties  enjoined  by  the  Church — and  rewarded 
piety  with  blue  ribands,  invitations  to  Marli, 
governments,  pensions,  and  regiments.  Forth 
with  Versailles  became,  in  every  thing  but 
dress,  a  convent.  The  pulpits  and  confession 
als  were  surrounded  by  swords  and  embroidery. 
The  marshals  of  France  were  much  in  prayer ; 
and  there  was  hardly  one  among  the  dukes 
and  peers  who  did  not  carry  good  little  books 
in  his  pocket,  fast  during  Lent,  and  communi 
cate  at  Easter.  Madame  de  Maintenon,  who 
had  a  great  ohare  in  the  blessed  work,  boasted 
that  oevotion  had  become  quite  the  fashion. 
A  fashion  indeed  it  was ;  and  like  a  fashion 
*t  passed  away.  No  sooner  had  the  old  king 
been  carried  to  St.  Denis,  than  the  whole  court 
unmasked.  Every  man  hastened  to  indemnify 
Himself,  by  the  excess  of  licentiousness  and 
impudence,  for  years  of  mortification.  The 


same  persons  who,  a  few  months  before,  with 
meek  voices  and  demure  looks,  had  consulted 
divines  about  the  state  of  their  souls,  now  sur 
rounded  the  midnight  table,  where,  amidst  the 
bounding  of  champagne  corks,  a  drunken 
prince,  enthroned  between  Dubois  and  Madame 
de  Parabere,  hiccoughed  out  atheistical  argu 
ments  and  obscene  jests.  The  early  part  of 
the  reign  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth  had  been  a 
time  of  license  ;  but  the  most  dissolute  men  of 
that  generation  would  have  blushed  at  the 
orgies  of  the  Regency. 

It  was  the  same  with  our  fathers  in  the  time 
of  the  Great  Civil  War.  We  are  by  no  means 
unmindful  of  the  great  debt  which  mankind 
owes  to  the  Puritans  of  that  time,  the  deliverers 
of  England,  the  founders  of  the  great  American 
Commonwealths.  But  in  the  day  of  their 
power  they  committed  one  great  fault,  which 
left  deep  and  lasting  traces  in  the  national 
character  and  manners.  They  mistook  the  end 
and  overrated  the  force  of  government.  They 
determined  not  merely  to  protect  religion  and 
public  morals  from  insult — an  object  for  which 
the  civil  sword,  in  discreet  hands,  may  be  bene 
ficially  employed — but  to  make  the  people 
committed  to  their  rule  truly  devout.  Yet  if 
they  had  only  reflected  on  events  which  they 
had  themselves  witnessed,  and  in  which  they 
had  themselves  borne  a  great  part,  they  would 
have  seen  what  was  likely  to  be  the  result  of 
their  enterprise.  They  had  lived  under  a  go 
vernment  which,  during  a  long  course  of 
years,  did  all  that  could  be  done,  by  lavish 
bounty  and  rigorous  punishment,  to  enforce 
conformity  to  the  doctrine  and  discipline  of  the 
Church  of  England.  No  person  suspected  of 
hostility  to  that  church  had  the  smallest  chance 
of  obtaining  favour  at  the  court  of  Charles. 
Avowed  dissent  was  punished  by  imprison 
ment,  by  ignominious  exposure,  by  cruel  mu 
tilations,  and  by  ruinous  fines.  And  the  event 
had  been,  that  the  Church  had  fallen,  and  had, 
in  its  fall,  dragged  down  with  it  a  monarchy 
which  had  stood  six  hundred  years.  The  Puritan 
might  have  learned,  if  from  nothing  else,  yet 
from  his  own  recent  victory,  that  governments 
which  attempt  things  beyond  their  reach  are 
likely  not  merely  to  fail,  but  to  produce  an 
effect  directly  the  opposite  of  that  which  they 
contemplate  as  desirable. 

All  this  was  overlooked.  The  saints  were 
to  inherit  the  earth.  The  theatres  were  closed. 
The  fine  arts  were  placed  under  absurd  re 
straints.  Vices  which  had  never  before  been 
even  misdemeanours  were  made  capital  felo 
nies.  And  it  was  solemnly  resolved  by  Parlia 
ment,  "that  no  person  should  be  employed  but 
such  as  the  House  shall  be  satisfied  of  his  real 
godliness."  The  pious  assembly  had  a  Bible 
lying  on  the  table  for  reference.  If  they  had 
consulted  it  they  might  have  learned  that  the 
wheat  and  the  tares  grow  together  inseparably, 
and  must  either  be  spared  together,  or  rooted 
up  together.  To  know  whether  a  man  was 
really  godly  was  impossible.  But  it  was  easy 
to  know  whether  he  had  a  plain  dress,  iank 
hair,  no  starch  in  his  linen,  no  gay  furnilure  in 
his  house  ;  whether  he  talked  through  his  nose, 
and  showed  the  whites  of  his  eyes  ;  whether  he 
named  his  children,  Assurance,  Tribulation  «»*• 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS   OF   THE   RESTORATION. 


443 


Maher-shalal-hash-baz — whether  he  avoided 
Spring  Garden  when  in  town,  and  abstained 
from  hunting  and  hawking  when  in  the  coun 
try — whether  he  expounded  hard  scriptures  to 
his  troop  of  dragoons,  and  talked  in  a  com 
mittee  of  ways  and  means  about  seeking  the 
Lord.  These  were  tests  which  could  easily  be 
applied.  The  misfortune  was,  that  they  were 
tests  which  proved  nothing.  Such  as  they 
were,  they  were  employed  by  the  dominant 
party.  And  the  consequence  was,  that  a  crowd 
of  impostors,  in  every  walk  of  life,  began  to 
mimic  and  to  caricature  what  were  then  re 
garded  as  the  outward  signs  of  sanctity.  The 
nation  was  not  duped.  The  restraints  of  that 
gloomy  time  were  such  as  would  have  been 
impatiently  borne,  if  imposed  by  men  who 
were  universally  believed  to  be  saints.  Those 
restraints  became  altogether  insupportable 
when  they  were  known  to  be  kept  up  for  the 
profit  of  hypocrites.  It  is  quite  certain  that, 
even  if  the  Royal  Family  had  never  returned 
— even  if  Richard  Cromwell  or  Henry  Crom 
well  had  been  at  the  head  of  the  administration 
— there  would  have  been  a  great  relaxation  of 
manners.  Before  the  Revolution  many  signs 
indicated  that  a  period  of  license  was  at  hand. 
The  Restoration  crushed  for  a  time  the  Puritan 
party,  and  placed  supreme  power  in  the  hands 
of  a  libertine.  The  political  counter-revolu 
tion  assisted  the  moral  counter-revolution,  and 
was  in  turn  assisted  by  it.  A  period  of  wild 
and  lesperate  dissoluteness  followed.  Even  in 
remote  manor-houses  and  hamlets  the  change 
was  in  some  degree  felt ;  but  in  London  the 
outbreak  of  debauchery  was  appalling.  And 
in  London  the  places  most  deeply  infected  were 
the  palace,  the  quarters  inhabited  by  the  aris 
tocracy,  and  the  Inns  of  Court.  It  was  on  the 
support  of  these  parts  of  the  town  that  the 
playhouses  depended.  The  character  of  the 
drama  became  conformed  to  the  character  of 
its  patrons.  The  comic  poet  was  the  mouthpiece 
of  the  most  deeply  corrupted  part  of  a  corrupted 
society.  And  in  the  plays  before  us,  we  find 
distilled  and  condensed,  the  essential  spirit  of 
the  fashionable  world  during  the  Anti-puritan 
reaction. 

The  Puritan  had  affected  formal  it}' ;  the 
comic  poet  laughed  at  decorum.  The  Puritan 
had  frowned  at  innocent  diversions  ;  the  comic 
poet  took  under  his  patronage  the  most  flagi 
tious  excesses.  The  Puritan  had  canted ;  the 
comic  poet  blasphemed.  The  Puritan  had 
made  an  affair  of  gallantry  felony,  without 
benefit  of  clergy;  the  comic  poet  represented 
it  as  an  honourable  distinction.  The  Puritan 
spoke  with  disdain  of  the  low  standard  of 
popular  morality;  his  life  was  regulated  by  a 
far  more  rigid  code ;  his  virtue  was  sustained 
by  motives  unknown  to  men  of  the  world. 
Unhappily  it  had  been  amply  proved  in  many 
cases,  and  might  well  be  suspected  in  many 
more,  that  these  high  pretensions  were  un 
founded.  Accordingly,  the  fashionable  circles, 
and  the  comic  poets  who  were  the  spokesmen 
of  those  circles,  took  up  the  notion  that  all  pro 
fessions  of  piety  and  integrity  were  to  be  con 
strued  by  the  rule  of  contrary;  that  it  might 
well  be  doubted  whether  there  was  such  a 
thing  as  virtue  in  the  world ;  but  that,  at  all 


events,  a  person  who  affected  to  be  better  than 
his  neighbours  was  sure  to  be  a  knave. 

In  the  old  drama  there  had  been  much  that 
was  reprehensible.  But  whoever  compares 
even  the  least  decorous  plays  of  Fletcher  with 
those  contained  in  the  volume  before  us,  will 
see  how  much  the  profligacy  which  follows  a 
period  of  overstrained  austerity,  goes  beyond 
the  profligacy  which  precedes  such  a  period. 
The  nation  resembled  the  demoniac  in  the 
New  Testament.  The  Puritans  boasted  that 
the  unclean  spirit  was  cast  out.  The  house 
was  empty,  swept,  and  garnished,  and  for  a 
time  the  expelled  tenant  wandered  through  dry 
places  seeking  rest  and  finding  none.  But 
the  force  of  the  exorcism  was  spent.  The 
fiend  returned  to  his  abode  ;  and  returned  not 
alone.  He  took  to  him  seven  other  spirits 
more  wicked  than  himself.  They  entered  in, 
and  dwelt  together:  and  the  second  possession 
was  worse  than  the  first. 

We  will  now,  as  far  as  our  limits  will  per 
mit,  pass  in  review  the  writers  to  whom  Mr 
Leigh  Hunt  has  introduced  us.  Of  the  four, 
Wycherley  stands,  we  think,  last  in  literary 
merit,  but  first  in  order  of  time,  and  first,  be 
yond  all  doubt,  in  immorality. 

WILLIAM  WTCHEIILET  was  born  in  1640. 
He  was  the  son  of  a  Shropshire  gentleman  of 
old  family,  and  of  what  was  then  accounted  a 
good  estate.  The  property  was  estimated  at 
600/.  a  year,  a  fortune  which,  among  the  for 
tunes  of  that  time,  probably  ranked  as  a  for 
tune  of  2000/.  a  year  would  rank  in  our  days. 

William  was  an  infant  when  the  civil  war 
broke  out;  and,  while  he  was  still  in  his  rudi 
ments,  a  Presbyterian  hierarchy  and  a  republi 
can  government  were  established  on  the  ruins 
of  the  ancient  church  and  throne.  Old  Mr. 
Wycherley  was  attached  to  the  royal  cause, 
and  was  not  disposed  to  intrust  the  education 
of  his  heir  to  the  solemn  Puritans  who  n<  ar 
ruled  the  universities  and  public  schools.  Ac 
cordingly,  the  young  gentleman  was  sent  ai 
fifteen  to  France.  He  resided  some  time  In 
the  neighbourhood  of  the  Duke  of  Montausie-i, 
chief  of  one  of  the  noblest  races  of  Touraine. 
The  duke's  wife,  a  daughter  of  the  house  of 
Rambouillet,  was  a  finished  specimen  of  those 
talents  and  accomplishments  for  which  lw;r 
house  was  celebrated.  The  young  foreigner 
was  introduced  to  the  splendid  circle  which 
surrounded  the  duchess,  and  there  he  appears 
to  have  learned  some  good  and  some  evil.  In 
a  few  years  he  returned  to  this  country  a  fine 
gentleman  and  a  Papist.  His  conversion,  it 
may  safely  be  affirmed,  was  the  effect,  not  of 
any  strong  impression  on  his  understanding 
or  feelings,  but  partly  of  intercourse  with  an 
agreeable  society  in  which  the  Church  of 
Rome  was  the  fashion;  and  partly  of  that 
aversion  to  Galvinistic  austerities,  which  was 
then  almost  universal  among  young  En<-!i:sh- 
men  of  parts  and  spirit,  and  which,  at  on«> 
time,  seemed  likely  to  make  one  half  of  them 
Catholics,  and  the  other  half  Atheists. 

But  the  Restoration  came.  The  universities 
were  again  in  loyal  hands ;  and  there  was  rea 
son  to  hope  that  there  would  be  again  a  na 
tional  church  fit  for  a  gentleman.  Wycherley 
became  a  member  of  Queen's  Collvge,  Oxford. 


444 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  abj'ired  the  errors  of  the  Church  of  Rome. 
The  somewhat  equivocal  glory  of  turning,  for 
a  short  time,  a  very  good-for-nothing  Papist 
intc  a  very  good-for-nothing  Protestant  is  as 
cribed  to  Bishop  Barlow. 

Wycherley  left  Oxford  without  taking  a  de 
gree,  and  entered  at  the  Temple,  where  he 
lived  gayly  for  some  years,  observing  the  hu 
mours  of  the  town,  enjoying  its  pleasures,  and 
picking  up  just  as  much  law  as  was  necessary 
to  make  the  character  of  a  pettifogging  attor 
ney  or  a  litigious  client  entertaining  in  a 
comedy. 

From  an  early  age  he  had  been  in  the  habit 
of  amusing  himself  by  writing.  Some  wretch 
ed  lines  of  his  on  the  Restoration  are  still  ex 
tant.  Had  he  devoted  himself  to  the  making 
of  verses,  he  would  have  been  nearly  as  far 
below  Tate  and  Blackmore  as  Tate  and  Black- 
more  are  below  Dryden.  His  only  chance  for 
renown  would  have  been,  that  he  might  have 
occupied  a  niche,  ia  a  satire,  between  Fleck- 
noe  and  Settle.  There  was,  however,  another 
kind  of  composition  in  which  his  talents  and 
acquirements  qualified  him  to  succeed  ;  and  to 
that  he  judiciously  betook  himself. 

In  his  old  age  he  used  to  say,  that  he  wrote 
"Love  in  a  Wood"  at  nineteen,  the  "Gen 
tleman  Dancing-Master"  at  twenty-one,  the 
"  Plain  Dealer"  at  twenty-five,  and  the  "Coun 
try  Wife"  at  one  or  two-and-thirty.  We  are 
incredulous,  we  own,  as  to  the  truth  of  this 
Story.  Nothing  that  we  know  of  Wychorley 
leads  us  to  think  him  incapable  of  sacrificing 
truth  to  vanity.  And  his  memory  in  the  de 
cline  of  his  life  played  him  such  strange  tricks, 
that  we  might  question  the  correctness  of  his 
assertion,  without  throwing  any  imputation  on 
his  veracity.  It  is  certain  that  none  of  his 
plays  were  acted  till  1672,  when  he  gave  "Love 
in  a  Wood"  to  the  public.  It  seems  improba 
ble  that  he  should  resolve  on  so  important  an 
occasion  as  that  of  a  first  appearance  before 
the  world,  to  run  his  chance  with  a  feeble 
piece,  written  before  his  talents  were  ripe,  be 
fore  his  style  was  formed,  before  he  had  looked 
abroad  into  the  world ;  and  this  when  he  had 
actually  in  his  desk  two  highly-finished  plays, 
the  fruit  of  his  matured  powers.  When  we 
look  minutely  at  the  pieces  themselves,  we 
find  in  every  part  of  them  reason  to  suspect 
the  accuracy  of  Wycherley's  statement.  In 
the  first  scene  of  "  Love  in  a  Wood,"  to  go  no 
further,  we  find  many  passages  which  he 
could  not  have  written  when  he  was  nineteen. 
There  is  an  allusion  to  gentlemen's  periwigs, 
which  first  came  into  fashion  in  1663;  an  allu 
sion  to  guineas,  which  were  first  struck  in 
1663;  an  allusion  to  the  vests  which  Charles 
ordered  to  be  worn  at  court  in  1666;  an  allu 
sion  to  ihe  fire  of  1666;  several  allusions  to 
political  and  ecclesiastical  affairs  which  must 
be  assigned  tc  times  later  than  the  year  of  the 
Restoration — to  times  when  the  government 
and  the  city  were  opposed  to  each  other,  and 
when  the  Presbyterian  ministers  had  been 
driven  from  the  parish  churches  to  the  con 
venticles.  But  it  is  needless  to  dwell  on  par 
ticular  expressions.  The  whole  air  and  spirit 
of  the  piece  belong  to  a  period  subsequent  to 
that  mectioned  by  Wycherley.  As  to  the 


|  "Plain  Dealer,"  which  is  said  to  have  been 
I  written  when  he  was  twenty-five,  it  contains 
one  scene  unquestionably  written  after  1675, 
several  which  are  later  than  1668,  and  scarce 
ly  a  line  which  can  have  been  composed  be 
fore  the  end  of  1666. 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  age  at  which 
Wycherley  composed  his  plays,  it  is  certain 
that  he  did  not  bring  them  before  the  public 
till  he  was  upwards  of  thirty.  In  1672,  "Love 
in  a  Wood"  was  acted  with  more  success  than, 
it  deserved,  and  this  event  produced  a  great 
change  in  the  fortunes  of  the  author.  The 
Duchess  of  Cleveland  cast  her  eyes  upon  him, 
and  was  pleased  with  his  appearance.  This 
abandoned  woman,  not  content  with  her  com 
placent  husband  and  her  royal  keeper,  lavished 
her  fondness  on  a  crowd  of  paramours  of  all 
ranks,  from  dukes  to  rope-dancers.  In  the 
time  of  the  commonwealth  she  commenced  her 
career  of  gallantry,  and  terminated  it  under 
Anne,  by  marrying,  when  a  great-grandmother, 
that  worthless  fop,  Beau  Fielding.  It  is  not 
strange  that  she  should  have  regarded  Wy 
cherley  with  favour.  His  figure  was  com 
manding,  his  countenance  strikingly  handsome, 
his  look  and  deportment  full  of  grace  and  dig 
nity.  He  had,  as  Pope  said  long  after,  "  the 
true  nobleman  look,"  the  look  which  seems  to 
indicate  superiority,  and  a  not  unbecoming 
consciousness  of  superiority.  His  hair,  in 
deed,  as  he  says  in  one  of  his  poems,  was  pre 
maturely  gray.  But  in  that  age  of  periwigs 
this  misfortune  was  of  little  importance.  The 
duchess  admired  him,  and  proceeded  .o  make 
love  to  him  after  the  fashion  of  the  coarse- 
minded  and  shameless  circle  to  which  she  be 
longed.  In  the  Ring,  when  the  crowd  of  beau 
ties  and  fine  gentlemen  was  thickest,  she  put 
her  head  out  of  her  coach-window,  and  bawled 
to  him — "  Sir,  you  are  a  rascal ;  you  are  a  vil 
lain  ;"  and,  if  she  be  not  belied,  added  another 
phrase  of  abuse  which  we  will  not  quote,  but 
of  which  we  may  say  that  it  might  most  justly 
have  been  applied  to  her  own  children.  Wy 
cherley  called  on  her  grace  the  next  day,  and 
with  great  humility  begged  to  know  in  what 
way  he  had  been  so  unfortunate  as  to  disoblige 
her.  Thus  began  an  intimacy  from  which  the 
poet  probably  expected  wealth  and  honours. 
Nor  were  such  expectations  unreasonable.  A 
handsome  young  fellow  about  the  court,  known, 
by  the  name  of  Jack  Churchill,  was  about  the 
same  time  so  lucky  as  to  become  the  object  of  a 
short-lived  fancy  of  the  duchess.  She  had  pre 
sented  him  with  4500/.,  the  price,  in  all  proba 
bility,  of  some  title  or  some  pardon.  The  pru 
dent  youth  had  lent  the  money  on  high  interest 
and  on  landed  security,  and  this  judicious  in 
vestment  was  the  beginning  of  the  most  splen 
did  private  fortune  m  Europe.  Wycherley  was 
not  so  lucky.  The  partiality  with  which  the 
great  lady  regarded  him  was,  indeed,  the  talk 
of  the  whole  town  ;  and,  sixty  years  later,  old 
men  who  remembered  those  days  told  Voltaire 
that  she  often  stole  from  the  court  to  her  lover's 
chambers  in  the  Temple,  disguised  like  a  coun 
try  girl,  with  a  straw  hat  on  her  head,  pattens 
on  her  feet,  and  a  basket  in  her  hand.  The 
poet  was  indeed  too  happy  and  proud  to  be 
discreet.  He  dedicated  to  the  duchess  the  play 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE  RESTORATION. 


445 


which  had  led  to  their  acquaintance,  and  in  the 
dedication  expressed  himself  in  terms  which 
could  not  but  confirm  the  reports  which  had 
gone  abroad.  But  at  Whitehall  such  an  affair 
was  regarded  in  no  serious  light.  The  lady 
was  not  afraid  to  bring  Wycherley  to  court, 
and  to  introduce  him  to  a  splendid  society, 
with  which,  as  far  as  appears,  he  had  never 
before  mixed.  The  easy  king,  who  allowed  to 
his  mistresses  the  same  liberty  which  he 
claimed  for  himself,  was  pleased  with  the  con 
versation  and  manners  of  his  new  rival. 

So  high  did  Wycherley  stand  in  the  royal 
favour,  that  once,  when  he  was  confined  by  a 
fever  to  his  lodgings  in  Bow-street,  Charles, 
who,  with  all  his  faults,  was  certainly  a  man 
of  a  social  and  affable  disposition,  called  on 
him,  sat  by  his  bed,  advised  him  to  try  change 
of  air,  and  gave  him  a  handsome  sum  of  mo 
ney  to  defray  the  expense  of  the  journey. 
Buckingham,  then  master  of  the  horse,  and 
one  of  that  infamous  ministry  known  by  the 
name  of  the  Cabal,  had  been  one  of  the 
duchess's  innumerable  paramours.  He  at  first 
showed  some  symptoms  of  jealousy,  but  soon, 
after  his  fashion,  veered  round  from  anger  to 
fondness,  and  gave  Wycherley  a  commission 
in  his  own  regiment,  and  a  place  in  the  royal 
household. 

It  would  be  unjust  to  Wycherley's  memory 
not  to  mention  here  the  only  good  action,  as 
far  as  we  know,  of  his  whole  life.  He  is  said 
to  have  made  great  exertions  to  obtain  the  pa 
tronage  of  Buckingham  for  the  illustrious  au 
thor  of"  Hudibras,"  who  was  now  sinking  into 
an  obscure  grave,  neglected  by  a  nation  proud 
of  his  genius,  and  by  a  court  which  he  had 
served  too  well.  His  grace  consented  to  see 
poor  Butler,  and  an  appointment  was  made. 
But  unhappily  two  pretty  women  passed  by; 
the  volatile  duke  ran  after  them ;  the  oppor 
tunity  was  lost,  and  could  never  be  regained. 

The  second  Dutch  war,  the  most  disgraceful 
war  in  the  whole  history  of  England,  was  now 
raging.  It  was  not  in  that  age  com  idered  as  by 
any  means  necessary  that  a  naval  officer  should 
receive  a  professional  education.  Young  men 
of  rank,  who  were  hardly  able  to  keep  their 
feet  in  a  breeze,  served  on  board  of  the  king's 
ships,  sometimes  with  commissions  and  some 
times  as  volunteers.  Mulgrave,  Dorset,  Ro 
chester,  and  many  others,  left  the  playhouses 
and  the  Mall  for  hammocks  and  salt  pork; 
and,  ignorant  as  they  were  of  the  rudiments 
of  naval  science,  showed,  at  least  on  the  day 
of  battle,  the  courage  which  is  seldom  wanting 
in  an  English  gentleman.  All  good  judges 
of  maritime  affairs  complained  that  under  this 
system  the  ships  were  grossly  mismanaged, 
and  that  the  tarpaulins  contracted  the  vices, 
without  acquiring  the  graces,  of  the  court.  But 
on  this  subject,  as  on  every  other,  the  govern 
ment  of  Charles  was  deaf  to  all  remonstrances 
where  the  interests  or  whims  of  favourites  were 
concerned.  Wycherley  did  not  choose  to  be 
out  of  the  fashion.  He  embarked,  was  present 
at  a  battle,  and  celebrated  it  on  his  return  in  a 
copy  of  verses  too  bad  for  the  bellman."* 

*  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt  supposes  that  the  battle  at  which 
Wyciierley  was  present  was  that  which  the  Duke  of 
York  gained  over  Opdam,  in  1665.  We  believe  »hat  it 


About  the  same  time  he  brought  on  the  stage 
his  second  piece,  the  "Gentleman  Dancing 
Master."  The  biographer  says  nothing,  as  far 
as  we  remember,  about  the  fate  of  this  play. 
There  is,  however,  reason  to  believe,  that, 
though  certainly  far  superior  to  "  Love  in  a 
Wood,"  it  was  not  equally  successful.  It  was 
first  tried  at  the  west  end  of  the  town,  and,  as 
the  poet  confessed,  "would  scarce  do  there."  It 
was  then  performed  in  Salisbury  Court,  but,  as  it 
should  seem,  with  no  better  event.  For,  in  the 
prologue  to  the  "Country  Wife,"  Wycherley 
described  himself  as  "the  late  so  baffled  scrib 
bler." 

In  1675,  the  "Country  Wife"  was  performed 
with  brilliant  success,  which,  in  a  literary  point 
of  view,  was  not  wholly  unmerited.  For, 
though  one  of  the  most  profligate  and  heartless 
of  human  compositions,  it  is  the  elaborate  pro 
duction  of  a  mind,  not  indeed  rich,  original,  or 
imaginative,  but  ingenious,  observant,  quick  to 
seize  hints,  and  patient  of  the  toil  of  polishing. 

The  "Plain  Dealer,"  equally  immoral  and 
equally  well  written,  appeared  in  1677.  At 
first  this  piece  pleased  the  people  less  than  the 
critics ;  but  after  a  time  its  unquestionable 
merits,  and  the  zealous  support  of  Lord  Dor 
set,  whose  influence  in  literary  and  fashion 
able  society  was  unbounded,  established  it  in 
the  public  favour. 

The  fortune  of  Wycherley  was  now  in  the 
zenith,  and  began  to  decline.  A  long  life  was 
still  before  him.  But  it  was  destined  to  be 
filled  with  nothing  but  shame  and  wretched 
ness,  domestic  dissensions,  literary  failures, 
and  pecuniary  embarrassments. 

The  king,  who  was  looking  about  for  an  ac 
complished  man  to  conduct  the  education  of 
his  natural  son,  the  young  Duke  of  Richmond, 
at  length  fixed  on  Wycherley.  The  poet,  ex 
ulting  in  his  good  luck,  went  down  to  amuse 
himself  atTunbridge;  looked  into  a  booksel 
ler's  shop  on  the  Pantiles,  and  to  his  great  de 
light,  heard  a  handsome  woman  ask  for  the 
"Plain  Dealer,"  which  had  just  been  published. 
He  made  acquaintance  with  the  lady,  who 
proved  to  be  the  Countess  of  Drogheda,  a  gay 
young  widow,  with  an  ample  jointure.  She 
was  charmed  with  his  person  and  his  wit;  and, 
after  a  short  flirtation,  agreed  to  become  his 
wife.  Wycherley  seems  to  have  been  appre 
hensive  that  this  connexion  might  not  suit 
well  with  the  king's  plan  respecting  the  Duke 
of  Richmond.  He  accordingly  prevailed  on 
the  lady  to  consent  to  a  private  marriage.  All 
came  out.  Charles  thought  the  conduct  of 

was  one  of  the  battles  between  Rupert  and  DC  Iluyter, 
in  1673. 

The  point  is  of  no  importance ;  and  there  can  scarcely 
he  said  to  he  any  evidence  either  way.  We  offer,  how 
ever,  to  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt's  consideration  three  argu 
ments — of  no  great  weight  certainly — yet  such  as  might, 
we  think,  to  prevail  in  the  absence  of  better  First,  it 
is  not  very  likely  that  a  young  Templar,  quite  unknown 
in  the  world— and  Wycherley  was  such  in  1665 — should 
have  quitted  his  chambers  to  go  to  sea.  On  the  oiher 
hand,  it  would  have  been  in  the  regular  course  of  thing* 
that,  when  a  courtier  and  an  equerry,  he  should  offer 
his  services.  Secondly,  his  verses  appear  to  have  been 
written  after  a  drawn  battle,  like  those  of  1673.  and  not 
after  a  complete  victory  like  that  of  1665.  Thirdly,  in  the 
epilogue  to  the  "  Gentleman  Dancing- Master,"  written 
in  1673,  he  says  thai  "all  gentlemen  must  pack  to  s--eu;" 
an  expression  which  makes  it  probable  that  he  did  n«M 
himself  mean  to  stay  behind. 
2P 


446 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Wycherley  both  disrespectful  and  disinge 
nuous.  Other  causes  probably  assisted  to 
alienate  the  sovereign  from  the  subject  who 
nad  been  so  highly  favoured.  Buckingham 
was  now  in  opposition,  and  had  been  com 
mitted  to  the  Tower;  not,  as  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt 
supposes,  on  a  charge  of  treason,  but  by  an 
order  of  the  House  of  Lords  for  some  expres 
sions  which  he  had  used  in  debate.  Wycherley 
wrote  some  bad  lines  in  praise  of  his  impri 
soned  patron,  which,  if  they  came  to  the 
knowledge  of  the  king,  would  certainly  have 
made  his  majesty  very  angry.  The  favour  of 
the  court  was  completely  withdrawn  from  the 
poet.  An  amiable  woman,  with  a  large  for 
tune,  might  indeed  have  been  an  ample  com 
pensation  for  the  loss.  But  Lady  Drogheda 
was  ill-tempered,  imperious,  and  extravagantly 
jealous.  She  had  herself  been  a  maid  of 
honour  at  Whitehall.  She  well  knew  in  what 
estimation  conjugal  fidelity  was  held  among 
the  fine  gentlemen  there ;  and  watched  her 
town  husband  as  assiduously  as  Mr.  Pinch- 
wife  watched  his  country  wife.  The  unfortu 
nate  wit  was,  indeed,  allowed  to  meet  his 
friends  at  a  tavern  opposite  his  own  house. 
But  on.  such  occasions  the  windows  were 
always  open,  in  order  that  her  ladyship,  who 
was  posted  on  the  other  side  of  the  street, 
might  be  satisfied  that  no  woman  was  of  the 
party. 

The  death  of  Lady  Drogheda  released  the 
unfortunate  poet  from  this  distress ;  but  a  se 
ries  of  disasters,  in  rapid  succession,  broke 
down  his  health,  his  spirits,  and  his  fortune. 
His  wife  meant  to  leave  him  a  good  property, 
and  left  him  only  a  lawsuit.  His  father  could 
not  or  would  not  assist  him.  He  was  at  length 
thrown  into  the  Fleet,  and  languished  there 
during  seven  years,  utterly  forgotten,  as  it 
should  seem,  by  the  gay  and  lively  circle  of 
which  he  had  been  a  distinguished  ornament. 
In  the  extremity  of  his  distress  he  implored 
the  publisher  who  had  been  enriched  by  the 
sale  of  his  works,  to  lend  him  twenty  pounds, 
and  was  refused.  His  comedies,  however, 
still  kept  possession  of  the  stage,  and  drew 
great  audiences,  which  troubled  themselves 
littlo  about  the  situation  of  the  author.  At 
length  James  the  Second,  who  had  now  suc 
ceeded  to  the  throne,  happened  to  go  to  the 
theatre  on  an  evening  when  the  "Plain  Dealer" 
was  acted.  He  was  pleased  by  the  perform 
ance,  and  touched  by  the  fate  of  the  writer, 
whom  he  probably  remembered  as  one  of  the 
gayest  and  handsomest  of  his  brother's  cour- 
tieis.  The  king  determined  to  pay  Wycher- 
ley's  debts,  and  to  settle  on  the  unfortunate 
poet  a  pension  of  200/.  a  year.  This  munifi 
cence,  on  the  part  of  a  prince  who  was  little 
in  the  habit  of  rewarding  literary  merit,  and 
whose  whole  scul  was  devoted  to  the  interests 
of  his  church,  raises  in  us  a  surmise  which 
Mr.  Leigh  Hunt  will,  we  fear,  pronounce  /cry 
uncharitable.  We  cannot  help  suspecting  that 
it  was  at  this  time  that  Wycherley  returned  to 
the  communion  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  That 
he  did  return  to  the  communion  of  the  Church 
of  Rome  is  certain.  The  date  of  his  re-con 
version,  as  far  as  we  know,  has  never  be»n 
mentioned  by  any  biographer.  We  believe 


that,  if  we  place  it  at  this  time,  we  do  no  in 
justice  to  the  character  either  of  Wycherley  or 
I  James. 

Not  long  after,  old  Mr.  Wycherley  died;  and 
|  his  son,  now  past  the  middle  of  life,  came  to 
the  family  estate.  Still,  however,  he  was  not 
at  his  ease.  His  embarrassments  were  great 
his  property  was  strictly  tied  up;  and  he  was 
on  very  bad  terms  with  the  heir-at-law.  He 
appears  to  have  led,  during  a  long  course  of 
years,  that  most  wretched  life,  the  life  of  an 
old  boy  about  town.  Expensive  tastes  with 
little  money,  and  licentious  appetites  with  de 
clining  vigour,  were  the  just  penance  for  his 
early  irregularities.  A  severe  illness  had  pro 
duced  a  singular  effect  on  his  intellect.  His 
memory  played  him  pranks  stranger  than 
almost 'any  that  are  to  be  found  in  the  history 
of  that  strange  faculty.  It  seemed  to  be  at  once 
preternaturally  strong  and  preternatural!/ 
weak.  If  a  book  was  read  to  him  before  he 
went  to  bed,  he  would  wake  the  next  morning 
with  his  mind  full  of  the  thoughts  and  expres 
sions  which  he  had  heard  over  night;  and  he 
would  write  them  down,  without  in  the  least 
suspecting  that  they  were  not  his  own.  In  his 
verses  the  same  ideas,  and  even  the  same 
words  came  over  and  over  again  several  times 
in  a  short  composition.  His  fine  person  bore 
the  marks  of  age,  sickness,  and  sorrow ;  and 
he  mourned  for  his  departed  beauty  with  an 
effeminate  regret.  He  could  not  look  without 
a  sigh  at  the  portrait  which  Lely  had  painted 
of  him  when  he  was  only  twenty-eight;  and 
often  murmured,  Quantum  mutatus  ab  illo.  He 
was  still  nervously  anxious  about  his  literary 
reputation ;  and,  not  content  with  the  fame 
which  he  still  possessed  as  a  dramatist,  was 
determined  to  be  renowned  as  a  satirist  and 
an  amatory  poet. 

In  1704,  after  twenty-seven  years  of  silence, 
he  again  appeared  as  an  author.  He  put  forth 
a  large  folio  of  miscellaneous  verses,  which, 
we  believe,  has  never  been  reprinted.  Some 
of  these  pieces  had  probably  circulated  through 
the  town  in  manuscript ;  for,  before  the  volume 
appeared,  the  critics  at  the  coffee-houses  very 
confidently  predicted  that  it  would  be  utterly- 
worthless;  and  were,  in  consequence,  bitterly 
reviled  by  the  poet  in  an  ill-written,  foolish, 
and  egotistical  preface.  The  book  amply  vin 
dicated  the  most  unfavourable  prophecies  that 
had  been  hazarded.  The  style  and  versifica 
tion  are  beneath  criticism;  the  morals  are 
those  of  Rochester.  For  Rochester,  indeed, 
there  was  some  excuse.  When  his  offences 
against  decorum  were  committed,  he  was  a 
very  young  man,  misled  by  a  prevailing  fash 
ion.  Wycherley  was  sixty-four.  He  had  long 
outlived  the  times  when"  libertinism  was  re 
garded  as  essential  to  the  character  of  a  wit 
and  a  gentleman.  Most  of  the  rising  poets, 
like  Addison,  John  Philips,  and  Rowe,  were 
studious  of  decency.  We  can  hardly  conceive 
any  thing  more  miserable  than  the  figure  which 
the  ribald  old  man  makes  in  the  midst  of  so 
many  sober  and  well-conducted  youths. 

In  the  very  year  in  which  this  bulky  volume 
of  obscene  doggerel  was  published,  Wycherley 
formed  an  acquaintance  of  a  very  singular 
kind.  A  little,  pale,  crooked  sickly,  bright- 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE  RESTORATION. 


447 


eyed  urchin,  just  turned  of  sixteen,  had  written 
some  copies  of  verses,  in  which  discerning 
judges  could  detect  the  promise  of  future  emi 
nence.  There  was,  indeed,  as  yet  nothing  very 
striking  or  original  in  the  conceptions  of  the 
young  poet.  But  he  was  already  skilled  in  the 
art  of  metrical  composition.  His  diction  and 
his  music  were  not  these  of  the  great  old  mas 
ters,  but  that  which  his  ablest  contemporaries 
were  labouring  to  do,  he  already  did  best.  His 
style  was  not  richly  poetical,  but  it  was  always 
neat,  compact,  and  pointed.  His  verse  wanted 
variety  of  pause,  of  swell,  and  of  cadence;  but 
it  never  grated  on  the  ear  by  a  harsh  turn,  or 
disappointed  it  by  a  feeble  close.  The  youth 
was  already  free  of  the  company  of  wits,  and 
was  greatly  elated  at  being  introduced  to  the 
author  of  the  "Plain  Dealer"  and  the  "Country 
Wife." 

It  is  curious  to  trace  the  history  of  the  inter 
course  which  took  place  between  Wycherley 
and  Pope — between  the  representative  of  the 
age  that  was  going  out,  and  the  representative 
of  the  age  that  was  coming  in — between  the 
friend  of  Rochester  and  Buckingham,  and  the 
friend  of  Lyttleton  and  Mansfield.  At  first  the 
boy  was  enchanted  by  the  kindness  and  conde 
scension  of  his  new  friend,  haunted  his  door, 
and  followed  him  about  like  a  spaniel,  from 
coffee-house  to  coffee-house.  Letters  full  of 
affection,  humility,  and  fulsome  flattery,  were 
interchanged  between  the  friends.  But  the 
first  ardour  of  affection  could  not  last.  Pope, 
though  at  no  time  scrupulously  delicate  in  his 
writings,  or  fastidious  as  to  the  morals  of  his 
associates,  was  shocked  by  the  indecency  of  a 
rake  who,  at  seventy,  was  still  the  representa 
tive  of  the  monstrous  profligacy  of  the  Restora 
tion.  As  he  grew  older,  as  his  mind  expanded 
and  his  fame  rose,  he  appreciated  both  himself 
and  Wycherley  more  justly.  He  felt  a  well- 
founded  contempt  for  the  old  gentleman's 
verses,  and  was  at  no  great  pains  to  conceal 
his  opinion.  Wycherley,  on  the  other  hand, 
though  blinded  by  self-love  to  the  imperfections 
of  what  he  called  his  poetry,  could  not  but  see 
that  there  was  an  immense  difference  between 
his  young  companion's  rhymes  and  his  own. 
He  was  divided  between  two  feelings.  He 
wished  to  have  the  assistance  of  so  skilful  a 
hand  to  polish  his  lines;  and  yet  he  shrank 
from  the  humiliation  of  being  beholden  for 
literary  assistance  to  a  lad  who  might  have 
been  his  grandson.  Pope  was  willing  to  give 
assistance,  but  was  by  no  means  disposed  to 
give  assistance  and  flattery  too.  He  took  the 
trouble  to  retouch  whole  reams  of  feeble,  stum 
bling  verses,  and  inserted  many  vigorous  lines, 
which  the  least  skilful  reader  will  distinguish 
in  an  instant.  But  he  thought  that  by  these 
services  he  acquired  a  right  to  express  him 
self  in  terms  which  would  not,  under  ordinary 
circumstances,  become  a  youth  when  address 
ing  a  man  of  four  times  his  age.  In  one  letter 
he  tells  Wycherley  that  "  the  worst  pieces  are 
such  as,  to  render  them  very  good,  would  re 
quire  almost  the  entire  new  writing  of  them." 
In  another  he  gives  the  following  account  of 
his  corrections: — "Though  the  whole  be  as 
short  again  as  at  first,  there  is  not  one  thought 
milled  but  what  is  a  repetition  of  something 


in  your  first  volume,  or  in  this  very  paper :  and 
the  versification  throughout  is,  I  believe,  such 
as  nobody  can  be  shocked  at.  The  repeated 
permission  you  give  me  of  dealing  freely  with 
you,  will,  I  hope,  excuse  what  I  have  done;  for, 
if  I  have  not  spared  you  when  I  thought  seve 
rity  would  do  you  a  kindness,  I  have  not  man 
gled  you  where  I  thought  there  was  no  absolute 
need  of  amputation."  Wycherley  continued 
to  return  thanks  for  all  this  hacking  and  hew 
ing,  which  was,  indeed,  of  inestimable  service 
to  his  compositions.  But  by  degrees  his  thanks 
began  to  sound  very  like  reproaches.  In  pri 
vate  he  is  said  to  have  described  Pope  as  a 
person  who  could  not  cut  out  a  suit,  but  who 
had  some  skill  in  turning  old  coats.  In  his 
letter  to  Pope,  while  he  acknowledged  that  the 
versification  of  his  poems  had  been  greatly 
improved,  he  spoke  of  the  whole  art  of  versifi 
cation  with  scorn,  and  sneered  at  those  who 
preferred  sound  to  sense.  Pope  revenged  him 
self  for  this  outbreak  of  spleen  by  return  of 
post.  He  had  in  his  hands  a  volume  of  Wy 
cherley 's  rhymes,  and  he  wrote  to  say  that  this 
volume  was  so  full  of  faults  that  he  could  not 
correct  it  without  completely  defacing  the  ma 
nuscript.  "I  am,"  he  said,  "equally  afraid  of 
sparing  you,  and  of  offending  you  by  too  impu 
dent  a  correction."  This  was  more  than  flesh 
and  blood  could  bear:  Wycherley  reclaimed 
his  papers,  in  a  letter  in  which  resentment 
shows  itself  plainly  through  the  thin  disguise 
of  civility.  Pope,  glad  to  be  rid  of  a  trouble 
some  and  inglorious  task,  sent  back  the  depo 
sit;  and,  byway  of  a  parting  courtesy,  advised 
the  old  man  to  turn  his  poetry  into  prose,  and 
assured  him  that  the  public  would  like  his 
thoughts  much  better  without  his  versification. 
Thus  ended  this  memorable  correspondence. 

Wycherley  lived  some  years  after  the  termi 
nation  of  the  strange  friendship  which  we  have 
described.  The  last  scene  of  his  life  was 
perhaps,  the  most  scandalous.  Ten  days  before 
his  death,  at  seventy-five,  he  married  a  young 
girl,  merely  in  order  to  injure  his  nephew;  an 
act  which  proves  that  neither  years,  nor  adver 
sity,  nor  what  he  called  his  philosophy,  nor 
either  of  the  religions  which  he  had  at  different 
times  professed,  had  taught  him  the  rudiments 
of  morality.  He  died  in  December,  1715,  and 
lies  in  the  vault  under  the  church  of  St.  Paul, 
in  Covent-Garden. 

His  bride  soon  after  married  a  Captain 
Shrimpton,  who  thus  became  possessed  of  a 
large  collection  of  manuscripts.  These  were 
sold  to  a  bookseller.  They  were  so  full  of 
erasures  and  interlineations  that  no  printer 
could  decipher  them.  It  was  necessary  to  call 
in  the  aid  of  a  professed  critic  ;  and  Theobald, 
the  editor  of  Shakspeare,  and  the  hero  of  the 
first  Dunciad,  was  employed  to  ascertain  tho 
true  reading.  In  this  way  a  volume  of  miscel 
lanies  in  verse  and  prose  was  got  up  for  the 
market.  The  collection  derives  all  its  value 
from  the  traces  of  Pope's  hand,  which  are  every 
where  discernible. 

Of  the  moral  character  of  Wycherley  it  can 
hardly  be  necessary  for  us  to  say  more.  His 
fame  as  a  writer  rests  wholly  on  his  comedies, 
and  chiefly  on  the  last  two.  Even  as  a  comic 
writer,  he  was  neither  of  the  best  school,  nor 


* 


448 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


• 


highest  in  his  school.  He  was  in  truth  a  worse 
Congreve.  His  chief  merit,  like  Congreve, 
lies  in  the  style  of  his  dialogue.  But  the  wit 
which  lights  up  the  "Plain  Dealer"  and  the 
"  Country  Wife"  is  pale  and  flickering,  when 
compared  with  the  gorgeous  blaze  which  daz- 
7les  us  almost  to  blindness  in  "Love  for  Love" 
and  the  "  Way  of  the  World."  Like  Congreve 
• — and,  indeed,  even  more  than  Congreve — 
Wycherley  is  ready  to  sacrifice  dramatic  pro 
priety  to  the  liveliness  of  his  dialogue.  The 
poet  speaks  out  of  the  mouths  of  all  his  dunces 
and  coxcombs,  and  makes  them  describe  them 
selves  with  a  good  sense  and  acuteness  which 
puts  them  on  a  level  with  the  wits  and  heroes. 
We  will  give  two  instances,  the  first  which  oc 
cur  to  us,  from  the  "  Country  Wife."  There 
are  to  be  found  in  the  world  fools  who  find  the 
society  of  old  friends  insipid,  and  who  are 
always  running  after  new  companions.  Such 
a  character  is  a  fair  subject  for  comedy.  But 
nothing  can  be  more  absurd  than  to  introduce 
a  man  of  this  sort  saying  to  his  comrade — "I 
can  deny  you  nothing;  for  though  I  have 
known  thee  a  great  while,  never  go  if  I  do  not 
love  thee  as  well  as  a  new  acquaintance."  That 
town  wits,  again,  have  always  been  rather  a 
heartless  class,  is  true.  But  none  of  them,  we 
will  answer  for  it,  ever  said  to  a  young  lady  to 
whom  he  was  making  love — "  We  wits  rail  and 
make  love  often  but  to  show  our  parts :  as  we 
have  no  affections,  so  we  have  no  malice." 

Wycherley's  plays  are  said  to  have  been  the 
produce  of  long  and  patient  labour.  The  epi 
thet  of  "  slow"  was  early  given  to  him  by  Ro 
chester,  and  was  frequently  repeated.  In  truth, 
his  mind,  unless  we  are  greatly  mistaken,  was 
naturally  a  very  meager  soil,  and  was  forced 
only  by  great  labour  and  outlay  to  bear  fruit, 
which,  after  all,  was  not  of  the  highest  flavour. 
He  has  scarcely  more  claim  to  originality  than 
Terence.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say,  that  there 
is  hardly  any  thing  of  the  least  value  in  his 
plays,  of  which  the  hint  is  not  to  be  found  else 
where.  The  best  scenes  in  the  "Gentleman 
Dancing-Master,"  were  suggested  by  Calderon's 
Maestro  de  Danzar,  not  by  any  means  one  of  the 
happiest  comedies  of  the  great  Castilian  poet. 
The  "  Country  Wife"  is  borrowed  from  the 
Ecole  des  Maris  and  the  Ecole  des  Femmes.  The 
groundwork  of  the  "  Plain  Dealer"  is  taken 
from  the  Misanthrope  of  Moliere.  One  whole 
scene  is  almost  translated  from  the  Critique  de 
F Ecole  des  Femmes;  Fidelia  is  Shakspeare's 
Viola  stolen,  and  marred  in  the  stealing;  and 
the  Widow  Blackacre,  beyond  comparison 
Wycherley's  best  comic  character,  is  the 
Countess  in  Racine's  Plaideurs,  talking  the 
jargon  of  English  instead  of  that  of  French 
chicane. 

The  only  thing  original  about  Wycherley — 
the  only  thing  which  he  could  furnish  from  his 
own  mind  in  inexhaustible  abundance — was 
profligacy.  It  is  curious  to  observe  how  every 
thing  that  he  touched,  however  pure  and  noble, 
took  in  an  instant  the  colour  of  his  own  mind. 
Compare  the  Ecole  des  Femmes  with  the  "Coun 
try  WTife."  Agnes  is  a  simple  and  amiable 
girl,  whose  heart  is  indeed  full  of  love,  but  of 
love  sanctioned  by  honour,  morality,  and  rc- 
Her  natural  talents  are  great.  They 


have  been  hidden,  and,  as  it  might  appear,  de 
stroyed  by  an  education  elaborately  bad.  But 
they  are  called  forth  into  full  energy  by  a  virtu 
ous  passion.  Her  lover,  while  he  adores  her 
beauty,  is  too  hones^a  man  to  abuse  the  con 
fiding  tenderness  of  a  creature  so  charming 
and  inexperienced.  Wycherley  takes  this  plot 
into  his  hands ;  and  forthwith  this  sweet  and 
graceful  courtship  becomes  a  licentious  in 
trigue  of  the  lowest  and  least  sentimental  kind, 
between  an  impudent  London  rake  and  the 
idiot  wife  of  a  country  squire.  We  will  not 
go  into  details.  In  truth,  Wycherley's  indecency 
is  protected  against  the  critics  as  a  skunk  io 
protected  against  the  hunters.  It  is  safe,  be 
cause  it  is  too  filthy  to  handle,  and  too  noisomo 
even  to  approach. 

It  is  the  same  with  the  "  Plain  Dealer."  How 
careful  has  Shakspeare  been  in  "Twelfth 
Night,"  to  preserve  the  dignity  and  delicacy  of 
Viola,  under  her  disguise  !  Even  when  wear 
ing  a  page's  doublet  and  hose,  she  is  never 
mixed  up  with  any  transaction  which  the  most 
fastidious  mind  could  regard  as  Leaving  a  stain 
on  her.  She  is  employed  by  the  Duke  on  an 
embassy  of  love  to  Olivia ;  but  on  an  embassy 
of  the  most  honourable  kind.  Wycherley  bor 
rows  Viola — and  Viola  forthwith  becomes  a 
pander  of  the  basest  sort.  But  the  character 
of  Manly  is  the  best  illustration  of  our  mean 
ing.  Moliere  exhibited  in  his  misanthrope  a 
pure  and  noble  mind,  which  had  been  sorely 
vexed  by  the  sight  of  perfidy  and  malevolence, 
disguised  under  the  forms  of  politeness.  As 
every  extreme  naturally  generates  its  contrary, 
Alceste  adopts  a  standard  of  good  and  evil  di 
rectly  opposed  to  that  of  the  society  which  sur 
rounds  him.  Courtesy  seems  to  him  a  vice  ; 
and  those  stern  virtues  which  are  neglected  by 
the  fops  and  coquettes  of  Paris  become  too 
exclusively  the  objects  of  his  veneration.  He 
is  often  to  blame ;  he  is  often  ridiculous ;  but 
he  is  always  a  good  man ;  and  the  feeling  which 
he  inspires  is  regret  that  a  person  so  estimable 
should  be  so  unamiable.  Wycherley  borrowed 
Alceste,  and  turned  him — we  quote  the  words 
of  so  lenient  a  critic  as  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt — intc 
"  a  ferocious  sensualist,  who  believed  himself 
as  great  a  rascal  as  he  thought  everybody 
else."  The  surliness  of  Moliere's  hero  is 
copied  and  caricatured.  But  the  most  nause 
ous  libertinism  and  the  most  dastardly  fraud 
are  substituted  for  the  purity  and  integrity  of 
the  original.  And,  to  make  the  whole  com~ 
plete,  Wycherley  does  not  seem  to  have  been 
aware  that  he  was  not  drawing  the  portrait  of 
an  eminently  honest  man.  So  depraved  was 
his  moral  taste,  that,  while  he  firmly  believed 
he  was  producing  a  picture  of  virtue  too  ex 
alted  for  the  commerce  of  this  world,  he  was 
really  delineating  the  greatest  rascal  that  is  to 
be  found,  even  in  his  own  writings. 

We  pass  a  very  severe  censure  on  Wycher 
ley,  when  we  say  that  it  is  a  relief  to  turn  from 
him  to  Congreve.  Congreve's  writings,  in 
deed,  are  by  no  means  pure,  nor  was  he,  as  far 
as  we  are  able  to  judge,  a  warm-hearted  or 
high-minded  man.  Yet,  in  coming  to  him,  we 
feel  that  the  worst  is  over — that  we  are  one  re 
move  farther  from  the  Restoration— that  we  are 
past  the  Nadir  of  national  taste  and  morality. 


COMIC   DRAMATISTS   OF  THE   RESTORATION. 


4-19 


COS-RBEVE  was  born  in  1670,*  at 
Bardsey,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Leeds.  His 
father,  a  younger  son  of  a  very  ancient  Staf 
fordshire  family,  had  distinguished  himself 
among  the  Cavaliers  in  the  Civil  War,  was  set 
down  after  the  Restoration  for  the  Order  of  the 
Royal  Oak,  and  subsequently  settled  in  Ire 
land,  under  the  patronage  of  the  Earl  of  Bur 
lington. 

Congreve  passed  his  childhood  and  youth 
in  Ireland.  He  was  sent  to  school  at  Kilkenny, 
and  thence  went  to  the  University  of  Dublin. 
His  learning  does  great  honour  to  his  instruct- 
ers.  From  his  writings  it  appears,  not  only 
that  he  was  well  acquainted  with  Latin  litera 
ture,  but  that  his  knowledge  of  the  Greek  poets 
was  such  as  was  not,  in  his  time,  common  even 
in  a  college. 

When  he  had  completed  his  academical  stu 
dies,  he  was  sent  to  London  to  study  the  law, 
and  was  entered  of  the  Middle  Temple.  He 
troubled  himself,  however,  very  little  about 
pleading  or  conveyancing;  and  gave  himself 
up  to  literature  and  society.  Two  kinds  of 
ambition  early  took  possession  of  his  mind, 
and  often  pulled  it  in  opposite  directions.  He 
was  conscious  of  great  fertility  of  thought,  and 
power  of  ingenious  combination.  His  lively 
conversation,  his  polished  manners,  and  his 
highly  respectable  connections  had  obtained 
for  him  ready  access  to  the  best  company.  He 
longed  to  be  a  great  writer.  He  longed  to  be  a 
man  of  fashion.  Either  object  was  within  his 
reach.  But  could  he  secure  both  ?  Was  there 
not  something  vulgar  in  letters — something 
inconsistent  with  the  easy  apathetic  graces  of  a 
man  of  the  mode?  Was  it  aristocratical  to  be 
confounded  with  creatures  who  lived  in  the 
cocklofts  of  Grub  Street,  to  bargain  with  pub 
lishers,  to  hurry  printers'  devils,  to  squabble 
with  managers,  to  be  applauded  or  hissed  by 
pit,  boxes,  and  galleries  !  Could  he  forego  the 
renown  of  being  the  first  wit  of  his  age  ? 
Could  he  attain  that  renown  without  sullying 
what  he  valued  quite  as  much — his  character 
for  gentility  1  The  history  of  his  life  is  the 
history  of  a  conflict  between  these  two  im 
pulses.  In  his  youth  the  desire  of  literary 
fame  had  the  mastery ;  but  soon  the  meaner 
ambition  overpowered  the  higher,  and  obtained 
supreme  dominion  over  his  mind. 

His  first  work,  a  novel  of  no  great  value,  he 
published  under  the  assumed  name  of  "Cleo- 
phil."  His  second  was  the  "Old  Bachelor," 
acted  in  1693,  a  play  inferior  indeed  to  his 
other  comedies,  but,  in  its  own  line,  inferior  to 
them  alone.  The  plot  is  equally  destitute  of 
interest  and  of  probability.  The  characters 
are  either  not  distinguishable,  or  are  distin 
guished  only  by  peculiarities  of  the  most  glar 
ing  kind.  But  the  dialogue  is  resplendent  with 
wit  and  eloquence — which  indeed  are  so  abun 
dant  that  the  fools  come  in  for  an  ample  share 
—and  yet  preserves  a  certain  colloquial  air,  a 
certain  indescribable  ease,  of  which  Wycher- 
ley  had  given  no  example,  and  which  Sheridan 
in  vain  attempted  to  imitate.  The  author, 
divided  between  pride  and  shame — pride  at 


*  Mr.  T.eigh  Hunt  says  1669.     But  the  Old  Style  has 
misled  him. 

VOL.  IV.— 57 


having  written  a  good  play,  and  shame  at 
having  done  an  ungentlemanlike  thing — pre 
tended  that  he  had  merely  scribbled  a  few 
scenes  for  his  own  amusement,  and  affected  to 
yield  unwillingly  to  the  importunities  of  those 
who  pressed  him  to  try  his  fortune  on  the 
stage.  The  "Old  Bachelor"  was  seen  in 
manuscript  by  Dryden;  one  of  whose  best 
qualities  was  a  hearty  and  generous  admira 
tion  for  the  talents  of  others.  He  declared  that 
he  had  never  seen  such  a  first  play ;  and  lent 
his  services  to  bring  it  into  a  form  fit  for  re 
presentation.  Nothing  was  wanting  to  the 
success  of  the  piece.  It  was  so  cast  as  to  bring 
into  play  all  the  comic  talent,  and  to  exhibit  on 
the  boards  in  one  view  all  the  beauty  which 
Drury  Lane  Theatre,  then  the  only  theatre  in 
London,  could  assemble.  The  result  was  a 
complete  triumph ;  and  the  author  was  grati 
fied  with  rewards  more  substantial  than  the 
applauses  of  the  pit.  Montagu,  then  a  Lord  of 
the  Treasury,  immediately  gave  him  a  place, 
and,  in  a  short  time,  added  the  reversion  of 
another  place  of  much  greature  value,  which, 
however,  did  not  become  vacant  till  many 
years  had  elapsed. 

In  1694,  Congreve  brought  out  the  "Double- 
Dealer,"  a  comedy  in  which  all  the  powers 
which  had  produced  the  "  Old  Bachelor"  show 
themselves,  matured  by  time  and  improved  bj 
exercise.  But  the  audience  was  shocked  by 
the  characters  of  Maskwell  and  Lady  Touch 
wood.  And,  indeed,  there  is  something  strangely 
revolting  in  the  way  in  which  a  group  that 
seems  to  belong  to  the  house  of  Laius  or  of 
Pelops,  is  introduced  into  the  midst  of  the 
Brisks,  Froths,  Carelesses,  and  Plyants.  Ths 
play  was  unfavourably  received.  Yet,  if  the 
praise  of  distinguished  men  could  compensate 
an  author  for  the  disapprobation  of  the  multi 
tude,  Congreve  had  no  reason  to  repine.  Dry- 
den,  in  one  of  the  most  ingenious,  magnificent, 
and  pathetic  pieces  that  he  ever  wrote,  extolled 
the  author  of  the  "  Double-Dealer"  in  terms 
which  now  appear  extravagantly  hyperbolical. 
Till  Congreve  came  forth— so  ran  this  exqui 
site  flattery — the  superiority  of  the  poets  who 
preceded  the  civil  wars  was  acknowledged. 

"Theirs  was  the  giant  race  before  the  flood." 

Since  the  return  of  the  royal  house,  much  art 
and  ability  had  been  exerted,  but  the  old  mas 
ters  had  been  still  unrivalled. 

"Our  builders  were  with  want  of  genius  curst. 
The  second  temple  was  not  like  the  first.' 

At  length  a  writer  had  arisen  who,  just  emeijs, 
ing  from  boyhood,  had  surpassed  the  authors 
of  the  "  Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestic,"  and  ihe 
"  Silent  Woman,"  and  who  had  only  one  rival 
left  to  contend  with. 

"Heaven,  that  but  once  was  prodigal  before, 
To  8hakspe%re  gave  as  much,  he  could  not  givt^  him 
more." 

Some  lines  near  the  end  of  the  poem  are  ?.in 
gularly  graceful  and  touching,  and  sank  i-ep 
into  the  heart  of  Congreve. 

"  Already  am  I  worn  with  cares  and  age, 
And  just  abandoning  the  ungrateful  stage  ; 
But  you,  whom  every  Muse  and  Grace  adorn. 
Whom  I  foresee  to  better  fortune  born, 
2*2 


450 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Be  kind  to  my  remains  ;  and,  oh.  defend 
Against  your  judgment  your  departed  friend; 
Lei  not  the  insulting  foe  my  fame  pursue, 
But  guard  those  laurels  which  descend  to  you." 

The  crowd,  as  usual,  gradually  came  over  to 
the  opinion  of  the  men  of  note;  and  the  "Dou 
ble-Dealer"  was  before  long  quite  as  much 
admired,  though  perhaps  never  so  much  liked 
as  the  "Old  Bachelor." 

In  1695  appeared  "Love  for  Love,"  superior 
both  in  wit  and  in  scenic  effect  to  either  of  the 
preceding  plays.  It  was  performed  at  a  new 
theatre  which  Betterton  and  some  other  actors, 
disgusted  by  the  treatment  which  they  received 
in  Drury  Lane,  just  opened  in  a  tennis-court 
near  Lincoln's  Inn.  Scarcely  any  comedy 
within  the  memory  of  the  oldest  man  had  been 
equally  successful.  The  actors  were  so  elated 
that  they  gave  Congreve  a  share  in  their 
theatre,  and  he  promised,  in  return,  to  furnish 
them  with  a  play  every  year,  if  his  health 
would  permit.  Two  years  passed,  however, 
before  he  produced  the  "  Mourning  Bride  ;"  a 
play  which,  paltry  as  it  is  when  compared,  we 
do  not  say  with  Lear  or  Macbeth,  but  with  the 
best  dramas  of  Massinger  and  Ford,  stands 
very  high  among  the  tragedies  of  the  age  in 
which  it  was  written.  To  find  any  thing  so 
good  we  must  go  twelve  years  back  to  "  Venice 
Preserved"  or  six  years  forward  to  the  "  Fair 
Penitent."  The  noble  passage  which  Johnson, 
in  writing  and  in  conversation,  extolled  above 
any  other  in  the  English  drama,  has  suffered 
greatly  in  the  public  estimation  from  the  ex 
travagance  of  his  praise.  Had  he  contented 
himself  with  saying  that  it  was  finer  than  any 
thing  in  the  tragedies  of  Dryden,  Otway,  Lee, 
Rowe,  Southern,  Hughes,  and  Addison — than 
any  thing,  in  short,  that  had  been  written  for 
the  stage  since  the  time  of  Charles  the  First — 
he  would  not  have  been  in  the  wrong. 

The  success  of  the  "Mourning  Bride"  was 
even  greater  than  that  of  "  Love  for  Love." 
Congreve  was  now  allowed  to  be  the  first  tra 
gic,  as  well  as  the  first  comic  dramatist  of  his 
time ;  and  all  this  at  twenty-seven.  We  be 
lieve  that  no  English  writer,  except  Lord  Byron, 
has,  at  so  early  an  age,  stood  so  high  in  the 
estimation  of  his  contemporaries. 

At  this  time  took  place  an  event  which  de 
serves,  in  our  opinion,  a  very  different  sort  of 
notice  from  that  which  has  been  bestowed  on 
it  by  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt.  The  nation  had  now 
nearly  recovered  from  the  demoralizing  effect 
of  the  Puritan  austerity.  The  gloomy  follies 
of  the  reign  of  the  Saints  were  but  faintly  re 
membered.  The  evils  produced  by  profane- 
ness  and  debauchery  were  recent  and  glaring. 
The  court,  since  the  Revolution,  had  ceased  to 
patronise  licentiousness.  Mary  was  strictly 
pious ;  and  the  vices  of  the  cold,  stern,  and 
silent  William,  were  not  obtruded  on  the  pub 
lic  eye.  Discountenanced  by  thefgovernment, 
and  falling  in  the  favour  of  the  people,  the  pro- 
iligacy  of  the  Restoration  still  maintained  its 
ground  in  some  parts  of  society.  Its  strong 
holds  were  the  places  where  men  of  wit  and 
fashion  congregated,  and  above  all,  the  thea 
tres.  At  this  conjuncture  arose  a  great  refor 
mer,  whom,  widely  as  we  differ  from  him  in 


many  important  points,  we  can  never  mention 
without  respect. 

Jeremy  Collier  was  a  clergyman  of  the 
Church  of  England,  bred  at  Cambridge.  His 
talents  and  attainments  were  such  as  might 
have  been  expected  to  raise  him  to  the  highest 
honours  of  his  profession.  He  had  an  exten 
sive  knowledge  of  books,  and  yet  he  had 
mingled  with  polite  society,  and  is  said  not  to 
have  wanted  either  grace  or  vivacity  in  con 
versation.  There  were  few  branches  of  lite 
rature  to  which  he  had  not  paid  some  attention. 
But  ecclesiastical  antiquity  was  his  favourite 
study.  In  religious  opinions  he  belonged  to 
that  section  of  the  Church  of  England  which 
lies  furthest  from  Geneva  and  nearest  to  Rome. 
His  notions  touching  Episcopal  government, 
holy  orders,  the  efficacy  of  the  sacraments,  the 
authority  of  the  Fathers,  the  guilt  of  schism, 
the  importance  of  vestments,  ceremonies,  and 
solemn  days,  differed  little  from  those  which 
are  now  held  by  Dr.  Pusey  and  Mr.  Newman. 
Towards  the  close  of  his  life,  indeed,  Collier 
took  some  steps  which  brought  him  still  nearer 
to  Popery — mixed  water  with  the  wine  in  the 
Eucharist,  made  the  sign  of  the  cross  in  con 
firmation,  employed  oil  in  the  visitation  of  the 
sick,  and  offered  up  prayers  for  the  dead.  His 
politics  were  of  a  piece  with  his  divinity.  He 
was  a  Tory  of  the  highest  sort,  such  as  in  the 
cant  of  that  age  was  called  a  Tantivy.  Not 
even  the  tyranny  of  James,  not  even  the  per 
secution  of  the  bishops  and  the  spoliation  of 
the  universities,  could  shake  that  steady  loy 
alty.  While  the  Convention  was  sitting,  Col 
lier  wrote  with  vehemence  in  defence  of  the 
fugitive  king,  and  was  in  consequence  arrested.  3 
But  his  dauntless  spirit  was  not  to  be  so  tamed* 
He  refused  to  take  the  oaths,  renounced  all  his 
preferments,  and,  in  a  succession  of  pamphlets 
written  with  much  violence  and  with  some 
ability,  attempted  to  excite  the  nation  against 
its  new  masters.  In  1692,  he  was  again  ar 
rested  on  suspicion  of  having  been  concerned 
in  a  treasonable  plot.  So  unbending  were  his 
principles  that  his  friends  could  hardly  per 
suade  him  to  let  them  bail  him  ;  and  he  after 
wards  expressed  his  remorse  for  having  been  * 
induced  thus  to  acknowledge,  by  implication, 
the  authority  of  a  usurping  government.  He 
was  soon  in  trouble  again.  Sir  John  Friend 
and  Sir  William  Parkins  were  tried  and  con 
victed  of  high  treason  for  planning  the  murder 
of  King  William.  Collier  administered  spi 
ritual  consolation  to  them,  attended  them  to 
Tyburn,  and  just  before  their  execution  laid 
his  hands  on  their  heads,  and  by  the  authority 
which  he  derived  from  Christ,  solemnly  ab 
solved  them.  This  scene  gave  indescribable 
scandal.  Tories  joined  with  Whigs  in  blam 
ing  the  conduct  of  the  daring  priest.  There 
are,  it  was  said,  some  acts  which  fall  under  the 
definition  of  treason  into  which  a  good  man 
may,  in  troubled  times,  be  led  even  by  his  vir 
tues.  It  may  be  necessary  for  the  protection 
of  society  to  punish  such  a  man.  But  even  in. 
punishing  him  we  consider  him  as  legally 
rather  than  morally  guilty,  and  hope  that  his 
honest  error,  though  it  cannot  be  pardoned 
here,  will  not  be  counted  to  him  for  sin  here- 


COMIC   DRAMATISTS  OF  THE   RESTORATION. 


451 


after.  But  such  was  not  the  case  of  Collier's 
penitents.  They  were  concerned  in  a  plot  for 
waylaying  and  butchering,  in  an  hour  of  secu 
rity,  one  who,  whether  he  were  or  were  not 
their  king,  was  at  all  events  their  fellow-crea 
ture.  Whether  the  Jacobite  theory  about  the 
rights  of  governments,  and  the  duties  of  sub 
jects,  were  or  were  not  well  founded,  assassi 
nation  must  always  be  considered  as  a  great 
crime.  It  is  condemned  even  by  the  maxims 
of  worldly  honour  and  morality.  Much  more 
must  it  be  an  object  of  abhorrence  to  the  pure 
Spouse  of  Christ.  The  Church  cannot  surely, 
without  the  saddest  and  most  mournful  fore 
bodings,  see  one  of  her  children  who  has  been 
guilty  of  this  great  wickedness,  pass  into  eter 
nity  without  any  sign  of  repentance.  That 
these  traitors  had  given  any  sign  of  repentance 
was  not  alleged.  It  might  be  that  they  had 
privately  declared  their  contrition;  and,  if  so, 
the  minister  of  religion  might  be  justified  in 
privately  assuring  them  of  the  Divine  forgive 
ness.  But  a  public  remission  ought  to  have 
been  preceded  by  a  public  atonement.  The 
regret  of  these  men,  if  expressed  at  all,  had 
been  expressed  in  secret.  The  hands  of  Col 
lier  had  been  laid  on  them  in  the  presence  of 
thousands.  The  inference  which  his  enemies 
drew  from  his  conduct  was,  that  he  did  not 
consider  the  conspiracy  against  the  life  of 
William  as  sinful.  But  this  inference  he  very 
vehemently,  and,  we  doubt  not,  very  sincerely 
denied. 

The  storm  raged.  The  bishops  put  forth  a 
solemn  censure  of  the  absolution.  The  At 
torney-General  brought  the  matter  before  the 
Court  of  King's  Bench.  Collier  had  now 
made  up  his  mind  not  to  give  bail  for  his  ap 
pearance  before  any  court  which  derived  its 
authority  from  the  usurper.  He  accordingly 
absconded,  and  was  outlawed.  He  survived 
these  events  abdut  thirty  years.  The  prose 
cution  was  not  pressed,  and  he  was  soon  suf 
fered  to  resume  his  literary  pursuits  in  quiet. 
At  a  later  period,  many  attempts  were  made  to 
shake  his  perverse  integrity  by  offers  of  wealth 
and  dignity,  but  in  vain.  When  he  died,  to 
wards  the  end  of  the  reign  of  George  I.,  he  was 
still  under  the  ban  of  the  law. 

We  shrll  not  be  suspected  of  regarding 
eitheV  the  politics  or  the  theology  of  Collier 
with  partiality;  but  we  believe  him  to  have 
been  as  honest  and  courageous  a  man  as  ever 
lived.  We  will  go  further,  and  say  that, 
though  passionate  and  often  wrong-headed,  he 
was  a  singularly  fair  controversialist — candid, 
generous,  too  high-spirited  to  take  mean  ad 
vantages  even  in  the  most  exciting  disputes, 
and  pure  from  all  taint  of  personal  malevo 
lence.  It  must  also  be  admitted  that  his  opi 
nions  on  ecclesiastical  and  political  affairs, 
though  in  themselves  absurd  and  pernicious, 
eminently  qualified  him  to  be  the  reformer  of 
our  lighter  literature.  The  libertinism  of  the 
press  and  of  the  stage,  was,  as  we  have  said, 
the  effect  of  the  reaction  against  the  Puritan 
strictness.  Profligacy  was,  like  the  oak  leaf 
on  the  twenty-ninth  of  May,  the  badge  of  a 
Cavalier  and  a  High  Churchman.  Decency 
was  associated  with  conventicles  and  calves' 
head.  GraveQarelates  were  too  much  disposed  I 


to  wink  at  the  excesses  of  a  body  of  zealous 
and  able  allies,  who  covered  Roundheads  and 
Presbyterians  with  ridicule.  If  a  Whig  raised 
his  voice  against  the  impiety  and  licentious 
ness  of  the  fashionable  writers,  his  mouth  was 
instantly  stopped  by  the  retort — You  are  one 
of  those  who  groan  at  a  light  quotation  from 
Scripture,  and  raise  estates  out  of  the  plunder 
of  the  Church. — who  shudder  at  a  double  en 
tendre,  and  chop  off  the  heads  of  kings.  A 
Baxter,  a  Burnet,  even  a  Tillotson,  would  have 
done  little  to  purify  our  literature.  But  when 
a  man,  fanatical  in  the  cause  of  Episcopacy, 
and  actually  under  outlawry  for  his  attach 
ment  to  hereditary  right,  came  forward  as  the 
champion  of  decency,  the  battle  was  already 
half  won. 

In  1698,  Collier  published  his  "Short  View 
of  the  Profaneness  and  Immorality  of  the 
English  Stage,"  a  book  which  threw  the  whole 
literary  world  into  commotion,  but  which  is 
now  much  less  read  than  it  deserves.  The 
faults  of  the  work,  indeed,  are  neither  few  nor 
small.  The  dissertations  on  the  Greek  and 
Latin  Drama  do  not  at  all  help  the  argument; 
and,  whatever  may  have  been  thought  of  them 
by  the  generation  which  fancied  that  Christ- 
church  had  refuted  Bentley,  are  such  as  in 
the  present  day,  a  scholar  of  very  humble  pre 
tensions  may  venture  to  pronounce  boyish,  or 
rather  babyish.  The  censures  are  not  suffi 
ciently  discriminating.  The  authors  whom 
Collier  accused  had  been  guilty  of  such  gross 
sins  against  decency,  that  he  was  certain  to 
weaken,  instead  of  strengthening  his  case,  by 
introducing  into  his  charge  against  them  any 
matter  about  which  there  could  be  the  smallest 
dispute.  He  was,  however,  so  injudicious  as 
to  place  among  the  outrageous  offences,  which 
he  justly  arraigned,  some  things  which  are 
really  quite  innocent;  and  some  slight  in 
stances  of  levity,  which,  though  not  perhaps 
strictly  correct,  would  easily  be  paralleled 
from  the  works  of  writers  who  had  rendered 
great  services  to  morality  and  religion.  Thus 
he  blames  Congreve,  the  number  and  gravity 
of  whose  real  transgressions  made  it  quite 
unnecessary  to  tax  him  with  any  that  were  not 
real,  for  using  the  words  "martyr"  and  "in 
spiration"  in  a  light  sense:  as  if  an  archbishop 
might  not  say  that  a  speech  was  inspired  by 
claret,  or  that  an  alderman  was  a  martyr  to 
the  gout.  Sometimes,  again,  Collier  does  not 
sufficiently  distinguish  between  the  dramatist 
and  the  persons  of  the  drama.  Thus  he 
blames  Vanbrugh  for  putting  into  Lord  Fop- 
pington's  mouth  some  raillery  on  the  Chui'ch 
service;  though  it  is  obvious  that  Vanbrugh 
could  not  better  express  reverence  than  by 
making  Lord  Foppington  express  contempt. 
There  is  also  throughout  the  "Short  View" 
too  strong  a  display  of  professional  feeling. 
Collier  is  not  content  with  claiming  for  his 
order  an  immunity  from  insult  and  indiscri 
minate  scurrility;  he  will  not  allow  that,  in 
any  case,  any  word  or  act  of  a  divine  can  be 
a  proper  subject  for  ridicule.  Nor  does  he 
confine  this  benefit  of  clergy  to  the  ministers 
of  the  Established  Church ;  he  extends  the 
privilege  to  Catholic  priests,  and,  what  in  him 
is  more  surprising,  to  Dissenting  p  reamer* 


452 


MACAULAVS   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


This,  however,  is  a  mere  trifle.    Imauns,  Brah-  ] 
mins,  priests  of  Jupiter,  priests  of  Baal,  are  I 
all  to  be  held  sacred.     Dryden  is  blamed  for  j 
making   the  Mufti  in  "Don  Sebast-an"  talk 
nonsense.    Lee  is  called  to  a  seven;  account 
for  his  incivility  to  Tiresias.    But  the  most 
curious  passage  is  that  in  which  Collier  re 
sents  some  uncivil  reflections  thrown  by  Cas 
sandra,  in  "  Cleomenes,"  on  the  calf  Apis  and 
his   hierophants.    The   words,  "  grass-eating, 
foddered  god," — words  which  really  are  much 
in  the  style  of  several  passages  in  the  Old 
Testament,  give  as  much  offence  to  this  Chris 
tian  divine  as  they  could  have  given  to  the 
priests  at  Memphis. 

But,  when  all  these  deductions  have  been 
made,  great  merit  must  be  allowed  to  this 
work.  There  is  hardly  any  book  of  that  time 
from  which  it  would  be  possible  to  select  spe 
cimens  of  writing  so  excellent  and  so  various. 
To  compare  Collier  with  Pascal  would  indeed 
be  absurd.  Yet  we  hardly  know  where,  ex 
cept  in  the  "  Provincial  Letters,"  we  can  find 
mirth  so  harmoniously  and  beco  '  ly  blend 
ed  with  solemnity  as  in  the  "  View." 
In  truth,  all  the  modes  of  ridicule,  ;i  m  broad 
fun  to  polished  and  antithetical  sarcasm,  were 
at  Collier's  command.  On  the  other  hand,  he 
was  complete  master  of  the  rhetoric  of  honest 
indignation.  We  scarcely  know  any  volume 
which  contains  so  many  bursts  of  that  pecu- 
Jiar  eloquence  which  comes  from  the  heart, 
and  goes  to  the  heart.  Indeed,  the  spirit  of  the 
book  is  truly  heroic.  In  order  fairly  to  appre 
ciate  it,  we  must  remember  the  situation  in 
which  the  writer  stood.  He  was  under  the 
frown  of  power.  His  name  was  already  a 
mark  for  the  invectives  of  one  half  of  the 
writers  of  the  age ;  when,  in  the  case  of  good 
taste,  good  sense,  and  good  morals,  he  gave 
battle  to  the  other  half.  Strong  as  his  political 
prejudices  were,  he  seems  on  this  occasion  to 
have  entirely  laid  them  aside.  He  has  for 
gotten  that  he  was  a  Jacobite,  and  remembers 
only  that  he  is  a  citizen  and  a  Christian.  Some 
of  his  sharpest  censures  are  directed  against 
poetry  which  had  been  hailed  with  delight  by 
the  Tory  party,  and  had  inflicted  a  deep  wound 
on  the  Whigs.  It  is  really  inspiriting  to  see 
how  gallantly  the  solitary  outlaw  advances  to 
attack  enemies,  formidable  separately,  and  it 
might  have  been  thought,  irresistible  when 
combined  —  distributes  his  swashing  blows 
right  and  left  among  Wycherley,  Congreve, 
and  Vanbrugh — treads  the  wretched  D'Urfey 
down  in  the  dirt  beneath  his  feet — and  strikes 
with  all  his  strength  full  at  the  towering  crest 
of  Dryden. 

The  effect  produced  by  the  "Short  View" 
•was  immense.  The  nation  was  on  the  side  of 
Collier.  But  it  could  not  be  doubted  that,  in 
the  great  host  which  he  had  defied,  some  cham 
pion  would  be  found  to  lift  the  gauntlet.  The 
general  belief  was,  that  Dryden  would  take  the 
field;  and  ail  the  wits  anticipated  a  sharp 
contest  between  two  well-paired  combatants. 
The  great  poet  had  been  singled  out  in  the 
most  marked  manner.  It  was  well  known  that 
he  was  deeply  hurt,  that  much  smaller  provo 
cations  had  formerly  roused  him  to  violent 
if  sen 'merit,  ?.nd  that  there  was  no  literary 


weapon,  offensive  or  defensive,  of  which  he 
was  not  master.  But  his  conscience  smote 
him ;  he  stood  abashed,  like  the  fallen  arch 
angel  at  the  rebuke  of  Zephon, 

"And  felt  how  awful  goodness  is,  arid  saw 
Virtue  in  her  shape  how  lovely  ;  saw  and  pined 
His  loss." 

At  a  later  period  he  mentioned  the  "  Short 
View"  in  the  preface  to  his  "Fables."  He 
complained,  with  some  asperity,  of  the  harsh 
ness  with  which  he  had  been  treated,  and 
urged  some  matters  in  mitigation.  But  on  the 
whole,  he  frankly  acknowledged  that  he  had 
been  justly  reproved.  "If,"  said  he,  "Mr.  Col 
lier  be  my  enemy,  let  him  triumph.  If  he  be 
my  friend,  as  I  have  given  him  no  personal 
occasion  to  be  otherwise,  he  will  be  glad  of  my 
repentance." 

It  would  have  been  wise  in  Congreve  tc 
follow  his  master's  example.  He  was  pre 
cisely  in  that  situation  in  which  it  is  madness 
to  attempt  a  vindication ;  for  his  guilt  was  so 
clear,  that  no  address  or  eloquence  could  ob 
tain  an  acquittal.  On  the  other  hand,  there 
were,  in  his  case,  many  extenuating  circum 
stances,  which,  if  he  had  acknowledged  his 
error,  and  promised  amendment,  would  have 
procured  his  pardon.  The  most  rigid  censor 
could  not  but  make  great  allowances  for  the 
faults  into  which  so  young  a  man  had  been 
seduced  by  evil  example,  by  the  luxuriance  of 
a  vigorous  fancy,  and  by  the  inebriating  effect 
of  popular  applause.  The  esteem,  as  well  as 
the  admiration,  of  the  public  was  still  within 
the  reach.  He  might  easily  have  effaced  all 
memory  of  his  transgressions,  and  have  shared 
with  Addison  the  glory  of  showing  that  the 
most  brilliant  wit  may  be  the  ally  of  virtue. 
But  in  awy  case,  prudence  should  have  re 
strained  him  from  encountering  Collier.  The 
non-juror  was  a  man  thoroughly  fitted  by  na 
ture,  education,  and  habit,  for  polemical  dispute. 
Congreve's  mind,  though  one  of  no  common 
fertility  and  vigour,  was  of  a  different  class. 
No  man  understood  so  well  the  art  of  polish 
ing  epigrams  and  repartees  into  the  clearest 
effulgence,  and  setting  them  tastefully  in  easy 
and  familiar  dialogue.  In  this  sort  of  jewellery 
he  attained  to  a  mastery  unprecedented  and 
inimitable.  But  he  was  altogether  rude  in  the 
art  of  controversy,  and  he  had  a  cause  to  de 
fend  which  scarcely  any  art  could  have  ren 
dered  victorious. 

The  event  was  such  as  might  have  been 
foreseen.  Congreve's  answer  was  a  complete 
failure.  He  was  angry,  obscure,  and  dull. 
Even  the  Green  Room  and  Wills'  Coffee-House 
were  compelled  to  acknowledge,  that  in  wit 
the  parson  had  a  decided  advantage  over  the 
poet.  Not  only  was  Congreve  unable  to  make 
any  show  of  a  case  where  he  was  in  the  wrong, 
but  he  succeeded  in  putting  himself  completely 
in  the  wrong  where  he  was  in  the  right.  Collier 
had  taxed  him  with  profaneness  for  calling  a 
clergyman  Mr.  Prig,  and  for  introducing  a  coach 
man  named  Jehu,  in  allusion  to  the  King  of  Israel^, 
who  was  known  at  a  distance  by  his  furious 
driving.  Had  there  been  nothing  worse  in  the 
,  "  Old  Bachelor"  and  "  Double  Dealer,"  Con- 
I  greve  might  pass  for  as  pure  a  writer  as  Cow- 
iper  himself;  who  in  poems  revised  by  so 


COMIC   DRAMATISTS   OF  THE   RESTORATION. 


453 


austere  a  censor  as  John  Newton,  calls  a  fox 
hunting  squire  Nimrod,  and  gives  to  a  chaplain 
the  disrespectful  name  of  Smug.  Congreve 
might  with  good  effect  have  appealed  to  the 
public  whether  it  might  not  be  fairly  presumed 
that,  when  such  frivolous  charges  were  made, 
there  were  no  very  serious  charges  to  make. 
Instead  of  doing  this,  he  pretended  that  he 
meant  no  allusion  to  the  Bible  by  the  name  of 
Jehu,  and  no  reflection  by  the  name  of  Prig. 
Strange  that  a  man  of  such  parts  should,  in 
order  to  defend  himself  against  imputations 
which  nobody  could  regard  as  important,  tell 
untruths  which  it  was  certain  that  nobody 
would  believe. 

One  of  the  pleas  which  Congreve  set  up  for 
himself  and  his  brethren  was,  that,  though  they 
might  be  guilty  of  a  little  levity  here  and  there, 
they  were  careful  to  inculcate  a  moral,  packed 
close  into  two  or  three  lines,  at  the  end  of  every 
play.  Had  the  fact  been  as  he  stated  it,  the 
defence  would  be  worth  very  little.  For  no 
man  acquainted  with  human  nature  could  think 
that  a  sententious  couplet  would  undo  all  the 
mischief  that  five  profligate  acts  had  done. 
But  it  would  have  been  wise  in  Congreve  to 
have  looked  again  at  his  own  comedies  before 
he  used  this  argument.  Collier  did  so;  and 
found  that  the  moral  of  the  "  Old  Bachelor" — 
the  grave  apophthegm  which  is  to  be  a  set-off 
against  all  the  libertinism  of  the  piece — is  con 
tained  in  the  following  triplet: — 

"What  rugged  ways  attend  the  noon  of  life! 
Our  sun  declines,  and  with  what  anxious  strife, 
What  pain,  we  tug  that  galling  load — a  wife." 

"'  Love  for  Love,"  says  Collier,  "  may  have 
a  somewhat  better  farewell,  but  it  would  do  a 
man  little  service  should  he  remember  it  to  his 
dying  day:" — 

"The  miracle  to-day  is,  that  we  find 
A  lover  true,  not  that  a  woman's  kind." 

Collier's  reply  was  severe  and  triumphant. 
One  of  his  repartees  we  will  quote,  not  as  a 
favourable  specimen  of  his  manner,  but  be 
cause  it  was  called  forth  by  Congreve's  cha 
racteristic  affectation.  The  poet  spoke  of  the 
"Old  Bachelor"  as  a  trifle  to  which  he  at 
tached  no  value,  and  which  had  become  public 
by  a  sort  of  accident.  "I  wrote  it,"  he  said, 
"  to  amuse  myself  in  a  slow  recovery  from  a 
fit  of  sickness." — "What  his  disease  was,"  re 
plied  Collier,  "  I  am  not  to  inquire  :  but  it  must 
be  a  very  ill  one  to  be  worse  than  the  remedy." 

All  that  Congreve  gained  by  coming  forward 
on  this  occasion  was,  that  he  completely  de 
prived  himself  of  the  excuse  which  he  might 
with  justice  have  pleaded  for  his  early  offences. 
"  Why,"  asked  Collier,  "should  the  man  laugh 
at  the  mischief  of  the  boy,  and  make  the  dis 
orders  of  his  nonage  his  own,  by  an  after  ap 
probation  1  " 

Congreve  was  not  Collier's  only  opponent. 
Vanbrugh,  Denis,  and  Settle  took  the  field. 
And,  from  the  passage  in  a  contemporary  sa 
tire,  we  are  inclined  to  think  that  among  the 
answers  to  th<  "Short  View,"  was  one  written, 
or  supposed  to  be  written,  by  Wycherley.  The 
victory  remained  with  Collier.  A  great  and 
rapid  reform  in  all  the  departments  of  our 
lighter  literature  was  the  effect  of  his  labours. 


A  new  race  of  wits  and  poets  arose,  who  gene 
rally  treated  with  reverence  the  great  ties  which 
bind  society  together ;  and  whose  very  inde 
cencies  were  decent  when  compared  with  those 
of  the  school  which  flourished  during  the  last 
forty  years  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

This  controversy  probably  prevented  Con 
greve  from  fulfilling  the  engagements  into 
which  he  had  entered  with  the  actors.  It  was 
not  till  1700  that  he  produced  the  "  Way  of  the 
World,"  the  most  deeply  meditated,  and  the 
most  brilliantly  written,  of  all  his  works.  It 
wants,  perhaps,  the  constant  movement,  the 
effervescence  of  animal  spirits,  which  we  find 
in  "Love  for  Love."  But  the  hysterical  rants 
of  Lady  Wishfort,  the  meeting  of  Witwould 
and  his  brother,  the  country  knight's  courtship 
and  his  subsequent  revel,  and  above  all,  the 
chase  and  surrender  of  Milamant,  are  superior 
to  any  thing  that  is  to  be  found  in  the  whole 
range  of  English  comedy  from  the  Civil  War 
downwards.  It  is  quite  inexplicable  to  us  that 
this  play  should  have  failed  on  the  stage.  Yet 
so  it  was ;  and  the  author,  already  sore  with 
the  wounds  which  Collier  had  inflicted,  was 
galled  past  endurance  by  this  new  stroke.  He 
resolved  never  more  to  expose  himself  to  the 
rudeness  of  a  tasteless  audience,  and  took  leave 
of  the  theatre  forever. 

He  lived  twenty-eight  years  longer,  without 
adding  to  the  high  literary  reputation  which  he 
had  attained.  He  read  much  while  he  retained 
his  eyesight,  and  now  and  then  wrote  a  short 
essay,  or  an  idle  tale  in  verse ;  but  appears 
never  to  have  planned  any  considerable  work. 
The  miscellaneous  pieces  which  he  published 
in  1710  are  of  little  value,  and  have  long  been 
forgotten. 

The  stock  of  fame  which  he  had  acquired  by 
his  comedies  was  sufficient,  assisted  by  the 
graces  of  his  manner  and  conversation,  to  se 
cure  for  him  a  high  place  in  the  estimation  of 
the  world.  During  the  winter,  he  lived  among 
the  most  distinguished  and  agreeable  people 
in  London.  His  summers  were  passed  at  the 
splendid  country-seats  of  ministers  and  peers. 
Literary  envy,  and  political  faction,  which  in 
that  age  respected  nothing  else,  respected  his 
repose.  He  professed  to  be  one  of  the  party 
of  which  his  patron  Montagu,  now  Lord  Halifax, 
was  the  head.  But  he  had  civil  words  and 
small  good  offices  for  men  of  every  shade  of 
opinion.  And  men  of  every  shade  of  opinion 
spoke  well  of  him  in  return. 

His  means  were  for  a  long  time  scanty.  The 
place  which  he  had  in  possession,  barely  en 
abled  him  to  live  with  comfort.  And  when 
the  Tories  came  into  power,  some  thought  that 
he  would  lose  even  this  moderate  provision. 
But  Harley,  who  v/as  by  no  means  disposed  to 
adopt  the  exterminating  policy  of  the  October 
club,  and  who,  with  all  his  faults  of  under 
standing  and  temper,  had  a  sincere  kindness 
for  men  of  genius,  reassured  the  anxious  poet 
by  quoting  very  gracefully  and  happily  th« 
lines  of  Virgil — 

"Non  obtusa  adeo  gestainus  pectora  Poem, 
Nee  tarn  aversus  equos  Tyria  sol  jungit  ab  urbe." 

The  indulgence  with  which  Congreve  wa 
treated  by  the  Tories,  was  not  purchased  by 


454 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


any  concession  on  his  part  which  could  justly 
offend  the  Whigs.  It  was  his  rare  good-fortune 
to  share  the  triumph  of  his  friends  without 
having  shared  their  proscription.  When  the 
house  of  Hanover  came  to  the  throne,  his  for 
tunes  began  to  flourish.  The  reversion  to 
which  he  had  been  nominated  twenty  years 
before,  fell  in.  He  was  made  a  secretary  to  the 
island  of  Jamaica;  and  his  whole  income 
amounted  to  1200/.  a  year — a  fortune  which, 
for  a  single  man,  was,  in  that  age,  not  only 
easy,  but  splendid.  He  continued,  however, 
to  practise  the  frugality  which  he  had  learned 
when  he  could  scarcely  spare,  as  Swift  tells 
us,  a  shilling  to  pay  the  chairman  who  carried 
him  to  Lord  Halifax's.  Though  he  had  no 
body  to  save  for,  he  laid  up  at  least  as  much 
as  he  spent. 

The  infirmities  of  age  came  early  upon  him. 
His  habits  had  been  intemperate;  he  suffered 
much  from  gout;  and  vvnen  confined  to  his 
chamber,  had  no  longer  the  solace  of  literature. 
Blindness,  the  most  cruel  misfortune  that  can 
befall  the  lonely  student,  made  his  books  use 
less  to  him.  He  was  thrown  on  society  for  all 
his  amusement,  and,  in  society,  his  good  breed 
ing  and  vivacity  made  him  always  welcome. 

By  the  rising  men  of  letters  he  was  consi 
dered  not  as  a  rival,  but  as  a  classic.  He  had 
left  their  arena;  he  never  measured  his 
strength  with  them  ;  and  he  was  always  loud 
in  applause  of  their  exertions.  They  could, 
therefore,  entertain  no  jealousy  of  him  ;  and 
thought  no  more  of  detracting  from  his  fame 
*han  of  carping  at  the  great  men  who  had  been 
lying  a  hundred  years  in  Poet's  Corner.  Even 
the  inmates  of  Grub  Street,  even  the  heroes  of 
the  Dunciad,  were  for  once  just  to  living 
merit.  There  can  be  no  stronger  illustration 
of  the  estimation  in  which  Congreve  was  held, 
than  the  fact  that  Pope's  Iliad,  a  work  which 
appeared  with  more  splendid  auspices  than 
any  other  in  our  language,  was  dedicated  to 
him.  There  was  not  a  duke  in  the  kingdom 
who  would  not  have  been  proud  of  such  a 
compliment.  Dr.  Johnson  expresses  great 
admiration  for  the  independence  of  spirit 
which  Pope  showed  on  this  occasion,  and 
some  surprise  at  his  choice.  "He  passed  over 
peers  and  statesmen  to  inscribe  his  'Iliad'  to 
Congreve,  with  a  magnanimity  of  which  the 
praise  had  been  complete,  had  his  friend's 
virtue  been  equal  to  his  wit.  Why  he  was 
chosen  for  so  great  an  honour,  it  is  not  now 
possible  to  know."  It  is  certainly  impossible 
to  know;  yet,  we  think,  it  is  possible  to  guess. 
The  translation  of  the  "Iliad"  had  been  zeal 
ously  befriended  by  men  of  al!  political  opi- 
pions.  The  poet  who  at  an  early  age  had 
been  raised  to  affluence  by  the  emulous  libe 
rality  of  Whigs  and  Tories,  could  not  with  pro 
priety  inscribe  to  a  chief  of  either  party,  a 
work  which  had  been  munificently  patronised 
by  both.  It  was  necessary  to  find  some  person 
who  was  at  once  eminent  and  neutral.  It  was 
Iherefore  necessary  to  pass  over  peers  and 
Hatesmeri.  Congreve  had  a  high  name  in 
letters.  He  had  a  high  name  in  aristocratic 
C'rtles.  He  lived  on  terms  of  civility  with 
of  all  parties.  By  a  courtesy  paid  him 


neither  the  ministers  nor  the  leaders  of  the  op« 
position  could  be  offended. 

The  singular  affectation  which  had  from  the 
first  been  characteristic  of  Congreve,  grew 
stronger  and  stronger  as  he  advanced  in  life. 
At  last  it  became  disagreeable  to  him  to  hear 
his  own  comedies  praised.  Voltaire,  \\  hose 
soul  was  burned  up  by  the  raging  desire  for 
literary  renown,  was  half  puzzled,  half  dis 
gusted  by  what  he  saw,  during  his  visit  to 
England,  of  this  extraordinary  whim.  Con 
greve  disclaimed  the  character  of  a  poet — de 
clared  that  his  plays  were  trifles  produced  in 
an  idle  hour,  and  begged  that  Voltaiie  would 
consider  him  merely  as  a  gentleman.  "If  you 
had  been  merely  a  gentleman,"  said  Voltaire, 
"I  should  not  have  come  to  see  you." 

Congreve  was  not  a  man  of  warm  affections. 
Domestic  ties  he  had  none  ;  and  in  the  tempo 
rary  connections  which  he  formed  with  a  suc 
cession  of  beauties  from  the  green-room,  his 
heart  does  not  appear  to  have  been  at  all  in 
terested.  Of  all  his  attachments,  that  to  Mrs. 
Bracegirdle  lasted  the  longest,  and  was  the 
most  celebrated.  This  charming  actress,  who 
was,  during  many  years,  the  idol  of  all  Lon 
don;  whose  face  caused  the  fatal  broil  in 
which  Mountfort  fell,  and  for  which  Lord  Mo- 
hun  was  tried  by  the  Peers;  and  to  whom  the 
Earl  of  Scarsdale  was  said  to  have  made 
honourable  addresses,  had  conducted  herself, 
in  very  trying  circumstances,  with  extraordi 
nary  discretion.  Congreve  at  length  became 
her  confidential  friend.  They  constantly  rode 
out  together,  and  dined  together.  Some  people 
.said  that  she  was  his  mistress,  and  others  that 
she  would  soon  be  his  wife.  He  was  at  last 
drawn  away  from  her  by  the  influence  of  a 
wealthier  and  haughtier  beauty.  Henrietta, 
daughter  of  the  great  Marlborough,  and  wife 
of  the  Earl  of  Godolphin,  had,  on  her  father's 
death,  succeeded  to  his  dukedom,  and  to  the 
greater  part  of  his  immense  property.  Her 
husband  was  an  insignificant  man,  of  whom 
Lord  Chesterfield  said,  that  he  came  to  the 
House  of  Peers  only  to  sleep,  and  that  he 
might  as  well  sleep  on  the  right  as  on  the  left 
of  the  woolsack.  Between  the  duchess  and 
Congreve  sprung  up  a  most  eccentric  friend 
ship.  He  had  a  seat  every  day  at  her  table, 
and  assisted  in  the  direction  of  her  concerts. 
That  malignant  old  hag,  the  Dowager  Duchess 
Sarah,  who  had  quarrelled  with  her  daughter, 
as  she  had  quarrelled  with  everybody  else, 
affected  to  suspect  that  there  was  something 
wrong.  But  the  world  in  general  appears  to 
have  thought  that  a  great  lady  might,  without 
any  imputation  on  her  character,  pay  attention 
to  a  man  of  eminent  genius,  who  was  nearly 
sixty  years  old,  who  was  still  older  in  appear 
ance  and  in  constitution,  who  was  confined  to 
his  chair  by  gout,  and  was  unable  to  read  from 
blindness. 

In  the  summer  of  1728,  Congreve  was  or 
dered  to  try  the  Bath  waters.  During  his  ex 
cursion  he  was  overturned  in  his  chariot,  and 
received  some  severe  internal  injury,  from 
which  he  never  recovered.  He  came  back 
to  London  in  a  dangerous  state,  complained 
constantly  of  a  pain  in  his  side,  and  con- 


COMIC  DRAMATISTS  OF  THE  RESTORATION. 


465 


tinned  to  sink,  till,  in  the  following  January, 
he  expired. 

He  left  10;000/.  saved  out  of  the  emolu 
ments  of  his  lucrative  places.  Johnson  says 
that  this  money  ought  to  have  gone  to  the  Con- 
greve  family,  which  was  then  in  great  distress. 
Doctor  Young  and  Mr.  Leigh  Hunt,  two  gen 
tlemen  who  seldom  agree  with  each  other,  but 
with  whom,  on  this  occasion,  we  are  happy  to 
agree,  think  that  it  ought  to  have  gone  to  Mrs. 
Bracegirdle.  Congreve  bequeathed  200/.  to 
Mrs.  Bracegirdle,  and  an  equal  sum  to  a  cer 
tain  Mrs.  Jellat;  but  the  bulk  of  his  accumu 
lations  went  to  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough, 
in  whose  immense  wealth  such  a  legacy  was 
as  a  drop  in  the  bucket.  It  might  have  raised 
the  fallen  fortunes  of  a  Staffordshire  squire- 
it  might  have  enabled  a  retired  actress  to  en 
joy  every  comfort,  and,  in  her  sense,  every 
luxury — but  it  was  not  sufficient  to  defray  the 
duchess's  establishment  for  two  months. 

The  great  lady  buried  her  friend  with  a 
pomp  seldom  seen  at  fhe  funerals  of  poets. 
The  corpse  lay  in  state  under  the  ancient  roof 
of  the  Jerusalem  Chamber,  and  was  interred 
in  Westminster  Abbey.  The  pall  was  borne 
by  the  Duke  of  Bridgewater,  Lord  Cobham,  the 
Earl  of  Wilmington,  who  had  been  Speaker, 
and  who  was  afterwards  First  Lord  of  the 
Treasury,  and  other  men  of  high  consideration. 
Her  grace  laid  out  her  friend's  bequest  in  a 
superb  diamond  necklace,  which  she  wore  in 
honour  of  him;  and,  if  report  is  to  be  believed, 
sho  ared  her  regard  in  ways  much  more  extra 
ordinary.  It  is  said  that  she  had  a  statue  of 
him  in  ivory,  which  moved  by  clockwork,  and 
was  placed  daily  at  her  table ;  that  she  had  a 
wax  doll  made  in  imitation  of  him,  and  that  the 
feet  of  this  doll  were  regularly  blistered  and 
anointed  by  the  doctors,  as  poor  Congreve's 
feet  had  been  when  he  suffered  from  the  gout. 
A.  monument  was  erected  to  the  poet  in  West 
minster  Abbey,  with  an  inscription  written  by 
the  duchess;  and  Lord  Cobham  honoured  him 
with  a  cenoiaphy,  which  seems  to  us  (though 


that  is  a  bold  word)  the  ugliest  and  most  absurd 
of  the  buildings  at  Stowe. 

We  have  said  that  Wycherley  was  a  worse 
Congreve.  There  was,  indeed,  a  remarkable 
analogy  between  the  writings  and  lives  of  these 
two  men.  Both  were  gentlemen  liberally  edu 
cated.  Both  led  town  lives,  and  knew  human 
nature  only  as  it  appears  between  Hyde  Park 
and  the  Tower.  Both  were  men  of  wit.  Nei 
ther  had  much  imagination.  Both  at  an  "arly 
age  produced  lively  and  profligate  comedies. 
Both  retired  from  the  field  while  still  in  early 
manhood,  and  owed  to  their  youthful  achieve 
ments  in  literature  the  consideration  which 
they  enjoyed  in  later  life.  Both,  after  they  had 
ceased  to  write  for  the  stage,  published  volumes 
of  miscellanies,  which  did  little  credit  either  to 
their  talents  or  their  morals.  Both,  during 
their  declining  years,  hung  loose  upon  society; 
and  both,  in  their  last  moments,  made  eccentric 
and  unjustifiable  dispositions  respecting  their 
estates. 

But  in  every  point  Congreve  maintained  his 
superiority  to  Wycherley.  Wycherley  had  wit; 
but  the  wit  of  Congreve  far  outshines  that  of 
every  comic  writer,  except  Sheridan,  who  has 
arisen  within  the  last  t\vo  centuries.  Congreve 
had  not,  in  a  large  measure,  the  poetical  facul 
ty,  but,  compared  with  Wycherley,  he  might  be 
called  a  great  poet.  Wycherley  had  some 
knowledge  of  books,  but  Congreve  was  a  man 
of  real  learning.  Congreve's  offences  against 
decorum,  though  highly  culpable,  were  not  so 
gross  as  those  of  Wycherley;  nor  did  Congreve, 
like  Wycherley,  exhibit  to  the  world  the  deplo 
rable  spectacle  of  a  licentious  dotage.  Con 
greve  died  in  the  enjoyment  of  high  considera 
tion  ;  Wycherley  forgotten  or  despised.  Con- 
greve's  will  was  absurd  and  capricious;  but 
Wycherley's  last  actions  appeared  to  have 
been  prompted  by  obdurate  malignity. 

Here,  at  least  for  the  present,  we  must  stop, 
Vanbrugh  and  Farquhar  are  not  men  to  b« 
hastily  dismissed,  and  we  have  not  left  our 
selves  space  to  do  them  justice. 


466 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


THE  LATE  LORD  HOLLAND.* 


[EDINBURGH  REVIEW  FOR  JULY,  1841.] 


MANY  reasons  make  it  impossible  for  us  to 
lay  before  our  readers,  at  the  present  moment, 
a  complete  view  of  the  character  and  public 
career  of  the  late  Lord  Holland.  But  we  feel 
that  we  have  already  deferred  too  long  the  duty 
of  paying  some  tribute  to  his  memory.  We 
feel  that  it  is  more  becoming  to  bring,  without 
further  delay,  an  offering,  though  intrinsically 
of  little  value,  than  to  leave  his  tomb  longer 
without  some  token  of  our  reverence  and  love. 

We  shall  say  very  little  of  the  book  which 
lies  on  our  table.  And  yet  it  is  a  book  which, 
even  if  it  had  been  the  work  of  a  less  distin 
guished  man,  or  had  appeared  under  circum 
stances  less  interesting,  would  have  well  repaid 
an  attentive  perusal.  It  is  valuable,  both  as  a 
record  of  principles  and  as  a  model  of  compo 
sition.  We  find  in  it  all  the  great  maxims 
which,  during  more  than  forty  years,  guided 
Lord  Holland's  public  conduct,  and  the  chief 
reasons  on  which  those  maxims  rest,  condensed 
into  the  smallest  possible  space,  and  set  forth 
with  admirable  perspicuity,  dignity,  and  preci 
sion.  To  his  opinions  on  Foreign  Policy  we, 
for  the  most  part,  cordially  assent;  but,  now 
and  then,  we  are  inclined  to  think  them  impru 
dently  generous.  We  could  not  have  signed 
the  protest  against  the  detention  of  Napoleon. 
The  protest  respecting  the  course  which  Eng 
land  pursued  at  the  Congress  of  Verona,  though 
it  contains  much  that  is  excellent,  contains 
also  positions  which,  we  are  inclined  to  think, 
Lord  Holland  would,  at  a  later  period,  have 
admitted  to  be  unsound.  But  to  all  his  doc 
trines  on  Constitutional  Questions  we  give  our 
hearty  approbation  ;  and  we  firmly  believe  that 
no  British  government  has  ever  deviated  from 
that  line  of  internal  policy  which  he  has  traced, 
without  detriment  to  the  public. 

We  will  give,  as  a  specimen  of  this  little 
volume,  a  single  passage,  in  which  a  chief 
article  of  the  political  creed  of  the  Whigs  is 
stated  and  explained  with  singular  clearnes's, 
force,  and  brevity.  Our  readers  will  remember 
that,  in  1825,  the  Catholic  Association  agitated 
for  emancipation  with  most  formidable  effect. 
The  Tories  acted  after  their  kind.  Instead  of 
removing  the  grievance,  they  tried  to  put  down 
the  agitation,  and  brought  in  a  law,  apparently 
sharp  and  stringent,  but,  in  truth,  utterly  impo 
tent,  for  restraining  the  right  of  petition.  Lord 
Holland's  protest  on  that  occasion  is  excellent. 

"We  are,"  says  he,  "well  aware  that  the 
privileges  of  the  people,  the  rights  of  free  dis 
cussion,  and  the  spirit  and  letter  of  our  popular 
institutions,  must  render— and  they  are  intend- 


*  The  Opinions  of  Lord  Holland,  as  recorded  in  the 
Journals  of  the  House  of  Lords,  from  1797  to  1841.  Col- 
i,cted  and  edited  by  D.  C.  MOYLAN,  of  Lincoln's  Inn, 
Barrister-at-Law.  8vo  London.  1841. 


ed  to  render — the  continuance  of  an  extensive* 
grievance,  and  of  the  dissatisfaction  consequent 
thereupon,  dangerous  to  the  tranquillity  of  the 
country,  and  ultimately  subversive  of  the  au 
thority  of  the  state.  Experience  and  theory 
alike  forbid  us  to  deny  that  effect  of  a  free  con 
stitution  ;  a  sense  of  justice  and  a  love  of  liberty 
equally  deter  us  from  lamenting  it.  But  we 
have  always  been  taught  to  look  for  the  reme 
dy  of  such  disorders  in  the  redress  of  the  griev 
ances  which  justify  them,  and  in  the  removal 
of  the  dissatisfaction  from  which  they  flow; 
not  in  restraints  on  ancient  privileges,  not  in 
inroads  on  the  right  of  public  discussion,  nor 
in  violations  of  the  principles  of  a  free  govern 
ment.  If,  therefore,  the  legal  method  of  seek 
ing  redress,  which  has  been  resorted  to  by 
persons  labouring  under  grievous  disabilities, 
be  fraught  with  immediate  or  remote  danger  to 
the  state,  we  draw  from  that  circumstance  a 
conclusion  long  since  foretold  by  great  author 
ity — namely,  that  the  British  constitution  and 
large  exclusions  cannot  subsist  together ;  that 
the  constitution  must  destroy  them,  or  they 
will  destroy  the  constitution." 

It  was  not,  however,  of  this  little  book,  valua 
ble  and  interesting  as  it  is,  but  of  the  author, 
that  we  meant  to  speak ;  and  we  will  try  to  do 
so  with  calmness  and  impartiality. 

In  order  fully  to  appreciate  the  character  of 
Lord  Holland,  it  is  necessary  to  go  far  back 
into  the  history  of  his  family ;  for  he  had  in 
herited  something  more  than  a  coronet  and  an 
estate.  To  the  house  of  which  he  was  the 
head  belongs  one  distinction,  which  we  believe 
to  be  without  a  parallel  in  our  annals.  During 
more  than  a  century,  there  has  never  been  a 
time  at  which  a  Fox  has  not  stood  in  a  promi 
nent  station  among  public  men.  Scarcely  had 
the  checkered  career  of  the  first  Lord  Holland 
closed,  when  his  son,  Charles,  rose  to  the  head 
of  the  Opposition,  and  to  the  first  rank  among 
English  debaters.  And  before  Charles  was 
borne  to  Westminster  Abbey,  a  third  Fox  had 
already  become  one  of  the  most  conspicuous 
politicians  in  the  kingdom. 

It  is  impossible  not  to  be  struck  by  the  strong 
family  likeness  which,  in  spite  of  diversities 
arising  from  education  and  position,  appears 
in  these  three  distinguished  persons.  In  their 
faces  and  figures  there  was  a  resemblance, 
such  as  is  common  enough  in  novels,  where 
one  picture  is  good  for  ten  generations,  but 
such  as  in  real  life  is  seldom  found.  The  ample 
person,  the  massy  and  thoughtful  forehead,  the 
large  eyebrows,  the  full  cheek  and  lip ;  the  ex 
pression,  so  singularly  compounded  of  sense, 
humour,  courage,  openness,  a  strong  will  and  a 
sweet  temper,  were  common  to  all.  But  the 
features  of  the  founder  of  the  house,  as  th» 


THE   LATE   LORD  HOLLAND. 


457 


bf  Reynolds  and  the  chisel  of  Nollekens 
•tinted  them  down  to  us,  were  disagree-: 
irsh  and  exaggerated.     In  his  descend-  j 
pect  was  preserved ;  but   it  was  j 
[  it  became,  in  the  late  lord,  the  j 
ious  and  interesting  countenance  that ! 
lighted  up  by  the  mingled  lustre  of  ' 
ce  and  benevolence. 

As  ft  was  with  the  faces  of  the  men  of  this 
oble  family,  so  was  it  with  their  minds.     Na- 
ure  had  done  much  for  them  all.     She  had 
oulded  them  all  of  that  clay  of  which  she  is 
ost  sparing.    To  all  she  had  given  strong 
easun  and  sharp  wit ;  a  quick  relish  for  every 
;al  and  intellectual  enjoyment;  constitu- 
intrepidity,  and  that  frankness  by  which 
tional  intrepidity  is  generally  accom- 
spirits  which  nothing  could  depress ; 
easy,  generous,  and  placable  ;  and  that 
rgeniakourtesy  which  has  its  seat  in  the  heart, 
andofVhich  artificial  politeness  is  only  a  faint 
and  coM  imitation.     Such  a  disposition  is  the 
richest  inheritance  that  ever  was  entailed  on 
any  far 

But  tiMning  and  situation  greatly  modified 
the  finicalities  which  nature  lavished  with 
such  p^B^ion  on  three  generations  of  the 
house  clHox.  The  first  Lord  Holland  was 
a  needy^Jolitical  adventurer.  He  entered 
public  life  at  a  time  when  the  standard  of  in 
tegrity  among  statesmen  was  low.  He  started 
as  the  adherent  of  a  minister  who  had  in 
deed  many  titles  to  respect ;  who  possessed 
eminent  talents  both  for  administration  and  for 
debate;  who  understood  the  public  interest 
well,  and  who  meant  fairly  by  the  country  ; 
but  whe  had  seen  so  much  perfidy  and  mean 
ness,  that  he  had  become  skeptical  as  to  the 
existence  of  probity.  Weary  of  the  cant  of 
patriotism,  Walpole  had  learned  to  talk  a  cant 
of  a  different  kind.  Disgusted  by  that  sort  of 
hypocrisy  which  is  at  least  a  homage  to  virtue, 
he  was  too  much  in  the  habit  of  practising  the 
less  respectable  hypocrisy  which  ostentatiously 
displays  and  sometimes  even  stimulates  vice. 
To  Walpole,  Fox  attached  himself  politically 
and  personally,  with  the  ardour  which  belonged 
to  his  temperament.  And  it  is  not  to  be  denied, 
that  in  the  school  of  Walpole  he  contracted 
faults  which  destroyed  the  value  of  his  many 
great  endowments.  He  raised  himself,  indeed, 
to  the  first  consideration  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons  ;  he  became  a  consummate  master  of  the 
art  of  debate ;  he  attained  honours  and  im 
mense  wealth — but  the  public  esteem  and  con 
fidence  were  withheld  from  him.  His  private 
friends,  indeed,  justly  extolled  his  generosity 
and  good-nature.  They  maintained,  that  in 
those  parts  of  his  conduct  which  they  could 
least  defend,  there  was  nothing  sordid ;  and 
that,  if  he  was  misled,  he  was  misled  by 
amiable  feelings — by  a  desire  to  serve  his 
friends,  and  by  anxious  tenderness  for  his 
children.  But  by  the  nation  he  was  regarded 
as  a  man  of  insatiable  rapacity  and  desperate 
ambition  ;  as  a  man  ready  to  adopt,  without 
scruple,  the  most  immoral  and  the  most  un 
constitutional  measures;  as  a  man  perfectly 
fitted,  by  all  his  opinions  and  feelings,  for  the 
work  of  managing  the  Parliament  by  means  of 
secret  service-money,  and  of  keeping  down  the 
VOL.  IV.— 58 


people  with  the  bayonet.  Many  of  his  contem 
poraries  had  a  morality  quite  as  lax  as  his ;  but 
very  few  among  them  had  his  talents,  and  none 
had  his  hardihood  and  energy.  He  could  not, 
like  Sandys  and  Doddington,  find  safety  in  con 
tempt.  He  therefore  became  an  object  of  such 
general  aversion  as  no  statesman  since  the  fall 
of  Strafford  has  incurred — of  such  general 
aversion  as  was  probably  never  in  any  country 
ncurred  by  a  man  of  so  kind  and  cordial  a  dis 
position.  A  weak  mind  would  have  sunk  under 
such  a  load  of  unpopularity.  But  that  resolute 
spirit  seemed  to  derive  new  firmness  from  the 
public  hatred.  The  only  effect  which  re 
proaches  appeared  to  produce  on  him,  was  to 
sour,  in  some  degree,  his  naturally  sweet  tem 
per.  The  last  steps  of  his  public  life  were 
marked,  not  only  by  that  audacity  which  he  had 
derived  from  nature — not  only  by  that  immo 
rality  which  he  had  learned  in  the  school  of 
Walpole — but  by  a  harshness  which  almost 
amounted  to  cruelty,  and  which  had  never  been 
supposed  to  belong  to  his  character.  His  se 
verity  increased  the  unpopularity  from  which 
it  had  sprung.  The  well-known  lampoon  of 
Gray  may  serve  as  a  specimen  of  the  feeling 
of  the  country.  All  the  images  are  taken  from 
shipwrecks,  quicksands,  and  cormorants.  Lord 
Holland  is  represented  as  complaining,  that  the 
cowardice  of  his  accomplices  had  prevented 
him  from  putting  down  the  free  spirit  of  the 
city  of  London  by  sword  and  fire,  and  as  pining 
for  the  time  when  birds  of  prey  should  make 
their  nests  in  Westminster  Abbey,  and  unclean 
beasts  burrow  in  St.  Paul's. 

Within  a  few  months  after  the  death  of  this 
remarkable  man,  his  second  son  Charles  ap 
peared  at  the  head  of  the  party  opposed  to  the 
American  War.  Charles  had  inherited  the 
bodily  and  mental  constitution  of  his  father, 
and  had  been  much — far  too  much — under  his 
father's  influence.  It  was  indeed  impossible 
that  a  son  of  so  affectionate  and  noble  a  spirit 
should  not  have  been  warmly  attached  to  a 
parent  who  possessed  many  fine  qualities,  and 
who  carried  his  indulgence  and  liberality  to 
wards  his  children  even  to  a  culpable  extents 
The  young  man  saw  that  the  person  to  whom 
he  was  bound  by  the  strongest  ties,  was,  in  the 
highest  degree,  odious  to  the  nation ;  and  the 
effect  was  what  might  have  been  expected 
from  his  strong  passions  and  constitutional 
boldness.  He  cast  in  his  lot  with  his  father,  and 
took,  while  still  a  boy,  a  deep  part  in  the  most 
unjustifiable  and  unpopular  measures  that  had 
been  adopted  since  the  reign  of  James  the 
Second.  In  the  debates  on  the  Middlesex 
election,  he  distinguished  himself,  not  only  by 
his  precocious  powers  of  eloquence,  but  by  the 
vehement  and  scornful  manner  in  which  he 
bade  defiance  to  public  opinion.  He  was  at 
that  time  regarded  as  a  man  likely  to  be  tli2 
most  formidable  champion  of  arbitrary  govern 
ment  that  had  appeared  since  the  Revolution- 
— to  be  a  Bute  with  far  greater  powers — a 
Mansfield  with  far  greater  courage.  Happily 
his  father's  death  liberated  him  early  from  the 
pernicious  influence  by  which  he  had  been 
misled.  His  mind  expanded.  His  range  of 
observation  became  wider.  His  genius  brokr 
through  early  prejudices.  His  natural  benr 


458 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


volence  and  magnanimity  had  fair  play.  In  a 
very  short  time  he  appeared  in  a  situation 
worthy  of  his  understanding  and  of  his  heart. 
From  a  family  whose  name  was  associated  in 
the  public  mind  with  tyranny  and  corruption — 
from  a  party  of  which  the  theory  and  the  prac 
tice  were  equally  servile — from  the  midst  of 
the  Luitrells,  the  Dysons,  the  Barringtons — 
came  forth  the  greatest  parliamentary  defender 
of  civil  and  religious  liberty. 

The  late  Lord  Holland  succeeded  to  the 
talents  and  to  the  fine  natural  dispositions  of 
his  house.  But  his  situation  was  very  differ 
ent  from  that  of  the  two  eminent  men  of  whom 
we  have  spoken.  In  some  important  respects 
it  was  better ;  in  some  it  was  worse  than  theirs. 
He  had  one  great  advantage  over  them.  He 
received  a  good  political  education.  The  first 
lord  was  educated  by  Sir  Robert  Walpole.  Mr. 
Fox  was  educated  by  his  father.  The  late  lord 
was  educated  by  Mr.  Fox.  The  pernicious 
maxims  early  imbibed  by  the  first  Lord  Hol 
land,  made  his  great  talents  useless,  and  worse 
than  useless,  to  the  state.  The  pernicious 
maxims  early  imbibed  by  Mr.  Fox  led  him,  at 
the  commencement  of  his  public  life,  into  great 
faults,  which,  though  afterwards  nobly  expiated, 
were  never  forgotten.  To  the  very  end  of  his 
career,  small  men,  when  they  had  nothing  else 
to  say  in  defence  of  their  own  tyranny,  bigotry, 
and  imbecility,  could  always  raise  a  cheer  by 
some  paltry  taunt  about  the  election  of  Colonel 
Luttrell,  the  imprisonment  of  the  Lord  May 
or,  and  other  measures  in  which  the  great 
Whig  leader  had  borne  a  part  at  the  age  of 
one  or  two-and-twenty.  On  Lord  Holland  no 
such  slur  could  be  thrown.  Those  who  most 
dissent  from  his  opinions  must  acknowledge, 
that  a  public  life,  more  consistent,  is  not  to  be 
found  in  our  annals.  Every  part  of  it  is  in 
perfect  harmony  with  every  other;  and  the 
whole  is  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  great 
principles  of  toleration  and  civil  freedom. 
This  rare  felicity  is  in  a  great  measure  to  be 
attributed  to  the  influence  of  Mr.  Fox.  Lord 
Holland,  as  was  natural  in  a  person  of  his  ta 
lents  and  expectations,  began  at  a  very  early 
age  to  take  the  keenest  interest  in  politics;  and 
Mr.  Fox  found  the  greatest  pleasure  in  forming 
the  mind  of  so  hopeful  a  pupil.  They  corres 
ponded  largely  on  political  subjects  when  the 
young  lord  was  only  sixteen  ;  and  their  friend 
ship  and  mutual  confidence  continued  to  the 
day  of  that  mournful  separation  at  Chiswick. 
Under  such  training,  such  a  man  as  Lord 
Holland  was  in  no  danger  of  falling  into  those 
faults  which  threw  a  dark  shade  over  the  whole 
career  of  his  grandfather,  and  from  which  the 
youth  of  his  uncle  was  not  wholly  free. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  late  Lord  Holland,  as 
compared  with  his  grandfather  and  his  uncle, 
Laboured  under  one  great  disadvantage.  They 
were  members  of  the  House  of  Commons.  He 
became  a  peer  while  still  an  infant.  When 
he  entered  public  life,  the  House  of  Lords  was 
a  very  small  and  a  very  decorous  assembly. 
The  minority  to  which  he  belonged  was  scarce 
ly  able  to  muster  five  or  six  votes  on  the  most 
important  nights,  when  eighty  or  ninety  lords 
were  present.  Debate  had  accordingly  be 


come  a  mere  form,  as  it  was  in  the  Irish  Housn 
of  Peers  before  the  Union.  This  was  a  great 
misfortune  to  a  man  like  Lord  Holland.  It  was 
not  by  occasionally  addressing  fifteen  or  twenty 
solemn  and  unfriendly  auditors,  that  his  grand 
father  and  his  uncle  attained  their  unrivalled 
parliamentary  skill.  The  former  had  learned 
his  art  in  "  the  great  Walpolean  battles,"  on 
nights  when  Onslow  was  in  the  chair  seven- 
teen  hours  without  intermission;  when  the 
thick  ranks  on  both  sides  kept  unbroken  order 
till  long  after  the  winter  sun  had  risen  upon 
them ;  when  the  blind  were  led  out  by  the  hand 
into  the  lobby ;  and  the  paralytic  laid  down  in 
their  bed-clothes  on  the  benches.  The  pow 
ers  of  Charles  Fox  were,  from  the  first,  exer 
cised  in  conflicts  not  less  exciting.  The  great 
talents  of  the  late  Lord  Holland  had  no  such 
advantage.  This  was  the  more  unfortunate, 
because  the  peculiar  species  of  eloquence, 
which  belonged  to  him  in  common  with  his 
family,  required  much  practice  to  develope  it. 
With  strong  sense,  and  the  greatest  readiness 
of  wit,  a  certain  tendency  to  hesitation  was 
hereditary  in  the  line  of  Fox.  This  hesitation 
arose,  not  from  the  poverty,  but  from  the  wealth 
of  their  vocabulary.  They  paused,  not  from 
the  difficulty  of  finding  one  expression,  but 
from  the  difficulty  of  choosing  between  several. 
It  was  only  by  slow  degrees,  and  constant  ex 
ercise,  that  the  first  Lord  Holland  and  his  son 
overcame  the  defect.  Indeed,  neither  of  them 
overcame  it  completely. 

In  statement,  the  late  Lord  Holland  was  not 
successful ;  his  chief  excellence  lay  in  reply. 
He  had  the  quick  eye  of  his  house  for  the  un 
sound  parts  of  an  argument,  and  a  great  felicity 
in  exposing  them.  He  was  decidedly  more 
distinguished  in  debate  than  any  peer  of  his 
times  who  had  not  sat  in  the.  House  of  Com 
mons.  Nay,  to  find  his  equal  among  persons 
similarly  situated,  we  must  go  back  eighty 
years — to  Earl  Granville.  For  Mansfield, 
Thurlow,  Loughborough,  Grey,  Grenville, 
Brougham,  Plunkett,  and  other  eminent  men, 
living  and  dead,  whom  we  will  not  stop  to  enu 
merate,  carried  to  the  Upper  House  an  elo 
quence  formed  and  matured  in  the  Lower. 
The  opinion  of  the  most  discerning  judges  was, 
that  Lord  Holland's  oratorical  performances, 
though  sometimes  most  successful,  afforded  no 
fair  measure  of  his  oratorical  powers ;  and 
that,  in  an  assembly  of  which  the  debates  were 
frequent  and  animated,  he  would  have  attained 
a  very  high  order  of  excellence.  It  was,  in 
deed,  impossible  to  converse  with  him  without 
seeing  that  he  was  born  a  debater.  To  him,  as 
to  his  uncle,  the  exercise  of  the  mind  in  dis 
cussion  was  a  positive  pleasure.  With  the 
greatest  good-nature  and  good-breeding,  he 
was  the  very  opposite  to  an  assenter.  The 
word  "  disputatious"  is  generally  used  as  a 
word  of  reproach ;  but  we  can  express  our 
meaning  only  by  saying  that  Lord  Holland  was 
most  courteously  and  pleasantly  disputatious. 
In  truth,  his  quickness  in  discovering  and  ap 
prehending  distinctions  and  analogies  was 
such  as  a  veteran  judge  might  envy.  The  law 
yers  of  the  Duchy  of  Lancaster  were  astonish 
ed  to  find  in  an  unprofessional  man  so  strong 


THE  LATE  LORD  HOLLAND. 


459 


a  relish  for  the  esoteric  parts  of  their  science; 
and  complained  that  as  soon  as  they  had  split 
a  hair,  Lord  Holland  proceeded  to  split  the 
filaments  into  filaments  still  finer.  In  a  mind 
less  happily  constituted,  there  might  have  been 
a  risk  that  this  turn  for  subtilty  would  have 
produced  serious  evil.  But  in  the  heart  and 
understanding  of  Lord  Holland  there  was 
ample  security  against  all  such  danger.  He 
was  not  a  man  to  be  the  dupe  of  his  own  inge 
nuity.  He  puts  his  logic  to  its  proper  use ; 
and  in  him  the  dialectician  was  always  subor 
dinate  to  the  statesman. 

His  political  life  is  written  in  the  chronicles 
of  his  country.  Perhaps,  as  we  have  already 
intimated,  his  opinions  on  two  or  three  great 
questions  of  Foreign  Policy  were  open  to  just 
objection.  Yet  even  his  errors,  if  he  erred, 
were  amiable  and  respectable.  We  are  not 
sure  that  we  do  not  love  and  admire  him  the 
more  because  he  was  now  and  then  seduced 
from  what  we  regard  as  a  wise  policy,  by  sym 
pathy  with  the  oppressed;  by  generosity  to 
wards  the  fallen;  by  a  philanthropy  so  en 
larged  that  it  took  in  all  naf'ons ;  by  love  of 
peace,  which  in  him  was  second  only  to  the 
love  of  freedom ;  by  the  magnanimous  credulity 
of  a  mind  which  was  as  incapable  of  suspect 
ing  as  of  devising  mischief. 

To  his  views  on  questions  of  Domestic  Po 
licy,  the  voice  of  his  countrymen  does  ample 
justice.  They  revere  the  memory  of  the  man 
who  was,  during  forty  years,  the  constant  pro 
tector  of  all  oppressed  races,  of  all  persecuted 
sects — of  the  man,  whom  neither  the  preju 
dices  nor  the  interests  belonging  to  his  station 
couji  seduce  from  the  path  of  right — of  the 
noble,  who  in  every  great  crisis  cast  in  his  lot 
with  the  commons — of  the  planter,  who  made 
manful  war  on  the  slave-trade — of  the  land 
owner,  whose  whole  heart  was  in  the  struggle 
against  the  corn-laws. 

We  have  hitherto  touched  almost  exclusive 
ly  on  those  parts  of  Lord  Holland's  character 
which  were  open  to  the  observation  of  mil 
lions.  How  shall  we  express  the  feelings  with 
which  his  memory  is  cherished  by  those  who 
were  honoured  with  his  friendship  ]  Or  in 
what  language  shall  we  speak  of  that  house, 
once  celebrated  for  its  rare  attractions  to  the 
furthest  ends  of  the  civilized  world,  and  now 
silent  and  desolate  as  the  grave?  That  house 
was,  a  hundred  and  twenty  years  ago,  apostro 
phized  by  a  poet  in  tender  and  graceful  lines, 
which  have  now  acquired  a  new  meaning  not 
less  sad  than  that  which  they  originally  bore : — 

"Thou  hill,  whose  brow  the  antique  structures  grace, 
RearM  by  hold  chiefs  of  Warwick's  nnble  race, 
Why,  once  so  loved,  wl*ene'er  thy  bower  appears, 
O'er  my  dim  eyeballs  glance  the  sudden  tears  1 
How  sweet  were  onee  thy  prospects  fresh  and  fair, 
Thy  sloping  walks,  and  unpolluted  air! 
How  sweet  the  glooms  beneath  thine  aged  trees, 
Thy  noontide  shadow,  and  thine  evening  breeze! 
His  image  thy  forsaken  bowers  restore; 
Thy  walks  and  airy  prospects  charm  no  more  ; 
No  more  the  summer  in  thy  glooms  allay'd, 
Thine  evening  breezes,  and  thy  noonday  shade." 

Yet  a  few  years,  and  the  shades  and  struc 
tures  may  follow  their  illustrious  masters 
The  wonderful  city  which,  ancient  and  gigan 


tic  as  it  is,  still  continues  to  grow  as  fas*  as  a 
young  town  of  logwood  by  a  water-privilege 
in  Michigan,  may  soon  displace  those  turrets 
and  gardens  which  are  associated  with  so 
much  that  is  interesting  and  noble — with  the 
courtly  magnificence  of  Rich — with  the  loves 
of  Ormond — with  the  counsels  of  Cromwell— 
with  the  death  of  Addison.  The  time  is  coming 
when,  perhaps,  a  few  old  men,  the  last  survi 
vors  of  our  generation,  will  in  vain  seek, 
amidst  new  streets,  and  squares,  and  railway 
stations,  for  the  site  of  that  dwelling  which 
was  in  their  youth  the  favourite  resort  of  wits 
and  beauties — of  painters  and  poets — of  scho 
lars,  philosophers,  and  statesmen.  They  will 
then  remember,  with  strange  tenderness,  many 
objects  once  familiar  to  them — the  avenue  and 
the  terrace,  the  busts  and  the  paintings;  the 
carving,  the  grotesque  gilding,  and  the  enig 
matical  mottoes.  With  peculiar  fondness  they 
will  recall  that  venerable  chamber,  in  which 
all  the  antique  gravity  of  a  college  library  was 
so  singularly  blended  with  all  that  female 
grace  and  wit  could  devise  to  embellish  a 
drawing-room.  They  will  recollect,  not  un 
moved,  those  shelves  loaded  with  the  varied 
learning  of  many  lands  and  many  ages;  those 
portraits  in  which  were  preserved  the  features 
of  the  best  and  wisest  Englishmen  of  two  gene 
rations.  They  will  recollect  how  many  men 
who  have  guided  the  politics  of  Europe — who 
have  moved  great  assemblies  by  reason  and 
eloquence — who  have  put  life  into  bronze  and 
canvass,  or  who  have  left  to  posterity  things 
so  written  as  it  shall  not  willingly  let  them  die 
— were  there  mixed  with  all  that  was  loveliest 
and  gayest  in  the  society  of  the  most  splendid 
of  capitals.  They  will  remember  the  singular 
character  which  belonged  to  that  circle,  in 
which  every  talent  and  accomplishment,  every 
art  and  science,  had  its  place.  They  will  re 
member  how  the  last  debate  was  discussed  in 
one  corner,  and  the  last  comedy  of  Scribe  in 
another;  while  Wilkie  gazed  with  modest  ad 
miration  on  Reynolds'  Baretti ;  while  Mackin 
tosh  turned  over  Thomas  Aquinas  to  verify  a 
quotation;  while  Talleyrand  related  his  con 
versations  with  Barras  at  the  Luxemburg,  of 
his  ride  with  Lannes  over  the  field  of  Auster- 
litz.  They  will  remember,  above  all,  the  grace 
— and  the  kindness,  far  more  admirable  than, 
grace — with  which  the  princely  hospitality  of 
that  ancient  mansion  was  dispensed.  They 
will  remember  the  venerable  and  benignant 
countenance  and  the  cordial  voice  of  him  who 
bade  them  welcome.  They  will  remember 
that  temper  which  years  of  pain,  of  sickne.;s, 
of  lameness,  of  confinement,  seemed  only  to 
make  sweeter  and  sweeter;  and  that  frank 
politeness,  which  at  once  relieved  all  the  em 
barrassment  of  the  youngest  and  most  timiJ 
writer  or  artist,  who  found  himself  for  the  first 
time  among  ambassadors  and  earls.  They 
will  remember  that  constant  flow  of  conversa 
tion,  so  natural,  so  animated,  so  various,  so 
rich  with  observation  and  anecdote ;  that  wit 
which  never  gave  a  wound;  that  exquisite 
mimicry  which  ennobled,  instead  of  degrading; 
that  goodness  of  heart  which  appeared  in  every 
look  and  accent,  and  gave  additional  value  uj 


4t>0 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


every  talent  and  acquirement.  They  will  re 
member,  loo,  that  he  whose  name  they  hold  in 
reverence  was  not  less  distinguished  by  the  in 
flexible  uprightness  of  his  political  conduct 
than  by  his  loving  disposition  and  his  winning 
manners.  They  will  remember  that,  in  the 
last  lines  which  he  traced,  he  expressed  his 


joy  that  he  had  done  nothing  unworthy  of  the 
friend  of  Fox  and  Grey ;  and  they  will  have 
reason  to  feel  similar  joy,  if,  in  looking  back 
on  many  troubled  years,  they  cannot  accuse 
themselves  of  having  done  any  thing  unworthy 
of  men  who  were  distinguished  by  the  friend 
ship  of  Lord  Holland. 


WARREN   HASTINGS. 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  OCTOBER,  1841.] 


Tins  book  seems  to  have  been  manufactured 
in  pursuance  of  a  contract,  by  which  the  re 
presentatives  of  Warren  Hastings,  on  the  one 
part,  bound  themselves  to  furnish  papers,  and 
Mr.  Gleig,  on  the  other  part,  bound  himself  to 
furnish  praise.  It  is  but  just  to  say  that  the 
covenants  on  both  sides  have  been  most  faith 
fully  kept;  arid  the  result  is  before  us  in  the 
form  of  three  big  bad  volumes,  full  of  un 
digested  correspondence  and  undiscerning 
panegyric. 

If  it  were  worth  while  to  examine  this  per 
formance  in  detail,  we  could  easily  make  a 
long  article  by  merely  pointing  out  inaccurate 
statements,  inelegant  expressions,  and  immoral 
doctrines.  But  it  would  be  idle  to  waste  criti 
cism  on  a  bookmaker;  and,  whatever  credit 
Mr.  Gleig  may  have  justly  earned  by  former 
works,  it  is  as  a  bookmaker,  and  nothing  more, 
that  he  now  comes  before  us.  More  eminent 
men  than  Mr.  Gleig  have  written  nearly  as  ill 
as  he,  when  they  have  stooped  to  similar 
drudgery.  It  would  be  unjust  to  estimate 
Goldsmith  by  the  History  of  Greece,  or  Scott 
b}'  the  Life  of  Napoleon.  Mr.  Gleig  is  neither 
A  Goldsmith  nor  a  Scott;  but  it  would  be  un 
just  to  deny  that  he  is  capable  of  something 
better  than  these  memoirs.  It  would  also,  we 
hope  and  believe,  be  unjust  to  charge  any 
Christian  minister  with  the  guilt  of  deliberate 
ly  maintaining  some  propositions  which  we 
find  in  this  book.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say, 
that  Mr.  Gleig  has  written  several  passages, 
which  bear  the  same  relation  to  the  "Prince" 
of  Machiavelli  that  the  "  Prince  of  Machiavelli 
bears  to  the  "Whole  Duty  of  Man,"  and  which 
would  excite  amazement  in  a  den  of  robbers, 
or  on  board  of  a  schooner  of  pirates.  But  we 
are  willing  to  attribute  these  offences  to  haste, 
to  thoughtlessness,  and  to  that  disease  of  the 
understanding  which  may  be  called  the  Furor 
Biographicus,  and  which  is  to  writers  of  lives 
what  the  goitre  is  to  an  Alpine  shepherd,  or 
lirt-eating  to  a  Negro  slave. 

We  are  inclined  to  think  that  we  shall  best 
meet  the  wishes  of  our  readers,  if,  instead  of 
dwelling  on  the  faults  of  this  book,  we  attempt 
V  give,  in  a  way  necessarily  hasty  and  imper- 


»  Memoirs  of  the  Life  of  Warren  JIastirtes,jirst  Govern 
or- General  of  Bengal.  Compiled  from  Original  Papers, 
by  tlie  Ilev.  Ci  R.  GLEIG,  M.A..  3  vols.  8vo.  London. 
1841. 


feet,  our  own  view  of  the  life  and  character  of 
Mr.  Hastings.  Our  feeling  towards  him  is  not 
exactly  that  of  the  House  of  Commons  which 
impeached  him  in  1787;  neither  is  it  that  of 
the  House  of  Commons  which  uncovered  and 
stood  up  to  receive  him  in  1813.  He  had 
great  qualities,  and  he  rendered  great  services 
to  the  state.  But  to  represent  him  as  a  man 
of  stainless  virtue,  is  to  make  him  ridiculous; 
and  from  regard  for  his  memory,  if  from  no 
other  feeling,  his  friends  would  have  done  well 
to  lend  no  countenance  to  such  puerile  adula 
tion.  We  believe  that,  if  he  were  now  living, 
he  would  have  sufficient  judgment  and  suffi 
cient  greatness  of  mind  to  wish  to  be  shown 
as  he  was.  He  must  have  known  that  there 
were  dark  spots  on  his  fame.  He  might  also 
have  felt  with  pride,  that  the  splendour  of  his 
fame  would  bear  many  spots.  He  would  have 
preferred,  we  are  confident,  even  the  seventy 
of  Mr.  Mill  to  the  puffing  of  Mr.  Gleig.  He 
would  have  wished  posterity  to  have  a  like 
ness  of  him,  though  an  unfavourable  likeness, 
rather  than  a  daub  at  once  insipid  and  unna 
tural,  resembling  neither  him  nor  anybody  else. 
"Paint  me  as  I  am,"  said  Oliver  Cromwell, 
while  sitting  to  young  Lely.  "  If  you  leave 
out  the  scars  and  wrinkles,  I  will  not  pay  you 
a  shilling."  Even  in  such  a  trifle,  the  great 
Protector  showed  both  his  good  sense  and  his 
magnanimity.  He  did  not  wish  all  that  was 
characteristic  in  his  countenance  to  be  lost,  in 
the  vain  attempt  to  give  him  the  regular  fea 
tures  and  the  smooth  blooming  cheeks  of  the 
curl-pated  minions  of  James  the  First.  He 
was  content  that  his  face  should  go  forth 
marked  with  all  the  blemishes  which  had  been 
put  on  it  by  time,  by  war,  by  sleepless  nights, 
by  anxiety,  perhaps  by  remorse;  but  with  va 
lour,  policy,  authority,  and  public  care,  written 
in  all  its  princely  lines.  If  men  truly  great 
knew  their  own  interest,  it  is  thus  that  they 
would  wish  their  minds  to  be  portrayed.  • 

Warren  Hastings  sprang  from  an  ancient 
and  illustrious  race.  It  has  been  affirmed  that 
his  pedigree  can  be  traced  back  to  the  great 
Danish  sea-king,  whose  sails  were  long  the 
terror  of  both  coasts  of  the  British  channel* 
and  who,  after  many  fierce  and  doubtful  strug 
gles,  yielded  at  last  to  the  valour  and  genius 
of  Alfred.  But  the  undoubted  splendour  of 
the  line  of  Hastings  needs  no  illustration  from 
fable.  One  branch  of  that  line  wore,  ia  the 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


461 


fourteenth  century,  the  coronet  of  Pembroke. 
From  another  branch  sprang  the  renowned 
Chamberlain,  the  faithful  adherent  of  the 
White  Rose,  whose  fate  has  furnished  so 
striking  a  theme  both  to  poets  and  to  histo 
rians.  His  family  received  from  the  Tudors 
the  earldom  of  Huntingdon ;  which,  after  long 
dispossession,  was  regained  in  our  time  by 
a  series  of  events  scarcely  paralleled  in  ro 
mance. 

The  lords  of  the  manor  of  Daylesford,  in 
Worcestershire,  claimed  to  be  considered  as 
the  heads  of  this  distinguished  family.  The 
main  stock,  indeed,  prospered  less  than  some 
of  the  younger  shoots.  But  the  Daylesford 
family,  though  not  ennobled,  was  wealthy  and 
highly  considered,  till,  about  two  hundred  years 
ago,  it  was  overwhelmed  in  the  great  ruin  of 
the  Civil  War.  The  Hastings  of  that  time  was 
a  zealous  Cavalier.  He  raised  money  on  his 
own  lands,  sent  his  plate  to  the  mint  at  Oxford, 
joined  the  royal  army,  and,  after  spending 
half  of  his  property  in  the  cause  of  King 
Charles,  was  glad  to  ransom  himself  by  mak 
ing  over  most  of  the  remaining  half  to  Speaker 
Lenthal.  The  old  seat  at  Daylesford  still  re 
mained  in  the  family;  but  it  could  no  longer 
be  kepi  up ;  and  in  the  following  generation 
it  was  sold  to  a  merchant  of  London. 

Before  the  transfer  took  place,  the  last  Hast 
ings  of  Daylesford  had  presented  his  second 
son  to  the  rectory  of  the  parish  in  which  the 
ancient  residence  of  the  family  stood.  The 
living  was  of  little  value;  and  the  situation  of 
the  poor  clergyman,  after  the  sale  of  the  estate, 
was  deplorable.  He  was  constantly  engaged 
in  lawsuits  about  his  tithes  with  the  new  lord 
of  the  manor,  and  was  at  length  utterly  ruined. 
His  eldest  son,  Howard,  a  we-11-conducted 
young  man,  obtained  a  place  in  the  Customs. 
The  second  son,  Pynaslon,  an  idle,  worthless 
boy,  married  before  he  was  sixteen,  lost  his 
wife  in  two  years,  and  went  to  the  West  Indies, 
where  he  died,  leaving  to  the  care  of  his  un 
fortunate  father  a  little  orphan,  destined  to 
strange  and  memorable  vicissitudes  of  fortune. 

Warren,  the  son  of  Pynaston,  was  born  on 
the  6th  of  December,  1732.  His  mother  died 
a  few  days  later,  and  he  was  left  dependent 
on  his  distressed  grandfather.  The  child  was 
early  sent  to  the  village  school,  where  he 
learned  his  letters  on  the  same  bench  with  the 
sons  of  the  peasantry.  Nor  did  any  thing  in 
his  garb  or  fare  indicate  that  his  life  was  to 
take  a  widely  different  course  from  that  of  the 
young  rustics  with  whom  he  studied  and 
played.  But  no  cloud  could  overcast  the 
dawn  of  so  much  genius  and  so  much  ambi 
tion.  The  very  ploughmen  observed,  and  long 
remembered,  how  kindly  little  Warren  look  to 
his  book.  The  daily  sight  of  the  lands  which 
his  ancestors  had  possessed,  and  which  had 
passed  into  the  hands  of  strangers,  filled  his 
young  brain  with  wild  fancies  and  projects. 
He  loved  to  hear  stories  of  the  wealth  and 
greatness  of  his  progenitors — of  their  splendid 
housekeeping,  their  loyalty,  and  their  valour. 
On  one  bright  summer  day,  the  boy,  then  just 
seven  years  old,  lay  on  the  bank  of  the  rivulet 
which  flows  through  the  old  domain  of  his 
house  to  join  the  Isis.  There,  as  threescore 


j  and  ten  years  later  he  told  the  tale,  rose  in  hi? 
mind  a  scheme  which,  through  all  the  turns 
of  his  eventful  career,  was  never  abandoned. 
He  would  recover  the  estate  which  had  be- 
longed  to  his  fathers.  He  would  be  Hastings 
of  Daylesford.  This  purpose,  formed  in  in 
fancy  and  poverty,  grew  stronger  as  his  intel 
lect  expanded  and  as  his  fortune  rose.  He 
pursued  his  plan  with  that  calm  but  indomita 
ble  force  of  will,  which  was  the  most  striking 
peculiarity  of  his  character.  When,  under  a 
tropical  sun,  he  ruled  fifty  millions  of  Asiatics, 
his  hopes,  amidst  all  the  cares  of  war,  finance, 
and  legislation,  still  pointed  to  Daylesford. 
And  when  his  long  public  life,  so  singularly 
checkered  with  good  and  evil,  with  glory  and 
obloquy,  had  at  length  closed  forever,  it  was 
to  Daylesford  that  he  retired  to  die. 

When  he  was  eight  years  old,  his  uncle, 
Howard,  determined  to  take  charge  of  him, 
and  to  give  him  a  liberal  education.  The  boy 
went  up  to  London,  and  was  sent  to  a  school 
at  Newington,  where  he  was  well  taught  but 
ill  fed.  He  always  attributed  the  smallness  of 
his  stature  to  the  hard  and  scanty  fare  of  his 
seminary.  At  ten  he  was  removed  to  West 
minster  school,  then  flourishing  under  the  care 
of  Dr.  Nichols.  Vinny  Bourne,  as  his  pupils 
affectionately  called  him,  was  one  of  the  mas 
ters.  Churchill,  Colman,  Lloyd,  Cumberland, 
Cowper,  were  among  the  students.  With 
Cowper,  Hastings  formed  a  friendship  which 
neither  the  lapse  of  time,  nor  a  wide  dissimi 
larity  of  opinions  and  pursuits,  could  wholly 
dissolve.  It  does  not  appear  that  they  ever 
met  after  they  had  grown  to  manhood.  But 
many  years  later,  when  the  voices  of  a  crowd 
of  great  orators  were  crying  for  vengeance  on 
the  oppressor  of  India,  the  shy  and  secluded 
poet  could  imagine  to  himself  Hastings  the 
Governor-General,  only  as  the  Hastings  with 
whom  he  had  rowed  on  the  Thames  and  played 
in  the  cloister;  and  refused  to  believe  that  so 
good-tempered  a  fellow  could  have  done  any 
thing  very  wrong.  His  own  life  had  been 
spent  in  praying,  musing,  and  rhyming  among 
the  waterlilies  of  the  Ouse.  He  had  preserved 
in  no  common  measure  the  innocence  of  child 
hood.  His  spirit  had  indeed  been  severely 
tried,  but  not  by  temptations  which  impelled 
him  to  any  gross  violation  of  the  rules  of  so 
cial  morality.  He  had  never  been  attacked 
by  combinations  of  powerful  and  deadly  ene 
mies.  He  had  never  been  compelled  to  make 
a  choice  between  innocence  and  greatness, 
between  crime  and  ruin.  Firmly  as  he  held 
in  theory  the  doctrine  of  human  depravity,  his 
habits  were  such,  that  he  was  unable  fo  conceive 
how  far  from  the  path  of  right,  even  kind  and 
noble  natures  may  be  hurried  by  the  rage  of 
conflict  and  the  lust  of  dominion. 

Hastings   had   another   associate   at  West 
minster,  of  whom  we  shall  have  occasion  to 
make  frequent  mention — Elijah  Impey.     We 
know  little  about  their  school  days.    "But  we 
;  think  we  may  safely  venture  to  guess  that, 
I  whenever  Hastings  wished  to  play  any  tr'cJr 
!  more  than  usually  naughty,  he  hired  Impey 
|  with  a  tart  or  a  ball  to  act  as  fag  in  the  worst 
i  part  of  the  prank. 

i      Warren  was  distinguished  among  his  coin 
2  Q.2 


462 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


rades  a;  an  excellent  swimmer,  boatman,  and  i 
scholar.     At  fourteen  he  was  first  in  the  ex- ! 
ami  nation  for  the  foundation.    His   name  in  ! 
gilded  letters  on  the  walls  of  the  dormitory,  ! 
still  attests  his  victory  over  many  older  com- 1 
petitors.     He  stayed  two  years  longer  at  the  { 
school,  and  was  looking  forward  to  a  student-  | 
ship  at  Christchurch,  when  an  event  happen 
ed  which  changed  the  whole  course  of  his  life. 
Howard  Hastings   died,  bequeathing  his   ne- 
phewto  the  care  of  a  friend  and  distant  relation, 
named  Chiswick.    This  gentleman,  though  he 
did  not  absolutely  refuse  the  charge,  was  de 
sirous  to  rid  himself  of  it  as  soon  as  possible. 
Dr.  Nichols  made  strong  remonstrances  against 
the   cruelty  of  interrupting  the   studies  of  a 
youth  who  seemed  likely  to  be  one  of  the  first 
scholars  of  the  age.     He  even  offered  to  bear 
the  expense  of  sending  his  favourite  pupil  to 
Oxford.      But   Mr.   Cniswick   was    inflexible. 
He  thought  the  years  which  had  already  been 
wasted  on  hexameters  and  pentameters  quite 
sufficient.     He  had  it  in  his  power  to  obtain 
for  the  lad  a  writership  in  the  service  of  the 
East  India  Company.      Whether   the  young 
adventurer,  when   once   shipped  off,  made   a 
fortune,  or  died  of  a  liver  complaint,  he  equal 
ly  ceased  to  be  a  burden  to  anybody.     Warren 
was  accordingly  removed  from  Westminster 
school,  and  placed  for  a  few  months  at  a  com 
mercial    academy,  to    study   arithmetic    and 
book-keeping.     In  January,  1750,  a  few  days 
after  he  had  completed  his  seventeenth  year, 
he  sailed  for  Bengal,  and  arrived  at  his  desti 
nation  in  the  October  following. 

He  was  immediately  placed  at  a  desk  in  the 
Secretary's  office  at  Calcutta,  and  laboured 
there  during  two  years.  Fort  William  was 
then  a  purely  commercial  settlement.  In  the 
south  of  India  the  encroaching  policy  of  Du- 
pleix  had  transformed  the  servants  of  the 
English  company,  against  their  will,  into 
diplomatists  and  generals.  The  war  of  the 
succession  was  raging  in  the  Carnatic ;  and 
the  tide  had  been  suddenly  turned  asrainst  the 
French  by  the  genius  of  young  Robert  Clive. 
But  in  Bengal,  the  European  settlers,  at  peace 
with  the  natives  and  with  each  other,  were 
wholly  occupied  with  Ledgers  and  Bills  of 
lading. 

After  two  years  passed  in  keeping  accounts 
at  Calcutta,  Hastings  was  sent  up  the  country 
to  Cossimbazar,  a  town  which  lies  on  the 
Hoogly,  about  a  mile  from  Moorshedabad,  and 
which  then  bore  to  Moorshedabad  a  relation,  if 
we  may  compare  small  things  with  great,  such 
as  the  city  of  London  bears  to  Westminster. 
Moorshedabad  was  the  abode  of  the  prince 
who,  by  an  authority  ostensibly  derived  from 
the  Mogul,  but  really  independent,  ruled  the 
three  great  provinces  of  Bengal,  Orissa,  and 
Bahar.  At  Moorshedabad  were  the  court,  the 
h<irem,  and  the  public  offices.  Cossimbazar 
was  a  port  and  a  place  of  trade,  renowned  for 
the  quantity  and  excellence  of  the  silks  which 
were  sold  in  its  marts,  and  constantly  receiving 
and  sending  forth  fleets  of  richly  laden  barges. 
At.  this  important  point,  the  'Company  had 
established  a  small  factory  subordinate  to  that 
t>f  Fort  William.  Here,  during  several  years, 
Hastings  was  employed  in  making  bargains 


for  stuffs  with  native  brokers.  While  he  was 
thus  engaged,  Surajah  Dowlah  succeeded  to 
the  government,  and  declared  war  against  the 
English.  The  defenceless  settlement  of  Cos 
simbazar,  lying  close  to  the  tyrant's  capital, 
was  instantly  seized  Hastings  was  sent  a 
prisoner  to  Moorshedabad;  but,  in  conse* 
quence  of  the  humane  intervention  of  the  ser» 
vants  of  the  Dutch  Company,  was  treated  with 
indulgence.  Meanwhile  the  Nabob  marched 
on  Calcutta;  the  governor  and  the  command 
ant  fled;  the  town  and  citadel  were  taken,  and 
most  of  the  English  prisoners  perished  in  the 
Blackhole. 

In  these  events  originated  the  greatness  of 
Warren  Hastings.  The  fugitive  governor  and 
his  companions  had  taken  refuge  on  the  dreary 
islet  of  Fulda,  near  the  mouth  of  the  Hoogly. 
They  were  naturally  desirous  to  obtain  full 
information  respecting  the  proceedings  of  the 
Nabob;  and  no  person  seemed  so  likely  to 
furnish  it  as  Hastings,  who  was  a  prisoner  at 
large  in  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  the 
court.  He  thus  became  a  diplomatic  agent, 
and  soon  established  a  high  character  of  abili 
ty  and  resolution.  The  treason  which  at  a  later 
period  was  fatal  to  Surajah  Dowlah  was  al 
ready  in  progress ;  and  Hastings  was  admitted 
to  the  deliberations  of  the  conspirators.  But 
the  time  for  striking  had  not  arrived.  It  was 
necessary  to  postpone  the  execution  of  the  de 
sign  ;  and  Hastings,  who  was  now  in  extreme 
peril,  fled  to  Fulda. 

Soon  after  his  arrival  at  Fulda,  the  expedi 
tion  from  Madras,  commanded  by  Clive,  ap 
peared  in  the  Hoogley.  Warren,  young,  intre 
pid,  and  excited  probably  by  the  example  of 
the  commander  of  the  forces,  who,  having  like 
himself  been  a  mercantile  agent  of  the  Com 
pany,  had  been  turned  by  public  calamities 
into  a  soldier,  determined  to  serve  in  the  ranks. 
During  the  early  operations  of  the  war  he  car 
ried  a  musket.  But  the  quick  eye  of  Clive 
soon  perceived  that  the  head  of  the  young 
volunteer  would  be  more  useful  than  his  arm. 
When,  after  the  battle  of  Plassey,  Meer  Jaffier 
was  proclaimed  Nabob  of  Bengal,  Hastings 
was  appointed  to  reside  at  the  court  of  the  new 
prince  as  agent  for  the  Company. 

He  remained  at  Moorshedabad  till  the  year 
1761,  when  he  became  member  of  Council,  and 
was  consequently  forced  to  reside  at  Calcutta. 
This  was  during  the  interval  between  dive's 
first  and  second  administration — an  interva* 
which  has  left  on  the  fame  of  the  East  India 
Company  a  stain  not  wholly  effaced  by  many 
years  of  just  and  humane  government.  Mr. 
Vansittart,  the  Governor,  was  at  the  head  of  a 
new  and  anomalous  empire.  On  the  one  side 
was  a  band  of  English  functionaries,  daring, 
intelligent,  eager  to  be  rich.  On  the  other  side 
was  a  great  native  population,  helpless,  timid, 
accustomed  to  crouch  under  oppression.  To 
keep  the  stronger  race  from  preying  on  the 
weaker  was  an  undertaking  which  tasked  to 
the  utmost  the  talents  and  energy  of  Clive. 
Vansittart,  with  fair  intentions,  was  a  feeblo 
and  inefficient  ruler.  The  master  caste,  as 
was  natural,  broke  loose  from  all  restraint, 
and  then  was  seen  what  we  believe  *o  be  the 
most  frightful  of  all  spectacles,  the  strength 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


463 


of  civilization  without  its  mercy.    To  all  other 
despotism  there  is  a  check;  imperfect,  indeed, 
and  liable  to  gross  abuse,  but  still  sufficient 
to  preserve  society  from  the  last  extreme  of 
misery.     A  time  comes  when  the  evils  of  sub 
mission  are  obviously  greater  than  those  of  re 
sistance;  when  fear  itself  begets  a  sort  of  cou 
rage  ;  when  a  convulsive  burst  of  popular  rage 
and  despair  warns  tyrants  not  to  presume  too 
far  on  the  patience  of  mankind.     Bat  against 
misgovernment  such  as  then  afflicted  Bengal 
it  was  impossible  to  struggle.     The  superior 
intelligence  and  energy  of  the  dominant  class 
made  their  power  irresistible.     A  war  of  Ben 
galees  against  Englishmen  was  like  a  war  of 
sheep  against  wolves,  of  men  against  demons. 
The  only  protection  which  the  conquered  could 
find  was  in  the  moderation,  the  clemency,  the 
enlarged  policy  of  the  conquerors.     That  pro 
tection,  at  a  later  period,  they  found.     But  at 
first  English  power  came  among  them  unac 
companied  by  English  morality.    There  was 
an  interval  between  the  time  at  which  they  be 
came  our  subjects  and  the  time  at  which  we 
began  to  reflect  that  we  were  bound  to  dis 
charge  towards  them  the  duty  of  rulers.     Dur 
ing  that  interval  the  business  of  a  servant  of 
the  Company  was  simply  to  wring  out  of  the 
ratives  a  hundred  or  two  hundred  thousand 
founds  as  speedily  as  possible,  that  he  might 
return  home  before  his  constitution  had  suf 
fered  from  the  heat,  to  marry  a  peer's  daugh 
ter,  to  buy  rotten  boroughs  in  Cornwall,  and  to 
give  balls  in  St.  James's  Square.     Of  the  con 
duct  of  Hastings  at  this  time  little  is  known ; 
but  the  little  that  is  known,  and  the  circum 
stance  that  little  is  known,  must  be  considered 
as  honourable  to  him.     He  could  not  protect 
the  natives ;  all  that  he  could  do  was  to  ab 
stain  from  plundering  and  oppressing  them 
and  this  he  appears  to  have  done.     It  is  cer 
tain  that  at  this  time  he  continued  poor;  and 
it  is  equally  certain  that,  by  cruelty  and  dis 
honesty,  he  might  easily  have  become  rich.    I 
is  certain  that  he  was  never  charged  with  hav 
ing  borne  a  share   in  the  abuses  which  then 
prevailed;  and  it  is  almost  equally  certain  that 
if  he  had  borne  a  share  in  those  abuses,  the 
able  and  bitter  enemies  who  afterwards  perse 
cuted  him  would  not  have  failed  to  discover 
and  to  proclaim  his  guilt.     The  keen,  severe 
and  even  malevolent   scrutiny  to  which   hh 
whole  public  life  was  subjected — a  scrutiny 
unparalleled,  as  we  believe,  in  the  history  of 
mankind — is,  in  one  respect,  advantageous  to 
his  reputation.     It  brought  many  lamentable 
blemishes  to  light;  but  it  entitles  him  to  be 
considered  pure  from  every  blemish  which  has 
not  been  brought  to  light. 

The  truth  is,  that  the  temptations  to  which 
so  many  English  functionaries  yielded  in  th 
lime  of  Mr.  Vansittart,  were  not  temptations 
addressed  to  the  ruling  passions  of  Warren 
Hastings.  He  was  not  squeamish  in  pecu 
niary  transactions ;  but  he  was  neither  sordk 
nor  rapacious.  He  was  far  too  enlightened  a 
man  to  look  on  a  great  empire  purely  as  < 
bucanier  would  look  on  a  galleon.  Had  hi 
heart  been  much  worse  than  it  was,  his  under 
standing  would  have  preserved  him  from  tha 
extremity  of  baseness.  He  was  an  unscrupu 


us,  perhaps  an  unprincipled  statesman;  but 
till  he  was  a  statesman,  and  not  a  freebooter. 

In  17G4,  Hastings  relumed  to  England.  He 
ad  realized  only  a  very  moderate  fortune,  and 
hat  moderate  fortune  was  soon  reduced  to  no- 
hing,  partly  by  his  praiseworthy  liberality  and 
>artly  by  his  mismanagement.  Towards  his 
•elations  he  appears  to  have  acted  very  gene 
rously.  The  greater  part  of  his  savings  h* 
eft  in  Bengal,  hoping  probably  to  obtain  the 
ligh  usury  of  India.  But  high  usury  and  bad 
security  generally  go  together;  and  Hastings 
ost  both  interest  and  principal. 

He  remained  four  years  in  England.  Of  his 
ife  at  this  time  very  little  is  known.  But  it 
las  been  asserted,  and  is  highly  probable,  that 
iberal  studies  and  the  society  of  men  of  let- 
ers  occupied  a  great  part  of  his  time.  It  is 
o  be  remembered  to  his  honour,  that  in  days 
when  the  languages  of  the  East  were  regarded 
3y  other  servants  of  the  Company  merely  as 
the  means  of  communicating  with  weavers 
and  money-changers,  his  enlarged  and  accom 
plished  mind  sought  in  Asiatic  learning  for 
lew  forms  of  intellectual  enjoyment,  and  for 
lew  views  of  government  and  society.  Per 
haps,  like  most  persons  who  have  pawl  much 
attention  to  departments  of  knowledge  which 
lie  out  of  the  common  track,  he  was  inclined 
to  overrate  the  value  of  his  favourite  stiulies. 
He  conceived  that  the  cultivation  of  Persian 
literature  might  with  advantage  he  made  a  part 
of  the  liberal  education  of  an  English  gentk- 
man ;  and  he  drew  up  a  plan  with  lhat  view. 
It  is  said  that  the  University  of  Oxford,  in 
which  Oriental  learning  had  never,  since  th« 
revival  of  letters,  been  wholly  neglected,  was 
to  be  the  seat  of  the  institution  which  he  con 
templated.  An  endowment  was  expected  from 
the  munificence  of  the  Company,  and  profes 
sors  thoroughly  competent  to  interpret  Hafiz 
and  Ferdusi  were  to  be  engaged  in  the  East. 
Hastings  called  on  Johnson  with  the  hope,  as 
it  would  seem,  of  interesting  in  his  project  a 
man  who  enjoyed  the  highest  literary  reputa 
tion,  and  who  was  particularly  connected  with 
Oxford.  The  interview  appears  to  have  left 
on  Johnson's  mind  a  most  favourable  impres 
sion  of  the  talents  and  attainments  of  his 
visiter.  Long  after,  when  Hastings  was  ruling 
the  immense  population  of  British  India,  the 
old  philosopher  wrote  to  him,  and  referred  in 
the  most  courtly  terms,  though  with  great  dig 
nity,  to  their  short  but  agreeable  intercourse. 

Hastings  soon  began  to  look  again  towards 
India.  He  had  little  to  attach  him  to  England, 
and  his  pecuniary  embarrassments  were  great. 
He  solicited  his  old  masters  the  Directors  for 
employment.  They  acceded  to  his  request, 
with  high  compliments  both  to  his  abilities  and 
to  his  integrity,  and  appointed  him  a  member 
of  Council  at  Madras.  It  would  be  unjust  not 
to  mention,  that  though  forced  to  borrow  money 
for  his  outfit,  he  did  not  withdraw  any  portion 
of  the  sum  which  he  had  appropriated  tc  the 
relief  of  his  distressed  relations.  In  the  spring 
of  1769  he  embarked  on  board  of  the  "  Duke  of 
Grafton,"  and  commenced  a  voyage  distin 
guished  by  incidents  which  might  furnish  mai 
ler  for  a  novel. 
Among  the  passengers  in  the  "  Duke  of  Graf 


464 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ton,"  was  a  German  by  the  name  of  Imhoff. 
He  called  himself  a  baron,  but  he  was  in  dis 
tressed  circumstances;  and  was  going  out  to 
Madras  as  a  portrait  painter,  in  the  hope  of 
picking  up  some  of  the  pagodas  which  were 
then  lightly  got  and  as  lightly  spent  by  the 
English  in  India.  The  baron  was  accompanied 
by  his  wife,  a  native,  we  have  somewhere  read, 
of  Archangel.  This  young  woman,  who,  born 
lander  the  Arctic  circle,  was  destined  to  play 
the  part  of  a  queen  under  the  tropic  of  Cancer, 
had  an  agreeable  person,  a  cultivated  mind, 
and  manners  in  the  highest  degree  engaging. 
She  despised  her  husband  heartily,  and,  as  the 
story  which  we  have  to  tell  sufficiently  proves, 
not  without  reason.  She  was  interested  by  the 
conversation  and  flattered  by  the  attentions  of 
Hastings.  The  situation  was  indeed  perilous. 
No  place  is  so  propitious  to  the  formation 
either  of  close  friendships  or  of  deadly  enmi 
ties  as  an  Indiaman.  There  are  very  few 
people  who  do  not  find  a  voyage  which  lasts 
several  months  insupportably  dull.  Anything 
is  welcome  which  may  break  that  long  mono- 
lony — a  sail,  a  shark,  an  albatross,  a  man  over 
board.  Most  passengers  find  some  resource 
in  eating  twice  as  many  meals  as  on  land.  But 
the  great  devices  for  killing  the  time  are, 
quarrelling  and  flirting.  The  facilities  for  both 
these  exciting  pursuits  are  great.  The  inmates 
of  the  ship  are  thrown  together  far  more  than 
in  any  country-seat  or  boarding-house.  None 
can  escape  from  the  rest  except  by  imprison 
ing  himself  in  a  cell  in  which  he  can  hardly 
turn.  All  food,  all  exercise,  is  taken  in  com 
pany.  Ceremony  is  to  a  great  extent  banished. 
It  is  every  day  in  the  power  of  a  mischievous 
person  to  inflict  innumerable  annoyances ;  it  is 
every  day  in  the  power  of  an  amiable  person 
to  confer  little  services.  It  not  seldom  happens 
that  serious  distress  and  danger  call  forth  in 
genuine  beauty  and  deformity  heroic  virtues 
and  abject  vices,  which,  in  the  ordinary  inter 
course  of  good  society,  might  remain  during 
many  years  unknown  even  to  intimate  associ 
ates.  Under  such  circumstances  met  Warren 
Hastings  and  the  Baroness  Imhoff;  two  per 
sons  whose  accomplishments  would  have 
attracted  notice  in  any  court  of  Europe.  The 
gentleman  had  no  domestic  ties.  The  lady  was 
tied  to  a  husband  for  whom  she  had  no  regard, 
and  who  had  no  regard  for  his  own  honour. 
An  attachment  sprang  up,  which  M^as  soon 
strengthened  ty  events  such  as  could  hardly 
have  occurred  on  land.  Hastings  fell  ill.  The 
baroness  nursed  him  with  womanly  tender 
ness,  gave  him  his  medicines  with  her  own 
hand,  and  even  sat  up  in  his  cabin  while  he 
slept.  Long  before  the  "Duke  of  Grafton" 
reached  Madras,  Hastings  was  in  love.  But 
his  love  was  of  a  most  characteristic  descrip 
tion.  Like  his  hatred,  like  his  ambition,  like 
all  his  passions,  it  was  strong,  but  not  impetu 
ous.  It  was  calm,  deep,  earnest,  patient  of 
delay,  unconquerable  by  time.  Imhoff  was 
called  into  council  by  his  wife  and  his  x'ife's 
lover.  It  was  arranged  that  the  baroness 
should  institute  a  suit  for  a  divorce  in  the 
courts  of  Franconia;  that  the  baron  should 
aiTord  every  facility  to  the  proceeding;  and 
vbat,  during  the  years  which  might  elapse 


before  the  sentence  should  be  pronounced,  they 
should  continue  to  live  together.  It  was  also 
agreed  that  Hastings  shoiild  bestow  some  very 
substantial  marks  of  gratitude  on  the  complai 
sant  husband ;  and  should,  when  the  marriage 
was  dissolved,  make  the  lady  his  wife,  and 
adopt  the  children  whom  she  had  already 
borne  to  Imhoff. 

We  are  not  inclined  to  judge  either  Hastings 
or  the  baroness  severely.  There  was  undoubV 
edly  much  to  extenuate  their  fault.  But  we 
can  by  no  means  concur  with  the  Rev.  Mr, 
Gleig,  who  carries  his  partiality  to  so  injudi 
cious  an  extreme,  as  to  describe  the  conducl 
of  Imhoff — conduct  the  baseness  of  which  is 
the  best  excuse  for  the  lovers — as  "  wise  and 
judicious." 

At  Madras  Hastings  found  the  trade  of  th« 
Company  in  a  very  disorganized  state.  His 
own  tastes  would  have  led  him  rather  to  poli 
tical  than  to  commercial  pursuits;  but  he  knew 
that  the  favour  of  his  employers  depended 
chiefly  on  their  dividends,  and  their  dividends 
depended  chiefly  on  the  investment.  He  there 
fore,  with  great  judgment,  determined  to  apply 
his  vigorous  mind  for  a  time  to  this  depart 
ment  of  business;  which  had  been  much  neg 
lected,  since  the  servants  of  the  Company  had 
ceased  to  be  clerks,  and  had  become  warriors 
and  negotiators. 

In  a  very  few  months  he  effected  an  import 
ant  reform.  The  Directors  notified  to  him 
their  high  approbation,  and  were  so  much 
pleased  with  his  conduct,  that  they  determined 
to  place  him  at  the  head  of  the  government  of 
Bengal.  Early  in  1772  he  quitted  Fort  St. 
George  for  his  new  post.  The  Imhoffs,  who 
were  still  man  and  wife,  accompanied  him, 
and  lived  at  Calcutta  "  on  the  same  wise  and 
judicious  plan"  (we  quote  the  words  of  Mr. 
Gleig)  which  they  had  already  followed  during 
more  than  two  years. 

When  Hastings  took  his  seat  at  the  head  of 
the  council  board,  Bengal  was  still  governed 
according  to  the  system  which  Clive  had  de 
vised — a  system  which  was,  perhaps,  skilfully 
contrived  for  the  purpose  of  facilitating  and 
concealing  a  great  revolution,  but  which,  when 
that  revolution  was  complete  and  irrevocable, 
could  produce  nothing  but  inconvenience. 
There  were  two  governments,  the  real  and  the 
ostensible.  The  supreme  power  belonged  to 
the  Company,  and  was  in  truth  the  most  des 
potic  power  that  can  be  conceived.  The  only 
restraint  on  the  English  masters  of  the  country 
was  that  which  their  own  justice  and  humanity 
imposed  on  them.  There  was  no  constitu 
tional  check  on  their  will,  and  resistance  to 
them  was  utterly  hopeless. 

But  though  thus  absolute  in  reality,  the 
English  had  not  yet  assumed  the  style  of  so 
vereignty.  They  held  their  territories  as  vas 
sals  of  the  throne  of  Delhi ;  they  raised  their 
revenues  as  collectors  appointed  by  the  im 
perial  commission;  their  public  seal  was  in 
scribed  with  the  imperial  titles ;  and  their  mini 
struck  only  the  imperial  coin. 

There  was  still  a  Nabob  of  Bengal,  who  stood 

to  the  English  rulers  of  his  country  in  the  same 

relation  in  which  Augustulus  stood  to  Odoacer, 

j  or  the  last  Merovingian*  to  Charles   Martei 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


and  Pep  in.  He  lived  at  Moorshedabad.  sur- 1 
rounded  by  princely  magnificence.  He  was 
approached  with  the  outward  marks  of  reve 
rence,  and  his  name  was  used  in  public  instru 
ments  ;  but  in  the  government  of  the  country- 
he  had  less  real  share  than  the  youngest  writer 
)r  cadet  in  the  Company's  service. 

The  English  Council  which  represented  the 
Company  at  Calcutta,  was  constituted  on  a 
yery  different  plan  from  that  which  has  since 
beet,  adopted.  At  present  the  governor  is,  as 
to  all  executive  measures,  absolute.  He  can 
'declare  war,  conclude  peace,  appoint  public 
functionaries  or  remove  them,  in  opposition  to 
the  unanimous  sense  of  those  who  sit  with 
him  in  council.  They  are,  indeed,  entitled  to 
know  all  that  is  done,  to  discuss  all  that  is 
done,  to  advise,  to  remonstrate,  to  send  home 
protests.  But  it  is  with  the  governor  that  the 
supreme  power  resides,  and  on  him  that  the 
whole  responsibility  rests.  This  system,  which 
was  introduced  by  Mr.  Pitt  and  Mr.  Dundas 
in  spite  of  the  strenuous  opposition  of  Mr. 
Burke,  we  conceive  to  be  on  the  whole  the 
best  that  was  ever  devised  for  the  government 
of  a  country  where  no  materials  can  be  found 
foe  a  representative  constitution.  In  the  time 
of  Hastings  the  governor  had  only  one  vote  in 
Council,  and,  in  case  of  an  equal  division,  a 
casting  vote.  It  therefore  happened  not  un- 
frequently  that  he  was  overruled  on  the  gravest 
questions;  and  it  was  possible  that  he  might 
be  wholly  excluded,  for  years  together,  from 
the  real  direction  of  public  affairs. 

The  English  functionaries  at  Fort  William 
had  as  yet  paid  little  or  no  attention  to  the  in 
ternal  government  of  Bengal.  The  only  branch 
of  p.3,.i«ics  with  which  they  much  busied  them 
selves  was  negotiation  with  the  native  princes. 
The  police,  the  administration  of  justice,  the 
details  of  the  collection  of  revenue,  they  almost 
entirely  neglected.  We  may  remark  that  the 
phraseology  of  the  Company's  servants  still 
bears  the  traces  of  this  state  of  things.  To  this 
day  they  always  use  the  word  "  political"  as 
synonymous  with  "  diplomatic."  We  could 
name  a  gentleman  still  living,  who  was  de 
scribed  by  the  highest  authority  as  an  inva 
luable  public  servant,  eminently  fit  to  be  at  the 
head  of  the  departments  of  finance,  revenue, 
and  justice,  but  unfortunately  quite  ignorant 
of  all  political  business. 

The  internal  government  of  Bengal  the  Eng 
lish  rulers  delegated  to  a  great  native  minister, 
vrho  was  stationed  at  Moorshedabad.  All  mi 
litary  affairs,  and,  with  the  exception  of  what 
pertains  to  mere  ceremonial,  all  foreign  affairs, 
were  withdrawn  from  his  control ;  but  the 
other  departments  of  the  administration  were 
entirely  confided  to  him.  His  own  stipend 
amounted  to  near  a  hundred  thousand  pounds 
sterling  a  year.  The  civil  list  of  the  Nabobs, 
amounting  to  more  than  three  hundred  thousand 
pounds  a  year,  passed  through  the  minister's 
hands,  and  was,  to  a  great  extent,  at  his  dis 
posal.  The  collection  of  the  revenue,  the  su 
perintendence  of  the  household  of  the  prince, 
the  administration  of  justice,  the  maintenance 
of  order,  were  left  to  this  high  functionary; 
ard  for  the  exercise  of  his  immense  power  he 
VOL.  IV.— 59 


was  responsible  to  none  out  tne  British  masters 
of  the  country. 

A  situation  so  important,  lucrative,  and 
splendid,  was  naturally  an  object  of  ambition 
to  the  ablest  and  most  powerful  natives.  Clive 
had  found  it  difficult  to  decide  between  con 
flicting  pretensions.  Two  candidates  stood  out 
prominently  from  the  crowd,  each  of  them  the 
representative  of  a  race  and  of  a  religion. 

The  one  was  Mohammed  Reza  Khan,  a 
Mussulman  of  Persian  extraction,  able,  active, 
religious  after  the  fashion  of  his  people,  and 
highly  esteemed  by  them.  In  England,  he  might 
perhaps  have  been  regarded  as  a  corrupt  and 
greedy  politician.  But  tried  by  the  lower  stand 
ard  of  Indian  morality,  he  might  be  considered 
as  a  man  of  integrity  and  honour. 

His  competitor  was  a  Hindoo  Brahmin,  whose 
name  has,  by  a  terrible  and  melancholy  event, 
been  inseparably  associated  with  that  of  War 
ren  Hastings — the  Maharajah  Nuncomar.  This 
man  had  played  an  important  part  in  all  the 
revolutions  which,  since  the  time  of  Surajah 
Dowlah,  had  taken  place  in  Bengal.  To  the 
consideration  which  in  that  country  belongs  to 
high  and  pure  caste,  he  added  the  weight  which 
is  derived  from  wealth,  talents,  and  experience. 
Of  his  moral  character  it  is  difficult  to  give  a 
notion  to  those  who  are  acquainted  with  human 
nature  only  as  it  appears  in  our  island.  What 
the  Italian  is  to  the  Englishman,  what  the  Hin 
doo  is  to  the  Italian,  what  the  Bengalee  is  to 
other  Hindoos,  that  was  Nuncomar  to  other 
Bengalees.  The  physical  organization  of  the 
Bengalee  is  feeble  even  to  effeminacy.  He 
lives  in  a  constant  vapour  bath.  His  pursuits 
are  sedentary,  his  limbs  delicate,  his  move 
ments  languid.  During  many  ages  he  has  been 
trampled  upon  by  men  of  bolder  and  more 
hardy  breeds.  Courage,  independence,  ve 
racity,  are  qualities  to  which  his  constitution 
and  his  situation  are  equally  unfavourable. 
His  mind  bears  a  singular  analogy  to  his  body 
It  is  weak  even  to  helplessness,  for  purposes 
of  manly  resistance ;  but  its  suppleness  and  its 
tact  move  the  children  of  sterner  climates  to 
admiration  not  unmingled  with  contempt.  All 
those  arts  which  are  the  natural  defence  of  the 
weak,  are  more  familiar  Avith  this  subtle  race 
than  to  the  Ionian  of  the  times  of  Juvenal,  or 
to  the  Jew  of  the  dark  ages.  What  the  horns 
are  to  the  buffalo,  what  the  paw  is  to  the  tiger, 
what  the  sting  is  to  the  bee,  what  beauty,  ac 
cording  to  the  old  Greek  song,  is  to  woman, 
deceit  is  to  the  Bengalee.  Large  promises, 
smooth  excuses,  elaborate  tissues  of  circum 
stantial  falsehood,  chicanery,  perjury,  forgery, 
are  the  weapons,  offensive  and  defensive,  of 
the  people  of  the  Lower  Ganges.  All  those 
millions  do  not  furnish  one  sepoy  to  the  armies 
of  the  Company.  But  as  usurers,  as  money 
changers,  as  sharp  legal  practitioners,  no  class 
j  of  human  beings  can  bear  a  comparison  with 
'  them.  With  all  his  softness,  the  Bengalee  ia 
i  by  no  means  placable  in  his  enmities,  or  prone 
!  to  pity.  The  pertinacity  with  which  he  ad 
heres  to  his  purposes,  yields  only  to  the  immo- 
,  diate  pressure  of  fear.  Nor  does  he  lack  a 
certain  kind  of  courage  which  is  often  want- 
;  ing  in  his  masters.  To  inevitable  evils  he  i* 


466 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


sometimes  found  to  oppose  a  passive  fortitude, 
such  as  the  Stoics  attributed  to  their  ideal  sage. 
A  European  warrior,  who  rushes  on  a  battery 
of  cannon  with  a  loud  hurrah,  will  shriek  un 
der  the  surgeon's  knife,  and  fall  into  an  agony 
of  despair  at  the  sentence  cf  death.  But  the 
Bengalee  would  see  his  country  overrun,  his 
house  laid  in  ashes,  his  children  murdered  or 
dishonoured,  without  having  the  spirit  to  strike 
one  blow;  he  has  yet  been  known  to  endure 
torture  with  the  firmness  of  Mucius,  and  to 
mount  the  scaffold  with  the  steady  step  and 
even  pulse  of  Algernon  Sydney. 

In  Nuncomar,  the  national  character  was 
strongly  and  with  exaggeration  personified. 
The  Company's  servants  had  repeatedly  de 
tected  him  in  the  most  criminal  intrigues.  On 
one  occasion  he  brought  a  false  charge  against 
another  Hindoo,  and  tried  to  substantiate  it  by 
producing  forged  documents.  On  another  oc 
casion  it  was  discovered  that,  while  professing 
the  strongest  attachment  to  the  English,  he 
was  engaged  in  several  conspiracies  against 
them  ;  and  in  particular  that  he  was  the  me 
dium  of  a  correspondence  between  the  court 
of  Delhi  and  the  French  authorities  in  the  Car- 
natic.  For  these  and  similar  practices,  he  had 
been  long  detained  in  confinement.  But  his 
talents  and  influence  had  not  only  procured 
his  liberation,  but  had  obtained  for  him  a  cer 
tain  degree  of  consideration  even  among  the 
British  rulers  of  his  country. 

Clive  was  extremely  unwilling  to  place  a 
Mussulman  at  the  head  of  the  administration 
of  Bengal.  On  the  other  hand,  he  could  not 
cring  himself  to  confer  immense  power  on  a 
man  to  whom  every  sort  of  villany  had  re 
peatedly  been  brought  home.  Therefore,  though 
the  Nabob,  over  whom  Nuncomar  had  by  in 
trigue  acquired  great  influence,  begged  that  the 
artful  Hindoo  might  be  intrusted  with  the  go 
vernment,  Clive,  after  some  hesitation,  decided 
honestly  and  wisely  in  favour  of  Mohammed 
Keza  Khan,  who  had  held  his  high  office  seven 
years  when  Hastings  became  Governor.  An 
infant  son  of  Meer  Jaffier  was  now  Nabob  ;  and 
the  guardianship  of  the  young  prince's  person 
had  been  confined  to  the  minister. 

Nuncomar,  stimulated  at  once  by  cupidity 
and  malice,  had  been  constantly  attempting  to 
undermine  his  successful  rival.  This  was  not 
difficult.  The  revenues  of  Bengal,  under  the 
administration  established  by  Clive,  did  not 
yield  such  a  surplus  as  had  been  anticipated 
by  the  Company ;  for,  at  that  time,  the  most 
absurd  notions  were  entertained  in  England 
respecting  the  wealth  of  India.  Palaces  of 
porphyry,  hung  with  the  richest  brocade,  heaps 
of  pearls  and  diamonds,  vaults  from  which  pa 
godas  and  gold  mohurs  were  measured  out  by 
the  bushel,  filled  the  imagination  even  of  men 
of  business.  Nobody  seemed  to  be  aware  of 
what  nevertheless  was  most  undoubtedly  the 
truth,  that  India  was  a  much  poorer  country 
Jian  countries  which  in  Europe  are  reckoned 
poor — than  Ireland,  for  example,  than  Portu 
gal,  or  than  Sweden.  It  was  confidently  be 
lieved  by  Lords  of  the  Treasury  and  Members 
for  the  City,  that  Bengal  would  not  only  defray 
its  own  charges,  but  would  afford  an  increased 


dividend  to  the  proprietors  of  Indian  stock, 
and  large  relief  to  the  English  finances.  These 
absurd  expectations  were  disappointed ;  and 
the  Directors,  naturally  enough,  chose  to  attri 
bute  the  disappointment  rather  to  the  misma 
nagement  of  Mohammed  Reza  Khan,  than  to 
their  own  ignorance  of  the  country  intrusted 
to  their  care.  They  were  confirmed  in  their 
error  by  the  agents  of  Nuncomar ;  for  Nunco 
mar  had  agents  even  in  Leadenhall  Street. 
Soon  after  Hastings  reached  Calcutta,  he  re 
ceived  a  letter  addressed  by  the  Court  of  Di 
rectors,  not  to  the  Council  generally,  but  to 
himself  in  particular.  He  was  directed  to  re 
move  Mohammed  Reza  Khan,  to  arrest  him, 
together  with  all  his  family  and  all  his  parti 
sans,  and  to  institute  a  strict  inquiry  into  the 
whole  administration  of  the  province.  It  was 
added,  that  the  Governor  would  do  well  to 
avail  himself  of  the  assistance  of  Nuncomar 
in  the  investigation.  The  vices  of  Nuncomar 
were  acknowledged.  But  even  from  his  vice:, 
it  was  said,  much  advantage  might  at  such  a 
conjuncture  be  derived;  and,  though  he  could 
not  safely  be  trusted,  it  might  still  be  proper 
to  encourage  him  by  hopes  of  reward. 

The  Governor  bore  no  good- will  to  Nunco 
mar.  Many  years  before,  they  had  known 
each  other  at  Moorshedabad ;  and  then  a  quar 
rel  had  risen  between  them,  which  all  the 
authority  of  their  superiors  could  hardly  com 
pose.  Widely  as  they  differed  in  most  points, 
they  resembled  each  other  in  this,  that  both 
were  men  of  unforgiving  natures.  To  Mo 
hammed  Reza  Khan,  on  the  other  hand,  Hast 
ings  had  no  feelings  of  hostility.  Nevertheless 
he  proceeded  to  execute  the  instructions  of  the 
Company  with  an  alacrity  which  he  never 
showed,  except  when  instructions  were  in  per* 
feet  conformity  with  his  own  views.  He  had, 
wisely  as  we  think,  determined  to  get  rid  of 
the  system  of  double  government  in  Bengal 
The  orders  of  the  Directors  furnished  him  with 
the  means  of  effecting  his  purpose,  and  dis 
pensed  him  from  the  necessity  of  discussing 
the  matter  with  his  Council.  He  took  his  mea 
sures  with  his  usual  vigour  and  dexterity.  At 
midnight,  the  palace  of  Mohammed  Reza 
Khan,  at  Moorshedabad,  was  surrounded  by  a 
battalion  of  sepoys.  The  minister  was  roused 
from  his  slumbers  and  informed  that  he  was  a 
prisoner.  With  the  Mussulman  gravity,  he 
bent  his  head  and  submitted  himself  to  the  will 
of  God.  He  fell  not  alone.  A  chief,  named 
Schitab  Roy,  had  been  intrusted  with  the  go 
vernment  of  Bahar.  His  valour  and  his  at 
tachment  to  the  English  had  more  than  once 
been  signally  proved.  On  that  memorable 
day  on  which  the  people  of  Patna  saw  frcra 
their  walls  the  whole  army  of  the  Mogul  scat 
tered  by  the  little  band  of  Captain  Knox,  th« 
voice  of  the  British  conquerors  assigned  the 
palm  of  gallantry  to  the  brave  Asiatic.  "1 
never,"  said  Knox,  when  he  introduced  Schitafc 
Roy,  covered  with  blood  and  dust,  to  the  Eng 
lish  functionaries  assembled  in  the  factory— 
"  I  never  saw  a  native  fight  so  before."  Schitab 
Roy  was  involved  in  the  ruin  of  Mohammed 
Reza  Khan,  was  deprived  of  his  government, 
and  was  placed  under  arrest.  The  members 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


467 


of  the  Council  received  no  intimation  of  these  ' 
measures  till  the  prisoners  were  on  their  road 
lo  Calcutta. 

The  inquiry  into  the  conduct  of  the  minister 
was  postponed  on  different  pretences.  He  was 
detained  in  an  easy  confinement  during  many 
months.  In  the  mean  time  the  great  revolution 
which  Hastings  had  planned  was  carried  into 
effect.  The  office  of  minister  was  abolished. 
The  internal  administration  was  transferred  to 
the  servants  of  the  Company.  A  system — a 
very  iriperfect  system  it  is  true — of  civil  and 
criminal  justice,  under  English  superintend 
ence,  was  established.  The  Nabob  was  no 
longer  to  have  even  an  ostensible  share  in  the 
government;  but  he  was  still  to  receive  a  con 
siderable  annual  allowance,  and  to  be  sur 
rounded  with  the  state  of  sovereignty.  As  he 
was  an  infant,  it  was  necessary  to  provide 
guardians  for  his  person  and  property.  His 
person  was  intrusted  to  a  lady  of  his  father's 
harem,  known  by  the  name  of  the  Munny  Be 
gum.  The  office  of  treasurer  of  the  household 
was  bestowed  on  a  son  of  Nuncomar,  named 
Goordas.  Nuncomar's  services  were  wanted, 
yet  he  could  not  safely  be  trusted  with  power ; 
and  Hastings  thought  it  a  master-stroke  of 
policy  to  reward  the  able  and  unprincipled 
parent  by  promoting  the  inoffensive  child. 

The  revolution  completed,  the  double  go 
vernment  dissolved,  the  company  installed  in 
the  full  sovereignty  of  Bengal,  Hastings  had 
no  motive  to  treat  the  late  ministers  with 
rigour.  Their  trial  had  been  put  off  on 
various  pleas  till  the  new  organization  was 
complete.  They  were  then  brought  before  a 
committee,  over  which  the  Governor  presided. 
Schitab  Roy  was  speedily  acquitted  with 
honour.  A  formal  apology  was  made  to  him 
for  the  restraint  to  which  he  had  been  sub 
jected.  All  the  Eastern  marks  of  respect  were 
bestowed  on  him.  He  was  clothed  in  a  robe 
of  honour,  presented  with  jewels  and  with  a 
richly  harnessed  elephant,  and  sent  back  in 
state  lo  Patna.  But  his  health  had  suffered 
from  confinement;  his  high  spirit  had  been 
cruelly  wounded;  and  soon  after  his  liberation 
he  died  of  a  broken  heart. 

The  innocence  of  Mohammed  Reza  Khan 
was  not  so  clearly  established.  But  the  Go 
vernor  was  not  disposed  to  deal  harshly.  After 
a  long  hearing,  in  which  Nuncomar  appeared 
as  the  accuser,  and  displayed  both  the  art  and 
the  inveterate  rancour  which  distinguished 
him,  Hastings  pronounced  that  the  charges 
had  not  been  made  out,  and  ordered  the  fallen 
minister  to  be  set  at  liberty. 

Nuncomar  had  proposed  to  destroy  the  Mus 
sulman  administration,  and  to  rise  on  its  ruins. 
Both  his  malevolence  and  his  cupidity  had 
been  disappointed.  Hastings  had  made  him  a 
tool — had  used  him  for  the  purpose  of  accom 
plishing  the  transfer  of  the  government  from 
Moorxhedabad  to  Calcutta,  from  native  to 
European  hands.  The  rival,  the  enemy,  so 
ong  envied,  so  implacably  persecuted,  had 
neen  dismissed  unhurt.  The  situation  so  long 
and  ardently  desired  had  been  abolished.  It 
was  natural  that  the  Governor  should  be  from 
that  time  an  object  of  the  most  intense  hatred 
to  the  vindictive  Brahmin.  As  yet,  however, 


it  was  necessary  to  suppress  such  feelings. 
The  time  was  coming  when  that  long  ani 
mosity  was  to  end  in  a  desperate  and  deadly 
struggle. 

In  the  mean  time,  Hastings  was  compelled 
to  turn  his  attention  to  foreign  affairs.  The 
object  of  his  diplomacy  was  at  this  time  sim 
ply  to  get  money.  The  finances  of  his  govern 
ment  were  in  an  embarrassed  state ;  and  this 
embarrassment  he  was  determined  to  relieve 
by  some  means,  fair  or  foul.  The  principle 
which  directed  all  his  dealings  with  his  neigh 
bours  is  fully  expressed  by  the  old  motto  of 
one  of  the  great  predatory  families  of  Teviot- 
dale — "Thou  shalt  want  ere  I  want."  He 
seems  to  have  laid  it  down,  as  a  fundamental 
proposition  which  could  not  be  disputed,  that 
when  he  had  not  as  many  lacs  of  rupees  as 
the  public  service  required,  he  was  to  take 
them  from  anybody  who  had.  One  thing,  in 
deed,  is  to  be  said  in  excuse  for  him.  The 
pressure  applied  to  him  by  his  employers  at 
home  was  such  as  only  the  highest  virtue 
could  have  withstood — such  as  left  him  no 
choice  except  to  commit  great  wrongs,  or  to 
resign  his  high  post,  and  with  that  post  all  his 
hopes  of  fortune  and  distinction.  It  is  perfect 
ly  true,  that  the  Directors  never  enjoined  or 
applauded  any  crime.  Far  from  it.  Whoever 
examines  their  letters  at  that  time,  will  find 
there  many  just  and  humane  sentiments,  many 
excellent  precepts ;  in  short,  an  admirable  cir 
cle  of  political  ethics.  But  every  exhortation 
is  modified  or  nullified  by  a  demand  for  money. 
"Govern  leniently,  and  send  more  money; 
practise  strict  justice  and  moderation  towards 
neighbouring  powers,  and  send  more  money;" 
this  is  in  truth  the  sum  of  almost  all  the  in 
structions  that  Hastings  ever  received  from 
home.  Now,  these  instructions,  being  inter 
preted,  mean  simply,  "Be  the  father  and  the 
oppressor  of  the  people;  be  just  and  unjust, 
moderate  and  rapacious."  The  Directors  dealt 
with  India,  as  the  church,  in  the  good  old 
times,  dealt  with  a  heretic.  They  delivered 
the  victim  over  to  the  executioners,  with  an 
earnest  request  that  all  possible  tenderness 
might  be  shown.  We  by  no  means  accuse  or 
suspect  those  who  framed  these  despatches  of 
hypocrisy.  It  is  probable  that,  writing  fifteen 
thousand  miles  from  the  place  where  their 
orders  were  to  be  carried  into  effect,  they  never 
perceived  the  gross  inconsistency  of  which 
they  were  guilty.  But  the  inconsistency  was 
at  once  manifest  to  their  lieutenant  at  Calcutta, 
who,  with  an  empty  treasury,  Avith  an  unpaid 
army,  with  his  own  salary  often  in  arrear, 
with  deficient  crops,  with  government  tenants 
daily  running  away,  was  called  upon  to  remit 
home  another  half  million  without  fail.  Hast 
ings  saw  that  it  was  absolutely  necessary  for 
him  to  disregard  either  the  moral  discourses  or 
the  pecuniary  requisitions  of  his  employers. 
Being  forced  to  disobey  them  in  something,  he 
had  to  consider  what  kind  of  disobedience  they 
would  most  readily  pardon  ;  and  he  correctly 
judged  that  the  safest  course  would  be  to  neg 
lect  the  Sermons  and  to  find  'he  Rupees. 

A  mind  so  fertile  as  his,  and  so  little  re 
strained  by  conscientious  scruples,  speedily 
discovered  several  modes  of  relieving  1h*» 


468 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


financial  embarrassments  of  the  government. 
The  allowance  of  the  Nabob  of  Bengal  was 
reduced  at  a  stroke  from  320,000/.  a  year  to 
half  that  sum.  The  Company  had  bound  itself 
to  pay  nearly  300,000/.  a  year  to  the  Great 
Mogul,  as  a  mark  of  homage  for  the  provinces 
which  he  had  intrusted  to  their  care  ;  and  they 
had  ceded  to  him  the  districts  of  Corah  and 
•Vllahabad.  On  the  plea  that  the  Mogul  was 
not  really  independent,  but  merely  a  tool  in  the 
hands  of  others,  Hastings  determined  to  retract 
these  concessions.  He  accordingly  declared 
that  the  English  would  pay  no  more  tribute, 
and  sent  troops  to  occupy  Allahabad  and  Co 
rah.  The  situation  of  these  places  was  such, 
that  there  would  be  little  advantage  and  great 
expense  in  retaining  them.  Hastings,  who 
wanted  money  and  not  territory,  determined  to 
sell  them.  A  purchaser  was  not  wanting. 
The  rich  province  of  Oude  had,  in  the  general 
dissolution  of  the  Mogul  Empire,  fallen  to  the 
share  of  the  great  Mussulman  house  by  which 
it  is  still  governed.  About  twenty  years  ago, 
this  house,  by  the  permission  of  the  British 
government,  assumed  the  royal  title,  but,  in 
the  time  of  Warren  Hastings,  such  an  assump 
tion  would  have  been  considered  by  the  Mo 
hammedans  of  India  as  a  monstrous  impiely. 
The  Prince  of  Oude,  though  he  held  the  power, 
did  not  venture  to  use  the  style  of  sovereignty. 
To  the  appellation  of  Nabob  or  Viceroy,  he 
added  that  of  Vizier  of  the  monarchy  of  Hin- 
dostan — just  as  in  the  last  century  the  Electors 
of  Saxony  and  Brandenburg,  though  independ 
ent  of  the  Emperor,  and  often  in  arms  against 
him,  were  proud  to  style  themselves  his  Grand 
Chamberlain  and  Grand  Marshal.  Snjah 
Dowlah,  then  nabob  vizier,  was  on  excellent 
terms  with  the  English.  He  had  a  large  trea 
sure.  Allahabad  and  Corah  were  so  situated 
that  they  might  be  of  use  to  him,  and  could  be 
of  none  to  the  Company.  The  buyer  and  seller 
soon  came  to  an  understanding;  and  the  pro 
vinces  which  had  been  torn  from  the  Mogul 
were  made  over  to  the  government  of  Oude  for 
about  half  a  million  sterling. 

But  there  was  another  matter  still  more  im 
portant  to  be  settled  by  the  Vizier  and  the  Go 
vernor.  The  fate  of  a  brave  people  was  to 
be  decided.  It  was  decided  in  a  manner 
which  has  left  a  lasting  stain  on  the  fame  of 
Hastings  and  of  England. 

The  people  of  central  Asia  had  always  been 
to  the  inhabitants  of  India  what  the  warriors 
of  the  German  forests  were  to  the  subjects  of 
the  decaying  monarchy  of  Rome.  The  dark, 
slender,  and  timid  Hindoo  shrank  from  a  con 
flict  with  the  strong  muscle  and  resolute  spirit 
of  the  fair  race  which  dwelt  beyond  the  passes. 
There  is  reason  to  believe  that,  at  a  period  an 
terior  to  the  dawn  of  regular  history,  the  peo 
ple  who  spoke  the  rich  and  flexible  Sanscrit 
came  from  regions  lying  far  beyond  the  Hy-  I 
phasis  and  the  Hystaspes,  and  imposed  their 
yoke  on  the  children  of  the  soil.  It  is  certain 
that,  during  the  last  ten  centuries,  a  succession  | 
of  invaders  descended  from  the  west  on  Hin 
dustan  ;  nor  was  the  course  of  conquest  ever 
turned  back  towards  the  setting  sun,  till  that 
memorable  campaign  in  which  the  cross  of 


Saint  George   was  planted  on  the   walls  ol 
Ghizni. 

The  Emperors  of  Hindostan  themselves 
came  from  the  other  side  of  the  great  moun 
tain  ridge :  and  it  had  al*  ays  been  their  prac 
tice  to  recruit  their  array  from  the  hardy  and 
valiant  race  from  which  their  own  illustrious 
house  sprang.  Among  the  military  adven 
turers  who  were  allured  to  the  Mogul  stand 
ards  from  the  neighbourhood  of  Cabul  and 
Candahar,  were  conspicuous  several  gallant 
bands,  known  by  the  name  of  the  Rohillas. 
Their  services  had  been  rewarded  with  large 
tracts  of  land — fiefs  of  the  spear,  if  we  may 
use  an  expression  drawn  from  an  analogous 
state  of  things — in  that  fertile  plain  through 
which  the  Ramgunga  flows  from  the  snowy 
heights  of  Kumaon  to  join  the  Ganges.  In  the 
general  confusion  which  followed  the  death  of 
Aurungzebe,  the  warlike  colony  became  vir 
tually  independent.  The  Rohillas  were  distin 
guished  from  the  other  inhabitants  of  India  by 
a  peculiarly  fair  complexion.  They  were  more 
honourably  distinguished  by  valour  in  war 
and  by  skill  in  the  arts  of  peace.  While 
anarchy  raged  from  Lahore  to  Cape  Comorin, 
their  little  territory  enjoyed  the  blessings  of 
repose  under  the  guardianship  of  courage. 
Agriculture  and  commerce  flourished  among 
them;  nor  were  they  negligent  of  rhetoric  and 
poetry.  Many  persons  now  living  have  heard 
aged  men  talk  with  regret  of  the  golden  days 
when  the  Afghan  princes  ruled  in  the  vale  of 
Rohilcund. 

Sujah  Dowlah  had  set  his  heart  on  adding 
this  rich  district  to  his  own  principality. 
Right,  or  show  of  right,  he  had  absolutely 
none.  His  claim  was  in  no  respect  better 
founded  than  that  of  Catherine  to  Poland,  or 
that  of  the  Bonaparte  family  to  Spain.  The 
Rohillas  held  their  country  by  exactly  the  same 
title  by  which  he  held  his  :  and  had  governed 
their  country  far  better  than  his  had  ever  been 
governed.  Nor  were  they  a  people  whom  it 
was  perfectly  safe  to  attack.  Their  land  was 
indeed  an  open  plain,  destitute  of  natural  de 
fences  ;  but  their  veins  were  full  of  the  high 
blood  of  Afghanistan.  As  soldiers,  they  had 
not  the  steadiness  which  is  seldom  found  ex 
cept  in  company  with  strict  discipline;  but 
their  impetuous  valour  had  been  proved  on 
many  fields  of  battle.  It  was  said  that  their 
chiefs,  when  united  by  common  peril,  could 
bring  eighty  thousand  men  into  the  field.  Su 
jah  Dowlah  had  himself  seen  them  fight,  and 
wisely  shrank  from  a  conflict  with  them. 
There  was  in  India  one  army,  and  only  one, 
against  which  even  those  proud  Caucasian 
tribes  could  not  stand.  It  had  been  abundantly 
proved  that  neither  tenfold  odds  nor  the  mar 
tial  ardour  of  the  boldest  Asiatic  nations, 
could  avail  aught  against  English  science  and 
resolution.  Was  it  possible  to  induce  the 
Governor  of  Bengal  to  let  out  to  hire  the  irre 
sistible  energies  of  the  imperial  people — the 
skill,  against  which  the  ablest  chiefs  of  Hin 
dostan  were  helpless  as  infants — the  disci- 
pline,  which  had  so  often  triumphed  over  th« 
frantic  struggles  of  fanaticism  and  despair- 
the  unconquerable  British  courage  which  ii 


WARREN    HASTINGS. 


469 


never  so  sedate  and  stubborn  as  towards  the 
close  of  a  doubtful  and  murderous  day! 

This  was  what  the  Nabob  Vizier  asked,  and 
what  Hastings  granted.  A  bargain  was  soon 
struck.  Each  of  the  negotiators  had  what  the 
other  wanted.  Hastings  was  in  need  of  funds 
to  carry  on  the  government  of  Bengal,  and  to 
send  remittances  to  London;  and  Sujah  Dow- 
la  h  had  an  ample  revenue.  Sujah  Dowlah 
was  bent  on  subjugating  the  Rohillas;  and 
Hastings  had  at  his  disposal  the  only  force  by 
which  the  Rohillas  could  be  subjugated.  It 
was  agreed  that  an  English  army  should  be 
lent  to  the  Nabob  Vizier,  and  that,  for  the  loan, 
he  should  pay  400,000/.  sterling,  besides  de 
fraying  all  the  charge  of  the  troops  while  em 
ployed  in  his  service. 

"I  really  cannot  see,"  says  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Gleig,  "  upon  what  grounds,  either  of  politi 
cal  or  moral  justice,  this  proposition  deserves 
to  be  stigmatized  as  infamous."  If  we  under 
stand  the  meaning  of  words,  it  is  infamous  to 
commit  a  wicked  action  for  hire,  and  it  is 
wicked  to  engage  in  war  without  provocation. 
In  this  particular  war,  scarcely  one  aggravat 
ing  circumstance  was  wanting.  The  object 
of  the  Rohilla  war  was  this — to  deprive  a  large 
population,  who  had  never  done  us  the  least 
harm,  of  a  good  government,  and  to  place 
them,  against  their  will,  under  an  execrably 
bad  one.  Nay,  even  this  is  not  all.  England 
now  descent  led  far  below  the  level  even  of 
those  petty  German  princes,  who,  about  the 
same  time,  sold  us  troops  to  fight  the  Ameri 
cans.  The  hussar-mongers  of  Hesse  and  An- 
spach  had  at  least  the  assurance  that  the  ex 
peditions  on  which  their  soldiers  were  to  be 
em  ployed,  would  be  conducted  in  conformity 
with  the  humane  rules  of  civilized  warfare. 
Was  the  Rohilla  war  likely  to  be  so  conducted? 
Did  the  Governor  stipulate  that  it  should  be  so 
conducted'!  He  well  knew  what  Indian  war 
fare  was.  He  well  knew  that  the  power  which 
he  covenanted  to  put  into  Sujah  Dowlah's 
hands  would,  in  all  probability,  be  atrociously 
abused;  and  he  required  no  guarantee,  no 

Sromise  that  it  should  not  be  so  abused.  He 
id  not  even  reserve  to  himself  the  right  of 
withdrawing  his  aid  in  case  of  abuse,  however 
gross.  Mr.  Gleig  repeats  Major  Scott's  absurd 
plea  that  Hastings  was  justified  in  letting  out 
English  troops  to  slaughter  the.  Rohillas,  be 
cause  the  Rohillas  were  not  of  Indian  race,  but 
a  colony  from  a  distant  country.  What  were 
the  English  themselves  1  Was  it  for  them  to 
proclaim  a  crusade  for  the  expulsion  of  all 
intruders  from  the  countries  watered  by  the 
Ganges?  Did  it  lie  in  their  mouths  to  contend 
that  a  foreign  settler,  who  establishes  an  empire 
in  India,  is  a  caput  Ivpinum?  What  would 
they  have  said  if  any  other  power  had,  on  such 
a  ground,  attacked  Madras  or  Calcutta,  with 
out  the  slightest  provocation]  Such  a  defence 
was  wanting  to  make  the  infamy  of  the  trans 
action  complete.  The  atrocity  of  the  crime 
and  the  hypocrisy  of  the  apology  are  worthy 
of  each  other. 

One  of  the  three  brigades  of  which  the  Ben 
gal  army  consisted  was  sent  under  Colonel 
Champion  to  join  Sujah  Dowlah's  forces. 
The  Rohillas  expostulated,  entreated,  offered  a 


large  ransom,  but  in  vain.  They  then  resolved 
to  defend  themselves  to  the  last.  A  bloody 
battle  was  fought.  "  The  enemy,"  says  Co 
lonel  Champion,  "  gave  proof  of  a  good  share 
of  military  knowledge  ;  and  it  is  impossible  to 
describe  a  more  obstinate  firmness  of  resolution 
than  they  displayed."  The  dastardly  sovereign, 
of  Oude  fled  from  the  field.  The  English  were 
left  unsupported;  but  their  fire  and  their  charge 
were  irresistible.  It  was  not,  however,  till  the 
most  distinguished  chiefs  had  fallen,  fighting 
bravely  at  the  head  of  their  troops,  that  the 
Rohilla  ranks  gave  way.  Then  the  Nabob 
Vizier  and  his  rabble  made  their  appearance, 
and  hastened  to  plunder  the  camp  of  the  valiant 
enemies,  whom  they  had  never  dared  to  look 
in  the  face.  The  soldiers  of  the  Company, 
trained  in  an  exact  discipline,  kept  unbroken 
order,  while  the  tents  were  pillaged  by  these 
worthless  allies.  But  many  voices  were  heard 
to  exclaim,  "We  have  had  all  the  fighting,  and 
these  rogues  are  to  have  all  the  profit." 

Then  the  horrors  of  Indian  war  were  let 
loose  on  the  fair  valleys  and  cities  of  Rohil- 
cund.  The  whole  country  was  in  a  blaze. 
More  than  a  hundred  thousand  people  fled 
from  their  homes  to  pestilential  jungles,  pre 
ferring  famine  and  fever,  and  the  haunts  of 
tigers,  to  the  tyranny  of  him,  to  whom  an  Eng 
lish  and  a  Christian  government  had,  for 
shameful  lucre,  sold  their  substance  and  their 
blood,  and  the  honour  of  their  wives  and  daugh 
ters.  Colonel  Champion  remonstrated  with 
the  Nabob  Vizier,  and  sent  strong  representa 
tions  to  Fort  William ;  but  the  Governor  had 
made  no  conditions  as  to  the  mode  in  which  the 
war  was  to  be  carried  on.  He  had  troubled 
himself  about  nothing  but  his  forty  lacs  ;  and, 
though  he  might  disapprove  of  Sujah  Dowlah's 
wanton  barbarity,  he  did  not  think  himself  en 
titled  to  interfere,  except  by  offering  advice. 
This  delicacy  excites  the  admiration  of  the 
reverend  biographer.  "  Mr.  Hastings,"  he  says, 
"could  not  himself  dictate  to  the  Nabob,  nor 
permit  the  commander  of  the  Company's  troops 
to  dictate  how  the  war  was  to  be  carried  on." 
No,  to  be  sure.  Mr.  Hastings  had  only  to  put 
down  by  main  force  the  brave  struggles  of  in 
nocent  men  fighting  for  their  liberty.  Their 
military  resistance  crushed,  his  duties  ended; 
and  he  had  then  only  to  fold  his  arms  and  look 
on,  while  their  villages  were  burned,  their 
children  butchered,  and  their  women  violated 
Will  Mr.  Gleig  seriously  maintain  this  opi 
nion?  Is  any  rule  more  plain  than  this,  that 
whoever  voluntarily  gives  to  another  irresisti 
ble  power  over  human  beings,  is  bound  to  take 
order  that  such  power  shall  not  be  barbarously 
abused?  But  we  beg  pardon  of  our  readers 
for  arguing  a  point  so  clear. 

We  hasten  to  the  end  of  this  sad  and  d'is 
graceful  story.  The  war  has  ceased.  The 
finest  population  in  India  was  subjected  to  a 
greedy,  cowardly,  cruel  tyrant.  Commerce  and 
agriculture  languished.  The  rich  province 
which  had  tempted  the  cupidity  of  Sujah  Dov. 
lah  became  the  most  miserable  part  even  of 
his  miserable  dominions.  Yet  is  the  injured 
nation  not  yet  extinct.  At  long  intervaig 
gleams  of  its  ancient  spirit  have  flashed  forth  ; 
!  and  even,  at  this  day,  valour,  and  self-respec4 
2  R 


470 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  a  chivalrous  feeling,  rare  among  Asiatics,  j 
and  the  bitter  remembrance  of  the  great  crime 
of  England,  distinguish  that  noble  Afghan 
race.  To  this  day  they  are  regarded  as  the 
best  of  all  sepoys  at  the  cold  steel ;  and  it  was 
recently  remarked  by  one  who  had  enjoyed 
great  opportunities  of  observation,  that  the  only 
natives  of  India  to  whom  the  word  "  gentle 
men"  can  with  perfect  propriety  be  applied, 
are  to  be  found  among  the  Rohillas. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  the  morality  of 
Hastings,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  the  financial 
results  of  his  policy  did  honour  to  his  talents. 
In  less  than  two  years  after  he  assumed  the 
government,  he  had,  without  imposing  any  ad 
ditional  burdens  on  the  people  subject  to  his 
authority,  added  about  450,000/.  to  the  annual 
income  of  the  Company,  besides  procuring 
about  a  million  in  ready  money.  He  had  also 
relieved  the  finances  of  Bengal  from  military 
expenditure,  amounting  to  near  250,000/.  a 
year,  and  had  thrown  that  charge  on  the  Na 
bob  of  Oude.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  this 
was  a  result  which,  if  it  had  been  obtained  by 
honest  means,  would  have  entitled  him  to  the 
warmest  gratitude  of  his  country ;  and  which, 
by  whatever  means  obtained,  proved  that  he 
possessed  great  talents  for  administration. 

In  the  mean  time,  Parliament  had  been  en 
gaged  in  long  and  grave  discussions  on  Indian 
affairs.  The  ministry  of  Lord  North,  in  the 
session  of  1773,  introduced  a  measure  which 
made  a  considerable  change  in  the  constitution 
of  the  Indian  government.  This  law,  known 
by  the  name  of  the  Regulating  Act,  provided 
that  the  presidency  of  Bengal  should  exercise 
a  control  over  the  other  possessions  of  the 
Company;  that  the  chief  of  that  presidency 
should  be  styled  Governor-General ;  that  he 
should  be  assisted  by  four  councillors ;  and 
that  a  supreme  court  of  judicature,  consisting 
of  a  chief  justice  and  three  inferior  judges, 
should  be  established  at  Calcutta.  This  court 
was  made  independent  of  the  Governor-Gene 
ral  and  Council,  and  was  intrusted  with  a  civil 
and  criminal  jurisdiction  of  immense  and,  at 
the  same  time,  of  undefined  extent. 

The  Governor-General  and  councillors  were 
named  in  the  act,  and  were  to  hold  their  situa 
tions  for  five  years.  Hastings  was  to  be  the 
first  Governor-General.  One  of  the  four  new 
councillors,  Mr.  Barwell,  an  experienced  ser 
vant  of  the  Company,  was  then  in  India.  The 
other  three,  General  Clavering,  Mr.  Monson 
and  Mr.  Francis,  were  sent  out  from  England 
The  ablest  of  the  new  councillors  was,  be 
yond  all  doubt,  Philip  Francis.  His  acknow 
ledged  compositions  prove  that  he  possessec 
considerable  eloquence  and  information.  Se 
veral  years  passed  in  the  public, otfices  hac 
formed  him  to  habits  of  business.  His  ene 
mies  have  never  denied  that  he  had  a  fearless 
and  manly  spirit;  and  his  friends,  we  are 
afraid,  must  acknowledge  that  his  estimate  of 
himself  was  extravagantly  high,  that  his  tern 
por  was  irritable,  that  his  deportment  was  often 
rude  and  petulant,  and  that  his  hatred  was  oi 
intense  bitterness  and  long  duration. 

It  is  scarcely  possible  to  mention  this  emi 
nent  man  without  adverting  for  a  moment  to 
the  question  which  his  name  at  once  suggests 


to  every  mind.  Was  he  the  author  of  the  Let- 
ers  of  Junius  ?  Our  own  firm  belief  is,  that 
he  was.  The  external  evidence  is,  we  think, 
such  as  would  support  a  verdict  in  a  civil, 
nay,  in  a  criminal  proceeding.  The  hand 
writing  of  Junius  is  the  very  peculiar  hand 
writing  of  Francis,  slightly  disguised.  As  to 
he  position,  pursuits,  and  connections  of  Ju 
nius,  the  following  are  the  most  important  facts 
which  can  be  considered  as  clearly  proved : 
irst,  that  he  was  acquainted  with  the  technical 
forms  of  the  Secretary  of  State's  office ;  second- 
y,  that  he  was  intimately  acquainted  with  the 
business  of  the  war-office;  thirdly,  that  he, 
during  the  year  1770,  attended  debates  in  the 
House  of  Lords,  and  took  notes  of  speeches, 
particularly  of  the  speeches  of  Lord  Chatha.n  ; 
fourthly,  that  he  bitterly  resented  the  appoint 
ment  of  Mr.  Chamier  to  the  place  of  Deputy 
Secretary  at  War;  fifthly,  that  he  was  bound 
by  some  strong  tie  to  the  first  Lord  Holland. 
Now,  Francis  passed  some  years  in  the  Secre 
tary  of  State's  office.  He  was  subsequently 
chief  clerk  of  the  war-office.  He  repeatedly 
mentioned  that  he  had  himself,  in  1770,  heard 
speeches  of  Lord  Chatham ;  and  some  of  those 
speeches  were  actually  printed  from  his  notes. 
He  resigned  his  clerkship  at  the  war-office  from 
resentment  at  the  appointment  of  Mr.  Chamier. 
It  was  by  Lord  Holland  that  he  was  first  intro 
duced  into  the  public  service.  Now  here  are 
five  marks,  all  of  which  ought  to  be  found  in 
Junius.  They  are  all  five  found  in  Francis. 
We  do  not  believe  that  more  than  two  of  them 
can  be  found  in  any  other  person  whatever. 
If  this  argument  does  not  settle  the  question, 
there  is  an  end  of  all  reasoning  on  c-rcumstan, 
tial  evidence. 

The  internal  evidence  seems  to  us  to  pcint 
the  same  way.  The  style  of  Francis  bears  a 
strong  resemblance  to  that  of  Junius ;  nor  are 
we  disposed  to  admit,  what  is  generally  taken, 
for  granted,  that  the  acknowledged  composi 
tions  of  Francis  are  very  decidedly  inferior  to 
the  anonymous  letters.  The  argument  from 
inferiority,  at  all  events,  is  one  which  may  be 
urged  with  at  least  equal  force  against  every 
claimant  that  has  ever  been  mentioned,  with 
the  single  exception  of  Burke,  who  certainly 
was  not  Junius.  And  what  conclusion,  after 
all,  can  be  drawn  from  mere  inferiority  1 
Every  writer  must  produce  his  best  work; 
and  the  interval  between  his  best  work  and 
his  second  best  work  may  be  very  wide  indeed. 
Nobody  will  say  that  the  best  letters  of  Junius 
are  more  decidedly  superior  to  the  acknow 
ledged  works  of  Francis,  than  three  or  four  of 
Corneille's  tragedies  to  the  rest;  than  three  or 
four  of  Ben  Jonson's  comedies  to  the  rest; 
than  the  Pilgrim's  Progress  to  the  other  works 
of  Bunyan  ;  than  Don  Quixote  to  the  other 
works  of  Cervantes.  Nay,  it  is  certain  that 
the  Man  in  the  Mask,  whoever  ho  may  have 
been,  was  a  most  unequal  writer.  To  go  no 
further  than  the  letters  which  bear  the  signa 
ture  t)f  Junius  ; — the  letter  to  the  king  and  the 
letters  to  Home  Tooke  have  little  in  common, 
except  the  asperity;  and  asperity  was  an  in 
gredient  seldom  wanting  ei/her  in  the  \vfeings 
or  in  the  speeches  of  Francis. 

Indeed,  one  of  the  strongest  reasons  for  be- 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


471 


aeving  that  Francis  was  Junius,  is  the  moral 
resemblance  between  the  two  men.  It  is  not 
difficult,  from  the  letters  which,  under  various 
signatures,  are  known  to  have  been  written  by 
Junius,  and  from  his  dealings  with  Woodfall 
and  others,  to  form  a  tolerably  correct  notion 
of  his  character.  He  was  clearly  a  man  not 
destitute  of  real  patriotism  and  magnanimity — 
a  man  whose  vices  were  not  of  a  sordid  kind. 
But  he  must  also  have  been  a  man  in  the 
highest  degree  arrogant  and  insolent,  a  man 
prone  to  malevolence,  and  prone  to  the  error 
of  mistaking  his  malevolence  for  public  virtue. 
"Doest  thou  well  to  be  angry  1"  was  the  ques 
tion  asked  in  old  time  of  the  Hebrew  prophet. 
And  he  answered,  "  I  do  well."  This  was  evi 
dently  the  temper  of  Junius;  and  to  this  cause 
we  attribute  the  savage  cruelty  which  dis 
graces  several  of  his  letters.  No  man  is  so 
merciless  as  he  who,  under  a  strong  self-delu 
sion,  confounds  his  antipathies  with  his  duties. 
It  may  be  added,  that  Junius,  though  allied 
with  the  democratic  party  by  common  enmi 
ties,  was  the  very  opposite  of  a  democratic 
politician.  While  attacking  individuals  with 
a  ferocity  which  perpetually  violated  all  the 
laws  of  literary  warfare,  he  regarded  the  most 
defective  parts  of  old  institutions  with  a  re 
spect  amounting  to  pedantry ; — pleaded  the 
cause  of  Old  Sarum  with  fervour,  and  con 
temptuously  told  the  capitalists  of  Manchester 
and  Leeds,  that,  if  they  wanted  votes,  they 
might  buy  land  and  become  freeholders  of 
Lancashire  and  Yorkshire.  All  this,  we  be 
lieve,  might  stand,  with  scarcely  any  change, 
for  a  character  of  Philip  Francis. 

It  is  not  strange  that  the  great  anonymous 
writer  should  have  been  willing  at  that  time 
to  leave  the  country  which  had  been  so  power 
fully  stirred  by  his  eloqtence.  Every  thing 
had  gone  against  him.  That  party  which  he 
clearly  preferred  to  every  other,  the  party  of 
George  Grenville,  had  been  scattered  by  the 
death  of  its  chief,  and  Lord  Suffolk  had  led 
the  greater  part  of  it  over  to  the  ministerial 
benches.  The  ferment  produced  by  the  Mid 
dlesex  election  had  gone  down.  Every  faction 
must  have  been  alike  an  object  of  aversion  to 
Junius.  His  opinions  on  domestic  affairs  se 
parated  him  from  the  Ministry,  his  opinions  on 
colonial  affairs  from  the  Opposition.  Under 
such  circumstances  he  had  thrown  down  his 
pen  in  misanthropic  despair.  His  farewell 
letter  to  Woodfall  bears  date  the  19th  of  Janu 
ary,  1783.  In  that  letter  he  declared  that  he 
must  be  an  idiot  to  write  again ;  that  he  had 
meant  well  by  the  cause  and  the  public  ;  that 
both  were  given  up ;  that  there  were  not  ten 
men  who  would  act  steadily  together  on  any 
question.  "But  it  is  all  alike,"  he  added,  "vile 
and  contemptible.  You  have  never  flinched 
thai;  I  know  of,  and  I  shall  always  rejoice  to 
hear  of  your  prosperity."  These  were  the  last 
words  of  Junius.  In  a  year  from  that  time 
Philip  Francis  was  on  his  voyage  to  Bengal. 

With  the  three  new  councillors  came  out 
the  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court.  The  Chief 
Justice  was  Sir  Elijah  Impey.  He  was  an  old 
acquaintance  of  Hastings,  and  it  is  probable 
that  the  Governor-General,  if  he  had  searched 
through  all  the  Inns  of  Court,  could  not  have 


found  an  equally  serviceable  tool.  But  th*» 
members  of  Council  were  by  no  means  in  an 
obsequious  mood.  Hastings  greatly  disliked 
the  new  form  of  government,  and  had  no  very 
high  opinion  of  his  coadjutors.  They  had  heard 
of  this,  and  were  disposed  to  be  suspicious 
and  punctilious.  When  men  are  in  such  a 
frame  of  mind,  any  trifle  is  sufficient  to  give 
occasion  for  dispute.  The  members  of  Coun 
cil  expected  a  salute  of  twenty-one  guns  frcn? 
the  batteries  of  Fort  William.  Hastings  al 
lowed  them  only  sev  ::nteen.  They  landed  in 
ill-humour.  The  first  civilities  were  exchanged 
with  cold  reserve.  On  the  morrow  commenced 
that  long  quarrel  which,  after  distracting  Bri 
tish  India,  was  renewed  in  England,  and  in 
which  all  the  most  eminent  statesmen  and  ora 
tors  of  the  age  took  active  part  on  one  or  the 
:)ther  side. 

Hastings  was  supported  by  Barwell.  They 
had  not  always  been  friends.  But  the  arrival 
of  the  new  members  of  Council  from  England 
naturally  had  the  effect  of  uniting  the  old  ser 
vants  of  the  Company.  Claveriag,  Monson, 
and  Francis  formed  the  majority.  They  in 
stantly  wrested  the  government  out  of  the 
hands  of  Hastings  ;  condemned,  certainly  not 
without  justice,  his  late  dealings  with  the  Na 
bob  Vizier;  recalled  the  English  agent  from 
Oude,  and  .sent  thither  a  creature  of  their  own1 
ordered  the  brigade  which  had  conquered  the 
unhappy  Rohillas  to  return  to  the  Company's 
territories,  and  instituted  a  severe  inquiry  into 
the  conduct  of  the  war.  Next,  in  spite  of  the 
Governor-General's  remonstrances,  they  pro 
ceeded  to  exercise,  in  the  most  indiscreet  man 
ner,  their  new  authority  over  the  subordinate 
presidencies;  threw  all  the  affairs  of  Bombay 
into  confusion  ;  and  interfered,  with  an  incre 
dible  union  of  rashness  and  feebleness,  in  the 
intestine  disputes  of  the  Mahratta  government. 
At  the  same  time  they  fell  on  the  internal  ad 
ministration  of  Bengal,  and  attacked  the  whole 
fiscal  and  judicial  system — a  system  which  was 
undoubtedly  d°fective,  but  which  it  was  very 
improbable  that  gentlemen  fresh  from  England 
would  be  competent  to  amend.  The  effect  of 
their  reforms  was,  that  all  protection  to  life 
and  property  \vas  withdrawn,  and  that  gangs 
of  robbers  plundered  and  slaughtered  with  im 
punity  in  the  very  suburbs  of  Calcutta.  Has 
tings  continued  to  live  in  the  Government- 
house,  and  to  draw  the  salary  of  Governor- 
General.  He  continued  even  to  take  the  lead 
at  the  council-board  in  the  transaction  of  ordi 
nary  business ;  for  his  opponents  could  not  but 
feel  that  he  knew  much  of  which  they  were  ig 
norant,  and  that  he  decided,  both  surely  and 
speedily,  many  questions  which  to  them  would 
have  been  hopelessly  puzzling.  But  the  higher 
powers  of  government  and  the  most  valuable 
patronage  had  been  taken  from  him. 

The  natives  soon  found  this  out.    They  con 
sidered  him  as  a  fallen  man,  and  they  acted 
after  their  kind.     Some  of  our  readers  may 
have  seen  in  India  a  cloud  of  crows  pecking  a 
!  sick  vulture  to  death — no  bad  type  ol   what 
happens  in  that  country  as  ofter.  a.«  fortune 
deserts  one  who  has  been,  great  and  dreaced. 
j  In  an  instant  all  the  sycophants  who  had  latelr 
I  been  ready  to  lie  for  him,  to  forge  for  him  tc 


472 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


pander  for  him,  tc,  poison  for  him,  hasten  to  i  an  end,  and  left  the  room,  followed  by  Barwell 
purchase  the  favour  of  his  victorious  enemies  |  The  other  members  kept  their  seats,  voted 
by  accusing  him.  An  Indian  government  has  j  themselves  a  council,  put  Clavering  in  the 
only  to  let  it  be  understood  that  it  wishes  a  |  chair,  and  ordered  Nuncomar  to  be  called  in. 
particular  man  to  be  ruined,  and  in  twenty- 
four  hours  it  will  be  furnished  with  grave 
charges,  supported  by  depositions  so  full  and 


circumstantial,  that  any  person  unaccustomed 
to  Asiatic  mendacity  would  regard  them  as  de 
cisive.  It  is  well  if  the  signature  of  the  des 
tined  victim  is  not  counterfeited  at  the  foot  of 
eome  illegal  compact,  and  if  some  treasonable 
paper  is  not  slipped  into  a  hiding-place  in  his 
house.  Hastings  was  now  regarded  as  help 
less.  The  power  to  make  or  mar  the  fortune 
of  every  man  in  Bengal  had  passed,  as  it 
seemed,  into  the  hands  of  his  opponents.  Im 
mediately  charges  against  the  Governor-Gene 
ral  began  to  pour  in.  They  were  eagerly  wel 
comed  by  the  majority,  who,  to  do  them  justice, 
were  men  of  too  much  honour  knowingly  to 
countenance  false  accusations,  but  who  were 
not  sufficiently  acquainted  with  the  East  to  be 
aware  that,  in  that  part  of  the  world,  a  very 
little  encouragement  from  power  will  call  forth 
in  a  week  more  Oateses,  and  Bedloes,  and  Dan- 
gerfields  than  Westminster  Hall  sees  in  a  cen 
tury. 

It  would  have  been  strange  indeed  if,  at  such 
a  juncture,  Nuncomar  had  remained  quiet. 
That  bad  man  was  stimulated  at  once  by  ma 
lignity,  by  avarice,  and  by  ambition.  Now  was 
the  time  to  be  avenged  on  his  old  enemy,  to 
wreak  a  grudge  of  seventeen  years,  to  establish 
himself  in  the  favour  of  the  majority  of  the 
Council,  to  become  the  greatest  native  of  Ben 
gal.  From  the  time  of  the  arrival  of  the  new 
councillors,  he  had  paid  the  most  marked  court 
to  them,  and  had  in  consequence  been  exclud 
ed,  with  all  indignity,  from  the  Government- 
house.  He  now  put  into  the  hands  of  Francis, 
with  great  ceremony,  a  paper  containing  seve 
ral  charges  of  the  most  serious  description. 
By  this  document  Hastings  was  accused  of 
putting  offices  up  to  sale,  and  of  receiving 
bribes  for  suffering  offenders  to  escape.  In 
particular,  it  was  alleged  that  Mohammed  Reza 
Khan  had  been  dismissed  with  impunity,  in 
consideration  of  a  great  sum  paid  to  the  Go 
vernor-General. 

Francis  read  the  paper  in  Council.  A  vio 
lent  altercation  followed.  Hastings  complained 
in  bitter  terms  of  the  way  in  which  he  was 
treated,  spoke  with  contempt  of  Nuncomar  and 
of  Nuncomar's  accusation,  and  denied  the  right 
of  the  council  to  sit  in  judgment  on  the  Go 
vernor.  At  the  next  meeting  of  the  Board, 
another  communication  from  Nuncomar  was 
produced.  He  requested  that  he  might  be  per 
mitted  to  attend  the  Council,  and  that  he  might 
be  heard  in  support  of  his  assertions.  Another 
tempestuous  debate  took  place.  The  Governor- 
General  maintained  that  the  council-room  was 
not  a  proper  place  for  such  an  investigation  ; 
that  from  persons  who  were  heated  by  daily 
conflict  with  him  he  could  not  expect  the  fair 
ness  of  judges  ;  and  that  he  could  not,  without 
betraying  the  dignity  of  his  post,  submit  to  be 
confronted  with  such  a  man  as  Nuncomar. 


Nuncomar  not  only  adhered  to  the  original 
charges,  but,  after  the  fashion  of  the  East,  pro 
duced  a  large  supplement.  He  stated  thai 


Hastings  had  received  a  great  sum  for  appoint 
ing  Rajah  Goordas  treasurer  of  the  Nabob's 
household,  and  for  committing  the  care  of  his 
highness's  person  to  the  Munny  Begum.  He 
put  in  a  letter  purporting  to  bear  the  seal  of 
the  Murxny  Bsgum,  for  the  purpose  of  establish 
ing  the  truth  of  his  story.  The  seal,  whether 
forged,  as  Hastings  affirmed,  or  genuine,  as  we 
are  rather  inclined  to  believe,  proved  nothing. 
Nuncomar,  as  everybody  knows  who  knows 
India,  had  only  to  tell  the  Munny  Begum  that 
such  a  letter  wou]d  give  pleasure  to  the  major 
ity  of  the  Council,  in  order  to  procure  her  at 
testation.  The  majority,  hcweyer,  voted  that 
the  charge  was  made  out ;  that  Hastings  had 
corruptly  received  between  thirty  and  forty 
thousand  pounds,  and  that  he  ought  to  bs  com 
pelled  to  refund. 

Th-j  general  feeling  among  the  English  iit 
Bengal  was  strongly  in  favour  of  the  Governor- 
General.  In  talents  for  business,  in  knowledge 
of  the  country,  in  general  courtesy  of  demean 
our,  he  was  decidedly  superior  to  his  persecu 
tors.  The  servants  of  the  Company  were  na 
turally  disposed  to  side  with  the  most  distin 
guished  member  of  their  own  body  against  a 
War-office  clerk,  who,  profoundly  ignorant  of 
the  native  languages  and  the  native  characters 
took  on  himself  to  regulate  every  department 
of  the  administration.  Hastings,  however,  in 
spite  of  the  general  sympathy  of  his  countrymen, 
was  in  a  most  painful  situation.  There  was  still 
an  appeal  to  highert authority  in  England.  If 
that  authority  took  part  with  his  enemies,  no 
thing  was  left  to  him  but  to  throw  up  his  office. 
He  accordingly  placed  his  resignation  in  the 
hands  of  his  agent  in  London,  Colonel  Mac- 
leane.  But  Macleane  was  instructed  not  to 
produce  the  resignation,  unless  it  should  be 
fully  ascertained  that  the  feeling  at  the  India 
House  was  adverse  to  the  Governor-General. 

The  triumph  of  Nuncomar  seemed  to  be 
complete.  He  held  a  daily  levee,  to  which  his 
countrymen  resorted  in  crowds,  and  to  which, 
on  one  occasion,  the  majority  of  the  Council 
condescended  to  repair.  His  house  was  an 
office  for  the  purpose  of  receiving  charges 
against  the  Governor-General.  It  was  said  that, 
partly  by  threats  and  partly  by  wheedling,  he 
had  induced  many  of  the  wealthiest  men  of  the 
province  to  send  in  complaints.  But  he  was 
playing  a  desperate  game.  It  was  not  safe  to 
drive  to  despair  a  man  of  such  resource  and 
of  such  determination  as  Hastings.  Nunco 
mar,  with  all  his  acuteness,  did  not  understand 
the  nature  of  the  institutions  under  which  he 
lived.  He  saw  that  he  had  with  him  the  ma 
jority  of  the  body  which  made  treaties,  gave 
places,  raised  taxes.  The  separation  between 
political  and  judicial  functions  was  a  thing  of 
which  he  had  no  conception.  It  had  probably 
never  occurred  to  him  that  there  was  in  Bengal 


The  majority,  however,  resolved  to  go  into  the    an  authority  perfectly  independent  of  the  Coun- 
charges.    Hastings  rose,  declared  the  sitting  at  i  cil— an  authority  which  could  protect  one  whom 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


473 


the  Council  wished  to  destroy,  and  send  to  the 
gibbet  one  whom  the  Council  wished  to  protect. 
Yet  such  was  the  fact.  The  Supreme  Court 
was,  within  the  sphere  of  its  own  duties,  alto 
gether  independent  of  the  government.  Hast 
ings,  with  his  usual  sagacity,  had  seen  how 
much  advantage  he  might  derive  from  possess 
ing  himself  of  this  stronghold,  and  he  had  acted 
accordingly.  The  judges,  especially  the  chief 
justice,  were  hostile  to  the  majority  of  the 
Council.  The  time  had  now  come  for  putting 
this  formidable  machinery  in  action. 

On  a  sudden,  Calcutta  was  astounded  by  the 
news  that  Nuncomar  had  been  taken  up  on  a 
charge  of  felony,  committed,  and  thrown  into 
the  common  jail.  The  crime  imputed  to  him 
was,  that  six  years  before  he  had  forged  a  bond. 
The  ostensible  prosecutor  was  a  native.  But 
it  was  then  and  still  is  the  opinion  of  every 
body — idiots  and  biographers  excepted — that 
Hastings  was  the  real  mover  in  the  business; 

The  rage  of  the  majority  rose  to  the  highest 
point.  They  protested  against  the  proceedings 
of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  sent  several  urgent 
messengers  to  the  judges,  demanding  that  Nun 
comar  should  be  admitted  to  bail.  The  judges 
returned  haughty  and  resolute  answers.  All 
that  the  Council  could  do,  was  to  heap  honours 
and  emoluments  on  the  family  of  Nuncomar; 
and  this  they  did.  In  the  mean  time  the  assizes 
commenced;  a  true  bill  was  found;  and  Nun 
comar  was  brought  before  Sir  Elijah  Impey 
and  a  jury,  composed  of  Englishmen.  A  great 
quantity  of  contradictory  swearing,  and  the 
necessity  of  having  every  word  of  the  evidence 
interpreted,  protracted  the  trial  to  a  most  unu 
sual  length.  At  last,  a  verdict  of  guilty  was 
returned,  and  the  Chief  Justice  pronounced 
sentence  of  death  on  the  prisoner.  Mr.  Gleigis 
so  strangely  ignorant  as  to  imagine  that  the 
judges  had  no  further  discretion  in  the  case, 
and  that  the  power  of  extending  mercy  to  Nun 
comar  resided  with  the  Council.  He  therefore 
throws  on  Francis,  and  Francis's  party,  the 
whole  blame  of  what  followed.  We  should 
have  thought  that  a  gentleman  who  has  pub 
lished  five  or  six  bulky  volumes  on  Indian 
affairs,  might  have  taken  the  trouble  to  inform 
himself  as  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  the 
Indian  government.  The  Supreme  Court  had, 
under  the  Regulating  Act,  the  power  to  respite 
criminals  till  the  pleasure  of  the  crown  should 
be  known.  The  Council  had,  at  that  time,  no 
power  to  interfere. 

That  Impey  ought  to  have  respited  Nunco 
mar,  we  hold  to  be  perfectly  clear.  Whether 
the  whole  proceeding  was  not  illegal,  is  a  ques 
tion.  But  it  is  certain  that,  whatever  may  have 
been,  according  to  technical  rules  of  construc 
tion,  the  effect  of  the  statute  under  which  the 
trial  took  place,  it  was  most  unjust  to  hang  a 
Hindoo  for  forgery.  The  law  which  made 
forgery  capital  in  England,  was  passed  \vithout 
the  smallest  reference  to  the  state  of  society  in 
India.  It  was  unknown  to  the  natives  of  India. 
tt  had  never  been  put  in  execution  among 
them — certainly  not  for  want  of  delinquents 
It  was  in  the  highest  degree  shocking  to  all 
their  notions.  They  were  not  accustomed  to 
the  distinction  which  many  circumstances 
peculiar  to  our  own  state  of  society,  have  led 
Vo'..IV.--  60 


us  to  make  between  forgery  and  other  kinds 
of  cheating.  The  counterfeiting  of  a  seal  was, 
in  their  estimation,  a  common  act  of  swindling; 
nor  had  it  ever  crossed  their  minds  that  it  was 
to  be  punished  as  severely  as  gang-robbery  or 
assassination.  A  just  judge  would,  beyond  all 
doubt,  have  reserved  the  case  for  the  consider 
ation  of  the  sovereign.  But  Impey  would  not 
hear  of  mercy  or  delay. 

The  excitement  among  all  classes  was  great. 
Francis,  and  Francis's  few  English  adherents, 
described  the  Governor-General  and  the  Chief 
Justice  as  the  worst  of  murderers.  Clavering, 
it  was  said,  swore  that,  even  at  the  foot  of  the 
gallows,  Nuncomar  should  be  rescued.  The 
bulk  of  the  European  society,  though  strongly 
attached  to  the  Governor-General,  could  not 
but  feel  compassion  for  a  man,  who,  with  all 
his  crimes,  had  so  long  filled  so  large  a  space 
in  their  sight — who  had  been  great  and  power 
ful  before  the  British  empire  in  India  began  to 
exist — and  to  whom,  in  the  old  times,  governors 
and  members  of  Council,  then  mere  commer 
cial  factors,  had  paid  court  for  protection.  The 
feeling  of  the  Hindoos  was  infinitely  stronger. 
They  were,  indeed,  not  a  people  to  strike  one 
blow  for  their  countryman.  But  his  sentence 
filled  them  with  sorrow  and  dismay.  Tried 
even  by  their  low  standard  of  morality,  he  was 
a  bad  man.  But,  bad  as  he  was,  he  was  the 
head  of  their  race  and  religion — a  Brahmin  of 
the  Brahmins.  He  had  inheritevl  ihe  purest 
arid  highest  caste.  He  had  practised,  with  the 
greatest  punctuality,  all  those  ceremonies  to 
which  the  superstitious  Bengalees  ascribed  far 
more  importance  than  to  the  correct  discharge 
of  the  social  duties.  They  felt,  therefore,  as  a 
devout  Catholic  in  the  dark  ages  would  have 
felt,  at  seeing  a  prelate  of  the  highest  dignity 
sent  to  the  gallows  by  a  secular  tribunal.  Ac 
cording  to  their  old  national  laws,  a  Brahmin 
could  not  be  put  to  death  for  any  crime  what 
ever.  And  the  crime  for  which  Nuncomar 
was  about  to  die  was  regarded  by  them  in 
much  the  same  light  in  which  the  selling  of  an 
unsound  horse,  for  a  sound  price,  is  regarded 
by  a  Yorkshire  jockey. 

The  Mohammedans  alone  appear  to  have 
seen  with  exultation  the  fate  of  the  powerful 
Hindoo,  who  had  attempted  to  rise  by  means 
of  the  ruin  of  Mohammed  Reza  Khan.  The 
Mussulman  historian  of  those  times  takes  de 
light  in  aggravating  the  charge.  He  assures 
us,  that  in  Nuncomar's  house  a  casket  was 
found  containing  counterfeits  of  the  seals  of  all 
the  richest  men  of  the  province.  We  have 
never  fallen  in  with  any  other  authority  for 
this  story,  which,  in  itself,  is  by  no  means  im 
probable. 

The  day  drew  near,  and  Nuncomar  prepared 
himself  to  die,  with  that  quiet  fortitude  with 
which  the  Bengalee,  so  effeminately  timid  ia 
personal  conflict,  often  encounters  calamities 
for  which  there  is  no  remedy.  The  sheriff, 
with  the  humanity  which  is  seldom  wanting  in 
an  English  gentleman,  visited  the  prisoner  on 
the  eve  of  the  execution,  and  assured  him  that 
no  indulgence,  cons-stent  with  the  law,  should 
be  refused  him.  Nuncomar  expressed  his 
gratitude  with  great  politeness  and  unaltered 
composure.  Not  a  muscle  of  his  face  mir/ec! 
2  u  2 


474 


MAC ATJ  LAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Not  a  sigh  broke  from  him.  He  put  his  finger 
to  his  forehead,  and  calmly  said  that  fate  would 
have  its  way,  and  that  there  was  no  resisting 
the  pleasure  of  God.  He  sent  his  compliments 
to  Francis,  Clavering,  and  Monson,  and  charged 
them  to  protsct  Rajah  Goordas,  who  was  about 
to  become  the  head  of  the  Brahmins  of  Bengal. 
The  sheriff  withdrew,  greatly  agitated  by  what 
had  passed,  and  Nuncomar  sat  composedly 
down  to  write  notes  and  examine  accounts. 

The  next  morning,  before  the  sun  was  in 
his  power,  an  immense  concourse  assembled 
round  the  place  where  the  gallows  had  been 
set  up.  Grief  and  horror  were  on  every  face  ; 
yet.  to  the  last,  the  multitude  could  hardly  be 
lieve  that  the  English  really  purposed  to  take 
the  life  of  the  great  Brahmin.  At  length  the 
mournful  procession  came  through  the  crowd. 
Nuncomar  sat  up  in  his  palanquin,  and  looked 
round  him  with  unaltered  serenity.  He  had 
just  parted  from  those  who  were  most  nearly 
connected  with  him.  Their  cries  and  contor 
tions  had  appalled  the  European  ministers  of 
justice,  but  had  not  produced  the  smallest 
effect  on  the  iron  stoicism  of  the  prisoner. 
The  only  anxiety  which  he  expressed  was,  that 
men  of  his  own  priestly  caste  might  be  in  at 
tendance  to  take  charge  of  his  corpse.  He 
again  desired  to  be  remembered  to  his  friends 
in  the  Council,  mounted  the  scaffold  with  firm 
ness,  and  gave  the  signal  to  the  executioner. 
The  moment  that  the  drop  fell,  a  howl  of  sor 
row  and  despair  rose  from  the  innumerable 
spectators.  Hundreds  turned  away  their  faces 
from  the  polluting  sigh  ,  fled  with  loud  wail- 
ings  towards  the  HoogVey.  and  plunged  into  its 
holy  waters,  as  if  to  purify  themselves  from  the 
guilt  of  having  looked  on  such  a  crime.  These 
feeling?  were  not  confined  to  Calcutta.  The 
whole  province  was  greatly  excited ;  and  the 
population  of  Dacca,  in  particular,  gave  strong 
signs  of  grief  and  dismay. 

Of  Impey's  conduct,  it  is  impossible  to  speak 
too  severely.  We  have  already  said  that,  in 
our  opinion,  he  acted  unjustly  in  refusing  to 
respite  Nuncomar.  No  rational  man  can  doubt 
that  he  took  this  course  in  order  to  gratify  the 
Governor-General.  If  we  had  ever  any  doubts 
on  that  point,  they  would  have  been  dispelled 
by  a  letter  which  Mr.  Gleig  has  published. 
Hastings,  three  or  four  years  later,  described 
Impey  as  the  man  "  to  whose  support  he  was 
at  one  time  indebted  for  the  safety  of  his  for 
tune,  honour,  and  reputation."  These  strong 
words  can  refer  only  to  the  case  of  Nuncomar; 
and  they  must  mean  that  Impey  hanged  Nun 
comar  in  order  to  support  Hastings.  It  is, 
therefore,  our  deliberate  opmion,  that  Impey, 
sitting  as  a  judge,  put  a  man  unjustly  to  death 
in  order  to  serve  a  political  purpose. 

But  we  look  on  the  conduct  of  Hastings  in  a 
somewhat  different  light.  He  was  struggling 
for  fortune,  honour,  liberty — all  that  makes  life 

valuaole.  He  was  beset  by  rancorous  and  un- !  Every  thing  that  could  make  the  warning  un 
principled  enemies.  From  his  colleasrues  he  pressive — dignity  in  the  sufferer,  solemnity  in 
could  expect  no  justice.  He  cannot  be  blamed  the  proceeding — was  found  in  this  case.  The 
for  wishing  to  crush  his  accusers.  He  was  I  helpless  rage  and  vain  struggles  of  the  Council 
in  iecd  bound  to  use  only  legitimate  means  for  made  the  triumph  more  signal.  From  that 
that  end.  But  it  was  not  strange  that  he  should  I  moment  the  conviction  of  every  native  was, 
have  thought  any  means  legitimate  which  were  j  that  it  was  safer  to  take  the  part  of  Hastings  in 
pronounced  legitimate  by  the  sages  of  the  law  i  a  minority,  than  that  of  Francis  in  a  majority 


— by  men  whose  peculiar  duty  it  was  to  deal 
justly  between  adversaries,  and  whose  educa 
tion  might  be  supposed  to  have  peculiarly  quail 
fied  them  for  the  discharge  of  that  duty.  No 
body  demands  from  a  party  the  unbending 
equity  cf  a  judge.  The  reason  that  judges  are 
appointed  is,  that  even  good  men  cannot  be 
trusted  to  decide  causes  in  which  they  are 
themselves  concerned.  Not  a  day  passes  on 
which  an  honest  prosecutor  does  not  ask  for 
what  none  but  a  dishonest  tribunal  would 
grant.  It  is  too  much  to  expect  that  any  man, 
when  his  dearest  interests  are  at  stake,  and  his 
strongest  passions  excited,  will,  as  against 
himself,  be  more  just  than  the  sworn  dispensers 
of  justice.  To  take  an  analogous  case  from 
the  history  of  our  own  island:  Suppose  the 
Lord  Stafford,  when  in  the  Tower  on  suspicion 
of  being  concerned  in  the  Popish  plot,  had 
been  apprized  that  Titus  Oates  had  done  some 
thing  which  might,  by  a  questionable  construc 
tion,  be  brought  under  the  head  of  felony. 
Should  we  severely  blame  Lord  Stafford,  in  the 
supposed  case,  for  causing  a  prosecution  to  be 
instituted,  for  furnishing  funds,  for  using  all 
his  influence  to  intercept  the  mercy  of  the 
crown  1  We  think  not.  If  a  judge,  indeed, 
from  favour  to  the  Catholic  lord,  were  to 
strain  the  law  in  order  to  hang  Oates,  such  a 
judge  would  richly  deserve  impeachment.  But 
it  does  not  appear  to  us  that  the  Catholic  lord, 
by  bringing  the  case  before  the  judge  for  deci 
sion,  would  materially  overstep  the  limits  of  a 
just  self-defence. 

While,  therefore,  we  have  not  the  least  doubt 
that  this  memorable  execution  is  to  be  attri 
buted  to  Hastings,  we  doubt  whether  it  can 
with  justice  be  reckoned  among  his  crimes. 
That  his  conduct  was  dictated  by  a  profound 
policy,  is  evident.  He  was  in  a  minority  in 
Council.  It  was  possible  that  he  might  long 
be  in  a  minority.  He  knew  the  native  cha 
racter  well.  He  knew  in  what  abundance  ac 
cusations  are  certain  to  flow  in  against  thfr 
most  innocent  inhabitant  of  India  who  is 
under  the  frown  of  power.  There  was  not  in 
the  whole  black  population  of  Bengal,  a  place 
holder,  a  place-hunter,  a  government  tenant, 
who  did  not  think  that  he  might  better  himself 
by  sending  up  a  deposition  against  the  Go 
vernor-General.  Under  these  circumstances, 
the  persecuted  statesman  resolved  to  teach  the 
whole  crew  of  accusers  and  witnesses,  that, 
though  in  a  minority  at  the  Council-board,  he 
was  still  to  be  feared.  The  lesson  which  he 
grave  them  was  indeed  one  not  to  be  forgotten. 
The  head  of  the  combination  which  had  been 
formed  against  him,  the  richest,  the  most 
powerful,  the  most  artful  of  the  Hindoos,  dis 
tinguished  by  the  favour  of  those  who  then 
held  the  government,  fenced  round  by  the  su 
perstitious  reverence  of  millions,  was  hanged 
in  broad  day  before  many  thousand  people. 


WARRING  HASTINGS. 


475 


and  that  he  who  was  so  venturous  as  to  join  j  Parliament  before  Christmas,  and  to  bring  in 
in  running  down  the  Governor-General,  might  i  a  bill  for  depriving  the  Company  of  all  political 
chance,  in  the  phrase  of  the  Eastern  poet,  to  power,  and  for  restricting  it  to  its  old  business 
find  a  tiger,  while  beating  the  jungle  for  a  deer,  of  trading  in  silks  and  teas. 


The  voices  of  a  thousand  informers  were  si 
lenced  in  an  instant.  From  that  time,  what 
ever  difficulties  Hastings  might  have  to  en 
counter,  he  was  never  molested  by  accusations 
from  natives  of  India. 

It  is  a  remarkable  circumstance,  that  one.  of 
the  letters  of  Hastings  to  Dr.  Johnson,  bears 
date  a  very  few  hours  after  the  death  of  Nun- 
comar.  While  the  whole  settlement  was  in 
commotion,  —  while  a  mighty  and  ancient 
priesthood  were  weeping  over  the  remains  of 
their  chief— the  conqueror  in  that  deadly  grap 
ple  sat  down,  with  characteristic  self-posses 
sion,  to  write  about  the  Tour  to  the  Hebrides, 
Jones's  Persian  Grammar,  and  the  history,  tra 
ditions,  arts,  and  natural  productions  of  India! 

In  the  mean  lime,  intelligence  of  the  Rohilla 
war,  and  of  the  first  disputes  between  Hastings 
and  his  colleagues,  had  reached  London.  The 
Directors  took  part  with  the  majority,  and  sent 
out  a  letter  filled  with  severe  reflections  on  the 
conduct  of  Hastings.  They  condemned,  in 
strong  but  just  terms,  the  iniquity  of  under 
taking  offensive  wars  merely  for  the  sake  of 
pecuniary  advantages.  But  they  utterly  forgot 
that,  if  Hastings  had  by  illicit  means  obtained 
pecuniary  advantages,  he  had  done  so,  not  for 
his  own  benefit,  but  in  order  to  meet  their  de 
mands.  To  enjoin  honesty,  and  to  insist  in 
having  what  could  not  be  honestly  got,  was  then 
the  constant  practice  of  the  Company.  As 
Lady  Macbeth  says  of  her  husband,  they  "  would 
not  play  false,  and  yet  would  wrongly  win." 

The  Regulating  Act,  by  which  Hastings  had 
been  appointed  Governor-General  for  five  years, 
empowered  the  Crown  to  remove  him  on  an 
address  from  the  Company.  Lord  North  was 
desirous  to  procure  such  an  address.  The  three 
members  of  Council  who  had  been  sent  out 
from  England,  were  men  of  his  own  choice. 
General  Clavering,  in  particular,  was  sup 
ported  by  a  large  parliamentary  connection, 
such  as  no  cabinet  could  be  inclined  to  dis 
oblige.  The  wish  of  the  minister  was  to  dis 
place  Hastings,  and  to  put  Clavering  at  the 
head  of  the  government.  In  the  Court  of  Di 
rectors  parties  were  very  nearly  balanced ; 
eleven  voted  against  Hastings— ten  for  him. 
The  Court  of  Proprietors  was  then  convened. 
The  great  sale-room  presented  a  singular  ap 
pearance.  Letters  had  been  sent  by  the  Secre 
tary  of  the  Treasury,  exhorting  all  the  sup 
porters  of  government  who  held  India  stock  to 
be  in  attendance.  Lord  Sandwich  marshalled 
the  friends  of  the  administration  with  his  usual 
dexterity  and  alertness.  Fifty  peers  and  privy 
councillors,  seldom  seen  so  far  eastward,  were 
counted  in  the  crowd.  The  debate  lasted  till 
midnight.  The  opponents  of  Hastings  had 
small  superiority  on  the  division ;  but  a  ballot 
was  demanded, "and  the  result  was,  that  the 
Governor-General  triumphed  by  a  majority  of 
above  a  hundred  over  the  combined  efforts  of 
the  Directors  and  the  cabinet.  The  ministers 
were  greatly  exasperated  by  this  defeat.  Even 
Lord  North  lost  his  temper — no  ordinary  oc- 


Colonel  Macleane,  who  through  all  this  con- 
lict,  had  zealously  supported  the  cause  of 
Hastings,  now  thought  that  his  employer  was 
n  imminent  danger  of  being  turned  out,  brand 
ed  with  parliamentary  censure,  perhaps  prose 
cuted.  The  opinion  of  the  crown  lawyers  had 
already  been  taken,  respecting  some  parts  of 
the  Governor-General's  conduct.  It  seemed  to 
be  high  time  to  think  of  a  secure  and  honour 
able  retreat.  Under  these  circumstances,  Mac- 
eane  thought  himself  jiistified  in  producing 
the  resignation  with  which  he  had  been  in 
trusted.  The  instrument  was  not  in  very  ac- 
urate  form ;  but  the  Directors  were  too  eager 
to  be  scrupulous.  They  accepted  the  resigna- 
ion,  fixed  on  Mr.  Wheler,  one  of  their  own 
>ody,  to  succeed  Hastings,  and  sent  out  orders 
that  General  Clavering,  as  senior  member  of 
ouncil,  should  exercise  the  functions  of  Go 
vernor-General  till  Mr.  Wheler  should  arrive. 

But  while  these  things  were  passing  in  Eng- 
and,  a  great  change  had  taken  place  in  Bengal. 
Monson  was  no  more.  Only  four  members  of 
the  government  were  left.  Clavering  and 
Francis  were  on  the  one  side,  Barwell  and  the 
Governor-General  on  the  other;  and  the  Go 
vernor-General  had  the  casting  vote.  Hastings, 
who  had  been  during  two  years  destitute  of  all 
power  and  patronage,  became  at  once  absolute. 
He  instantly  proceeded  to  retaliate  on  his  ad 
versaries.  Their  measures  were  reversed ; 
their  creatures  were  displaced.  A  new  valua 
tion  of  the  lands  of  Bengal,  for  the  purposes  of 
taxation,  was  ordered;  and  it  was  provided 
that  the  whole  inquiry  should  be  conducted  by 
the  Governor-General,  and  that  all  the  letters 
relating  to  it  should  run  in  his  name.  He  be 
gan,  at  the  same  time,  to  revolve  vast  plans  of 
conquest  and  dominion;  plans  which  he  lived 
to  see  realized,  though  not  by  himself.  His 
project  was  to  form  subordinary  alliances  with 
the  native  princes,  particularly  with  those  of 
Oude  and  Berar ;  and  thus  to  make  Britain  the 
paramount  power  in  India.  While  he  was  me 
ditating  these  great  designs,  arrived  the  intelli 
gence  that  he  had  ceased  to  be  Governor- 
General,  that  his  resignation  had  been  ac 
cepted,  that  Mr.  Wheler  was  coming  out  imme 
diately,  and  that,  till  Mr.  Wheler  arrived,  the 
chair  was  to  be  filled  by  Clavering. 

Had  Monson  been  still  alive,  Hastings  would 
probably  have  retired  without  a  struggle  ;  but 
he  has  now  the  real  master  of  British  Ir  dia, 
and  he  was  not  disposed  to  quit  his  high  place. 
He  asserted  that  he  had  never  given  an}-  in 
structions  which  could  warrant  the  steps  which 
had  been  taken.  What  his  instructions  had 
been,  he  owned  he  had  forgotten.  If  he  had 
kept  a  copy  of  them,  he  had  mislaid  it.  But  he 
was  certain  that  he  had  repeatedly  declared  to 
the  Directors  that  he  would  not  resign.  He 
could  not  see  how  the  court,  possessed  of  that 
declaration  from  himself,  could  receive  his  re 
signation  from  the  doubtful  hands  of  an  agent.  If 
the  resignation  were  in  valid,  all  the  proceedings 
which  were  founded  on  that  resignation  were 
currence  with  him — and  threatened  to  convoke  |  null,  and  Hastings  was  still  Governor-General 


476 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


He  afterwards  affirmed  that,  though  his 
agenls  had  not  acted  in  conformity  with  his  in 
structions,  he  would  nevertheless  have  held 
himself  bound  by  their  acts,  if  Clavering  had 
not  attempted  to  seize  the  supreme  power  by 
violence.  Whether  this  assertion  were  or  were 
not  true,  it  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  impru 
dence  of  Clavering  gave  Hastings  an  advan 
tage.  The  General  sent  for  the  keys  of  the 
fort  and  the  treasury,  took  possession  of  the  re 
cords,  and  held  a  Council  at  which  Francis 
attended.  Hastings  took  the  chair  in  another 
apartment,  and  Barwell  sat  with  him.  Each  of 
the  two  parties  had  a  plausible  show  of  right. 
There  was  no  authority  entitled  to  their  obedi 
ence  within  fifteen  thousand  miles.  It  seemed 
that  there  remained  no  way  of  settling  the  dis 
pute  except  an  appeal  to  arms;  and  from  such 
an  appeal  Hastings,  confident  of  his  influence 
over  his  countrymen  in  India,  was  riot  inclined 
to  shrink.  He  directed  the  officers  of  the  garri 
son  of  Fort  William,  and  of  all  the  neighbour 
ing  stations,  to  obey  no  orders  but  his.  At  the 
same  time,  with  admirable  judgment,  he  offered 
to  submit  the  case  to  the  Supreme  Court, 
and  to  abide  by  its  decision.  By  making 
this  proposition  he  risked  nothing;  yet  it  was  a 
proposition  which  his  opponents  could  hardly 
reject.  Nobody  could  be  treated  as  a  criminal, 
for  obeying  what  the  judges  had  solemnly  pro 
nounced  to  be  the  lawful  government.  The 
boldest  man  would  shrink  from  taking  arms  in 
defence  of  what  the  judges  should  pronounce 
to  be  usurpation.  Clavering  and  Francis, 
after  some  delay,  unwillingly  consented  to 
abide  by  the  award  of  the  court.  The  court 
pronounced  that  the  resignation  was  invalid, 
and  that  therefore  Hastings  was  still  Governor- 
General  under  the  Regulating  Act ,  and  the  de 
feated  members  of  the  Council,  finding  that  the 
sense  of  the  whole  settlement  was  against 
them,  acquiesced  in  the  decision. 

About  this  time  arrived  the  news  that,  after 
A  suit  which  had  lasted  several  years,  the 
Franconian  courts  had  decreed  a  divorce  be 
tween  Imhoff  and  his  wife.  The  Baron  left 
Calcutta,  carrying  with  him  the  means  of  buy 
ing  an  estate  in  Saxony.  The  lady  became 
Mrs.  Hastings.  The  event  was  celebrated  by 
great  festivities,  and  all  the  most  conspicuous 
persons  at  Calcutta,  without  distinction  of  par 
ties,  were  invited  to  the  Government-house. 
Clavering,  as  the  Mohammedan  chronicler 
tells  the  story,  was  sick  in  mind  and  body,  and 
excused  himself  from  joining  the  splendid 
assembly.  But  Hastings,  whom,  as  it  should 
seem,  success  in  ambition  and  in  love  had  put 
into  high  humour,  would  take  no  denial.  He 
went  himself  to  the  General's  house,  and  at 
length  brought  his  vanquished  rival  in  triumph 
to  the  gay  circle  which  surrounded  the  bride. 
The  exertion  was  too  much  for  a  frame  broken 
DV  mortification  as  well  as  by  disease — Claver 
ing  died  a  few  days  later. 

Wheler,  who  came  out  expecting  to  be  Go 
vernor-General,  and  was  forced  to  content  him 
self  with  a  seat  at  the  Council-board,  generally 
voted  with  Francis.  But  the  Governor-General, 
with  Bar  well's  help  and  his  own  casting  vote, 
was  still  the  master.  Some  change  took  place  j 
at  this  Line  io  the  feeling  both  of  the  Court  of  I 


Directors  and  of  the  Ministers  of  the  Crown. 
All  designs  against  Hastings  were  dropped; 
and  when  his  original  term  of  five  years  ex- 
!  pired,  he  was  quietly  reappointed.  The  truth 
is,  that  the  fearful  dangers  to  which  the  public 
interests  in  every  quarter  were  now  exposed, 
made  both  Lord  North  and  the  Company  un 
willing  to  part  with  a  Governor,  whose  talents, 
experience,  and  resolution,  enmity  itself  Avas 
compelled  to  acknowledge. 

The  crisis  was  indeed  formidable.  That 
great  and  victorious  empire,  on  the  throne  ot 
which  George  the  Third  had  taken  his  seat 
eighteen  years  before,  with  brighter  hopes  than 
had  attended  the  accession  of  any  of  the  long 
line  of  English  sovereigns,  had,  by  the  most 
senseless  misgovernment,  been  brought  to  the 
verge  of  ruin.  In  America  millions  of  English 
men  were  at  war  with  the  country  from  which 
their  blood,  their  language,  their  religion,  and 
their  institutions  were  derived;  and  to  which 
but  a  short  time  before,  they  had  been  as 
strongly  attached  as  the  inhabitants  of  Norfolk 
and  Leicestershire.  The  great  p,;wers  of 
Europe,  humbled  to  the  dust  by  the  vigour  and 
genius  which  had  guided  the  councils  of 
George  the  Second,  now  rejoiced  in  the  pros 
pect  of  a  signal  revenge.  The  lime  was  ap 
proaching  when  our  island,  while  struggling  to 
keep  down  the  United  States  of  America,  and 
pressed  with  a  still  nearer  danger  by  the  too 
just  discontents  of  Ireland,  was  to  be  assailed 
by  France,  Spain,  and  Holland,  and  to  be 
threatened  by  the  armed  neutrality  of  the  Bal 
tic;  when  even  our  maritime  supremacy  was 
to  be  in  jeopardy  ;  when  hostile  fleets  were  to 
command  the  Straits  of  Calpe  and  the  Mexican 
Sea;  when  the  British  flag  was  to  be  scarcely 
able  to  protect  the  British  Channel.  Great  as 
were  the  faults  of  Hastings,  it  was  happy  for 
our  country  that  at  that  conjuncture,  the  most 
terrible  through  which  she  has  ever  passed,  he 
was  the  ruler  of  her  Indian  dominions. 

An  attack  by  sea  on  Bengal  was  little  to  be 
apprehended.  The  danger  was,  that  the 
European  enemies  of  England  might  form  an 
alliance  with  some  native  power — might  fur 
nish  that  power  with  troops,  arms,  and  ammu 
nition — and  might  thus  assail  our  possessions 
on  the  side  of  the  land.  It  was  chiefly  from  the 
Mahrattas  that  Hastings  anticipated  danger. 
The  original  seat  of  that  singular  people  was 
the  wild  range  of  hills  which  run  along  the 
western  coast  of  India.  In  the  reign  of  Aurung- 
zebe  the  inhabitants  of  those  regions,  led  by 
the  great  Sevajee,  began  to  descend  on  the  pos 
sessions  of  their  wealthier  and  less  warlike 
neighbours.  The  energy,  ferocity,  and  cun 
ning  of  the  Mahrattas,  soon  made  them  the 
most  conspicuous  among  the  new  powers 
which  were  generated  by  the  corruption  of  the 
decaying  monarchy.  At  first  they  were  only 
robbers.  They  soon  rose  to  the  dignity  of  con 
querors.  Half  the  provinces  of  the  empire 
were  turned  into  Mahratta  principalities.  Free 
booters,  sprung  from  low  castes,  and  accustom 
ed  to  menial  employments,  became  mighty 
Rajahs.  The  Bonslas,  at  the  head  of  a  band 
of  plunderers,  occupied  the  vast  region  of 
Berar.  The  Guicowar,  which  is,  being  inter 
preted,  the  Herdsman,  founded  that 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


477 


which  still  reigns  in  Guzerat.  The  houses  of 
Scindia  and  Holkar  waxed  great  in  Malwa. 
One  adventurous  captain  made  his  nest  on  the 
impregnable  rock  of  Gooti.  Another  became 
the  lord  of  the  thousand  villages  which  are 
scattered  among  the  green  rice-fields  of  Tan- 
jo  re. 

That  was  the  time,  throughout  India,  of 
double  government.  The  form  and  the  power 
where  everywhere  separated.  The  Mussulman 
Nabobs,  who  had  become  sovereign  princes — 
the  Vizier  in  Oude,  and  the  Nizam  at  Hydra- 
bad — still  called  themselves  the  viceroys  of  the 
house  of  Tamerlane.  In  the  same  manner  the 
Mahralta  states,  though  really  independent, 
pretended  to  be  members  of  one  empire;  and 
acknowledged,  by  words  and  ceremonies,  the 
supremacy  of  the  heir  of  Sevajee — a  roi  faineant 
who  chewed  bang,  and  toyed  with  dancing 
girls,  in  a  state-prison  at  Sattara — and  of  his 
Peshwa  or  mayor  of  the  palace,  a  great  heredi 
tary  magistrate,  who  kept  a  court  with  kingly 
state  at  Poonah,  and  whose  authority  was 
obeyed  in  the  spacious  provinces  of  Aurunga- 
bad  and  Bejapoor. 

Some  months  before  war  was  declared  in 
Europe,  the  government  of  Bengal  was  alarm 
ed  by  the  news  that  a  French  adventurer,  who 
passed  for  a  man  of  quality,  had  arrived  at 
Poonah.  It  was  said  that  he  had  been  received 
there  with  great  distinction — that  he  had  de 
livered  to  the  Peshwa  letters  and  presents  from 
Louis  the  Sixteenth, — and  that  a  treaty,  hos 
tile  to  England,  had  been  concluded  between 
France  and  the  Mahrattas. 

Hastings  immediately  resolved  to  strike  the 
first  blow.  The  title  of  the  Peshwa  was  not  un 
disputed.  A  portion  of  the  Mahratta  nation  was 
favourable  to  a  pretender.  The  Governor- 
General  determined  to  espouse  this  pretender's 
interest,  to  move  an  army  across  the  peninsula 
of  India,  and  to  form  a  close  alliance  with  the 
chief  of  the  house  of  Bonsla,  who  ruled  Berar, 
and  who,  in  power  and  dignity,  was  inferior  to 
none  of  the  Mahratta  princes. 

The  army  had  marched,  and  the  negotiations 
with  Berar  were  in  progress,  when  a  letter 
from  the  English  consul  at  Cairo,  brought  the 
news  that  war  had  been  proclaimed  both  in 
London  and  Paris.  All  the  measures  which 
the  crisis  required  were  adopted  by  Hastings 
without  a  moment  of  delay.  The  French  fac 
tories  in  Bengal  were  seized.  Orders  were 
sent  to  Madras  that  Pondicherry  should  instant 
ly  be  occupied.  Near  Calcutta,  works  were 
thrown  up,  which  were  thought  to  render  the 
approach  of  a  hostile  force  impossible.  A 
maritime  establishment  was  formed  for  the  de 
fence  of  the  river.  Nine  new  battalions  of 
sepoys  were  raised,  and  a  corps  of  native  artil 
lery  was  formed  out  of  the  hardy  Lascars  of 
the  Bay  of  Bengal.  Having  made  these  ar 
rangements,  the  Governor-General  with  calm 
confidence  pronounced  his  presidency  secure 
from  all  attack,  unless  the  Mahrattas  should 
march  against  it  in  conjunction  with  the 
French. 

The  expedition  which  Hastings  had  sent 
westward  was  not  so  speedily  or  completely 
successful  as  most  of  his  undertakings.  The 
comraanding-oflicer  procrastinated.  The  au 


thorities  at  Bombay  blundered.  But  the  Go 
vernor-General  persevered.  A  new  command 
er  repaired  the  errors  of  his  predecessor 
Several  brilliant  actions  spread  the  military 
renown  of  the  English  through  regions  win  re 
no  European  flag  had  ever  been  seen.  It  is 
probable  that,  if  a  new  and  more  formidable 
danger  had  not  compelled  Hastings  to  change 
his  whole  policy,  his  plans  respecting  the 
Mahratta  empire  would  have  been  carried  into 
complete  effect. 

The  authorities  in  England  had  wisely  sent 
out  to  Bengal,  as  commander  of  the  forces,  and 
member  of  the  Council,  one  of  the  most  distin 
guished  soldiers  of  that  time.  Sir  Eyre  Coote 
had,  many  years  before,  been  conspicuous 
among  the  founders  of  the  British  Empire  in 
the  East.  At  the  council  of  war  which  pre 
ceded  the  battle  of  Plassey,  he  earnestly  re 
commended,  in  opposition  to  the  majority,  that 
daring  course  which,  after  some  hesitation, 
was  adopted,  and  which  was  crowned  with 
such  splendid  success.  He  subsequently  com 
manded  in  the  south  of  India  against  the  brave 
and  unfortunate  Lally,  gained  the  decisive 
battle  of  Wandewash  over  the  French  and  their 
native  allies,  took  Pondicherry,  and  made  the 
English  power  supreme  in  the  Carnatic. 
Since  those  great  exploits  near  twenty  years 
had  elapsed.  Coote  had  no  longer  the  bodily 
^activity  which  he  had  shown  in  earlier  days; 
nor  was  the  vigour  of  his  mind  altogether  un 
impaired.  He  was  capricious  and  fretful,  and 
required  much  coaxing  to  keep  him  in  good- 
humour.  It  must,  we  fear,  be  added,  that  the 
love  of  money  had  grown  upon  him,  and  that 
he  thought  more  about  his  allowances,  and  less 
about  his  duties,  than  might  have  been  expect 
ed  from  so  eminent  a  member  of  so  noble  a 
profession.  Still  he  was  perhaps  the  ablest 
otficer  that  was  then  to  be  found  in  the  British 
army.  Among  the  native  soldiers  his  name 
was  great  and  his  influence  unrivalled.  Nor 
is  he  yet  forgotten  by  them.  Now  and  then  a 
white-bearded  old  sepoy  may  still  be  found, 
who  loves  to  talk  of  Porto  Novo  and  Pollilore, 
It  is  but  a  short  time  since  one  of  those  aged 
men  came  to  present  a  memorial  to  an  English 
officer,  who  holds  one  of  the  highest  employ 
ments  in  India;  a  print  of  Coote  hung  in  the 
room  ;  the  veteran  recognised  at  once  that  face 
and  figure  which  he  had  not  seen  for  more  than 
half  a  century,  and,  forgetting  his  salam  to  the 
living,  halted,  drew  himself  up,  lifted  his  hand, 
and  with  solemn  reverence  paid  his  military 
obeisance  to  the  dead. 

Coote  did  not,  like  Barwell,  vote  constantly 
with  the  Governor-General;  but  he  was  by  no 
means  inclined  to  join  in  systematic  oppo«i- 
tion  ;  and  on  most  questions  concurred  with 
Hastings,  who  did  his  best,  by  assiduous  court 
ship,  and  by  readily  granting  the  most  exorbi 
tant  allowances,  to  gratify  the  strongest  pas 
sions  of  the  old  soldier. 

It  seemed  likely  at  this  time  that  a  general 
reconciliation  would  put  an  end  to  the  quarrels 
which  had,  during  some  years,  weakened  ami 
disgraced  the  government  of  Bengal.  The 
dangers  of  the  empire  might  well  induce  men 
of  patriotic  feeling — and  of  patriotic  feelina,, 
neither  Hastings  nor  Francis  was  destitute- 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


?o  forget  private  enmities,  and  to  co-operate 
neartily  for  the  general  good.  Coote  had 
never  been  concerned  in  faction.  Wheler  was 
thoroughly  tired  of  it.  Barwell  had  made  an 
ample  fortune,  and  though  he  had  promised 
that  he  would  not  leave  Calcutta  while  Hast 
ings  wanted  his  help,  was  most  desirous  to  re 
turn  to  England,  and  exerted  himself  to  pro 
mote  an  arrangement  which  would  set  him  at 
liberty.  A  compact  was  made,  by  which 
Francis  agreed  to  desist  from  opposition,  and 
Hastings  engaged  that  the  friends  of  Francis 
.should  be  admitted  to  a  fair  share  of  the  ho 
nours  and  emoluments  of  the  service.  During 
a  few  months  after  this  treaty  there  was  ap 
parent  harmony  at  the  Council-board. 

Harmony,  indeed,  was  never  more  neces 
sary;  for  at  this  moment  internal  calamities, 
more  formidable  than  war  itself,  menaced  Ben 
gal.  The  authors  of  the  Regulating  Act  of 
1773  had  established  two  independent  powers, 
the  one  judicial,  the  other  political;  and,  with 
a  carelessness  scandalously  common  in  Eng 
lish  legislation,  had  omitted  to  define  the  limits 
of  either.  The  judges  took  advantage  of  the 
indistinctness,  and  attempted  to  draw  to  them 
selves  supreme  authority,  not  only  within  Cal 
cutta,  but  through  the  whole  of  the  great  terri 
tory  subject  to  the  presidency  of  Fort  William. 
There  are  few  Englishmen  who  will  not  admit 
that  the  English  law,  in  spite  of  modern  im 
provements,  is  neither  so  cheap  nor  so  speedy 
as  might  be  wished.  Still,  it  is  a  system  which 
has  grown  up  amongst  us.  In  some  points,  it 
has  been  fashioned  to  suit  our  feelings;  in 
others,  it  has  gradually  fashioned  our  feelings 
to  suit  itself.  Even  to  its  worst  evils  we  are 
accustomed;  and  therefore,  though  we  may 
complain  of  them,  they  do  not  strike  us  with 
the  horror  and  dismay  which  would  be  pro 
duced  by  a  new  grievance  of  smaller  severity. 
In  India  the  case  is  widely  different.  English 
law,  transplanted  to  that  country,  has  all  the 
vices  from  which  we  suffer  here ;  it  has  them 
all  in  a  far  higher  degree ;  and  it  has  other 
vices,  compared  with  which  the  worst  vices 
from  which  we  suffer  are  trifles.  Dilatory 
here,  it  is  far  more  dilatory  in  a  land  where 
the  help  of  an  interpreter  is  needed  by  every 
judge  and  by  every  advocate.  Costly  here,  it 
is  far  more  costly  in  a  land  into  which  the 
legal  practitioners  must  be  imported  from  an 
immense  distance.  All  English  labour  in 
India,  from  the  labour  of  the  Governor-General 
and  the  Commander-in-Chief,  down  to  that  of 
a  groom  or  a  watchmaker,  must  be  paid  for  at 
a  higher  rate  than  at  home.  No  man  will  be 
banished,  and  banished  to  the  torrid  zone,  for 
nothing.  The  rule  holds  good  with  respect  to 
the  legal  profession.  No  English  barrister 
will  work,  fifteen  thousand  miles  from  all  his 
friends,  with  the  thermometer  at  ninety-six  in 
the  shade,  for  the  same  emoluments  which  will 
content  him  in  the  Chambers  that  overlook  the 
Thames.  Accordingly,  the  fees  in  Calcutta 
are  about  three  times  as  great  as  the  fees  of 
Westminster  Hall ;  and  this,  though  the  people 
of  India  are,  beyond  all  comparison,  poorer 
than  the  people  of  England.  Yet  the  delay  and 
the  expense,  grievous  as  they  are,  form  the 
smallest  part  of  the  evil  which  English  law, 


imported  without  modifications  into  India, 
could  not  fail  to  produce.  The  strongest  feel 
ings  of  our  nature,  honour,  religion,  female 
modesty,  rose  up  against  the  innovation.  Ar 
rest  on  mesne  process  was  the  first  step  in  most 
civil  proceedings ;  and  to  a  native  of  rankr  ar 
rest  was  not  merely  a  restraint,  but  a  foul  per 
sonal  indignity.  Oaths  were  required  in  every 
stage  of  every  suit;  and  the  feeling  of  a  quaker 
about  an  oath  is  hardly  stronger  than  that  of  a 
respectable  native.  That  the  apartments  of  a 
woman  of  quality  should  be  entered  by  strange 
men,  or  that  her  face  should  be  seen  by  them, 
are,  in  the  East,  intolerable  outrages — outrages 
which  are  more  dreaded  than  death,  and  which 
can  be  expiated  only  by  the  shedding  of  blood. 
To  these  outrages  the  most  distinguished  fami 
lies  of  Bengal,  Bahar,  and  Orissa,  were  now 
exposed.  Imagine  what  the  state  of  our  own 
country  would  be,  if  a  jurisprudence  were,  on 
a  sudden,  introduced  amongst  us,  which  should 
be  to  us  what  our  jurisprudence  was  to  our 
Asiatic  subjects.  Imagine  what  the  state  of 
our  own  country  would  be,  if  it  were  enacted 
that  any  man,  by  merely  swearing  that  a  debt 
was  due  to  him,  should  acquire  a  right  to  in 
sult  the  persons  of  men  of  the  most  honourable 
and  sacred  callings,  and  of  women  of  the  most 
shrinking  delicacy,  to  horsewhip  a  general 
officer,  to  put  a  bishop  in  the  stocks,  to  treat 
ladies  in  the  way  which  called  forth  the  blow 
of  Wat  Tyler.  Something  like  this  was  the 
effect  of  the  attempt  which  the  Supreme  Court 
made  to  extend  its  jurisdiction  over  the  whole 
of  the  Company's  territory. 

A  reign  of  terror  began— of  terror  height 
ened  by  mystery;  for  even  that  which  was 
endured  was  less  horrible  than  that  which  was 
anticipated.  No  man  knew  what  was  next  to 
be  expected  from  this  strange  tribunal.  It 
came  from  beyond  the  black  water,  as  the 
people  of  India,  with  mysterious  horror,  call 
the  sea.  It  consisted  of  judges,  not  one  of 
whom  spoke  the  language,  or  was  familiar 
with  the  usages,  of  the  millions  over  whom 
they  claimed  boundless  authority.  Its  records 
were  kept  in  unknown  characters ;  its  sen 
tences  were  pronounced  in  unknown  sounds. 
It  had  already  collected  round  itself  an  army 
of  the  worst  part  of  the  native  population — in 
formers,  and  false  witnesses,  and  common  bar 
rators,  and  agents  of  chicane ;  and,  above  all, 
a  banditti  of  bailiffs'  followers,  compared  with 
whom  the  retainers  of  the  worst  English 
spunging-houses,  in  the  worst  times,  might  be 
considered  as  upright  and  tender-hearted. 
Numbers  of  natives,  highly  considered  among 
their  countrymen,  were  seized,  hurried  up  to 
Calcutta,  flung  into  the  common  jail — not  for 
any  crime  ever  imputed — not  for  any  debt  that 
had  been  proved,  but  merely  as  a  precaution 
till  their  cause  should  come  to  trial.  There 
were  instances  in  which  men  of  the  most 
venerable  dignity,  persecuted  without  a  cause 
by  extortioners,  died  of  rage  and  shame  in  the 
gripe  of  the  vile  alguazils  of  Impey.  The  ha 
rems  of  noble  Mohammedans — sanctuaries 
respected  in  the  East  by  governments  which 
respected  nothing  else — were  burst  open  by 
gangs  of  bailiffs.  The  Mussulmans,  braver 
and  less  accustomed  to  submission  than  the 


WARREN   HASTINGS. 


479 


Hindoos,  sometimes  stood  on  their  defence  ; 
and  there  were  instances  in  which  they  shed 
their  blood  in  the  doorway,  while  defending, 
sword  in  hand,  the  sacred  apartments  of  their 
women.  Nay,  it  seemed  as  if  even  the  faint 
hearted  Bengalee,  who  had  crouched  at  the 
feet  of  Surajah  Dowlah,  who  had  been  mute 
during  the  administration  of  Vansittart,  would 
at  length  find  courage  in  despair-  No  Mah- 
ratta  invasion  had  ever  spread  through  the 
province  such  dismay  as  this  inroad  of  Eng 
lish  lawyers.  All  the  injustice  of  former  op 
pressors,  Asiatic  and  European,  appeared  as 
a  blessing  when  compared  with  the  justice  of 
the  Supreme  Court. 

Every  class  of  the  population,  English  and 
native,  with  the  exception  of  the  ravenous  pet 
tifoggers  who  fattened  on  the  misery  and  ter 
ror  of  an  immense  community,  cried  out  loudly 
against  this  fearful  oppression.  But  the  judges 
were  immovable.  If  a  bailiff  was  resisted, 
they  ordered  the  soldiers  to  be  called  out.  If 
a  servant  of  the  Company,  in  ccnformity  with 
the  orders  of  the  government,  withstood  the 
miserable  catch-poles  who,  with  Impey's  writs 
in  their  hands,  exceeded  the  insolence  and 
rapacity  of  gang-robbers,  he  was  flung  into 
prison  for  a  contempt.  The  lapse  of  sixty 
years — the  virtue  and  wisdom  of  many  emi 
nent  magistrates,  who  have  during  that  time 
administered  justice  in  the  Supreme  Court — 
have  not  effaced  from  the  minds  of  the  peo 
ple  of  Bengal  the  recollection  of  those  evil 
days. 

The  members  of  the  government  were,  on 
this  subject,  united  as  one  man.  Hastings  had 
courted  the  judges ;  he  had  found  them  useful 
instruments.  But  he  was  not  disposed  to  make 
them  his  own  masters,  or  the  masters  of  India. 
His  mind  was  large;  his  knowledge  of  the 
native  character  most  accurate.  He  saw  that 
the  system  pursued  by  the  Supreme  Court  was 
degrading  to  the  government,  and  ruinous  to 
the  people;  and  resolved  to  oppose  it  man 
fully.  The  consequence  was,  that  the  friend 
ship — if  that  be  the  proper  word  for  such  a 
connection — which  had  existed  between  him 
and  Impey,  was  for  a  time  completely  dis 
solved.  The  government  placed  itself  firmly 
between  the  tyrannical  tribunal  and  the  peo 
ple.  The  Chief  Justice  proceeded  to  the  wild 
est  excesses.  The  Governor-General  and  all 
the  members  of  Council  were  served  with 
summonses,  calling  on  them  to  appear  before 
the  king's  justices,  and  to  answer  for  their 
public  acts.  This  was  too  much.  Hastings, 
with  just  scorn,  refused  to  obey  the  call,  set  at 
liberty  the  persons  wrongfully  detained  by  the 
court,  and  took  measures  for  resisting  the  out 
rageous  proceedings  of  the  sheriff's  officers, 
if  necessary  by  the  sword.  But  he  had  in 
view  another  device,  which  might  prevent  the 
necessity  of  an  appeal  to  arms.  He  was  sel 
dom  at  a  loss  for  an  expedient;  and  he  knew 
Impey  well.  The  expedient,  in  this  case,  was 
a  very  simple  one — neither  more  nor  less  than 
a  bribe.  Impey  was,  by  act  of  Parliament,  a 
judge,  independent  of  the  government  of  Ben 
gal,  and  entitled  to  a  salary  of  8,0007.  a  year. 
Hastings  proposed  to  make  him  also  a  judge 
in  the  Company's  service,  removable  at  the 


pleasure  of  the  government  of  Bengal !  and  to 
give  him,  in  that  capacity,  about  8,000/.  a  year 
more.  It  was  understood  that,  in  consideration 
of  this  new  salary,  Impey  would  desist  from 
urging  the  high  pretensions  of  his  court.  If 
he  did  urge  these  pretensions,  the  government 
could,  at  a  moment's  notice,  eject  him  from  the 
new  place  which  had  been  created  for  him. 
The  bargain  was  struck,  Bengal  was  saved, 
an  appeal  to  force  was  averted  ;  and  the  Chief 
Justice  was  rich,  quiet,  and  infamous. 

Of  Impey's  conduct  it  is  unnecessary  to 
speak.  It  was  of  a  piece  with  almost  every 
part  of  his  conduct  that  comes  under  the  no 
tice  of  history.  No  other  such  judge  has  dis 
honoured  the  English  ermine,  since  Jeffries 
drank  himself  to  death  in  the  Tower.  But  we 
cannot  agree  with  those  who  have  blamed 
Hastings  for  this  transaction.  The  case  stood 
thus.  The  negligent  manner  in  which  the 
Regulating  Act  had  been  framed,  put  it  in  the 
power  of  the  Chief  Justice  to  throw  a  great 
country  into  the  most  dreadful  confusion.  He 
was  determined  to  use  his  power  to  the  utmost, 
unless  he  was  paid  to  be  still ;  and  Hastings 
consented  to  pay  him.  The  necessity  was  to 
be  deplored.  It  is  also  to  be  deplored  that 
pirates  should  be  able  to  exact  ransom,  by 
threatening  to  make  their  captives  walk  the 
plank.  But  to  ransom  a  captive  from  pirates 
has  always  been  held  a  humane  and  Christian 
act;  and  it  would  be  absurd  to  charge  the 
payer  of  the  ransom  with  corrupting  the  virtue 
of  the  corsair.  This,  we  seriously  think,  is  a 
not  unfair  illustration  of  the  relative  position 
of  Impey,  Hastings,  and  the  people  of  India. 
Whether  it  was  right  in  Impey  to  demand  or 
to  accept  a  price  for  powers  which,  if  they 
really  belonged  to  him,  he  could  not  abdicate 
— which,  if  they  did  not  belong  to  him,  h? 
ought  never  to  have  usurped — and  which  in 
neither  case  he  could  honestly  sell — is  one 
question.  It  is  quite  another  question,  whethei 
Hastings  was  not  right  to  give  any  sum,  how 
ever  large,  to  any  man,  however  worthless, 
rather  than  either  surrender  millions  of  hu 
man  beings  to  pillage,  or  rescue  them  by 
civil  war. 

Francis  strongly  opposed  this  arrangeme-nt 
It  may,  indeed,  be  suspected  that  personal 
aversion  to  Impey  was  as  strong  a  motive  with 
Francis  as  regard  for  the  welfare  of  the  pro- 
vince.  To  a  mind  burning  with  resentment, 
it  might  seem  better  to  leave  Bengal  to  the  op 
pressors,  than  to  redeem  it  by  enriching  th"m. 
It  is  not  improbablt ,  on  the  Dther  hand,  :hat 
Hastings  may  have  been  the  more  willing  to 
resort  to  an  expedient  agreeable  to  the  Chief 
Justice,  because  that  high  functionary  had  al 
ready  been  so  serviceable,  and  might,  whrn 
existing  dissensions  were  composed,  be  ser 
viceable  again. 

But  it  was  not  on  this  point  aione  that 
Francis  was  now  opposed  to  Hastings.  Th« 
peace  between  them  proved  to  be  only  a  short 
and  hollow  truce,  during  which  their  mutual 
aversion  was  constantly  becoming  stronger 
|  At  length  an  explosion  took  place.  Hastings 
publicly  charged  Francis  with  having  deceived 
him,  and  induced  Barwell  to  quit  the  service 
by  insincere  nromises.  Then  came  a  dispute 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


a:-h  \s  irequentiy  arises  even  between  ho- 
utwraUe  uen,  when  they  make  important 
agreements  ly  mere  verbal  communication. 
An  impartial  historian  will  probably  be  of  opi 
nion  that  they  Lad  misunderstood  each  other ; 
but  their  minds;  were  so  much  imbittered,  that 
they  imputed  to  each  other  nothing  less  than 
deliberate  villany.  "  I  do  not,"  said  Hastings, 
in  a  minute  recorded  in  the  Consultations  of 
the  Government— J"  I  do  not  trust  to  Mr. 
Francis's  promises  of  candour,  convinced  that 
he  is  incapable  of  it.  I  judge  of  his  public 
conduct  by  his  private,  which  I  have  found  to 
be  void  of  truth  and  honour."  After  the  Coun 
cil  had  risen,  Francis  put  a  challenge  into  the 
Governor-General's  hand  :  it  was  instantly  ac 
cepted.  They  met,  and  fired.  Francis  was 
shot  through  the  body.  He  was  carried  to  a 
neighbouring  house,  where  it  appeared  that 
the  wound,  though  severe,  was  not  mortal. 
Hastings  inquired  repeatedly  after  his  enemy's 
Health,  and  proposed  to  call  on  him;  but 
Francis  coldly  declined  the  visit.  He  had  a 
proper  sense,  he  said,  of  the  Governor-Ge 
neral's  politeness,  but  must  decline  any  private 
interview.  They  could  meet  only  at  the  Coun 
cil-board. 

In  a  very  short  time  it  was  made  signallv 
manifest  to  how  great  a  danger  the  Cfovernor- 
General  had,  on  this  occasion,  exposed  his 
country.  A  crisis  arrived  with  which  he,  and 
he  alone,  was  competent  to  deal.  It  is  net  too 
much  to  say,  that,  if  he  had  been  taken  from 
the  head  of  affairs,  the  years  1780  and  1781 
would  have  been  as  fatal  to  our  power  in  Asia 
as  to  our  power  in  America. 

The  Mahrattas  had  been  the  chief  objects 
of  apprehension  to  Hastings.  The  measures 
which  he  had  adopted  for  the  purpose  of  break 
ing  their  power,  had  at  first  been  frustrated  by 
the  errors  of  those  whom  he  was  compelled  to 
employ ;  but  his  perseverance  and  ability 
seemed  likely  to  be  crowned  v/ith  success, 
when  a  far  more  formidable  danger  showed  it 
self  in  a  distant  quarter. 

About  thirty  years  before  thin  time,  a  Moham 
medan  soldier  had  begun  to  distinguish  him 
self  in  the  wars  of  Southern  India.  His  edu 
cation  had  been  neglected;  his  extraction  was 
mean.  His  father  had  been  a  petty  officer  of 
revenue ;  his  grandfather  a  wandering  Dervise. 
But  though  thus  meanly  descended — though  j 
ignorant  even  of  the  alphabet — the  adventurer 
had  no  sooner  been  placed  at  the  head  of  a 
body  of  troops,  than  he  approved  hiuself  a 
man  born  for  conquest  and  command.  Among 
the  crowd  of  chiefs  who  were  struggling  for  a 
share  of  India,  none  could  compare  with  him 
in  the  qualities  of  the  captain  and  the  states 
man.  He  became  a  general — he  became  a 
prince.  Out  of  the  fragments  of  old  princi 
palities,  which  had  gone  to  pieces  in  the  ge 
neral  wreck,  he  formed  for  himself  a  great, 
compact,  and  vigorous  empire.  That  empire 
he  ruied  with  the  ability,  severity,  and  vigi 
lance  of  Louis  the  Eleventh.  Licentious  in 
his  pleasures,  implacable  in  his  revenge,  he 
had  yet  enlargement  of  mind  enough  to  per-  j 
ceive  how  much  the  prosperity  of  subjects  adds  , 
fo  the  strength  of  governments.  He  was  an  | 

npres«or;  but  he  had  at  least  the  merit  of  pro 


tecting  his  people  against  all  oppression  except 
his  own.  He  was  now  in  extreme  old  age; 
but  his  intellect  was  as  clear,  and  his  spirit  as 
high,  as  in  the  prime  of  manhood.  Such  was 
the  great  Hyder  AH,  the  founder  of  the  Moham 
medan  kingdom  of  Mysore,  and  the  most  for 
midable  enemy  with  whom  the  English  con 
querors  of  India  have  ever  had  to  contend. 

Had  Hastings  been  Governor  of  Madras, 
Hyder  would  have  been  either  made  a  friend 
or  vigorously  encountered  as  an  enemy.  Un 
happily  the  English  authorities  in  the  south 
provoked  their  powerful  neighbour's  hostility, 
without  being  prepared  to  repel  it.  On  a  sud 
den,  an  army  of  ninety  thousand  men,  far  su 
perior  in  discipline  and  efficiency  to  any  other 
native  force  that  could  be  found  in  India,  came 
pouring  through  those  wild  passes,  which, 
worn  by  mountain  torrents,  and  dark  with 
jungle,  lead  down  from  the  table-land  of  My 
sore  to  the  plains  of  the  Carnatic.  This  great 
army  was  accompanied  by  a  hundred  pieces 
of  cannon;  and  its  movements  were  guided 
by  many  French  officers,  trained  in  the  best 
military  schools  of  Europe. 

Hyder  was  everywhere  triumphant.  The 
sepoys  in  many  British  garrisons  flung  down 
their  arms.  Some  forts  were  surrendered  by 
treachery,  and  some  by  despair.  In  a  few  days 
the  whole  open  country  north  of  the  Coleroon 
had  submitted.  The  English  inhabitants  of 
Madras  could  already  see  by  night  from  the 
top  of  Mount  St.  Thomas,  the  eastern  sky  red 
dened  by  a  vast  semicircle  of  blazing  villages. 
The  white  villas,  embosomed  in  little  groves 
of  tulip  trees,  to  which  our  countrymen  retire 
after  the  daily  labours  of  government  and  of 
trade,  when  the  cool  evening  breeze  springs  up 
from  the  bay,  were  now  left  without  inhabit 
ants;  for  bands  of  the  fierce  horsemen  of 
Mysore  had  already  been  seen  prowling  near 
those  gay  verandas.  Even  the  town  was  not 
thought  secure,  and  the  British  merchants  and 
public  functionaries  made  haste  to  crowd  them 
selves  behind  the  cannon  of  Fort  St.  George. 

There  were  the  means  indeed  of  forming  an 
army  which  might  have  defended  the  presi 
dency,  and  even  driven  the  invader  back  to 
his  mountains.  Sir  Hector  Munro  was  at  the 
head  of  one  considerable  force;  Baillie  was 
advancing  with  another.  United,  they  might 
have  presented  a  formidable  front  even  to  such 
an  enemy  as  Hyder.  But  the  English  com 
manders,  neglecting  those  fundamental  rules 
of  the  military  art,  of  which  the  propriety  is 
obvious  even  to  men  who  have  never  received 
a  military  education,  deferred  their  junction, 
and  were  separately  attacked.  Baillie's  de 
tachment  was  destroyed.  Munro  was  forced 
to  abandon  his  baggage,  to  fling  his  guns  into 
the  tanks,  and  to  save  himself  by  a  retreat 
which  might  be  called  a  flight.  In  three  weeks 
from  the  commencement  of  thn  war,  the  Bri 
tish  empire  in  Southern  India  had  been  brought 
to  the  verge  of  ruin.  Only  a  few  fortified 
places  remained  to  us.  The  glory  of  our  arms 
had  departed.  It  was  known  that  a  great 
French  expedition  might  soon  be  expected  on 
the  coast  of  Coromandel.  England,  beset  by 
enemies  on  every  side,  was  in  no  condition  to 
protect  such  remote  dependencies. 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


Then  it  was  that  the  fertile  genius  and  se 
rene  courage  of  Hastings  achieved  their  most 
signal  triumph.  A  swift  ship,  flying  before  the 
southwejt  monsoon,  brought  the  evil  tidings 
in  few  days  lo  Calcutta.  In  twenty-four  hours 
the  Governor-General  had  framed  a  complete 
plan  of  policy  adapted  to  the  altered  state  of 
affairs.  The  struggle  with  Hyder  was  a  strug 
gle  for  life  and  death.  All  minor  objects  must 
be  sacrificed  to  the  preservation  of  the  Carna- 
tic.  The  disputes  with  the  Mahrattas  must  be 
accommodated.  A  large  military  force  and  a 
Supply  of  money  must  be  instantly  sent  to  Ma 
dras.  But  even  these  measures  would  be  in 
sufficient  unless  the  war,  hitherto  so  grossly 
mismanaged,  were  placed  under  the  direction 
of  a  vigorous  mind.  It  was  no  time  for  trifling. 
Hastings  determined  to  resort  to  an  extreme 
exercise  of  power;  to  suspend  the  incapable 
governor  of  Fort  St.  George,  to  send  Sir  Eyre 
Coote  to  oppose  Hyder,  and  to  intrust  that  dis 
tinguished  general  with  the  whole  administra 
tion  of  the  war. 

In  spite  of  the  sullen  opposition  of  Francis, 
who  had  now  recovered  from  his  wound  and 
had  returned  to  the  Council,  the  Governor- 
General's  wise  and  firm  policy  was  approved 
by  the  majority  of  the  board.  The  reinforce 
ments  were  sent  off  with  great  expedition,  and 
reached  Madras  before  the  French  armament 
arrived  in  the  Indian  seas.  Coote,  broken  by 
age  and  disease,  was  no  longer  the  Coote  of 
Wandewash ;  but  he  was  still  a  resolute  and 
skilful  commander.  The  progress  of  Hyder 
was  arrested,  and  in  a  few  months  the  great 
victory  of  Porto  Novo  retrieved  the  honour  of 
the  English  arms. 

In  the  mean  time  Francis  had  returned  to 
England,  and  Hastings  was  now  left  perfectly 
unfettered.  Wheler  had  gradually  been  relax 
ing  in  his  opposition,  and,  after  the  departure 
of  his  vehement  and  implacable  colleague,  co 
operated  heartily  with  the  Governor-General, 
whose  influence  over  his  countrymen  in  India, 
always  great,  had,  by  the  vigour  and  success 
of  his  recent  measures,  been  considerably  in 
creased. 

But  though  the  difficulties  arising  from  fac 
tions  within  the  Council  were  at  an  end,  an 
other  class  of  difficulties  had  become  more 
pressing  than  ever.  The  financial  embarrass 
ment  was  extreme.  Hastings  had  to  find  the 
means,  not  only  of  carrying  on  the  government 
of  Bengal,  but  of  maintaining  a  most  costly 
war  against  both  Indian  and  European  ene 
mies  in  the  Carnatic,  and  of  making  remit 
tances  to  England.  A  few  years  before  this 
time  he  had  obtained  relief  by  plundering  the 
Mogul  and  enslaving  the  Rohillas,  nor  were 
the  resources  of  his  fruitful  mind  by  any 
means  exhausted. 

His  first  design  was  on  Benares,  a  city  which, 
in  wealth,  population,  dignity,  and  sanctity,  was 
among  the  foremost  of  Asia.  It  was  commonly 
believed  that  half  a  million  of  human  beings 
was  crowded  into  that  labyrinth  of  lofty  alleys, 
rich  with  shrines,  and  minarets,  and  balconies, 
and  carved  oriels,  to  which  the  sacred  apes 
clung  by  hundreds.  The  traveller  could  scarce 
ly  make  his  way  through  the  press  of  holy  men 
dicants  and  not  less  holy  bulls.  The  broad 

VOL.  IV.— 61 


and  stately  flights  of  steps  which  descended  from 
these  swarming  haunts  to  the  bathing-places 
along  the  Ganges  were  worn  every  day  by  the 
footsteps  of  an  innumerable  multitude  of  wor 
shippers.  The  schools  and  temples  drew 
crowds  of  pious  Hindoos  from  every  province 
where  the  Brahminical  faith  was  known.  Hun 
dreds  of  devotees  came  thither  every  month  to 
die — for  it  was  believed  that  a  peculiarly  happy 
fate  awaited  the  man  who  should  pass  from  the 
sacred  city  into  the  sacred  river.  Nor  was 
superstition  the  only  motive  which  allured 
strangers  to  that  great  metropolis.  Commerce 
had  as  many  pilgrims  as  religion.  All  along 
the  shores  of  the  venerable  stream  lay  great 
fleets  of  vessels  laden  with  rich  merchandise. 
From  the  looms  of  Benares  went  forth  the 
most  delicate  silks  that  adorned  the  balls  of 
St.  James's  and  of  the  Petit  Trianon;  and  in 
the  bazaars  the  muslins  of  Bengal  and  the 
sabres  of  Oude  were  mingled  with  the  jewels 
of  Golconda  and  the  shawls  of  Cashmere.  This 
rich  capital  and  the  surrounding  tract  had  long 
been  under  the  immediate  rule  of  a  Hindoo  prince 
who  rendered  homage  to  the  Mogul  emperors. 
During  the  great  anarchy  of  India  the  lords 
of  Benares  became  independent  of  the  court 
of  Delhi,  but  were  compelled  to  submit  to  the 
authority  of  the  Nabob  of  Oude.  Oppressed 
by  this  formidable  neighbour,  they  invoked  the 
protection  of  the  English.  The  English  pro 
tection  was  given,  and  at  length  the  Nabob 
Vizier,  by  a  solemn  treaty,  ceded  all  his  rights 
over  Benares  to  the  Company.  From  that  time 
the  Rajah  was  the  vassal  of  the  government 
of  Bengal,  acknowledged  its  supremacy,  and 
sent  an  annual  tribute  to  Fort  William.  These 
duties  Cheyte  Sing,  the  reigning  prince,  had 
fulfilled  with  strict  punctuality. 

Respecting  the  precise  nature  of  the  legal 
relation  between  the  Company  and  the  Rajah 
of  Benares  there  has  been  much  warm  and 
acute  controversy.  On  the  one  side  it  has 
been  maintained  that  Cheyte  Sing  was  merely 
a  great  subject,  on  whom  the  superior  power 
had  a  right  to  call  for  aid  in  the  necessities  of 
the  empire.  On  the  other  side  it  has  been 
contended  that  he  was  an  independent  prince, 
that  the  only  claim  which  the  Company  had 
upon  him  was  for  a  fixed  tribute,  and  that, 
while  the  fixed  tribute  was  regularly  paid,  as- 
it  assuredly  was,  the  English  had  no  more 
right  to  exact  any  further  contribution  from 
him  than  to  demand  subsidies  from  Holland 
or  Denmark.  Nothing  is  easier  than  to  find 
precedents  and  analogies  in  favour  of  either 
view. 

Our  own  impression  is  that  neither  view  i* 
correct.  It  was  too  much  the  habit  of  English 
politicians  to  take  it  for  granted  that  there  was 
in  India  a  known  and  definite  constitution  by 
which  questions  of  this  kind  were  to  be  decided. 
The  truth  is-,  that  during  the  interval  which 
elapsed  between  the  fall  of  the  house  of  Ta» 
merlane  and  the  establishmeni  of  the  British 
ascendency,  there  was  no  constitution.  Th« 
|  old  order  of  things  had  passed  away;  the  new 
order  of  things  was  not  yet  formed.  All  was 
transition,  confusion,  obscurity.  Everybody 
kept  his  head  as  he  best  might,  and  scramble** 
for  whatever  he  could  get.  There  have 
2S 


482 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


similar  seasons  in  Europe.  The  time  of  the 
dissolution  of  the  Carlovingian  empire  is  an 
instance.  Who  would  think  of  seriously  dis 
cussing  the  question,  what  extent  of  pecuniary 
aid  and  of  obedience  Hugh  Capet  had  a  con 
stitutional  right  to  demand  from  the  Duke  of 
Brittany  or  the  Duke  of  Normandy  1  The  words 
"constitutional  right"  had,  in  that  state  of  so 
ciety,  no  meaning.  If  Hugh  Capet  laid  hands 
on  all  the  possessions  of  the  Duke  of  Norman 
dy,  this  might  be  unjust  and  immoral;  but  it 
would  not  be  illegal  in  the  sense  in  which  the 
ordinances  of  Charles  the  Tenth  were  illegal. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  Duke  of  Normandy 
made  war  on  Hugh  Capet,  this  might  be  un 
just  and  immoral ;  but  it  would  not  be  illegal 
in  the  sense  in  which  the  expedition  of  Prince 
Louis  Bonaparte  was  illegal. 

Very  similar  to  this  was  the  state  of  India 
sixty  years  ago.  Of  the  existing  governments 
not  a  single  one  could  lay  claim  to  legitimacy, 
or  plead  any  other  title  than  recent  occupation. 
There  was  scarcely  a  province  in  which  the 
real  sovereignty  and  the  nominal  sovereignty 
were  not  disjoined.  Titles  and  forms  were  still 
retained,  which  implied  that  the  heir  of  Ta 
merlane  was  an  absolute  ruler,  and  that  the 
Nabobs  of  the  provinces  were  his  lieutenants. 
In  reality,  he  was  a  captive.  The  Nabobs  were 
in  some  places  independent  princes.  In  other 
places,  as  in  Bengal  and  the  Carnatic,  they 
had,  like  their  master,  become  mere  phantoms, 
and  the  Company  was  supreme.  Among  the 
Mahrattas  again,  the  heir  of  Sevajee  still  kept 
the  title  of  Rajah  ;  but  he  was  a  prisoner,  and 
his  prime  minister,  the  Peshwa,  had  become 
the  hereditary  chief  of  the  state.  The  Peshwa, 
.'n  his  turn,  was  fast  sinking  into  the  same  de 
graded  situation  to  which  he  had  reduced  the 
Rajah.  It  was,  we  believe,  impossible  to  find, 
from  the  Himalayas  to  Mysore,  a  single  go 
vernment  which  was  at  once  de  facto  and  de  jure 
— which  possessed  the  physical  means  of  mak 
ing  itself  feared  by  its  neighbours  and  subjects, 
and  which  had  at  the  same  time  the  authority 
derived  from  law  and  long  prescription. 

Hastings  clearly  discerned,  what  was  hidden 
from  most  of  his  contemporaries,  that  such  a 
state  of  things  gave  immense  advantages  to  a 
ruler  of  great  talents  and  few  scruples.  In 
every  international  question  that  could  arise, 
he  had  his  option  between  the  de  facto  ground 
and  the  dejure  ground;  and  the  probability  was 
that  one  of  those  grounds  would  sustain  any 
claim  that  it  might  be  convenient  for  him  to 
make,  and  enable  him  to  resist  any  claim  made 
by  others.  In  every  controversy,  accordingly, 
he  resorted  to  the  plea  which  suited  his  imme 
diate  purpose,  without  troubling  himself  in  the 
least  about  consistency;  and  thus  he  sc£-~.ely 
ever  failed  to  find  what,  to  persons  of  shi>rt 
memories  and  scanty  information,  seemed  to 
be  a  justification  for  what  he  wanted  to  do. 
Sometimes  the  Nabob  of  Bengal  is  a  shadow, 
sometimes  a.  monarch ;  sometimes  the  Vizier 
is  a  mere  deputy,  sometimes  an  independent 
potentate.  If  it  is  expedient  for  the  Company 
to  show  some  legal  title  to  the  revenues  of 
Bengal,  the  grant  under  the  seal  of  the  Mogul 
IR  brought  forward  as  an  instrument  of  the 
highest  authority.  When  the  Mogul  asks  for 


the  rents  which  were  reserved  to  him  by  that 
very  grant,  he  is  told  that  he  is  a  mere  pa 
geant  ;  that  the  English  power  rests  on  a  very 
different  foundation  from  a  charter  given  by 
him ;  that  he  is  welcome  to  play  at  royalty  as 
long  as  he  likes,  but  that  he  must  expect  no 
tribute  from  the  real  masters  of  India. 

It  is  true,  that  it  was  in  the  power  of  others, 
as  well  as  of  Hastings,  to  practise  this  leger 
demain;  but  in  the  controversies  of  govern 
ments,  sophistry  is  of  little  use  unless  it  be 
backed  by  power.  There  is  a  principle  which 
Hastings  was  fond  of  asserting  in  the  strongest 
terms,  and  on  which  he  acted  with  undeviating 
steadiness.  It  is  a  principle  which,  we  must 
own,  can  hardly  be  disputed  in  the  present 
state  of  public  law.  It  is  this — that  where  an 
ambiguous  question  arises  between  two  go 
vernments,  there  is,  if  they  cannot  agree,  no 
appeal  except  to  force,  and  that  the  opinion  of 
the  strongest  must  prevail.  Almost  every 
question  was  ambiguous  in  India.  The  Eng 
lish  government  was  the  strongest  in  India. 
The  consequences  are  obvious.  The  English 
government  might  do  exactly  \vhat  it  chose. 

The  English  government  now  chose  to  wring 
money  out  of  Cheyte  Sing.  It  had  formerly 
been  convenient  to  treat  him  as  a  sovereign 
prince ;  it  was  now  convenient  to  treat  him  as 
a  subject.  Dexterity  inferior  to  that  of  Hast 
ings  could  easily  find,  in  that  general  chaos  of 
laws  and  customs,  arguments  for  either  course. 
Hastings  wanted  a  great  supply.  It  was  known 
that  Cheyte  Sing  had  a  large  revenue,  and  it 
\vas  suspected  that  he  had  accumulated  a 
treasure.  Nor  was  he  a  favourite  at  Calcutta-. 
He  had,  when  the  Governor-General  was  in 
great  difficulties,  courted  the  favour  of  Francis 
and  Clavering.  Hastings,  who,  less  we  believe 
from  evil  passions  than  from  policy,  seldom 
left  an  injury  unpunished,  was  not  sorry  that 
the  fate  of  Cheyte  Sing  should  teach  neigh 
bouring  princes  the  same  lessons  which  the 
fate  of  Nuncomar  had  already  impressed  on 
the  inhabitants  of  Bengal. 

In  1778,  on  the  first  breaking  out  of  the  war 
with  France,  Cheyte  Sing  was  called  upon  to 
pay,  in  addition  to  his  fixed  tribute,  an  extra 
ordinary  contribution  of  50,0007.  In  1779,  an 
equal  sum  was  exacted.  In  1780,  the  demand 
was  renewed.  Cheyte  Sing,  in  the  hope  of  ob 
taining  some  indulgence,  secretly  offered  the 
Governor-General  a  bribe  of  20,0007.  Hastings 
took  the  money;  and  his  enemies  have  main 
tained  that  he  took  it  intending  to  keep  it.  He 
certainly  concealed  the  transaction,  for  a  time, 
both  from  the  Council  in  Bengal  and  from  the 
Directors  at  home ;  nor  did  he  ever  give  any 
satisfactory  reason  for  the  concealment.  Public 
pirit  or  the  fear  of  detection,  however,  deter 
mined  him  to  withstand  the  temptation.  He 
paid  over  the  bribe  to  the  Company's  treasury, 
and  insisted  that  the  Rajah  should  instantly 
comply  with  the  demands  of  the  English  go 
vernment.  The  Rajah,  after  the  fashion  of  his 
countrymen,  shuffled,  solicited,  and  pleaded 
poverty.  The  grasp  of  Hastings  was  not  to  be 
so  eluded.  He  added  another  10,OOOZ.  as  a 
fine  for  delay,  and  sent  troops  to  exact  the 
money. 

The  money  was  paid.    But  this   was  not 


WARREN  HASTINGS 


483 


enough.  The  late  events  in  the  south  of  India 
had  increased  the  financial  embarrassments 
of  the  Company.  Hastings  was  determined  to 
plunder  Cheyte  Sing,  and,  for  that  end,  to  fasten 
a  quarrel  on  him.  Accordingly,  the  Rajah  was 
now  required  to  keep  a  body  of  cavalry  for  the 
service  of  the  British  government.  He  objected 
and  evaded.  This  was  exactly  what  the  Go 
vernor-General  wanted.  He  had  now  a  pretext 
for  treating  the  wealthiest  of  his  vassals  as  a 
criminal.  "I  resolved,"  these  are  the  words 
of  Hastings  himself,  "  to  draw  from  his  guilt 
the  means  of  relief  to  the  Company's  distresses, 
— to  make  him  pay  largely  for  his  pardon,  or 
to  exact  a  severe  vengeance  for  past  delin 
quency."  The  plan  was  simply  this — to  de 
mand  larger  and  larger  contributions,  till  the 
Rajah  should  be  driven  to  remonstrate,  then  to 
call  his  remonstrance  a  crime,  and  to  punish 

^1^    him  by  confiscating  all  his  possessions. 

•\    Cheyte  Sing  was  In  the  greatest  dismay.    He 

m*  offered  200,<)00/.  to  propitiate  the  British  go- 

*>Vernment.     But  Hastings  replied,  that  nothing 

0  less  than  half  a  million  would  be  accepted. 
Nay,  he  began  to  think  of  selling  Benares  to 
Oude,  as  he  had  formerly  sold  Allahabad  and 
Rohilcund.  The  matter  was  one  which  could 
not  be  well  managed  at  a  distance;  and  Hast 
ings  resolved  to  visit  Benares. 

Cheyte  Sing  received  his  liege  lord  with 
rvery  mark  of  reverence;  came  near  sixty 
miles,  with  his  guards,  to  meet  and  escort  the 
illustrious  visitor;  and  expressed  his  deep 
concern  at  the  displeasure  of  the  English.  He 
even  took  off  his  turban,  and  laid  it  in  the  lap 
of  Hastings — a  gesture  which  in  India  marks 
the  most  profound  submission  and  devotion. 
Hastings  behaved  with  cold  and  repulsive  se 
verity/  Having  arrived  at  Benares,  he  sent  to 
the  Rajah  a  paper  containing  the  demands  of 
the  government  of  Bengal.  The  Rajah,  in 
reply,  attempted  to  clear  himself  from  the  ac 
cusations  brought  against  him.  Hastings,  who 
wanted  money  and  not  excuses,  was  not  to  be 
— put  off  by  the  ordinary  artifices  of  eastern  ne 
gotiation.  He  instantly  ordered  the  Rajah  to 
be  arrested,  and  placed  under  the  custody  of 
two  companies  of  sepoys. 

In  taking  these  strong  measures,  Hastings 
scarcely  showed  his  usual  judgment.  It  is 
probable  that,  having  had  little  opportunity  of 
personally  observing  any  part  of  the  popula 
tion  of  India,  except  the  Bengalees,  he  was  not 
fully  aware  of  the  difference  between  their 
character  and  that  of  the  tribes  which  inhabit 
the  upper  provinces.  He  was  now  in  a  land 
far  more  favourable  to  the  vigour  of  the  hu 
man  frame  than  the  Delta  of  the  Ganges;  in 
a  land  fruitful  of  soldiers,  who  have  been 
found  worthy  to  follow  English  battalions  to 
the  charge,  and  into  the  breach.  The  Rajah 
was  popular  among  his  subjects.  His  admi 
nistration  had  been  mild;  and  the  prosperity 
of  the  district  which  he  governed  presented  a 
striking  contrast  to  the  depressed  state  of  Ba- 
har,  under  our  rule — a  still  more  striking  con 
trast  to  the  misery  of  the  provinces  which 
were  cursed  by  the  tyranny  of  the  Nabob 
Vizier.  The  national  and  religious  prejudices 
with  which  the  English  were  regarded  through 
out  India,  were  peculiarly  intense  in  the  me- 


|  tropolis  of  the  Brahminical  superstition.  It 
I  can  therefore  scarcely  be  doubted  that  the 
Governor-General,  before  he  outraged  the  dig 
nity  of  Cheyte  Sing  by  an  arrest,  ought  to  have 
assembled  a  force  capable  of  bearing  down  all 
opposition.  This  had  not  been  done.  The 
handful  of  sepoys  who  attended  Hastings 
would  probably  have  been  sufficient  to  over 
awe  Moorshedabad,  or  the  Black  town  of  Cal 
cutta.  But  they  were  unequal  to  a  conflict 
with  the  hardy  rabble  of  Benares.  The  streets 
surrounding  the  palace  were  filled  by  an  im 
mense  multitude  ;  of  whom  a  large  proportion, 
as  is  usual  in  upper  India,  wore  arms.  The 
tumult  became  a  fight,  and  the  fight  a  massa 
cre.  The  English  officers  defended  themselves 
with  desperate  courage  against  overwhelming 
numbers,  and  fell,  as  became  them,  sword  in 
hand.  The  sepoys  were  butchered.  The  gates 
were  forced.  The  captive  prince,  neglected 
by  his  jailers  during  the  confusion,  discovered 
an  outlet  which  opened  on  the  precipitous  bank 
of  the  Ganges,  let  himself  down  to  the  water 
by  a  string  made  of  the  turbans  of  his  attend 
ants,  found  a  boat,  and  escaped  to  the  opposite 
shore. 

If  Hastings  had,  by  indiscreet  violence, 
brought  himself  into  a  difficult  and  perilous 
situation,  it  is  only  just  to  acknowledge,  that 
he  extricated  himself  with  even  more  than  his 
usual  ability  and  presence  of  mind.  He  had 
only  fifty  men  with  him.  The  building  in. 
which  he  had  taken  up  his  residence  was  on 
every  side  blockaded  by  the  insurgents.  But 
his  fortitude  remained  unshaken.  The  Rajah 
from  the  other  side  of  the  river  sent  apolo 
gies  and  liberal  offers.  They  were  not  even 
answered.  Some  subtle  and  enterprising  men 
were  found  who  undertook  to  pass  through  the 
throng  of  enemies,  and  to  convey  the  intelli 
gence  of  the  late  events  to  the  English  canton 
ments.  It  is  the  fashion  of  the  natives  of  India 
to  wear  large  ear-rings  of  gold.  When  they 
travel,  the  rings  are  laid  aside  lest  they  should 
tempt  some  gang  of  robbers  ;  and,  in  place  of 
the  ring,  a  quill  or  a  roll  of  paper  i:>  inserted 
in  the  orifice  to  prevent  it  from  closing.  Hast 
ings  placed  in  the  cars  of  his  messengers  let 
ters  rolled  up  in  the  smallest  compass.  Some 
of  these  letters  were  addressed  to  the  com 
manders  of  the  English  troops.  One  was 
written  to  assure  his  wife  of  his  safety.  One 
was  to  the  envoy  whom  he  had  sent  to  nego 
tiate  with  the  Mahrattas.  Instructions  for  the 
negotiation  were  needed;  and  the  Governor- 
General  framed  them  in  that  situation  of  ex 
treme  danger,  with  as  much  composure  as  if 
he  had  been  writing  in  his  palace  at  Calcutta. 
Things,  however,  were  not  yet  at  the  worst. 
An  English  officer  of  more  spirit  than  judg 
ment,  eager  to  distinguish  himself,  made  a 
premature  attack  on  the  insurgents  beyond 
the  river.  His  troops  were  entangled  in  nar 
row  streets,  and  assailed  by  a  furious  popula 
tion.  He  fell,  with  many  of  his  men;  and  the 
survivors  were  forced  to  retire. 

This  event  produced  the  effect  which  ha<* 
never  failed  to  follow  every  check,  however 
slight,  sustained  in  India  by  the  English  arms. 
For  hundreds  of  miles  round,  the  whole  coun 
try  was  in  commotion.  The  «Hitire  population 


484 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  the  district  of  Benares  took  arms.  The 
fields  were  abandoned  by  the  husbandmen, 
who  thronged  to  defend  their  prince.  The  in 
fection  spread  to  Oude.  The  oppressed  people 
of  that  province  rose  up  against  the  Nabob 
Vizier,  refused  to  pay  their  imposts,  and  put 
the  revenue  officers  to  flight.  Even  Bahar 
was  ripe  for  revolt.  The  hopes  of  Cheyte 
Sing  began  to  rise.  Instead  of  imploring  mer 
cy  in  the  humble  style  of  a  vassal,  he  began  to 
talk  the  language  of  a  conqueror,  and  threat 
ened,  it  was  said,  to  sweep  the  white  usurpers 
oat  of  the  land.  But  the  English  troops  were 
now  assembling  fast.  The  officers,  and  even 
the  private  men,  regarded  the  Governor-Gene 
ral  with  enthusiastic  attachment,  and  flew  to 
his  aid  with  an  alacrity  which,  as  he  boasted, 
had  never  been  shown  on  any  other  occasion. 
Major  Popham,  a  brave  and  skilful  soldier, 
who  had  highly  distinguished  himself  in  the 
Mahratta  war,  and  in  whom  the  Governor- 
General  reposed  the  greatest  confidence,  took 
the  command.  The  tumultuary  army  of  the 
Rajah  was  put  to  rout.  His  fastnesses  were 
stormed.  In  a  few  hours,  above  thirty  thou 
sand  men  left  his  standard,  and  returned  to  their 
Ordinary  avocations.  The  unhappy  prince  fled 
from  his  country  forever.  His  fair  domain  was 
added  to  the  British  dominions.  One  of  his 
relations  indeed  was  appointed  Rajah;  but  the 
Rajah  of  Benares  was  henceforth  to  be,  like 
the  Nabob  of  Bengal,  a  mere  pensioner. 

By  this  revolution,  an  addition  of  200,OOOZ. 
a  year  Mas  made  to  the  revenues  of  the  Com 
pany.  But  the  immediate  relief  was  not  as 
grea;  as  had  been  expected.  The  treasure 
laid  up  by  Cheyte  Sing  had  been  popularly  es 
timated  at  a  million  sterling.  It  turned  out  to 
be  about  a  fourth  part  of  that  sum,  and,  such 
as  it  was,  it  was  seized  and  divided  as  prize- 
money  by  the  army. 

Disappointed  in  his  expectations  from  Be 
nares,  Hastings  was  more  violent  than  he 
would  otherwise  have  been,  in  his  dealings 
with  Oude.  Sujah  Dowlah  had  long  been  dead. 
His  son  and  successor,  Asaph-ul-Dowlah,  was 
one  of  the  weakest  and  most  vicious  even  of 
eastern  princes.  His  life  was  divided  between 
torpid  repose  and  the  most  odious  forms  of 
sensuality.  In  his  court  there  was  boundless 
waste ;  throughout  his  dominions,  wretched 
ness  and  disorder.  He  had  been,  under  the 
skilful  management  of  the  English  govern 
ment,  gradually  sinking  from  the  rank  of  an 
independent  prince  to  that  of  a  vassal  of  the 
Company.  It  was  only  by  the  help  of  a  Bri 
tish  brigade  that  he  could  be  secure  from  the 
aggressions  of  neighbours  who  despised  his 
weakness,  and  from  the  vengeance  of  subjects 
who  detested  his  tyranny.  A  brigade  was  fur 
nished  ;  and  he  engaged  to  defray  the  charge 
if  pacing  and  maintaining  it.  From  that  time 
his  independence  was  at  an  end.  Hastings 
was  not  a  man  to  lose  the  advantage  which  he 
had  thus  gained.  The  Nabob  soon  began  to 
complain  of  the  burden  which  he  had  under 
taken  to  bear.  His  revenues,  he  said,  were 
falling  off;  his  servants  were  unpaid;  he 
could  no  longer  support  the  expense  of  the 
arrangement  which  he  had  sanctioned.  Hast 
ings  would  not  ;isten  to  these  representations. 


The  Vizier,  he  said,  had  invited  the  Govern 
ment  of  Bengal  to  send  him  troops,  and  had 
promised  to  pay  for  them.  The  troops  had 
been  sent.  How  long  the  troops  were  to  re 
main  in  Oude,  was  a  matter  not  settled  by  the 
treaty.  It  remained,  therefore,  to  be  settled 
between  the  contracting  parties.  But  the  con 
tracting  parties  differed.  Who  then  must  de 
cide  ?  The  strongest. 

Hastings  also  argued,  that  if  the  English 
force  was  withdrawn,  Oude  would  certainly 
become  a  prey  to  anarchy,  and  would  proba 
bly  be  overrun  by  a  Mahratta  army.  That 
the  finances  of  Oude  were  embarrassed,  he  ad 
mitted.  But  he  contended,  not  without  reason, 
that  the  embarrassment  was  to  be  attributed  to 
the  incapacity  and  vices  of  Asaph-ul-Do\vlah 
himself,  and  that,  if  less  were  spent  on  the 
troops,  the  only  effect  would  be  that  more 
would  be  squandered  on  worthless  favourites, 

Hastings  had  intended,  afler  settling  the 
affairs  of  Benares,  to  visit  Lucknow,  and  there 
to  confer  with  Asaph-ul-Do wlah.  But  the  ob 
sequious  courtesy  of  the  Nabob  Vizier  pre 
vented  that  visit.  With  a  small  train  he  has 
tened  to  meet  the  Governor-General.  An, 
interview  took  place  in  the  fortress  which, 
from  the  crest  of  the  precipitous  rock  of  Chu- 
nar,  looks  down  on  the  waters  of  the  Ganges. 

At  first  sight  it  might  appear  impossible  that 
the  negotiation  should  come  to  an  amicable 
close.  Hastings  wanted  an  extraordinary  sup 
ply  of  money.  Asaph-ul-Dowlah  wanted  to 
obtain  a  remission  of  what  he  already  owed. 
Such  a  difference  seemed  to  admit  of  no  com 
promise.  There  was,  however,  one  course 
satisfactory  to  both  sides,  one  course  by  which 
it  was  possible  to  relieve  the  finances  both  of 
Oude  and  of  Bengal ;  and  that  course  was 
adopted.  It  was  simply  this — that  the  Go 
vernor-General  and  the  Nabob  Vizier  should 
join  to  rob  a  third  party;  and  the  third  party 
whom  they  determined  to  rob  was  the  parent 
of  one  of  the  robbers. 

The  mother  of  the  late  Nabob,  and  his  wife, 
who  was  the  mother  of  the  present  Nabob, 
were  known  as  the  Begums  or  Princesses  of 
Oude.  They  had  possessed  great  influence 
over  Sujah  Dowlah,  and  had,  at  his  death,  been 
left  in  possession  of  a  splendid  dotation.  The 
domains  of  which  they  received  the  rents  and 
administered  the  government  were  of  wide  ex 
tent.  The  treasure  hoarded  by  the  lale  Nabob 
— a  treasure  which  was  probably  estimated  at 
nearly  three  millions  sterling— was  in  their 
hands.  They  continued  to  occupy  his  favour 
ite  palace  at  Fyzabad,  the  Beautiful  Dwelling; 
while  Asaph-ul-Dowlah  held  his  court  in  the 
stately  Lucknow,  which  he  had  built  for  him 
self  on  the  shores  of  the  Goomti,  and  had 
adorned  with  noble  mosques  and  colleges. 

Asaph-ul-Dowlah  had  already  extorted  con 
siderable  sums  from  his  mother.  She  had  at 
length  appealed  to  the  English  ;  and  the  Eng 
lish  had  interfered.  A  solemn  compact  had 
been  made,  by  which  she  consented  to  give 
her  son  some  pecuniary  assistance,  and  he  in 
his  turn  promised  never  to  commit  any  further 
invasion  of  her  rights.  This  compact  was 
formally  guarantied  by  the  government  of 
Bengal.  But  times  had  changed  :  money  wa» 


WARREN    HASTINGS. 


485 


wanted;  and  the  power  uhioh  had  given  the 
guarantee  was  not  ashamed  to  instigate  the 
spoiler. 

It  was  necessary  to  find  some  pretext  for  a 
confiscation,  inconsistent  not  merely  with 
plighted  faith — not  merely  with  the  ordinary 
rules  of  humanity  and  justice — but  with  that 
great  law  of  filial  piety,  which,  even,  in  the 
wildest  tribes  of  savages — even  in  those  more 
degraded  communities  which  wither  under  the 
influence  of  a  corrupt  half-civilization — retains 
a  certain  authority  over  the  human  mind.  A 
pretext  was  the  last  thing  that  Hastings  was 
likely  to  want.  The  insurrection  at  Benares 
had  produced  disturbances  in  Oude.  These 
disturbances  it  was  convenient  to  impute  to 
the  princesses.  Evidence  for  the  imputation 
there  was  scarcely  any;  unless  reports  wan 
dering  from  one  mouth  to  another,  and  gaining 
something  by  every  transmission,  may  be  call 
ed  evidence.  The  accused  were  furnished 
with  no  charge ;  they  were  permitted  to  make 
no  defence;  for  the  Governor-General  wisely 
considered  that  if  he  tried  them  he  might  not 
be  able  to  find  a  ground  for  plundering  them. 
It  was  agreed  between  him  and  the  Nabob  Vi 
zier,  that  the  noble  ladies  should,  by  a  sweep 
ing  measure  of  confiscation,  be  stripped  of 
their  domains  and  treasures  for  the  benefit  of 
the  Company  ;  and  that  the  sums  thus  obtained 
should  be  accepted  by  the  government  of  Ben 
gal  in  satisfaction  of  its  claims  on  the  govern 
ment  of  Oude. 

While  Asaph-ul-Dowlah  was  at  Chunar,  he 
was  completely  subjugated  by  the  clear  and 
commanding  intellect  of  the  English  states 
man.  But  when  they  had  separated,  he  began 
to  reflect  with  uneasiness  on  the  engagements 
into  which  he  had  entered.  His  mother  and 
grandmother  protested  and  implored.  His 
heart,  deeply  corrupted  by  absolute  power  and 
licentious  pleasures,  yet  not  naturally  unfeel 
ing,  failed  him  in  this  crisis.  Even  the  Eng 
lish  resident  at  Lucknow,  though  hitherto 
devoted  to  Hastings,  shrank  from  extreme 
measures.  But  the  Governor-General  was 
inexorable.  He  wrote  to  the  resident  in  terms 
of  the  greatest  severity,  and  declared  that,  if 
the  spoliation  which  had  been  agreed  upon 
were  not  instantly  carried  into  effect,  he  would 
himself  go  to  Lucknow,  and  do  that  from  which 
feebler  minds  recoiled  with  dismay.  The  re 
sident,  thus  menaced,  waited  on  his  highness, 
and  insisted  that  the  treaty  of  Chunar  should 
be  carried  into  full  and  immediate  effect. 
Asaph-ul-Dowlah  yielded— making  at  the  same 
time  a  solemn  protestation  that  he  yielded  to 
compulsion.  The  lands  were  resumed ;  but 
»he  treasure  was  not  so  easily  obtained.  It 
tfas  necessary  to  use  force.  A  body  of  the 
Company's  troops  marched  to  Fyzabad,  and 
forced  the  gates  of  the  palace.  The  prin 
cesses  were  confined  to  their  own  apartments. 
But  still  they  refused  to  submit.  Some  more 
stringent  mode  of  coercion  was  to  be  found. 
A  mode  was  found,  of  which,  even  at  this  dis 
tance  of  time,  we  cannot  speak  without  shame 
and  sorrow. 

There  were  at  Fyzabad  two  ancient  men  be 
longing  to  that  unhappy  class  which  a  prac- 
uce  of  immemorial  antiquity  in  the  East  has 


excluded  from  the  pleasures  oi  iOre  and  from 
the  hope  of  posterity.  It  has  always  been  held 
in  Asiatic  courts,  that  beings  thus  estranged 
from  sympathy  with  their  kind  are  those  whom 
princes  may  most  safely  trust.  Sujah  Dowlah 
had  been  of  this  opinion.  He  had  given  his 
entire  confidence  to  the  two  eunuchs :  and  after 
his  death  they  remained  at  the  head  of  the 
household  of  his  widow. 

These  men  were,  by  the  orders  of  the  Bri 
tish  government,  seized,  imprisoned,  ironed, 
starved  almost  to  death,  in  order  to  extort  mo 
ney  from  the  princesses.  After  they  had  been, 
two  months  in  confinement,  their  health  gave 
way.  They  implored  permission  to  take  a  lit 
tle  exerci.se  in  the  garden  of  their  prison.  The 
officer  who  was  in  charge  of  them  stated,  that 
if  they  were  allowed  this  indulgence,  there 
was  not  the  smallest  chance  of  their  escaping, 
and  that  their  irons  really  added  nothing  to  the 
security  of  the  custody  in  which  they  were 
kept.  He  did  not  understand  the  plan  of  his 
superiors.  Their  object  in  these  inflictions 
was  not  security,  but  torture;  and  all  mitiga 
tion  was  refused.  Yet  this  was  not  the  worst. 
It  was  resolved  by  an  English  government  that 
these  two  infirm  old  men  should  be  delivered 
to  the  tormentors.  For  that  purpose  they  were 
removed  to  Lucknow.  What  horrors  their 
dungeon  there  witnessed  can  only  be  guessed. 
But  there  remains  on  the  records  of  Parliament 
this  letter,  written  by  a  British  resident  to  a 
British  s'oldier: — 

"Sir,  the  Nabob  having  determined  to  inflict 
corporal  punishment  upon  the  prisoners  under 
your  guard,  this  is  to  desire  that  his  officers, 
when  they  shall  come,  may  have  free  access 
to  the  prisoners,  and  be  permitted  to  do  with 
them  as  they  shall  see  proper." 

While  these  barbarities  were  perpetrated  at 
Lucknow,  the  princesses  were  still  under  du 
resse  at  Fyzabad.  Food  was  allowed  to  enter 
their  apartments  only  in  such  scanty  quanti 
ties,  that  their  female  attendants  were  in  dan 
ger  of  perishing  with  hunger.  Month  after 
month  this  cruelty  continued,  till  at  length, 
after  twelve  hundred  thousand  pounds  had 
been  wrung  out  of  the  princesses,  Hastings 
began  to  think  that  he  had  really  got  to  the 
bottom  of  their  revenue,  and  that  no  rigour 
could  extort  more.  Then  at  length  the  wretch 
ed  men  who  were  detained  at  Lucknow  regain 
ed  their  liberty.  When  their  irons  were 
knocked  off,  and  the  doors  of  their  prison 
opened,  their  quivering  lips,  the  tears  which 
ran  down  their  cheeks,  and  the  thanksgivings 
which  they  poured  forth  to  the  common  Father 
of  Mussulmans  and  Christians,  melted  even 
the  stout  hearts  of  the  English  warriors  who 
stood  by. 

There  is  a  man  to  whom  the  conduct  ot 
Hastings,  through  the  whole  of  these  proceed 
ings,  appears  not  only  excusable  but  laudabl** 
There  is  a  man  who  tells  us,  "  that  he  must 
really  be  pardoned  if  he  ventures  to  charac 
terize  as  something  pre-eminently  ridiculous, 
'  and  wicked,  the  sensibility  which  would  balance 
against  the  preservation  of  British  India  a  little 
personal  suffering,  which  was  applied  only  so 
long  as  the  suffere.rs  refused  to  deliver  up  a 
portion  of  that  wealth,  the  whole  of  which  tneir 
3.3 


486 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


own  and  their  mistresses'  treason  had  forfeit-  j 
rd."      We  cannot,  we   must    own,  envy  the  i 
reverend  biographer,  either  his  singular  notion  j 
of  what  constitutes   pre-eminent  wickedness,  | 
or  his  equally  singular  perception  of  the  pre 
eminently  ridiculous.     Is  this  the  generosity  j 
of  an  English  soldier  ?     Is  this  the  chanty  of  a  j 
Christian  priest  7    Could  neither  of  Mr.  Gleig's 
professions  teach  him  the  very  rudiments  of 
morality  1     Or  is  morality  a  thing  which  may 
be  well  enough  in  sermons,  bat  which  has  no 
thing  to  do  with  biography  1 

But  we  must  not  forget  to  do  justice  to  Sir 
Elijah  Impey's  conduct  on  this  occasion.  It 
was  not  indeed  easy  for  him  to  intrude  himself 
into  a  business  so  entirely  alien  from  all  his 
official  duties.  Bat  there  was  something  inex 
pressibly  alluring,  we  must  suppose,  in  the 
peculiar  rankness  of  the  infamy  which  was 
then  to  be  got  at  Lucknow.  He  hurried  thither 
as  fast  as  relays  of  palanquin-bearers  could 
carry  him.  A  crowd  of  people  came  before 
him  with  affidavits  against  the  Begums,  ready 
drawn  in  their  hands.  Those  affidavits  he  did 
not  read.  The  greater  part,  indeed,  he  could 
not  read;  for  they  were  in  Persian  and  Hin- 
dostanee,  and  no  interpreter  was  employed. 
He  administered  the  oath  to  the  deponents, 
with  all  possible  expedition ;  and  asked  not  a 
single  question,  not  even  whether  they  had 
perused  the  statements  to  which  they  swore. 
This  work  performed,  he  got  again  into  his 
palanquin,  and  posted  back  to  Calcutta,  to  be  in 
time  for  the  opening  of  term.  The  cause 
was  one  which,  by  his  own  confession,  lay 
altogether  out  of  his  jurisdiction.  Under  the 
charter  of  justice,  he  had  no  more  right  to  in 
quire  into  crimes  committed  by  natives  in 
Oude,  than  the  Lord  President  of  the  Court  of 
Session  of  Scotland  to  hold  an  assize  at  Exeter. 
He  had  no  right  to  try  the  Begums,  nor  did  he 
pretend  to  try  them.  With  what  object,  then, 
did  he  undertake  so  long  a  journey]  Evi 
dently  in  order  that  he  might  give,  in  an  irre 
gular  manner,  that  sanction  which  in  a  regular 
manner  he  could  not  give,  to  the  crimes  of  those 
who  had  recently  hired  him  ;  and  in  order  that 
a  confused  mass  of  testimony  which  he  did  not 
sift,  which  he  did  not  even  read,  might  acquire 
an  authority  not  properly  belonging  to  it,  from 
the  signature  of  the  highest  judicial  functionary 
in  India. 

The  time  was  approaching,  however,  when 
he  was  to  be  stripped  of  that  robe  which  has 
never,  since  the  Revolution,  been  disgraced  so 
foully  as  by  him.  The  state  of  India  had  for 
some  time  occupied  much  of  the  attention  of 
the  British  Parliament.  Towards  the  close  of 
the  American  war,  two  committees  of  the  Com 
mons  sat  on  Eastern  affairs.  In  the  one  Ed 
mund  Burke  took  the  lead.  The  other  was 
under  the  presidency  of  the  able  and  versatile 
Henry  Dundas,  then  Lord  Advocate  of  Scot- 
»and.  Great  as  are  the  changes  which,  during 
the  last  sixty  years,  have  taken  place  in  our 
Asiatic  dominions,  the  reports  which  those 
committees  laid  on  the  table  of  the  House  will 
still  be  found  most  interesting  and  instructive. 

There  was  as  yet  no  connection  between  the 
Company  and  either  of  the  great  parties  in  the 
slate.  The  ministers  had  no  motive  to  defend 


Indian  abuses.  On  the  contrary,  it  was  fo* 
their  interest  to  show,  if  possible,  that  the  go 
vernment  and  patronage  of  our  Oriental  eux 
pire  might,  with  advantage,  be  transferred  to 
themselves.  The  votes,  therefore,  which,  in 
consequence  of  the  reports  made  by  the  two 
committees,  were  passed  by  the  Commons, 
breathed  the  spirit  of  stern  and  indignant  jus 
tice.  The  severest  epithets  were  applied  to 
several  of  the  measures  of  Hastings,  especially 
to  the  Rohilla  war;  and  it  was  resolved, on  the 
motion  of  Mr.  Dundas,  that  the  Company  ought 
to  recall  a  Governor-General  who  had  brought 
such  calamities  on  the  Indian  people,  and  such 
dishonour  on  the  British  name.  An  act  was 
passed  for  limiting  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Su 
preme  Court.  The  bargain  which  Hastings 
had  made  with  the  Chief  Justice  was  con 
demned  in  the  strongest  terms  ;  and  an  address 
was  presented  to  the  king,  praying  that  Impey 
might  be  ordered  home  to  answer  for  his  mis 
deeds. 

Impey  was  recalled  by  a  letter  from  the  Se 
cretary  of  State.  But  the  proprietors  of  India 
stock  resolutely  refused  to  dismiss  Hastings 
from  their  service;  and  passed  a  resolution, 
affirming,  what  was  undeniably  true,  that  they 
were  intrusted  by  law  with  the  right  of  naming 
and  removing  their  Governor-General ;  and 
that  they  were  not  bound  to  obey  the  directions 
of  a  single  branch  of  the  legislature  with  re 
spect  to  such  a  nomination  or  removal. 

Thus  supported  by  his  employers,  Hastings 
remained  at  the  head  of  the  government  of 
Bengal  till  the  spring  of  1785.  His  administra 
tion,  so  eventful  and  stormy,  closed  in  almost 
perfect  quiet.  In  the  Council  there  was  no 
regular  opposition  to  his  measures.  Peacu 
was  restored  to  India.  The  Mahratta  war  had 
ceased.  Hyder  was  no  more.  A  treaty  had 
been  concluded  with  his  son,  Tippoo ;  and  tht 
Carnatic  had  been  evacuated  by  the  armies  of 
Mysore.  Since  the  termination  of  the  Ameri 
can  war,  England  had  no  European  enemy  or 
rival  in  the  Eastern  seas. 

On  a  general  review  of  the  long  administra 
tion  of  Hastings,  it  is  impossible  to  deny  that 
against  the  great  crimes  by  which  it  is  ble 
mished,  we  have  to  set  off  great  public  ser 
vices.  England  had  passed  through  a  perilous 
crisis.  She  still,  indeed,  maintained  her  place 
in  the  foremost  rank  of  European  powers;  and 
the  manner  in  which  she  had  defended  herself 
against  fearful  odds  had  inspired  surrounding 
nations  with  a  high  opinion  both  of  her  spirit 
and  of  her  strength.  Nevertheless,  in  every 
part  of  the  world,  except  one,  she  had  been  a 
loser.  Not  only  had  she  been  compelled  to 
acknowledge  the  independence  of  thirteen  co 
lonies  peopled  by  her  children,  and  to  concili 
ate  the  Irish  by  giving  up  the  right  of  legislat 
ing  fur  them  ;  but,  in  the  Mediterranean,  in  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico,  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  on  the 
continent  of  America,  she  had  been  compelled 
j  to  cede  the  fruits  of  her  victories  in  former 
wars.  Spain  regained  Minorca  and  Florida; 
j  France  regained  Senegal,  Goree,  and  several 
West  India  islands.  The  only  quarter  of  the 
world  in  which  Britain  had  lost  nothing,  was 
i  the  quarter  in  which  her  inter*  Ms  had  been 
j  committed  to  the  care  of  Hastings.  Tn  spite  of 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


487 


the  utmost  exertions  both  of  European  and 
Asiatic  enemies,  the  power  of  our  country  in 
the  East  had  been  greatly  augmented.  Benares 
was  subjected;  the  Nabob  Vizier  reduced  to 
vassalage.  That  our  influence  had  been  thus 
extended,  nay,  that  Fort  William  and  Fort  St. 
George  had  not  been  occupied  by  hostile 
armies,  was  owing,  if  we  may  trust  the  gene 
ral  voice  of  the  English  in  India,  to  the  skill 
and  resolution  of  Hastings. 

His  internal  administration,  with  all  its 
blemishes,  gives  him  a  title  to  be  considered 
as  one  of  the  most  remarkable  men  in  our  his 
tory.  He  dissolved  the  double  government. 
He  transferred  the  direction  of  affairs  to  Eng 
lish  hands.  Out  of  a  frightful  anarchy,  he 
educed  at  least  a  rude  and  imperfect  order. 
The  whole  organization  by  which  justice  was 
dispensed,  revenue  collected,  peace  maintain- 
sd,  throughout  a  territory  not  inferior  in  popu 
lation  to  the  dominions  of  Louis  the  Sixteenth, 
or  of  the  Emperor  Joseph, 'was  created  and 
superintended  by  him.  He  boasted  that  every 
public  office,  without  exception,  which  existed 
when  he  left  Bengal  was  his  work.  It  is  quite 
true  that  this  system,  after  all  the  improve 
ments  suggested  by  the  experience  of  sixty 
years,  still  needs  improvement ;  and  that  it  was 
at  first  far  more  defective  than  it  now  is.  But 
whoever  seriously  considers  what  it  is  to  con 
struct  from  the  beginning  the  whole  of  a  ma 
chine  so  vast  and  complex  as  a  government, 
will  allow  that  what  Hastings  effected  deserves 
high  admiration.  To  compare  the  most  cele 
brated  European  ministers  to  him,  seems  to  us 
as  unjust  as  it  would  be  to  compare  the  best 
baker  in  London  with  Robinson  Crusoe ;  who, 
before  he  could  bake  a  single  loaf,  had  to  make 
his  plough  and  his  harrow,  his  fences  and  his 
scarecrows,  his  sickle  and  his  flail,  his  mill  and 
his  oven. 

The  just  fame  of  Hastings  rises  still  higher, 
when  we  reflect  that  he  was  not  bred  a  states 
man  ;  that  he  was  sent  from  school  to  a  count 
ing-house;  and  that  he  was  employed  during 
the  prime  of  his  manhood  as  a  commercial 
agent  far  from  all  intellectual  society. 

Nor  must  we  forget  that  all,  or  almost  all,  to 
whom,  when  placed  at  the  head  of  affairs,  he 
could  apply  for  assistance,  were  persons  who 
owed  as  little  as  himself,  or  less  than  himself, 
to  education.  A  minister  in  Europe  finds  him 
self,  on  the  first  day  on  which  he  commences 
his  functions,  surrounded  by  experienced  pub 
lic  servants,  the  depositaries  of  official  tradi 
tions.  Hastings  had  no  such  help.  His  own 
reflection,  his  own  energy,  were  to  supply  the 
place  of  all  Downing  street  and  Somerset 
house.  Having  had  no  facilities  for  learning,  he 
was  forced  to  teach.  He  had  first  to  form  him 
self,  and  then  to  form  his  instruments  ;  and  this 
not  in  a  single  department,  but  in  all  the  de 
partments  of  the  administration. 

It  must  be  added  that,  while  engaged  in  this 
most  arduous  task,  he  was  constantly  tram 
melled  by  orders  from  home,  and  frequently 
borne  down  by  a  majority  in  Council.  The 
preservation  of  an  empire  from  a  formidable 
combination  of  foreign  enemies,  the  construc 
tion  01  a  government  in  all  its  parts,  were 
accomplished  by  him;  while  every  ship  brought 


out  bales  of  censure  from  his  employers,  and 
while  the  records  of  every  consultation  were 
filled  with  acrimonious  minutes  by  his  col 
leagues.  We  believe  that  there  never  was  a 
public  man  whose  temper  was  so  severely 
tried; — not  Marlborough,  when  thwarted  by  the 
Dutch  Deputies ;— not  Wellington,  when  he  had 
to  deal  at  once  with  the  Portuguese  Regency, 
the  Spanish  Juntas,  and  Mr.  Percival.  But  the 
temper  of  Hastings  was  equal  to  almost  any 
trial.  It  was  not  sweet,  but  it  was  calm.  Quick 
and  vigorous  as  his  intellect  was,  the  patience 
with  which  he  endured  the  most  cruel  vexations 
till  a  remedy  could  be  found,  resembled  the  pa 
tience  of  stupidity.  He  seems  to  have  been 
capable  of  resentment,  bitter  and  long  en 
during;  yet  his  resentment  so  seldom  hurried 
him  into  any  blunder,  that  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  what  appeared  to  be  revenge  was 
any  thing  but  policy. 

The  effect  of  his  singular  equanimity  was, 
that  he  always  had  the  full  command  of  all  the 
resources  of  one  of  the  most  fertile  minds  that 
ever  existed.  Accordingly,  no  complication  of 
perils  and  embarrassments  could  perplex  him. 
For  every  difficulty  he  had  a  contrivance  ready; 
and,  whatever  may  be  thought  of  the  justice 
and  humanity  of  some  of  his  contrivances,  it 
is  certain  that  they  seldom  failed  to  serve  the 
purpose  for  which  were  designed. 

Together  with  this  extraordinary  talent  for 
devising  expedients,  Hastings  possessed,  in  a 
very  high  degree,  another  talent  scarcely  less 
necessary  to  a  man  in  his  situation; — we  mean 
the  talent  for  conducting  political  controversy. 
It  is  as  necessary  to  an  English  statesman  in. 
the  East  that  he  should  be  able  to  write,  as  it  is 
to  a  minister  in  this  country  that  he  should  be 
able  to  speak.  It  is  chiefly  by  the  oratory  of  a 
public  man  here  that  the  nation  judges  of  his 
powers.  It  is  from  the  letters  and  reports  of  a 
public  man  in  India  that  the  dispensers  of  pa 
tronage  form  their  estimate  of  him.  In  each 
case,  the  talent  which  receives  peculiar  en 
couragement  is  developed,  perhaps  at  the  ex 
pense  of  the  other  powers.  In  this  country, 
we  sometimes  hear  men  speak  above  their 
abilities.  It  is  not  very  unusual  to  find  gentle 
men  in  the  Indian  service  who  write  above 
their  abilities.  The  English  politician  is  a 
little  too  much  of  a  debater;  the  Indian  politi 
cian  a  little  too  much  of  an  essayist. 

Of  the  numerous  servants  of  the  Company 
who  have  distinguished  themselves  as  framers 
of  Minutes  and  Despatches,  Hastings  stands  at 
the  head.  He  was  indeed  the  person  who  gave 
to  the  official  writing  of  the  Indian  governments 
the  character  which  it  still  retains.  He  was 
matched  against  no  common  antagonist.  But 
even  Francis  was  forced  to  acknowledge,  with 
sullen  and  resentful  candour,  that  there  was 
no  contending  against  the  pen  of  Hastings 
And,  in  truth,  the  Governor-General's  power 
of  making  out  a  case — of  perplexing  Avhat  it 
was  inconvenient  that  people  should  under 
stand — and  of  selling  in  the  clearest  roint  of 
view  whatever  would,  bear  the  light,  was  >n 
comparable.  His  style  must  be  praised  with 
some  reservation.  It  was  in  general  forcible, 
pure,  and  polished :  but  it  was  sometimes, 
though  not  often,  turgid,  and,  on  one  or  two  occa 


483 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


sions,  even  bombastic.  Perhaps  the  fondness 
of  Hastings  for  Persian  literature  may  have 
tended  to  corrupt  his  taste. 

And,  since  we  have  referred  to  his  literary 
tastes,  it  would  be  most  unjust  not  to  praise  the 
judicious  encouragement  which,  as  a  ruler,  he 

§ive  to  liberal  studies  and  curious  researches, 
is  patronage,  was  extended,  with  prudent 
generosity,  to  voyages,  travels,  experiments, 
publications.  He  did  little,  it  is  true,  towards 
introducing  into  India  the  learning  of  the 
West.  To  make  the  young  natives  of  Bengal 
familiar  with  Milton  and  Adam  Smith — to  sub 
stitute  the  geography,  astronomy,  and  surgery 
of  Europe  for  the  dotages  of  the  Brahminical 
superstition,  or  for  the  imperfect  science  of 
ancient  Greece  transfused  through  Arabian  ex 
positions — this  was  a  scheme  reserved  to 
crown  the  beneficent  administration  of  a  far 
more  virtuous  ruler.  Still,  it  is  impossible  to 
refuse  high  commendation  to  a  man,  who, 
taken  from  a  ledger  to  govern  an  empire,  over 
whelmed  by  public  business,  surrounded  by 
men  as  busy  as  himself,  and  separated  by 
thousands  of  leagues  from  almost  all  literary 
society,  gave,  both  by  his  example  and  by  his 
munificence,  a  great  impulse  to  learning.  In 
Persian  and  Arabic  literature  he  was  deeply 
skilled.  With  the  Sanscrit  he  was  not  himself 
acquainted ;  but  those  who  first  brought  that 
language  to  the  knowledge  of  European  stu 
dents  owed  much  to  his  encouragement.  It 
was  under  his  protection  that  the  Asiatic  So 
ciety  commenced  its  honourable  career.  That 
distinguished  body  selected  him  to  be  its  first 
president;  but,  with  excellent  taste  and  feel 
ing,  he  declined  the  honour  in  favour  of  Sir 
William  Jones.  But  the  chief  advantage  which 
the  students  of  Oriental  letters  derived  from 
his  patronage  remains  to  be  mentioned.  The 
Pundits  of  Bengal  had  always  looked  with 
great  jealousy  on  the  attempts  of  foreigners  to 
pry  into  those  mysteries  which  were  locked  up 
in  the  sacred  dialect.  Their  religion  had  been 
persecuted  by  the  Mohammedans.  What  they 
knew  of  the  spirit  of  the  Portuguese  govern 
ment  might  warrant  them  in  apprehending  per 
secution  from  Christians.  That  apprehension, 
the  wisdom  and  moderation  of  Hastings  re 
moved.  He  was  the  first  foreign  ruler  who 
succeeded  in  gaining  the  confidence  of  the  he 
reditary  priests  of  India;  and  who  induced  them 
to  lay  open  to  English  scholars  the  secrets  of 
the  old  Brahminical  theology  and  jurisprudence. 
It  is,  indeed,  impossible  to  deny  that,  in  the 
great  art  of  inspiring  large  masses  of  human 
beings  with  confidence  and  attachment,  no 
ruler  ever  surpassed  Hastings.  If  he  had 
made  himself  popular  with  the  English  by 
giving  up  the  Bengalees  to  extortion  and  op 
pression,  or  if,  on  the  other  hand,  he  had 
conciliated  the  Bengalees  and  alienated  the 
English,  there  would  have  been  no  cause  for 
wonder.  What  is  peculiar  to  him  is,  that, 
being  the  chief  of  a  small  band  of  strangers 
who  exercised  boundless  power  over  a  great 
indigenous  population,  he  made  himself  be 
loved  both  by  the  subject  many  and  by  the  do 
minant  few.  The  affection  felt  for  him  by  the 
civil  service  was  singularly  ardent  and  con 
stant.  Through  all  his  disasters  and  perils, 


his  brethren  stood  by  him  with  steadfast  loy 
alty.  The  army,  at  the  same  time,  loved  him 
as  armies  have  seldom  loved  any  but  the 
greatest  chiefs  who  have  led  them  to  victory. 
Even  in  his  disputes  with  distinguished  mili 
tary  men,  he  could  always  count  on  the  sup 
port  of  the  military  profession.  While  such 
was  his  empire  over  the  hearts  of  his  coun 
trymen,  he  enjoyed  among  the  natives  a  popu 
larity,  such  as  other  governors  have  perhaps 
better  merited,  but  such  as  no  other  governor 
has  been  able  to  attain.  He  spoke  their  ver 
nacular  dialects  with  facility  and  precision. 
He  was  intimately  acquainted  with  their  feel 
ings  and  usages.  On  one  or  two  occasions, 
for  great  ends,  he  deliberately  acted  in  defi 
ance  of  their  opinions;  but  on  such  occasions 
he  gained  more  in  their  respect  than  he  lost  in 
their  love.  In  general,  he  carefully  avoided 
all  that  could  shock  their  national  or  religious 
prejudices.  His  administration  was  indeed  in 
many  respects  faulty  ;  but  the  Bengalee  stand 
ard  of  good  government  was  not  high.  Under 
the  Nabobs,  the  hurricane  of  Mahratta  cavalry 
had  passed  annually  over  the  rich  alluvial 
plain.  But  even  the  Mahratta  shrank  from  a 
conflict  with  the  mighty  children  of  the  sea, 
and  the  immense  rice-harvests  of  the  Lower 
Ganges  were  safely  gathered  in,  under  the  pro 
tection  of  the  English  sword.  The  first  Eng 
lish  conquerors  had  been  more  rapacious  and 
merciless  even  than  the  Mahrattas ;  but  that 
generation  had  passed  away.  Defective  as 
was  the  police,  heavy  as  were  the  public  bur 
dens,  the  oldest  man  in  Bengal  could  probably 
not  recollect  a  season  of  equal  security  and 
prosperity.  For  the  first  time  within  living 
memory,  the  province  was  placed  under  a  go 
vernment  strong  enough  to  prevent  others  from 
robbing,  and  not  inclined  to  play  the  robber 
itself.  These  things  inspired  good-will.  At 
the  same  time,  the  constant  success  of  Hast 
ings,  and  the  manner  in  which  he  extricated 
himself  from  every  difficulty,  made  him  an 
object  of  superstitious  admiration;  and  the 
more  than  regal  splendour  which  he  some 
times  displayed,  dazzled  a  people  who  have 
much  in  common  with  children.  Even  now, 
after  the  lapse  of  more  than  fifty  years,  the 
natives  of  India  still  talk  of  him  as  the  greatest 
of  the  English,  and  nurses  sing  children  to 
sleep  with  a  jingling  ballad  about  the  fleet 
horses  and  richly-caparisoned  elephants  of  Sa 
hib  Warren  Hostein. 

The  gravest  offences  of  which  Hastings  was 
guilty  did  not  affect  his  popularity  with  the 
people  of  Bengal ;  for  those  offences  were 
committed  against  neighbouring  states.  Those 
offences,  as  our  readers  must  have  perceived, 
we  are  not  disposed  to  vindicate ;  yet,  in  order 
that  the  censure  may  be  justly  apportioned  to 
the  transgression,  it  is  fit  that  the  motive  of  the 
criminal  should  be  take.n  into  consideration. 
The  motive  which  prompted  the  worst  act  of 
Hastings  was  misdirected  and  ill-regulated 
public  spirit.  The  rules  of  justice,  the  senti 
ments  of  humanity,  the  plighted  faith  of  treaties, 
were  in  his  view  as  nothing,  when  opposed  to 
the  immediate  interests  of  the  state.  This  is 
no  justification,  according  to  the  principles 
eithej:  of  morality,  or  of  what  we  believe  to  be 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


48 


Identical  with  morality;  namely,  far-sighted 
policy.  Nevertheless,  the  common  sense  of  j 
mankind,  which  in  questions  of  this  sort  sel-  | 
dom  goes  far  wrong,  will  always  recognise  a  i 
distinction  between  crimes  which  originate  in  i 
an  inordinate  zeal  for  the  commonwealth,  and  j 
crimes  which  originate  in  selfish  cupidity.  To 
the  benefit  of  this  distinction  Hastings  is  fairly 
entitled.  There  is,  we  conceive,  no  reason  to 
suspect  that  the  Rohilla  war,  the  revolution  of 
Benares,  or  the  spoliation  of  the  Princesses  of 
Oude  added  a  rupee  to  his  fortune.  We  will 
not  affirm  that,  in  all  pecuniary  dealings,  he 
showed  that  punctilious  integrity,  that  dread 
of  the  faintest  appearance  of  evil,  which  is 
now  the  glory  of  the  Indian  civil  service.  But 
when  the  school  in  which  he  had  been  trained, 
and  the  temptations  to  which  he  was  exposed, 
are  considered,  we  are  more  inclined  to  praise 
him  for  his  general  uprightness  with  respect 
to  money,  than  rigidly  to  blame  him  for  a  few 
transactions  which  would  now  be  called  inde 
licate  and  irregular,  but  which  even  now 
would  hardly  be  designated  as  corrupt.  A  ra 
pacious  man  he  certainly  was  riot.  Had  he 
been  so,  he  would  infallibly  have  returned  to 
his  country  the  richest  subject  in  Europe.  We 
speak  within  compass,  when  we  say  that,  with 
out  applying  any  extraordinary  pressure,  he 
might  easily  have  obtained  from  the  zemindars 
of  the  Company's  provinces,  and  from  neigh 
bouring  princes,  in  the  course  of  thirteen 
years,  more  than  three  millions  sterling,  and 
might  have  outshone  the  splendour  of  Carlton 
House  and  of  the  Palais  Royale.  He  brought 
home  a  fortune  such  as  a  Governor-General, 
fond  of  state>  and  careless  of  thrift,  might 
easily,  during  so  long  a  tenure  of  office,  save 
out  of  his  legal  salary.  Mrs.  Hastings,  we  are 
afraid,  was  less  scrupulous.  It  was  generally 
believed  that  she  accepted  presents  with  great 
alacrity,  and  that  she  thus  formed,  without  the 
connivance  of  her  husband,  a  private  hoard, 
amounting  to  several  lacs  of  rupees.  We  are 
the  more  inclined  to  give  credit  to  this  story, 
because  Mr.  Gleig,  who  cannot  but  have  heard 
it,  does  not,  as  far  as  we  have  observed,  notice 
or  contradict  it. 

The  influence  of  Mrs.  Hastings  over  her 
husband  was  indeed  such,  that  she  might 
easily  have  obtained  much  larger  sums  than 
she  was  ever  accused  of  receiving.  At  length 
her  health  began  to  give  way;  and  the  Go 
vernor-General,  much  against  his  will,  was 
compelled  to  send  her  to  England.  He  seems 
to  have  loved  her  with  that  love  which  is  pecu 
liar  to  men  of  strong  minds — to  men  whose 
affection  is  not  easily  won  or  widely  diffused. 
The  talk  of  Calcutta  ran  for  some  time  on  the 
luxurious  manner  in  which  he  fitted  up  the 
round  house  of  an  Indiaman  for  her  accommo 
dation — on  the  profusion  of  sandal-wood  and 
carved  ivory  which  adorned  her  cabin — and 
on  the  thousands  which  had  been  expended  in 
order  to  procure  for  her  the  society  of  an 
agreeable  female  companion  during  the  voy 
age.  We  remark  here,  that  the  letters  of 
Hastings  to  his  wife  are  exceedingly  charac 
teristic—tender,  and  full  of  indications  of 
esteem  and  confidence ;  but  at  the  same  time, 
a  iittie  more  ceremonious  than  is  usual  in  so 
VOL.  IV.— 62 


intimate  a  relation.  The  solemn  courtesy 
with  which  he  compliments  "his  elegant  Ma 
rian,"  reminds  us  now  and  then  of  the  dig 
nified  air  with  which  Sir  Charles  Grandison 
bowed  over  Miss  Byron's  hand  in  the  cedar 
Parlour. 

After  some  months,  Hastings  prepared  to 
follow  his  wife  to  England.  When  it  was  an 
nounced  that  he  was  about  to  quit  his  office, 
the  feeling  of  the  society  which  he  had  so  long 
governed  manifested  itself  by  many  signs. 
Addresses  poured  in  from  Europeans  and 
Asiatics,  from  civil  functionaries,  soldiers,  and 
traders.  On  the  day  on  which  he  delivered 
up  the  keys  of  office,  a  crowd  of  friends  and 
admirers  formed  a  lane  to  the  quay  where  he 
embarked.  Several  barges  escorted  him  far 
down  the  river;  and  some  attached  friends  re 
fused  to  quit  him  till  the  low  coast  of  Bengal 
was  fading  from  the  view,  and  till  the  pilot 
was  leaving  the  ship. 

Of  his  voyage  little  is  known,  except  that  he 
amused  himself  with  books  and  with  his  pen ; 
and  that  among  the  compositions  by  which  he 
beguiled  the  tediousness  of  that  long  leisure, 
was  a  pleasing  imitation  of  Horace's  Otium 
Divos  rogat.  This  little  poem  was  inscribed  to 
his  friend  Mr.  Shore,  afterwards  Lord  Teign- 
mouth — a  man  of  whose  integrity,  humanity, 
and  honour,  it  is  impossible  to  speak  too  high 
ly  ;  but  who,  like  some  other  excellent  mem 
bers  of  the  civil  service,  extended  to  the  con 
duct  of  Hastings  an  indulgence  of  which  his 
own  conduct  never  stood  in  need. 

The  voyage  was,  for  those  times,  very  speedy. 
Hastings  was  little  more  than  four  months  on 
the  sea.  In  June,  1785,  he  landed  at  Ply 
mouth,  posted  to  London,  appeared  at  court, 
paid  his  respects  in  Leadenhall  Street,  and 
then  retired  with  his  wife  to  Cheltenham. 

He  was  greatly  pleased  with  his  reception. 
The  king  treated  him  with  marked  distinction. 
The  queen,  who  had  already  incurred  much 
censure  on  account  of  the  favour  which,  in 
spite  of  the  ordinary  severity  of  her  virtue,  she 
had  shown  to  the  "elegant  Marian,"  was  not 
less  gracious  to  Hastings.  The  Directors  re 
ceived  him  in  a  solemn  sitting;  and  their 
chairman  read  to  him  a  vote  of  thanks  which 
they  had  passed  without  one  dissentient  voice. 
"I  find  myself,"  said  Hastings,  in  a  letter  writ 
ten  about  a  quarter  of  a  year  after  his  arrival 
in  England, — "I  find  myself  everywhere,  and 
universally,  treated  with  evidences,  apparent 
even  to  my  own  observation,  that  I  possess  the 
good  opinion  of  my  country." 

The  confident  and  exulting  tone  of  his  cor 
respondence  about  this  time  is  the  more  re 
markable,  because  he  had  already  received 
ample  notice  of  the  attack  which  was  in  pre 
paration.  Within  a  week  after  he  landed  at 
Plymouth,  Burke  gave  notice  in  the  House  of 
Commons  of  a  motion  seriously  affecting  a 
gentleman  lately  returned  from  India.  The 
session,  however,  was  then  so  far  advanced, 
that  it  was  impossible  to  enter  on  so  exten 
sive  and  important  a  subject. 

Hastings,  it  is  clear,  was  not  sensible  of  the 
danger  of  his  position.  Indeed  that  sagacity, 
that  judgment,  that  readiness  in  devising  expe 
dients  which  had  distinguished  him  in  the 


490 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


East,  seemed  n>w  to  have  forsaken  him;  not 
that  his  abilities  were  at  all  impaired ;  not  that 
he  was  not  still  the  same  man  who  had  tri 
umphed  over  Francis  and  Nuncomar,  who  had 
made  the  Chief  Justice  and  the  Nabob  Vizier 
his  tools,  who  had  deposed  Cheyte  Sing,  and 
repelled  Hyder  AH; — but  an  oak,  as  Mr.  Grat- 
tan  finely  said,  should  not  be  transplanted  at 
fifty.  A  man  who,  having  left  England  when  a 
boy,  returns  to  it  after  thirty  or  forty  years  pass 
ed  in  India,  will  find,  be  his  talents  what  they 
may,  that  he  has  much  both  to  learn  and  to  un 
learn  before  he  can  take  a  place  among  Eng 
lish  statesmen.  The  working  of  a  representa 
tive  system,  the  war  of  parties,  the  arts  of  de 
bate,  the  influence  of  the  press,  are  startling 
novelties  to  him.  Surrounded  on  every  side 
Ly  new  machines  and  new  tactics,  he  is  as 
much  bewildered  as  Hannibal  would  have  been 
at  Waterloo,  or  Themistocles  at  Trafalgar. 
His  very  acuteness  deludes  him.  His  very 
vigour  causes  him  to  stumble.  The  more  cor 
rect  his  maxims,  when  applied  to  the  state  of 
society  to  which  he  is  accustomed,  the  more 
certain  they  are  to  lead  him  astray.  This  was 
strikingly  the  case  with  Hastings.  In  India  he 
had  a  bad  hand ;  but  he  was  master  of  the 
came,  and  he  won  every  stake.  In  England 
ne  held  excellent  cards,  if  he  had  known  how 
to  play  them;  and  it  was  chiefly  by  his  own 
errors  that  he  was  brought  to  the  verge  of  ruin. 
Of  all  his  errors  the  most  serious  was  per 
haps  the  choice  of  a  champion.  Clive,  in 
similar  circumstances,  had  made  a  singularly 
happy  selection.  He  put  himself  into  the  hands 
of  Wedderburne,  afterwards  Lord  Loughbo- 
rough,  one  of  the  few  great  advocates  who 
have  also  been  great  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  To  the  defence  of  Clive,  therefore,  no 
thing  was  wanting — neither  learning  nor  know 
ledge  of  tbn  world,  neither  forensic  acuteness 
nor  that  eloquence  which  charms  political  as 
semblies.  Hastings  intrusted  his  interests  to 
a  very  different  person,  a  major  in  the  Bengal 
army  named  Scott.  This  gentleman  had  been 
sent  over  from  India  some  time  before  as  the 
agent  of  the  Governor-General.  It  was  ru 
moured  that  his  services  were  rewarded  with 
Oriental  munificence;  and  we  believe  that  he 
received  much  more  than  Hastings  could  con 
veniently  spare.  The  Major  obtained  a  seat 
in  Parliament,  and  was  there  regarded  as  the 
crgan  of  his  employer.  It  was  evidently  inn- 
possible  that  a  gentlemen  so  situated  could 
speak  with  the  authority  which  belongs  to  an 
independent  position.  Nor  had  the  agent  of 
Hastings  the  talents  necessary  for  obtaining 
the  ear  of  an  assembly  which,  accustomed  to 
listen  to  great  orators,  had  naturally  become 
fastidious.  He  was  always  on  his  legs;  he 
was  very  tedious  ;  and  he  had  only  one  topic, 
the  merits  and  wrongs  of  Hastings.  Every 
body  who  knows  the  House  of  Commons  will 
easily  guess  what  followed.  The  Major  was 
»oon  considered  the  greatest  bore  of  his  time. 
His  exertions  were  not  confined  to  Parliament. 
There  was  hardly  a  day  on  which  the  newspa 
pers  did  not  contain  some  puff  upon  Hastings, 
signed  Jttialicu*  or  Bengalensis,  bu!  known  to 
be  written  by  the  indefatigable  Scott;  and 
hardly  a  month  in  which  some  bulky  pamphlet 


on  the  same  subject,  and  from  the  same  pen, 
did  not  pass  to  the  trunkmakers  and  the  pastry 
cooks.  As  to  this  gentleman's  capacity  for 
conducting  a  delicate  question  through  Parlia 
ment,  our  readers  will  want  no  evidence  be 
yond  that  which  they  will  find  in  letters  pre 
served  in  these  volumes.  We  will  give  a  sin 
gle  specimen  of  his  temper  and  judgment.  He 
designated  the  greatest  man  then  living  as 
"that  reptile  Mr.  Burke." 

In  spite,  however,  of  this  unfortunate  chcice> 
the  general  aspect  of  affairs  was  favourable  to 
Hastings.  The  king  was  on  his  side.  The 
Company  and  its  servants  were  zealous  in  his 
cause.  Among  public  men  he  had  many  ar 
dent  friends.  Such  were  Lord  Mansfield,  who 
had  outlived  the  vigour  of  his  body  but  not  of 
his  mind ;  and  Lord  Lansdowne,  who,  though 
unconnected  with  any  party,  retained  the  im 
portance  which  belongs  to  great  talents  and 
knowledge.  The  ministers  were  generally  be 
lieved  to  be  favourable  to  the  late  Governor- 
General.  They  owed  their  power  to  the  cla 
mour  which  had  been  raised  against  Mr.  Fox's 
East  India  bill.  The  authors  of  that  bill,  when 
accused  of  invading  vested  rights,  and  of  set 
ting  up  powers  unknown  to  the  constitution, 
had  defended  themselves  by  pointing  to  the 
crimes  of  Hastings,  and  by  arguing  that  abuses 
so  extraordinary  justified  extraordinary  mea 
sures.  Those  who,  by  opposing  that  bill,  had 
raised  themselves  to  the  head  of  affairs,  would 
naturally  be  inclined  to  extenuate  the  evils 
which  had  been  made  the  plea  for  administer 
ing  so  violent  a  remedy ;  and  such,  in  fact,  was 
their  general  disposition.  The  Lord  Chancel 
lor  Thurlow,  in  particular,  whose  great  place 
and  force  of  intellect  gave  him  a  weight  in  the 
government  inferior  only  to  that  of  Mr.  Pitt, 
espoused  the  cause  of  Hastings  with  indeco 
rous  violence.  Mr.  Pitt,  though  he  had  cen 
sured  many  parts  of  the  India  system,  had 
studiously  abstained  from  saying  a  word 
against  the  late  chief  of  the  Indian  govern 
ment.  To  Major  Scott,  indeed,  the  young  mi 
nister  had  in  private  extolled  Hastings  as  a 
great,  a  wonderful  man,  who  had  the  highest 
claims  on  the  government.  There  was  only 
one  objection  in  granting  all  that  so  eminent  a 
servant  of  the  public  could  ask: — the  resolu 
tion  of  censure  still  remained  on  the  journals 
of  the  House  of  Commons.  That  resolution 
was,  indeed,  unjust;  but,  till  it  was  rescinded, 
could  the  minister  advise  the  king  to  bestow 
any  mark  of  approbation  on  the  person  cen 
sured  1  If  Major  Scott  is  to  be  trusted,  Mr. 
Pitt  declared  that  this  was  the  only  reason 
which  prevented  the  government  from  confer 
ring  a  peerage  on  the  late  Governor-General. 
Mr.  Dundas  was  the  only  important  member 
of  the  administration  who  was  deeply  commit 
ted  to  a  different  view  on  the  subject.  He  had 
moved  the  resolutions  which  created  the  diffi 
culty;  but  even  from  him  little  was  to  be  ap 
prehended.  Since  he  presided  over  the  com 
mittee  on  Eastern  affairs,  great  changes  had 
taken  place.  He  was  surrounded  by  new  al 
lies;  he  had  fixed  his  hopes  on  new  objects; 
and  whatever  may  have  been  his  good  quali 
ties — and  he  had  many — flattery  itself  never 
reckoned  rigid  consistency  in  the  number. 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


491 


From  the  Ministry,  therefore,  Hastings  had 
every  reason  to  expect  support ;  and  the  Minis 
try  was  very  powerful.  The  Opposition  was 
loud  and  vehement  against  him.  But  the  Op 
position,  though  formidable  from  the  wealth 
and  influence  of  some  of  its  members,  and 
from  the  admirable  talents  and  eloquence  of 
others,  was  outnumbered  in  Parliament,  and 
odious  throughout  the  country.  Nor,  as  far  as 
we  can  judge,  was  the  Opposition  generally 
desirous  to  engage  in  so  serious  an  under 
taking  as  the  impeachment  of  an  Indian  Go 
vernor.  Such  an  impeachment  must  last  for 
years.  It  must  impose  on  the  chiefs  of  the 
party  an  immense  load  of  labour.  Yet  it  could 
scarcely,  in  any  manner,  affect  the  event  of  the 
great  political  game.  The  followers  of  the 
coalition  were  therefore  more  inclined  to  re 
vile  Hastings  than  to  prosecute  him.  They 
lost  no  opportunity  of  coupling  his  name  with 
the  names  of  the  most  hateful  tyrants  of  whom 
history  makes  mention.  The  wits  of  Brookes's 
aimed  their  keenest  sarcasms  both  at  his  pub 
lic  and  at  his  domestic  life.  Some  fine  dia 
monds  which  he  had  presented,  as  it  was  ru 
moured,  to  the  royal  family,  and  a  certain 
richly  carved  ivory  bed  which  the  queen  had 
done  him  the  honour  to  accept  from  him,  were 
favourite  subjects  of  ridicule.  One  lively  poet 
proposed,  that  the  great  acts  of  the  fair  Marian's 
present  husband  should  be  immortalized  by  the 
pencil  of  his  predecessor ;  and  that  Imhoff 
should  be  employed  to  embellish  the  House  of 
Commons  with  paintings  of  the  bleeding  Ro- 
hillas,  of  Nuncomar  swinging,  of  Cheyte  Sing 
letting  himself  down  to  the  Ganges.  Another, 
in  an  exquisitely  humorous  parody  of  Virgil's 
third  eclogue,  propounded  the  question — what 
that  mineral  could  be  of  which  the  rays  had 
power  to  make  the  most  austere  of  princesses 
the  friend  of  a  wanton.  A  third  described, 
with  gay  malevolence,  the  gorgeous  appear 
ance  of  Mrs.  Hastings  at  St.  James's,  the  ga 
laxy  of  jewels,  torn  from  Begums,  which 
adorned  her  head-dress,  her  necklace  gleam 
ing  with  future  votes,  and  the  depending  ques 
tions  th.«.t  shone  upon  her  ears.  Satirical 
attacks  c/  this  description,  and  perhaps  a  mo 
rion  for  a  vote  of  censure,  would  have  satisfied 
the  great  body  of  the  Opposition.  But  there 
were  two  men  whose  indignation  was  not  to 
be  so  appeased,  Philip  Francis  and  Edmund 
Burke. 

Francis  had  recently  entered  the  House  of 
Commons,  and  had  already  established  a  cha 
racter  there  for  industry  and  talent.  He  la 
boured  indeed  under  one  most  unfortunate 
defect — want  of  fluency.  But  he  occasionally 
expressed  himself  with  a  dignity  and  energy 
worthy  of  the  greatest  orators.  Before  he  had 
been  many  days  in  Parliament,  he  incurred  the 
bitter  dislike  of  Pitt,  who  constantly  treated 
him  with  as  much  asperity  as  the  laws  of  de 
bate  would  allow.  Neither  lapse  of  years  nor 
change  of  scene  had  mitigated  the  enmitie 
which  Francis  had  brought  back  from  the 
East.  After  his  usual  fashion,  he  mistook  his 
malevolence  for  virtue  ;  nursed  it,  as  preach 
ers  tell  us  that  we  ought  to  nurse  our  good  dis 
positions;  and  paraded  it,  on  all  occasions 
with  Pharisaical  ostentation. 


The  zeal  of  Burke  was  still  fiercer;  but  it 
was  far  purer.  Men,  unable  to  understand  tho 
elevation  of  his  mind,  have  tried  to  find  out 
some  discreditable  motive  for  the  vehemence 
and  pertinacity  which  he  showed  on  this  occa 
sion.  But  they  have  altogether  failed.  The 
idle  story  that  he  had  some  private  slight  to 
revenge,  has  long  been  given  up,  even  by  the 
advocates  of  Hastings.  Mr.  Gleig  supposes 
that  Burke  wa.s  actuated  by  party  spirit,  that 
he  retained  a  bitter  remembrance  of  the  fall  of 
the  coalition,  that  he  attributed  that  fall  to  the 
exertions  of  the  East  India  interest,  and  that 
he  considered  Hastings  as  the  head  and  the 
personification  of  that  interest.  This  explana 
tion  seems  to  be  sufficiently  refuted  by  a  re 
ference  to  dates.  The  hostility  of  Burke  to 
Hastings  commenced  long  before  the  coalition; 
and  lasted  long  after  Burke  had  become  a 
strenuous  supporter  of  those  by  whom  the  coa 
lition  had  been  defeated.  It  began  when  Burke 
and  Fox,  closely  allied  together,  were  attack 
ing  the  influence  of  the  crown,  and  calling  for 
peace  with  the  American  republic.  It  con 
tinued  till  Burke,  alienated  from  Fox,  and 
loaded  with  the  favours  of  the  crown,  died, 
preaching  a  crusade  against  the  French  repub 
lic.  It  seems  absurd  to  attribute  to  the  events 
of  1784  an  enmity  which  began  in  1781,  and 
which  retained  undiminished  force  long  after 
persons  far  more  deeply  implicated  than  Hast 
ings  in  the  events  of  1784  had  been  cordially 
forgiven.  And  why  should  we  look  for  any 
other  explanation  of  Burke's  conduct  than  that 
which  we  find  on  the  surface  ?  The  plain 
truth  is,  that  Hastings  had  committed  some 
great  crimes,  and  that  the  thought  of  those 
crimes  made  the  blood  of  Burke  boil  in  his 
veins;  for  Burke  was  a  man  in  whom  compas 
sion  for  suffering,  and  hatred  of  injustice  and 
tyranny,  were  as  strong  as  in  Las  Casas  or 
Clarkson.  And  although  in  him,  as  in  Las 
Casas  and  in  Clarkson,  these  noble  feelings 
were  alloyed  with  the  infirmity  which  belongs 
to  human  nature,  he  is,  like  them,  entitled  to 
this  great  praise,  that  he  devoted  years  of  in 
tense  labour  to  the  service  of  a  people  with 
whom  he  had  neither  blood  nor  language,  nei 
ther  religion  nor  manners  in  common  ;  and 
from  whom  no  requital,  no  thanks,  no  applause 
could  be  expected. 

His  knowledge  of  India  was  such  as  few, 
even  of  those  Europeans  who  have  passed 
many  years  in  that  country,  have  attained; 
and  such  as  certainly  was  never  attained  by 
any  public  man  who  had  not  quitted  Europe. 
He  had  studied  the  history,  the  laws,  and  the 
usages  of  the  East  with  an  industry,  such  as  is 
seldom  found  united  to  so  much  genius  and  so 
much  sensibility.  Others  have  perhaps  been 
equally  laborious,  and  have  collected  an  equal 
mass  of  materials;  but  the  manner  in  \vhich 
Burke  brought  his  higher  powers  of  intellect 
to  work  on  statements  of  facts,  and  on  tables 
of  figures,  was  peculiar  to  himself.  In  every 
part  of  those  huge  bales  of  Indian  information, 
which  repelled  almost  all  other  readers,  his 
mind,  at  once  philosophical  and  poetical,  found 
something  to  instruct  or  to  delight.  His  rea 
son  analyzed  and  digested  those  vast  and 
shapeless  masses;  his  imagination  animated 


492 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  coloured  them.     Out  of  darkness,  and  dul- 
ness,   and  confusion,  he  drew  a  rich   abun 
dance  of  ingenious  theories  and  vivid  pictures. 
He  had,  in  the  highest  degree,  that  noble  fa 
culty,  whereby  man  is  able  to  live  in  the  past 
and  in  the  future,  in  the  distant  and  in  the  un 
real.     India  and  its  inhabitants  were  not  to 
him,  as  to  most  Englishmen,  mere  names  and 
abstractions,  but  a  real  country  and  a  real  peo 
ple.     The  burning  sun  ;  the  strange  vegetation 
of  the  palm  and  the  cocoa  trees  ;  the  rice-lick 
and  the  tank;  the  huge  trees,  older  than  the 
Mogul  empire,  under  which  the  village  crowds 
assemble ;  the  thatched  roof  of  the  peasant' 
hut,  and  the  rich  tracery  of  the  mosque,  where 
the  imaurn  prayed  with  his  face  to  Mecca;   the 
drums,  and  banners,  and  gaudy  idols  ;  the  de 
votee  swinging  in  the  air;  the  graceful  maiden, 
with  the  pitcher  on  her  head,  descending  the 
steps  to  the  river-side;    the  black  faces,  the 
long  beards,  the  yellow  streaks  of  sect;  the 
turbans  and  the  flowing  robes;  the  spears  and 
silver  maces;  the  elephants  with  their  cano 
pies  of  state;    the  gorgeous  palanquin  of  the 
prince,  and  the  close  litter  of  the  noble  lady — 
all  those  things   were  to  him  as  the  objects 
amidst  which  his  own  life  had  been  passed — 
as  the  objects  which  lay  on  the  road  between 
Beaconsfield  and  St.  James's  Street.     All  In 
dia  was  present  to  the  eye  of  his  mind,  from 
the  halls  where  suitors  laid  gold  and  perfumes 
at  the   feet  of  sovereigns,  to  the  wild   moor 
where  the  gipsy-camp  was  pitched — from  the 
bazars,  humming  like  beehives  with  the  crowd 
of  buyers  and  sellers,  to  the  jungle  where  the 
lonely  courier  shakes  his  bunch  of  iron  rings 
to  scare  away  the  hyaenas.     He  had  just  as 
lively  an  idea  of  the  insurrection  at  Benares  as 
of  Lord  George  Gordon's  riots,  and  of  the  exe 
cution  of  Nuncomar  as  of  the  execution  of  Dr. 
Dodd.     Oppression  in  Bengal  was  to  him  the 
same  thing  as  oppression  in  the  streets  of  Lon 
don. 

He  saw  that  Hastings  had  been  guilty  of 
some  most  unjustifiable  acts.  All  that  followed 
was  natural  and  necessary  in  a  mind  like 
Burke's.  His  imagination  and  his  passions, 
once  excited,  hurried  him  beyond  the  bounds 
of  justice  and  good  sense.  His  reason,  power 
ful  as  it  was,  was  reduced  to  be  the  slave  of 
feelings  which  it  should  have  controlled.  His 
indignation,  virtuous  in  its  origin,  acquired  too 
much  of  the  character  of  personal  aversion. 
He  could  see  DO  mitigating  circumstance,  no 
redeeming  merit.  His  temper,  which,  though 
generous  and  affectionate,  had  always  been, 
irritable,  had  now  been  almost  savage  by 
bodily  infirmities  and  mental  vexations.  Con 
scious  of  great  powers  and  great  virtues,  he 
found  himself,  in  age  and  poverty,  a  mark  for 
the  hatred  of  a  perfidious  court  and  a  deluded 
people.  In  Parliament  his  eloquence  was  out 
of  elite.  A  young  generation  which  knew  him 
not  had  filled  the  House.  Whenever  he  rose 
to  speak,  his  voice  was  drowned  by  the  un 
seemly  interruptions  of  lads  who  were  in 
their  cradles  when  his  orations  on  the  Stamp 
Act  cailed  forth  the  applause  of  the  great  Earl 
of  Chatham.  These  things  had  produced  on 
his  proud  and  sensitive  spirit  an  effect  at  which 
wi-  cannot  wonder.  He  could  no  longer  dis 


cuss  any  question  with  calmness,  or  make 
allowances  for  honest  difference  of  opinion. 
Those  who  think  that  he  was  more  violent  and 
acrimonious  in  debates  about  India  than  on 
other  occasions,  are  ill-informed  respecting  the 
last  years  of  his  life.  In  the  discussions  on 
the  Commercial  Treaty  with  the  court  of  Ver 
sailles,  on  the  Regency,  on  the  French  Revo 
lution,  he  showed  even  more  virulence  than  in 
conducting  the  impeachment.  Indeed,  it  may 
be  remarked,  that  the  very  persons  who  repre 
sented  him  as  a  mischievous  maniac  for  con 
demning  in  burning  words  the  Rohilla  war  and 
the  spoliation  of  the  Begums,  exalted  him  into 
an  inspired  prophet  as  soon  as  he  began  to  de 
claim,  with  greater  vehemence,  and  not  with 
greater  reason,  against  the  taking  of  the  Bas- 
tile  and  the  insults  offered  to  Marie  Antoinette. 
To  us  he  appears  to  have  been  neither  a  ma 
niac  in  the  former  case  nor  a  prophet  in  the 
latter,  but  in  both  cases  a  great  and  good  man 
led  into  extravagance  by  a  tempestuous  sensi 
bility  which  domineered  over  all  his  faculties. 
It  may  be  doubted  whether  the  personal  anti 
pathy  of  Francis  or  the  nobler  indignation  of 
Burke  would  have  led  their  party  to  adopt  ex 
treme  measures  against  Hastings,  if  his  own 
conduct  had  been  judicious.  He  should  have 
>lt  that,  great  as  his  public  services  had  been, 
he  was  not  faultless ;  and  should  have  been 
content  to  make  his  escape,  without  aspiring 
:o  the  honours  of  a  triumph.  He  and  his  agent 
:ook  a  different  view.  They  were  impatient 
or  the  rewards  which,  as  they  conceived,  were 
leferred  only  till  Burke's  attack  should  be  over. 
They  accordingly  resolved  to  force  a  decisive 
action  with  an  enemy  for  whom,  had  they  been 
wise,  they  would  have  made  a  bridge  of  gold. 
On  the  first  day  of  the  session  of  1786,  Major 
Scott  reminded  Burke  of  the  notice  given  in 
he  preceding  year,  and  asked  Burke  whether 
t  was  seriously  intended  to  bring  any  charge 
against  the  late  Governor-General.  This  chal- 
enge  left  no  course  open  to  the  Opposition  ex 
cept  to  come  forward  as  accusers  or  to  acknow- 
edge  themselves  calumniators.  The  adrninis- 
ration  of  Hastings  had  not  been  so  blameless 
lor  was  the  great  party  of  Fox  and  North  so 
eeble  that  it  could  be  prudent  to  venture  on 
;o  bold  a  defiance.  The  leaders  of  the  Oppo 
sition  instantly  returned  the  only  answer  which 
hey  could  with  honour  return,  and  the  whole 
>arty  wa"  irrevocably  pledged  to  a  prosecu- 
ion. 

Bu'«\e  began  his  operations  by  applying  for 

apers.     Some  of  the  documents  for  which  he 

isked  were  refused  by  the  ministers,  who,  in 

he  debate,  held  language  such  as  strongly  con- 

irmed  the  prevailing  opinion  that  they  intend- 

d  to  support  Hastings.    In  April  the  charges 

were  laid  on  the  table.    They  had  been  drawn 

up  by  Burke  with  great  ability,  though  in  a 

rm  too  much  resembling  that  of  a  pamphlet 

fastings  was  furnished  with  a  copy  of  the  ac- 

usation,  and  it  was  intimated  to  him  .hat  he 

night,  if  he  thought  fit,  be  heard  in  Kls  own 

defence  at  the  bar  of  the  Commons 

Here,  again,  Hastings  was  pursued  by  the 
same  fatality  which  had  attended  him  ever 
since  the  day  when  he  set  foot  on  English 
ground.  It  seemed  to  be  decreed  that  this  man. 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


493 


so  politic  and  so  successful  in  the  East,  should 
commit  nothing  but  blunders  in  Europe.  Any 
judicious  adviser  would  have  told  him  that  the 
best  thing  which  he  could  do  would  be  to  make 
an  eloquent,  forcible,  and  affecting  oration  at 
the  bar  of  the  House  ;  but  that,  if  he  could  not 
trust  himself  to  speak,  but  found  it  necessary 
to  read,  he  ought  to  be  as  concise  as  possible. 
Audiences  accustomed  to  extemporaneous  de 
bating  of  the  highest  excellence  are  always 
impatient  of  long  written  compositions.  Hast 
ings,  however,  sat  down  as  he  would  have 
done  at  the  Government-house  in  Bengal,  and 
prepared  a  paper  of  immense  length.  That 
paper,  if  recorded  on  the  consultations  of  an 
Indian  administration,  would  have  been  justly 
praised  as  a  very  able  minute,  but  it  was  now 
out  of  place.  It  fell  flat,  as  the  best  written 
defence  must  have  fallen  flat,  on  an  assembly 
accustomed  to  the  animated  and  strenuous  con 
flicts  of  Pitt  and  Fox.  The  members,  as  soon 
as  their  curiosity  about  the  face  and  demeanour 
of  so  eminent  a  stranger  was  satisfied,  walked 
away  to  dinner,  and  left  Hastings  to  tell  his 
story  till  midnight  to  the  clerks  and  the  ser- 
geant-at-arms. 

All  preliminary  steps  having  been  duly  taken, 
Burke,  in  the  beginning  of  June,  brought  for 
ward  the  charge  relating  to  the  Rohilla  war. 
He  acted  discreetly  in  placing  this  accusation 
in  the  van;  for  Dundas  had  moved,  and  the 
House  had  adopted  a  resolution,  condemning, 
in  the  most  severe  terms,  the  policy  followed 
by  Hastings  with  regard  to  Rohilcund.  Dun- 
das  had  little,  or  rather  nothing,  to  say  in  de 
fence  of  his  own  consistency;  but  he  put  a  bold 
face  on  the  matter,  and  opposed  the  motion. 
Among  other  things,  he  declared  that,  though 
he  still  thought  the  Rohilla  war  unjustifiable, 
he  considered  the  services  which  Hastings  had 
subsequently  rendered  to  the  state  as  sufficient 
to  atone  even  for  so  great  an  offence.  Pitt  did 
not  speak,  but  voted  with  Dundas,  and  Hast 
ings  was  absolved  by  a  hundred  and  nineteen 
Totes  against  sixty-seven. 

Hastings  was  now  confident  of  victory.  It 
seemed,  indeed,  that  he  had  reason  to  be  so. 
The  Rohilla  war  was,  of  all  his  measures,  that 
which  his  accusers  might  with  the  greatest  ad 
vantage  assail.  It  had  been  condemned  by  the 
Court  of  Directors.  It  had  been  condemned 
by  the  House  of  Commons.  It  had  been  con 
demned  by  Mr.  Dundas,  who  had  since  become 
the  chief  minister  of  the  crown  for  Indian 
affairs.  Yet  Burke,  having  chosen  the  strong 
ground,  had  been  completely  defeated  on  it. 
That,  having  failed  here,  he  should  succeed  on 
any  point,  was  generally  thought  impossible.  It 
was  rumoured  at  the  clubs  and  coffee-houses 
that  one  or  perhaps  two  more  charges  would 
be  brought  forward ;  that  if,  on  those  charges, 
the  sense  of  the  House  of  Commons  should  be 
against  impeachment,  the  Opposition  would  let 
the  matter  drop;  that  Hastings  would  be  im 
mediately  raised  to  the  peerage,  decorated  with 
the  star  of  the  Bath,  sworn  of  the  Privy  Coun 
cil,  and  invited  to  lend  the  assistance  of  his 
talents  and  experience  to  the  India  Board. 
Lord  Thurlow,  indeed,  some  months  before, 
had  spoken  with  contempt  of  the  scruples 
which  prevented  Pitt  from  calling  Hastings  to 


the  House  of  Lords ;  and  had  even  said  that 
if  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  was  afraid 
of  the  Commons,  there  was  nothing  to  prevent 
the  Keeper  of  the  Great  Seal  from  taking  the 
royal  pleasure  about  a  patent  of  peerage.  The 
very  title  was  chosen.  Hastings  was  to  be 
Lord  Daylesford.  For,  through  all  changes 
of  scene  and  changes  of  fortune  remained  un 
changed  his  attachment  to  the  spot  which  had 
witnessed  the  greatness  and  the  fall  of  his 
family,  and  which  had  borne  so  great  a  part 
in  the  first  dreams  of  his  young  ambition. 

But  in  a  very  few  days  these  fair  prospects 
were  overcast.  On  the  13th  of  June,  Mr.  Fox 
brought  forward,  with  great  ability  and  elo 
quence,  the  charge  respecting  the  treatment  of 
Cheyte  Sing.  Francis  followed  on  the  same 
side.  The  friends  of  Hastings  were  in  high 
spirits  when  Pitt  rose.  With  his  usual  abun 
dance  and  felicity  of  language,  the  minister 
gave  his  opinion  on  the  case.  He  maintained 
that  the  Governor-General  was  justified  in 
calling  on  the  Rajah  of  Benares  for  pecuniary 
assistance,  and  in  imposing  a  fine  when  that 
assistance  was  contumaciously  withheld.  He 
also  thought  that  the  conduct  of  the  Governor- 
General,  during  the  insurrection,  had  been  dis 
tinguished  by  ability  and  presence  of  mind. 
He  censured,  with  great  bitterness,  the  conduct 
of  Francis,  both  in  India  and  in  Parliament,  as 
most  dishonest  and  malignant.  The  necessary 
inference  from  Pitt's  arguments  seemed  to  be. 
that  Hastings  ought  to  be  honourably  acquitted- 
and  both  the  friends  and  the  opponents  of  the 
minister  expected  from  him  a  declaration  to 
that  effect.  To  the  astonishment  of  all  parties, 
he  concluded  by  saying,  that  though  he  thought 
it  right  in  Hastings  to  fine  Cheyte  Sing  for 
contumacy,  yet  the  amount  of  the  fine  was  too 
great  for  the  occasion.  On  this  ground,  and 
on  this  ground  alone,  did  Mr.  Pitt,  applauding 
every  other  part  of  the  conduct  of  Hastings 
with  regard  to  Benares,  declare  that  he  should 
vote  in  favour  of  Mr.  Fox's  motion. 

The  House  was  thunderstruck,  and  it  well 
might  be  so;  for  the  wrong  done  to  Cheyte 
Sing,  even  had  it  been  as  flagitious  as  Fox  and 
Francis  contended,  was  a  trifle  when  compared 
with  the  horrors  which  had  been  inflicted  ou 
Rohilcund.  But  if  Mr.  Pitt's  view  of  the  case 
of  Cheyte  Sing  were  correct,  there  was  no 
ground  at  all  for  an  impeachment,  or  even  for 
a  vote  of  censure.  If  the  offence  of  Hastings 
was  really  no  more  than  this, — that,  having  a 
right  to  impose  a  mulct,  the  amount  of  which 
mulct  was  not  defined,  but  was  left  to  be  settled 
by  his  discretion,  he  had,  not  for  his  own  ad 
vantage,  but  for  that  of  the  state,  demanded  too 
much, — was  this  an  offence  which  required  a 
criminal  proceeding  of  the  highest  solemnity — 
a  criminal  proceeding  to  which,  during  sixty 
years,  no  public  functionary  had  been  subject 
ed  1  We  can  see,  we  think,  in  what  way  a 
man  of  sense  and  integrity  might  have  been 
induced  to  take  any  course  respectingHastings, 
except  the  course  which  Mr.  Pitt  took.  Such 
a  man  might  have  thought  a  great  example 
necessary,  for  the  preventing  of  injustice,  and 
for  the  vindicaung  of  the  national  honour ,  and 
might,  on  that  ground,  have  vokd  for  impeach 
ment  both  on  the  Rohilla  charge  an"  on  tho 
2T 


494 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Benares  charge.  Such  a  man  might  have 
thought  that  the  offences  of  Hastings  had  heen 
atoned  for  by  great  services,  and  might,  on  that 
ground,  have  voted  against  the  impeachment 
on  both  charges.  With  great  diffidence,  we 
give  it  as  our  opinion,  that  the  most  correct 
course  would,  on  the  whole,  have  been  to  im 
peach  on  the  Rohilla  charge,  and  to  acquit  on 
the  Benares  charge.  Had  the  Benares  charge 
appeared  to  us  in  the  same  light  in  which  it 
appeared  to  Mr.  Pitt,  we  should,  without  hesi 
tation,  have  voted  for  acquittal  on  that  charge. 
The  one  course  which  it  is  inconceivable  that 
any  man  of  a  tenth  part  of  Mr.  Pitt's  abilities 
can  have  honestly  taken,  was  the  course  which 
he  took.  He  acquitted  Hastings  on  the  Rohilla 
charge.  He  softened  down  the  Benares  charge 
till  it  became  no  charge  at  all,  and  then  he 
pronounced  that  it  contained  matter  for  im 
peachment. 

Nor  must  it  be  forgotten,  that  the  principal 
reason  assigned  by  the  ministry  for  not  im 
peaching  Hastings  on  account  of  the  Rohilla 
war  was,  that  the  delinquencies  of  the  early 
part  of  his  administration  had  been  atoned  for 
by  the  excellence  of  the  later  part.  Was  it 
not  most  extraordinary,  that  men  who  had  held 
this  language  could  afterwards  vote  that  the 
later  part  of  his  administration  furnished  mat 
ter  for  no  less  than  twenty  articles  of  impeach 
ment1?  They  first  contended  that  the  conduct 
of  Hastings  in  1780  and  1781  was  so  highly 
meritorious,  that,  like  works  of  supererogation 
in  the  Catholic  theology,  it  ought  to  be  effica 
cious  for  the  cancelling  of  former  offences ;  and 
they  then  prosecuted  him  for  his  conduct  in 
1780  and  1781. 

The  general  astonishment  was  the  greater, 
because,  only  twenty-four  hours  before,  the 
members  on  whom  the  Ministry  could  depend 
had  received  the  usual  notes  from  the  treasury, 
begging  them  to  be  in  their  places  and  to  vote 
against  Mr.  Fox's  motion.  It  was  asserted  by 
Mr.  Hastings,  that  early  on  the  morning  of  the 
very  day  on  which  the  debate  took  place,  Dun- 
das  called  on  Pitt,  woke  him,  and  was  closeted 
with  him  many  hours.  The  result  of  this  con 
ference  was  a  determination  to  give  up  the  late 
Governor-General  to  the  vengeance  of  the  Op 
position.  It  was  impossible  even  for  the  most 
powerful  minister  to  carry  all  his  followers 
with  him  in  so  strange  a  course.  Several  per 
sons  high  in  office,  the  Attorney-General,  Mr. 
Grenville,  and  Lord  Mulgrave  voted  against 
Mr.  Pitt.  But  the  devoted  adherents  who  stood 
by  the  head  of  the  government  without  asking 
questions,  were  sufficiently  numerous  to  turn 
the  scale.  A  hundred  and  nineteen  members 
voted  for  Mr.  Fox's  motion;  seventy-nine 
ugainst  it.  Dundas  silently  followed  Pitt. 

That  good  and  great  man,  the  late  William 
Wilbcrforce,  often  related  the  events  of  this 
remarkable  night.  He  described  the  amaze 
ment  of  the  House,  and  the  bitter  reflections 
which  were  muttered  against  the  prime  minis 
ter  by  some  of  the  habitual  supporters  of  go 
vernment.  Pitt  himself  appeared  to  feel  that 
his  conduct  required  some  explanation.  He 
Iftft  the  treasury-bench,  sat  for  some  time  by 
Mr.  Wilberforce,  and  very  earnestly  declared 
that  he  had  found  it  impossible,  as  a  man  of 


I  conscience,  to  stand  any  longer  by  Hastings. 
J  The  business,  he  said,  was  too  bad.  Mr.  Wil- 
I  berforce,  we  are  bound  to  add,  fully  believed 
j  that  his  friend  was  sincere,  and  that  the  suspi- 
j  cions  to  which  this  mysterious  affair  gave  rise 
were  altogether  unfounded. 

Those  suspicions,  indeed,  were  such  as  it  is 
painful  to  mention.  The  friends  of  Hastings, 
most  of  whom,  it  is  to  be  observed,  generally 
supported  the  administration,  affirmed  that  the 
motive  of  Pitt  and  Dundas  was  jealousy. 
Hastings  was  personally  a  favourite  with  the 
king.  'He  was  the  idol  of  the  East  India  Com 
pany  and  of  its  servants.  If  he  were  absolved 
by  the  Commons,  seated  among  the  Lords,  ad 
mitted  to  the  Board  of  Control,  closely  allied 
with  the  strong-minded  and  imperious Thurlow, 
was  it  not  almost  certain  that  he  would  soon 
draw  to  himself  the  entire  management  of 
Eastern  affairs?  Was  it  not  possible  that  he 
might  become  a  formidable  rival  in  the  cabi 
net  1  It  had  probably  got  abroad  that  very 
singular  communications  had  taken  place  be 
tween  Thurlow  and  Major  Scott ;  and  that,  if 
the  first  Lord  of  the  Treasury  was  afraid  to 
recommend  Hastings  for  a  peerage,  the  Chan 
cellor  was  ready  to  take  the  responsibility  cf 
that  step  on  himself.  Of  all  ministers,  Pitt  was 
the  least  likely  to  submit  with  patience  to  such 
an  encroachment  on  his  functions.  If  the 
Commons  impeached  Hastings,  all  danger  was 
at  an  end.  The  proceeding,  however  it  might 
terminate,  would  probably  last  some  years.  In. 
the  mean  time,  the  accused  person  would  be 
excluded  from  honours  and  public  employ 
ments,  and  could  scarcely  venture  even  to  pay 
his  duty  at  court.  Such  \vere  the  motives  at 
tributed,  by  a  great  part  of  the  public,  to  the 
young  minister,  whose  ruling  passion  was  ge 
nerally  believed  to  be  avarice  of  power. 

The  prorogation  soon  interrupted  the  dis 
cussions  respecting  Hastings.  In  the  following 
year  those  discussions  were  resumed.  The 
charge  touching  the  spoliation  of  the  Begums 
was  brought  forward  by  Sheridan,  in  a  speech 
which  was  so  imperfectly  reported  that  it  may 
be  said  to  be  wholly  lost;  but  which  was, 
without  doubt,  the  most  elaborately  brilliant  of 
all  the  productions  of  his  ingenious  mind.  The 
impression  which  it  produced  was  such  as  has 
never  been  equalled.  He  sat  down,  not  merely 
amidst  cheering,  but  amidst  the  loud  clapping 
of  hands,  in  which  the  Lords  below  the  bar, 
and  the  strangers  in  the  gallery,  joined.  The 
excitement  of  the  House  was  such  that  no  other 
speaker  could  obtain  a  hearing,  and  the  de 
bate  was  adjourned.  The  impression  made 
by  this  remarkable  display  of  eloquence  on 
severe  and  experienced  critics,  whose  discern 
ment  may  be  supposed  to  have  been  quickened 
by  emulation,  was  deep  and  permanent.  Mr. 
Windham,  twenty  years  later,  said  that  the 
speech  deserved  all  its  fame,  and  was,  in  spite 
of  some  faults  of  taste,  such  as  were  seldom 
wanting  either  in  the  literary  or  in  the  parlia 
mentary  performances  of  Sheridan,  the  greatest 
that  had  been  delivered  within  the  memory  of 
man.  Mr.  Fox,  about  the  same  time,  being  asked 
by  the  late  Lord  Holland  what  was  the  best 
speech  ever  made  in  the  Hou.se  of  Commons, 
assigned  the  first  place,  without  hesitation,  to 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


495 


the  great  oration  of  Sheridan  on  the   Oude ! 
charge. 

When  the  debate  was  resumed,  the  tide  ran  j 
so  strongly  against  the  accused,  that  his  friends  j 
were  coughed  and  scraped  down.  Pitt  declared  ! 
himself  for  Sheridan's  motion ;  and  the  question  | 
was  carried  by  a  hundred  and  seventy-five  j 
vctes  against  sixty-eight. 

The  Opposition,  flushed  with  victory,  and 
strongly  supported  by  the  public  sympathy, 
proceeded  to  bring  forward  a  succession  of 
charges  relating  chiefly  to  pecuniary  trans 
actions.  The  friends  of  Hastings  were  dis 
couraged,  and,  having  now  no  hope  of  being 
able  to  avert  an  impeachment,  were  not  very 
strenuous  in  their  exertions.  At  length  the 
House,  having  agreed  to  twenty  articles  of 
charge,  directed  Burke  to  go  before  the  Lords, 
and  to  impeach  the  late  Governor-General  of 
High  Crimes  and  Misdemeanours.  Hastings 
was  at  the  same  time  arrested  by  the  sergeant- 
at-arms,  and  carried  to  the  bar  of  the  Peers. 

The  session  was  now  within  ten  days  of  its 
close.  It  was,  therefore,  impossible  that  any 
progress  could  be  made  in  the  trial  till  the  next 
year.  Hastings  was  admitted  to  bail ;  and 
further  proceedings  were  postponed  till  the 
Houses  should  reassemble. 

When  Parliament  met  in  the  following  win 
ter,  the  Commons  proceeded  to  elect  a  com 
mittee  for  managing  the  impeachment.  Burke 
stood  at  the  head,  and  with  him  were  asso 
ciated  most  of  the  leading  members  of  the 
Opposition.  But  when  the  name  of  Francis 
was  read,  a  fierce  contention  arose.  It  was 
said  that  Francis  and  Hastings  were  noto 
riously  on  bad  terms ;  that  they  had  been  at 
feud  during  many  years  ;  that  on  one  occasion 
their  mutual  aversion  had  impelled  them  to 
seek  each  other's  lives  ;  and  that  it  would  be 
improper  and  indelicate  to  select  a  private 
enemy  to  be  a  public  accuser.  It  was  urged 
on  the  other  side  with  great  force,  particularly 
by  Mr.  Windham,  that  impartiality,  though  the 
first  duty  of  a  judge,  had  never  been  reckoned 
among  the  qualities  of  an  advocate;  that  in 
the  ordinary  administration  of  criminal  justice 
in  England,  the  aggrieved  party,  the  very  last 
person  who  ought  to  be  admitted  into  the  jury- 
box,  is  the  prosecutor;  that  what  was  wanted 
in  a  manager  was,  not  that  he  should  be  free 
from  bias,  but  that  he  should  be  energetic,  able, 
well-informed,  and  active.  The  ability  and  in 
formation  of  Francis  were  admitted;  and  the 
very  animosity  with  which  he  was  reproached, 
whether  a  virtue  or  a  vice,  was  at  least  a 
pledge  for  his  energy  and  activity.  It  seems 
difficult  to  refute  these  arguments.  But  the 
inveterate  hatred  borne  by  Francis  to  Hastings 
had  excited  general  disgust.  The  House  de 
cided  that  Francis  should  not  be  a  manager. 
Pitt  voted  with  the  majority,  Dundas  with  the 
minority. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  preparations  for  the 
trial  had  proceeded  rapidly;  and  on  the  13th 
of  February,  1788,  the  sittings  of  the  Court 
commenced.  There  have  been  spectacles  more 
dazxling  to  the  eye,  more  gorgeous  with  jewel 
lery  and  cloth  of  gold,  more  attractive  to  grown 
up  children,  than  that  which  was  then  exhi 
bited  at  Westminster;  but,  perhaps,  there  never 


was  a  spectacle  so  well  calculated  to  strike  a 
highly  cultivated,  a  reflecting,  an  imaginative 
mind.  All  the  various  kinds  of  interest  which 
belong  to  the  near  and  to  the  distant,  to  the 
present  and  to  the  past,  were  collected  on  one 
spot  and  in  one  hour.  All  the  talents  and  all 
the  accomplishments  which  are  developed  by 
liberty  and  civilization  were  now  displayed, 
with  every  advantage  that  could  be  derived 
both  from  co-operation  and  from  contrast. 
Every  step  in  the  proceedings  carried  the  mind 
either  backward,  through  many  troubled  cen 
turies,  to  the  days  when  the  foundations  of  the 
constitution  were  laid;  or  far  away, over  bound 
less  seas  and  deserts,  to-  dusky  nations  living 
under  strange  stars,  worshipping  strange  gods, 
and  writing  strange  characters  from  right  to 
left.  The  High  Court  of  Parliament  was  to  sit, 
according  to  forms  handed  down  from  the  days 
of  the  Plantagenets,  on  an  Englishman  accused 
of  exercising  tyranny  over  the  lord  of  the  holy 
city  of  Benares,  and  the  ladies  of  the  princely 
house  of  Oude. 

The  place  was  worthy  of  such  a  trial.  It 
was  the  great  hall  of  William  Rufus;  the  hall 
which  had  resounded  with  acclamations  at  the 
inauguration  of  thirty  kings;  the  hall  which 
had  witnessed  the  just  sentence  of  Bacon  and 
the  just  absolution  of  Somers;  the  hall  where 
the  eloquence  of  Strafford  had  for  a  moment 
awed  and  melted  a  victorious  party  inflamed 
with  just  resentment;  the  hall  where  Charles 
had  confronted  the  High  Court  of  Justice  with 
the  placid  courage  which  has  half  redeemed 
his  fame.  Neither  military  nor  civil  pomp  was 
wanting.  The  avenues  were  lined  with  gre 
nadiers.  The  streets  were  kept  clear  by  ca 
valry.  The  peers,  robed  in  gold  and  ermine, 
were  marshalled  by  the  heralds  under  Gartqr 
King-at-Arms.  The  judges,  in  their  vestments 
of  state,  attended  to  give  advice  on  points  of 
law.  Near  a  hundred  and  seventy  Lords,  three- 
fourths  of  the  Upper  House,  as  the  Upper 
House  then  was,  walked  in  solemn  order  from 
their  usual  place  of  assembling  to  the  tribunal. 
The  junior  baron  present  led  the  way — Lord 
Heathfield,  recently  ennobled  for  his  memo 
rable  defence  of  Gibraltar  against  the  fleets  and 
armies  of  France  and  Spain.  The  long  pro 
cession  was  closed  by  the  Duko  of  Norfolk, 
Earl  Marshal  of  the  realm,  by  the  great  digni 
taries,  and  by  the  brothers  and  sons  of  the 
king.  Last  of  all  came  the  Prince  of  Wales, 
conspicuous  by  his  fine  person  and  noble  bear 
ing.  The  gray  old  walls  were  hung  with  scarlet* 
The  long  galleries  were  crowded  by  such  an 
audience  as  has  rarely  excited  the  fears  or  the 
emulation  of  an  orator.  There  were  gathered  ' 
together,  from  all  parts  of  a  great,  free,  enlight 
ened,  and  prosperous  realm,  grace  and  female 
loveliness,  wit  and  learning,  the  representatives 
of  every  science  and  of  every  art.  There 
were  seated  around  the  queen  the  fair-haireu 
young  daughters  of  the  house  of  Brunswick. 
There  the  ambassadors  of  great  kings  and 
commonwealths  gazed  with  admiration  on  a 
spectacle  which  no  other  country  in  the  world 
could  present.  There  Siddons,  in  the  prime 
of  her  majestic  beauty,  looked  with  emotion  on 
a  scene  surpassing  all  the  imitations  of  the 
stage.  There  the  historian  cu  the  Roman  Em 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


pirc  thought  of  the  days  when  Cicero  pleaded 
the  cause  of  Sicily  against  Verres;  and  when, 
before  a  senate  which  had  still  some  show  of 
freedom,  Tacitus  thundered  against  the  op 
pressor  of  Africa.  There  were  seen,  side  by 
side,  the  greatest  painter  and  the  greatest  scho 
lar  of  the  age.  The  spectacle  had  allured 
Reynolds  from  that  easel  which  has  preserved 
to  us  the  thoughtful  foreheads  of  so  many 
writers  and  statesmen,  and  the  sweet  smiles  of 
so  many  noble  matrons.  It  had  induced  Parr 
to  suspend  his  labours  in  that  dark  and  pro 
found  mine  from  which  he  had  extracted  a  vast 
treasure  of  erudition — a  treasure  too  often  bu 
ried  in  the  earth,  too  often  paraded  with  inju 
dicious  and  inelegant  ostentation  ;  but  still  pre 
cious,  massive,  and  splendid.  There  appeared 
the  voluptuous  charms  of  her  to  whom  the  heir 
of  the  throne  had  in  secret  plighted  his  faith. 
There,  too,  was  she,  the  beautiful  mother  of  a 
beautiful  race,  the  Saint  Cecilia,  whose  deli 
cate  features,  lighted  up  by  love  and  music, 
art  has  rescued  from  the  common  decay.  There 
were  the  members  of  that  brilliant  society 
which  quoted,  criticised,  and  exchanged  repar 
tees,  under  the  rich  peacock  hangings  of  Mrs. 
Montague.  And  there  the  ladies,  whose  lips, 
wiore  persuasive  than  those  of  Fox  himself,  had 
carried  the  Westminster  election  against  pa 
lace  and  treasury,  shone  round  Georgiana  Du 
chess  of  Devonshire. 

The  Sergeants  made  proclamation.  Hast 
ings  advanced  to  the  bar,  and  bent  his  knee, 
The  culprit  was  indeed  not  unworthy  of  that 
great  presence.  He  had  ruled  an  extensive 
and  populous  country,  had  made  laws  and 
treaties,  had  sent  forth  armies,  had  set  up  and 

Eulled  down  princes.  And  m  his  high  place 
e  had  so  borne  himself,  that  all  had  feared 
him,  that  most  had  loved  him,  and  that  hatred 
itself  could  deny  him  no  title  to  glory,  except 
virtue.  He  looked  like  a  great  man,  and  not 
like  a  bad  man.  A  person  small  and  ema 
ciated,  yet  deriving  dignity  from  a  carriage 
which,  while  it  indicated  deference  to  the 
court,  indicated  also  habitual  self-possession 
and  self-respect;  a  high  and  intellectual  fore 
head  ;  a  brow  pensive,  but  not  gloomy ;  a 
mouth  of  inflexible  decision  ;  a  face  pale  and 
worn,  but  serene,  on  which  was  written,  as 
legibly  as  under  the  great  picture  in  the  Coun 
cil-chamber  at  Calcutta,  Mens&qua  in  arduis; — 
such  was  the  aspect  with  which  the  great  pro 
consul  presented  himself  to  his  judges. 

His  counsel  accompanied  him,  men  all  of 
whom  were  afterwards  raised  by  their  talents 
and  learning  to  the  highest  posts  in  their  pro 
fession, — the  bold  and  strong-minded  Law, 
afterwards  Chief  Justice  of  the  King's  Bench  ; 
he  more  humane  and  eloquent  Dallas,  after 
wards  Chief  Justice  of  the  Common  Pleas ; 
and  Plomer,  who,  nearly  twenty  years  later, 
successfully  conducted  in  the  same  high  court 
the  defence  of  Lord  Melville,  and  subsequently 
became  Vice-chancellor  and  master  of  the 
Rolls. 

But  neither  the  culprit  nor  his  advocates  at- 

tt acted  so  much  notice  as  the  accusers.    In 

the  midst  of  the  blaze  of  red  drapery,  a  space 

had  been  fitted  up  with  green  benches  and 

for  the  Commons.    The  managers,  with 


Burke  at  their  head,  appeared  in  full  dresj*. 
The  collectors  of  gossip  did  not  fail  to  remark 
that  even  Fox,  generally  so  regardless  of  his 
appearance,  had  paid  to  the  illustrious  tribunal 
the  compliment  of  wearing  a  bag  and  sword. 
Pitt  had  refused  to  be  one  of  the  conductors  of 
the  impeachment;  and  his  commanding,  copi 
ous,  and  sonorous  eloquence  was  wanting  to 
that  great  muster  of  various  talents.  Age  and 
blmdness  had  unfitted  Lord  North  for  the  du 
ties  of  a  public  prosecutor;  and  his  friends 
were  left  without  the  help  of  his  excellent 
sense,  his  tact,  and  his  urbanity.  But,  in  spite 
of  the  absence  of  these  two  distinguished  mem 
bers  of  the  Lower  House,  the  box  in  which  the 
managers  stood  contained  an  array  of  speak 
ers  such  as  perhaps  had  not  appeared  together 
since  the  great  age  of  Athenian  eloquence. 
There  stood  Fox  and  Sheridan,  the  English 
Demosthenes  and  the  English  Hyperides, 
There  was  Burke,  ignorant,  indeed,  or  negli 
gent  of  the  art  of  adapting  his  reasonings  and 
his  style  to  the  capacity  and  taste  of  his  hear 
ers  ;  but  in  aptitude  of  comprehension  and 
richness  of  imagination  superior  to  every  ora 
tor,  ancient  or  modern.  There,  with  eyes  re 
verentially  fixed  on  Burke,  appeared  the  finest 
gentleman  of  the  age — his  form  developed  by 
every  manly  exercise — his  face  beaming  with 
intelligence  and  spirit — the  ingenious,  the 
chivalrous,  the  high-souled  Windham.  Nor, 
though  surrounded  by  such  men,  did  the 
youngest  manager  pass  unnoticed.  At  an  age 
when  most  of  those  who  distinguish  them 
selves  in  life  are  still  contending  for  prizes 
and  fellowships  at  college,  he  had  won  for 
himself  a  conspicuous  place  in  Parliament. 
No  advantage  of  fortune  or  connection  was 
wanting  that  could  set  off  to  the  height  his 
splendid  talents  and  his  unblemished  honour. 
At  twenty-three  he  had  been  thought  worthy 
to  be  ranked  with  the  veteran  statesmen  who 
appeared  as  the  delegates  of  the  British  Com 
mons,  at  the  bar  of  the  British  nobility.  All 
who  stood  at  that  bar,  save  him  alone,  are 
gone — culprit,  advocates,  accusers.  To  the 
generation  which  is  now  in  the  vigour  of  life, 
he  is  the  sole  representative  of  a  great  age 
which  has  passed  away.  But  those  who, 
within  the  last  ten  years,  have  listened  with 
delight,  till  the  morning  sun  shone  on  the 
tapestries  of  the  House  of  Lords,  to  the  lofty 
and  animated  eloquence  of  Charles  Earl  Grey, 
are  able  to  form  some  estimate  of  the  powers 
of  a  race  of  men  among  whom  he  was  not  the 
foremost. 

The  charges  and  the  answers  of  Hastings 
were  first  read.  This  ceremony  occupied  two 
whole  days,  and  was  rendered  less  tedious 
than  it  would  otherwise  have  been,  by  the 
silver  voice  and  just  emphasis  of  Cowper,  the 
clerk  of  the  court,  a  near  relation  of  the  amia 
ble  poet.  On  the  third  day  Burke  rose.  Four 
sittings  of  the  court  were  occupied  by  his 
opening  speech,  Avhich  was  intended  to  be  a 
general  introduction  to  all  the  charges.  With 
an  exuberance  of  thought  and  a  splendour  of 
diction  which  more  than  satisfied  the  highly- 
raised  expectation  of  the  audience,  he  described 
the  character  and  institutions  of  the  natives  of 
India;  recounted  the  circumstances  in  which 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


497 


the  Asiatic  empire  of  Britain  had  originated ; 
and  set  forth  the  constitution  of  the  Company 
and  of  the  English  Presidencies.  Having  thus 
attempted  to  communicate  to  his  hearers  an 
idea  of  Eastern  society,  as  vivid  as  that  which 
existed  in  his  own  mind,  he  proceeded  to  ar 
raign  the  administration  of  Hastings,  as  sys 
tematically  conducted  in  defiance  of  morality 
and  public  law.  The  energy  and  pathos  of 
the  great  orator  extorted  expressions  of  un 
wonted  admiration  even  from  the  stern  and 
hostile  Chancellor ;  and,  for  a  moment,  seemed 
to  pierce  even  the  resolute  heart  of  the  defend 
ant.  The  ladies  in  the  galleries,  unaccustomed 
to  such  displays  of  eloquence,  excited  by  the 
solemnity  of  the  occasion,  and  perhaps  not  un 
willing  to  display  their  taste  and  sensibility, 
were  in  a  state  of  uncontrollable  emotion. 
Handkerchiefs  were  pulled  out;  smelling-bot 
tles  were  handed  round ;  hysterical  sobs  and 
screams  were  heard  ;  and  Mrs.  Sheridan  was 
carried  out  in  a  fit.  At  length  the  orator  con 
cluded.  Raising  his  voice  till  the  old  arches 
of  Irish  oak  resounded — "Therefore,"  said  he, 
"hath  it  with  all  confidence  been  ordered  by 
the  Commons  of  Great  Britain,  that  I  impeach 
"Warren  Hastings  of  high  crimes  and  misde 
meanours.  I  impeach  him  in  the  name  of  the 
Comnions  House  of  Parliament,  whose  trust 
he  hiis  betrayed.  I  impeach  him  in  the  name 
of  the  English  nation,  whose  ancient  honour 
he  has  sullied.  I  impeach  him  in  the  name 
of  the  people  of  India,  whose  rights  he  has 
trodden  under  foot,  and  whose  country  he  has 
turned  into  a  desert.  Lastly,  in  the  name  of 
human  nature  itself,  in  the  name  of  both  sexes, 
in  the  name  of  every  age,  in  the  name  of  every 
rank,  I  impeach  the  common  enemy  and  op 
pressor  of  all !" 

When  the  deep  murmur  of  various  emotion? 
had  subsided,  Mr.  Fox  rose  to  address  the  Lords 
respecting  the  course  of  proceeding  to  be  fol 
lowed.  The  wish  of  the  accuser  was,  that  the 
court  would  bring  to  a  close  the  investigation 
of  the  first  charge  before  the  second  was  open 
ed.  The  wish  of  Hastings  and  his  counse 
was,  that  the  managers  should  open  all  th< 
charges,  and  produce  all  the  evidence  for  th< 
prosecution,  before  the  defence  began.  Th< 
Lords  retired  to  their  own  house,  to  consider 
the  question.  The  Chancellor  took  the  side  ot 
Hastings.  Lord  Loughborough,  who  was  nov 
in  opposition,  supported  the  demand  of  the 
managers.  The  division  showed  which  waj 
the  inclination  of  the  tribunal  leaned.  A  ma 
jority  of  near  three  to  one  decided  in  favour  of 
the  course  for  which  Hastings  contended. 

When  the  court  sat  again,  Mr.  Fox,  assistec 
by  Mr.  Grey,  opened  the  charge  respecting 
f'heyte  Sing,  and  several  days  were  spent  in 
reading  papers  and  hearing  witnesses.  Thi 
next  article  was  that  relating  to  thePrincesse 
of  Oude.  The  conduct  of  this  part  of  the  case 
was  intrusted  to  Sheridan.  The  curiosity  o 
the  public  to  hear  him  was  unbounded.  Hi 
sparkling  and  highly-finished  declamation  last 
ed  two  days ;  but  the  Hall  was  crowded  to  suf 
focation  during  the  whole  time.  It  was  sak 
that  fifty  guineas  had  been  paid  for  a  singl 
ticket.  Sheridan,  when  he  concluded,  con 
Irived,  Mrith  a  knowledge  of  stage-effect  whicl 
VOL.  IV.— 63 


lis  father  might  have  envied,  to  sink  back,  as 
f  exhausted,  into  the  arms  of  Burire,  who 
lugged  him  with  the  energy  of  generous  admi» 
ation ! 

June  was  now  far  advanced.  The  session 
could  not  last  much  longer,  and  the  progress 
which  had  been  made  in  the  impeachment  was 
not  very  satisfactory.  There  were  twenty 
charges.  On  two  only  of  these  had  even  the 
case  for  the  prosecution  been  heard;  and  it 
was  now  a  year  since  Hastings  had  been  ad 
mitted  to  bail. 

The  interest  taken  by  the  public  in  the  trial 
was  great  when  the  court  began  to  sit,  and 
rose  to  the  height  when  Sh<  ridan  spoke  on  th«r 
harge  relating  to  the  Be>ums.  From  that 
time  the  excitement  went  down  fast.  The 
pectacle  had  lost  the  attraction  of  novelty. 
The  great  displays  of  rhetoric  were  over. 
What  was  behind  was  not  of  a  nature  to  entice 
men  of  letters  from  their  books  in  the  morning, 
or  to  tempt  ladies  who  had  left  the  masquerade 
at  two,  to  be  out  of  bed  before  eight.  There 
remained  examinations  and  cross-examina 
tions.  There  remained  statements  of  accounts. 
There  remained  the  reading  of  papers,  filled- 
with  words  unintelligible  to  English  ears — with 
lacs  and  crores,  zemindars  and  aumils,  sun- 
nuds  and  perwannahs,  jaghires  and  nuzzurs* 
There  remained  bickerings,  not  always  carriet 
on  with  the  best  taste  or  with  the  best  temper 
between  the  managers  of  the  impeachment  and 
the  counsel  for  the  defence,  particularly  between 
Mr.  Burke  and  Mr.  Law.  There  remained  the 
endless  marches  and  counter-marches  of  the 
Peers  between  their  house  and  the  hall;  for 
as  often  as  a  point  of  law  was  to  be  dis- 
cussed  their  lordships  retired  to  discuss  it 
apart;  and  the  consequence  was,  as  the  late 
Lord  Stanhope  wittily  said,  that  the  judges 
walked  and  the  trial  stood  still. 

It  is  to  be  added,  that  in  the  spring  of  1788, 
when  the  trial  commenced,  no  important  ques 
tion,  either  of  domestic  or  foreign  policy,  ex 
cited  the  public  mind.  The  proceeding  in 
Westminster  Hall,  therefore,  naturally  excited 
most  of  the  attention  of  Parliament  and  of  the 
public.  It  was  the  one  great  event  of  that  sea 
son.  But  in  the  following  year,  the  king's  ill 
ness,  the  debates  en  the  regency,  the  expecta* 
tionofachange  of  ministry,  completely  diverted 
public  attention  from  Indian  affairs;  and  within 
a  fortnight  after  George  the  Third  had  returned 
thanks  in  St.  Paul's  for  his  recovery,  the  States- 
General  of  France  met  at  Versailles.  In  the 
midst  of  the  agitation  produced  by  those  events, 
the  impeachment  was  for  a  time  almost  for 
gotten. 

The  trial  in  the  hall  went  on  languidly.  Iijt 
the  session  of  1788,  when  the  proceedings  had 
the  interest  of  novelty,  and  when  the  Peers  had 
little  other  business  before  them,  only  thirty*- 
five  days  were  given  to  the  impeachment.  In 
1789,  the  Regency  Bill  occupied  vhe  Upper 
House  till  the  session  was  far  advanced.  When 
the  king  recovered,  the  circuits  were  beginning^ 
The  judges  left  town  ;  the  Lords  waited  for  the 
return  of  the  oracles  of  jurisprudence ;  and 
the  consequence  was,  that  during  the  whole 
year  only  seventeen  days  were  given  to  the 
case  of  Hastings.  It  was  clear  that  the  matter 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


would  be  protracted  to  a  length  unprecedented 
in  the  annals  of  criminal  law. 

In  truth,  it  is  impossible  to  deny  that  im 
peachment,  though  it  is  a  fine  ceremony,  and 
though  it  may  have  be£n  useful  in  the  seven 
teenth  century,  is  not  a  proceeding  from  which 
much  good  can  now  be  expected.  Whatever 
confidence  may  be  placed  in  the  decisions  of 
the  Peers  on  an  appeal  arising  out  of  ordinary 
litigation,  it  is  certain  that  no  man  has  the  least 
confidence  in  their  impartiality,  when  a  great 
public  functionary,  charged  with  a  great  state 
crime,  is  brought  to  their  bar.  They  are  all 
politicians.  There  is  hardly  one  among  them, 
whose  vote  on  an  impeachment  may  not  be 
confidently  predicted  before  a  witness  has  been 
examined;  and  even  were  it  possible  to  rely  on 
their  justice,  they  would  still  be  quite  unfit  to 
try  such  a  cause  as  that  of  Hastings.  They 
sit  only  during  half  the  year.  They  have  to 
transact  much  legislative  and  much  judicial 
business.  The  law-lords,  whose  advice  is  re 
quired  to  guide  the  unlearned  majority,  are 
employed  daily  in  administering  justice  else 
where.  It  is  impossible,  therefore,  that  during 
ia  busy  session,  the  Upper  House  should  give 
more  than  a  few  days  to  an  impeachment.  To 
expect  that  their  lordships  would  give  up  par 
tridge-shooting,  in  order  to  bring  the  greatest 
delinquent  to  speedy  justice,  or  to  relieve  ac 
cused  innocence  by  speedy  acquittal,  would  be 
unreasonable  indeed.  A  well  constituted  tribu 
nal,  sitting  regularly  six  days  in  the  week,  and 
nine  hours  in  the  day,  would  have  finished  the 
trial  of  Hastings  in  less  than  three  months. 
The  Lords  had  not  finished  their  work  in  seven 
years. 

The  result  ceased  to  be  a  matter  of  doubt, 
from  the  time  when  the  Lords  resolved  that 
they  would  be  guided  by  the  rules  of  evidence 
which  are  received  in  inferior  courts  of  the 
realm.  Those  rules,  it  is  well  known,  exclude 
much  information  which  would  be  quite  suffi 
cient  to  determine  the  conduct  of  any  reasona 
ble  man,  in  the  most  important  transactions  of 
private  life.  Those  rules,  at  every  assizes, 
save  scores  of  culprits,  whom  judges,  jury,  and 
spectators,  firmly  believed  to  be  guilty.  But 
when  those  rules  were  rigidly  applied  to  of 
fences  committed  many  years  before,  at  the 
distance  of  many  thousand  miles,  conviction 
was,  of  course,  out  of  the  question.  We  do 
not  blame  the  accused  and  his  counsel  for 
availing  themselves  of  every  legal  advantage 
in  order  to  obtain  an  acquittal.  But  it  is  clear 
.hat  an  acquittal  so  obtained  cannot  be  pleaded 
in  bar  of  the  judgment  of  history. 

Several  attempts  were  made  by  the  friends 
of  Hastings1  to  put  a  stop  to  the  trial.  In  1789 
they  proposed  a  vote  of  censure  upon  Burke, 
for  some  violent  language  which  he  had  used 
respecting  the  death  of  Nuncomar,  and  the 
connection  between  Hastings  and  Impey. 
Burke  was*  then  unpopular  in  the  last  de 
gree  both  with  the  House  and  with  the  coun 
try.  The  asperity  and  indecency  of  some 
expressions  which  he  had  used  during  the 
debates  on  the  Regency  had  annoyed  even  his 
wannest  friends.  The  vote  of  censure  was 
carried,  and  those  who  had  moved  it  hoped 
iliat  the  managers  would  resign  in  disgust. 


Burke  was  deeply  hurt.  But  his  zeal  for  what 
he  considered  as  the  cause  of  justice  and  mer 
cy  triumphed  over  his  personal  feelings.  He 
received  the  censure  of  the  House  with  dignity 
and  meekness,  and  declared  that  no  personal 
mortification  or  humiliation  should  induce  him, 
to  flinch  from  the  sacred  duty  which  he  had 
undertaken. 

In  the  following  year,  the  Parliament  was 
dissolved;  and  the  friends  of  Hastings  enter 
tained  a  hope  that  the  new  House  of  Commons 
might  not  be  disposed  to  go  on  with  the  im 
peachment.  They  began  by  maintaining  thai 
the  whole  proceeding  was  terminated  by  the 
dissolution.  Defeated  on  this  point,  they  made 
a  direct  motion  that  the  impeachment  should  be 
dropped ;  but  they  were  defeated  by  the  com 
bined  forces  of  the  government  and  the  oppo 
sition.  It  was,  however,  resolved  that,  for  the 
sake  of  expedition,  many  of  the  articles  should 
be  withdrawn.  In  truth,  had  not  some  such 
measure  been  adopted,  the  trial  would  have 
lasted  till  the  defendant  was  in  his  grave. 

At  length,  in  the  spring  of  1795,  the  decision 
was  pronounced,  nearly  eight  years  after  Hast 
ings  had  been  brought  by  the  sergeant-at-arms 
of  the  Commons  to  the  bar  of  the  Lords.  On 
the  last  day  of  this  great  procedure,  the  public 
curiosity,  long  suspended,  seemed  to  be  re 
vived.  Anxiety  about  the  judgment  there 
could  be  none ;  for  it  had  been  fully  ascer 
tained  that  there  was  a  great  majority  for  the 
defendant.  But  many  wished  to  see  the  pa 
geant,  and  the  hall  was  as  much  crowded  as 
on  the  first  day.  But  those  who,  having  been 
present  on  the  first  day,  now  bore  a  part  in  the 
proceedings  of  the  last,  were  few,  and  most  of 
those  few  were  altered  men. 

As  Hastings  himself  said,  the  arraignment 
had  taken  place  before  one  generation,  and  the 
judgment  was  pronounced  by  another.  The 
spectator  could  not  look  at  the  woolsack,  or  at 
the  red  benches  of  the  peers,  or  at  the  green 
benches  of  the  Commons,  without  seeing 
something  that  reminded  him  of  the  instability 
of  all  human  things ; — of  the  instability  of 
power,  and  fame,  and  life,  of  the  more  lamenta 
ble  instability  of  friendship.  The  great  seal 
was  borne  before  Lord  Loughborough,  who, 
when  the  trial  commenced,  was  a  fierce  oppo 
nent  of  Mr.  Pitt's  government,  and  who  was 
now  a  member  of  that  government;  while 
Thurlow,  who  presided  in  the  court  when  it 
first  sat,  estranged  from  all  his  old  allies,  sat 
scowling  among  the  junior  barons.  Of  a  hun 
dred  and  sixty  nobles  who  walked  in  the  pro 
cession  on  the  first  day.  sixty  had  been  laid  in 
their  family  vaults.  Still  more  affecting  must 
have  been  the  sight  of  the  managers'  box. 
What  had  become  of  that  fair  fellowship,  so 
closely  bound  together  by  public  and  private 
ties,  so  resplendent  with  every  talent  and  ac 
complishment  1  It  had  been  scattered  by  ca 
lamities  more  bitter  than  the  bitterness  c! 
death.  The  great  chiefs  were  still  living,  and 
still  in  the  full  vigour  of  their  genius.  But 
their  friendship  was  at  an  end.  It  had  been 
violently  and  publicly  dissolved  with  tears  and 
stormy  reproaches.  If  those  men,  once  so  dear 
to  each  other,  were  now  compelled  to  meet  for 
the  purpose  of  managing  the  impeachment 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


499 


they  met  as  strangers  whom  public  business 
had  brought  together,  and  behaved  to  each 
other  with  cold  and  distant  civility.  Burke 
had  in  his  vortex  whirled  away  Windham. 
Fox  had  been  followed  by  Sheridan  and  Grey. 

Only  twenty-nine  peers  voted.  Of  these 
only  six  found  Hastings  guilty,  on  the  charges 
relating  to  Cheyte  Sing  and  to  the  Begums. 
On  other  charges  the  majority  in  his  favour 
was  still  greater.  On  some  he  was  unani 
mously  absolved.  He  was  then  called  to  the 
bar,  informed  from  the  woolsack  that  the  Lords 
had  acquitted  him,  and  solemnly  discharged. 
He  bowed  respectfully,  and  retired. 

We  have  said  that  the  decision  had  been 
fully  expected.  It  was  also  generally  approved. 
At  the  commencement  of  the  trial  there  had 
been  a  strong  and  indeed  unreasonable  feeling 
against  Hastings.  At  the  close  of  the  trial, 
there  was  a  feeling  equally  strong  and  equally 
unreasonable  in  his  favour.  One  cause  of  the 
change  was,  no  doubt,  what  is  commonly  call 
ed  the  fickleness  of  the  multitude,  but  what 
seems  to  us  to  be  merely  the  general  law  of 
human  nature.  Both  in  individuals  and  in 
masses  violent  excitement  is  al\vays  followed 
by  remission,  and  often  by  reaction.  We  are 
all  inclined  to  depreciate  \vhatever  we  have 
overpraised ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  to  show 
undue  indulgence  where  we  have  shown  un 
due  rigour.  It  was  thus  in  the  case  of  Hast 
ings.  The  length  of  his  trial,  moreover,  made 
him  an  object  of  compassion.  It  was  thought, 
and  n?t  without  reason,  that,  even  if  he  was 
guilty,  he  was  still  an  ill-used  man,  and  that 
an  impeachment  of  eight  years  was  more  than 
a  sufficient  punishment.  It  was  also  felt  that, 
though  in  the  ordinary  course  of  criminal  law, 
a  defendant  is  not  allowed  to  set  off  his  good 
actions  against  his  crimes,  a  great  political 
cause  should  be  tried  on  different  principles ; 
and  that  a  man  who  had  governed  a  great 
country  during  thirteen  years  might  have  done 
some  very  reprehensible  things,  and  yet  might 
be  on  the  whole  deserving  of  rewards  and  ho 
nours  rather  than  of  fine  and  imprisonment. 
The  Press,  an  instrument  neglected  by  the  pro 
secutors,  was  used  by  Hastings  and  his  friends 
with  great  effect.  Every  ship,  too,  that  arrived 
from  Madras  or  Bengal  brought  a  cuddy  full 
of  his  admirers.  Every  gentleman  from  India 
spoke  of  the  late  Governor-General  as  having 
deserved  better,  and  having  been  treated 
worse,  than  any  man  living.  The  effect  of 
this  testimony,  unanimously  given  by  all  per 
sons  who  knew  the  East,  was  naturally  very 
great.  Retired  members  of  the  Indian  ser 
vices,  civil  and  military,  were  settled  in  all 
corners  of  the  kingdom.  Each  of  them  was, 
of  course,  in  his  own  little  circle  regarded  as 
an  oracle  on  an  Indian  question ;  and  they 
were,  with  scarcely  one  exception,  the  zealous 
advocates  of  Hastings.  It  is  to  be  added,  that 
the  numerous  addresses  to  the  late  Governor- 
General,  which  his  friends  in  Bengal  obtained 
from  the  natives  and  transmitted  to  England, 
made  a  considerable  impression.  To  these  ad 
dresses  we  attach  little  or  no  importance. 
That  Hastings  was  beloved  by  the  people 
whom  he  governed  is  true;  but  the  eulogies 
of  jmiidits,  zemindars,  Mohammedan  doctors, 


do  not  prove  it  to  be  true.  For  an  English  col 
lector  or  judge  would  have  found  it  easy  lo  in 
duce  any  native  who  could  write,  to  sign  a 
panegyric  on  the  most  odious  ruler  that  ever 
was  in  India.  It  was  said  that  at  Benares,  the 
very  place  at  which  the  acts  set  forth  in  the 
first  article  of  impeachment  had  been  com 
mitted,  the  natives  had  erected  a  temple  to 
Hastings;  and  this  story  excited  a  strong  sen 
sation  in  England.  Burke's  observations  on 
the  apotheosis  were  admirable.  He  saw  no 
reason  for  astonishment,  he  said,  in  the  inci 
dent  which  had  been  represented  as  so  strik 
ing.  He  knew  something  of  the  mythology  of 
the  Brahmins.  He  knew  that,  as  they  wor 
shipped  some  gods  from  love,  so  they  wor 
shipped  others  from  fear.  He  knew  that  they 
erected  shrines,  not  only  to  the  benignant  dei 
ties  of  light  and  plenty,  but  also  to  the  fiends 
who  preside  over  smallpox  and  murder.  Nor 
did  he  at  all  dispute  the  claim  of  Mr.  Hastings 
to  be  admitted  into  such  a  Pantheon.  This 
teply  has  always  struck  us  as  one  of  the  finest 
that  ever  was  made  in  Parliament.  It  is  a 
grave  and  forcible  argument,  decorated  by  the 
most  brilliant  wit  and  fancy. 

Hastings  was,  however,  safe.  But,  in  every 
thing  except  character,  he  would  have  been 
far  better  off,  if,  when  first  impeached,  he  had 
at  once  pleaded  guilty,  and  paid  a  fine  of  fifty 
thousand  pounds.  He  was  a  ruined  man.  The 
legal  expenses  of  his  defence  had  been  enor 
mous.  The  expenses  which  did  not  appear  in 
his  attorney's  bill  were  perhaps  larger  still. 
Great  sums  had  been  paid  to  Major  Scott. 
Great  sums  had  been  laid  out  in  bribing  news 
papers,  rewarding  pamphleteers,  and  circulat 
ing  tracts.  Burke,  so  early  as  1790,  declared 
in  the  House  of  Commons  that  twenty  thousand 
pounds  had  been  employed  in  corrupting  the 
press.  It  is  certain  that  no  controversial 
weapon,  from  the  gravest  reasoning  to  the 
coarsest  ribaldry,  was  left  unemployed.  Logan, 
in  prose,  defended  the  accused  governor  with 
great  ability.  For  the  lovers  of  verse,  the 
speeches  of  the  managers  were  burlesqued  in 
Simpkin's  letters.  It  is,  we  are  afraid,  indis 
putable  that  Hastings  stooped  so  low  as  to 
court  the  aid  of  that  malignant  and  filthy  ba 
boon,  John  Williams,  who  called  himself  An 
thony  Pasquin.  It  was  necessary  to  subsidize 
such  allies  largely.  The  private  hoards  of  Mrs. 
Hastings  had  disappeared.  It  is  said  that  the 
banker  to  whom  they  had  been  intrusted  had 
failed.  Still,  if  Hastings  had  practised  strict 
economy,  he  would,  after  all  his  losses,  have 
had  a  moderate  competence ;  but  in  the  ma 
nagement  of  his  private  affairs  he  was  impru 
dent.  The  dearest  wish  of  his  heart  had  always 
been  to  regain  Daylesford.  At  length,  in  the 
very  year  in  which  his  trial  commenced,  the 
wish  was  accomplished ;  and  the  domain, 
alienated  more  than  seventy  years  before,  re 
turned  to  the  descendant  of  its  old  lords.  But 
the  manor-house  was  a  ruin ;  and  the  grounds 
round  it  had,  during  many  years,  oeen  utterly 
neglected.  Hastings  proceeded  to  build,  to 
plant,  to  form  a  sheet  of  water,  to  excavate  a 
grotto;  and,  before  he  was  dismissed  from  the 
bar  of  the  House  of  Lords,  he  had  expended 
more  than  10,000^.  in  a  lorn.'ng  his  sea.. 


600 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  general  feeling  both  of  the  Directors  and 
of  the  proprietors  of  the  East  India  Company 
was,  that  he  had  great  claims  on  them,  that  his 
services  to  them  had  been  eminent,  and  that  his 
misfortunes  had  been  the  effect  of  his  zeal  for 
their  interests.  His  friends  in  Leadenhall 
street,  proposed  to  reimburse  him  for  the  costs  I 
of  his  trial,  and  to  settle  on  him  an  annuity  of  i 
live  thousand  pounds  a  year.  But  the  consent  j 
of  the  Board  of  Control  was  required;  and  at 
the  head  of  the  Board  of  Control  was  Mr.  Dun- 
das,  who  had  himself  been  a  party  to  the  im 
peachment,  who  had,  on  that  account,  been 
reviled  with  great  bitterness  by  the  partisans 
of  Hastings,  and  who,  therefore,  was  not  in  a 
very  complying  mood.  He  refused  to  consent 
to  what  the  Directors  suggested.  The  Directors 
remonstrated.  A  long  controversy  followed. 
Hastings,  in  the  mean  time,  was  reduced  to 
such  distress  that  he  could  hardly  pay  his 
weekly  bills.  At  length  a  compromise  was 
made.  An  annuity  of  four  thousand  a  year 
was  settled  on  Hastings ;  and,  in  order  to  em- 
able  him  to  meet  pressing  demands,  he  was  to 
receive  ten  years'  annuity  in  advance.  The 
Company  was  also  permitted  to  lend  him  fifty 
thousand  pounds,  to  be  repaid  by  instalments, 
without  interest.  This  relief,  though  given  in 
the  most  absurd  manner,  was  sufficient  to  en 
able  the  retired  governor  to  live  in  comfort, 
and  even  in  luxury,  if  he  had  been  a  skilful 
manager.  But  he  was  careless  and  profuse, 
and  was  more  than  once  under  the  necessity 
cf  applying  to  the  Company  for  assistance, 
which  was  liberally  given. 

He  had  security  and  affluence,  but  not  the 
power  and  dignity,  which,  when  he  landed 
from  India,  he  had  reason  to  expect.  He  had 
then  looked  forward  to  a  coronet,  a  red  riband, 
a  seat  at  the  Council-board,  an  office  at  White 
hall.  He  was  then  only  fifty-two,  and  might 
hope  for  many  years  of  bodily  and  mental 
vigour.  The  case  was  widely  different  \vhen 
he  left  the  bar  of  the  Lords.  He  was  now  too 
old  a  man  to  turn  his  mind  to  a  new  class  of 
studies  and  duties.  He  had  no  chance  of  re 
ceiving  any  mark  of  royal  favour  while  Mr. 
Pitt  remained  in  power;  and,  when  Mr.  Pitt 
retired,  Hastings  was  approaching  his  seven 
tieth  year. 

Once,  and  only  once,  after  his  acquittal,  he 
interfered  in  politics,  and  that  interference  was 
not  much  to  his  honour.  In  1804,  he  exerted 
himself  strenuously  to  prevent  Mr.  Addington, 
against  whom  Fox  and  Pitt  had  combined, 
from  resigning  the  Treasury.  It  is  difficult  to 
believe  that  a  man  so  able  and  energetic  as 
Hastings,  can  have  thought  that,  when  Bona 
parte  was  at  Boulogne  with  a  great  army,  the 
defence  of  our  island  could  safely  be  intrusted 
to  a  ministry  which  did  not  contain  a  single 
person  whom  flattery  could  describe  as  a  great 
statesman.  It  is  also  certain  that,  on  the  im 
portant  question  which  had  raised  Mr.  Adding 
ton  to  power,  and  on  which  he  differed  from 
both  Fox  and  Pitt,  Hastings,  as  might  nave 
been  expected,  agreed  with  Fox  and  Pitt,  and 
was  decidedly  opposed  to  Addington.  Religious 
intolerance  has  never  been  the  vice  of  the  India 
service,  and  certainly  was  not  the  vice  of 
Hastings.  But  Mr.  Addington  had  treated  him 


with  marked  favour.  Fox  had  been  a  principa. 
manager  of  the  impeachment.  To  Pitt  it  was 
owing  that  there  had  been  an  impeachment; 
and  Hastings,  we  fear,  was  on  this  occasion 
guided  by  personal  considerations,  rather  than 
by  a  regard  to  the  public  interest. 

The  last  twenty-four  years  of  his  life  were 
chiefly  passed  at  Daylesford.  He  amused  him 
self  with  embellishing  his  grounds,  riding  fine 
Arab  horses,  fattening  prize-cattle,  and  trying 
to  rear  Indian  animals  and  vegetables  in  Eng«- 
land.  He  sent  for  seeds  of  a  very  fine  custard- 
apple,  from  the  garden  of  what  had  once  been 
his  own  villa,  among  the  green  hedgerows  of 
Allipore.  He  tried  also  to  naturalize  in  Wor 
cestershire  the  delicious  leechee,  almosi  the 
only  fruit  of  Bengal,  which  deserves  to  be  re 
gretted  even  amidst  the  plenty  of  Covent-Gar- 
den.  The  Mogul  emperors,  in  the  time  of  their 
greatness,  had  in  vain  attempted  to  introduce 
into  Hindostan  the  goat  of  the  table-land  of 
Thibet,  whose  down  supplies  the  looms  of 
Cashmere  with  the  materials  of  the  finest 
shawls.  Hastings  tried,  with  no  better  fortune, 
to  rear  a  breed  at  Daylesford ;  nor  does  he 
seem  to  have  succeeded  better  with  the  cattle 
of  Bootan,  whose  tails  are  in  high  esteem  as  the 
best  fans  for  brushing  away  the  musquitoes. 

Literature  divided  his  attention  with  his  con 
servatories  and  his  menagerie.  He  had  always 
loved  books,  and  they  were  now  necessary  to 
him.  Though  not  a'  poet,  in  any  high  sense 
of  the  word,  he  wrote  neat  and  polished  lines 
with  great  facility,  and  was  fond  of  exercising 
this  talent.  Indeed,  if  we  must  speak  out,  he 
seems  to  have  been  more  of  a  Trissotin  than 
was  to  be  expected  from  the  powers  of  his 
mind,  and  from  the  great  part  which  he  had 
played  in  life.  We  are  assured  in  these  Me 
moirs,  that  the  first  thing  which  he  did  in  the 
morning  was  to  compose  a  copy  of  verses. 
When  the  family  and  guests  assembled,  the 
poem  made  its  appearance  as  regularly  as  the 
eggs  and  rolls;  and  Mr.  Gleig  requires  us  to 
believe  that,  if  from  any  accident  Hastings 
came  to  the  breakfast-table  without  one  of  his 
charming  performances  in  his  hand,  the  omis 
sion  was  felt  by  all  as  a  grievous  disappoint 
ment.  Tastes  differ  widely.  For  ourselves 
we  must  say  that,  however  good  the  breakfasts 
at  Daylesford  may  have  been — and  we  are  as- 
sured  that  the  tea  was  of  the  most  aromatic 
flavour,  and  that  neither  tongue  nor  venison- 
pasty  was  wanting — we  should  have  thought 
the  reckoning  high,  if  we  had  been  forced  to 
earn  our  repast  by  listening  every  day  to  a  new 
madrigal  or  sonnet  composed  by  our  host.  We 
are  glad,  however,  that  Mr.  Gleig  has  preserved 
this  little  feature  of  character,  though  we  think 
it  by  no  means  a  beauty.  It  is  good  to  be  often 
reminded  of  the  inconsistency  of  human  na 
ture  ;  and  to  learn  to  look  without  wonder  or 
disgust  on  the  weaknesses  which  are  found  in 
the  strongest  minds.  Dionysius  in  old  times, 
Frederic  in  the  last  century,  with  capacity  and 
vigour  equal  to  the  conduct  of  the  greatest  af 
fairs,  united  all  the  little  vanities  and  affecta 
tions  of  provincial  blue-stockings.  These  great 
examples  may  console  the  admirers  of  Hast 
ings  for  the  affliction  of  seeing  him  reduced  to 
the  level  of  the  Hayleys  and  the  Sewanls. 


WARREN  HASTINGS. 


501 


When  Hastings  had  passed  many  years  in 
retirement,  and  had  long  outlived  the  common 
age  of  men,  he  again  became  for  a  short  time 
an  object  of  general  attention.  In  1813  the 
charter  of  the  East  India  Company  was  renew 
ed  ;  and  much  discussion  about  Indian  affairs 
took  place  in  Parliament.  It  was  determined  to 
examine  witnesses  at  the  bar  of  the  Commons, 
and  Hastings  was  ordered  to  attend.  He  had 
appeared  at  that  bar  before.  It  was  when  he 
read  his  answer  to  the  charges  which  Burke 
had  laid  on  the  table.  Since  that  time  twenty- 
seven  years  had  elapsed;  public  feeling  had 
undergone  a  complete  change;  the  nation  had 
now  forgotten  his  faults,  and  remembered  only 
his  services.  The  reappearance,  too  of  a  man 
who  had  been  among  the  most  distinguished 
of  a  generation  that  had  passed  away,  who  now 
belonged  to  history,  and  who  seemed  to  have 
risen  from  the  dead,  could  not  but  produce  a 
solemn  and  pathetic  effect.  The  Commons 
received  him  with  acclamations,  ordered  a 
chair  to  be  set  for  him,  and  when  he  retired, 
rose  and  uncovered.  There  were,  indeed,  a 
few  who  did  not  sympathize  with  the  general 
feeling.  One  or  two  of  the  managers  of  the 
impeachment  were  present.  They  sat  in  the 
same  seats  which  they  had  occupied  when  they 
had  been  thanked  for  the  services  which  they 
had  rendered  in  Westminster  Hall ;  for,  by  the 
courtesy  of  the  House,  a  member  who  has  been 
thanked  in  his  place,  is  considered  as  having  a 
right  always  to  occupy  that  place.  These  gen 
tlemen  were  not  disposed  to  admit  that  they 
had  employed  several  of  the  best  years  of  their 
Jives  in  persecuting  an  innocent  man.  They 
accordingly  kept  their  seats,  and  pulled  thei'r 
hats  over  their  brows ;  but  the  exceptions  only 
made  the  prevailing  enthusiasm  more  remark 
able.  The  Lords  received  the  old  man  with 
similar  tokens  of  respect.  The  University  of 
Oxford  conferred  on  him  the  degree  of  Doctor 
of  Laws;  and,  in  the  Sheldonian  theatre,  the 
under-graduates  welcomed  him  with  tumultu 
ous  cheering. 

These  marks  of  public  esteem  were  soon 
followed  by  marks  of  the  favour  of  the  crown. 
Hastings  was  sworn  of  the  Privy  Council,  and 
was  admitted  to  a  long  private  audience  of  the 
Prince  Regent,  who  treated  him  very  gracious 
ly.  When  the  Emperor  of  Russia  and  the  King 
of  Prussia  visited  England,  Hastings  appeared 
in  their  train  both  at  Oxford  and  in  the  Guild 
hall  of  London ;  and,  though  surrounded  by  a 
crowd  of  princes  and  great  warriors,  was  every 
where  received  by  the  public  with  marks  of 
respect  and  admiration.  He  was  presented  by 
the  Prince  Regent  both  to  Alexander  and  to 
Trederic  William;  and  his  Royal  Highness 
went  so  far  as  to  declare  in  public,  that  honours 
far  higher  than  a  seat  in  the  Privy  Council 
were  due,  and  should  soon  be  paid,  to  the  man 
who  had  saved  the  British  dominions  in  Asia. 
Hastings  now  confidently  expected  a  peerage ; 
but.  from  some  unexplained  cause,  he  was 
aga_i  disappointed. 


He  lived  about  four  years  longer  in  the  en 
joyment  of  good  spirits,  of  faculties  not  im 
paired  to  any  painful  or  degrading  extent,  and 
of  health  such  as  is  rarely  enjoyed  by  those 
who  attain  such  an  age.  At  length,  on  the  22J 
of  August,  1819,  in  the  eighty-sixth  year  of  his 
age,  he  met  death  with  the  same  tranquil  and 
decorous  fortitude  which  he  had  opposed  to 
all  the  trials  of  his  various  and  eventful  life. 

With  all  his  fa  ills — and  they  were  neither 
few  nor  small — only  one  cemetery  was  worthy 
to  contain  his  remains.  In  that  temple  of  si 
lence  and  reconciliation,  where  the  enmities 
of  twenty  generations  lie  buried,  in  the  Great 
Abbey  which  has  for  ages  afforded  a  quiet 
resting-place  to  those  whose  rninds  and  bodies 
have  been  shattered  by  the  contentions  of  the 
Great  Hall,  the  dust  of  the  illustrious  accused 
should  have  been  mingled  with  the  dust  of  the 
illustrious  accusers.  This  was  not  to  be.  Yet 
the  place  of  interment  was  not  ill  chosen.  Be 
hind  the  chancel  of  the  parish-church  of 
Daylesford,  in  earth  which  already  held  the 
bones  of  many  chiefs  of  the  house  of  Hastings, 
was  laid  the  coffin  of  the  greatest  man  who 
has  ever  borne  that  ancient  and  widely  extend 
ed  name.  On  that  very  spot  probably,  four 
score  years  before,  the  little  Warren,  meanly 
clan  and  scantily  fed,  had  played  with  the  chil 
dren  of  ploughmen.  Even  then  his  young  mind 
had  revolved  plans  which  might  be  called  ro 
mantic.  Yet,  however  romantic,  it  is  not  like 
ly  that  they  had  been  so  strange  as  th^  fruth. 
Not  only  had  the  poor  orphan  retrieved  the 
fallen  fortunes  of  his  line.  Not  only  had  he 
repurchased  the  old  lands,  and  rebuilt  the  old 
dwelling.  He  had  preserved  and  extended  an. 
empire.  He  had  founded  a  polity.  He  had 
administered  government  and  war  with  more 
than  the  capacity  of  Richelieu ;  and  had  pa 
tronised  learning  with  the  judicious  liberality 
of  Cosmo.  He  had  been  attacked  by  the  most 
formidable  combination  of  enemies  that  ever 
sought  the  destruction  of  a  single  victim  ;  and 
over  that  combination,  after  a  struggle  of  tea 
years,  he  had  triumphed.  He  had  at  length 
gone  down  to  his  grave  in  the  fulness  of  age — 
in  peace,  after  so  many  troubles;  in  honour, 
after  so  much  obloquy. 

Those  who  look  on  his  character  without  fa 
vour  or  malevolence,  will  pronounce  that,  in 
the  two  great  elements  of  all  social  virtue — in 
respect  for  the  rights  of  others,  and  in  sympa 
thy  for  the  sufferings  of  others — he  was  defi 
cient.  His  principles  were  somewhat  lax. 
His  heart  was  somewhat  hard.  But  while  we 
cannot  with  truth  describe  him  either  as  a 
righteous  or  as  a  merciful  ruler,  we  cannot 
regard  without  admiration  the  amplitude  and 
fertility  of  his  intellect — his  rare  talents  for 
command,  for  administration,  and  for  contro 
versy — his  dauntless  courage — his  honourable 
poverty — his  fervent  zeal  for  the  interests  of 
the  state — his  noble  equanimity,  tried  by  both 
extremes  of  fortune,  aci  never  disturbed  by 
eith'r. 


502 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


FEEDEEIC   THE  GEEAT.' 

'EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  APRIL,  1842.] 


THIS  work,  which  has  the  high  honour  of 
being  introduced  to  the  world  by  the  author  of 
"Lochiel"  and  "  Hohenlinden,"  is  not  wholly 
unworthy  of  so  distinguished  a  chaperon.  It 
professes,  indeed,  to  be  no  more  than  a  compi 
lation  ;  but  it  is  an  exceedingly  amusing  com 
pilation,  and  we  shall  be  glad  to  have  more  of 
it  The  narrative  comes  down  at  present  only 
lo  the  commencement  of  the  Seven  Years' 
War,  and  therefore  does  not  comprise  the 
most  interesting  portion  of  Frederic's  reign. 

It  may  not  be  unacceptable  to  our  readers 
that  we  should  take  this  opportunity  of  pre 
senting  them  with  a  slight  sketch  of  the  life  of 
the  greatest  king  that  has,  in  modern  times, 
succeeded  by  right  of  birth  to  a  throne.  It  may, 
we  fear,  be  impossible  to  compress  so  long  and 
eventful  a  story  within  the  limits  which  we  must 
prescribe  to  ourselves.  Should  we  be  compelled 
to  break  off,  we  shall,  when  the  continuation  of 
this  work  appears,  return  to  the  subject. 

The  Prussian  monarchy,  the  youngest  of  the 
great  European  states,  but  in  population  and 
in  revenue  the  fifth  amongst  them,  and  in  art, 
science,  and  civilization  entitled  to  the  third,  if 
not  the  second  place,  sprang  from  an  humble 
origin.  About  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  cen 
tury,  the  marquisate  of  Brandenburg  was  be 
stowed  by  the  Emperor  Sigismund  on  the  noble 
family  of  Hohenzollern.  In  the  sixteenth  century 
that  family  embraced  the  Lutheran  doctrines. 
Early  in  the  seventeenth  century  it  obtained 
from  the  King  of  Poland  the  investiture  of  the 
duchy  of  Prussia.  Even  after  this  accession 
of  territory,  the  chiefs  of  the  house  of  Hohen 
zollern  hardly  ranked  with  the  Electors  of  Sax 
ony  and  Bavaria.  The  soil  of  Brandenburg 
was  for  the  most  part  sterile.  Even  round 
Berlin,  the  capital  of  the  province,  and  round 
Potsdam,  the  favourite  residence  of  the  Mar 
graves,  the  country  was  a  desert.  In  some 
tracts,  the  deep  sand  could  with  difficulty  be 
forced  by  assiduous  tillage  to  yield  thin  crops 
of  rye  and  oats.  In  other  places,  the  ancient 
forests,  from  which  the  conquerors  of  the  Ro 
man  empire  had  descended  on  the  Danube, 
remained  untouched  by  the  hand  of  man. 
Where  the  soil  was  rich  it  was  generally 
marshy,  and  its  insalubrity  repelled  the  culti 
vators  whom  its  fertility  attracted.  Frederic 
William,  called  the  Great  Elector,  was  the 
prince  to  whose  policy  his  successors  have 
agreed  to  ascribe  their  greatness.  He  ac 
quired  by  the  peace  of  Westphalia  several 
Taluable  possessions,  and  among  them  the  rich 
city  and  district  of  Magdeburg ;  and  he  left  to 
his  son  Frederic  a  principality  as  considerable 
as  any  which  was  not  called  a  kingdom. 

Frederic  aspired  to  the  style  of  royalty.    Os- 

*  Frederic  the  Great  and  his  Times.  Edited,  with  an 
Introduction,  by  TIIUMAS  CAMPBELL.  Esq.  2  vols.  8vo. 
I  ondon  1842. 


tentatious  and  profuse,  negligent  of  his  trad 
interests  and  of  his  high  duties,  insatiably 
eager  for  frivolous  distinctions,  he  added  no 
thing  to  the  real  weight  of  the  state  which  he 
governed  ;  perhaps  he  transmitted  his  inheri 
tance  to  his  children  impaired  rather  than 
augmented  in  value,  but  he  succeeded  in  gain 
ing  the  great  object  of  his  life,  the  title  of  king. 
In  the  year  1700  he  assumed  this  new  dignity. 
He  had  on  that  occasion  to  undergo  all  the 
mortifications  which  fall  to  the  lot  of  ambitious 
upstarts.  Compared  with  the  other  crowned 
heads  of  Europe,  he  made  a  figure  resembling 
that  which  a  Nabob  or  a  Commissary,  who 
had  bought  a  title,  would  make  in  the  com 
pany  of  Peers  whose  ancestors  had  been  at 
tainted  for  treason  against  the  Plantagenets. 

The  envy  of  the  class  which  he  quitted,  and 
the  civil  scorn  of  the  class  into  which  he  in 
truded  himself,  were  marked  in  very  signifi 
cant  ways.  The  elector  of  Saxony  at  first 
refused  to  acknowledge  the  new  majesty. 
Louis  the  Fourteenth  looked  down  on  his  bro 
ther  king  with  an  air  not  unlike  that  with 
which  the  count  in  Moliere's  play  regards 
Monsieur  Jourdain,  just  fresh  from  the  mum 
mery  of  being  made  a  gentleman.  Austria 
exacted  large  sacrifice  in  return  for  her  re 
cognition,  and  at  last  gave  it  ungraciously. 

Frederic  was  succeeded  by  his  son,  Frederic 
William,  a  prince  who  must  be  allowed  to 
have  possessed  some  talents  for  administra 
tion,  but  whose  character  was  disfigured  by 
the  most  odious  vices,  and  whose  eccentrici 
ties  were  such  as  had  never  been  seen  out  of  a 
madhouse.  He  was  exact  and  diligent  in  the 
transaction  of  business,  and  he  was  the  first 
who  formed  the  design  of  obtaining  for  Prus 
sia  a  place  among  the  European  powers,  alto 
gether  out  of  proportion  to  her  extent  and 
population,  by  means  of  a  strong  military  or 
ganization.  Strict  economy  enabled  him  to 
keep  up  a  peace  establishment  of  sixty  thou 
sand  troops.  These  troops  were  disciplined 
in  such  a  manner,  that  placed  beside  them, 
the  household  regiments  of  Versailles  and  St. 
James's  would  have  appeared  an  awkward 
squad.  The  master  of  such  a  force  could  not 
but  be  regarded  by  all  his  neighbours  as  a  for 
midable  enemy,  and  a  valuable  ally. 

But  the  mind  of  Frederic  William  was  so 
ill-regulated,  that  all  his  inclinations  became 
passions,  and  all  his  passions  partook  of  the 
character  of  moral  and  intellectual  disease. 
His  parsimony  degenerated  into  sordid  ava 
rice.  His  taste  for  military  pomp  and  ordet 
became  a  mania,  like  that  of  a  Dutch  burgo 
master  for  tulips  ;  or  that  of  a  member  of  the 
Roxburgh  club  for  Caxtons.  While  tho  en 
voys  of  the  court  of  Berlin  were  in  a  state  of 
such  squalid  poverty  as  moved  the  laughter 
of  foreign  capitals ;  while  the  food  placed  be- 


FREDERIC  THE  GREAT. 


503 


fore  the  princes  ana  the  princesses  of  the 
blood-royal  of  Prussia  was  too  scanty  to  ap 
pease  hunger,  and  so  bad  that  even  hunger 
Juathed  it — no  price  was  thought  too  extrava 
gant  for  tall  recruits.  The  ambition  of  the 
king  was  to  form  a  brigade  of  giants,  and 
every  country  was  ransacked  by  his  agents 
for  men  above  the  ordinary  stature.  These 
researches  were  not  confined  to  Europe.  No 
head  that  towered  above  the  crowd  in  the  ba 
zaars  of  Aleppo,  of  Cairo,  or  of  Surat,  could 
escape  the  crimps  of  Frederic  William.  One 
Irishman  more  than  seven  feet  high,  who  was 
picked  up  in  London  by  the  Prussian  ambas 
sador,  received  a  bounty  of  nearly  1300/.  ster 
ling — very  much  more  than  the  ambassador's 
salary.  This  extravagance  was  the  more  ab 
surd,  because  a  stout  youth  of  five  feet  eight, 
who  might  have  been  procured  for  a  few  dol 
lars,  would  in  all  probability  have  been  a 
much  more  valuable  soldier.  But  to  Frederic 
"William,  this  huge  Irishman  was  what  a  brass 
Otho,  or  a  Vinegar  Bible,  is  to  a  collector  of  a 
different  kind. 

It  is  remarkable,  that  though  the  main  end 
of  Frederic  William's  administration  was  to 
have  a  military  force,  though  his  reign  forms 
an  important  epoch  in  the  history  of  military 
discipline,  and  though  his  dominant  passion  was 
the  love  of  military  display,  he  was  yet  one  of  the 
most  pacific  of  princes.  We  are  afraid  that 
his  aversion  to  war  was  not  the  effect  of  huma 
nity,  but  was  merely  one  of  his  thousand  whims. 
His  feeling  about  his  troops  seems  to  have  re 
sembled  a  miser's  feeling  about  his  money. 
He  loved  to  collect  them,  to  count  them,  to  see 
them  increase;  but  he  could  not  find  it  in  his 
heart  to  break  in  upon  the  precious  hoard. 
He  looked  forward  to  some  future  time  when 
his  Patagonian  battalions  were  to  drive  hostile 
infantry  before  them  like  sheep.  But  this  fu 
ture  time  was  always  receding ;  and  it  is  pro 
bable  that,  if  his  life  had  been  prolonged  thirty 
years,  his  superb  army  would  never  have  seen 
any  harder  service  than  a  sham  fight  in  the 
fields  near  Berlin.  But  the  great  military 
means  which  he  had  collected,  were  destined 
to  be  employed  by  a  spirit  far  more  daring 
and  inventive  than  his  own. 

Frederic,  surnamed  the  Great,  son  of  Fre 
deric  William,  was  born  in  January,  1712.  It 
may  safely  be  pronounced  that  he  had  received 
from  nature  a  strong  and  sharp  understanding, 
and  a  rare  firmness  of  temper  and  intensity  of 
will.  As  to  the  other  parts  of  his  character,  it 
is  difficult  to  say  whether  they  are  to  be  as 
cribed  to  nature,  or  to  the  strange  training 
which  he  underwent.  The  history  of  his  boy 
hood  is  painfully  interesting.  Oliver  Twist  in 
the  parish  workhouse,  Smike  at  Dotheboys 
Hall,  were  petted  children  when  compared 
with  this  wretched  heir-apparent  of  a  crown. 
The  nature  of  Frederic  William  was  hard  and 
bad,  and  the  habit  of  exercising  arbitrary  power 
had  made  him  frightfully  savage.  His  rage 
constantly  vented  itself  to  right  and  left  in 
curses  and  blows.  When  his  majesty  took  a 
walk,  every  human  being  fled  before  him,  as 
if  a  tiger  had  broken  loose  from  a  menagerie. 
If  he  met  a  lady  in  the  street,  he  gave  her  a 


brats.  If  he  saw  a  clergyman  staring  at  the 
soldiers,  he  admonished  the  reverend  gentle 
man  to  betake  himself  to  study  and  prayer, 
and  enforced  this  pious  advice  by  a  sound 
caning,  administered  on  the  spot.  But  it  was 
in  his  own  house  that  he  was  most  unreasona 
ble  and  ferocious.  His  palace  was  hell,  and 
he  the  most  execrable  of  fiends — a  cross  be 
tween  Moloch  and  Puck.  His  son  Frederic 
and  his  daughter  Wilhelmina,  afterwards  Mar 
gravine  of  Bareuth,  were  in  an  especial  man 
ner  objects  of  his  aversion.  His  own  mind 
was  uncultivated.  He  despised  literature.  He 
hated  infidels,  Papists,  and  metaphysicians, 
and  did  not  very  well  understand  in  what  they 
differed  from  each  other.  The  business  of 
life,  according  to  him,  was  to  drill  and  to  be 
drilled.  The  recreations  suited  to  a  prince, 
were  to  sit  in  a  cloud  of  tobacco-smoke,  to  sip 
Swedish  beer  between  the  puffs  of  the  pipe,  to 
play  backgammon  for  three-halfpence  a  rub 
ber,  to  kill  wild  hogs,  and  to  shoot  partridges 
by  the  thousand.  The  Prince-Royal  showed 
little  inclination  either  for  the  serious  employ 
ments  or  for  the  amusements  of  his  father.  He 
shirked  the  duties  of  the  parade — he  detested 
the  fume  of  tobacco — he  had  no  taste  either  for 
backgammon  or  for  field-sports.  He  had  re 
ceived  from  nature  an  exquisite  ear,  and  per 
formed  skilfully  on  the  flute.  His  earliest  in 
structors  had  been  French  refugees,  and  they  had 
awakened  in  him  a  strong  passion  for  French 
literature  and  French  society.  Frederic  Wil 
liam  regarded  these  tastes  as  effeminate  and 
contemptible,  and,  by  abuse  and  persecution, 
made  them  still  stronger.  Things  became 
worse  when  the  Prince-Royal  attained  that 
time  of  life  at  which  the  great  revolution  in 
the  human  mind  and  body  takes  place.  He 
was  guilty  of  some  youthful  indiscretions, 
which  no  good  and  wise  parent  would  regard 
with  severity.  At  a  later  period  he  was  ac 
cused,  truly  or  falsely,  of  vices,  from  which 
History  averts  her  eyes,  and  which  even  Sa 
tire  blushes  to  name — vices  such  that,  to  bor 
row  the  energetic  language  of  Lord-Keeper 
Coventry,  "  the  depraved  nature  of  man,  which 
of  itself  carrieth  man  to  all  other  sin,  abhorreth 
them."  But  the  offences  of  his  youth  were  not 
characterized  by  any  peculiar  turpitude.  They 
excited,  however,  transports  of  rage  in  the 
king,  who  hated  all  faults  except  those  to 
which  he  was  himself  inclined ;  and  who  con 
ceived  that  he  made  ample  atonement  to  Hea 
ven  for  his  brutality,  by  holding  the  softer  pas 
sions  in  detestation.  The  Prince-Royal,  too, 
was  not  one  of  those  who  are  content  to  take 
their  religion  on  trust.  He  asked  puzzling 
questions,  and  brought  forward  arguments 
which  seemed  to  savour  of  something  different 
from  pure  Lutheranism.  The  king  suspected 
that  his  son  was  inclined  to  be  a  heretic  cf 
some  sort  or  other,  whether  Calvinist  or  Atheist, 
his  maj  sty  did  not  very  well  know.  The  or 
dinary  malignity  of  Frederic  William  was  ba^ 
enough.  He  now  thought  malignity  a  part  of 
his  duty  as  a  Christian  man,  anu  aii  the  con 
science  that  he  had  stimulated  his  hatred. 
The  flute  was  broken— the  French  books  were 
sent  out  of  the  palace — the  prince  was  Kicked, 
and  cudgelled,  anf  pulled  by  the  hair.  4.t  r!;n 


604 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


ner  the  plates  were  hurled  at  his  head — some 
times  he  was  restricted  to  bread  and  water — 
sometimes  he  was  forced  to  swallow  food  so 
nauseous  that  he  could  not  keep  it  on  his  sto 
mach.  Once  his  father  knocked  him  down, 
dragged  him  along  the  floor  to  a  window,  and 
was  with  difficulty  prevented  from  strangling 
him  with  the  cord  of  the  curtain.  The  queen, 
for  the  crime  of  not  wishing  to  see  her  son 
murdered,  was  subjected  to  the  grossest  indig 
nities.  The  Princess  Wilhelmina,  who  took 
her  brother's  part,  was  treated  almost  as  ill  as 
Mrs.  Brownrigg's  apprentices.  Driven  to  de 
spair,  the  unhappy  youth  tried  to  run  away ; 
then  the  fury  of  the  old  tyrant  rose  to  madness. 
The  prince  was  an  officer  in  the  army ;  his 
flight  was  therefore  desertion,  and,  in  the  moral 
code  of  Frederic  William,  desertion  was  the 
highest  of  all  crimes.  "  Desertion,"  says  this 
royal  theologian,  in  one  of  his  half-crazy  let 
ters,  "  is  from  hell.  It  is  a  work  of  the  child 
ren  of  the  devil.  No  child  of  God  could  pos 
sibly  be  guilty  of  it."  An  accomplice  of  the 
prince,  in  spite  of  the  recommendation  of  a 
court-martial,  was  mercilessly  put  to  death. 
It  seemed  probable  that  the  prince  himself 
would  suffer  the  same  fate.  It  was  with  dif 
ficulty  that  the  intercession  of  the  States  of 
Holland,  of  the  Kings  of  Sweden  and  Poland, 
and  of  the  Emperor  of  Germany,  saved  the 
House  of  Brandenburgh  from  the  stain  of  an 
unnatural  murder.  After  months  of  cruel  sus 
pense,  Frederic  learned  that  his  life  would  be 
spared.  He  remained,  however,  long  a  pri 
soner;  but  he  was  not  on  that  account  to  be 
pitied.  He  found  in  his  jailers  a  tenderness 
which  he  had  never  found  in  his  father;  his 
table  was  not  sumptuous,  but  he  had  whole 
some  food  in  sufficient  quantity  to  appease 
hunger;  he  could  read  the  Hcnriade  without 
being  kicked,  and  play  on  his  flute  without 
having  it  broken  over  his  head. 

When  his  confinement  terminated,  he  was 
a  man.  He  had  nearly  completed  his  twenty- 
first  year,  and  could  scarcely,  even  by  such  a 
parent  as  Frederic  William  be  kept  much 
'onger  under  the  restraints  which  had  made 
nis  boyhood  miserable.  Suffering  had  matured 
his  understanding,  while  it  had  hardened  his 
heart  and  soured  his  temper.  He  had  learnt 
self-command  and  dissimulation  ;  he  affected 
to  conform  to  some  of  his  father's  views,  and 
submissively  accepted  a  wife,  who  was  a  wife 
onJy  in  name,  from  his  father's  hand.  He  also 
served  with  credit,  though  without  any  oppor 
tunity  of  acquiring  brilliant  distinction,  under 
the  command  of  Prince  Eugene,  during  a  cam 
paign  marked  by  no  extraordinary  events.  He 
was  now  permitted  to  keep  a  separate  esta 
blishment,  and  was  therefore  able  to  indulge 
wi»h  caution  his  own  tastes.  Partly  in  order 
to  conciliate  the  king,  and  partly,  no  doubt, 
from  inclination,  he  gave  up  a  portion  of  his 
lime  to  military  and  political  business,  and 
thus  gradually  acquired  such  an  aptitude  for 
affairs  as  his  most  intimate  associates  were 
not  aware  that  he  possessed. 

His  favourite  abode  was  at  Rheinsberg,  near 
the  frontier  which  separates  the  Prussian  do 
minions  from  the  duchy  of  Mecklenburg. 
Rheinsberg  is  a  fertile  and  smiling  spot,  in  the 


midst  of  the  sandy  waste  of  the  Marquisate. 
The  mansion,  surrounded  by  woods  of  oak 
and  beech,  looks  out  upon  a  spacious  lake. 
There  Frederic  amused  himself  by  laying  out 
gardens  in  regular  alleys  and  intricate  maies, 
by  building  obelisks,  temples,  and  conserva 
tories,  and  by  collecting  rare  fruits  and  flowers. 
His  retirement  was  enlivened  by  a  few  com 
panions,  among  whom  he  seems  to  have  pre 
ferred  those  who,  by  birth  or  extraction,  were 
French.  With  these  inmates  he  dined  and 
supped  well,  drank  freely,  and  amused  him 
self  sometimes  with  concerts,  sometimes  with 
holding  chapters  of  a  fraternity  which  he  call 
ed  the  Order  of  Bayard ;  but  literature  was  his 
chief  resource. 

His  education  had  been  entirely  French. 
The  long  ascendency  which  Louis  XIV.  had 
enjoyed,  and  the  eminent  merit  of  the  tragic 
and  comic  dramatists,  of  the  satirists,  and  of 
the  preachers  who  had  flourished  wilder  that 
magnificent  prince,  had  made  the  French  lan 
guage  predominant  in  Europe.  Even  in  coun 
tries  which  had  a  national  literature,  and  wvch 
could  boast  of  names  greater  than  those  cf 
Racine,  of  Moliere,  and  of  Massillon — in  the 
country  of  Dante,  in  the  country  of  Cervantes, 
in  the  country  of  Shakspeare  and  Milton — the 
intellectual  fashions  of  Paris  had  been  to  a 
great  extent  adopted.  Germany  had  not  yet 
produced  a  single  masterpiece  of  poetry  or 
eloquence.  In  Germany,  therefore,  the  French 
taste  reigned  without  rival  and  without  limit. 
Every  youth  of  rank  was  taught  to  speak  and 
write  French.  That  he  should  speak  and 
write  his  own  tongue  with  politeness,  or  even 
with  accuracy  and  facility,  was  regarded  as 
comparatively  an  unimportant  object.  Even 
Frederic  William,  with  all  his  rugged  Saxon 
prejudices,  thought  it  necessary  that  his  chil 
dren  should  know  French,  and  quite  unneces 
sary  that  they  should  be  well  versed  in  German. 
The  Latin  was  positively  interdicted.  "My 
son,"  his  majesty  wrote, "  shall  not  learn  Latin; 
and,  more  than  that,  I  will  not  suffer  anybody 
even  to  mention  such  a  thing  to  me."  One  of 
the  preceptors  ventured  to  read  the  Golden 
Bull  in  the  original  with  the  Prince-Royal. 
Frederic  William  entered  the  room,  and  broke 
out  in  his  usual  kingly  style. 

"Rascal,  what  are  you  at  there  1" 

"Please  your  majesty,"  answered  the  pre 
ceptor,  "I  was  explaining  the  Golden  Bull  to 
his  royal  highness." 

"I'll  Golden  Bull  you,  you  rascal !"  roared 
the  majesty  of  Prussia.  Up  went  the  king's 
cane,  away  ran  the  terrified  instructor,  and 
Frederic's  classical  studies  ended  forever. 
He  now  and  then  affected  to  quote  Latin  sen 
tences,  and  produced  such  exquisite  Cicero 
nian  phrases  as  these: — "Stantepede  morire," 
— "Degustibus  non  est  disputandus," — "Tot 
verbas  tot  spondera."  Of  Italian,  he  had  no; 
enough  to  read  a  page  of  Metastasio  with  ease 
and  of  the  Spanish  and  English,  he  did  not, 
as  far  as  we  are  aware,  understand  a  single 
word. 

As  the  highest  human  compositions  to  which 
he  had  access  were  those  of  the  French  writers, 
it  is  not  strange  that  his  admiration  for  those 
writers  should  have  been  unbounded.  His 


FREDERIC   THE  GREAT. 


505 


ambitious  and  eager  temper  early  prompted  ' 
him  to  imitate  what  he  admired.  The  wish, 
perhaps,  dearest  to  his  heart  was,  that  he  might 
rank  among  the  masters  of  French  rhetoric 
and  poetry.  He  wrote  prose  and  verse  as 
indcfatigably  as  if  he  had  been  a  starving 
hack  of  Cave  or  Osborn;  but  Nature,  which 
had  bestowed  on  him,  in  a  large  measure,  the 
talents  of  a  captain  and  of  an  administrator, 
had  withheld  from  him  those  higher  and  rarer 
gifts,  without  which  industry  labours  in  vain 
to  produce  immortal  eloquence  or  song.  And, 
indeed,  had  he  been  blessed  with  more  imagi 
nation,  wit,  and  fertility  of  thought,  than  he 
appears  to  have  had,  he  would  still  have  been 
subject  to  one  great  disadvantage,  which  would, 
in  all  probability,  have  forever  prevented  him 
from  taking  a  high  place  among  men  of  letters. 
He  had  not  the  full  command  of  any  language. 
There  was  no  machine  of  thought  which  he 
could  employ  with  perfect  ease,  confidence, 
and  freedom.  He  had  German  enough  to 
scold  his  servants,  or  tc  five  the  word  of 
command  to  his  grenadiers  ;  bul  his  grammar 
and  pronunciation  were  extremely  bad.  He 
found  it  difficult  to  make  out  the  meaning 
even  of  the  simplest  German  poetry  On  one 
occasion  a  version  of  Racine's  fykigenie  was 
read  to  him.  He  held  the  French  original  in 
his  hand;  but  was  forced  to  own  that,  even 
with  such  help,  he  could  not  understand  the 
translation.  Yet  though  he  had  neglected  his 
mother  tongue  in  order  to  bestow  all  his  atten 
tion  on  French,  his  French  was,  after  all,  the 
French  of  a  foreigner.  It  was  necessary  for 
him  to  have  always  at  his  beck  some  men  of 
letters  from  Paris  to  point  out  the  solecisms 
and  false  rhymes,  of  which,  to  the  last,  he  was 
frequently  guilty.  Even  had  he  possessed  the 
poetic  faculty — of  which,  as  far  as  we  can 
judsre,  he  was  utterly  destitute — the  want  of  a 
language  would  have  prevented  him  from  be 
ing  a  great  poet.  No  noble  work  of  imagina 
tion,  as  far  as  we  recollect,  was  ever  composed 
by  any  man,  except  in  a  dialect  which  he  had 
learned  without  remembering  how  or  when  ; 
and  which  he  had  spoken  with  perfect  ease 
before  he  had  ever  analyzed  its  structure. 
Romans  of  great  talents  wrote  Greek  verses  ; 
but  how  many  of  those  verses  have  deserved 
to  live?  Many  men  of  eminent  genius  have, 
in  modern  times,  written  Latin  poems ;  but, 
as  far  as  we  are  aware,  none  of  those  poems, 
not  even  Milton's,  can  be  ranked  in  the  first 
class  of  art,  or  even  very  high  in  the  second. 
It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  in  the  French 
verses  of  Frederic,  we  can  find  nothing  be 
yond  the  reach  of  any  man  of  good  parts  and 
industry — nothing  above  the  level  of  Newdi- 
gate  and  Seatonian  poetry.  His  best  pieces 
may  perhaps  rank  with  the  worst  in  Dodsley's 
collection.  In  history,  he  succeeded  better. 
We  do  not,  indeed,  find  in  any  part  of  his 
Voluminous  Memoirs,  either  deep  reflection  or 
vivid  painting.  But  the  narrative  is  distin 
guished  by  clearness,  conciseness,  good  sense, 
and  a  certain  air  of  truth  and  simplicity,  which 
is  singularly  graceful  in  a  man  who,  having 
done  great  things,  sits  down  to  relate  them. 
On  the  whole,  however,  none  of  his  writings 
are  so  agreeable  to  us  as  his  Letters ;  particu- 
VOL.  IV.— 64 


larly  those  whichfare  written  with  earnestness^ 
and  are  not  embroidered  with  verses. 

It  is  not  strange  that  a  young  man  devoted  to 
literature,  and  acquainted  only  with  the  litera 
ture  of  France,  should  have  looked  with  profound 
veneration  on  the  genius  of  Voltaire.  Nor  is 
it  just  to  condemn  him  for  this  feeling.  "A 
man  who  has  never  seen  the  sun,"  says  Calde- 
ron  in  one  of  his  charming  comedies,  "cannot 
be  blamed  for  thinking  that  no  glory  can  exceed 
that  of  the  moon.  A  man  who  has  seen  neither 
moon  nor  sun,  cannot  be  blamed  for  talking  of 
the  unrivalled  brightness  of  the  morning  star." 
Had  Frederic  been  able  to  read  Homer  and 
Milton,  or  even  Virgil  and  Tasso,  his  ail  mira 
tion  of  the  Hettriade  would  prove  that  he  was 
utterly  destitute  of  the  power  of  discerning 
what  is  excellent  in  art.  Had  he  been  familiar 
with  Sophocles  or  Shakspeare,  we  should  have 
expected  him  to  appreciate  Zaire  more  justly. 
Had  he  been  able  to  study  Thucydides  and 
Tacitus  in  the  original  Greek  and  Latin,  he 
would  have  known  that  there  were  heights  in 
the  eloquence  of  history  far  beyond  the  reach 
of  the  author  of  the  Life  of  Charles  the  Tw'lfih. 
But  the  finest  heroic  poem,  several  of  the  most 
powerful  tragedies,  and  the  most  brilliant  and 
picturesque  historical  work  that  Frederic  had 
ever  read,  were  Voltaire's.  Such  high  and 
various  excellence  moved  the  young  prince 
almost  to  adoration.  The  opinions  of  Voltaire 
on  religious  and  philosophical  questions  had 
not  yet  been  fully  exhibited  to  the  public.  At 
a  later  period,  when  an  exile  from  his  country, 
and  at  open  war  with  the  Church,  he  spoke 
out.  But  when  Frederic  was  at  Rheinsberg, 
Voltaire  was  still  a  courtier;  and,  though  he 
could  not  always  curb  his  petulant  wit,  he  had 
as  yet  published  nothing  that  could  exclude 
him  from  Versailles,  and  little  that  a  divine  of 
the  mild  and  generous  school  of  Grotius  and 
Tillotson  might  not  read  with  pleasure.  In 
the  Henriadc,  in  Zaire,  and  in  Jllzirc,  Christian 
piety  is  exhibited  in  the  most  amiable  formj 
and,  some  years  after  the  period  of  which  we 
are  writing,  a  Pope  condescended  to  accept 
the  dedication  of  Mahomet.  The  real  senti 
ments  of  the  poet,  however,  might  be  clearly 
perceived  by  a  keen  eye  through  the  decent 
disguise  with  which  he  veiled  them,  and  could 
not  escape  the  sagacity  of  Frederic,  who  held 
similar  opinions,  and  had  been  accustomed  to 
practise  similar  dissimulation. 

The  prince  wrote  to  his  idol  in  the  style  of  a 
worshipper,  and  Voltaire  replied  with  exquisite 
grace  and  address.  A  correspondence  follow 
ed,  which  may  be  studied  with  advantage  by 
those  Avho  wish  to  become  proficients  in  the 
ignoble  art  of  flattery.  No  man  ever  paid 
compliments  better  than  Voltaire.  His  sweet 
ened  confectionary  had  always  a  delicate,  yet 
stimulating  flavour,  which  was  delightful  to 
palates  wearied  by  the  coarse  preparations  of 
inferior  artists.  It  was  only  from  his  hand  that 
so  much  sugar  could  be  swallowed  without 
making  the  swallower  sick.  Copies  of  verses, 
writing-desks,  trinkets  of  amber,  were  ex 
changed  between  the  friends.  Frederic  con 
fided  his  writings  to  Voltaire,  and  Voltaire 
applauded,  as  if  Frederic  had  been  Racine  and 
Bossuetin  one.  One  of  his  royal  highness* 

au 


506 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


performances  was  a  refutation  of  the  Principe 
of  Machiavelli.  Voltaire  undertook  to  convey 
it  to  the  press.  It  was  entitled  the  Aiiti-Machi- 
avel,  and  was  an  edifying  homily  against  rapa 
city,  perfidy,  arbitrary  government,  unjust  war 
— in  short,  against  almost  every  thing  for  which 
its  author  is  now  remembered  among  men. 

The  old  king  uttered  now  and  then  a  fero 
cious  growl  at  the  diversions  of  Rheinsberg. 
But  his  health  was  broken,  his  end  was  ap- 

Eroaching,  and  his  vigour  was  impaired.  He 
ad  only  one  pleasure  left — that  of  seeing  tall 
soldiers.  He  could  always  be  propitiated  by  a 
present  of  a  grenadier  of  six  feet  eight  or  six 
feet  nine;  and  such  presents  were  from  time 
to  time  judiciously  offered  by  his  son. 

Early  in  the  year  1740,  Frederic  William 
met  death  with  a  firmness  and  dignity  worthy 
of  a  better  and  wiser  man  ;  and  Frederic,  who 
had  just  completed  his  twenty-eighth  year,  be 
came  King  of  Prussia.  His  character  was 
little  understood.  That  he  had  good  abilities, 
indeed,  no  person  who  had  talked  with  him  or 
corresponded  with  him  could  doubt.  But  the 
easy  Epicurean  life  which  he  had  led,  his  love 
of  good  cookery  and  good  wine,  of  music,  of 
conversation,  of  light  literature,  led  many  to 
regard  him  as  a  sensual  and  intellectual  volup 
tuary.  His  habit  of  canting  about  moderation, 
peace,  liberty,  and  the  happiness  which  a  good 
mind  derives  from  the  happiness  of  others,  had 
imposed  on  some  who  should  have  known 
better.  Those  who  thought  best  of  him,  ex 
pected  a  Telemachus  after  Fenelon's  pattern. 
Others  predicted  the  approach  of  a  Medicean 
age — an  age  propitious  to  learning  and  art,  and 
not  unpropnious  to  pleasure.  Nobody  had  the 
least  suspicion  that  a  tyrant  of  extraordinary 
military  and  political  talents,  of  industry  more 
extraordinary  still,  without  fear,  without  faith, 
and  without  mercy,  had  ascended  the  throne. 

The  disappointment  of  Falstaft"  at  his  old 
boon  companion's  coronation,  was  not  more 
bitter  than  that  which  awaited  some  of  the 
inmates  of  Rheinsberg.  They  had  long  looked 
forward  to  the  accession  of  their  patron,  as  to 
the  day  from  which  their  own  prosperity  and 
greatness  was  to  date.  They  had  at  last  reach 
ed  the  promised  land,  the  land  which  they  had 
figured  to  themselves  as  flowing  with  milk  and 
honey,  and  they  found  it  a  desert.  "No  more 
of  these  fooleries,"  was  the  short,  sharp  admo 
nition  given  by  Frederic  to  one  of  them.  It 
soon  became  plain  that,  in  the  most  important 
points,  the  new  sovereign  bore  a  strong  family 
likeness  to  his  predecessor.  There  was  a  wide 
difference  between  the  father  and  the  son  as 
respected  extent  and  vigour  of  intellect,  specu 
lative  opinions,  amusements,  studies,  outward 
demeanour.  But  the  groundwork  of  the  cha 
racter  was  the  same  in  both.  To  both  were 
coiumun  the  love  of  order,  the  love  of  business, 
Ihe  military  taste,  the  parsimony,  the  imperious 
spirit,  the  temper  irritable  even  to  ferocity,  the 
pleasure  in  the  pain  and  humiliation  of  others. 
But  these  propensities  had  in  Frederic  William 
partaken  of  the  genera'  nnsoundness  of  his 
mind,  and  wore  a  very  different  aspect  when 
found  in  company  with  the  strong  and  culti 
vated  understanding  of  his  successor.  Thus, 
for  example,  Frederic  was  as  anxious  as  any 


prince  could  be  about  the  efficacy  of  his  army 
But  this  anxiety  never  degenerated  into  a  mo* 
nomania,  like  that  which  led  his  father  to  nay 
fancy-prices  for  giants.  Frederic  was  as  thrifty 
about  money  as  any  prince  or  any  private  man 
ought  to  be.  But  he  did  not  conceive,  like  his 
father,  that  it  was  worth  while  to  eat  unwhole 
some  cabbages  for  the  sake  of  saving  four  or 
five  rix-dollars  in  the  year.  Frederic  was,  we 
fear,  as  malevolent  as  his  father;  but  Frede 
ric's  wit  enabled  him  often  to  show  his  male 
volence  in  ways  more  decent  than  those  to 
which  his  father  resorted,  and  to  inflict  misery 
and  degradation  by  a  taunt  instead  of  a  blow. 
Frederic,  it  is  true,  by  no  means  relinquished 
his  hereditary  privilege  of  kicking  and  cudgel 
ling.  His  practice,  however,  as  to  that  matter, 
differed  in  some  important  respects  from  his 
father's.  To  Frederic  William,  the  mere  cir 
cumstance  that  any  persons  whatever,  men, 
women,  or  children,  Prussians  or  foreigners, 
were  within  reach  of  his  toes  and  of  his  cane, 
appeared  to  be  a  sufficient  reason  for  proceed 
ing  to  belabour  them.  Frederic  required  pro 
vocation  as  well  as  vicinity;  nor  was  he  ever 
known  to  inflict  this  paternal  species  of  correc 
tion  on  any  but  his  born  subjects;  though  on 
one  occasion  M.  Thiebault  had  reason,  during 
a  few  seconds,  to  anticipate  the  high  honour 
of  being  an  exception  to  this  general  rule. 

The  character  of  Frederic  was  still  very  im 
perfectly  understood  either  by  his  subjects  or 
by  his  neighbours,  when  events  occurred  which 
exhibited  it  in  a  strong  light.  A  few  months 
after  his  accession  died  Charles  VI.,  Emperor 
of  Germany,  the  last  descendant,  in  the  male 
line,  of  the  house  of  Austria. 

Charles  left  no  son,  and  had,  long  before  bis 
death,  relinquished  all  hopes  of  male  issue. 
During  the  latter  part  of  his  life,  his  principal 
object  had  been  to  secure  to  his  descendants  in 
the  female  line  the  many  crowns  of  the  house 
of  Hapsburg.  With  this  view,  he  had  promul 
gated  a  new  law  of  succession,  widely  cele 
brated  throughout.  Europe  under  the  name  of 
the  "Pragmatic  Sanction."  By  virtue  of  this 
decree,  his  daughter,  the  Archduchess  Maria 
Theresa,  wife  of  Francis  of  Lorraine,  succeed 
ed  to  the  dominions  of  her  ancestors. 

No  sovereign  has  ever  taken  possession  of 
a  throne  by  a  clearer  title.  All  the  politics  of 
the  Austrian  cabinet  had,  during  twenty  years, 
been  directed  to  one  single  end — the  settlement 
of  the  succession.  From  every  person  whose 
rights  could  be  considered  as  injuriously  af 
fected,  renunciations  in  the  most  solemn  form 
had  been  obtained.  The  new  law  had  been 
ratified  by  the  Estates  of  all  the  kingdoms  arid 
principalities  which  made  up  the  great  Aus 
trian  monarchy.  England,  France,  Spain,  Rus 
sia,  Poland,  Prussia,  Sweden,  Denmark,  the 
Germanic  body, had  bound  themselves  by  treaty 
to  maintain  the  "Pragmatic  Sanction."  That 
instrument  was  placed  under  the  protection  of 
the  public  faith  of  the  whole  civilized  world. 

Even  if  no  positive  stipulations  on  this  sub 
ject  had  existed,  the  arrangement  was  one 
which  no  good  man  would  have  been  willing 
to  disturb.  It  was  a  peaceable  arrangement, 
ft  was  an  arrangement  acceptable  to  the  great 
population  whose  happiness  was  chiefly  coa 


FREDERIC   THE    GREAT 


507 


cerned.  It  was  an  arrangement  which  made 
no  change  in  the  distribution  of  power  among 
the  states  of  Christendom.  It  was  an  arrange 
ment  which  could  be  set  aside  only  by  means 
of  a  general  war;  and,  if  it  were  set  aside,  the 
effect  would  be.  that  the  equilibrium  of  Europe 
would  be  deranged,  that  the  loyal  and  patriotic 
feelings  of  millions  would  be  cruelly  outraged, 
and  that  great  provinces,  which  had  been 
united  for  centuries,  would  be  torn  from  each 
other  by  main  force. 

The  sovereigns  of  Europe  were,  therefore, 
bound  by  every  obligation  which  those  who 
are  intrusted  with  power  over  their  fellow- 
creatures  ought  to  hold  most  sacred,  to  respect 
and  defend  the  rights  of  the  Archduchess.  Her 
situation  and  her  personal  qualities  were  such 
as  might  be  expected  to  move  the  mind  of  any 
generous  man  to  pity,  admiration,  and  chivai- 
rous  tenderness.  She  was  in  her  twenty-fourth 
year.  Her  form  was  majestic,  her  features 
beautiful,  her  countenance  sweet  and  ani 
mated,  her  voice  musical,  her  deportment  gra 
cious  and  dignified.  In  all  domestic  relations 
she  was  without  reproach.  She  was  married 
to  a  husband  whom  she  loved,  and  was  on  the 
point  of  giving  birth  to  a  child  when  death  de 
prived  her  of  her  father.  The  loss  of  a  parent 
and  the  new  cares  of  the  empire  were  too 
much  for  her  in  the  delicate  state  of  her  health. 
Her  spirits  were  depressed,  and  her  cheek  lost 
its  bloom. 

Yet  it  seemed  that  she  had  little  cause  for 
anxiety.  It  seemed  that  justice,  humanity,  and 
the  faith  of  treaties  would  have  their  due 
weight,  and  that  the  settlement  so  solemnly 
guarantied  would  be  quietly  carried  into  effect. 
England,  Russia,  Poland,  and  Holland  declared 
in  form  their  intention  to  adhere  to  their  en 
gagements.  The  French  ministers  made  a 
verbal  declaration  to  the  same  effect.  But 
from  no  quarter  did  the  young  Queen  of  Hun 
gary  receive  stronger  assurances  of  friendship 
and  support  than  from  the  King  of  Prussia. 

Yet  the  King  of  Prussia,  the  "  Anti-Machia- 
vel,"  had  already  fully  determined  to  commit 
the  great  crime  of  violating  his  plighted  faith, 
of  robbing  the  ally  whom  he  was  bound  to  de 
fend,  and  of  plunging  all  Europe  into  a  long, 
bloody,  and  desolating  war,  and  all  this  for  no 
end  whatever  except  that  he  might  extend  his 
dominions  and  see  his  name  in  the  gazettes. 
He  determined  to  assemble  a  great  army  with 
speed  and  secrecy  to  invade  Silesia  before 
Maria  Theresa  should  be  apprized  of  his  de 
sign,  and  to  add  that  rich  province  to  his  king 
dom. 

We  will  not  condescend  to  refute  at  length 
the  pleas  which  the  compiler  of  the  Memoirs 
before  us  has  copied  from  Doctor  Preuss. 
They  amount  to  this — that  the  house  of  Bran 
denburg  had  some  ancient  pretensions  to  Sile 
sia,  and  had  in  the  previous  century  been  com 
pelled,  by  hard  usage  on  the  part  of  the  court 
of  Vienna,  to  waive  those  pretensions.  It  is 
certain  that,  whoever  might  originally  have 
been  in  the  right,  Prussia  had  submitted. 
Prince  after  prince  of  the  house  of  Branden 
burg  had  acquiesced  in  the  existing  arrange 
ment.  Nay,  the  court  of  Berlin  had  recently 
been  allied  with  that  of  Vienna,  and  had  gua 


rantied  the  integrity  of  the  Austrian  "ies.  I» 
it  not  perfectly  clear  that,  if  antiquated  claim? 
are  to  be  set  up  against  recent  treaties  and 
long  possession,  the  world  can  never  be  at 
peace  for  a  day?  The  laws  of  all  nations 
have  wisely  established  a  time  of  limitation, 
after  which  titles,  however  illegitimate  in  their 
origin,  cannot  be  questioned.  It  is  felt  by 
everybody  that  to  eject  a  person  from  his 
estate  on  the  ground  of  some  injustice  com 
mitted  in  the  time  of  the  Tudors,  would  pro 
duce  all  the  evils  which  result  from  arbitrary 
confiscation,  and  would  make  all  property  in 
secure.  It  concerns  the  commonwealth — so 
runs  the  legal  maxim — that  there  be  an  end 
of  litigation.  And  surely  this  maxim  is  at 
least  equally  applicable  to  the  great  common 
wealth  of  states,  for  in  that  commonwealth  liti 
gation  means  the  devastation  of  provinces,  the 
suspension  of  frade  and  industry,  sieges  like 
those  of  Badajoz  and  St.  Sebastian,  pitched 
fields  like  those  of  Eylau  and  Borodino.  We 
hold  that  the  transfer  of  Norway  from  Denmark 
to  Sweden  was  an  unjustifiable  proceeding;  but 
would  the  king  of  Denmark  be  therefore  justi 
fied  in  landing,  without  any  new  provocation, 
in  Norway,  and  commencing  military  opera 
tions  there  1  The  King  of  Holland  thinks,  no 
doubt,  that  he  was  unjustly  deprived  of  the 
Belgian  provinces.  Grant  that  it  were  so. 
Would  he,  therefore,  be  justified  in  marching 
with  an  army  on  Brusseh  1  The  case  against 
Frederic  was  still  stronger,  inasmuch  as  the 
injustice  of  which  he  complained  had  been 
committed  more  than  a  century  before.  Nor 
must  it  be  forgotten  that  he  owed  'he  highest 
personal  obligations  to  the  house  of  Austria. 
It  may  be  doubted  whether  his  life  had  not 
been  preserved  by  the  intercession  of  the  prince 
whose  daughter  he  was  about  to  plunder. 

To  do  the  king  justice,  he  pretended  to  no 
more  virtue  than  he  had.  In  manifestoes  he 
might,  for  form's  sake,  insert  some  idle  stories 
about  his  antiquated  claim  on  Silesia;  but  in 
his  conversations  and  Memoirs  he  took  a  very 
different  tone.  To  quote  his  own  words, — "Am 
bition,  interest,  the  desire  of  making  people  talk 
about  me,  carried  the  day  and  I  decided  foi 
war." 

Having  resolved  on  his  course,  he  acted  with 
ability  and  vigour.  It  was  impossible  wholly 
to  conceal  his  preparations,  for  throughout  the 
Prussian  territories  regiments,  guns,  and  bag. 
gage  were  in  motion,  The  Austrian  envoy 
at  Berlin  apprized  his  court  of  these  facts,  and 
expressed  a  suspicion  of  Frederic's  designs; 
but  the  ministers  of  Maria  Theresa  refused  to 
give  credit  to  so  Wack  an  imputation  on  a 
young  prince  who  was  known  chiefly  by  hisr 
high  professions  of  integrity  and  philanthropy, 
"We  will  not," — -they  wrote — "we  cannot  be 
lieve  it." 

In  the  mean  time  the  Prussian  forces  had 
been  assembled.  Without  any  declaration  of 

!  war,  without  any  demand  for  reparation,  in  the 
very  act  of  pouring  forth  compliments  and  as- 

;  surances   of  good-will,  Frederic  commenced 

•  hostilities.  Many  thousands  of  his  troop?  wer« 
actually  in  Silesia  before  the  Queen  of  Hun 
gary  knew  that  he  had  set  up  any  claim  to 

.  a«y  part  of  her  territories.    At  length  he  sent 


508 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


her  a  message  which  could  be  regarded  only 
as  an  insult.  If  she  would  but  let  him  have 
Silesia,  he  would,  he  said,  stand  by  her  against 
any  power  which  should  try  to  deprive  her  of 
her  other  dominions:  as  if  he  was  not  already 
bound  to  stand  by  her,  or  as  if  his  new  promise 
could  be  of  more  value  than  the  old  one! 

It  was  the  depth  of  winter.  The  coid  was 
severe,  and  the  roads  deep  in  mire.  But  the 
Prussians  passed  on.  Resistance  was  impos 
sible.  The  Austrian  army  was  then  neither 
numerous  nor  efficient.  The  small  portion  of 
that  army  which  lay  in  Silesia  was  unprepared 
for  hostilities.  Glogau  was  blockaded  ;  Bres- 
lau  opened  its  gates;  Ohlau  was  evacuated. 
A  few  scattered  garrisons-  still  held  out;  but 
the  whole  open  country  was  subjugated:  no 
enemy  ventured  to  encounter  the  king  in  the 
field;  and,  before,  the  end  of  January,  1741,  he 
returned  to  receive  the  congratulations  of  his 
subjects  at  Berlin. 

Had  the  Silesian  question  been  merely  a 
question  between  Frederic  and  Maria  Theresa 
it  would  be  impossible  to  acquit  the  Prussian 
king  of  gross  perfidy.  But  when  we  consider 
the  effects  which  his  policy  produced,  and 
could  not  fail  to  produce,  on  the  whole  com 
munity  of  civilized  nations,  we  are  compelled 
to  pronounce  a  condemnation  still  more  se 
vere.  Till  he  began  the  war  it  seemed  pos 
sible,  even  probable,  that  the  peace  of  the  world 
would  be  preserved.  The  plunder  of  the  great 
Austrian  heritage  was  indeed  a  strong  tempta 
tion:  and  in  more  than  one  cabinet  ambitious 
schemes  were  already  meditated.  But  the  trea 
ties  by  which  the  "Pragmatic  Sanction"  had 
been  guarantied  were  express  and  recent.  To 
throw  all  Europe  into  confusion  for  a  purpose 
clearly  unjust  was  no  light  matter.  England 
was  true  to  her  engagements.  The  voice  of 
Fleury  had  always  been  for  peace.  He  had  a 
conscience.  He  was  now  in  extreme  old  age, 
and  was  unwilling,  after  a  life  which,  when  his 
situation  was  considered,  must  be  pronounced 
singularly  pure,  to  carry  the  fresh  stain  of  a 
great  crime  before  the  tribunal  of  his  God. 
Even  the  vain  and  unprincipled  Belle-Isle, 
whose  whole  life  was  one  wild  daydream  of 
conquest  and  spoliation,  felt  that  France,  bound 
as  she  was  by  solemn  stipulations,  could  not 
without  disgrace  make  a  direct  attack  on  the 
Austrian  dominions.  Charles,  Elector  of  Ba 
varia,  pretended  that  he  had  a  right  to  a  large 
part  of  the  inheritance  which  the  "Pragmatic 
Sanction"  gave  to  the  Queen  of  Hungary,  but 
he  was  not  sufficiently  powerful  to  move  with 
out  support.  It  might,  therefore,  not  unreason 
ably  be  expected  that,  after  a  short  period  of 
restlessness,  all  the  potentates  of  Christendom 
would  acquiesce  in  the  arrangements  made  by 
the  late  emperor.  But  the  selfish  rapacity  of 
the  King  of  Prussia  gave  the  signal  to  his 
neighbours.  His  example  quieted  their  sense 
of  shame.  His  success  led  them  to  underrate 
the  difficulty  of  dismembering  the  Austrian  mo 
narchy.  The  whole  world  sprang  to  arms.  On 
ihe  head  of  Frederic  is  all  the  blood  which  was 
sined  >n  a  war  which  raged  during  many  years 
and  in  every  quarter  of  the  globe — the  blood  of 
ihe  column  of  Fontenoy,  the  blood  of  the  brave 
mountaineers  who  were  slaughtered  at  Cullo- 


den.  The  evils  produced  by  this  wickedness 
were  felt  in  lands  where  the  name  of  Prussia 
was  unknown;  and,  in  order  that  he  might  rob 
a  neighbour  whom  he  had  promised  to  defend, 
black  men  fought  on  the  coast  of  Coromandel, 
and  red  men  scalped  each  other  by  the  great 
lakes  of  North  America. 

Silesia  had  been  occupied  without  a  battle  5 
but  the  Austrian  troops  were  advancing  to  the 
relief  of  the  fortresses  which  still  held  out.  In 
the  spring  Frederic  rejoined  his  army.  He 
had  seen  little  of  war,  and  had  never  com 
manded  any  great  body  of  men  in  the  field.  It 
is  not,  therefore,  strange  that  his  first  military 
operations  showed  little  of  that  skill  which,  at 
a  later  period,  was  the  admiration  of  Europe. 
What  connoisseurs  say  of  some  pictures  paint 
ed  by  Raphael  in  his  youth,  may  be  said  of  this 
campaign.  It  was  in  Frederic's  early  bad 
manner.  Fortunately  for  him,  the  generals  to 
whom  he  was  opposed  were  men  of  small  ca 
pacity.  The  discipline  of  his  own  troops,  par 
ticularly  of  the  infantry,  was  unequalled  in 
that  age  ;  and  some  able  and  experienced  offi 
cers  were  at  hand  to  assist  him  with  their  ad 
vice.  Of  these,  the  most  distinguished  was 
Field-Marshal  Schwerin— a  brave  adventurer 
of  Pomeranian  extraction,  who  had  served  half 
the  governments  in  Europe,  had  borne  the 
commissions  of  the  States-General  of  Holland 
and  of  the  Duke  of  Mecklenburg,  and  fought 
under  Maryborough  at  Blenheim,  and  had  been 
with  Charles  the  Twelfth  at  Bender. 

Frederic's  first  battle  was  fought  at  Molwitz, 
and  never  did  the  career  of  a  great  commander 
open  in  a  more  inauspicious  manner.  His 
army  was  victorious.  Not  only,  however,  did 
he  not  establish  his  title  to  the  character  of  an 
able  general,  but  he  was  so  unfortunate  as  to 
make  it  doubtful  whether  he  possessed  the 
vulgar  courage  of  a  soldier.  The  cavalry 
which  he  commanded  in  person,  was  put  tf 
flight.  Unaccustomed  to  the  tumult  and  car 
nage  of  a  field  of  battle,  he  lost  his  self-posses-' 
sion,  and  listened  too  readily  to  those  who 
urged  him  to  save  himself.  His  .English  gray 
carried  him  many  miles  from  thte  field,  whiU 
Schwerin,  though  wounded  in  two  places,  man 
fully  upheld  the  day.  The  skill  of  the  old  Field- 
Marshal  and  the  steadiness  of  the  Prussian  ha 
lations  prevailed;  and  the  Austrian  army  way 
driven  from  the  field  with  the  loss  of  eight 
thousand  men. 

The  news  was  carried  late  at  night  to  a  mili 
in  which  the  king  had  taken  shelter.  It  gave 
him  a  bitter  pang.  He  was  successful ;  but  he 
owed  his  success  to  dispositions  which  others 
had  made,  and  to  the  valour  of  men  who  had 
fought  while  he  was  flying.  So  unpromising 
was  the  first  appearance  of  the  greatest  warrior 
of  that  age ! 

The  battle  (  f  Molwitz  was  the  signa.  for  a 
general  explosion  throughout  Europe.  Ba  /aria 
took  up  arms.  France,  not  yet  declaring  her 
self  a  principal  in  the  war,  took  part  in  it  as 
an  ally  of  Bavaria.  The  two  great  statesmen 
to  whom  mankind  had  owed  many  years  of 
tranquillity,  disappeared  about  this  time  from 
the  scene ;  but  not  till  they  had  both  been  guilty 
of  the  weakness  of  sacrificing  their  sense  of 
justice  and  their  love  of  peace  in  the  vain  hop* 


FREDERIC  THE  GREAT. 


509 


of  preserving  their  power.  Fleury,  sinking 
under  age  and  infirmity,  was  borne  down  by 
the  impetuosity  of  Belle-Isle.  Walpole  retired 
from  the  service  of  his  ungrateful  country  to 
his  woods  and  paintings  at  Houghton;  and  his 
power  devolved  on  the  daring  and  eccentric 
Cartcret.  As  were  the  ministers,  so  were  the 
nations.  Thirty  years  during  which  Europe, 
had,  with  few  interruptions,  enjoyed  repose, 
had  prepared  the  public  mind  for  great  mili 
tary  efforts.  A  new  generation  had  grown  up, 
which  could  not  remember  the  siege  of  Turin, 
or  the  slaughter  of  Malplaquet;  which  knew 
war  by  nothing  but  its  trophies ;  and  which, 
while  it  looked  with  pride  on  the  tapestries  at 
Blenheim,  or  the  statue  in  the  "Place  of  Vic 
tories,"  little  thought  by  what  privations,  by 
"what  waste  of  private  fortunes,  by  how  many 
bitter  tears,  conquests  must  be  purchased. 

For  a  time  fortune  seemed  adverse  to  the 
Queen  of  Hungary.  Frederic  invaded  Moravia. 
The  French  and  Bavarians  penetrated  into 
Bohemia,  and  were  there  joined  by  the  Saxons. 
Prague  was  taken.  The  Elector  of  Bavaria 
was  raised  by  the  suffrages  of  his  colleagues 
to  the  Imperial  throne — a  throne  which  the 
practice  of  centuries  had  almost  entitled  the 
house  of  Austria  to  regard  as  a  hereditary 
possession. 

Yet  was  the  spirit  of  the  haughty  daughter 
of  the  Ccesars  unbroken.  Hungary  was  still 
hers  by  an  unquestionable  iitle;  and  although 
her  ancestors  had  found  Hungary  the  most 
mutinous  of  all  their  kingdoms,  she  resolved 
to  trust  herself  to  the  fidelity  of  a  people,  rude 
indeed,  turbulent,  and  impatient  cf  oppression, 
but  brave,  generous,  and  simple-hearted.  In 
the  midst  of  distress  and  peril  she  had  given 
birth  to  a  son,  afterwards  the  Emperor  Joseph 
the  Second.  Scarcely  had  she  risen  from  her 
couch,  when  she  hastened  to  Presburg.  There, 
in  the  sight  of  an  innumerable  multitude,  she 
was  crowded  with  the  crown  and  robed  with 
the  robe  of  St.  Stephen.  No  spectator  could 
refrain  his  tears  when  the  beautiful  young 
mother,  still  weak  from  child-bearing,  rode, 
after  the  fashion  of  her  fathers,  up  the  Mount 
of  Defiance,  unsheathed  the  ancient  sword  of 
stale,  shook  it  towards  north  and  south,  east 
and  west,  and,  with  a  glow  on  her  pale  face, 
challenged  the  four  corners  of  the  world  to  dis 
pute  her  rights  and  those  of  her  boy.  At  the 
first  sitting  of  the  Diet  she  appeared  clad  in 
deep  mourning  for  her  father,  and  in  pathetic 
and  dignified  words  implored  her  people  to 
support  her  just  cause.  Magnates  and  deputies 
sprang  up,  half  drew  their  sabres,  and  with 
eager  voices  vowed  to  stand  by  her  with  their 
lives  and  fortunes.  Till  then,  her  firmness  had 
never  once  forsaken  her  before  the  public  eye, 
butatthat  shout  she  sank  down  upon  her  throne, 
and  wept  aloud.  Still  more  touching  was  the 
sight  when,  a  few  days  later,  she  came  before 
the  Estates  of  her  realm,  and  held  up  before 
them  the  liitle  Archduke  in  her  arms.  Then 
it  was  that  the  enthusiasm  of  Hungary  broke 
forth  into  that  war-cry  which  soon  resounded 
throughout  Europe,  "Let  us  die  for  our  King, 
Maria  Theresa !" 

In  the  mean  time,  Frederic  was  meditating 
H  change  of  policy.  He  had  no  wish  to  raise 


'  France  to  supreme  power  on  the  continent,  at 
|  the  expense  of  the  house  of  Hapslmrg.  His 
j  first  object  was,  to  rob  the  Queen  of  Hungary. 
His  second  was,  that,  if  possible,  nobody  should 
rob  her  but  himself.  He  had  entered  into  en 
gagements  with  the  powers  leagued  against 
Austria;  but  these  engagements  were  in  his 
estimation  of  no  more  force  than  the  guarantee 
formerly  given  to  the  "  Pragmatic  Sanction." 
His  game  was  now  to  secure  his  share  of  the 
plunder  by  betraying  his  accomplices.  Maria 
Theresa  was  little  inclined  to  listen  to  any  such 
compromise;  but  the  English  government  re 
presented  to  her  so  strongly  the  necessity  of 
buying  ofTso  formidable  an  enemy  as  Frederic, 
that  she  agreed  to  negotiate.  The  negotiation 
would  not,  however,  have  ended  in  a  treaty, 
had  not  the  arms  of  Frederic  been  crowned 
with  a  second  victory.  Prince  Charles  of  Lor 
raine,  brother-in-law  to  Maria  Theresa,  a  bold 
and  active,  though  unfortunate  general,  gave 
battle  to  the  Prussians  at  Chotusitz,  and  was 
defeated.  The  king  was  still  only  a  learner  of 
the  military  art.  He  acknowledged,  at  a  later 
period,  that  his  success  on  this  occasion  was 
to  be  attributed,  not  at  all  to  his  own  general 
ship,  but  solely  to  the  valour  and  steadiness  of 
his  troops.  He  completely  effaced,  however, 
by  his  courage  and  energy,  the  stain  which 
Molwitz  had  left  on  his  reputation. 

A  peace,  concluded  under  the  English  media 
tion,  was  the  fruit  of  this  battle.  Maria  Theresa 
ceded  Silesia;  Frederic  abandoned  his  allies: 
Saxony  followed  his  example;  and  the  queen 
was  left  at  liberty  to  turn  her  whole  force 
against  France  and  Bp.varia.  She  was  every 
where  triumphant.  The  French  were  com 
pelledto  evacuate  Bohemia,  and  with  difficulty 
effected  their  escape.  The  whole  line  of  thoii 
retreat  might  be  tracked  by  the  corpses  of 
thousands  who  died  of  cold,  fatigue  and  hunger 
Many  of  those  who  reached  their  country  car 
ried  with  them  seeds  of  death.  Bavaria  was 
overrun  by  bands  of  ferocious  warriors  from 
that  bloody  "debatable  land,"  which  lies  on  the 
frontier  between  Christendom  and  Islam.  The 
terrible  names  of  the  Pandoor,  the  Croat,  and 
the  Hussar,  then  first  became  familiar  to  west 
ern  Europe.  The  unfortunate  Charles  of  Ba 
varia,  vanquished  by  Austria,  betrayed  by 
Prussia,  driven  from  his  hereditary  states,  and 
neglected  by  his  allies,  was  hurried  by  shame 
and  remorse  to  an  untimely  end.  An  English 
army  appeared  in  the  heart  of  Germany,  and 
defeated  the  French  at  Dettingen.  The  Aus 
trian  captains  already  began  to  talk  of  coin 
pleting  the  work  of  Marlborough  and  Eugene, 
and  of  compelling  France  to  relinquish  Alsace 
and  the  Three  Bishoprics. 

The  Court  of  Versailles,  in  this  peril,  looked 
to  Frederic  for  help.  He  had  been  guilty  of 
two  great  treasons,  perhaps  he  might  be  'n- 
duced  to  commit  a  third.  The  Dutchess  of 
Chate'auroux  then  held  the  chief  influence  over 
the  feeble  Louis.  She  determined  to  send  an 
agent  to  Berlin,  and  Voltaire  was  selected  foi 
the  mission.  He  eagerly  undertook  the  task, 
for,  while  his  literary  fame  filled  all  Europe,  he 
was  troubled  with  a  childish  craving  for  politi 
cal  distinction.  He  was  vain,  and  not  without 
j  reason,  of  his  address,  and  of  his  insinuating 
2  u  2 


510 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


sloquence  ;  and  he  flattered  himself  that  he  pos- 
?esr,ed  boundless  influence  over  the  King  of 
Prussia.  The  truth  was,  that  he  knew,  as  yet, 
cnly  one  corner  of  Frederic's  character.  He 
was  well  acquainted  with  all  the  petty  vanities 
and  affectations  of  the  poetaster;  but  was  not 
aware  that  these  foibles  were  united  with  all 
the  talents  and  vices  which  lead  to  success  in 
active  life  ;  and  that  the  unlucky  versifier  who 
bored  him  with  reams  of  middling  Alexan 
drians,  was  the  most  vigilant,  suspicious,  and 
severe  of  politicians. 

Voltaire  was  received  with  every  mark  of 
respect  and  friendship,  was  lodged  in  the 
palace,  and  had  a  seat  daily  at  the  royal  table. 
The  negotiation  was  of  an  extraordinary  de 
scription.  Nothing  can  be  conceived  more 
whimsical  than  the  conferences  which  took 
place  between  the  first  literary  man  and  the 
first  practical  man  of  the  age,  whom  a  strange 
weakness  had  induced  to  exchange  their  parts. 
The  great  poet  would  talk  of  nothing  but  trea 
ties  and  guarantees,  and  the  great  king  of 
nothing  but  metaphors  and  rhymes.  On  one 
occasion  Voltaire  put  into  his  Majesty's  hand 
a  paper  on  the  state  of  Europe,  and  received  it 
back  with  verses  scrawled  on  the  margin.  In 
sscret  they  both  laughed  at  each  other.  Vol 
taire  did  not  spare  the  king's  poems  ;  and  the 
king  has  left  on  record  his  opinion  of  Voltaire's 
diplomacy.  "He  had  no  credentials,"  says 
Frederic,  "  and  the  whole  mission  was  a  joke, 
a  mere  farce." 

But  what  the  influence  of  Voltaire  could  not 
effect,  the  rapid  progress  of  the  Austrian  arms 
effected.  If  it  should  be  in  the  power  of  Maria 
Theresa  and  George  the  Second  to  dictate 
terms  of  peace  to  France,  what  chance  was 
there  that  Prussia  would  long  retain  Silesia  1 
Frederic's  conscience  told  him  that  he  had 
acted  perfidiously  and  inhumanly  towards  the 
Queen  of  Hungary.  That  her  resentment  was 
strong  she  had  given  ample  proof;  and  of 
her  respect  for  treaties  he  judged  by  his 
own.  Guarantees,  he  said,  were  mere  filigree, 
pretty  to  look  at,  but  too  brittle  to  bear  the 
slightest  pressure.  He  thought  it  his  safest 
course  to  ally  himself  closely  to  France,  and 
again  to  attack  the  Empress  Queen.  Accord 
ingly,  in  the  autumn  of  1744,  without  notice, 
without  any  decent  pretext,  he  recommenced 
hostilities,  marched  through  the  electorate  of 
Saxony  without  troubling  himself  about  the 
permission  of  the  Elector,  invaded  Bohemia, 
took  Prague,  and  even  menaced  Vienna. 

It  was  now  that,  for  the  first  time,  he  expe 
rienced  the  inconstancy  of  fortune.  An  Austrian 
army  under  Charles  of  Lorraine  threatened  his 
communications  with  Silesia.  Saxony  was  all 
in  arms  behind  him.  He  found  it  necessary  to 
save  himself  by  a  retreat.  He  afterwards 
owned  that  his  failure  was  the  natural  effect  of 
his  own  blunders.  No  general,  he  said,  had 
ever  committed  greater  faults.  It  must  be-added, 
that  to  the  reverses  of  this  campaign  he  always 
ascribed  his  subsequent  successes. 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  difficulty  and  disgrace 
tnat  he  caught  the  first  clear  glimpse  of  the 
principles  of  the  military  art. 

The  memorable  year  of  1745  followed.  The 
<var  raged  by  sea  and  land,  in  Italy,  in  Germany, 


and  in  Flanders  ;  and  even  England,  after  manrf 
years  of  profound  internal  quiet,  saw,  for  the 
last  time,  hostile  armies  set  in  battle  array 
against  each  other.  This  year  is  memorable 
in  the  life  of  Frederic,  as  the  date  at  which 
his  noviciate  in  the  art  of  war  may  be  said  to 
have  terminated.  There  have  been  great  cap 
tains  whose  precocious  and  self-taught  military 
skill  resembled  intuition.  Conde,  Clive,  and 
Napoleon  are  examples.  But  Frederic  was 
not  one  of  these  brilliant  portents.  His  profi 
ciency  in  military  science  was  simply  the  pro 
ficiency  which  a  man  of  vigorous  faculties 
makes  in  any  science  to  which  he  applies  his 
mind  with  earnestness  and  industry.  It  was 
at  Hohenfreidberg  that  he  first  proved  how 
much  he  had  profited  by  his  errors,  and  by  their 
consequences.  His  victory  on  that  day  was 
chiefly  due  to  his  skilful  dispositions,  and  con 
vinced  Europe  that  the  prince  who,  a  few  years 
before,  had  stood  aghast  in  the  rout  of  Molwitz, 
had  attained  in  the  military  art  a  mastery 
equalled  by  none  of  his  contemporaries,  or 
equalled  by  Saxe  alone.  The  victory  of  Ho 
henfreidberg  was  speedily  followed  by  that  of 
Sorr. 

In  the  mean  time,  the  arms  of  France  had 
been  victorious  in  the  Low  Countries.  Fre 
deric  had  no  longer  reason  to  fear  that  Maria 
Theresa  would  be  able  to  give  law  to  Europe, 
and  he  began  to  meditate  a  fourth  breach  of 
his  engagements.  The  court  of  Versailles  was 
alarmed  and  mortified.  A  letter  of  earnest 
expostulation,  in  the  handwriting  of  Louis, 
was  sent  to  Berlin  ;  but  in  vain.  In  the  au 
tumn  of  1745,  Frederic  made  peace  with  Eng 
land,  and,  before  the  close  of  the  year,  with 
Austria  also.  The  pretensions  of  Charles  of 
Bavaria  could  present  no  obstacle  to  an  ac 
commodation.  That  unhappy  prince  was  no 
more;  and  Francis  of  Lorraine,  the  husband 
of  Maria  Theresa,  was  raised,  with  the  general 
consent  of  the  Germanic  body,  to  the  Imperial 
throne. 

Prussia  was  again  at  peace;  but  the  Eu 
ropean  war  lasted  till,  in  the  year  1748,  it  was 
terminated  by  the  treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle, 
Of  all  the  powers  that  had  taken  part  in  it,  the 
only  gainer  was  Frederic.  Not  only  had  he 
added  to  his  patrimony  the  fine  province  of 
Silesia;  he  had,  by  his  unprincipled  dexterity, 
succeeded  so  well  in  alternately  depressing  the 
scale  of  Austria  and  that  of  France,  that  he 
was  generally  regarded  as  holding  the  balance 
of  Europe — a  high  dignity  for  one  who  ranked 
lowest  among  kings,  and  whose  great-grand 
father  had  been  no  more  than  a  margrave.  By 
the  public,  the  King  of  Prussia  was  considered 
as  a  politician  destitute  alike  of  morality  and 
decency,  insatiably  rapacious,  and  shameless 
ly  false;  nor  was  the  public  much  in  the  wrong 
He  was  at  the  same  time  allowed  to  be  a  man 
of  parts, — a  rising  general,  a  shrewd  negO' 
tiator  and  administrator.  Those  qualities 
wherein  he  surpassed  all  mankind,  were  as 
yet  unknown  to  others  or  to  himself;  for  they 
were  qualities  which  shine  out  only  on  a  dark 
ground.  His  career  had  hitherto,  with  little 
interruption,  been  prosperous ;  and  it  was  only 
in  adversity,  in  adversity  which  seemed  with 
out  hope  or  resource,  in  adversity  that  would 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT 


511 


have  overwhelmed  even  men  celebrated  for 
strength  of  mind,  that  his  real  greatness  could 
be  shown. 

He  had  from  the  commencement  of  his  reign 
applied  himself  to  public  business  after  a  fashion 
unknown  among  kings.  Louis  XIV.,  indeed, 
had  been  his  own  prime  minister,  and  had  ex 
ercised  a  general  superintendence  over  all  the 
departments  of  the  government;  but  this  was 
not  sufficient  for  Frederic.  He  was  not  con 
tent  with  being  his  own  prime  minister — he 
would  be  his  own  sole  minister.  Under  him 
there  was  no  room,  not  merely  for  a  Richelieu 
or  a  Mazarin,  but  for  a  Colbert,  a  Louvois,  or 
a  Torcy.  A  love  of  labour  for  its  own  sake,  a 
restless  and  insatiable  longing  to  dictate,  to 
intermeddle,  to  make  his  power  felt,  a  profound 
scorn  and  distrust  of  his  fellow-creatures,  in 
disposed  him  to  ask  counsel,  to  confide  import 
ant  secrets,  to  delegate  ample  powers.  The 
highest  functionaries  under  his  government 
were  mere  clerks,  and  were  not  so  much 
trusted  by  him  as  valuable  clerks  are  often 
trusted  by  the  heads  of  departments.  He  was 
his  own  treasurer,  his  own  commander-in- 
chief,  his  own  intendant  of  public  works;  his 
own  minister  for  trade  and  justice,  for  home 
a  flairs  and  foreign  affairs;  his  own  master  of 
the  horse,  steward  and  chamberlain.  Matters 
of  which  no  chief  of  an  office  in  any  other 
government  would  ever  hear,  were,  in  this  sin 
gular  monarchy,  decided  by  the  king  in  person. 
If  a  traveller  wished  fur  a  good  place  to  see  a 
review,  he  had  to  write  to  Frederic,  and  re 
ceived  next  day,  from  a  royal  messenger,  Fre 
deric's  answer  signed  by  Frederic's  own  hand. 
This  was  an  extravagant,  a  morbid  activity. 
The  public  business  would  assuredly  have 
been  better  done  if  each  department,  had  been 
put  under  a  man  of  talents  and  integrity,  and 
if  the  king  had  contented -himself  with  a  gene 
ral  control.  In  this  manner  the  advantages 
which  belong  to  unity  of  design,  and  the  ad 
vantages  which  belong  to  the  division  of  labour, 
would  have  been  to  a  great  extent  combined. 
But  such  a  system  would  not  have  suited  the 
peculiar  temper  of  Frederic.  He  could  tole 
rate  no  will,  no  reason  in  the  state,  save  his 
own.  He  wished  for  no  abler  assistance  than 
that  of  penmen  who  had  just  understanding 
enough  to  translate,  to  transcribe,  to  make  out 
his  scrawls,  and  to  put  his  concise  Yes  and  No 
into  an  official  form.  Of  the  higher  intellec 
tual  faculties,  there  is  as  much  in  a  copying 
machine,  or  a  lithographic  press,  as  he  required 
from  a  secretary  of  the  cabinet. 

His  own  exertions  were  such  as  were  hard 
ly  to  be  expected  from  a  human  body,  or  a 
human  mind.  At  Potsdam,  his  ordinary  resi 
dence,  he  rose  at  three  in  summer  and  four  in 
winter.  A  page  soon  appeared,  with  a  large 
basketful  of  all  the  letters  which  had  arrived 
for  the  king  by  the  last  courier — despatches 
*rom  ambassadors,  reports  from  officers  of 
revenue,  plans  of  buildings,  proposals  for 
draining  marshes,  complaints  from  persons 
who  thought  themselves  aggrieved,  applica 
tions  from  persons  who  wanted  titles,  military 
ccmmissir  us,  and  civil  situations.  He  ex 
amined  tnc  seals  with  a  keen  eye;  for  he  was 
fcever  for  a  moment  free  from  the  suspicion  that 


some  fraud  might  be  practised  on  him.  Then 
he  read  the  letters,  divided  them  into  several 
packets,  and  signified  his  pleasure,  generally 
by  a  mark,  often  by  two  or  three  words,  now 
and  then  by  some  cutting  epigram.  By  eight 
he  had  generally  finished  this  part  of  his  task. 
The  adjutant-general  was  then  in  attendance, 
and  received  instructions  for  the  day  as  tc  all 
the  military  arrangements  of  the  kingdom. 
Then  the  king  went  to  review  his  guards,  not 
as  kings  ordinarily  review  their  guards,  but 
with  the  minute  attention  and  severity  of  an 
old  drill-sergeant.  In  the  mean  time  the  four 
cabinet  secretaries  had  been  employed  in  an 
swering  the  letters  on  which  the  king  had  that 
morning  signified  his  will.  These  unhappy 
men  were  forced  to  work  all  the  year  round 
like  negro  slaves  in  the  time  of  the  sugar-crop. 
They  never  had  a  holiday.  They  never  knew 
what  it  was  to  dine.  It  was  necessary  that, 
before  they  stirred,  they  should  finish  the  whole 
of  their  work.  The  king,  always  on  his  guard 
against  treachery,  took  from  the  heap  a  hand 
ful  at  random,  and  looked  into  them  to  see 
whether  his  instructions  had  been  exactly 
followed.  This  was  no  bad  security  against 
foul  play  on  the  part  of  the  secretaries ;  for  if 
one  of  them  were  detected  in  a  trick,  he  might 
think  himself  fortunate  if  he  escaped  with  five 
years  imprisonment  in  a  dungeon.  Frederic 
then  signed  the  replies,  and  all  were  sent  off 
the  same  evening. 

The  general  principles  on  which  this  strange 
government  was  conducted,  deserve  attention. 
The  policy  of  Frederic  was  essentially  the  same 
as  his  father's;  but  Frederic,  while  he  carried 
that  policy  to  lengths  to  which  his  father  never 
thought  of  carrying  it,  cleared  it  at  the  same 
time  from  the  absurdities  with  which  his  father 
had  encumbered  it.  The  king's  first  object 
was  to  have  a  great,  efficient,  and  well-trained 
army.  He  had  a  kingdom  which  in  extent 
and  population  was  hardly  in  the  second  rank 
of  European  powers;  and  yet  he  aspired  to  a 
place  not  inferior  to  that  of  the  sovereigns  of 
England,  France,  and  Austria.  For  that  end 
it  was  necessary  that  Prussia  should  be  all 
sting.  Louis  XV.,  with  five  times  as  many 
subjects  as  Frederic,  and  more  than  five  times 
as  large  a  revenue,  had  not  a  more  formidable 
army.  The  proportion  which  the  soldiers  in 
Prussia  bore  to  the  people,  seems  hardly  cre 
dible.  Of  the  males  in  the  vigour  of  life,  a 
seventh  part  were  probably  under  arms;  and 
this  great  force  had,  by  drilling,  by  reviewing, 
and  by  the  unsparing  use  of  cane  and  scourge, 
been  taught  to  perform  all  evolutions  with  a 
rapidity  and  a  precision  which  would  have 
astonished  Villars  or  Eugene.  The  elevated 
feelings  which  are  necessary  to  the  best  kind 
of  army  were  then  wanting  to  the  Prussian 
service.  In  those  ranks  were  not  found  the 
religious  and  political  enthusiasm  which  in 
spired  the  pikemen  of  Cromwell — the  patriotic 
ardour,  the  thirst  of  glory,  the  devotion  to  a 
great  leader,  which  inflamed  the  Old  Guard  of 
Napoleon.  But  in  all  the  mechanical  pars 
of  the  military  calling,  the  Prussians  were  as 
superior  to  the  English  and  French  troops  of 
that  day,  as  the  English  and  French  troops  to 
a  rustic  militia. 


512 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Though  the  pay  of  the  Prussian  soldier  was 
small,  though  every  rixdollar  of  extraordinary 
churge  was  scrutinized  by  Frederic  with  a  vi 
gilance  and  suspicion  such  as  Mr.  Joseph 
Hume  never  brought  to  the  examination  of  an 
army-estimate,  the  expense  of  such  an  esta 
blishment  was,  for  the  means  of  the  country, 
enormous.  In  order  that  it  might  not  be  ut 
terly  ruinous,  it  was  necessary  that  every  other 
expense  should  be  cut  down  to  the  lowest  pos 
sible  point.  Accordingly,  Frederic,  though  his 
dominions  bordered  on  the  sea,  had  no  navy. 
He  neither  had  nor  wished  to  have  colonies. 
His  judges,  his  fiscal  officers,  were  meanly 
paid.  His  ministers  at  foreign  courts  walked 
on  foot,  or  drove  shabby  old  carriages  till  the 
axletrees  gave  way.  Even  to  his  highest  diplo 
matic  agents,  who  resided  at  London  and  Paris, 
he  allowed  less  than  a  thousand  pounds  sterling 
a  year.  The  royal  household  was  managed 
with  a  frugality  unusual  in  the  establishments 
of  opulent  subjects — unexampled  in  any  other 
palace.  The  king  loved  good  eating  and  drink 
ing,  and  during  great  part  of  his  life  took  plea 
sure  in  seeing  his  table  surrounded  by  guests; 
yet  the  whole  charge  of  his  kitchen  was  brought 
within  the  sum  of  two  thousand  pounds  sterling 
a  year.  He  examined  every  extraordinary  item 
with  a  care  which  might  be  thought  to  suit  the 
mistress  of  a  boarding-house  better  than  a 
great  prince.  When  more  than  four  rixdollars 
were  asked  of  him  for  a  hundred  oysters,  he 
stormed  as  if  he  had  heard  that  one  of  his  ge 
nerals  had  sold  a  fortress  to  the  Empress- 
Queen.  Not  a  bottle  of  champagne  was  un 
corked  without  his  express  order.  The  game 
of  the  royal  parks  and  forests,  a  serious  head 
of  expenditure  in  most  kingdoms,  was  to  him 
a  source  of  profit.  The  whole  was  farmed 
out  ;  and  though  the  farmers  were  almost 
ruined  by  their  contract,  the  king  would  grant 
them  no  remission.  His  wardrobe  consisted 
of  one  fine  gala  dress,  which  lasted  him  all  his 
life  ;  of  two  or  three  old  coats  fit  for  Monmouth 
street,  of  yellow  waistcoats  soiled  with  snuff*, 
and  of  huge  boots  embrowned  by  time.  One 
taste  alone  sometimes  allured  him  beyond  the 
limits  of  parsimony,  nay,  even  beyond  the 
limits  of  prudence — the  taste  for  building.  In 
all  other  things  his  economy  was  such  as  we 
might  cail  by  a  harsher  name,  if  we  did  not 
reflect  that  his  funds  were  drawn  from  a 
heavily  taxed  people,  and  that  it  was  impos 
sible  for  him,  without  excessive  tyranny,  to 
keep  up  at  once  a  formidable  army  and  a 
splendid  court. 

Considered  as  an  administrator,  Frederic 
had  undoubtedly  many  titles  to  praise.  Order 
\»as>  strictly  maintained  throughout  his  domi 
nions.  Property  was  secure.  A  great  liberty 
of  speaking  and  of  writing  was  allowed.  Con 
fident  in  the  irresistible  strength  derived  from 
a  great  army,  the  k*ng  looked  down  on  male- 
contents  and  libellers  with  a  wise  disdain  ;  and 
gave  Jitt.ie  encouragement  to  spies  and  inform 
ers.  When  he  was  told  of  the  disaffection  of 
one  of  his  subjects,  he  merely  asked,  "  How 
many  thousand  men  can  he  bring  into  the 
field  1"  He  once  saw  a  crowd  staring  at  some 
thing  on  a  wall.  He  rode  up,  and  found  that 
*he  object  of  curiosity  was  a  scurrilous  placard 


against  himself.  The  placard  had  te-sn  posted 
up  so  high  that  it  was  not  easy  to  read  it. 
Frederic  ordered  his  attendants  to  take  it  down 
and  put  it  lower.  "My  people  and  I,"  he  said, 
"have  come  to  an  agreement  which  satisfies 
us  both.  They  are  to  say  what  they  please, 
and  I  am  to  do  what  I  please."  No  person 
-.vould  have  dared  to  publish  in  London  satires 
on  George  II.  approaching  to  the  atrocity  of 
those  satires  on  Frederic  which  the  book 
sellers  at  Berlin  sold  with  impunity.  One  book 
seller  sent  to  the  palace  a  copy  of  the  most 
stinging  lampoon  that  perhaps  was  ever  writ 
ten  in  the  world,  the  "Memoirs  of  Voltaire," 
published  by  Beaumarchais,  and  asked  for  his 
majesty's  orders.  "Do  not  advert!? 2  i'  I:,  an 
offensive  manner,"  said  the  king;  "but  sell  it 
by  ali  means.  I  h^pe  it  will  pay  you  well.'* 
Even  among  statesmen  accustomed  to  the 
license  of  a  free  press  such  steadfastness  of 
mind  as  this  is  not  very  common. 

It  is  due  also  to  the  memory  of  Frederic  to 
say,  that  he  earnestly  laboured  to  secure  to  his 
people  the  great  blessing  of  cheap  and  speedy 
justice.  He  was  one  of  the  first  rulers  who 
abolished  the  cruel  and  absurd  practice  of  tor 
ture.  No  sentence  of  death,  pronounced  by  the 
ordinary  tribunals,  was  executed  without  his 
sanction;  and  his  sanction,  except  in  cases  of 
murder,  was  rarely  given.  Towards  his  troops 
he  acted  in  a  very  different  manner.  Military 
offences  were  punished  with  such  barbarous 
scourging,  that  to  be  shot  was  considered  by 
the  Prussian  soldier  as  a  secondary  punish 
ment.  Indeed,  the  principle  which  pervaded 
Frederic's  whole  policy  was  this — that  the 
more  severely  the  army  is  governed,  the  safer 
it  is  to  treat  the  rest  of  the  community  with 
lenity. 

Religious  persecution  was  unknown  under 
his  government — unless  some  foolish  and  un 
just  restrictions  which  lay  upon  the  Jews  may 
be  regarded  as  forming  an  exception.  His 
policy  with  respect  to  the  Catholics  of  Silesia 
presented  an  honourable  contrast  to  the  policy 
which,  under  very  similar  circumstances,  Eng 
land  long  followed  with  respect  to  the  Catholics 
of  Ireland.  Every  form  of  religion  and  irreli- 
gion  found  an  asylum  in  his  states.  The 
scoffer  whom  the  Parliaments  of  France  had 
sentenced  to  a  cruel  death,  was  consoled  by  a 
commission  in  the  Prussian  service.  The 
Jesuit  who  could  show  his  face  nowhere  else — 
who  in  Britain  was  still  subject  to  penal  laws, 
who  was  proscribed  by  France,  Spain,  Portu 
gal,  and  Naples,  who  had  been  given  up  even 
by  the  Vatican — found  safety  and  the  means 
of  subsistence  in  the  Prussian  dominions. 

Most  of  the  vices  of  Frederic's  administra 
tion  resolve  themselves  into  one  vice — the 
spirit  of  meddling.  The  indefatigable  activity 
of  his  intellect,  his  dicta'orial  temper,  his  mili 
tary  habits,  all  inclined  him  to  this  great  fault 
He  drilled  his  people  as  he  drilled  his  grena 
diers.  Capital  and  industry  were  diverted  from 
their  natural  direction  by  a  crowd  of  prepos 
terous  regulations.  There  was  a  monopoly  of 
coffee,  a  monopoly  of  tobacco,  a  monopoly  of 
refined  sugar.  The  public  money,  of  which 
the  king  was  generally  so  sparing,  was  lavishly 
|  spent  in  ploughing  bogs,  in  planting  mulberry 


FREDERIC   THE   GREAT. 


513 


tree;  amidst  the  sand,  in  bringing  sheep  from 
Spain  to  improve  the  Saxon  wool,  in  bestowing 
prizes  for  fine  yarn,  in  building  manufactories 
of  porcelain,  manufactories  of  carpets,  manu 
factories  of  hardware,  manufactories  of  lace. 
Neither  th^  experience  of  other  rulers,  nor  his 
own,  could  ever  teach  him  that  something 
more  than  an  edict  and  a  grant  of  public  mo 
ney  is  required  to  create  a  Lyons,  a  Brussels, 
or  a  Birmingham. 

For  his  commercial  policy,  however,  there 
's  some  excuse.  He  had  on  his  side  illustrious 
examples  and  popular  prejudice.  Grievously 
as  he  erred,  he  erred  in  company  with  his  age. 
In  other  departments  his  meddling  was  alto 
gether  without  apology.  He  interfered  with 
the  course  of  justice  as  well  as  with  the  course 
of  trade ;  and  set  up  his  own  crude  notions  of 
equity  against  the  law  as  expounded  by  the 
unanimous  voice  of  the  gravest  magistrates. 
It  never  occurred  to  him  that  a  body  of  men, 
whose  lives  were  passed  in  adjudicating  on 
questions  of  civil  right,  were  more  likely  to 
form  correct  opinions  on  such  questions  ftian 
a  prince  whose  attention  was  divided  between 
a  thousand  objects,  and  who  had  probably 
never  read  a  law-book  through.  The  resistance 
opposed  to  him  by  the  tribunals  inflamed  him 
to  fury.  He  reviled  his  Chancellor.  He 
kicked  the  shins  of  his  Judges.  He  did  not,  it 
is  true,  intend  to  act  unjustly.  He  firmly  be 
lieved  that  he  was  doing  right,  and  defending 
the  cause  of  the  poor  against  the  wealthy.  Yet 
this  well-meant  meddling  probably  did  far  more 
harm  than  all  the  explosions  of  his  evil  pas 
sions  during  the  whole  of  his  long  reign.  We 
could  make  shift  to  live  under  a  debauchee  or 
a  tyrant;  but  to  be  ruled  by  a  busy-body  is 
more  than  human  nature  can  bear. 

The  same  passion  for  directing  and  regulat 
ing  appeared  in  every  part  of  the  king's 
policy.  Every  lad  of  a  certain  station  in  life 
was  forced  to  go  to  certain  schools  within  the 
Prussian  dominions.  If  a  young  Prussian  re 
paired,  though  but  for  a  few  weeks,  to  Leyden 
or  Gottingen  for  the  purpose  of  study,  the  of 
fence  was  punished  with  civil  disabilities,  and 
sometimes  with  confiscation  of  property.  No 
body  was  to  travel  without  the  royal  permission. 
If  the  permission  were  granted,  the  pocket- 
money  of  the  tourist  was  fixed  by  royal  ordi 
nances.  A  merchant  might  take  with  him  two 
hundred  and  fifty  rixdollars  in  gold,  a  noble 
was  allowed  to  take  four  hundred;  for  it  may 
be  observed,  in  passing,  that  Frederic  studi 
ously  kept  up  the  old  distinction  between  the 
nobies  and  the  community.  In  speculation,  he 
was  a  French  philosopher;  but  in  action,  a 
German  prince.  He  talked  and  wrote  about 
the  privileges  of  blood  in  the  style  of  Sieyes  ; 
but  in  practice  no  chapter  in  the  empire  look 
ed  with  a  keener  eye  to  genealogies  and  quar- 
terings. 

Such  was  Frederic  the  Ruler.      But  there  j 
was  another  Frederic,  the  Frederic  of  Rheins-  I 
burg,  the  fiddler  and  flute-player,  the  poetaster 
and  metaphysician.     Amidst  the  cares  of  state  ' 
the  king  had  retained  his  passion  for  music, 
for  reading,  for  writing,  for  literary  society. 
To  these  amusements  he  devoted  ail  the  time 
he  coul'l  snatch  from  the  business  of  war  aud  I 

Vot  IV.— 65 


government;  and  perhaps  more  light  is  thrown 
on  his  character  by  what  passed  during  his 
hours  of  relaxation  than  by  his  battles  or  his 
laws. 

It  was  the  just  boast  of  Schiller,  that  in  his 
country  no  Augustus,  no  Lorenzo,  had  watched 
over  the  infancy  of  art.  The  rich  and  ener 
getic  language  of  Luther,  driven  by  the  Latin 
from  the  schools  of  pedants,  and  by  the  French 
from  the  palaces  of  kings,  had  taken  refuge 
among  the  people.  Of  the  powers  of  that  lan 
guage  Frederic  had  no  notion.  He  generally 
spoke  of  it,  and  of  those  who  used  it,  with  the 
contempt  of  ignorance.  His  library  consisted 
of  French  books ;  at  his  table  nothing  was 
heard  but  French  conversation. 

The  associates  of  his  hours  of  relaxation 
were,  for  the  most  part,  foreigners.  Britain 
furnished  to  the  royal  circle  two  distinguished 
men,  born  in  the  highest  rank,  and  driven  by 
civil  dissensions  from  the  land  to  which,  under 
happier  circumstances,  their  talents  and  vir 
tues  might  have  been  a  source  of  strength  and 
glory.  George  Keith,  Earl  Marischal  of  Scot 
land,  had  taken  arms  for  the  house  of  Stuart  in 
1715,  and  his  younger  brother  James,  then  only 
seventeen  years  old,  had  fought  gallantly  by 
his  side.  When  all  was  lost  they  retired  to 
the  Continent,  roved  from  country  to  country, 
served  under  many  standards,  and  so  bore 
themselves  as  to  win  the  respect  and  good-Mall 
of  many  who  had  no  love  for  the  Jacobite 
cause.  Their  long  wanderings  terminated  at 
Potsdam  ;  nor  had  Frederic  any  associates  who 
deserved  or  obtained  so  large  a  share  of  his 
esteem.  They  were  not  only  accomplished 
men,  but  nobles  and  warriors,  capable  of  serv 
ing  him  in  war  and  diplomacy,  as  well  as  of 
amusing  him  at  supper.  Alone  of  all  his  com 
panions  they  appear  never  to  have  had  reason 
to  complain  of  his  demeanour  towards  them. 
Some  of  those  who  knew  the  palace  best  pro 
nounced  that  the  Lord  Marischal  was  the 
only  human  being  whom  Frederic  ever  really 
loved. 

Italy  sent  to  the  parties  at  Potsdam  the  in 
genious  and  amiable  Algarotti,  and  Bastiani, 
the  most  crafty,  cautious,  and  servile  of  Abbes. 
But  the  greater  part  of  the  society  which  Fre 
deric  had  assembled  round  him,  was  drawn 
from  France.  Maupertuis  had  acquired  some 
celebrity  by  the  journey  which  he  made  to  Lap 
land,  for  the  purpose  of  ascertaining,  by  actual 
measurement,  the  shape  of  our  planet.  He 
was  placed  in  the  chair  of  the  Academy  of 
Berlin,  a  humble  imitation  of  the  renowned 
academy  of  Paris.  Baculard  D'Arnaud,  a 
young  poet,  who  was  thought  to  have  given 
promise  of  great  things,  had  been  induced  to 
quit  his  country,  and  to  reside  at  the  Prussian 
court.  The  Marquess  D'Argens  was  among 
the  king's  favourite  companions,  on  accounc, 
as  it  should  seem,  of  the  strong  opposition  be 
tween  their  characters.  The  parts  of  D'Av- 
gens  were  good,  and  his  manners  those  of  «. 
finished  French  gentleman  ;  but  his  whole  soui 
was  dissolved  in  sloth,  timidity,  and  self-indul 
gence.  His  was  one  of  that  abject  class  of 
minds  which  are  superstitious  without  beinjf 
religious.  Hating  Christianity  with  a  rancour 
which  made  him.  incapable  of  rational  inquiry 


614 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


unable  to  see  in  the  harmony  and  beauty  of  the 
universe  the  traces  of  divine  power  and  wis 
dom,  he  was  the  slave  of  dreams  and  omens; 
— would  not  sit  down  to  the  table  with  thirteen  j 
',n  company;  turned  pale  if  the  salt  fell  to- J 
wards  him ;  begged  his  guests  not  to  cross 
fheir  knives  and  forks  on  their  plates ;  and  j 
would  not  for  the  world  commence  a  journey 
on  Friday.  His  health  was  a  subject  of  con 
stant  anxiety  to  him.  Whenever  his  head 
ached,  or  his  pulse  beat  quick,  his  dastardly 
fears  and  effeminate  precautions  were  the  jest 
of  all  Berlin.  All  this  suited  the  king's  pur 
pose  admirably.  He  wanted  somebody  by 
whom  he  might  be  amused,  and  whom  he 
might  despise.  When  he  wished  to  pass  half 
an  hour  in  easy  polished  conversation,  D'Ar- 
gens  was  an  excellent  companion ;  when  he 
wanted  to  vent  his  spleen  and  contempt,  D'Ar- 
gens  was  an  excellent  butt. 

With  these  associates,  and  others  of  the  same 
class,  Fre-leric  loved  to  spend  the  time  which  he 
could  steal  from  public  cares.  He  wished  his 
supper-parties  to  be  gay  and  easy;  and  invited 
his  guests  to  lay  aside  all  restraint,  and  to  forget 
that  he  was  at  the  head  of  a  hundred  and  sixty 
thousand  soldiers,  and  was  absolute  master  of 
the  life  and  liberty  of  all  who  sat  at  meat  with 
him.  There  was,  therefore,  at  these  meetings  the 
outward  show  of  ease.  The  wit  and  learning 
of  the  company  were  ostentatiously  displayed. 
The  discussions  on  history  and  literature  were 
often  highly  interesting.  But  the  absurdity  of 
all  the  religions  known  among  men  was  the 
chief  topic  of  conversation ;  and  the  audacity 
with  which  doctrines  and  n.imes  venerated 
throughout  Christendom  were  treated  on  these 
occasions,  startled  even  persons  accustomed 
to  the  society  of  French  and  English  free-think 
ers.  But  real  liberty,  or  real  affection,  was  in 
this  brilliant  society  not  to  be  found.  Absolute 
kings  seldom  have  friends :  and  Frederic's 
faults  were  such  as,  even  where  perfect  equa 
lity  exists,  make  friendship  exceedingly  pre 
carious.  He  had  indeed  many  qualities,  which, 
on  a  first  acquaintance,  were  captivating.  His 
conversati'  n  was  lively;  his  manners  to  those 
whom  he  desired  to  please  were  even  caress 
ing.  No  man  could  flatter  with  more  delicacy. 
No  man  succeeded  more  completely  in  inspir 
ing  those  who  approached  him  with  vague 
Lopes  of  some  great  advantage  from  his  kind 
ness.  But  under  this  fair  exterior  he  was  a 
tyrant — suspicious,  disdainful,  and  malevolent. 
He  had  one  taste  which  may  be  pardoned  in  a 
boy,  but  which,  when  habitually  and  delibe 
rately  indulged  in  a  man  of  mature  age  and 
•trcng  understanding,  is  almost  invariably  the 
sign  of  a  bad  heart — a  taste  for  severe  practi 
cal  jokes.  If  a  friend  of  the  king  was  fond  of 
dress,  oil  was  flung  over  his  richest  suit.  If  he 
was  fond  of  iiioney,  some  prank  was  invented 
to  make  him  disburse  more  than  he  could  spare. 
If  he  was  hypochondrical, he  was  made  to  believe 
he  had  the  dropsy.  If  he  particularly  set  his 
heart  on  visiting  a  place,  a  letter  was  forged  to 
frighten  him  from  going  thither.  These  things, 
it  may  be  said,  are  trifles.  They  are  so ;  but  they 
arc  indications,  not  to  be  mistaken,  of  a  nature 
to  which  the  sight  of  human  suffering  and  hu 
man  degradation  is  an  agreeable  excitement. 


Frederic  had  a  keen  eye  for  the  foibles  cf 
others,  and  loved  to  communicate  hii>  discover 
ies.  He  had  some  talent  for  sarcasm,  and 
considerable  skill  in  detecting  the  sore  places 
where  sarcasm  would  be  most  actually  felt, 
His  vanity,  as  well  as  his  malignity,  found 
gratification  in  the  vexation  and  confusion  of 
those  who  smarted  under  his  caustic  jests. 
Yet  in  truth  his  success  on  these  occasions 
belonged  quite  as  much  to  the  king  as  to  the 
wit.  We  read  that  Commodus  descended, 
sword  in  hand,  into  the  arena  against  a  wretch 
ed  gladiator,  armed  only  with  a  foil  of  lead, 
and,  after  shedding  the  blood  of  the  helpless 
victim,  struck  medals  to  commemorate  the  in 
glorious  victory.  The  triumphs  of  Frederic 
in  the  war  of  repartee  were  much  of  the  same 
kind.  How  to  deal  with  him  was  the  most 
puzzling  of  questions.  To  appear  constrained 
in  his  presence  was  to  disobey  his  commands, 
and  to  spoil  his  amusement.  "  Yet  if  his  asso 
ciates  were  enticed  by  his  graciousness  to  in 
dulge  in  the  familiarity  of  a  cordial  intimacy, 
he  was  certain  to  make  them  repent  of  their 
presumption  by  some  cruel  humiliation.  To 
resent  his  affronts  was  perilous  ;  yet  not  to  re 
sent  them  was  to  deserve  and  to  invite  them. 
In  his  view,  those  who  mutinied  were  insolent 
and  ungrateful ;  those  who  submitted,  were 
curs  made  to  receive  bones  and  kickings  with 
the  same  fawning  patience.  It  is,  indeed,  dif 
ficult  to  conceive  how  any  thing  short  of  the 
rage  of  hunger  should  have  induced  men  to 
bear  the  misery  of  being  the  associates  of  the 
Great  King.  It  was  no  lucrative  post.  His 
majesty  was  as  severe  and  economical  in  hia 
friendships  as  in  the  other  charges  of  his  esta 
blishment,  and  as  unlikely  to  give  a  rixdollar 
too  much  for  his  guests  as  for  his  dinners. 
The  sum  which  he  allowed  to  a  poet  or  a  phi 
losopher,  was  the  very  smallest  sum  for  which 
such  poet  or  philosopher  could  be  induced  to 
sell  himself  into  slavery;  and  the  bondsman 
might  think  himself  fortunate,  if  what  had  been 
so  grudgingly  given  was  not,  after  years  of  suf 
fering,  rudely  and  arbitrarily  withdrawn. 

Potsdam  was,  in  truth,  what  it  was  called  by 
one  of  its  most  illustrious  inmates,  the  Palace 
of  Alcina.  At  the  first  glance  it  seemed  to  be 
a  delightful  spot,  where  every  intellectual  and 
physical  enjoyment  awaited  the  happy  ad 
venturer.  Every  new  comer  was  received 
with  eager  hospitality,  intoxicated  with  flatter}', 
encouraged  to  expect  prosperity  and  greatness. 
It  was  in  vain  that  a  long  succession  of  fa 
vourites  who  had  entered  that  abode  with  de 
light  and  hope,  and  who,  after  a  short  term  of 
delusive  happiness,  had  been  doomed  to  ex 
piate  their  folly  by  years  of  wretchedness  and 
degradation,  raised  their  voices  to  warn  the 
aspirant  who  approached  the  charmed  thresh 
old.  Some  had  wisdom  enough  to  discover 
the  truth  early,  and  spirit  enough  to  fly  without 
looking  back;  others  lingered  on  to  a  cheerlesi 
and  unhonoured  old  age.  We  have  no  hesi 
tation  in  saying  that  the  poorest  author  of  that 
time  in  London,  sleeping  on  a  bulk,  dining  m 
a  cellar,  with  a  cravat  of  paper,  and  a  skewer 
for  a  shirt-pin,  was  a  happier  man  than  any 
of  the  literary  inmates  of  Frederic's  court. 
But  of  all  who  entered  the  enchanted  garden 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT. 


515 


m  the  inebriation  of  de^.^h*  and  quitted  it  in 
agonies  of  rage  and  shame,  the  most  remarka 
ble  was  Voltaire.     Many  circumstances  had 
made  him  desirous  of  finding  a  home  at  a  dis 
tance  from  his  country.     His  fame  had  raised 
him  up  enemies.     His  sensibility  gave  them  a 
formidable  advantage  over  him.    They  were, 
indeed,  contemptible  assailants.      Of  all  that 
they  wrote  against  him,  nothing  has  survived 
except  what  he  has  himself  preserved.     But 
the  constitution  of  his  mind  resembled  the  con 
stitution  of  those  bodies  in  which  the  slightest 
scratch  of  a  bramble,  or  the  bite  of  a  gnat, 
never  fails  to  fester.    Though  his  reputation 
was  rather  raised  than  lowered  by  the  abuse 
of  such  writers  as  Freron  and  Desfontaines — 
though  the  vengeance  which  he  took  on  Fre 
ron  and  Desfontaines  was  such,  that  scourging, 
branding,  pillorying,  would  have  been  a  trifle 
to  it — there  is  reason  to  believe  that  they  gave 
him  far  more  pain  than  he  ever  gave  them. 
Though  he  enjoyed  during  his  own  lifetime  the 
reputation  of  a  classic — though  he  was  extolled 
by  his  contemporaries  above  all  poets,  phiio- 
sophers,and  historians — though  his  works  were 
read  with  as  much  delight  and  admiration  at 
Moscow   and  Westminster,  at  Florence   and 
Stockholm,  as  at  Paris  itself,  he  was  yet  tor 
mented  by  that  restless  jealousy  which  should 
seem  to  belong  only  to  minds  burning  with  the 
desire  of  fame,  and  yet  conscious  of  impotence. 
To  men  of  letters  who  could  by  no  possibility 
be  his  rivals,  he  was,  if  they  behaved  well  to 
him,  not  merely  just,  not  merely  courteous,  but 
often  a  hearty  friend  and  a  munificent  bene 
factor.    But   to   every  writer  who   rose  to  a 
celebrity   approaching    his    own,  he  became 
cither  a  disguised  or  an  avowed  enemy.     He 
slyly  depreciated  Montesquieu  and  Buffbn.    He 
publicly,  and  with  violent  outrage,  made  war 
on  Jean  Jacques.    Nor  had  he  the  art  of  hiding 
his  feelings  under  the  semblance  of  good-hu 
mour  or  of  contempt.     With  all  his  great  ta 
lents,  and  all  his  long  experience  of  the  world, 
he  had  no  more  self-command  than  a  petted 
child  or  an  hysterical  woman.     Whenever  he 
was  mortified,  he  exhausted  the  whole  rhetoric 
of  anger  and  sorrow  to  express  his  mortifica 
tion.     His  torrents  of  bitter  words — his  stamp 
ing  and  cursing — his  grimaces  and  his  tears 
of  rage — were  a  rich  feast  to  those  abject  na 
tures,  whose  delight  is  in  the  agonies  of  pow 
erful  spirits  and  in  the  abasement  of  immortal 
names.    These  creatures  had  now  found  out 
a  way  of  galling  him  to  the  very  quick.     In 
one  walk,  at  least,  it  had  been  admitted  by  envy 
itself  that  he  was  without  a  living  competitor. 
Since  Racine  had  been  laid  among  the  great 
men  whose  dust  made  the  holy  precinct  of 
Port-Royal  holier,  no  tragic  poet  had  appeared 
who  could  contest  the  palm  with  the  author  of 
Zaire,  of  Alzire,  and  of  Merope.     At  length   a 
rival   was   announced.      Old  Crebillon,  who, 
many  years  before,  had  obtained  some  theatri 
cal  success,  and  who  had  long  been  forgotten 
came  forth  from  his  garret  in  one  of  the  mean 
est  lanes  near  the  Rue  St.  Antoine,  and  wa 
welcomed  by  the  acclamations  of  envious  men 
of  letters,  and  of  a  capricious  populace.    A 
thing  called  Catiline,  which  he  had  written  in 
his  retirement,  was  acted  with  boundless  ap 


plause.  Of  this  execrable  piece  it  is  sufficient 
to  say,  that  the  plot  turns  on  a  love  affair,  car 
ried  on  in  all  the  forms  of  Scudery,  between 
Catiline,  whose  confidant  is  the  Praetor  Lentu- 
us,  and  Tullia,  the  daughter  of  Cicero.  The 
heatre  resounded  with  acclamations.  The 
dng  pensioned  the  successful  poet;  and  the 
coffee-houses  pronounced  that  Voltaire  was  a 
clever  man,  but  that  the  real  tragic  inspiration, 
he  celestial  fire  which  glowed  in  Corneille 
and  Racine  was  to  be  found  in  Crebillon, 
alone. 

The  blow  went  to  Voltaire's  heart.  Had 
lis  wisdom  and  fortitude  been  in  proportion  to 
he  fertility  of  his  intellect,  and  to  the  brilliancy 
of  his  wit,  he  would  have  seen  that  it  was  out 
of  the  power  of  all  the  puffers  and  detractors 
n  Europe  to  put  Catiline  above  Zaire ;  but  he 
lad  none  of  the  magnanimous  patience  with 
which  Milton  and  Bentley  left  their  claims  to 
he  unerring  judgment  of  time.  He  eagerly- 
engaged  in  an  undignified  competition  with 
Crebillon,  and  produced  a  series  of  plays  on 
the  same  subjects  which  his  rival  had  treated. 
These  pieces  were  coolly  received.  Angry 
with  the  court,  angry  with  the  capital,  Voltaire 
began  to  find  pleasure  in  the  prospect  of  exile. 
His  attachment  for  Madame  de  Chatelet  long 
prevented  him  from  executing  his  purpos*- 
Her  death  set  him  at  liberty;  and  he  deter 
mined  to  take  refuge  at  Berlin. 

To  Berlin  he  was  invited  by  a  series  of  let 
ters,  couched  in  terms  of  the  most  enthusiastic 
friendship  and  admiration.  For  once  the  rigid 
parsimony  of  Frederic  seemed  to  have  relaxed. 
Orders,  honourable  offices,  a  liberal  pension,  a 
well-served  table,  stately  apartments  under  a 
royal  roof,  were  offered  in  return  for  the  plea 
sure  and  honour  which  were  expected  from 
the  society  of  the  first  wit  of  the  age.  A  thou 
sand  louis  were  remitted  for  the  charges  of 
the  journey.  No  ambassador  setting  out  from 
Berlin  for  a  court  of  the  first  rank,  had  ever 
been  more  amply  supplied.  But  Voltaire  was 
not  satisfied.  At  a  later  period,  when  he  pos 
sessed  an  ample  fortune,  he  was  one  of  the 
most  liberal  of  men  ;  but  till  his  means  had 
become  equal  to  his  wishes,  his  greediness  for 
lucre  was  unrestrained  either  by  justice  or  by 
shame.  He  had  the  effrontery  to  ask  for  a 
thousand  louis  more,  in  order  to  enable  him  to 
bring  his  niece,  Madame  Denis,  the  ugliest  of 
coquettes,  in  his  company.  The  indelicate 
rapacity  of  the  poet  produced  its  natural  effect 
on  the  severe  and  frugal  king.  The  answer 
was  a  dry  refusal.  "I  did  not,"  said  his  ma 
jesty,  "  solicit  the  honour  of  the  lady's  society." 
On  this,  Voltaire  went  off  into  a  paroxysm  of 
childish  rage.  "Was  there  ever  such  avarice! 
He  has  hundred  of  tubs  full  of  dollars  in  his 
vaults,  and  haggles  with  me  about  a  poor  thou 
sand  louis."  It  seemed  that  the  negotiation, 
would  be  broken  off;  but  Frederic,  with  great 
dexterity,  affected  indifference,  and  seemed 
inclined  to  transfer  his  idolatry  to  Baculard 
d'Arnaud.  His  majesty  even  wrote  some  bad 
verses,  of  which  the  sense  was,  that  Voltaire 
was  a  setting  sun,  and  that  Arnaud  was  rising 
Good-natured  friends  soon  carried  the  lines  to 
Voltaire.  He  was  in  his  bed.  He  jumped  om 
in  his  shirt,  danced  about  the  room  with  rage, 


616 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  sent  for  his  passport  and  his  post-horses. 
It  was  not  difficult  to  foresee  the  end  of  a  con 
nection  which  had  such  a  beginning. 

It  was  in  the  year  1750  that  Voltaire  left  the 
great  capital,  which  he  was  not  to  see  again 
till,  after  the  lapse  of  nearly  thirty  years,  he 
returned,  bowed  down  by  extreme  old  age,  to 
die  in  the  midst  of  a  splendid  and  ghastly  tri 
umph.  His  reception  in  Prussia  was  such  as 
might  well  have  elated  a  less  vain  and  excit 
able  mind.  He  wrote  to  his  friends  at  Paris, 
that  the  kindness  and  the  attention  with  which 
he  had  been  welcomed  surpassed  description 
— that  the  king  was  the  most  amiable  of  men — 
that  Potsdam  was  the  Paradise  of  philosophers. 
He  was  created  chamberlain,  and  received,  to 
gether  with  his  gold  key,  the  cross  of  an  order, 
and  a  patent  ensuring  to  him  a  pension  of 
eight  hundred  pounds  sterling  a  year  for  life. 
A  hundred  and  sixty  pounds  a  year  were  pro 
mised  to  his  niece  if  she  survived  him.  The 
royal  cooks  and  coachmen  were  put  at  his  dis 
posal.  He  was  lodged  in  the  same  apartments 
in  which  Saxe  had  lived,  when,  at  the  height 
of  power  and  glory,  he  visited  Prussia.  Fre 
deric,  indeed,  stooped  for  a  time  even  to  use 
the  language  of  adulation.  He  pressed  to  his 
lips  the  meager  hand  of  the  little  grinning  ske 
leton,  whom  he  regarded  as  the  dispenser  of 
immortal  renown.  He  would  add,  he  said,  to 
the  titles  which  he  owed  to  his  ancestors  and 
his  sword,  another  title,  derived  from  his  last 
and  proudest  acquisition.  His  style  should 
run  thus : — Frederic,  King  of  Prussia,  Mar 
grave  of  Brandenburg,  Sovereign  Duke  of  Si 
lesia,  Possessor  of  Voltaire.  But  even  amidst 
the  delights  of  the  honey-moon,  Voltaire's  sen 
sitive  vanity  began  to  take  alarm.  A  few  days 
after  his  arrival,  he  could  not  help  telling  his 
niece,  that  the  amiable  king  had  a  trick  of 
giving  a  sly  scratch  with  one  hand  while  pat 
ting  and  stroking  with  the  other.  Soon  came 
hints  not  the  less  alarming  because  mysteri 
ous.  "  The  supper  parties  are  delicious.  The 
king  is  the  life  of  the  company.  But — I  have 
operas  and  comedies,  reviews  and  concerts, 
my  studies  and  books.  But — but — Berlin  is 
fine,  the  princess  charming,  the  maids  of 
honour  handsome.  But" 

This  eccrntric  friendship  was  fast  cooling. 
Never  had  there  met  two  persons  so  exquisite 
ly  fitted  to  plague  each  other.  Each  of  them 
nad  exactly  the  fault  of  which  the  other  was 
most  impatient;  and  they  were,  in  different 
ways,  the  most  impatient  ^f  mankind.  Frede 
ric  was  frugal,  almost  niggardly.  When  he 
had  secured  his  plaything,  he  began  to  think 
that  he  had  bought  it  too  dear.  Voltaire,  on 
the  other  hand,  was  greedy,  even  to  the  extent 
of  impudence  and  knavery;  and  conceived 
that  the  favourite  of  a  monarch,  who  had  bar 
rels  full  of  gold  and  silver  laid  up  in  cellars, 
ought  to  make  a  fortune  which  a  receiver- 
general  might  envy.  They  soon  discovered 
trach  other's  feelings.  Both  were  angry,  and 
a  war  began,  in  which  Frederic  stooped  to  the 
part  of  Harpagon,  and  Voltaire  to  that  of  Sea- 
pin.  It  is  humiliating  to  relate,  that  the  great 
warrior  and  statesman  gave  orders  that  his 
guest's  allowance  of  sugar  and  chocolate 
should  be  curtailed.  It  is,  if  possible,  a  still 


more  humiliating  fact,  that  Voltaire  indemni 
fied  himself  by  pocketing  the  wax-candles  in 
the  royal  antechamber.  Disputes  about  mo 
ney,  however,  were  not  the  most  serious  dis 
putes  of  these  extraordinary  associates.  The 
sarcasms  soon  galled  the  sensitive  temper  of 
the  poet.  D'Arnaud  and  D'Argens,  Guichard 
and  La  Metric,  might,  for  the  sake  of  a  morsel 
of  bread,  be  willing  to  bear  the  insolence  of  a 
master ;  but  Voltaire  was  of  another  order. 
He  knew  that  he  was  a  potentate  as  well  as 
Frederic ;  that  his  European  reputation,  and 
his  incomparable  power  of  covering  whatever 
he  hated  with  ridicule,  made  him  an  object  of 
dread  even  to  the  leaders  of  armies  and  the 
rulers  of  nations.  In  truth,  of  all  the  intellec 
tual  weapons  which  have  ever  been  wielded 
by  man,  the  most  terrible  was  the  mockery  of 
Voltaire.  Bigots  and  tyrants,  who  had  never 
been  moved  by  the  wailing  and  cursing  of 
millions,  turned  pale  at  his  name.  Principles 
unassailable  by  reason,  principles  which  had 
withstood  the  fiercest  attacks  of  power,  the 
most  valuable  truths,  the  most  generous  senti 
ments,  the  noblest  and  most  graceful  images, 
the  purest  reputations,  the  most  august  institu 
tions,  began  to  look  mean  and  loathsome  as 
soon  as  that  withering  smile  was  turned  upon 
them.  To  every  opponent,  however  strong  in 
his  cause  and  his  talents,  in  his  station  and  his 
character,  who  ventured  to  encounter  the  great 
scoffer,  might  be  addressed  the  caution  which 
was  given  of  old  to  the  Archangel : — 

"1  forewarn  tliee,  shun 
His  deadly  arrow  ;  neither  vainly  hope 
To  be  invulnerable  in  those  bright  arms, 
Though  ternper'il  heavenly  ;  for  thai  fata!  dint, 
Save  Him  who  reigns  above,  none  can  resist." 

We  cannot  pause  to  recount  how  often  that 
rare  talent  was  exercised  against  rivals  worthy 
of  esteem — how  often  it  was  used  to  crush  and 
torture  enemies  worthy  only  of  silent  disdain — 
how  often  it  was  perverted  to  the  more  noxious 
purpose  of  destroying  the  last  sola.ce  of  earthly 
misery,  and  the  last  restraint  on  earthly  power. 
Neither  can  we  pause  to  tell  how  often  it  was 
ased  to  vindicate  justice, humanity, and  tolera 
tion — the  principles  of  sound  philosophy,  the 
principles  01  free  government.  This  is  not 
the  place  for  a  full  character  of  Voltaire. 

Causes  of  quarrel  multiplied  fast.  Voltaire, 
who,  partly  from  love  of  money,  and  partly 
from  love  of  excitement,  was  always  fond  of 
stockjobbing,  became  implicated  in  transac 
tions  of  at  least  a  dubious  character.  The 
king  was  delighted  at  having  such  an  oppor 
tunity  to  humble  his  guest;  and  bitter  re 
proaches  and  complaints  were  exchanged. 
Voltaire,  too,  was  soon  at  war  with  the  other 
men  of  letters  who  surrounded  the  king;  and 
this  irritated  Frederic,  who,  however,  had  him 
self  chiefly  to  blame :  for,  from  that  love  of 
tormenting  which  was  in  him  a  ruling  passion, 
he  perpetually  lavished  extravagant  praises 
on  small  men  and  bad  books,  merely  in  order 
that  he  might  enjoy  the  mortification  and  rage 
which  on  such  occasions  Voltaire  took  no 
pains  to  conceal.  His  majesty,  however,  soon 
had  reason  to  regret  the  pains  which  he  had 
taken  to  kindle  jealousy  among  the  members 
of  his  household.  The  whole  palace  was,  m  a 


FREDERIC   THE    GREAT. 


517 


fermen.  with  literary  intrigues  and  cabals.  It 
was  to  no  purpose  that  the  imperial  voice, 
which  kept  a  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  sol 
diers  in  order,  was  raised  to  quiet  the  conten 
tion  of  the  exasperated  wits.  It  was  far  easier 
to  stir  up  such  a  storm  than  to  lull  it.  Nor 
was  Frederic,  in  his  capacity  of  wit,  by  any 
means  without  his  own  share  of  vexations. 
He  had  sent  a  large  quantity  of  verses  to  Vol 
taire,  and  requested  that  they  might  be  returned, 
with  remarks  arid  correction.  "See,"  exclaim 
ed  Voltaire,  "what  a  quantity  of  his  dirty  linen 
the  king  has  sent  me  to  wash  !"  Talebearers 
were  not  wanting  to  carry  the  sarcasm  to  the 
royal  ear ;  and  Frederic  was  as  much  incensed 
as  a  Grub  Street  writer  who  had  found  his 
name  in  the  "  Dunciad." 

This  could  not  last.  A  circumstance  which, 
when  the  mutual  regard  of  the  friends  was  in 
its  first  glow,  would  merely  have  been  matter 
for  laughter,  produced  a  violent  explosion. 
Maupertuis  enjoyed  as  much  of  Frederic's 
good-will  as  any  man  of  letters.  He  was  Pre 
sident  of  the  Academy  of  Berlin;  and  stood 
second  to  Voltaire,  though  at  an  immense  dis 
tance,  in  the  literary  society  which  had  been 
assembled  at  the  Prussian  court.  Frederic 
had,  by  playing  for  his  own  amusement  on  the 
feelings  of  the  two  jealous  and  vainglorious 
Frenchmen,  succeeded  in  producing  a  bitter 
enmity  between  them.  Voltaire  resolved  to 
set  his  mark,  a  mark  never  to  be  effaced,  on 
the  forehead  of  Maupertuis;  and  wrote  the  ex 
quisitely  ludicrous  diatribe  of  Doctor  Akukia. 
He  showed  this  little  piece  to  Frederic,  who 
had  too  much  taste  and  too  much  malice  not 
to  relish  such  delicious  pleasantry.  In  truth, 
even  at  this  time  of  day,  it  is  not  easy  for  any 
person  who  has  the  least  perception  of  the  ridi 
culous  to  read  the  jokes  on  the  Latin  city,  the 
Patagonians,  and  the  hole  to  the  centre  of  the 
earth,  without  laughing  till  he  cries.  But 
though  Frederic  was  diverted  by  this  charm 
ing  pasquinade,  he  was  unwilling  that  it  should 
get  abroad.  His  self-love  was  interested.  He 
had  selected  Maupertuis  to  fill  the  Chair  of 
his  Academy.  If  all  Europe  were  taught  to 
laugh  at  Maupertuis,  would  not  the  reputation 
of  the  Academy,  would  not  even  the  dignity  of 
its  royal  patron,  be  in  some  degree  compro 
mised  ]  The  king,  therefore,  begged  Voltaire 
to  suppress  his  performance.  Voltaire  pro 
mised  to  do  so,  and  broke  his  word.  The  dia 
tribe  was  published,  and  received  with  shouts 
of  merriment  and  applause  by  all  who  could 
read  the  French  language.  The  king  stormed. 
Voltaire,  with  his  usual  disregard  of  truth,  pro 
tested  his  innocence,  and  made  up  some  lie 
about  a  printer  or  an  amanuensis.  The  king 
was  not  to  be  so  imposed  upon.  He  ordered 
the  pamphlet  to  be  burned  by  the  common 
hangman,  and  insisted  upon  having  an  apology 
from  Voltaire,  couched  in  the  most  abject 
terms.  Voltaire  sent  back  to  the  king  his 
cross,  his  key,  and  the  patent  of  his  pension. 
After  this  burst  of  rage,  the  strange  pair  began 
(L>  be  ashamed  of  their  violence,  and  went 
through  the  forms  of  reconciliation.  But  the 
breach  was  irreparable;  and  Voltaire  took  his 
leave  of  Frederic  forever.  They  parted  with 
cold  civ'li  y;  but  their  hearts  were  big  with 


resentment.  Voltaire  had  in  his  keeping  a 
volume  of  the  king's  poetry,  and  forgot  to  re 
turn  it.  This  was,  we  believe,  merely  one  ol 
the  oversights  which  men  setting  out  upon  a 
journey  often  commit.  That  Voltaire  could 
have  meditated  plagiarism  is  quite  incredible. 
He  would  not,  we  are  confident,  for  the  half  of 
Frederic's  kingdom,  have  consented  to  father 
Frederic's  verses.  The  king,  however,  who 
rated  his  own  writings  much  above  their  value, 
and  who  was  inclined  to  see  all  Voltaire's  ac 
tions  in  the  worst  light,  was  enraged  to  think 
that  his  favourite  compositions  were  in  the 
hands  of  an  enemy,  as  thievish  as  a  daw  and 
as  mischievous  as  a  monkey.  In  the  anger 
excited  by  this  thought,  he  lost  sight  of  reason 
and  decency,  and  determined  on  committing 
an  outrage  at  once  odious  and  ridiculous. 

Voltaire  had  reached  Frankfort.  His  niece, 
Madame  Denis,  came  thither  to  meet  him.  He 
conceived  himself  secure  from  the  power  of  his 
late  master,  when  he  was  arrested  by  order  of 
the  Prussian  resident.  The  precious  volume 
was  delivered  up.  But  the  Prussian  agents 
had,  no  doubt,  been  instructed  not  to  let  Vol 
taire  escape  without  some  gross  indignity.  He 
was  confined  twelve  days  in  a  wretched  hovel. 
Sentinels  with  fixed  bayonets  kept  guard  over 
him.  His  niece  was  dragged  through  the 
mire  by  the  soldiers.  Sixteen  hundred  dollars 
were  extorted  from  him  by  his  insolent  jailers. 
It  is  absurd  to  say  that  this  outrage  is  not  to  be 
attributed  to  the  king.  Was  anybody  punish 
ed  for  it]  Was  anybody  called  in  question 
for  it]  Was  it  not  consistent  with  Frederic's 
character  ]  Was  it  not  of  a  piece  with  his  con 
duct  on  other  similar  occasions  1  Is  it  not  no 
torious  that  he  repeatedly  gave  private  direc 
tions  to  his  officers  to  pillage  and  demolish  the 
houses  of  persons  against  whom  he  had  a 
grudge — charging  them  at  the  same  time  to 
take  their  measures  in  such  a  way  that  his 
name  might  not  be  compromised]  He  acted 
thus  towards  Count  Buhl  in  the  Seven  Years' 
War.  Why  should  we  believe  that  he  would 
have  been  more  scrupulous  with  regard  to  Vol 
taire  ] 

When  at  length  the  illustrious  prisoner  re 
gained  his  liberty,  the  prospect  before  him  was 
but  dreary.  He  was  an  exile  both  from  the 
country  of  his  birth  and  from  the  country  of 
his  adoption.  The  French  government  had 
taken  offence  at  his  journey  to  Prussia,  and 
would  not  permit  him  to  return  to  Paris;  and 
in  the  vicinity  of  Prussia  it  was  not  safe  for 
him  to  remain. 

He  took  refuge  on  the  beautiful  shores  of 
Lake  Leman.  There,  loosed  from  every  tie 
which  had  hitherto  restrained  him,  and  having 
little  to  hope  or  to  fear  from  courts  and 
churches,  he  began  his  long  war  against  all 
that,  whether  for  good  or  evil,  had  authority 
over  man  ;  for  what  Burke  said  of  the  Consti 
tuent  Assembly,  was  eminently  true  of  this  its 
great  forerunner.  He  could  not  build — ha 
could  only  pull  down — he  was  the  very  Vitru- 
vius  of  ruin.  He  has  bequeathed  to  us  not  a 
single  doctrine  to  be  called  by  his  nam*" — not 
a  single  addition  to  the  stock  of  our  positive 
knowledge.  But  no  human  teacher  ever  left  be 
hind  him  so  vast  and  terrible  a  wreck  of  truing 
2  X 


518 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


and  falsehoods — of  things  noble  and  things  ' 
base — of  things  useful  and  things  pernicious. 
From  the  time  when  his  sojourn  beneath  the , 
Alps  commenced,  the  dramatist,  the  wit,  the ; 
historian,  was  merged  in  a  more  important 
character.  He  was  now  the  patriarch,  the  J 
founder  of  a  sect,  the  chief  of  a  conspiracy,  the 
prince  of  a  wide  intellectual  commonwealth. 
He  often  enjoyed  a  pleasure  dear  to  the  better 
part  of  his  nature,  the  pleasure  of  vindicating 
innocence  which  had  no  other  helper — of  re 
pairing  cruel  wrongs — of  punishing  tyranny 
in  high  places.  He  had  also  the  satisfaction, 
not  less  acceptable  to  his  ravenous  vanity,  of 
hearing  terrified  Capuchins  call  him  the  Anti 
christ.  But  whether  employed  in  works  of 
benevolence,  or  in  works  of  mischief,  he  never 
forgot  Potsdam  and  Frankfort;  and  he  listened 
anxiously  to  every  murmur  which  indicated 
lhat  a  tempest  was  gathering  in  Europe,  and 
that  his  vengeance  was  at  hand. 

He  soon  had  his  wish.  Maria  Theresa  had 
never  for  a  moment  forgotten  the  great  wrong 
which  she  had  received  at  the  hand  of  Frede 
ric.  Young  and  delicate,  just  left  an  orphan, 
just  about  to  be  a  mother,  she  had  been  com 
pelled  to  fly  from  the  ancient  capital  of  her 
race ;  she  had  seen  her  fair  inheritance  dis 
membered  by  robbers,  and  of  those  robbers  he 
had  been  the  foremost.  Without  a  pretext, 
without  a  provocation,  in  defiance  of  the  most 
sacred  engagement?,  he  had  attacked  the  help 
less  ally  whom  he  was  bound  to  defend.  The 
Empress-Queen  had  the  faults  as  well  as  the 
virtues  which  are  connected  with  quick  sensi 
bility  and  a  high  spirit.  There  was  no  peril 
which  she  was  not  ready  to  brave,  no  calamity 
which  she  was  not  ready  to  bring  on  her  sub 
jects,  or  on  the  whole  human  race,  if  only  she 
might  once  taste  the  sweetness  of  a  complete 
revenge.  Revenge,  too,  presented  itself  to  her 
narrow  and  superstitious  mind  in  the  guise  of 
duty.  Silesia  had  been  wrested  not  only  from 
the  house  of  Austria,  but  from  the  Church  of 
Rome. 

The  conqueror  had  indeed  permitted  his  new 
subjects  to  worship  God  after  their  own  fashion ; 
but  this  was  not  enough.  To  bigotry  it  seemed 
an  intolerable  hardship  that  the  Catholic  Church, 
having  long  enjoyed  ascendency,  should  be 
compelled  to  content  itself  with  equality.  Nor 
was  this  the  only  circumstance  which  led 
Maria  Theresa  to  regard  her  enemy  as  the 
enemy  of  God.  The  profaneness  of  Frederic's 
writings  and  conversation,  and  the  frightful 
rumours  which  were  circulated  respecting  the 
immoralities  of  his  private  life,  naturally  shock 
ed  a  woman  who  believed  with  the  firmest 
faith  all  that  her  confessor  told  her;  and  who, 
though  surrounded  by  temptations,  though 
young  and  beautiful,  though  ardent  in  all  her 
passions,  though  possessed  of  absolute  power, 
had  preserved  her  fame  unsullied  even  by  the 
breath  of  slander. 

To  recover  Silesia,  to  humble  the  dynasty 
of  Hcnenzollern  to  the  dust,  was  the  great  ob 
ject  of  her  life.  She  toiled  during  many  years 
for  this  end,  with  zeal  as  indefatigable  as  that 
which  the  poet  ascribes  to  the  stately  goddess 
who  tired  out  her  immortal  horses  in  the  work 
of  raising  the  nations  against  Troy,  and  whr 


offered  to  give  up  to  destruction  her  darling 
Sparta  and  Mycenae,  if  only  she  might  once  see 
the  smoke  going  up  from  the  palace  of  Priam. 
With  even  such  a  spirit  did  the  proud  Austrian 
Juno  strive  to  array  against  her  foe  a  coalition 
such  as  Europe  had  never  seen.  Ncthing 
would  content  her  but  that  the  whole  civilized 
world,  from  the  White  Sea  to  the  Adriatic,  from 
the  Bay  of  Biscay  to  the  pastures  of  the  wild 
horses  of  Tanais,  should  be  combined  in  arms 
against  one  petty  state. 

She  early  succeeded  by  various  arts  in  ob 
taining  the  adhesion  of  Russia.  An  ample 
share  of  spoil  was  promised  to  the  King  of 
Poland  ;  and  that  prince,  governed  by  his  fa 
vourite,  Count  Buhl,  readily  promised  the  as 
sistance  of  the  Saxon  forces.  The  great  diffi 
culty  was  with  France.  That  the  houses  of 
Bourbon  and  of  Hapsburg  should  ever  cor 
dially  co-operate  in  any  great  scheme  of  Euro 
pean  policy,  had  long  been  thought,  to  use  the 
strong  expression  of  Frederic,  just  as  impos 
sible  as  that  fire  and  water  should  amalgamate. 
The  whole  history  of  the  Continent,  during  two 
centuries  and  a  half,  had  been  the  history  of 
the  mutual  jealousies  and  enmities  of  France 
and  Austria.  Since  the  administration  of  Riche 
lieu,  above  all,  it  had  been  considered  as  the 
plain  policy  of  the  Most  Christian  king  to 
thwart  on  all  occasions  the  court  of  Vienna; 
and  to  protect  every  member  of  the  Germanic 
body  who  stood  up  against  the  dictation  of  the 
Caesars.  Common  sentiments  of  religion  had 
been  unable  to  mitigate  this  strong  antipathy 
The  rulers  of  France,  even  while  clothed  in 
the  Roman  purple,  even  while  persecuting  the 
heretics  of  Rochelle  and  Auvergne,  had  still 
looked  with  favour  on  the  Lutheran  and  Cal- 
vinistie  princes  who  were  struggling  against 
the  chief  of  the  empire.  "If  the  French  ministers 
paid  any  respect  to  the  traditional  rules  handed 
down  to  them  through  many  generations,  they 
would  have  acted  towards  Frederic  as  the 
greatest  of  their  predecessors  acted  towards 
Gustavus  Adolphus.  That  there  was  deadly 
enmity  between  Prussia  and  Austria,  was  of 
itself  a  sufficient  reason  for  close  friendship 
between  Prussia  and  France.  With  France, 
Frederic  could  never  have  any  serious  contro 
versy.  His  territories  were  so  situated,  that 
his  ambition,  greedy  and  unscrupulous  as  it 
was,  could  never  impel  him  to  attack  her  of 
his  own  accord.  He  was  more  than  half  a 
Frenchman.  He  wrote,  spoke,  read  nothing 
but  French ;  he  delighted  in  French  society. 
The  admiration  of  the  French  he  proposed  to 
himself  as  the  best  reward  of  all  his  exploits. 
It  seemed  incredible  that  any  French  govern 
ment,  however  notorious  for  levity  or  stupidity, 
could  spurn  away  such  an  ally. 

The  court  of  Vienna,  however,  did  not  de 
spair.  The  Austrian  diplomatists  propounded 
a  new  scheme  of  politics,  which,  it  must  be 
owned,  was  not  altogether  without  plausibility. 
The  great  powers,  according  to  this  theory, 
had  long  been  under  a  delusion.  They  had 
looked  on  each  other  as  natural  enemies,  while 
in  truth  they  were  natural  allies.  A  succession 
of  cruel  wars  had  devastated  Europe,  had 
thinned  the  population,  had  exhausted  the 
public  resources,  had  loaded  governments  wiih 


FREDERIC  THE  GREAT. 


519 


an  immense  burden  of  debt ;  and  when,  after 
two  hundred  years  of  murderous  hostility  or 
of  hollow  truce  the  illustrious  houses  whose 
enmity  had  distracted  the  world  sat  down  to 
count'  their  gains,  to  what  did  the  real  ad 
vantage  on  either   side  amount]     Simply  to 
this,  that  they  had  kept  each  other  from  thriv 
ing.    It  was  not  the  King  of  France,  it  was  not 
the  Emperor,  who  had  reaped  the  fruits  of  the 
Thirty  Years'  War,  of  the  War  of  the  Grand 
Alliance,  of  the  War  of  the  Pragmatic  Sanction. 
Those  fruits  had  been  pilfered  by  states  of  the 
second  and  third  rank,  Avhich,  secured  against 
jealousy  by  their  insignificance,  had  dexterously 
aggrandized  themselves   while  pretending   to 
serve   the   animosity  of  the   great   chiefs   of 
Christendom.     While  the  lion  and  tiger  were 
tearing  each  other,  the  jackal  had  run  off  into 
the  jungle  with  the  prey.     The  real  gainer  by 
the  Thirty  Years'  War  had  been  neither  France 
nor  Austria,  but  Sweden.     The  real  gainer  by 
the  War  of  the  Grand  Alliance  had  been  neither 
France   nor  Austria,   but    Savoy.    The    real 
gainer  by  the  War  of  the  Pragmatic  Sanction 
had  been  neither  France  nor  Austria,  but  the 
upstart  of  Brandenburg.  Of  all  these  instances, 
the  last  was  the  most  striking:    France  had 
made  great  efforts,  had  added  largely  to  her 
military  glory,  and  largely  to  her  public  bur 
dens ;  and  for  what  end  1    Merely  that  Frederic 
might  rule  Silesia.    For  this  and  this  alone 
one  French  army,  wasted  by  sword  and  famine, 
had   perished  in  Bohemia;   and  another  had 
purchased,  with  floods  of  the  noblest  blood,  the 
barren  glory  of  Fontenoy.     And  this  prince, 
for  whom  France  had  suffered  so  much,  was 
he  a  grateful,  was  he  even  an  honest  ally? 
Had  he  not  been  as  false  to  the  court  of  Ver 
sailles  as  to  the  court  of  Vienna  ]    Had  he  not 
played  en  a  larg«  scale,  the  same  part  which, 
in  privato  Hfe,  is  played  by  the  vile  agent  of 
chicane  who  sets  his  neighbours  quarrelling,  in 
volves  them  in  costly  and  interminable  litiga 
tion,  and  betrays  them  to  each  other  all  round, 
certain  that,  whoever  may  be  ruined,  he  shall 
be  enriched]     Surely  the  true  wisdom  of  the 
great  powers  was  to  attack,  not  each  other, 
but  this  common  barrator,  who,  by  inflaming 
the  passions  of  both,  by  pretending  to  serve 
both,  and  by  deserting  both,  had  raised  himself 
above  the  station  to  which  he  was  born.     The 
great  object  of  Austria  was  to  regain  Silesia; 
the  great  object  of  France  was  to  obtain  an  ac 
cession  of  territory  on  the  side  of  Flanders. 
If  they  took  opposite  sides,  the  result  would 
probably  be  that,  after  a  war  of  many  years, 
after  the  slaughter  of  many  thousands  of  brave 
men,  after  the  waste  of  many  millions  of  crowns, 
they  would  lay  down  their  arms  without  having 
achieved  either  object;  but,  if  they  came  to  an 
understanding,  there  would  be  no  risk  and  no 
difficulty.     Austria  would  willingly  make   in 
Belgium  such   cessions  as  France  could  not 
expect  to  obtain  by  ten  pitched  battles.     Silesia 
would  easily  be  annexed  to  the  monarchy  of 
which  it  had  long  been  a  part.    The  union  of 
two  such  powerful  governments  would  at  once 
overawe  the  King  of  Prussia.    If  he  resisted, 
one   short  cornpaign   would    settle    his   fate. 
France  and  Austria,  long  accustomed  to  rise 
from  the  game  of  war  both  losers,  would,  for 


the  first  time,  both  be  gainers.  There  couM  be 
no  room  for  jealousy  between  them.  The 
power  of  both  would  be  increased  at  once  ;  the 
equilibrium  between  them  would  be  preserved; 
and  the  only  sufferer  would  be  a  mischievous 
and  unprincipled  bucanier,  who  deserved  no 
tenderness  from  either. 

These  doctrines,  attractive  from  their  novel 
ty  and  ingenuity,  soon  became  fashionable  at 
the  supper-parties  and  in  the  coffee-houses  of 
Paris,  and  were  espoused  by  every  gay  mar 
quis  and  every  facetious  abbe  who  was  ad 
mitted   to  see  Madame  de  Pompadour's  hair 
curled  and  powdered.     It  was  not,  however,  to 
any  political  theory  that  the  strange  coalition 
between  France  and  Austria  owed  its  origin. 
The  real  motive  which  induced  the  great  conti 
nental  powers  to  forget  their  old  animosities 
and  their  old  state  maxims,  was  personal  aver 
sion  to  the  King  of  Prussia.    This  feeling  was 
strongest  in  Maria  Theresa;  but  it  was  by  no 
means  confined  to  her.     Frederic,  in  some  re 
spects  a  good  master,  was  emphatically  a  bad 
neighbour.     That  he  was  hard  in  all  his  deal 
ings,  and  quick  to  take  all  advantages,  was  not 
his  most  odious  fault.     His  bitter  and  scoffing 
speech  had  inflicted  keener  wounds  than  his 
ambition.     In   his  character   of  wit  he   was 
under  less  restraint  than  even  in  his  character 
of    ruler.      Satirical   verses   against   all    the 
princes  and  ministers  of  Europe  were  ascribed 
to  his  pen.     In  his  letters  and  conversation  he 
alluded  to  the  greatest  potentates  of  the  age  in 
terms  which  would  have  better  suited  Colle,  in 
a  war  of  repartee  with  young  Crebillon  at 
Pelletier's  table,  than  a  great  sovereign  speak 
ing  of  great  sovereigns.    About  women  he  was 
in  the  habit  of  expressing  himself  in  a  man 
ner  which  it  was  impossible  for  the  meekest 
of  women  to  forgive ;  and,  unfortunately  for 
him,  almost  the  whole  Continent  was  f.hen  go 
verned  by  women  who  were  by  no  means  con 
spicuous  for  meekness.     Maria  Theresa  her 
self  had  not  escaped  his  scurrilous  jests  ;  the 
Empress  Elizabeth  of  Russia  knew  that  her 
gallantries  afforded  him  a  favourite  theme  for 
ribaldry  and  invective ;   Madame  de  Pompa 
dour,  who  was  really  the  head  of  the  French 
government,  had  been  even  more  keenly  galled. 
She  had  attempted,  by  the  most  delicate  flattery, 
to  propitiate  the  King  of  Prussia,  but  her  mes 
sages  had  drawn  from  him  only  dry  and  sar 
castic  replies.      The  Empress-Queen   took  a 
very  different  course.     Though  the  haughtiest 
of  princesses,  though  the  most  austere  of  ma 
trons,  she  forgot  in  her  thirst  for  revenge  both 
the  dignity  of  her  race  and  the  pudty  of  her 
character,  and  condescended  to  flatter  the  low 
born  and  low-minded  concubine,  who,  having 
acquired  influence  by  prostituting  herself,  re 
tained  it  by  prostituting:  others.     Maria  The 
resa  actually  wrote  wilh  ner  own  hand  a  note, 
full  of  expressions  of  esteem  and  friendship, 
to  her  dear  cousin,  the  daughter  of  the  butcher 
Poisson,  the  wife  of  the  publican  D'Etiolns, 
the  kidnapper  of  young  girls  for  the  Parc-aux- 
cerfs — a  strange  cousin  for  the  descendant  of  so 
many  Emperors  of  the  West!     The  mistress 
was  completely  gained  over,  and  easily  carried 
her  point  with  Louis,  who  had,  indeed,  wrong* 
of  his  own  to  resent.    His  feelings  were  no. 


520 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


quick  ;  but  contempt,  s^ys  the  eastern  proverb 
pierces  even  through  the  shell  of  the  tortoise 
and  neither  prudence  nor  decorum  had  ever 
restrained  Frederic  from  expressing  his  mea 
sureless  contempt  for  the  sloth,  the  imbecility, 
and  the  baseness  of  Louis.  France  was  thus 
induced  to  join  the  coalition ;  and  the  example 
of  France  determined  the  conduct  of  Sweden, 
then  completely  subject  to  French  influence. 

The  enemies  of  Frederic  were  surely 
strong  enough  to  attack  him  openly ;  but  they 
were  desirous  to  add  to  all  their  other  advan 
tages  the  advantage  of  a  surprise.  He  was 
not,  however,  a  man  to  be  taken  off  his  guard. 
He  had  tools  in  every  court ;  and  he  now  re 
ceived  from  Vienna,  from  Dresden,  and  from 
Paris,  accounts  so  circumstantial  and  so  con 
sistent,  that  he  could  not  doubt  of  his  danger. 
He  learnt  that  he  was  to  be  assailed  at  once 
by  France,  Austria,  Russia,  Saxony,  Sweden, 
and  the  Germanic  body;  that  the  greater  part 
of  his  dominions  was  to  be  portioned  out 
amongst  his  enemies ;  that  France,  which 
from  her  geographical  position  could  not  di 
rectly  share  in  his  spoils,  was  to  receive  an 
equivalent  in  the  Netherlands ;  that  Austria 
•was  to  have  Silesia,  and  the  czarina  East 
Prussia;  that  Augustus  of  Saxony  expected 
Magdeburg;  and  that  Sweden  would  be  re 
warded  with  part  of  Pomerania.  If  these  de 
signs  succeeded,  the  house  of  Bradenburg 
would  at  once  sink  in  the  European  system  to 
a  place  lower  than  that  of  the  Duke  of  Wur- 
temburg  or  the  Margrave  of  Baden. 

And  what  hope  was  there  that  these  designs 
would  fail  ]  No  such  union  of  the  continental 
powers  had  been  seen  for  ages.  A  less  formi 
dable  confederacy  had  in  a  week  conquered 
all  the  provinces  of  Venice,  when  Venice  was 
at  the  height  of  power,  wealth,  and  glory.  A 
less  formidable  confederacy  had  compelled 
Louis  the  Fourteenth  to  bow  down  his  haughty 
head  to  the  very  earth.  A  less  formidable  con 
federacy  has,  wi'nin  our  own  memory,  subju 
gated  a  still  mightier  empire,  and  abased  a  still 
prouder  name.  Such  odds  had  never  been 
heard  of  in  war.  The  people  whom  Frederic 
ruled  were  not  five  millions.  The  population 
of  the  countries,  which  were  leagued  against 
him  amounted  to  a  hundred  millions.  The 
disproportion  in  wealth  was  at  least  equally 
great.  Small  communities,  actuated  by  strong 
sentiments  of  patriotism  or  loyalty,  have  some 
times  made  head  against  great  monarchies 
weakened  by  factions  and  discontents.  But 
small  as  was  Frederic's  kingdom,  it  probably 
contained  a  greater  number  of  disaffected  sub 
jects  than  were  to  be  found  in  all  the  states  of 
his  enemies.  Silesia  formed  a  fourth  part  of 
his  dominions;  and  from  the  Silesians,  born 
under  the  Austrian  princes,  the  utmost  that  he 
could  expect  was  apathy.  From  the  Silesian 
Catholics  he  could  hardly  expect  any  thing  but 
resisiance. 

Some  states  have  been  enabled,  by  their  geo 
graphical  position,  to  defend  themselves  with 
advantage  against  immense  force.  The  sea 
oas  repeatedly  protected  England  against  the 
fury  of  the  whole  Continent.  The  Venetian 
government,  driven  from  its  possessions  on  the 
could  still  bid  defiance  to  the  confederates 


of  Cambray  from  the  arsenal  amidst  the  la 
goons.  More  than  one  great  and  well-appoint 
ed  army,  which  regarded  the  shepherds  of  Swit 
zerland  as  an  easy  prey,  has  perished  in  the 
passes  of  the  Alps.  Frederic  had  no  such  ad 
vantage.  The  form  of  his  states,  their  situa 
tion,  the  nature  of  the  ground,  all  were  against 
him.  His  long,  scattered,  straggling  territory, 
seemed  to  have  been  shaped  with  an  express 
view  to  the  convenience  of  invaders,  and  was 
protected  by  no  sea,  by  no  chain  of  hills. 
Scarcely  any  corner  of  it  was  a  week's  march 
from  the  territory  of  the  enemy.  The  capital 
itself,  in  the  event  of  war,  would  be  constantly 
exposed  to  insult.  In  truth,  there  was  hardly 
a  politician  or  a  soldier  in  Europe  who  doubted 
that  the  conflict  would  be  terminated  in  a  very 
few  days  by  the  prostration  of  the  house  of 
Brandenburg. 

Nor  was  Frederic's  own  opinion  very  differ 
ent.  He  anticipated  nothing  short  of  his  owa 
ruin,  and  of  the  ruin  of  his  family.  Yet  there 
was  still  a  chance,  a  slender  chance,  of  escape, 
His  states  had  at  least  the  advantage  of  a  ceu 
tral  position ;  his  enemies  were  widely  sepa 
rated  from  each  other,  and  could  not.  conve 
niently  unite  their  overwhelming  forces  on  one 
point.  They  inhabited  different  climates,  and 
it  was  probable  that  the  season  of  the  year 
which  would  be  best  suited  to  the  military  ope 
rations  of  one  portion  of  the  league,  would  be 
unfavourable  to  those  of  another  portion.  The 
Prussian  monarchy,  too,  was  free  from  some 
infirmities  which  were  found  in  empires  far 
more  extensive  and  magnificent.  Its  effective 
strength  for  a  desperate  struggle  was  not  to  be 
measured  merely  by  the  number  of  square 
miles  or  the  number  of  people.  In  that  spare 
but  well-knit  i.id  well-exercised  body,  there 
was  nothing  tut  sinew,  and  muscle,  and  bone. 
No  public  creditors  looked  for  dividends.  No 
Hsiant  colonies  required  defence.  No  court, 
filled  with  flatterers  and  mistresses,  devoured 
he  pay  of  fifty  battalions.  The  Prussian 
army,  though  far  inferior  in  number  to  the 
troops  which  were  about  to  be  opposed  to  it, 
was  yet  strong  out.  of  all  proportion  to  the  extent 
of  the  Prussian  dominions.  It  was  also  admi 
rably  trained  and  admirably  officered,  accus- 
irned  to  obey  and  accustomed  to  conquer. 
The  revenue  was  not  only  unencumbered  by 
debt,  but  exceeded  the  ordinary  outlay  in  time 
of  peace.  Alone  of  all  the  European  princes, 
Frederic  had  a  treasure  laid  up  for  a  day  of 
difficulty.  Above  all,  he  was  one,  and  his 
enemies  were  many.  In  their  camps  would 
certainly  be  found  the  jealousy,  the  dissension, 
he  slackness  inseparable  from  coalitions ;  on 
iis  side  was  the  energy,  the  unity,  the  secrecy 
of  a  strong  dictatorship.  To  a  certain  extent 
he  deficiency  of  military  means  might  be  sup- 
ilied  by  the  resources  of  military  art.  Small 
as  the  king's  army  was,  when  compared  with 
he  six  hundred  thousand  men  whom  the  con» 
ederates  could  bring  into  the  field,  celerity  of 
movement  might  in  some  degree  compensate 
for  deficiency  of  bulk.  It  was  thus  just  possi- 
3le  that  genius,  judgment,  resolution,  and  good 
uck  united,  might  protract  the  struggle  during 
a  campaign  or  two ;  and  to  gain  even  a  month 
was  of  importance.  It  could  not  be  long  b«- 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT. 


521 


fore  the  vices  which  are  found  in  all  extensive 
confederacies  would  begin  to  show  themselves. 
Every  member  of  the  league  would  think  his 
own   share  of  the  war  too  large,  and  his  own  j 
share  of  the  spoils  too  small.     Complaints  and 
recrimination  would  abound.    The  Turk  might ; 
stir  on  the  Danube ;  the  statesmen  of  France  j 
might  discover  the  error  which  they  had  com-  : 
mitted  in  abandoning  the  fundamental  princi 
ples  of  their  national  policy.     Above  all,  death 
might  rid  Prussia  of  its  most  formidable  ene-  ' 
mies.    The  war  was  the  effect  of  the  personal 
aversion  with  which  three  or  four  sovereigns 
regarded  Frederic;  and  the  decease  of  any  of 
those  sovereigns  might   produce  a  complete 
revolution  in  the  state  of  Europe. 

In  the  midst  of  an  horizon  generally  dark 
and  stormy,  Frederic  could  discern  one  bright 
spot.  The  peace  which  had  been  concluded 
between  England  and  France  in  1748,  had 
been  in  Europe  no  more  than  an  armistice; 
and  had  not  even  been  an  armistice  in  the 
other  quarters  of  the  globe.  In  India  the  sove 
reignty  of  the  Carnatic  was  disputed  between 
two  great  Mussulman  houses;  Fort  Saint 
George  had  taken  the  one  side,  Pondi cherry  the 
other;  and  in  a  series  of  battles  and  sieges 
the  troops  of  Lawrence  and  Clive  had  been 
opposed  to  those  of  Dupleix.  A  struggle  less 
important  in  its  consequence,  but  not  less 
likely  to  produce  immediate  irritation,  was 
carried  on  between  those  French  and  English 
adventurers,  who  kidnapped  negroes  and  col 
lected  gold  dust  on  the  coast  of  Guinea.  But 
it  was  in  North  America  that  the  emulation 
and  mutual  aversion  of  the  two  nations  were 
most  conspicuous.  The  French  attempted  to 
hem  in  the  English  colonists  by  a  chain  of 
military  posts,  extending  from  the  Great  Lakes 
to  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi.  The  English 
took  arms.  The  wild  aboriginal  tribes  ap 
peared  on  each  side  mingled  with  the  "  Pale 
Faces."  Battles  were  fought;  forts  were 
stormed;  and  hideous  stories  about  stakes, 
scalpings,  and  death-songs  reached  Europe, 
and  inflamed  that  national  animosity  which 
the  rivalry  of  ages  had  produced.  The  dis 
putes  between  France  and  England  came  to  a 
crisis  at  the  very  time  when  the  tempest  which 
had  been  gathering  was  about  to  burst  on 
Prussia.  The  tastes  and  interests  of  Frederic 
would  have  led  him,  if  he  had  been  allowed 
an  option,  to  side  with  the  house  of  Bourbon. 
But  the  folly  of  the  court  of  Versailles  left 
him  no  choice.  France  became  the  tool  of 
Austria,  and  Frederic  was  forced  to  become  the 
ally  of  England.  He  could  not,  indeed,  expect 
that  a  power  which  covered  the  sea  with  its 
fleets,  and  which  had  to  make  war  at  once  on 
the  Ohio  and  the  Ganges,  would  be  able  to 
spare  a  large  number  of  troops  for  operations 
in  Germany.  But  England,  though  poor  com 
pared  with  the  England  of  our  time,  was  far 
richer  than  any  country  on  the  Continent. 
The  amount  of  her  revenue,  and  the  resources 
which  she  found  in  her  credit,  though  they 
may  be  thought  small  by  a  generation  which 
has  seen  her  raise  a  hundred  and  thirtv  mil 
lions  in  a  single  year,  appeared  miraculous  to 
the  politicians  of  that  age.  A  very  moderate 
portion  of  her  wealth,  expended  by  an  able 
VOL.  IV.— 66 


and  economical  prince,  in  a  country  where 
prices  were  low,  would  be  sufficient  to  equip 
and  maintain  a  formidable  army. 

Such  was  the  situation  in  which  Frederic 
found  himself.  He  saw  the  whole  extent  of 
his  peril.  He  saw  that  there  was  still  a  faint 
possibility  of  escape  ;  and,  with  prudent  teme 
rity,  he  determined  to  strike  the  first  blow.  It 
was  in  the  month  of  August,  1756,  that  the 
great  war  of  the  Seven  Years  commenced. 
The  king  demanded  of  the  Empress-Queen  a 
distinct  explanation  of  her  intentions,  and 
plainly  told  her  that  he  should  consider  a 
refusal  as  a  declaration  of  war.  "I  want,"  he 
said,  "  no  answer  in  the  style  of  an  oracle." 
He  received  an  answer  at  once  haughty  and 
evasive.  In  an  instant,  the  rich  electorate  of 
Saxony  was  overflowed  by  sixty  thousand 
Prussian  troops.  Augustus  with  his  army 
occupied  a  strong  position  at  Pirna.  The 
Queen  of  Poland  was  at  Dresden.  In  a  few 
days  Pirna  was  blockaded  and  Dresden  was 
taken.  The  object  of  Frederic  was  to  obtain 
possession  of  the  Saxon  State  Papers ;  for 
those  papers,  he  well  knew,  contained  ample 
proofs  that,  though  apparently  an  aggressor,  he 
was  really  acting  in  self-defence.  The  Queen 
of  Poland,  as  well  acquainted  as  Frederic 
with  the  importance  of  those  documents,  had 
packed  them  up,  had  concealed  them  in  her 
bed-chamber,  and  was  about  to  send  them  off 
to  Warsaw,  when  a  Prussian  officer  made  his 
appearance.  In  the  hope  that  no  soldier  would 
venture  to  outrage  a  lady,  a  queen,  a  daughter 
of  an  emperor,  the  mother-in-law  of  a  dauphin, 
she  placed  herself  before  the  trunk,  and  at 
length  sat  down  on  it.  But  all  resistance  was 
vain.  The  papers  were  carried  to  Frederic, 
who  found  in  them,  as  he  expected,  abundant 
evidence  of  the  designs  of  the  coalition.  The 
most  important  documents  were  instantly  pub 
lished,  and  the  effect  of  the  publication  was 
great.  It  was  clear  that,  of  whatever  sins  the 
King  of  Prussia  might  formerly  have  been 
guilty,  he  was  now  the  injured  party,  and  had 
merely  anticipated  a  blow  intended  to  destroy 
him. 

The  Saxon  camp  at  Pirna  was  in  the  mean 
time  closely  invested;  but  .the  besieged  were 
not  without  hopes  of  succour.  A  great  Aus 
trian  army  under  Marshal  Brown  was  about 
to  pour  through  the  passes  which  separate 
Bohemia  from  Saxony.  Frederic  left  at  Pirna 
a  force  sufficient  to  deal  with  the  Saxons,  has 
tened  into  Bohemia,  encountered  Brown  at 
Lowositz,  and  defeated  him.  This  battle  de 
cided  the  fate  of  Saxony.  Augustus  and  his 
favourite,  Buhl,  fled  to  Poland.  The  whole 
army  of  the  electorate  capitulated.  From  that 
time  till  the  end  of  the  war,  Frederic  treated 
Saxony  as  a  part  of  his  dominions,  or,  rather, 
he  acted  towards  the  Saxons  in  a  manner 
which  may  serve  to  illustrate  the  whole  mean- 
ing  of  that  tremendous  sentence — subjectos  tan- 
\  quam  suos,  viles  tanquam  alienos.  Saxony  was 
!  as  much  in  his  power  as  Brandenburg ;  and 
he  had  no  such  interest  in  the  welfare  of  Sax 
ony  as  he  had  in  the  welfare  of  Brandenburg. 
He  accordingly  levied  troops  and  exacted  con- 
tributions  throughout  the  enslaved  province, 
with  far  more  rigour  than  in  any  part  of  his 
2x2 


522 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


own  dominions.  Seventeen  thousand  men  who 
had  been  in  the  camp  at  Pirna  were  half  com 
pelled,  half  persuaded,  to  enlist  under  their 
conqueror.  Thus,  within,  a  few  weeks  from 
the  commencement  of  hostilities,  one  of  the 
confederates  had  been  disarmed,  and  his  wea 
pons  pointed  against  the  rest. 

The  winter  put  a  stop  to  military  operations. 
All  had  hitherto  gone  well.  But  the  real  tug 
of  war  was  still  to  come.  It  was  easy  to  foresee 
that  the  year  1757  would  be  a  memorable  era 
in  the  history  of  Europe. 

The  scheme  for  the  campaign  was  simple, 
bcld,  and  judicious.  The  Duke  of  Cumberland 
with  an  English  and  Hanoverian  army  was  in 
Western  Germany,  and  might  be  able  to  pre 
vent  the  French  troops  from  attacking  Prussia. 
The  Russians,  confined  by  their  snows,  would 
probably  not  stir  till  the  spring  was  far  ad 
vanced.  Saxony  was  prostrated.  Sweden  could 
do  nothing  very  important.  During  a  few- 
months  Frederic  would  have  to  deal  with 
Austria  alone.  Even  thus  the  odds  were 
against  him.  But  ability  and  courage  have 
often  triumphed  against  odds  still  more  formi 
dable. 

Early  in  1757  the  Prussian  army  in  Saxony 
began  to  move.  Through  four  defiles  in  the 
mountains  they  came  pouring  into  Bohemia. 
Prague  was  his  first  mark  ;  but  the  ulterior  ob 
ject  was  probably  Vienna.  At  Prague  lay 
Marshal  Brown  with  one  great  army.  Daun, 
the  most  cautious  and  fortunate  of  the  Austrian 
captains,  was  advancing  with  another.  Fre 
deric  determined  to  overwhelm  Brown  before 
Daun  should  arrive.  On  the  sixth  of  May  was 
fought,  under  those  walls  which,  a  hundred  and 
thirty  years  before,  had  witnessed  the  victory 
of  the  Catholic  league  and  the  flight  of  the  un 
happy  Palatine,  a  battle  more  bloody  than  any 
which  Europe  saw  during  the  long  interval  be 
tween  Malplaquet  and  Eylau.  The  king  and 
Prince  Ferdinand  of  Brunswick  were  distin 
guished  on  that  day  by  their  valour  and  exer 
tions.  But  the  chief  glory  was  with  Schvverin. 
When  the  Prussian  infantry  wavered,  the  stout 
old  marshal  snatched  the  colours  from  an  en 
sign,  and,  waving  them  in  the  air,  led  back  his 
regiment  to  the  charge.  Thus  at  seventy-two 
years  of  age,  he  fell  in  the  thickest  battle,  still 
grasping  the  standard  which  bears  the  black 
eagle  on  the  field  argent.  The  victory  remain 
ed  with  the  king.  But  it  had  been  dearly  pur 
chased.  Whole  columns  of  his  bravest  war 
riors  had  fallen.  He  admitted  that  he  had  lost 
eighteen  thousand  men.  Of  the  enemy,  twenty- 
four  thousand  had  been  killed,  wounded,  or 
taken. 

Part  of  the  defeated  army  was  shut  up  in 
Prague.  Part  fled  to  join  the  troops  which, 
Mnder  the  command  of  Daun,  were  now  close 
at  hand.  Frederic  determined  to  play  over 
the  same  game  which  had  succeeded  at  Lowo- 
sitz.  He  left  a  large  force  to  besiege  Prague, 
and  at  the  head  of  thirty  thousand  men  he 
marched  against  Daun.  The  cautious  marshal, 
though  he  had  a  great  superioritv  in  numbers, 
would  risk  nothing.  He  occupied  at  Kolin  a 
position  almost  impregnable,  and  awaited  the 
attack  oi  the  king. 

It  was  the  18th  of  June — a  day  which,  if  the 


Greek  superstition  still  retained  its  influence^ 
would  be  held  sacred  to  Nemesis — a  day  on 
which  the  two  greatest  princes  and  soldiers  of 
modern  times  were  taught,  by  a  terrible  expe 
rience,  that  neither  skill  nor  valour  can  fix  the 
inconstancy  of  fortune.  The  battle  began  before 
noon  ;  and  part  of  the  Prussian  army  maintain 
ed  the  contest  till  after  the  midsummer  sun, 
had  gone  down.  But  at  length  the  king  found 
that  his  troops,  having  been  repeatedly  driven, 
back  with  frightful  carnage,  could  no  longer  be 
led  to  the  charge.  He  was  with  difficulty  per 
suaded  to  quit  the  field.  The  officers  of  his 
personal  staff  were  under  the  necessity  of  ex 
postulating  with  him,  and  one  of  them  took  the 
liberty  to  say,  "  Does  your  majesty  mean  to 
storm  the  batteries  alone  1"  Thirteen  thousand 
of  his  bravest  followers  had  perished.  Nothing 
remained  for  him  but  to  retreat  in  good  order, 
to  raise  the  siege  of  Prague,  and  to  hurry  his 
army  by  different  routes  out  of  Bohemia. 

This  stroke  seemed  to  be  final.  Frederic's 
situation  had  at  best  been  such,  that  only  an  un 
interrupted  run  of  good-luck  could  save  him, 
as  it  seemed,  from  ruin.  And  now,  almost  in 
the  outset  of  the  contest,  he  had  met  with  a 
check  which,  even  in  a  war  between  equal 
powers,  would  have  been  felt  as  serious.  He 
had  owed  much  to  the  opinion  which  all 
Europe  entertained  of  his  army.  Since  his  ac 
cession,  his  soldiers  had  in  many  successive 
battles  been  victorious  over  the  Austrians. 
But  the  glory  had  departed  from  his  arms.  All 
whom  his  malevolent  sarcasms  had  wounded 
made  haste  to  avenge  themselves  by  scoffing 
at  the  scoffer.  His  soldiers  had  ceased  to  con 
fide  in  his  star.  In  every  part  of  his  camp  his 
dispositions  were  severely  criticised.  Even  in 
his  own  family  he  had  detractors.  His  next 
brother  William,  heir-presumptive,  or  rather, 
in  truth,  heir-apparent  to  the  throne,  and  great 
grandfather  of  the  present  king,  could  not  re 
frain  from  lamenting  his  own  fate  and  that  of 
the  house  of  Hohenzollern,  once  so  great  and 
so  prosperous,  but  now,  by  the  rash  ambition, 
of  its  chief,  made  a  byword  to  all  nations. 
These  complaints,  and  some  blunders  which 
William  committed  during  the  retreat  from 
Bohemia,  called  forth  the  bitter  displeasure  of 
the  inexorable  king.  The  prince's  heart  was 
broken  by  the  cutting  reproaches  of  his  brother; 
he  quitted  the  army,  retired  to  a  country  seat, 
and  in  a  short  time  died  of  shame  and  vexa 
tion. 

It  seemed  that  the  king's  distress  could 
hardly  be  increased.  Yet  at  this  moment 
another  blow  not  less  terrible  than  that  of 
Kolin  fell  upon  him.  The  French  under  Mar 
shal  D'Estrees  had  invaded  Germany.  The 
Duke  of  Cumberland  had  given  them  battle  at 
Hastembeck,  and  had  been  defeated.  In  order 
to  save  the  Electorate  of  Hanover  fronr^  entire 
subjugation,  he  had  made,  at  Clostern  Severn, 
an  arrangement  with  the  French  generals, 
which  left  them  at  liberty  to  turn  their  arms 
against  the  Prussian  dominions. 

That  nothing  might  be  wanting  to  Frederic's 
distress,  he  lost  his  mother  just  at  this  time; 
and  he  appears  to  have  felt  the  loss  more  than 
was  to  be  expected  from  the  hardness  and  se« 
verity  of  his  character.  In  truth,  his  raisfop. 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT. 


523 


tunes  had  now  cut  to  the  quick.  The  mocker,  I 
the  tyrant,  the  most  rigorous,  the  most  imperi- , 
ous,  the  most  cynical  of  men,  was  very  un 
happy.  His  face  was  so  haggard  and  his  form 
so  thin,  that  when  on  his  return  from  Bohemia 
he  passed  through  Leipsic,  the  people  hardly 
knew  him  again.  His  sleep  was  broken ;  the 
tears,  in  spite  of  himself,  often  started  into  his 
eyes  ;  and  the  grave  began  to  present  itself  to 
his  agitated  mind  as  the  best  refuge  from 
misery  and  dishonour.  His  resolution  was 
fixed  never  to  be  taken  alive,  and  never  to 
make  peace  on  condition  of  descending  from 
his  place  among  the  powers  of  Europe.  He 
saw  nothing  left  for  him  except  to  die ;  and  he 
deliberately  chose  his  mode  of  death.  He  al 
ways  carried  about  with  him  a  sure  and  speedy 
poison  in  a  small  glass  case  ;  and  to  the  few 
in  whom  he  placed  confidence,  he  made  no 
mystery  of  his  resolution. 

But  we  should  very  imperfectly  describe  the 
state  of  Frederic's  mind,  if  we  left  out  of  view 
the  laughable  peculiarities  which  contrasted  so 
singularly  with  the  gravity,  energy,  and  harsh 
ness  of  his  character.  It  is  difficult  to  say 
whether  the  tragic  or  the  comic  predominated 
in  the  strange  scene  which  was  then  acted.  In 
the  midst  of  all  the  great  king's  calamities,  his 
passion  for  writing  indifferent  poetry  grew 
stronger  and  stronger.  Enemies  all  around 
him,  despair  in  his  heart,  pills  of  corrosive 
sublimate  hidden  in  his  clothes,  he  poured  forth 
hundreds  upon  hundreds  of  lines,  hateful  to 
gods  and  men — the  insipid  dregs  of  Voltaire's 
Hippocrene — the  faint  echo  of  the  lyre  of 
Chaulieu.  It  is  amusing  to  compare  what  he 
did  during  the  last  months  of  1757,  with  what 
he  wrote  during  the  same  time.  It  may  be 
doubted  whether  any  equal  portion  of  the  life 
of  Hannibal,  of  Csesar,  or  of  Napoleon,  will 
bear  a  comparison  with  that  short  period,  the 
most  brilliant  in  the  history  of  Prussia  and  of 
Frederic.  Yet  at  this  very  time  the  scanty  lei 
sure  of  the  illustrious  warrior  was  employed 
in  producing  odes  and  epistles,  a  little  better 
than  Gibber's,  and  a  little  worse  than  Hayley's. 
Here  and  there  a  manly  sentiment  which  de 
serves  to  be  in  prose,  makes  it  appearance  in 
company  with  Prometheus  and  Orpheus,  Ely 
sium  and  Acheron,  the  plaintive  Philomel,  the 
poppies  of  Morpheus,  and  all  the  other  frippery 
which,  like  a  robe  tossed  by  a  proud  beauty  to 
her  waiting-women,  has  long  been  contemptu 
ously  abandoned  by  genius  to  mediocrity.  We 
hardly  know  any  instance  of  the  strength  and 
weakness  of  human  nature  so  striking,  and  so 
grotesque,  as  the  character  of  this  haughty, 
vigilant,  resolute,  sagacious  blue-stocking, 
half  Mithridates  and  half  Trissotin,  bearing  up 
against  a  world  in  arms,  with  an  ounce  of 

Soison  in  one  pocket  and  a  quire  of  bad  verses 
i  the  other. 

Frederic  had  some  time  before  made  ad 
vances  towards  a  reconciliation  with  Voltaire, 
aud  some  civil  letters  had  passed  between 
them.  After  the  battle  of  Kolin  their  episto 
lary  intercourse  became,  at  least  in  seemin 
friendly  and  confidential.  We  do  not  know 
any  collection  of  letters  which  throw  so  much 
light  on  the  darkest  and  most  intricate  parts 
of  human  nature  as  the  correspondence  of  these 


strange  beings  after  they  had  exchanged  for 
giveness.  Both  felt  that  the  quarrel  had  lower 
ed  them  in  the  public  estimation.  They  ad 
mired  each  other.  They  stood  in  need  of  each 
other.  The  great  king  wished  to  be  handed 
down  to  posterity  by  the  great  writer.  The  great 
writer  felt  himself  exalted  by  the  homage  of  the 
great  king.  Yet  the  wounds  which  they  had 
inflicted  on  each  other  were  too  deep  to  be 
effaced,  or  even  perfectly  healed.  Not  only  did 
the  scars  remain;  the  sore  places  often  festered 
and  bled  afresh. 

The  letters  consisted  for  the  most  part  of 
compliments,  thanks,  offers  of  service,  assu 
rances  of  attachment.  But  if  any  thing  brought 
back  to  Frederic's  recollection  the  cunning 
and  mischievous  pranks  by  which  Voltaire 
had  provoked  him,  some  expression  of  con 
tempt  and  displeasure  broke  forth  in  the  midst 
of  his  eulogy.  It  was  much  worse  when  any 
thing  recalled  to  the  mind  of  Voltaire  the  out 
rages  which  he  and  his  kinswoman  had  suf 
fered  at  Frankfort.  All  at  once  his  flowing 
panegyric  is  turned  into  invective.  "Rerneni' 
ber  how  you  behaved  to  me.  For  your  sake  I 
have  lost  the  favour  of  my  king.  For  your 
sake  I  am  an  exile  from  my  country.  I  loved 
you.  1  trusted  myself  to  you.  I  had  no  wish 
but  to  end  my  life  in  your  service.  And  what 
was  my  reward  1  Stripped  of  all  you  had  be 
stowed  on  me,  the  key,  the  order,  the  pension, 
I  was  forced  to  fly  from  your  territories.  I  was 
hunted  as  if  I  had  been  a  deserter  from  your 
grenadiers.  I  was  arrested,  insulted,  plundered. 
My  niece  was  dragged  in  the  mud  of  Frankfort 
by  your  soldiers  as  if  she  had  been  some  wretch 
ed  follower  of  your  camp.  You  have  great  ta 
lents.  You  have  good  qualities.  But  you  have 
one  odious  vice.  You  delight  in  the  abasement 
of  your  fellow-creatures.  You  have  brought 
disgrace  on  the  name  of  philosopher.  You 
have  given  some  colour  to  the  slanders  of  the 
bigots  who  say  that  no  confidence  can  be 
placed  in  the  justice  or  humanity  of  those  who 
reject  the  Christian  faith."  Then  the  king  an 
swers  with  less  heat,  but  with  equal  severity — 
"You  know  that  you  behaved  shamefully  in 
Prussia.  It  is  well  for  you  that  you  had  to 
deal  with  a  man  so  indulgent  to  the  infirmities 
of  genius  as  I  am.  You  richly  deserved  to  see 
the  inside  of  a  dungeon.  Your  talents  are  not 
more,  widely  known  than  your  faithlessness 
and  your  malevolence.  The  grave  itself  is  no 
asylum  from  your  spite.  Maupertuis  is  dead; 
but  you  still  go  on  calumniating  and  deriding 
him,  as  if  you  had  not  made  him  miserable 
enough  while  he  was  living.  Let  us  have  no 
more  of  this.  And,  above  all,  let  me  hear  no 
more  of  your  niece.  I  am  sick  to  death  of  her 
name.  I  can  bear  with  your  faults  for  the  sake 
of  your  merits  ;  but  she  has  not  written  Maho 
met  or  Merope" 

An  explosion  of  this  kind,  it  might  be  sup 
posed,  would  necessarily  put  an  end  to  all  ami 
cable  communication.  But  it  was  not  so.  After 
every  outbreak  of  ill  humour  this  extraordinary 
pair  became  more  loving  than  before,  and  ex. 
changed  compliments  and  assurances  of  mu 
tual  regard  with  a  wonderful  air  of  sincerity. 

It  may  well  be  supposed  that  men  who  wrotf 
thus  to  each  other  were  not  very  guarded  in 


524 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


what  they  said  of  each  other.  The  English 
ambassador,  Mitchell,  who  knew  that  the  King 
of  Prussia  was  constantly  writing  to  Voltaire 
with  the  greatest  freedom  on  the  most  import 
ant  subjects,  was  amazed  to  hear  his  majesty 
designate  this  highly  favoured  correspondent 
as  a  bad-hearted  fellow,  the  greatest  rascal  on 
the  face  of  the  earth.  And  the  language  which 
fhe  poet  held  about  the  king  was  not  much 
more  respectful. 

It  would  probably  have  puzzled  Voltaire  him 
self  to  say  what  was  his  real  feeling  towards 
Frederic.  It  was  compounded  of  all  senti 
ments,  from  enmity  to  friendship,  and  from 
scorn  to  admiration;  and  the  proportions  in 
which  these  elements  were  mixed  changed 
every  moment.  The  old  patriarch  resembled 
the  spoiled  child  who  screams,  stamps,  cuffs, 
laughs,  kisses,  and  cuddles  within  one  quarter 
of  an  hour.  His  resentment  was  not  extin 
guished;  yet  he  was  not  without  sympathy  for 
his  old  friend.  As  a  Frenchman,  he  wished 
success  to  the  arms  of  his  country.  As  a  phi 
losopher,  he  was  anxious  for  the  stability  of  a 
throne  on  which  a  philosopher  sat.  He  longed 
both  to  save  and  to  humble  Frederic.  There 
was  one  way,  and  only  one,  in  which  all  his 
conflicting  feelings  could  at  once  be  gratified. 
If  Frederic  were  preserved  by  the  interference 
of  France,  if  it  were  known  that  for  that  inter 
ference  he  was  indebted  to  the  mediation  of 
Voltaire,  this  would  indeed  be  delicious  re 
venge;  this  would  indeed  be  to  heap  coals 
of  fire  on  that  haughty  head.  Nor  did  the  vain 
and  restless  poet  think  it  impossible  that  he 
might,  from  his  hermitage  near  the  Alps,  dic 
tate  peace  to  Europe.  D'Estrees  had  quitted 
Hanover,  and  the  command  of  the  French 
army  had  been  intrusted  to  the  Duke  of  Riche 
lieu,  a  man  whose  chief  distinction  was  derived 
from  his  success  in  gallantry.  Richelieu  was, 
in  truth,  the  most  eminent  of  that  race  of  se 
ducers  by  profession  who  furnished  Crebillon 
the  younger  and  La  Clos  with  models  for  their 
heroes.  In  his  earlier  days  the  royal  house 
itself  had  not  been  secure  from  his  presumptu 
ous  love.  He  was  believed  to  have  carried  his 
conquests  into  the  family  of  Orleans;  and  some 
suspected  that  he  was  not  unconcerned  in  the 
mysterious  remorse  which  imbittered  the  last 
hours  of  the  charming  mother  of  Louis  the  Fif 
teenth.  But  the  duke  was  now  fifty  years  old. 
With  a,  heart  deeply  corrupted  by  vice,  a  head 
long  accustomed  to  think  only  on  trifles,  an  im 
paired  constitution,  an  impaired  fortune,  and, 
worst  of  all,  a  very  red  nose,  he  was  entering 
on  a  dull,  frivolous,  and  unrespected  old  age. 
Without  one  qualification  for  military  com 
mand  except  that  personal  courage  which  was 
common  to  him  and  the  whole  nobility  of 
France,  he  had  been  placed  at  the  head  of  the 
army  of  Hanover;  and  in  that  situation  he  did 
his  best  to  repair,  by  extortion  and  corruption, 
the  injury  which  he  had  done  to  his  property 
by  a  life  of  dissolute  profusion. 

The  Duke  of  Richelieu  to  the  end  of  his  life 
hated  the  phi!  >sophers  as  a  sect — not  for  those 
parts  of  their  system  which  a  good  and  wise 
man  would  have  condemned — but  for  their 
virtues,  for  their  spirit  of  free  inquiry,  and  for 
hatred  of  those  social  abuses  of  which  he 


was  himself  the  personification.  But  he,  like 
many  of  those  who  thought  with  him,  excepted 
Voltaire  from  the  list  of  proscribed  writers. 
He  frequently  sent  flattering  letters  to  Ferney. 
He  did  the  patriarch  the  honour  to  borrow 
money  of  him,  and  even  carried  his  conde 
scending  friendship  so  far  as  to  forget  to  pay 
interest.  Voltaire  thought  that  it  might  be  in 
his  power  to  bring  the  duke  and  the  King  of 
Prussia  into  communication  with  each  other. 
He  wrote  earnestly  to  both;  and  he  so  far  suc 
ceeded  that  a  correspondence  between  them 
was  commenced. 

But  it  was  to  very  different  means  that  Fre 
deric  was  to  owe  his  deliverance.  At  the  be 
ginning  of  November,  the  net  seemed  to  have 
closed  completely  round  him.  The  Russians 
were  in  the  field,  and  were  spreading  devasta 
tion  through  his  eastern  provinces.  Silesia 
was  overrun  by  the  Austrians.  A  great  French 
army  was  advancing  from  the  west  under  the 
command  of  Marshal  Soubise,  a  prince  of  the 
great  Armorican  house  of  Rohan.  Berlin  it 
self  had  been  taken  and  plundered  by  the 
Croatians.  Such  was  the  situation  from  which 
Frederic  extricated  himself,  with  dazzling 
glory,  in  the  short  space  of  thirty  days. 

He  marched  first  against  Soubise.  On  the 
fifth  of  November  the  armies  met  at  Rosbach. 
The  French  were  two  to  one  ;  but  they  were 
ill-disciplined,  and  their  general  was  a  dunce. 
The  tactics  of  Frederic,  and  the  well-regulated 
valour  of  the  Prussian  troops,  obtained  a  com 
plete  victory.  Seven  thousand  of  the  invaders 
were  made  prisoners.  Their  guns,  their  co 
lours,  their  baggage,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the 
conquerors.  Those  who  escaped  fled  as  con 
fusedly  as  a  mob  scattered  by  cavalry.  Victo 
rious  in  the  west,  the  king  turned  his  arms 
towards  Silesia.  In  that  quarter  every  thing 
seemed  to  be  lost.  Breslau  had  fallen  ;  and 
Charles  of  Lorraine,  with  a  mighty  power, 
held  the  whole  province.  On  the  fifth  of  De 
cember,  exactly  one  month  after  the  battle  of 
Rosbach,  Frederic,  with  forty  thousand  men, 
and  Prince  Charles,  at  the  head  of  not  less 
than  sixty  thousand,  met  at  Leuthen,  hard  by 
Breslau.  The  king,  who  was,  in  general, 
perhaps  too  much  inclined  to  consider  the 
common  soldier  as  a  mere  machine,  resorted, 
on  this  great  day,  to  means  resembling  those 
which  Bonaparte  afterwards  employed  with 
such  signal  success  for  the  purpose  of  stimu 
lating  military  enthusiasm.  The  principal 
officers  were  convoked.  Frederic  addressed 
them  with  great  force  and  pathos ;  and  directed 
them  to  speak  to  their  men  as  he  had  spoken 
to  *hem.  When  the  armies  were  set  in  battle 
array,  the  Prussian  troops  were  in  a  state  of 
ierce  excitement;  but  their  excitement  showed 
tself  after  the  fashion  of  a  grave  people.  The 
columns  advanced  to  the  attack  chanting,  to 
he  sound  of  drums  and  fifes,,  the  rude  hymns 
of  the  olil  Saxon  Herhholds.  They  had  never 
fought  so  well ;  nor  had  the  genius  of  their 
chief  ever  been  so  conspicuous.  "That  bat 
tle,"  said  Napoleon,  "  was  a  masterpiece.  Of 
itself  it  is  sufficient  to  entitle  Frederic  to  a 
place  in  the  first  rank  among  generals."  The 
victory  was  complete.  Twenty-seven  thousand 
Austriaiis  were  killed,  wounded,  ?r  *akeu; 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT. 


525 


fifty  stand  of  colours,  a  hundred  guns,  four 
thousand  wagons,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the 
Prussians.  Breslau  opened  its  gates;  Silesia 
was  reconquered  ;  Charles  of  Lorraine  retired 
to  hide  his  shame  and  sorrow  at  Brussels;  and 
Frederic  allowed  his  troops  to  take  some  re 
pose  in  winter  quarters,  after  a  campaign,  to 
the  vicissitudes  of  which  it  will  be  difficult  to 
find  any  parallel  in  ancient  or  modern  history. 

The  king's  fame  filled  all  the  world.  He 
had,  during  the  last  year,  maintained  a  con 
test,  on  terms  of  advantage,  against  three 
powers,  the  weakest  of  which  had  more  than 
three  times  his  resources.  He  had  fought  four 
great  pitched  battles  against  superior  forces. 
Three  of  these  battles  he  had  gained ;  and  the 
defeat  of  Kolin,  repaired  as  it  had  been,  rather 
raised  than  lowered  his  military  renown.  The 
victory  of  Leuthen  is,  to  this  day,  the  proudest 
on  the  roll  of  Prussian  fame.  Leipsic,  indeed, 
and  Waterloo,  produced  consequences  more 
important  to  mankind.  But  the  glory  of  Leipsic 
must  be  shared  by  the  Prussians  with  the  Aus- 
trians  and  Russians;  and  at  Waterloo  the 
British  infantry  bore  the  burden  and  heat  of 
the  day.  The  victory  of  Rosbach  was,  in  a 
military  point  of  view,  less  honourable  than 
that  of  Leuthen,  for  it  was  gained  over  an 
incapable  general  and  a  disorganized  army. 
But  the  moral  effect  which  it  produced  was 
immense.  All  the  preceding  triumphs  of 
Frederic  had  been  triumphs  over  Germans,  and 
could  excite  no  emotions  of  natural  pride 
among  the  German  people.  It  was  impossible 
that  a  Hessian  or  a  Hanoverian  could  feel  any 
patriotic  exultation  at  hearing  that  Pomeranians 
slaughtered  Moravians,  or  that  Saxon  banners 
had  been  hung  in  the  churches  of  Berlin.  In 
deed,  though  the  military  character  of  the  Ger 
mans  justly  stood  high  throughout  the  world, 
they  could  boast  of  no  great  day  which  belong 
ed  to  them  as  a  people; — of  no  Agincourt,  of 
no  Bannockburn.  Most  of  their  victories  had 
been  gained  over  each  other ;  and  their  most 
splendid  exploits  against  foreigners  had  been 
achieved  under  the  command  of  Eugene,  who 
was  himself  a  foreigner. 

The  news  of  the  battle  of  Rosbach  stirred 
the  blood  of  the  whole  of  the  mighty  popula 
tion  from  the  Alps  to  the  Baltic,  and  from  the 
borders  of  Courtland  to  those  of  Lorraine. 
Westphalia  and  Lower  Saxony  had  been 
deluged  by  a  great  host  of  strangers,  whose 
speech  was  unintelligible,  and  whose  petulant 
and  licentious  manners  had  excited  the  strong 
est  feelings  of  disgust  and  hatred.  That  great 
host  had  been  put  to  flight  by  a  small  band  of 
German  warriors,  led  by  a  prince  of  German 
blood  on  the  side  of  father  and  mother,  and 
marked  by  the  fair  hair  and  the  clear  blue  eye 
of  Germany.  Never  since  the  dissolution  of 
the  empire  of  Charlemagne,  had  the  Teutonic 
race  won  such  a  field  against  the  French.  The 
tidings  called  forth  a  general  burst  of  delight 
and  pride  from  the  whole  of  the  great  family 
which  spoke  the  various  dialects  of  the  ancient 
language  of  Arminius.  The  fame  of  Frederic 
began  to  supply,  in  some  degree,  the  place  of  a 
common  government  and  of  a  common  capi 
tal.  It  became  a  rallying  point  for  all  true 
Germans — a  subject  of  mutual  congratulation 


to  the  Bavarian  and  the  Westphalian,  to  the 
citizen  of  Frankfort  and  the  citizen  of  Nurem 
berg.  Then  first  it  was  manifest  that  the  Ger 
mans  were  truly  a  nation.  Then  first  was 
discernible  that  patriotic  spirit  which,  in  1813, 
achieved  the  great  deliverance  of  central  Eu 
rope,  and  which  still  guards,  and  long  will 
guard  against  foreign  ambition,  the  old  freedom 
of  the  Rhine. 

Nor  were  the  effects  produced  by  that  cele 
brated  day  merely  political.  The  greatest 
masters  of  German  poetry  and  eloquence  have 
admitted  that,  though  the  great  king  neither 
valued  nor  understood  his  native  language, 
though  he  looked  on  France  as  the  only  seat 
of  taste  and  philosophy;  yet,  in  his  own  despite, 
he  did  much  to  emancipate  the  genius  of  his 
countrymen  from  the  foreign  yoke ;  and  that, 
in  the  act  of  vanquishing  Soubise,  he  was,  un 
intentionally,  rousing  the  spirit  which  soon 
began  to  question  the  literary  precedence  of 
Boileau  and  Voltaire.  So  strangely  do  events 
confound  all  the  plans  of  man!  A  prince  who 
read  only  French,  who  wrote  only  French,  who 
ranked  as  a  French  classic,  became,  quite  un 
consciously,  the  means  of  liberating  half  the 
Continent  from  the  dominion  of  that  French 
criticism  of  which  he  was  himself,  to  the  end 
of  his  life,  a  slave.  Yet  even  the  enthusiasm 
of  Germany  in  favour  of  Frederic,  hardly 
equalled  the  enthusiasm  of  England.  The 
Hrth-day  of  our  ally  was  celebrated  with  as 
much  enthusiasm  as  that  of  our  own  sovereign, 
and  at  night  the  streets  of  London  were  in  a 
blaze  with  illuminations.  Portraits  of  the  Hero 
of  Rosbach,  with  his  cocked  hat  and  long  pig 
tail,  were  in  every  house.  An  attentive  observer 
will,  at  this  day,  find  in  the  parlours  of  old- 
fashioned  inns,  and  in  the  portfolios  of  printsel 
lers,  twenty  portraits  of  Frederic  for  one  of 
George  II.  The  sign-painters  were  everywhere 
employed  in  touching  up  Admiral  Verrion  into 
the  King  of  Prussia.  Some  young  Englishmen 
of  rank  proposed  to  visit  Germany  as  volun 
teers,  for  the  purpose  of  learning  the  art  of  war 
under  the  greatest  of  commanders.  This  last 
proof  of  British  attachment  and  admiration, 
Frederic  politely  but  firmly  declined.  His 
camp  was  no  place  for  amateur  students  of 
military  science.  The  Prussian  discipline  was 
rigorous  even  to  cruelty.  The  officers,  while 
in  the  field,  were  expected  to  practise  an  abste 
miousness  and  self-denial  such  as  was  hardly 
surpassed  by  the  most  rigid  monastic  orders* 
However  noble  their  birth,  however  high  their 
rank  in  the  service,  they  were  not  permitted  to 
eat  from  any  thing  better  than  pewter.  It  was 
a  high  crime  even  in  a  count  and  field-marshal 
to  have  a  single  silver  spoon  among  his  bag 
gage.  Gay  young  Englishmen  of  twenty  thou 
sand  a  year,  accustomed  to  liberty  and  to  luxu 
ry,  would  not  easily  submit  to  these  Spartan 
restraints.  The  king  could  not  venture  to  keep 
thorn  in  order  as  he  kept  his  own  subjects  in, 
order.  Situated  as  he  was  with  respect  to 
England,  he  could  not  well  imprison  or  shoot 
refractory  Howards  and  Cavendishes.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  example  of  a  few  fine  genti« 
men,  attended  by  chariots  and  livery  servants, 
eating  in  plate,  and  drinking  champagne  an«l 
tokay,  was  enough  to  corrupt  his  whole  arm> 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


He  thought  it  best  to  make  a  stand  at  first,  and 
civilly  refused  to  admit  such  dangerous  com 
panions  among  his  troops. 

The  help  of  England  was  bestowed  in  a 
manner  far  more  useful  and  more  acceptable. 
An  annual  subsidy  of  near  seven  hundred  thou 
sand  pounds  enabled  the  king  to  add  probably 
more  than  fifty  thousand  men  to  his  army. 
Pitt,  now  at  the  height  of  power  and  populari 
ty,  undertook  the  task  of  defending  Western 
Gt:rmany  against  France,  and  asked  Frederic 
only  for  the  loan  of  a  general.  The  general 
selected  was  Prince  Ferdinand  of  Brunswick, 
•who  had  attained  high  distinction  in  the  Prus 
sian  service.  He  was  put  at  the  head  of  an 
army,  partly  English,  partly  Hanoverian,  partly 
composed  of  mercenaries  hired  from  the  petty 
princes  of  the  empire.  He  soon  vindicated  the 
choice  of  the  two  allied  courts,  and  proved 
himself  the  second  general  of  the  age. 

Frederic  passed  the  winter  at  Breslau,  in 
reading,  writing,  and  preparing  for  the  next 
campaign.  The  havoc  which  the  war  had 
made  among  his  troops  was  rapidly  repaired, 
and  in  the  spring  of  1758  he  was  again  ready 
for  the  conflict.  Prince  Ferdinand  kept  the 
French  in  check.  The  king,  in  the  mean  time, 
after  attempting  against  the  Austrians  some 
operations  which  led  to  no  very  important 
result,  marched  to  encounter  the  Russians,  who, 
slaying,  burning,  and  wasting  wherever  they 
turned,  had  penetrated  into  the  heart  of  his 
realm.  He  gave  them  battle  at  Zorndorf,  near 
Frankfort  on  the  Oder.  The  fight  was  long 
and  bloody.  Quarter  was  neither  given  nor 
taken;  for  the  Germans  and  Scythians  regard 
ed  each  other  with  bitter  aversion,  and  the  sight 
of  the  ravages  committed  by  the  half-savage 
invaders  had  incensed  the  king  and  his  army. 
The  Russians  were  overthrown  with  great 
slaughter,  and  for  a  few  months  no  further 
danger  was  to  be  apprehended  from  the  east. 

A  day  of  thanksgiving  was  proclaimed  by 
the  king,  and  was  celebrated  with  pride  and 
delight  by  his  people.  The  rejoicings  in  Eng 
land  were  not  less  enthusiastic  or  less  sincere. 
This  may  be  selected  as  the  point  of  time  at 
•which  the  military  glory  of  Frederic  reached 
the  zenith.  In  the  short  space  of  three-quar 
ters  of  a  year  he  had  won  three  great  battles 
over  the  armies  of  three  mighty  and  warlike 
monarchies — France,  Austria,  and  Russia. 

But  it  was  decreed  that  the  temper  of  that 
strong  mind  should  be  tried  by  both  extremes 
of  fortune  in  rapid  succession.  Close  upon 
this  bright  series  of  triumphs  came  a  series  of 
disasters,  such  as  would  have  blighted  the  fame 
and  broken  the  heart  of  almost  any  other  com 
mander.  Yet  Frederic,  in  the  midst  of  his 
calamities,  was  still  an  object  of  admiration  to 
his  subjects,  his  allies,  and  his  enemies.  Over 
whelmed  by  adversit^,  sick  of  life,  he  still 
maintained  the  contest,  greater  in  defeat,  in 
flight,  and  in  what  seemed  hopeless  ruin,  than 
on  the  fields  of  his  proudest  victories. 

Having  vanquished  the  Russians,  he  hasten 
ed  ink)  Saxony  to  oppose  the  troops  of  the 
Kmnress-Queen,  commanded  by  Daun,  the 
most  ca.uious,  and  Laudohn,  the  most  inven 
tive  and  enterprising  of  her  generals.  These 
•wo  celebrated  commanders  agreed  on  a  scheme, 


in  which  the  prudence  of  the  one  and  the  vigour 
of  the  other  seem  to  have  happily  combined. 
At  dead  of  night  they  surprised  the  king  in  his 
camp  at  Hochkirchen.  His  presence  of  mind 
saved  his  troops  from  destruction,  but  nothing 
could  save  them  from  defeat  and  severe  loss. 
Marshal  Keith  was  among  the  slain.  The  first 
roar  of  the  guns  roused  the  noble  exile  from 
his  rest,  and  he  was  instantly  in  the  front  of 
the  battle.  He  received  a  dangerous  wound, 
bu'.  refused  to  quit  the  field,  and  was  in  the  act 
of  rallying  his  broken  troops,  when  an  Aus 
trian  bullet  terminated  his  checkered  and 
eventful  life. 

The  misfortune  was  serious.  But,  of  all  ge 
nerals,  Frederic  understood  best  how  to  repair 
defeat,  and  Daun  understood  least  how  to  im 
prove  victory.  In  a  few  days  the  Prussian 
army  was  as  formidable  as  before  the  ba.ttle. 
The  prospect  was,  however,  gloomy.  An  Aus 
trian  army  under  General  Harsch  had  invaded 
Silesia,  and  invested  the  fortress  of  Neisse. 
Daun,  after  his  success  at  Hochkirchen,  had 
written  to  Harsch  in  very  confident  terms: — 
"Go  on  with  your  operations  against  Neisse. 
Be  quite  at  ease  as  to  the  king.  I  will  give 
you  a  good  account  of  him."  In  truth,  the 
position  of  the  Prussians  was  full  of  difficulties. 
Between  them  and  Silesia  lay  the  victorious 
army  of  Daun.  It  was  not  easy  for  them  to 
reach  Silesia  at  all.  If  they  did  reach  it,  they 
lefi  Saxony  exposed  to  the  Austrian*.  But  the 
vigour  and  activity  of  Frederic  surmounted 
every  obstacle.  He  made  a  circuitous  march 
of  extraordinary  rapidity,  passed  Daun,  hasten 
ed  into  Silesia,  raised  the  seige  of  Neisse,  and 
drove  Harsch  into  Bohemia.  IMun  availed 
himself  of  the  king's  absence  to  attack  Dres 
den.  The  Prussians  defended  it  desperately. 
The  inhabitants  of  that  wealthy  and  polished 
capital  begged  in  vain  for  mercy  from  the  gar 
rison  within,  and  from  the  besiegers  without. 
The  beautiful  suburbs  were  burned  to  the 
ground.  It  was  clear  that  the  town,  if  won  at 
all,  would  be  won  street  by  street  by  the  bay 
onet.  At  this  conjuncture  came  news  that 
Frederic,  having  cleared  Silesia  of  his  enemies, 
was  returning  by  forced  marches  into  Saxony. 
Daun  retired  from  before  Dresden,  and  fell 
back  into  the  Austrian  territories.  The  king, 
over  heaps  of  ruins,  made  his  triumphant  entry 
into  the  unhappy  metropolis,  which  had  so 
cruelly  expiated  the  weak  and  perfidious  policy 
of  its  sovereign.  It  was  now  the  20th  of  No 
vember.  The  cold  weather  suspended  military 
perations,  and  the  king  again  took  up  his 
winter-quarters  at  Breslau. 

The  third  of  the  seven  terrible  years  was 
over;  and  Frederic  still  stood  his  ground.  He 
had  been  recently  tried  by  domestic  as  well  as 
by  military  disasters.  On  the  14th  of  October, 
the  day  on  which  he  was  defeated  at  Hochkir 
chen,  the  day  on  the  anniversary  of  which, 
forty-eight  years  later,  a  defeat  far  more  tre 
mendous  laid  the  Prussian  monarchy  in  the 
dust,  died  Wilhelmina,  Margravine  of  Bareuth. 
Prom  the  portraits  which  we  have  of  her,  by 
tier  own  hand,  and  by  the  hands  of  the  most 
discerning  of  her  contemporaries,  we  should 
pronounce  her  to  have  been  coarse,  indelicate, 
and  a  good  hater,  but  not  destitute  of  kind  and 


FREDERIC  THE   GREAT. 


527 


generous  feelings.     Her  mind,  naturally  strong  | 
and  observant,  had  been  highly  cultivated;  and; 
she  was,  and  deserved  to  be,  Frederic's  favour-  [ 
ite  sister.     He  felt  the  loss  as  much  as  it  was 
in  his  iron  nature  to  feel  the  loss  of  any  thing 
but  a  province  or  a  battle. 

At  Breslan,  during  the  winter,  he  was  in 
defatigable  in  his  poetical  labours.  The  most 
spirited  lines,  perhaps,  that  he  ever  wrote,  are 
to  be  found  in  a  bitter  lampoon  on  Louis  and 
Madame  de  Pompadour,  which  he  composed 
at  this  time,  and  sent  to  Voltaire.  The  verses 
were,  indeed,  so  good,  that  Voltaire  was  afraid 
that  he  might  himself  be  suspected  of  having 
written  them,  or  at  least  of  having  corrected 
them  ;  and  partly  from  fright — partly,  we  fear, 
from  love  of  mischief— sent  them  to  the  Duke 
of  Choiseul,  then  prime  minister  of  France. 
Choiseul  very  wisely  determined  to  encounter 
Frederic  at  Frederic's  own  weapons,  and  ap 
plied  for  assistance  to  Palissot,  who  had  some 
skill  as  a  versifier,  and  who,  though  he  had 
not  yet  made  himself  famous  by  bringing 
Rousseau  and  Helvetius  on  the  stage,  was 
known  to  possess  some  little  talent  for  satire. 
Palissot  produced  some  very  stinging  lines  on 
the  moral  and  literary  character  of  Frederic, 
ami  these  lines  the  duke  sent  to  Voltaire.  This 
war  of  couplets,  following  close  on  Ihe  carnage 
of  Zorndorf  and  the  conflagration  of  Dresden, 
illustrates  well  the  strangely  compounded  cha 
racter  of  the  King  of  Prussia. 

At  this  moment  he  was  assailed  by  a  new 
enemy.  Benedict  XIV.,  the  best  and  wisest  of 
the  two  hundred  and  fifty  successors  of  St. 
Peter,  was  no  more.  During  the  short  interval 
between  his  reign  and  that  of  his  disciple  Gan- 
ganelli,  the  chief  seat  in  the  Church  of  Rome 
was  filled  by  Rezzonico,  who  took  the  name  of 
Clement  XIII.  This  absurd  priest  determined 
to  try  what  the  weight  of  his  authority  could 
affect  in  favour  of  the  orthodox  Maria  Theresa 
against  a  heretic  king.  At  the  high  mass  on 
Christmas  day,  a  sword  with  a  rich  belt  and 
scahbard,  a  hat  of  crimson  velvet  lined  with 
ermine,  and  a  dove  of  pearls,  the  mystic  sym 
bol  of  the  Divine  Comforter,  were  solemnly 
blessed  by  the  supreme  pontiff,  and  were  sent 
with  great  ceremony  to  Marshal  Daun,  the  con 
queror  of  Kolin  and  Hochkirchen.  This  mark 
of  favour  had  more  than  once  been  bestowed 
by  the  Popes  on  the  great  champions  of  the 
faith.  Similar  honours  had  been  paid,  more 
than  six  centuries  earlier,  by  Urban  II.  to  God 
frey  of  Bouillon.  Similar  honours  had  been 
conferred  on  Alba  for  destroying  the  liberties 
of  the  Low  Countries,  and  on  John  Sobiesky 
after  the  deliverance  of  Vienna.  But  the  pre 
sents  which  were  received  with  profound  re 
verence  by  the  Baron  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre 
in  the  eleventh  century,  and  which  had  not 
wholly  lost  their  value  even  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  appeared  inexpressibly  ridiculous  to 
a  general  ion  which  read  Montesquieu  and  Vol 
taire.  Frederic  wrote  sarcastic  verses  on  the 
gifts,  the  giver,  and  the  receiver.  But  the 
public  wanted  no  prompter;  and  a  universal 
roar  of  laughter  from  Petersburg  to  Lisbon 
reminded  the  Vatican  that  the  age  of  crusades 
was  over. 

The  fourth  campaign,  the  most  disastrous 


of  all  the  campaigns  of  this  fearful  war,  had 
now  opened.  The  Austrians  filled  Saxony, 
and  menaced  Berlin.  The  Russians  defeated 
the  king's  generals  on  the  Oder,  threatened  Si- 
lesia,  effected  a  junction  with  Laudohn,  and 
intrenched  themselves  strongly  at  Kunersdorf. 
Frederic  hastened  to  attack  them.  A  great 
battle  was  fought.  During  the  earlier  part  of 
the  day  every  thing  yielded  to  the  impetuosity 
of  the  Prussians,  and  to  the  skill  of  their  chief. 
The  lines  were  forced.  Half  the  Russian  guns 
were  taken.  The  king  sent  off  a  courier  to 
Berlin  with  two  lines,  announcing  a  complete 
victory.  But,  in  the  mean  time,  the  stubborn 
Russians,  defeated  yet  unoroken,  had  taken  up 
their  stand  in  an  almost  impregnable  position, 
on  an  eminence  where  the  Jews  of  Frankfort 
were  wont  to  bury  their  dead.  Here  the  battle 
recommenced.  The  Prussian  infantry,  ex 
hausted  by  six  hours  of  hard  fighting  under  a 
sun  which  equalled  the  tropical  heat,  were  yet 
brought  up  repeatedly  to  the  attack,  but  in  vain. 
The  king  led  three  charges  in  person.  Two 
horses  were  killed  under  him.  The  officers  of 
his  staff  fell  all  around  him.  His  coat  was 
pierced  by  several  bullets.  All  was  in  vain. 
His  infantry  was  driven  back  with  frightful 
slaughter.  Terror  began  to  spread  fast  from 
man  to  man.  At  that  moment,  the  fiery  cavalry 
of  Laudohn,  still  fresh,  rushed  on  the  wavering 
ranks.  Then  followed  a  universal  rout.  Fre 
deric  himself  was  on  the  point  of  falling  into 
the  hands  of  the  conquerors,  and  was  with  dif 
ficulty  saved  by  a  gallant  officer,  who,  at  the 
head  of  a  handful  of  Hussars,  made  good  a 
diversion  of  a  few  minutes.  Shattered  in  body, 
shattered  in  mind,  the  king  reached  that  night 
a  village  which  the  Cossacks  had  plundered; 
and  there,  in  a  ruined  and  deserted  farm-house, 
flung  himself  on  a  heap  of  straw.  He  had  sent 
to  Berlin  a  second  despatch  very  different  from 
his  first : — "  Let  the  royal  family  leave  Berlin. 
Send  the  archives  to  Potsdam.  The  town  may 
make  terms  with  the  enemy." 

The  defeat  was,  in  truth,  overwhelming.  Of 
fifty  thousand  men,  who  had  that  morning 
marched  under  the  black  eagles,  not  three 
thousand  remained  together.  The  king  be 
thought  him  again  of  his  corrosive  sublimate, 
and  wrote  to  bid  adieu  to  his  friends,  and  to 
give  directions  as  to  the  measures  to  be  taken 
in  the  event  of  his  death : — "  I  have  no  resource 
left" — such  is  the  language  of  one  of  his  letters 
— "all  is  lost.  I  will  not  survive  the  ruin  of 
my  country.  Farewell  forever." 

But  the  mutual  jealousies  of  the  confederates 
prevented  them  from  following  up  their  vic 
tory.  They  lost  a  few  days  in  loitering  and 
squabbling;  and  a  few  days,  improved  by  Fre 
deric,  were  worth  more  than  the  years  of  other 
men.  On  the  morning  after  the  battle,  he 
had  got  together  eighteen  thousand  of  his 
troops.  Very  soon  his  force  amounted  to  thirty- 
thousand.  Guns  were  procured  from  the 
neighbouring  fortresses ;  and  there  was  again 
an  army.  Berlin  was  for  the  present  safe; 
but  calamities  came  pouring  on  the  king  in 
uninterrupted  succession.  One  of  his  generals, 
with  a  large  body  of  troops,  was  taken  at 
Maxen  ;  another  was  defeated  at  Meissen : 
and  when  at  length  the  campaign  of 


628 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


closed,  m  the  midst  of  a  rigorous  winter,  the 
situation  of  Prussia  appeared  desperate.  The 
only  consoling  circumstance  was,  that,  in  the 
West,  Ferdinand  of  Brunswick  had  been  more 
fortunate  than  his  master;  and  by  a  series  of 
exploits,  of  which  the  battle  of  Minden  was  the 
most  glorious,  had  removed  all  apprehension 
of  danger  on  the  side  of  France. 

The  fifth  year  was  now  about  to  commence. 
It  seemed  impossible  that  the  Prussian  terri 
tories,  repeatedly  devastated  by  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  invaders,  could  longer  support 
the  contest.  But  the  king  carried  on  war  as 
no  European  power  has  ever  carried  on  war, 
except  the  Committee  of  Public  Safety  during 
the  great  agony  of  the  French  Revolution.  He 
governed  his  kingdom  as  he  would  have  go 
verned  a  besieged  town,  not  caring  to  what 
extent  property  was  destroyed,  or  the  pursuits 
of  civil  life  suspended,  so  that  he  did  but  make 
head  against  the  enemy.  As  long  as  there  was 
a  man  left  in  Prussia,  that  man  might  carry 
a  musket — as  long  as  there  was  a  horse  left, 
that  horse  might  draw  artillery.  The  coin  was 
debased,  the  civil  functionaries  were  left  un 
paid;  in  some  provinces  civil  government 
altogether  ceased  to  exist.  But  there  were  still 
rye-bread  and  potatoes ;  there  were  still  lead 
and  gunpowder;  and,  while  the  means  of  sus 
taining  and  destroying  life  remained,  Frederic 
was  determined  to  fight  it  out  to  the  very  last. 

The  earlier  part  of  the  campaign  of  1760 
was  unfavourable  to  him.  Berlin  was  again 
occupied  by  the  enemy.  Great  contributions 
were  levied  on  the  inhabitants,  and  the  royal 
palace  was  plundered.  But  at  length,  after 
two  years  of  calamity,  victory  came  back  to 
his  arms.  At  Lignitz  he  gained  a  great  battle 
over  Laudohn ;  at  Torgau,  after  a  day  of  hor 
rible  carnage,  he  triumphed  over  Daun.  The 
fifth  year  closed  and  still  the  event  was  in 
suspense.  In  the  countries  where  the  war  had 
raged,  the  misery  and  exhaustion  were  more 
appalling  than  ever;  but  still  there  were  left 
men  and  beasts,  arms  and  food,  and  still  Fre 
deric  fought  on.  In  truth  he  had  now  been 
baited  into  savageness.  His  heart  was  ulce 
rated  with  hatred.  The  implacable  resentment 
with  which  his  enemies  persecuted  him,  though 
originally  provoked  by  his  own  unprincipled 
ambition,  excited  in  him  a  thirst  for  vengeance 
which  he  did  not  even  attempt  to  conceal.  "It 
is  hard,"  he  says  in  one  of  his  letters,  "  for  a 
man  to  bear  what  I  bear.  I  begin  to  feel  that, 
as  the  Italians  say,  revenge  is  a  pleasure  for 
the  gods.  My  philosophy  is  worn  out  by  suf 
fering.  I  am  no  saint,  like  those  of  whom  we 
read  in  the  legends;  and  I  will  own  that  I 
should  die  content  if  only  I  could  first  inflict  a 
portion  of  the  misery  which  I  endure." 

Borne  up  by  such  feelings,  he  struggled  with 
various  success,  but  constant  glory,  through 
the  comraign  of  1761.  On  the  whole,  the  re- 
suU  of  this  campaign  was  disastrous  to  Prus- 
si,a.  No  great  battle  was  gained  by  the  enemy; 
but,  in  spite  of  the  desperate  bounds  of  the 
hunted  tiger,  the  circle  of  pursuers  was  fast 
clr sing  round  him.  Laudohn  had  surprised 
the  important  fortress  of  Sweidnitz.  With 
that  fortress,  half  of  Silesia,  and  the  command 
of  the  most  important  defiles  through  the 


mountains,  had  been  transferred  to  the  Ana* 
trians.  The  Russians  had  overpowered  the 
king's  generals  in  Pomerania.  The  country 
was  so  completely  desolated  that  he  began,  by 
his  own  confession,  to  look  round  hi»n  with 
blank  despair,  unable  to  imagine  where  re* 
cruits,  horses,  or  provisions  were  to  be  found- 
Just  at  this  time  two  great  events  brought 
on  a  complete  change  in  the  relations  of  al 
most  all  the  powers  of  Europe.  One  of  those 
events  was  the  retirement  of  Mr.  Pitt  from 
office ;  the  other  was  the  death  of  the  Empress 
Elizabeth  of  Russia. 

The  retirement  of  Pitt  seemed  to  be  an  omen 
of  utter  ruin  to  the  House  of  Brandenburg, 
His  proud  and  vehement  nature  was  incapable 
of  any  thing  that  looked  like  either  fear  or 
treachery.  He  had  often  declared  that,  while 
he  was  in  power,  England  should  never  make 
a  peace  of  Utrecht; — should  never,  for  any 
selfish  object,  abandon  an  ally  even  in  the  last 
extremity  of  distress.  The  continental  war 
was  his  own  war.  He  had  been  bold  enough 
— he  who  in  former  times  had  attacked,  with 
irresistible  powers  of  oratory,  the  Hanoverian 
policy  of  Carteret,  and  the  German  subsidies 
of  Newcastle — to  declare  that  Hanover  ought 
to  be  as  dear  to  us  as  Hampshire,  and  that  he 
would  conquer  America  in  Germany.  He  had 
fallen;  and  the  power  which  he  had  exercised, 
not  always  with  discretion,  but  always  with 
vigour  and  genius,  had  devolved  on  a  favour 
ite  who  -was  the  representative  of  the  Tory 
party — of  the  party  which  had  thwarted  Wil 
liam,  which  had  persecuted  Marlborough,  and 
which  had  given  up  the  Catalans  to  the  ven 
geance  of  Philip  of  Anjou.  To  make  peace 
with  France — to  shake  off  with  all,  or  more 
than  all,  the  speed  compatible  with  decency, 
every  Continental  connection,  these  were  among 
the  chief  objects  of  the  new  minister.  The 
policy  then  followed  inspired  Frederic  with 
an  unjust,  but  deep  and  bitter  aversion  to  the 
English  name;  and  produced  effect*  which  are 
still  felt  throughout  the  civilized  world.  To 
that  policy  it  was  owing  that,  ome  years  later, 
England  could  not  find  on  the  whole  Continent 
a  single  ally  to  stand  by  her,  in  her  extreme 
need,  against  the  House  of  Bourbon.  To  that 
policy  it  was  owing  that  Frederic,  alienated 
from  England,  was  compelled  to  connect  him 
self  closely,  during  his  later  years,  with  Rus 
sia;  and  was  induced  reluctantly  to  assist  in 
that  great  crime,  the  fruitful  parent  of  other 
great  crimes — the  first  partition  of  Poland. 

Scarcely  had  the  retreat  of  Mr.  Pitt  deprived 
Prussia  of  her  only  friend,  when  the  death  of 
Elizabeth  produced  an  entire  revolution  in  the 
politics  of  the  North.  The  Grand  Duke  Peter 
her  nephew,  who  now  ascended  the  Russian 
throne,  was  not  merely  free  from  the  prejudices 
which  his  aunt  had  entertained  against  Fre 
deric,  but  was  a  worshipper,  a  servile  imitator, 
a  Boswell,  of  the  great  king.  The  days  of  the 
new  czar's  government  were  few  and  evil,  but 
sufficient  to  produce  a  change  in  the  whole  state 
of  Christendom.  He  set  the  Prussian  prisoners 
at  liberty,  fitted  them  out  decently,  and  sent 
them  back  to  their  master;  he  withdrew  his 
troops  from  the  provinces  which  Elizabeth  had 
decided  on  incorporating  with  her  dominions. 


FREDERIC   THE   GREAT 


529 


and  absolved  all  those  Prussian  subjects,  who  j 
had  been  compelled  to  swear  fealty  to  Russia, 
from  their  engagements. 

Not  content  with  concluding  peace  on  terms 
favourable  to  Prussia,  he  solicited  rank  in  the 
Prussian  service,  dressed  himself  in  a  Prus 
sian  uniform,  wore  the  Black  Eagle  of  Prus 
sia  on  his  breast,  made  preparations  for  visiting 
Prussia,  in  order  to  have  an  interview  with  the 
object  of  his  idolatry,  and  actually  sent  fifteen 
thousand  excellent  troops  to  reinforce  the 
shattered  army  of  Frederic.  Thus  strength 
ened,  the  king  speedily  repaired  the  losses  of 
the  preceding  year,  reconquered  Silesia,  de 
feated  Daun  at  Buckersdorf,  invested  and  re 
took  Schweidnitz,  and,  at  the  close  of  the  year, 
presented  to  the  forces  of  Maria  Theresa  a 
front  as  formidable  as  before  the  great  reverses 
of  1759.  Before  the  end  of  the  campaign,  his 
friend  the  Emperor  Peter  having,  by  a  series 
of  absurd  insults  to  the  institutions,  manners, 
and  feelings  of  his  people,  united  them  in  hos 
tility  to  his  person  and  government,  was  de 
posed  and  murdered.  The  empress,  who,  under 
the  title  of  Catherine  the  Second,  now  assumed 
the  supreme  power,  was,  at  the  commence 
ment  of  her  administration,  by  no  means  par 
tial  to  Frederic,  and  refused  to  permit  her  troops 
to  i"  nain  under  his  command.  But  she  ob 
served  the  peace  made  by  her  husband ;  and 
Prussia  was  no  longer  threatened  by  danger 
from  the  East. 

England  and  France  at  the  same  time  paired 
off  together.  They  concluded  a  treaty,  by 
•which  they  bound  themselves  to  observe  neu 
trality  with  respect  to  the  German  war.  Thus 
oie  coalitions  on  both  sides  were  dissolved; 
and  the  original  enemies,  Austria  and  Prussia, 
remained  alone  confronting  each  other. 

Austria  had  undoubtedly  by  far  greater  means 
than  Prussia,  and  was  less' exhausted  by  hos 
tilities;  yet  it  seemed  hardly  possible  that 
Austria  could  effect  alone  what  she  had  in 
vain  attempted  to  effect  when  supported  by 
France  on  the  one  side,  and  by  Russia  on  the 
other.  Danger  also  began  to  menace  the  im 
perial  house  from  another  quarter.  The  Otto 
man  Porte  held  threatening  language,  and  a 
hundred  thousand  Turks  were  mustered  on 
the  frontiers  of  Hungary.  The  proud  and  re 
vengeful  spirit  of  the  Empress-Queen  at  length 
gave  way;  and,  in  February,  1763,  the  peace 
of  Hubertsburg  put  an  end  to  the  conflict 
which  had,  during  seven  years,  devasted  Ger 
many.  The  king  ceded  nothing.  The  whole 
Continent  in  arms  had  proved  unable  to  tear 
Silesia  from  that  iron  grasp. 

The  war  was  over.  Frederic  was  safe.  His 
glory  was  beyond  the  reach  of  envy.  If  he  had 
not  made  conquests  as  vast  as  those  of  Alex 
ander,  of  Cwsar,  and  of  Napoleon — if  he  had 
not,  on  field  of  battle,  enjoyed  the  constant 
success  of  Marlborough  and  Wellington — he 
had  yet  given  an  example  unrivalled  in  history, 
of  what  capacity  and  resolution  can  effect 
against  the  greatest  superiority  of  power  and 
the  utmost  spite  of  fortune.  He  entered  Berlin 
in  triumph,  after  an  absence  of  more  than  six 
years.  The  streets  were  brilliantly  lighted  up, 
and  as  he  passed  along  in  an  open  carriage, 
with  Fei-linand  of  Brunswick  at  his  side,  the 
VOL.  IV.— 67 


multitude  saluted  him  with  loud  praises  and 
blessings.  He  was  moved  ly  those  marks  of 
attachment,  and  repeatedly  exclaimed — "  Long 
live  my  dear  people! — Long  live  my  children  !" 
Yet,  even  in  the  midst  of  that  gay  spectacle,  he 
could  not  but  perceive  everywhere  the  traces 
of  destruction  and  decay.  The  city  had  been 
more  than  once  plundered.  The  population 
had  considerably  diminished.  Berlin,  how 
ever,  had  suffered  little  when  compared  with 
most  parts  of  the  kingdom.  The  ruin  of  pri 
vate  fortunes,  the  distress  of  all  ranks,  was 
such  as  might  appal  the  firmest  mind.  Almost 
every  province  had  been  the  seat  of  war,  and 
of  war  conducted  wilh  merciless  ferocity. 
Clouds  of  Croatians  had  descended  on  Silesia. 
Tens  of  thousands  of  Cossacks  had  been  let 
loose  on  Pomerania  and  Brandenburg.  The 
mere  contributions  levied  by  the  invaders 
amounted,  it  was  said,  to  more  than  a  hundred 
millions  of  dollars;  and  the  value  of  what 
they  extorted  was  probably  much  less  than  the 
value  of  what  they  destroyed.  The  fields  lay 
uncultivated.  The  very  seed-corn  had  been 
devoured  in  the  madness  of  hunger.  Famine, 
and  contagious  maladies  the  effect  of  famine, 
had  swept  away  the  herds  and  flocks ;  and 
there  was  reason  to  fear  that  a  great  pestilence 
among  the  human  race  was  likely  to  follow  in 
the  train  of  that  tremendous  war.  Near  fif 
teen  thousand  houses  had  been  burned  to  the 
ground. 

The  population  of  the  kingdom  had  in  seven 
years  decreased  to  the  frightful  extent  of  ten 
per  cent.  A  sixth  of  the  males  capable  of 
bearing  arms  had  actually  perished  on  the 
field  of  battle.  In  some  districts,  no  labourers, 
except  women,  were  seen  in  the  fields  at  har 
vest  time.  In  others,  the  traveller  passed  shud 
dering  through  a  succession  of  silent  villages, 
in  which  not  a  single  inhabitant  remained. 
The  currency  had  been  debased ;  the  authority 
of  laws  and  magistrates  had  been  suspended; 
the  whole  social  system  was  deranged.  For, 
during  that  convulsive  struggle,  every  thing 
that  was  not  military  violence  was  anarchy. 
Even  the  army  was  disorganized.  Some  great 
generals,  and  a  crowd  of  excellent  officers,  had 
fallen,  and  it  had  been  impossible  to  supply 
their  places.  The  difficulty  of  finding  recruits 
had,  towards  the  close  of  the  war,  been  so 
great,  that  selection  and  rejection  were  impos 
sible.  Whole  battalions  were  composed  of  de 
serters  or  of  prisoners.  It  was  hardly  to  be 
hoped  that  thirty  years  of  repose  and  industry 
would  repair  the  ruin  produced  by  seven  years 
of  havoc.  One  consolatory  circumstance,  in 
deed,  there  was.  No  debt  had  been  incurred. 
The  burdens  of  the  war  had  been  terrible, 
almost  insupportable;  but  no  arrear  was 
left  to  embarrass  the  finances  in  the  time  of 
peace. 

Here,  for  the  present,  we  must  pause.  We 
have  accompanied  Frederic  to  the  close  of  his 
career  as  a  warrior.  Possibly,  when  these  Me 
moirs  are  completed,  we  may  resume  the  con 
sideration  of  his  character,  and  give  some  ac 
count  of  his  domestic  and  foreign  policy,  and 
of  his  private  habits,  during  the  many  years  of 
tranquillity  which  followed  the  Se<~en  Years' 
War. 

SY 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME 


BY 


THOMAS  BABDfGTON  MACAULAY. 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME, 


PREFACE. 


THAT  what  is  called  the  history  of  the  kings 
and  early  consuls  of  Rome  is  to  a  great  extent 
fabulous,  few  scholars  have,  since  the  time  of 
Beaufort,  ventured  to  deny.  It  is  certain  that, 
more  than  three  hundred  and  sixty  years  after 
the  date  ordinarily  assigned  for  the  foundation 
of  the  city,  the  public  records  were,  with 
scarcely  an  exception,  destroyed  by  the  Gauls. 
It  is  certain  that  the  oldest  annals  of  the  com 
monwealth  were  compiled  more  than  a  centu 
ry  and  a  half  after  the  destruction  of  the  re 
cords.  It  is  certain,  therefore,  that  the  great 
Latin  writers  of  a  later  period  did  not  possess 
those  materials,  without  which  a  trustworthy 
account  of  the  infancy  of  the  republic  could 
not  possibly  be  framed.  They  own,  indeed, 
that  the  chronicles  to  which  they  had  access 
were  filled  with  battles  that  were  never  fought 
and  consuls  that  were  never  inaugurated ;  and 
we  have  abundant  proof  that,  in  those  chroni 
cles,  events  of  the  greatest  importance,  such 
as  the  issue  of  the  war  with  Porsena,  and  the 
issue  of  the  war  with  Brennus  were  grossly 
misrepresented.  Under  these  circumstances  a 
wise  man  will  look  with  great  suspicion  on  the 
•  ••Tend  which  has  come  down  to  us.  He  will, 
v-'diaps,  be  inclined  to  regard  the  princes  who 
are  said  to  have  founded  the  civil  and  religious 
institutions  of  Rome,  the  son  of  Mars,  and  the 
husband  of  Egeria,  as  mere  mythological  per 
sonages,  of  the  same  class  with  Perseus  and 
Ixion.  As  he  draws  nearer  and  nearer  to  the 
confines  of  authentic  history,  he  will  become 
less  and  less  hard  of  belief.  He  will  admit 
that  the  most  important  parts  of  the  narrative 
have  some  foundation  in  truth.  But  he  will 
distrust  almost  all  the  details,  not  only  because 
they  seldom  rest  on  any  solid  evidence,  but 
also  because  he  will  constantly  detect  in  them, 
even  when  they  are  within  the  limits  of  physi 
cal  possibility,  that  peculiar  character,  more 
easily  understood  than  defined,  which  distin 
guishes  the  creations  of  the  imagination  from 
the  realities  of  the  world  in  which  we  live. 

The  early  history  of  Rome  is  indeed  far 
more  poetical  than  any  thing  else  in  Latin  lite 
rature.  The  loves  of  the  Vestal  and  the  God 
of  War,  the  cradle  laid  among  the  reeds  of 
Tiber,  the  fig  tree,  the  she-wolf/the  shepherd's 
cabin,  the  recognition,  the  fratricide,  the  rape 
of  the  Sabines,  the  death  of  Tarpeia,  the  fall 
of  Hostus  Hostilius,  the  struggle  of  Mettus 
Curtius  through  the  marsh,  the  women  rushing 
with  torn  raiment  and  dishevelled  hair  between 
their  fathers  and  their  husbands,  the  nightly 
meetings  of  Numa  and  the  Nymph  by  the  well 


in  the  sacred  grove,  the  fight  of  the  three  Ro- 
rnaris  and  the  three  Albans,  the  purchase  of  the 
Sibyline  books,  the  crime  of  Tullia,  the  simu 
lated  madness  of  Brutus,  the  ambiguous  reply 
of  the  Delphian  oracle  to  the  Tarquins,  the 
wrongs  of  Lucretia,  the  heroic  actions  of  Ho- 
ratius  Codes,  of  Sccevola,  and  of  Cloelia,  the 
battle  of  Regillus  won  by  the  aid  of  Castor  and 
Pollux,  the  fall  of  Cremera,  the  touching  story 
of  Coriolanus,  the  still  more  touching  story  of 
Virginia,  the  wild  legion  about  the  draining  of 
the  Alban  lake,  the  combat  between  Valerius 
Corvus  and  the  gigantic  Gaul,  are  among  the 
many  instances  which  will  at  once  suggest 
themselves  to  every  reader. 

In  the  narrative  of  Livy,  who  was  a  man  of 
fine  imagination,  these  stories  retain  much  of 
their  genuine  character.  Nor  could  even  the 
tasteless  Dionysius  distort  and  mutilate  them 
into  mere  prose.  The  poetry  shines,  in  spite 
of  him,  through  the  dreary  pedantry  of  his 
eleven  books.  It  is  discernible  in  the  most  te 
dious  and  in  the  most  superficial  modern  works 
on  the  early  times  of  Rome.  It  enlivens  the 
d ulness  of  the  Universal  History,  and  gives  a 
charm  to  the  most  meager  abridgments  of 
Goldsmith. 

Even  in  the  age  of  Plutarch  there  were  dis 
cerning  men  who  rejected  the  popular  account 
of  the  foundation  of  Rome,  because  that  ac 
count  appeared  to  them  to  have  the  air,  not  of 
a  history,  bat  of  a  romance  or  a  drama.  Plu 
tarch,  who  was  displeased  at  their  incredulity, 
had  nothing  better  to  say  in  reply  to  their  ar 
guments  than  that  chance  sometimes  turns 
poet,  and  produces  trains  of  events  not  to  be 
distinguished  from  the  most  elaborate  plots 
which  are  constructed  by  art.*  But  though 
the  existence  of  a  poetical  element  in  the  early 
history  of  the  Great  City  was  detected  so  many 
ages  ago,  the  first  critic  who  distinctly  saw 
from  what  source  that  poetical  element  had 
been  derived  was  James  Perizonius,  one  of  the 
most  acute  and  learned  critics  of  the  seven 
teenth  century.  His  theory,  which,  in  his  own 
age,  attracted  little  or  no  notice,  was  revived  in 
the  present  generation  by  Niebuhr,  a  man  who 


*  "YTTonrov  ulv  Iviots  eirrt  TO  fpa/tariKov  Kal  77X110710- 
TW<$«-  ov  for  <1£  dxiffTEiv,  ri\v  rv\i]v  6pwj>ruj,  oJW  itntij- 
ftaruv  6rmiovpy6f  tart,—  Pint.  Rom.  viii.  This  remark 
able  passage  has  been  more  grossly  misinterpreted  than 
any  other  in  the  Greek  language,  "where  the  sense  was 
so  obvious.  The  Latin  version  of  Cruserius,  the  French 
version  of  Amyot,  the  old  English  version  by  several 
hand*,  arid  the  later  English  version  hy  Latmhorne.  are 
all  equally  destitute  of  every  trace  of  the  meaning  of  the 
original.  None  of  the  translators  saw  even  thai  ir>iii)n* 
is  a  poem.  They  all  render  it  an  event 

2  T  2  533 


534 


LAYS  OF   ANCIENT  ROME. 


would  hare  been  the  first  writer  of  his  time,  j 
if  his   talent   for  communicating  truths   had  ! 
borne  any  proportion  to  his  talent  for  investi- 1 
gating  them.     It  has  been  adopted  by  several 
eminent  scholars  of  our  own  country,  particu 
larly  by  the  Bishop  of  St.  David's,  by  Professor 
Maiden,  and  by  the  lamented  Arnold.    It  ap- 1 
pears  to  be  now  generally  received  by  men 
conversant  with  classical  antiquity ;   and  in 
deed  it  rests  on  such  strong  proofs,  both  in 
ternal  and  external,  that  it  will  not  be  easily 
subverted.    A  popular  exposition  of  this  theory 
and  of  the  evidence  by  which  it  is  supported 
may  not  be  without  interest  even  for  readers 
who  are  unacquainted  with  the   ancient  lan 
guages. 

The  Latin  literature  which  has  come  down 
to  us  is  of  later  date  than  the  commencement 
of  the  second  Punic  war,  and  consists  almost 
exclusively  of  words  fashioned  on  Greek  mo 
dels.  The  Latin  metres,  heroic,  elegiac,  lyric, 
and  dramatic,  are  of  Greek  origin.  The  best 
Latin  epic  poetry  is  the  feeble  echo  of  the  Iliad 
and  Odyssey.  The  best  Latin  eclogues  are 
imitations  of  Theocritus.  The  plan  of  the  most 
finished  didactic  poem  in  the  Latin  tongue  was 
taken  from  Hesiod.  The  Latin  tragedies  are 
bad  copies  of  the  master-pieces  of  Sophocles 
and  Euripides.  The  Latin  comedies  are  free 
translations  from  Demophilus,  Menander,  and 
Apollodorus.  The  Latin  philosophy  was  bor 
rowed,  without  alteration,  from  the  Portico  and 
the  Academy ;  and  the  great  Latin  orators  con 
stantly  proposed  to  themselves  as  patterns  the 
speeches  of  Demosthenes  and  Lysias. 

But  there  was  an  earlier  Latin  literature,  a 
literature  truly  Latin,  which  has  wholly  pe 
rished — which  had,  indeed,  almost  wholly  pe 
rished  long  before  those  whom  we  are  in  the 
habit  of  regarding  as  the  greatest  Latin  writers 
were  born.  That  literature  abounded  with 
metrical  romances,  such  as  are  found  in  every 
country  where  there  is  much  curiosity  and  in 
telligence,  but  little  reading  and  writing.  All 
human  beings,  not  utterly  savage,  long  for 
some  information  about  past  times,  and  are 
delighted  by  narratives  which  present  pictures 
to  the  eye  of  the  mind.  But  it  is  only  in  very 
enlightened  communities  that  books  are  readily 
accessible.  Metrical  composition,  therefore, 
which,  in  a  highly  civilized  nation,  is  a  mere 
luxury,  is,  in  nations  imperfectly  civilized, 
almost  a  necessary  of  life,  and  is  valued  less 
on  account  of  the  pleasure  which  it  gives  to 
the  ear  than  on  account  of  the  help  which  it 
gives  to  the  memory.  A  man  who  can  invent 
or  embellish  an  interesting  story,  and  put  it 
into  a  form  which  others  may  easily  retain  in 
their  recollection,  will  always  be  highly  esteem 
ed  by  a  people  eager  for  amusement  and  infor 
mation,  but  destitute  of  libraries.  Such  is  the 
origin  of  ballad-poetry,  a  species  of  composi 
tion  which  scarcely  ever  fails  to  spring  up  and 
flourish  in  every  society,  at  a  certain  point  in 
the  progress  towards  refinement.  Tacitus  in 
forms  us  that  songs  were  the  only  memorials 
of  the  past  which  the  ancient  Germans  pos 
sessed.  We  learn  from  Lucan  and  from  Am- 
mianus  Marcellinus,  that  the  brave  actions  of 
the  ancient  Gauls  were  commemorated  in  the 
verses  of  Bards.  During  many  ages,  and 


through  many  revolutions,  minstrelsy  retained 
its  influence  over  both  the  Teutonic  and  the 
Celtic  race.  The  vengeance  exacted  by  the 
spouse  of  Attila  for  the  murder  cf  Siegfried 
was  celebrated  in  rhymes,  of  which  Germany 
is  still  justly  proud.  The  exploits  of  Athelstane 
were  commemorated  by  the  Anglo-Saxons,  and 
those  of  Canute  by  the  Danes,  in  rude  poems, 
of  which  a  few  fragments  have  come  down  to 
us.  The  chants  of  the  Welsh  harpers  pre 
served,  through  ages  of  darkness,  a  faint  and 
doubtful  memory  of  Arthur.  In  the  highlands 
of  Scotland  may  still  be  gleaned  some  reliques 
of  the  old  songs  about  Cuthullin  and  Fingal. 
The  long  struggle  of  the  Servians  against  the 
Ottoman  power  was  recorded  in  lays  full  of 
martial  spirit.  We  learn  from  Herrera  that, 
when  a  Peruvian  Inca  died,  men  of  skill  were 
appointed  to  celebrate  him  in  verses  which 
all  the  people  learned  by  heart,  and  sang  in 
public  on  days  of  festival.  The  feats  of  Kur- 
roglou,  the  great  freebooter  of  Turkistan,  re 
counted  in  ballads  composed  by  himself,  are 
known  in  every  village  of  Northern  Persia. 
Captain  Beechey  heard  the  bards  of  the  Sand 
wich  Islands  recite  the  heroic  achievements  of 
Tamehameha,  the  most  illustrious  of  their 
kings.  Mungo  Park  found  in  the  heart  of  Africa 
a  class  of  singing  men,  the  only  annalists  of 
their  rude  tribes,  and  heard  them  tell  the  story 
of  the  great  victory  which  Darnel,  the  negro 
prince  of  the  Jaloffs,  won  over  Abdulkader,  the 
Mussulman  tyrant  of  Foota  Torra.  This  spe 
cies  of  poetry  attained  a  high  degree  of  excel 
lence  among  the  Castilians,  before  they  began 
to  copy  Tuscan  patterns.  It  attained  a  still 
higher  degree  of  excellence  among  the  English 
and  the  Lowland  Scotch,  during  the  fourteenth, 
fifteenth,  and  sixteenth  centuries.  But  it  reach 
ed  its  full  perfection  in  ancient  Greece ;  for 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  great  Homeric 
poems  are  generically  ballads,  though  widely 
indeed  distinguished  from  all  other  ballads,  and, 
indeed,  from  almost  all  other  human  compo 
sitions,  by  transcendant  merit. 

As  it  is  agreeable  to  general  experience  that, 
at  a  certain  stage  in  the  progress  of  society, 
ballad-poetry  should  flourish,  so  is  it  also 
agreeable  to  general  experience  that,  at  a  sub 
sequent  stage  in  the  progress  of  society,  ballad- 
poetry  should  be  undervalued  and  neglected. 
Knowledge  advances:  manners  change  :  great 
foreign  models  of  composition  are  studied  and 
imitated.  The  phraseology  of  the  old  minstrels 
becomes  obsolete.  Their  versification,  which, 
having  received  its  laws  only  from  the  ear, 
abounds  in  irregularities,  seems  licentious  and 
uncouth.  Their  simplicity  appears  beggarly 
when  compared  with  the  quaint  forms  and 
gaudy  colouring  of  such  artists  as  Cowley  and 
Gongora.  The  ancient  lays,  unjustly  despised 
by  the  learned  and  polite,  linger  for  a  time  in 
the  memory  of  the  vulgar,  and  are  at  length  too 
often  irretrievably  lost.  We  cannot  wonder 
that  the  ballads  of  Rome  should  have  altogether 
disappeared,  when  we  remember  how  very 
narrowly,  in  spite  of  the  invention  of  printing, 
those  of  our  own  country  and  those  of  Spain 
escaped  the  same  fate.  There  is,  indeed,  little 
doubt  that  oblivion  covers  many  English  songs 
equal  to  any  that  were  published  by  Bishop 


PREFACE. 


535 


Percy,  and  many  Spanish  songs  as  good  as  '  Dionysius,  and  contains  a  very  remarkable  ra 
the  best  of  those  which  have  been  so  happily  ference  to  the  old  Latin  poetry.  Fabius  says 
translated  by  Mr.  LockharU  Eighty  years  ago  that,  in  his  time,  his  countrymen  were  still  in 
England  possessed  only  one  tattered  copy  of  i  the  habit  of  singing  ballads  about  the  Twins. 
Childe  Waters  and  Sir  Cauline,  and  Spain  only  ;  "  Even  in  the  hut  of  Faustulus," — so  these  old 
one  tattered  copy  of  the  noble  poem  of  the  Cid.  j  lays  appear  to  have  run, — "  the  children  of 
The  snuff  of  a  candle,  or  a  mischievous  dog, !  Rhea  and  Mars  were,  in  port  and  in  spirit,  not 
might  in  a  moment  have  deprived  the  world  for  !  like  unto  swineherds  or  cowherds,  but  such 
ever  of  any  of  those  fine  compositions.  Sir  j  that  men  might  well  guess  them  to  be  of  the 
Walter  Scott,  who  united  to  the  fire  of  a  great  j  blood  of  kings  and  gods."* 
poet  the  mirute  curiosity  and  patient  diligence  j  Cato  the  Censor,  who  also  lived  in  the  days 
of  a  great  antiquary,  was  but  just  in  time  to  j  of  the  Second  Punic  War,  mentioned  this  lost 
save  the  precious  reliques  of  the  Minstrelsy  of  j  literature  in  his  lost  work  on  the  antiquities  of 
the  Border.  In  Germany,  the  lay  of  the  Ni-  j  his  country.  Many  ages,  he  said,  before  his 


belungs  had  been  long  utterly  forgotten,  when, 
in  the  eighteenth  century,  it  was,  for  the  first 
time,  printed  from  a  manuscript  in  the  old 
library  of  a  noble  family.  In  truth,  the  only 
people  who,  through  their  whole  passage  from 
simplicity  to  the  highest  civilization,  never  for 
a  moment  ceased  to  love  and  admire  their  old 
ballads,  were  the  Greeks. 

That  the  early  Romans  should  have  had 
ballad-poetry,  and  that  this  poetry  should  have 
perished,  is,  therefore,  not  strange.  It  would,  on 
the  contrary,  have  been  strange  if  it  had  not 
come  to  pass ;  and  we  should  be  justified  in 
pronouncing  them  highly  probable,  even  if  we 
had  no  direct  evidence  on  the  subject.  But 
we  have  direct  evidence  of  unquestionable 
authority. 

Enniuc.  who  flourished  in  the  time  of  the 
Second  Punic  War,  was  regarded  in  the 
Augustan  age  as  the  father  of  Latin  poetry.  He 
was,  in  truth,  the  father  of  the  second  school 
of  Latin  poetry, — of  the  only  school  of  which 
the  works  have  descended  to  us.  But  from 
Ennius  himself  we  learn  that  there  were  poets 
who  stood  to  him  in  the  same  relation  in 
which  the  author  of  the  romance  of  Count 
Alarcos  stood  to  Garcilaso,  or  the  author  of  the 
"  Lytell  Geste  of  Robin  Hode"  to  Lord  Surrey. 
Ennius  speaks  of  verses  which  the  Fauns  and 
the  Bards  were  wont  to  chant  in  the  old  time, 
when  none  had  yet  studied  the  graces  of 
speech,  when  none  had  yet  climbed  the  peaks 
sacred  to  the  Goddesses  of  Grecian  song. 
"  Where,"  Cicero  mournfully  asks,  "  are  those 
old  verses  now  1"* 

Contemporary  with  Ennius  was  Quintus 
Fabius  Pictor,  the  earliest  of  the  Roman  anna 
lists.  His  account  of  the  infancy  and  youth  of 
Romulus  and  Remus  has  been  preserved  by 


*  "  Quid  ?     Nostri  veteres  versus  uhi  sunt  1 

.  .  .  .  'QuosolimFauni  vatesquecanebant, 
Cum  neque  MUSH  rum  scopulos  quisquam  superarat, 
Nee  dictistudiosus  erat.'  " 

Cic.  in  Bruto,  cap.  xviii. 

The,  Muses,  it  should  be  observed,  are  Greek  divinities. 
The  Italian  Goddesses  of  verse  were  the  CamoBnse.  At 
a  later  period,  the  appellations  were  used  indiscriminate 
ly  ;  lint  in  the  age  of  Ennius  there  was  probably  a  dis 
tinction.  In  the  epitaph  of  Nfevins  who  was  the  repre 
sentative  of  the  old  Italian  school  of  poetry,  the  Ca- 
inrEnae,  not  the  Muses,  are  represented  as  grieving  for 
the  loss  of  their  votary.  The  "  Musarum  scopuli"  are 
evidently  the  peaks  of  Parnassus. 

Scaliger,  in  a  note  on  Varro  (De  Lirtn-ua  Lafina,  lib. 
vi.)  suggests,  with  groat  ingenuity,  that  the  Fauns  who 
were  represented  by  the  superstition  of  later  ages  as  a 
race  of  monsters,  half  gods  and  half  brutes,  may  really 
have  been  a  class  of  men  who  exercised  in  Latium,  at  a 
very  remote  period,  the  same  functions  which  belonged 
to  the  Marians  in  Persia  and  to  the  Bards  in  Gaul. 


time,  there  were  ballads  in  praise  of  illustrious 

*  Oi  Si  dvdpudtvres  yivovrai,  KO.TO.  rt  <i£(W<i/  nop<j>rjs 
nl  (Ppovfinaros  oyxov,  oi>  ffi>o<f>opj3oTg  xal  /?oi)<ioAoi?  eoi- 
f>T£$,  a\X'  o'iov$  liv  rtj  d^KJjrretE  roi>s  tK  flamXeiov  rj 
vvTas  yfvovs,  KOI  and  daipdvuiv  oiropiii;  ycviaQui  vjifit^o* 
ti'ovf,  wj  lv  roTj  rmrptotf  Zfjvoi$  VTTO  'I'wuaidiv  ITI  Kail 
vva  feral. — Dion.  Hal.  i.  79.  This  passage  has  sometimes 
eeh  cited  as  if  Dionysius  had  been  speaking  in  his  own 
person,  and  had,  Greek  as  he  was,  been  so  industrious  Of 
so  fortunate  as  to  discover   some  valuable  remains  of 
that  early  Latin  poetry  which  the  greatest  Latin  writers 
of  his  age  regretted  as  hopelessly  lost.     Such  a  suppo 
sition  is  highly  improbable  ;  and  indeed   it  sterns  clear 
from  the  context  that  Dionysius,  as  Reiske  and  other 
editors  evidently  thought,  was  merely  quoting  from  Fa 
bius  Pictor.  The  whole  passage  has  the  air  of  an  extract 
from   an  ancient  chronicle,  and  is   introduced   by  the 
words,   KoiVroj  niv  <I>d/?£oj   6   Yl'iKTwp  Aej'O/^i'oj,  r»](5« 
ypti<j)£i. 

Another  argument  may  be  urged  which  seems  to  de 
serve  consideration.  The  author  of  the  passage  in 
question  mentions  a  thatched  hut  which,  in  his  time 
stood  between  Mount  Palatine  and  the  Circus.  This 
hut,  he  says,  was  built  by  Romulus,  and  was  tonstantly 
kept  in  repair  at  the  public  charge,  but  never  in  nny  res 
pect  embellished.  Now,  in  the  age  of  Dionysins  there 
certainly  was  at  Rome  a  thatched  hut,  said  to  have  been 
that  of  Romulus.  But  this  hut,  as  we  learn  from  Vitru- 
vius,  stood,  not  near  the  Circus,  but  in  the  Capitol.  (Vit. 
ii.  1.)  If,  therefore,  we  understand  Dionysius  to  speak 
in  his  own  person,  we  can  reconcile  his  statement  with 
that  of  Vitruvius  only  by  supposing  that  there  were  at 
Rome,  in  the  Augustan  age,  two  thatched  huts,  both  be 
lieved  to  have  been  built  by  Romulus,  and  both  carefully 
repaired,  and  held  in  high  honour.  The  objections  to 
such  a  supposition  seem  to  be  strong.  Neither  Dionysius 
nor  Vitruvius  speaks  of  more  than  one  such  hut.  Dio 
Cassius  informs  us  that  twice,  during  the  long  adminis 
tration  of  Augustus,  the  hut  of  Romulus  caught  fire, 
(xlviii.  43.  liv.  29.)  Had  there  been  two  such  huts, 
would  he  not  have  told  us  of  which  he  spoke?  An  Eng 
lish  historian  would  hardly  give  an  account  of  a  fire  at 
Queen's  College  without  saying  whether  it  was  at 
Queen's  College,  Oxford,  or  at  Queen's  College,  Cam 
bridge.  Marcus  Seneca,  Macrobius,  and  Conon,  a  Greek 
writer  from  whwm  Photius  has  made  large  extracts, 
mention  only  one  hut  of  Romulus,  that  in  the  Capitol. 
(Jit.  Seneca,  'Contr.  i.  6;  Macrcbius,  Sat.  i.  15;  Pliotius, 
Bill.  186.)  Ovid,  Petronius,  Valerius  Maximus,  Lucius 
Seneca,  and  St.  Jerome  mention  only  one  hut  of  Romu 
lus  without  specifying  the  site.  (Ovid,  Fasti,  iii.  183, 
Petrvwius,  Fragm.  ;  Vol.  Max.  iv.  4  ;  L.  Seneca,  Consola- 
tio  ad  Helviam  ;  D.  Hieron.  ad  Pavlininnum  de  I)idjimo. 

The  whole  difficulty  is  removed,  if  we  suppose  that 
Dionysius  was  merely  quoting  Fabius  Pictor.  Nothing 
is  more  probable  than  that  the  cabin,  which  in  the  time 
of  Fabius  stood  near  the  Circus,  might,  long  before  the 
age  of  Augustus,  have  been  transported  to  the  Capitol, 
as  the  place  fittest,  by  reason  both  of  its  safety  and  of 
its  sanctity,  to  contain  so  precious  a  relique. 

The  language  of  Plutarch  confirms  this  hypothesis, 
lie  describes,  with  great  precision,  the  spot  where  Ro 
mulus  dwelt  between  the  Palatine  Mount  and  the  Cir 
cus:  but  he  says  riot  a  word  implying  that  the  dwelling 
was  still  to  be  seen  there.  Indeed,  his  expressions  im 
ply  that  it  was  no  longer  there.  The  evidence  of  Soli 
nus  is  still  more  to  the  point.  He,  like  Plutarch, 
describes  the  spot  where  Romulus  i,.td  resided,  and 
says  expressly  that  the  hut  had  been  there,  but  that,  in 
his  time,  it  was  there  no  longer.  The  site,  it  is  certain, 
was  well  remembered  ;  and  probably  retained  its  old 
name,  as  Charing  Cross  and  the  Haymarket  have  done. 
This  is  probably  the  explanation  of  the  words,  "casa 
Romuli"  in  Victor's  description  of  the  Tenth  Region  Of 
Rome,  under  Valeiitwian 


53  6 


LAYS   OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


men  ;  and  these  ballads  it  was  the  fashion  for 
the  guests  at  banquets  to  sing  in  turn  while  the 
piper  played.  '-  Would,"  exclaims  Cicero, "  that 
we  still  had  the  old  ballads  of  which  Cato 
speaks  !"* 

Valerius  Maximus  gives  us  exactly  similar 
information,  without  mentioning  his  authority, 
and  observes  that  the  ancient  Roman  ballads 
were  probably  of  more  benefit  to  the  young 
than  all  the  lectures  of  the  Athenian  schools, 
and  that  to  the  influence  of  the  national  poetry 
were  to  be  ascribed  the  virtues  of  such  men 
as  Camillus  and  Fabricius.f 

Varro,  whose  authority  on  all  questions  con 
nected  with  the  antiquities  of  his  country  is 
entitled  to  the  greatest  respect,  tells  us  that  at 
banquets  it  was  once  the  fashion  for  boys  to 
sing,  sometimes  with  and  sometimes  without 
instrumental  music,  ancient  ballads  in  praise 
of  men  of  former  times.  These  young  per 
formers,  he  observes,  were  of  unblemished 
character,  a  circumstance  which  he  probably 
mentioned  because,  among  the  Greeks,  and 
indeed  in  his  time  among  the  Romans  also, 
the  morals  of  singing  boys  were  in  no  high 
repute.^ 

The  testimony  of  Horace,  though  given  in 
cidentally,  confirms  the  statements  of  Cato, 
Valerius  Maximus,  and  Varro.  The  poet  pre 
dicts  that,  under  the  peaceful  administration 
of  Augustus,  the  Romans  will,  over  their  full 
goblets,  sing  to  the  pipe,  after  the  fashion  of 
their  fathers,  the  deeds  of  brave  captains,  and 
the  ancient  legends  touching  the  origin  of  the 
city.§ 

The  proposition,  then,  that  Rome  had  ballad- 
poetry  is  not  merely  in  itself  highly  probable, 
but  it  is  fully  proved  by  direct  evidence  of  the 
greatest  weight. 

This  proposition  being  established,  it  be 
comes  easy  to  understand  why  the  early  his 
tory  of  the  city  is  unlike  almost  every  thing 
else  in  Latin  literature — native  where  almost 
every  thing  else  is  borrowed,  imaginative 
where  almost  every  thing  else  is  prosaic.  We 
can  scarcely  hesitate  to  pronounce  that  the 
magnificent,  pathetic,  and  truly  national  le- 


*  Cicero  refers  twice  to  this  important  passage  in 
Cato's  Ar:liqnities  : — "  Gravissimus  auctor  in  'Origini- 
hus'  (lixit  Cato,  morem  apud  nnjores  hunc  epularum 
fuisse,  iM  deinceps,  qui  accubarent,  canerent  ad  tibiani 
claroriitn  viroruin  laudes  atqne  virlutes.  Ex  quo  per- 
spicuum  est,  et  cantus  turn  fuisse  rescriptos  vncuin  so- 
nis,et  carmina." — THSC  Quast.  iv.  2.  Again  :"  Utinain 
exstarent  ilia  carmina  qua;  rnultis  saiculis  ante  siiain 
a:tatein  in  epulis  esse  cantitata  a  singiilis  convivis  de 
claronim  virornm  laudibus  in  'Originibus' scripturn  re- 
liquit  Cato."— Brutus,  cap.  xix. 

f  "  Majores  natu  in  conviviis  ad  tibias  epregia  siipe- 
iiorum  opera  carmine  comprehensa  pangebant,  quo  ad 
ea  imiianda  juventutem  alacriorum  redderent.  . 
Qiias  Athenas,  qnam  scholam,  qua;  alienigena  snidia 
hnic  domestica;  discipline  pretulerim?  Inde  oriebantur 
Camilli,  Scipionee,  Fabricii,  Marcelli,  Fabii."—  Vol. 
Max.  ii.  1. 

$"In  conviviis  pueri  modest!  nt  cantarent  carmina 
•  Htiqua,  i?i  qiiihus  laudes  erant  majorum,  et  assa  voce, 
Ct  cum  tibicine."     Nonius,  rfssa  voce  pro  sola. 
"  Nosque  et  profestis  lucihns  et  sacris, 
Inter  jocosi  mtinera  Liben, 

dim  prole  matroni?que  nostris, 

llite  Deos  priiis  apprecati, 

«  Virriue  functos,  MOIIE  PATRUM,  duces, 

Lyitis  riMiiixto  carmine  tihiis, 
Trojawque,  et  Anchisen,  et  almse 
Progeniem  Veneria  canemus." 

Carm.  iv.  51. 


gends,  which  present  so  striking  a  contrast  to 
all  that  surrounds  them,  are  broken  and  de 
faced  fragments  of  that  early  poetry  which, 
even  in  the  age  of  Cato  the  Censor,  had  be 
come  antiquated,  and  of  which  Tully  had 
never  heard  a  line. 

That  this  poetry  should  have  been  suffered 
to  perish  will  not  appear  strange  when  we 
consider  how  complete  was  the  triumph  of  the 
Greek  genius  over  the  public  mind  of  Italy. 
It  is  probable  that,  at  an  early  period,  Homer, 
Archilochus,  and  Herodotus,  furnished  some 
hints  to  the  Latin  minstrels:*  but  it  was  not 
till  after  the  war  with  Pyrrhus  that  the  poetry 
of  Rome  began  to  put  off  its  old  Ausonian 
character.  The  transformation  was  soon  con 
summated.  The  conquered,  says  Horace,  led 
captive  the  conquerors.  It  was  precisely  at 
the  time  at  which  the  Roman  people  rose  to 
unrivalled  political  ascendency,  that  they 
stooped  to  pass  under  the  intellectual  yoke. 
It  was  precisely  at  the  time  at  which  the 
sceptre  departed  from  Greece  that  the  empire 
of  her  language  and  of  her  arts  became  uni 
versal  and  despotic.  The  revolution  indeed 
was  not  effected  without  a  struggle.  Ncevius 
seems  to  have  been  the  last  of  the  ancient  line 
of  poets.  Ennius  was  the  founder  of  a  new 
dynasty.  Nasvius  celebrated  the  First  Punic 
War  in  Saturnian  verse,  the  old  national  verse 
of  Italy.f  Ennius  sang  the  Second  Punic  War 


*  See  the  Preface  to  the  Lay  of  the  Battle  of  Regillusu 

f  Cicero  gpeaks  highly  in  more  than  one  place  of  this 
poem  of  Nffivius  ;  Ennius  sneered  at  it,  and  stole  from  it 

As  to  the  Saturninn  measure,  see  Herman's  Elements! 
Doctriru-e  Metricse.  iii.  9. 

The  Saturnian  line  consisted  of  two  parts.  The  first 
was  a  catalectic  dimeter  iambic;  the  second  was  com 
posed  of  three  trochees.  But  the  license  taken  by  the 
early  Latin  poets  seems  to  have  been  almost  boundless. 
The  most  perfect  Saturnian  line  which  has  been  pre 
served  by  the  grammarians  was  the  work,  not  of  a  pro 
fessional  artist,  but  of  an  amateur  ; 

"Dabunt  malum  Metelli  Navio  poetrc." 

There  has  been  much  difference  of  opinion  among 
learned  men  respecting  the  history  of  this  measure. 
That  it  is  the  same  with  a  Greek  measure  used  by  Ar 
chilochus  is  indisputable.  (Beritlny,  Phahiris,  xi.)  But 
in  spite  of  the  authority  of  Terentianus  Maurus,  and  of 
the  still  higher  authority  of  Bentley,  we  may  venture  to 
doubt  whether  the  coincidence  was  not  fortuitous.  We 
constantly  find  the  same  rude  and  simple  numbers  in 
different  countries,  under  circumstances  which  make  it 
impossible  to  suspect  that  there  has  been  imitation  on 
either  side.  Bishop  Heber  heard  the  children  of  a  vil 
lage  in  Bengal  singing  "  Radha,  Radha,"  to  the  tune  of 
"My  boy  Billy."  Neither  the  Ciistilian  nor  the  German 
minstrels  of  Ihe  middle  ages  owed  any  thing  to  Paros  cr 
to  ancient  Rome.  Yet  both  the  poem  of  the  Cid  and  the 
poem  of  the  Nibelungs  contain  many  Saturnian  verses; 
as, — 

"  Estas  nuevas  a  mio  Cid  eran  venidas." 
"A  mi  lo  dicen  ;  a  ti  dan  las  orejadas." 

"  Man  mohte  michel  wunder  von  Sifride  sagen." 
"  Wa  ich  den  Kiinic  vinde  daz  sol  man  mir  sagen.** 

Indeed,  there  cannot  be  a  more  perfect  Saturnian  lino 
than  one  which  is  sung  in  every  English  nursery-- 

"  The  queen  was  in  her  parlour  eating  bread  and  honey." 

yet  the  author  of  this  line,  we  may  be  assured,  borrowed 
nothing  from  either  Ntevius  or  Archilochus. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  by  no  means  improbable  that, 
two  or  three  hundred  years  before  the  lime  of  Ennius, 
some  Latin  minstrels  may  have  visited  Sybaria  or  Cro- 
tona,  may  have  heard  some  versi  s  of  Arcliilochus  sung, 
may  have  been  pleased  with  the  metre,  and  may  have 
introduced  it  at  Rome.  Thus  much  is  certain,  that  the 
Saturnian  measure,  if  not  a  native  of  Italy,  was  at 
least  so  early  and  so  completely  naturalized  mere  that 
itb-  foreign  origin  was  forgotten. 


PREFACE. 


637 


in  numbers  borrowed  from  the  Iliad.  The 
elder  poet,  in  the  epitaph  which  he  wrote  for 
himself,  and  which  is  a  line  specimen  of  the 
early  Roman  diction  and  versification,  plain 
tively  boasted  that  the  Latin  language  had 
died  with  him.*  Thus,  what  to  Horace  ap 
peared  to  be  the  first  faint  dawn  of  Roman 
literature,  appeared  to  Ncevius  to  be  its  hope 
less  setting.  In  truth,  one  literature  was  set 
ting,  and  another  dawning.  ' 

The  victory  of  the  foreign  taste  was  deci 
sive:  and  indeed  we  can  hardly  blame  the 
Romans  for  turning  away  with  contempt  from 
the  rude  lays  which  had  delighted  their  lathers, 
and  giving  their  whole  admiration  to  the  great 
productions  of  Greece.  The  national  romances, 
neglected  by  the  great  and  the  refined  whose 
education  had  been  finished  at  Rhodes  or 
Athens,  continued,  it  may  be  supposed,  during 
some  generations,  to  delight  the  vulgar.  While 
Virgil,  in  hexameters  of  exquisite  modulation, 
described  the  sports  of  rustics,  those  rustics 
were  still  singing  their  wild  Saturnian  ballads.f 
It  is  not  improbable  that,  at  the  time  when 
Cicero  lamented  the  irreparable  loss  of  the 
poems  mentioned  by  Cato,  a  search  among  the 
nooks  of  the  Apennines,  as  active  as  the  search 
which  Sir  Walter  Scott  made  among  the  de 
scendants  of  the  mosstroopers  of  Liddesdale, 
might  have  brought  to  light  many  fine  remains 
of  ancient  minstrelsy.  No  such  search  was 
made.  The  Latin  ballads  perished  forever. 
Yet  discerning  critics  have  thought  that  they 
could  still  perceive  in  the  early  history  of 
Rome  numerous  fragments  of  this  lost  poetry, 

Bentley  says,  indeed,  that  the  Safurnian  measure  was 
first  brought  from  Greece  into  Italy  by  Nsrvius.  But  this 
is  merely  obiter  dictum,  to  use  a  phrase  common  in  our 
courts  of  law,  and  would  not  have  l>een  deliberately 
maintained  by  that  incomparable  critic,  whose  memory 
is  held  in  reverence  by  all  lovers  of  learning.  The 
arguments  which  might  be  broiic'nt  against  Bentley's 
assertion— for  it  is  mere  assertion,  supported  by  no  evi 
dence—are  Innumerable.  A  few  will  suffice. 

1.  Bentley's  assertion  is  opposed  to  the  testimony  of 
Ennius.     Ennius  sneered  at  Nffivius  for  writing  on  the 
First  Punic  War  in  verses  such  as  the  old  Italian  bards 
used  before  Greek  literature  had  been  studied.     Now, 
the  poem  of  Nrpvius  was  in  Saturnian  verse.     Is  it  pos 
sible  that  Enniiis  could  have  used  such  expressions,  if 
the   Saturnian   verse    had    been    just    imported    from 
Greece  for  the  first  timel 

2.  Berilley'*  assertion   is  opposed  to  the  testimony  of 
Horace.     "When  Greece,"  says  Horace,  "introduced 
her  aits  into  our  uncivilized  country,  those  rugged  Sa- 
turniat)  numbers  passed   away."     Would  Horace  have 
•aid  this,  if  the  Saturnian  numbers  had  been  imported 
from  Greece  just  before  the  hexameter? 

3.  Bentley's  assertion  is  opposed  to  the  testimony  of 
Festus  and  of  Aurelius  N  ictor,  both  of  whom  positively 
say  that  the  most  ancient  prophecies  attributed  to  the 
Fatms  were  in  Saturnian  verse. 

4.  Bentley's  assertion  is  opposed  to  the  testimony  of 
Terentianus  Maurus,  to  whom  he  has  himself  appealed. 
Terentianus  Maurus  does  indeed  say  that  the  Saturnian 
measure,  though  believed  by  the  Romans  from  a  very 
early  period  ("credidit  vetustas")  to  be  of  Italian  in 
vention,  was  really  borrowed  from  the  Greeks.      But 
Tereritianus  Maurus  does  not  say  that  it  was  first   bor 
rowed  by  Na>vius.     Nay,  the  expressions  used  by  Te 
rentianus  Maurus  clearly  imply  the  contrary;  for  how 
could   the   Romans  have   believed,  from  a   very  early 
period,  that  this  measure  was  the  indigenous  production 
of  Latium.  if  it  was  really  brought  over  from  Greece  in 
an  a^e  of  intelligence  and  liberal  curiosity, — in  the  age 
which  gave  birth  to  Ennius,  F|HIM.II».  Cato  the  Censor, 
and  other  distinguished  writers  1     If  Bentley's  assertion 
were  correct,  there  could   have  been  no  more  doubt  at 
Rome  about  the  Greek  orisrin  of  the  Saturnian  measure 
tiiiin  about  thf1  Greek  origin  of  hexameters  or  Sapphics. 

*  Aulus  GHlius,  Noctes  JJtticff,  i.  24. 
f  See  Soivius,  in  Georg.  ii.  3b5. 
VOL.  I\  —  08 


as  the  traveller  on  classic  ground  sometimes 
finds,  built  into  the  heavy  wall  of  a  fort  or  con 
vent,  a  pillar  rich  with  acanthus  leaves,  or  a 
frieze  where  the  Amazons  and  Bacchanals 
seem  to  live.  The  theatres  and  temples  of  the 
Greek  and  the  Roman  were  degraded  into  the 
quarries  of  the  Turk  and  the  Goth.  Even  so 
did  the  old  Saturnian  poetry  become  the  quarry 
in  which  a  crowd  of  orators  arid  annalists 
found  the  materials  for  their  prose. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  trace  the  process  by 
which  the  old  songs  were  transmuted  into  tho 
form  which  they  now  wear.  Funeral  pane 
gyric  and  chronicle  appear  to  have  been  the 
intermediate  links  which  connected  the  lost 
ballads  with  the  histories  now  extant.  From 
a  very  early  period  it  was  the  usage  that  an 
oration  should  be  pronounced  over  the  remains 
of  a  noble  Roman.  The  orator,  as  we  learn 
from  Polybius,  was  expected,  on  such  an  occa 
sion,  to  recapitulate  all  the  services  which  the 
ancestors  of  the  deceased  had,  from  the  earliest 
time,  rendered  to  the  commonwealth.  There 
can  be  little  doubt  that  the  speaker  on  whom 
this  duty  was  imposed  would  make  use  of  alt 
the  stories  suited  to  his  purpose  which  were  to 
be  found  in  the  popular  lays.  There  can  be  as 
little  doubt  that  the  family  of  an  eminent  man 
would  preserve  a  copy  of  the  speech  which 
had  been  pronounced  over  his  corpse.  The 
compilers  of  the  early  chronicles  would  have 
recourse  to  these  speeches ;  and  the  great  his 
torians  of  a  later  period  would  have  recourse 
to  the  chronicles. 

It  may  be  worth  while  to  select  a  particular 
story,  and  to  trace  its  probable  progress  through 
these  stages.  The  description  of  the  migration 
of  the  Fabian  house  to  Cremera  is  one  of  the 
finest  of  the  many  fine  passages  which  lie 
thick  in  the  earlier  books  of  Livy.  The  Con 
sul,  clad  in  his  military  garb,  stands  in  the 
vestibule  of  his  house,  marshalling  his  clan, 
three  hundred  arid  six  fighting  men,  all  of  the 
same  proud  patrician  blood,  all  worthy  to  be 
attended  by  the  fasces  and  to  command  the 
legions.  A  sad  and  anxious  retinue  of  friends 
accompanies  the  adventurers  through  the 
streets  ;  but  the  voice  of  lamentation  is  drown 
ed  by  the  shouts  of  admiring  thousands.  As 
the  procession  passes  the  Capitol,  prayers  and 
vows  are  poured  forth,  but  in  vain.  The  de 
voted  band,  leaving  Janus  on  the  right,  marches 
to  its  doom  through  the  Gate  of  Evil  Luck. 
After  achieving  great  deeds  of  valour  againsi 
overwhelming  numbers,  all  perish  save  one- 
child,  the  stock  from  which  the  great  Fabian 
race  was  destined  again  to  spring,  for  the 
safety  and  glory  of  the  commonwealth  That 
this  fine  romance,  the  details  of  which  are  so 
full  of  poetical  truth,  and  so  utterly  destitute 
of  all  show  of  historical  truth,  came  originally 
from  some  lay  which  had  often  been  sung  with 
great  applause  at  banquets,  is  in  the  highest 
degree  probable.  Nor  is  it  difficult  to  imagine 
I  a  mode  in  which  the  transmission  might  have 
I  taken  place.  The  celebrated  Quintus  Fabiu* 
Maximus,  who  died  about  twenty  years  befora 
the  First  Punic  War,  and  more  than  forty 
years  before  Ennius  was  born,  is  said  to  havts 
been  interred  with  extraordinary  pomp.  In  th«» 
eulogy  pronounced  over  his  body  all  the  great" 


538 


LAYS   OF   ANCIENT  ROME. 


exploits  of  his  ancestors  were  doubtless  re 
counted  and  exaggerated.  If  there  were  then 
extant  songs  which  gave  a  vivid  and  touching 
description  of  an  event,  the  saddest  and  the 
most  glorious  in  the  long  history  of  the  Fabian 
house,  nothing  could  be  more  natural  than  that 
the  panegyrist  should  borrow  from  such  songs 
their  finest  touches,  in  order  to  adorn  his 
speech.  A  few  generations  later  the  songs 
would  perhaps  be  forgotten,  or  remembered 
only  by  shepherds  and  vine-dressers.  But  the 
speech  would  certainly  be  preserved  in  the 
archives  of  the  Fabian  nobles.  Fabius  Pictor 
would  be  well  acquainted  with  a  document  so 
interesting  to  his  personal  feelings,  and  would 
insert  large  extracts  from  it  in  his  rude  chro 
nicle.  That  chronicle,  as  we  know,  was  the 
oldest  to  which  Livy  had  access.  Livy  would 
at  a  glance  distinguish  the  bold  strokes  of  the 
forgotten  poet  from  the  dull  and  feeble  narra 
tive  by  which  they  were  surrounded,  would 
retouch  them  with  a  delicate  and  powerful 
pencil,  and  would  make  them  immortal. 

That  this  might  happen  at  Rome  can  scarcely 
be  doubted  ;  for  something  very  like  this  has 
happened  in  several  countries,  and,  among 
others,  in  our  own.  Perhaps  the  theory  of 
Perizonius  cannot  be  better  illustrated  than  by 
showing  that  what  he  supposes  to  have  taken 
place  in  ancient  times  has,  beyond  all  doubt, 
taken  place  in  modern  times. 

"History,"  says  Hume,  with  the  utmost  gra 
vity,  "  has  preserved  some  instances  of  Edgar's 
amours,  from  which,  as  from  a  specimen,  we 
may  form  a  conjecture  of  the  rest."  He  then 
tells  very  agreeably  the  stories  of  Elfleda  and 
ElfrLla;  two  stories  which  have  a  most  sus 
picious  air  of  romance,  and  which,  indeed, 
greatly  resemble,  in  their  general  character, 
some  of  the  legends  of  early  Rome.  He  cites, 
as  his  authority  for  these  two  tales,  the  chro 
nicle  of  William  of  Malmesbury,  who  lived  in 
.he  time  of  King  Stephen.  The  great  majority 
of  readers  suppose  that  the  device  by  which 
Elfleda  was  substituted  for  her  young  mistress, 
the  artifice  by  which  Athelwold  obtained  the 
hand  of  Elfrida,  the  detection  of  that  artifice, 
the  hunting  party,  and  the  vengeance  of  the 
amorous  king,  are  things  about  which  there  is 
no  more  doubt  than  about  the  execution  of 
Anne  Boleyn,  or  the  slitting  of  Sir  John  Co 
ventry's  nose.  But,  when  we  turn  to  William 
of  Malmesbury,  we  find  that  Hume,  in  his 
eagerness  to  relate  these  pleasant  fables,  has 
overlooked  one  very  important  circumstance. 
William  does  indeed  tell  both  the  stories  ;  but 
he  srives  us  distinct  notice  that  he  does  not 
warrant  their  truth,  and  that  they  rest  on  no 
better  authority  than  that  of  ballads.* 

Such  is  the  way  in  which  these  two  well- 
known  tales  have  been  handed  down.  They 
originally  appeared  in  a  poetical  form.  They 
found  their  way  from  ballads  into  an  old  chroni 
cle.  The  ballads  perished;  the  chronicle  re 
mained.  A  great  historian,  some  centurie 


*  "  Irifarnins  quas  poet  dicam  mapis  respersernnt  can- 
lleruT."  E(ic;ir  appears  to  have  been  most  mercilessly 
treated  in  the  Anjilo-Saxon  ballads,  lie  was  the  fa 
vourite  of  the  monks;  and  the  monks  and  minstrels 
were  At  deadly  feud. 


after  the  ballads  had  been  altogether  forgotten, 
consulted  the  chronicle.  He  was  struck  by  thp 
ively  colouring  of  these  ancient  fictions ;  he 
ransferred  them  to  his  pages ;  and  thus  WR 
find  inserted,  as  unquestionable  facts,  in  a  nar 
rative  which  is  likely  to  last  as  long  as  the 
English  tongue,  the  inventions  of  some  min 
strel  whose  works  were  probably  never  com 
mitted  to  writing,  whose  name  is  buried  in. 
oblivion,  and  whose  dialect  has  become  obso- 
.ete.  It  must  then  be  admitted  to  be  possible, 
)r  rather  highly  probable,  that  the  stories  of 
Romulus  and  Remus,  and  of  the  Horatii  and 

uriatii,  may  have  had  a  similar  origin. 

Castilian  literature  will  furnish  us  with  an 
other  parallel  case.  Mariana,  the  classical 
iiistorian  of  Spain,  tells  the  story  of  the  ill-star 
red  marriage  which  the  King  Don  Alonso 
brought  about  between  the  heirs  of  Carrion 
and  the  two  daughters  of  the  Cid.  The  Cid. 
bestowed  a  princely  dower  on  his  sons-in-law. 
But  the  young  men  were  base  and  proud,  cow 
ardly  and  cruel.  They  were  tried  in  danger, 
and  found  wanting.  They  fled  before  the 
Moors,  and  once,  when  a  lion  broke  out  of  his 
den,  they  ran  and  couched  in  an  unseemly 
hiding-place.  They  knew  that  they  were  de 
spised,  and  took  counsel  how  they  might  be 
avenged.  They  parted  from  their  father-in-law 
with  many  signs  of  love,  and  set  forth  on  a 
journey  with  Dona  Elvira  and  Dona  Sol.  In 
a  solitary  place  the  bridegrooms  seized  their 
brides,  stripped  them,  scourged  them,  and  de 
parted,  leaving  them  for  dead.  But  one  of  the 
house  of  Bivar,  suspecting  foul  play,  had  fol 
lowed  them  in  disguise.  The  ladies  were 
brought  back  safe  to  the  house  of  their  father. 
Complaint  was  made  to  the  king.  It  was  ad 
judged  by  the  Cortes  that  the  dower  given  by 
the  Cid  should  be  returned,  and  that  the  heirs 
of  Carrion  together  with  one  of  their  kindred 
should  do  battle  against  three  knights  of  the 
party  of  the  Cid.  The  guilty  youths  would 
have  declined  the  combat;  but  all  their  shifts 
were  vain.  They  were  vanquished  in  the  lists, 
and  forever  disgraced,  while  their  injured 
wives  were  sought  in  marriage  by  great 
princes.* 

Some  Spanish  writers  have  laboured  to 
show,  by  an  examination  of  dates  and  circum 
stances,  that  this  story  is  untrue.  Such  con 
futation  was  surely  not  needed;  for  the  narra 
tive  is  on  the  face  of  it  a  romance.  How  it 
found  its  way  into  Mariana's  history  is  quite 
clear.  He  acknowledges  his  obligations  to  the 
old  chronicles,  arid  had  doubtless  before  him 
the"Cronica  del  famoso  Cavallero  Cid  Ruy 
Diez  Campeador,"  which  had  been  printed  as 
early  as  the  year  1552.  He  little  suspected 
that  all  the  most  striking  passages  in  this 
chronicle  were  copied  from  a  poem  of  the 
twelfth  century,  a  poem  of  which  the  language 
and  versification  had  long  been  obsolete,  but 
which  glowed  with  no  common  portion  of  the 
fire  of  the  Iliad.  Yet  such  was  the  fact. 
More  than  a  century  and  a  half  after  the  death 
of  Mariana,  this  grand  old  ballad,  of  which  one 
imperfect  copy  on  parchment,  four  hundred 

*  Mariana,  lib.  x.  cap.  4 


PREFACE. 


years  eld,  had  been  preserved  at  Bivar,  was 
for  the  first  time  printed.  Then  it  was  found 
that  every  interesting  circumstance  of  the  story 
of  the  heirs  of  Carrion  was  derived  by  the  elo 
quent  Jesuit  from  a  song  of  which  he  had 
never  heard,  and  which  was  composed  by  a 
minstrel  whose  very  name  had  long  been  for 
gotten.* 

Such,  or  nearly  such,  appears  to  have  been 
the  process  by  which  the  lost  ballad-poetry  of 
Rome  was  transformed  into  history.  To  re 
verse  that  process,  to  transform  some  portions 
of  early  Roman  history  back  into  the  poetry 
out  of  which  they  were  made,  is  the  object  of 
this  work. 

In  the  following  poems  the  author  speaks, 
not  in  his  own  person,  but  in  the  persons  of 
ancient  minstrels  who  know  only  what  a  Ro 
man  citizen,  born  three  or  four  hundred  years 
before  the  Christian  era,  may  be  supposed  to 
have  known,  and  who  are  in  nowise  above 
the  passions  and  prejudices  of  their  age  and 
country.  To  these  imaginary  poets  must  be 
ascribed  some  blunders  which  are  so  obvious 
that  it  is  unnecessary  to  point  them  out.  The 
real  blunder  would  have  been  to  represent 
these  old  poets  as  deeply  versed  in  general 
history,  and  studious  of  chronological  accuracy. 
To  them  must  also  be  attributed  the  illiberal 
sneers  at  the  Greeks,  the  furious  party  spirit, 
the  contempt  for  the  arts  of  peace,  the  love  of 
war  for  its  own  sake,  the  ungenerous  exultation 

*  See  the  account  which  Sanchez  gives  of  the  Bivar 
mam-script  in  the  first  volume  of  the  Colcccion  de  Poeaias 
Custel/anag  anteriores  al  Giiflo  XV.  Part  of  the  story  of 
the  lords  of  Carrion,  in  the  poem  of  the  Cid,  lias  been 
translated  by  Mr.  Frere  in  a  manner  above  all  praise. 


over  the  vanquished,  which  the  reader  will 
sometimes  observe.  To  portray  a  Roman  of 
the  age  of  Camillus  or  Curius  as  superior  to 
national  antipathies,  as  mourning  over  the  de 
vastation  and  slaughter  by  which  empire  and 
triumphs  were  to  be  won,  as  looking  on  human 
suffering  with  the  sympathy  of  Howard,  or  as 
treating  conquered  enemies  with  the  delicacy 
of  the  Black  Prince,  would  be  to  violate  all 
dramatic  propriety.  The  old  Romans  had 
some  great  virtues, — fortitude,  temperance, 
veracity,  spirit  to  resist  oppression,  respect  for 
legitimate  authority,  fidelity  in  the  observing 
of  contracts,  disinterestedness,  ardent  public 
spirit;  but  Christian  charity  and  chivalrous 
generosity  were  alike  unknown  to  them. 

It  would  have  been  obviously  improper  to 
mimic  the  manner  of  any  particular  age  or 
country.  Something  has  been  borrowed,  how 
ever,  from  our  own  old  ballads,  and  more  from 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  the  great  restorer  of  our  bal 
lad-poetry.  To  the  Iliad  still  greater  oblige 
tions  are  due ;  and  those  obligations  have  been 
contracted  with  the  less  hesitation  because 
there  is  reason  to  believe  that  some  of  the  old 
Latin  minstrels  really  had  recourse  to  that  in 
exhaustible  store  of  poetical  images. 

It  would  have  been  easy  to  swell  this  little 
volume  to  a  very  considerable  bulk,  by  append 
ing  notes  filled  with  quotations  ;  but  to  a  learn 
ed  reader  such  notes  are  not  necessary ;  for  an. 
unlearned  reader  they  would  have  little  inte 
rest;  and  the  judgment  passed  both  by  the 
learned  and  by  the  unlearned  on  a  work  of  the 
imagination  will  always  depend  much  more 
on  the  general  character  and  spirit  nf  such  « 
work  than  on  minute  details. 


640 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


HORATIUS. 


THEHB  can  be  little  doubt  that  among  those 
parts  of  early  Roman  history  which  had  a  po 
etical  origin  was  the  legend  of  Horatius  Codes. 
We  have  several  versions  of  the  story,  and 
these  versions  differ  from  each  other  in  points 
of  no  small  importance.  Polybius,  there  is 
reason  to  believe,  heard  the  tale  recited  over 
the  remains  of  some  Consul  or  Praetor  descend 
ed  from  the  old  Horatian  patricians ;  for  he 
evidently  introduces  it  as  a  specimen  of  the 
narratives  with  which  the  Romans  were  in  the 
habit  of  embellishing  their  funeral  oratory.  It 
is  remarkable  that,  according  to  his  descrip 
tion,  Horatius  defended  the  bridge  alone,  and 
perished  in  the  waters.  According  to  the 
chronicles  which  Livy  and  Dionysius  fol 
lowed,  Horatius  had  two  companions,  swam 
safe  to  shore,  and  was  loaded  with  honours 
and  rewards. 

These  discrepancies  are  easily  explained. 
Our  own  literature,  indeed,  will  furnish  an 
exact  parallel  to  what  may  have  taken  place 
at  Rome.  It  is  highly  probable  that  the  me 
mory  of  the  war  of  Porsena  was  preserved  by 
compositions  much  resembling  the  two  ballads 
which  stand  first  in  the  Re'iques  of  Ancient  Eng 
lish  Poetry.  In  both  those  ballads  the  English, 
commanded  by  the  Percy  fight  with  the  Scots, 
commanded  by  the  Douglas.  In  one  of  the 
ballads,  the  Douglas  is  killed  by  a  nameless 
English  arcner,  and  the  Percy  by  a  Scottish 
spearman  :  in  the  other,  the  Percy  slays  the 
Douglas  in  single  combat,  and  is  himself  made 
prisoner.  In  the  former,  Sir  Hugh  Montgomery 
is  shot  through  the  heart  by  a  Northumbrian 
bowman :  in  the  latter,  he  is  taken,  and  ex 
changed  for  the  Percy.  Yet  both  the  ballads 
relate  to  the  same  event,  and  that  an  event 
which  probably  took  place  within  the  memory 
of  persons  who  were  alive  when  both  the  bal 
lads  were  made.  One  of  the  minstrels  says : 

"Old  men  tliat  knowen  the  prownde  well  yenoughe 
CaH  it  the  bnttell  of  Otterburn  : 
At  Oucrluirn  began  this  spume 
Upon  a  iiioimyn  <lay. 
Ther  was  the  dnugchte  Doglas  slean : 
The  Perse  never  went  away." 

The  other  poet  sums  up  the  event  in  the  fol- 
owing  lines : 

"  Thys  fraye  bygan  at  Otterborne 

li'ytwene  the  nyghte  and  the  day; 
Ther  the  Dowglas  lost  hys  lyfe, 
And  the  Percy  was  lede  away." 

li  is  by  no  means  unlikely  .ha.;  there  were 


two  old  Roman  lays  about  the  defence  of  the 
bridge;  and  that,  while  the  story  which  Livy 
has  transmitted  to  us  was  preferred  by  the 
multitude,  the  other,  which  ascribed  the  whole 
glory  to  Horatius  alone,  may  have  been  the 
favourite  with  the  Horatian  house. 

The  following  ballad  is  supposed  to  have 
been  made  about  a  hundred  and  twenty  years 
after  the  war  which  it  celebrates,  and  just  be 
fore  the  taking  of  Rome  by  the  Gauls.  The 
author  seems  to  have  been'an  honest  citizen, 
proud  of  the  military  glory  of  his  country,  sick 
of  the  disputes  of  factions,  and  much  given  to 
pining  after  good  old  times  which  had  never 
really  existed.  The  allusion,  however,  to  the 
partial  manner  in  which  the  public  lands  were 
allotted  could  proceed  only  from  a  plebeian ; 
and  the  allusion  to  the  fraudulent  sale  of  spoils 
marks  the  date  of  the  poem,  and  shows  that 
the  poet  shared  in  the  general  discontent  with 
which  the  proceedings  of  Ca.millus,  after  the 
taking  of  Veii,  were  regarded. 

The  penultimate  syllable  of  the  name  Porse 
na  has  been  shortened  in  spite  of  the  authority 
of  Niebuhr,  who  pronounces,  without  assign' 
ing  any  ground  for  his  opinion,  thai  Martial 
was  guilty  of  a  decided  blunder  in  the  line, 
"Hanc  spectare  rnanuin  Porsena  ncm  potuit." 

It  is  not  easy  to  understand  how  any  modern 
scholar,  whatever  his  attainments  may  be, — 
and  those  of  Niebuhr  were  undoubtedly  im 
mense, — can  venture  to  pronounce  that  Mar 
tial  did  not  know  the  quantity  of  a  word  which 
he  must  have  uttered  and  heard  uttered  a 
hundred  times  before  he  left  school.  Niebuhr 
seems  also  to  have  forgotten  that  Martial  has 
fellow  culprits  to  keep  him  in  countenance. 
Horace  has  committed  the  same  decided  blun 
der  ;  for  he  gives  us,  as  a  pure  iambic  line, 

"Minacis  aut  Etrusca  Porsente  mantis." 
Silius  Italicus  has  repeatedly  offended  in  the 
same  way,  as  when  he  says, 

"Cernilur  effugiens  ardentem  Porsena  dextram;" 
and  again, 

"Clusinum  vulgus,  cum,  Porsena  magne,  jubebas." 

A  modern  writer  may  be  content  to  err  in  such 
company. 

Niebuhr's  supposition  that  each  of  the  three 
defenders  of  the  bridge  was  the  representative 
of  one  of  the  three  patrician  tribes  is  both  in 
genious  and  probable,  and  has  been  adopted 
in  the  following  poem. 


HORATIUS. 


641 


HORATIUS. 


A  LAY  MADE  ABOUT  TUB  YEAR  OF  THE  CITY  CCCLX. 


1. 

PonsuwA  of  Clusium 

By  the  Nine  Gods  he  swore 
That  the  great  house  of  Tarquin 

Should  suffer  wrong  no  more. 
By  the  Nine  Gods  he  swore  it, 

And  named  a  trysting  day, 
And  bade  his  messengers  ride  forth, 
East  and  west  and  south  and  north, 

To  summon  his  array. 

2. 

East  and  west  and  south  and  north 

The  messengers  ride  fast, 
And  tower  and  town  and  cottage 

Have  heard  the  trumpet's  blast. 
Shame  on  the  false  Etruscan, 

Who  lingers  in  his  home, 
When  Porsena  of  Clusium 

Is  on  the  march  for  Rome. 

3. 

The  horsemen  and  the  footmen 

Are  pouring  in  amain 
From  many  a  stately  market-place, 

From  many  a  fruitful  plain; 
From  many  a  lonely  hamlet, 

Which,  hid  by  beech  and  pine, 
Like  an  eagle's  nest  hangs  on  the  crest 

Of  purple  Apennine ; 


From  lordly  Volaterra, 

Where  scowls  the  far-famed  hold 
Piled  by  the  hands  of  giants 

For  god-like  kings  of  old; 
From  seagirt  Populonia, 

Whose  sentinels  descry 
Sardinia's  snowy  mountain-tops 

Fringing  the  southern  sky ; 


From  the  proud  mart  of  Pisae, 

Queen  of  the  western  waves, 
Where  ride  Massilia's  triremes 

Heavy  with  fair-haired  slaves; 
From  where  sweet  Clanis  wanders 

Through  corn,  and  vines,  and  flowers' 
From  where  Cortona  lifts  to  heaven 

Her  diadem  of  towers. 

6. 

Tall  are  the  oaks  whose  acorns 

Drop  in  dark  Auser's  rill ; 
Fat  are  the  stags  that  champ  the  boughs 

Of  the  Ciminian  hill; 
Beyond  all  streams  Clitumnus 

Is  to  the  herdsman  dear; 
Best  of  all  pools  the  fowler  loves 

The  great  Volsinian  mere. 

7. 

But  now  no  stroke  of  woodman 
Is  heard  by  Auser's  rill , 


No  hunter  tracks  the  stag's  green  path 

Up  the  Ciminian  hill; 
Unwatched  along  Clitumnus 

Grazes  the  milk-white  steer; 
Unharmed  the  water-fowl  may  dip 

In  the  Volsinian  mere.  • 

8. 
The  harvests  of  Arretium 

This  year  old  men  shall  reap ; 
This  year  young  boys  in  Umbro 

Shall  plunge  the  struggling  sheep; 
And  in  the  vats  of  Luna, 

This  year,  the  must  shall  foam 
Round  the  white  feet  of  laughing  #irli 

Whose  sires  have  marched  to  Rome. 

9. 
There  be  thirty  chosen  prophets, 

The  wisest  of  the  land, 
Who  alway  by  Lars  Porsena 

Both  morn  and  evening  stand: 
Evening  and  morn  the  Thirty 

Have  turned  the  verses  o'er, 
Traced  from  the  right  on  linen  white 

By  mighty  seers  of  yore. 

10. 

And  with  one  voice  the  Thirty 

Have  their  glad  answer  given: 
"Go  forth,  go  forth,  Lars  Porsena 

Go  forth,  beloved  of  Heaven; 
Go,  and  return  in  glory 

To  Clusium's  royal  dome, 
And  hang  round  Nurscia's  altars 

The  golden  shields  of  Rome." 

11. 

And  now  hath  every  city 

Sent  up  her  tale  of  men: 
The  foot  are  fourscore  thousand, 

The  horse  are  thousands  ten. 
Before  the  gates  of  Sutrium 

Is  met  the  great  array, 
A  proud  man  was  Lars  Porsena 

Upon  the  trysting  day. 

12. 
For  all  the  Etruscan  armies 

Were  ranged  beneath  his  eye, 
And  many  a  banished  Roman, 

And  many  a  stout  ally; 
And  with  a  mighty  following 

To  join  the  muster  came 
The  Tusculan  Mamilius, 

Prince  of  the  Latian  name. 

13. 

But  by  the  yellow  Tiber 

Was  tumult  and  affright: 
From  all  the  spacious  champaign 

To  Rome  men  took  their  flight. 
A  mile  around  the  city, 

The  throng  stopped  up  the  ways ; 
2Z 


542 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


A  fearful  sight  it  was  to  see 

Through  two  long  nights  and  days. 

14. 
For  aged  folk  on  crutches, 

And  women  great  with  child, 
And  mothers  sobbing  over  babes 

That  clung  to  them  and  smiled, 
And  sick  men  borne  in  litters 

High  on  the  necks  of  slaves, 
And  troops  of  sun-burned  husbandmen 

With  reaping-hooks  and  staves, 

15. 
And  droves  of  mules  and  asses 

Laden  with  skins  of  wine, 
And  endless  flocks  of  goats  and  sheep, 

And  endless  herds  of  kine, 
And  endless  trains  of  wagons 

That  creaked  beneath  their  weight 
Of  corn-sacks  and  of  household  goods, 

Choked  every  ;oanng  gate. 

16. 
Now,  from  the  rock  Tarpeian, 

Could  the  wan  burghers  spy 
The  line  of  blazing  villages 

Red  in  the  midnight  sky. 
The  Fathers  of  the  City, 

Tney  sat  all  night  and  day, 
For  every  hour  some  horseman  came 

With  tidings  of  dismay. 

17. 
To  eastward  and  to  westward 

Have  spread  the  Tuscan  bands ; 
Nor  house,  nor  fence,  nor  dovecote, 

In  Crustumerium  stands. 
Verbenna  down  to  Ostia 

Hath  wasted  all  the  plain ; 
Astur  hath  stormed  Janiculum, 

And  the  stout  guards  are  slain. 

18. 
I  wis,  in  all  the  Senate, 

There  was  no  heart  so  bold, 
But  sore  it  ached,  and  fast  it  beat, 

When  that  ill  news  was  told. 
Forthwith  up  rose  the  Consul, 

Up  rose  the  Fathers  all ; 
In  haste  they  girded  up  their  gowns, 

And  hied  them  to  the  wall. 

19. 
They  held  a  council  standing 

Before  the  River-gate ; 
Short  time  was  there,  ye  well  may  guess, 

For  musing  or  debate. 
Out  spoke  the  Consul  roundly: 

"  The  bridge  must  straight  go  down ; 
For,  since  Janiculum  is  lost, 

Naught  else  can  gave  the  town." 

20. 
Jusi  then  a  scout  came  flying, 

All  wild  with  haste  and  fear: 
«  To  arms!  to  arms  !  Sir  Consul; 

Lars  Porsena  is  here." 
On  the  low  hills  to  westward 

The  Consul  fixed  his  eye, 
And  saw  the  swarthy  storm  of  dust 

Bite  last  along  the  sky. 


21. 
And  nearer  fast  and  nearer 

Doth  the  red  whirlwind  come  ; 
And  louder  still  and  still  more  loud, 
From  underneath  that  rolling  cloud, 
Is  heard  the  trumpet's  war-note  proud, 

The  trampling  and  the  hum. 
And  plainly  and  more  plainly 

Now  through  the  gloom  appears, 
Far  to  left  and  far  to  right, 
In  broken  gleams  of  dark-blue  light, 
The  long  array  of  helmets  bright, 

The  long  array  of  spears. 

22. 
And  plainly  and  more  plainly, 

Above  that  glimmering  line, 
Now  might  ye  see  the  banners 

Of  twelve  fair  cities  shine  ; 
But  the  banner  of  proud  Clusium 

Was  highest  of  them  all, 
The  terror  of  the  Umbrian, 

The  terror  of  the  Gaul. 

23. 

And  plainly  and  more  plainly 

Now  might  the  burghers  know, 
By  port  and  vest,  by  horse  and  crest, 

'Each  warlike  Lucumo. 
There  Cilnius  of  Arretium 

On  his  fleet  roan  was  seen  ; 
And  Astur  of  the  fourfold  shield, 
Girt  with  the  brand  none  else  may  wield, 
Tolumnius  with  the  belt  of  gold, 
And  dark  Verbenna  from  the  hold 

By  reedy  Thrasymene. 

21. 

Fast  by  the  royal  standard, 

O'erlooking  all  the  war, 
Lars  Porsena  of  Clusium 

Sate  in  his  ivory  car. 
By  the  right  wheel  rode  Mamilius, 

Prince  of  the  Latian  name ; 
And  by  the  left  false  Sextus, 

That  wrought  the  deed  of  shame, 

25. 
But  when  the  face  of  Sextus 

Was  seen  among  the  foes, 
A  yell  that  rent  the  firmament 

From  all  the  town  arose. 
On  the  house-tops  was  no  woman 

But  spate  towards  him  and  hissed i 
No  child  but  screamed  out  curses, 

And  shook  its  little  fist. 

26. 
But  the  Consul's  brow  was  sad, 

And  the  Consul's  speech  was  low, 
And  darkly  looked  he  at  the  wall, 

And  darkly  at  the  foe. 
"  Their  van  will  be  upon  us 

Before  the  bridge  goes  down ; 
And  if  they  once  may  win  the  bridge, 

What  hope  to  save  the  town!" 

27. 

Then  out  spake  brave  Horatius, 
The  Captain  of  the  gate  : 


HORATIUS. 


54ft 


«  To  every  man  upon  this  earth 
Death  cometh  soon  or  late. 

And  how  can  man  die  better 
Than  facing  fearful  odds, 

For  the  ashes  of  his  fathers, 
And  the  temples  of  his  Gods, 

28. 
"And  for  the  tender  mother 

Who  dandled  him  to  rest, 
And  for  the  wife  who  nurses 

His  baby  at  her  breast, 
And  for  the  holy  maidens 

Who  feed  the  eternal  flame, 
To  save  them  from  false  Sextus 

That  wrought  the  deed  of  shame  7 

29. 

"  Hew  down  the  bridge,  Sir  Consul, 

With  all  the  speed  ye  may; 
I,  with  two  more  to  help  me, 

Will  hold  the  foe  in  play. 
In  yon  strait  path  a  thousand 

May  well  be  stopped  by  three. 
Now,  who  will  stand  on  either  hand, 

And  keep  the  bridge  with  me  1" 

30. 

Then  out  spake  Spurius  Lartius, 

A  Ramnian  proud  was  he : 
"Lo,  I  will  stand  on  thy  right  hand, 

And  keep  the  bridge  with  thee." 
And  out  spake  strong  Herminius, 

Of  Titian  blood  was  he: 
**I  will  abide  on  thy  left  side, 

And  keep  the  bridge  with  thee." 

31. 

"Horatius,"  quoth  the  Consul, 

"  As  thou  sayest,  so  let  it  be." 
And  straight  against  that  great  array 

Forth  went  the  dauntless  Three. 
For  Romans  in  Rome's  quarrel 

Spared  neither  land  nor  gold, 
Nor  son  nor  wife,  nor  limb  nor  life, 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 

32. 

Then  none  was  for  a  party ; 

Then  all  were  for  the  state; 
Then  the  great  man  helped  the  poor, 

And  the  poor  man  loved  the  great: 
Then  lands  were  fairly  portioned; 

Then  spoils  were  fairly  sold: 
The  Romans  were  like  brothers 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 

33. 

Now  Roman  is  to  Roman 

More  hateful  than  a  foe, 
And  the  Tribunes  beard  the  high, 

And  the  Fathers  grind  the  low. 
As  we  wax  hot  in  faction, 

In  battle  we  wax  cold; 
Wherefore  men  fight  not  as  the"y  fought 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 

34. 

NNW,  while  the  Three  were  tightening 
Their  harness  on  their  backs, 

The  Consul  was  the  foremost  man 
To  take  in  hand  an  axe ; 


Ar.  3  Fathers  mixed  with  Commons 
Seized  hatchet,  bar,  and  crow, 

And  smote  upon  the  planks  above, 
And  loosed  the  props  below. 

35. 

Meanwhile  the  Tuscan  army, 

Right  glorious  to  behold, 
Came  flashing  back  the  noonday  light, 
Rank  behind  rank,  like  surges  bright 

Of  a  broad  sea  of  gold. 
Four  hundred  trumpets  sounded 

A  peal  of  warlike  glee, 
As  that  great  host,  with  measured  tread, 
And  spears  advanced,  and  ensigns  spread, 
Rolled  slowly  towards  the  bridge's  head, 

Where  stood  the  dauntless  Three.     . 

36. 

The  Three  stood  calm  and  silent, 

And  looked  upon  the  foes, 
And  a  great  shout  of  laughter 

From  all  the  vanguard  rose: 
And  forth  three  chiefs  came  spurring 

Before  that  mighty  mass  ; 
To  earth  they  sprang,  their  swords  they  drew 
And  lifted  high  their  shields,  and  flew 

To  win  the  narrow  pass; 

37. 
Aunus  from  green  Tifernum, 

Lord  of  the  Hill  of  Vines  ; 
And  Seius,  whose  eight  hundred  slaves 

Sicken  in  Ilva's  mines  ; 
And  Picus,  long  to  Clusium 

Vassal  in  peace  and  war, 
Who  led  to  fight  his  Umbrian  powers 
Frtm  that  gray  crag  where,  girt  with  towers 
The  fortress  of  Nequinum  lowers 

O'er  the  pale  waves  of  Nar. 

38. 
Stout  Lartius  hurled  down  Aunus 

Into  the  stream  beneath  ; 
Herminius  struck  at  Seius, 

And  clove  him  to  the  teeth; 
At  Picus  brave  Horatius 

Darted  one  fiery  thrust, 
And  the  proud  Umbrian's  gilded  arnu 

Clashed  in  the  bloody  dust. 

39. 

Then  Ocnus  of  Falerii 

Rushed  on  the  Roman  Three; 
And  Lausulus  of  Urgo 

The  rover  of  the  sea; 
And  Aruns  of  Volsinium, 

Who  slew  the  great  wild  boar, 
The  great  wild  boar  that  had  his  den 
Amidst  the  reeds  of  Cosa's  fen, 
And  wasted  fields  and  slaughtered  m<«« 

Along  Albinia's  shore. 

40. 
Herminius  smote  down  Aruns; 

Lartius  laid  Ocnus  low: 
Right  to  the  heart  of  Lausulu* 

Horatius  sent  a  blow. 
"Lie  there,"  he  cried,  "fell  pirate' 

No  more,  aghast  and  pale, 


LAYS  OF   ANCIENT  ROME. 


From  Osiia's  walls  the  crowd  shall  mark 
The  track  of  thy  destroying  bark. 
No  more  Campania's  hinds  shall  fly 
To  woods  and  caverns  when  they  spy 
Thy  thrice  accursed  sail." 

41. 
But  now  no  sound  of  laughter 

Was  heard  amongst  the  foes. 
A  wild  and  wrathful  clamour 

From  all  the  vanguard  rose. 
Six  spears'  lengths  from  the  entrance 

Halted  that  mighty  mass, 
And  for  a  space  no  man  came  forth 

To  win  the  narrow  pass. 

42. 
But  hark  !  the  cry  is  Aslur: 

And  lo  !  the  ranks  divide ; 
And  the  great  Lord  of  Luna 

Comes  with  his  stately  stride. 
Upon  his  ample  shoulders 
»«  Clangs  loud  the  fourfold  shield, 
And  in  his  hand  he  shakes  the  brand 

Which  none  but  he  can  wield. 

43. 

He  smiled  on  those  bold  Romans 

A  smile  serene  and  high; 
He  eyed  the  flinching  Tuscans, 

And  scorn  was  in  his  eye. 
Quoth  he,  "  The  she-wolf's  litter 

Stand  savagely  at  bay: 
But  will  ye  dare  to  follow, 

If  Astur  clears  the  way  1" 

44. 
Then,  whirling  up  his  broadsword 

With  both  hands  to  the  height, 
He  rushed  against  Horatius, 

And  smote  with  all  his  might. 
With  shield  and  blade  Horatius 

Right  deftly  turned  the  blow. 
The  blow,  though  turned,  came  yet  too  nigh 
It  missed  his  helm,  but  gashed  his  thigh: 
The  Tuscans  raised  a  joyful  cry 

To  see  the  red  blood  flow. 

45. 
He  reeled,  and  on  Herminius 

He  leaned  one  breathing-space ; 
Then,  like  a  wild  cat  mad  with  wounds, 

Sprang  right  at  Astur's  face. 
Through  teeth,  and  skull,  and  helmet, 

So  fierce  a  thrust  he  sped, 
The  good  sword  stood  a  hand-breadth  out 

Behind  the  Tuscan's  head. 

46. 
And  the  great  Lord  of  Luna 

Fell  at  that  deadly  stroke, 
A »  falls  on  Mount  Alvernus 

A  thunder-smitten  oak. 
Far  o'er  the  crashing  forest 

The  giant  arms  lie  spread; 
And  the  pale  augurs,  muttering  low, 

liaze  on  the  blasted  head. 

47. 

f>n  Astur's  throat  Horatius 
l?i«>ht  firmly     ussed  his  heel. 


And  thrice  and  four  times  tugged  amuli;, 
Ere  he  wrenched  out  the  steel. 

"And  see,"  he  cried  "  the  welcome, 
Fair  guests,  that  waits  you  here  ! 

What  noble  Lucumo  comes  next 
To  taste  our  Roman  cheer  1" 

48. 
But  at  his  haughty  challenge 

A  sullen  murmur  ran, 
Mingled  of  wrath,  and  shame,  and  dread, 

Along  that  glittering  van. 
There  larked  not  men  of  prowess, 

Nor  men  of  lordly  race ; 
For  all  Etruria's  noblest 

Were  round  the  fatal  place. 

49. 
But  all  Etruria's  noblest 

Felt  their  hearts  sink  to  see 
On  the  earth  the  bloody  corpses, 

In  the  path  the  dauntless  Three* 
And,  from  the  ghastly  entrance 

Where  those  bold  Romans  stood, 
All  shrank,  like  boys  who  unaware, 
Ranging  the  woods  to  start  a  hare, 
Come  to  the  mouth  of  the  dark  lair 
Where,  growling  low,  a  fierce  old  bear 

Lies  amidst  bones  and  blood. 

50. 
Was  none  who  would  be  foremost 

To  lead  such  dire  attack ; 
But  those  behind  cried  "  Forward !" 

And  those  before  cried  "  Back  !" 
And  backward  now  and  forward 

Wavers  the  deep  array; 
And  on  the  tossing  sea  of  steel, 
To  and  fro  the  standards  reel ; 
And  the  victorious  trumpet-peal 

Dies  fitfully  away. 

51. 
Yet  one  man  for  one  moment 

Strode  out  before  the  crowd ; 
Well  known  was  he  to  all  the  Three, 

And  they  gave  him  greeting  loud. 
"Now  welcome,  welcome,  Sextus! 

Now  welcome  to  thy  home  ! 
Why  dost  thou  stay,  and  turn  awax  « 

Here  lies  the  road  to  Rome." 

52. 
Thrice  looked  he  on  the  city; 

Thrice  looked  he  on  the  dead- 
And  thrice  came  on  in  fury, 

And  thrice  turned  back  in  dread; 
And,  white  with  fear  and  hatred, 

Scowled  at  the  narrow  way 
Where,  wallowing  in  a  pool  of  blox>4 

The  bravest  Tuscans  lay. 

53. 
But  meanwhile  axe  and  lever 

Have  manfully  been  plied, 
And  now  the  bridge  hangs  tottering 

Above  the  boiling  tide. 
"Come  back,  come  back,  Horatius »* 

Loud  cried  the  Fathers  all. 
"Back,  Lartius  !  back,  Herminius! 

Back,  ere  the  ruin  fall !" 


HORATIUS 


545 


54. 
Back  darted  Spurius  Lartius; 

Herminias  darted  back: 
And,  as  the}'-  passed,  beneath  their  feet 

They  felt  the  timbers  crack. 
But  when  they  turned  their  faces, 

And  on  the  farther  shore 
Saw  brave  Horatius  stand  alone, 

They  would  have  crossed  once  more. 

55. 
But  with  a  crash  like  thunder 

Fell  every  loosened  beam, 
And,  like  a  dam,  the  mighty  wreck 

Lay  right  athwart  the  stream: 
And  a  long  shout  of  triumph 

Rose  from  the  walls  of  Rome, 
As  to  the  highest  turret-tops 

Was  splashed  the  yellow  foam. 

56. 

And  like  a  horse  unbroken 

When'  first  he  feels  the  rein, 
The  furious  river  struggled  hard, 

And  tossed  his  tawny  mane ; 
And  burst  the  curb,  and  bounded, 

Rejoicing  to  be  free  ; 
And  whirling  down,  in  fierce  career, 
Battlement,  and  plank,  and  pier, 

Rushed  headlong  to  the  sea. 


Alone  stood  brave  Horatius, 

But  constant  still  in  mind; 
Thrice  thirty  thousand  foes  before, 

And  the  broad  flood  behind. 
"Down  with  him  !"  cried  false  Sextus, 

With  a  smile  on  his  pale  face. 
"  Now  yield  thee,"  cried  Lars  Porsena, 

"  Now  yield  thee  to  our  grace." 

58. 
Round  turned  he,  as  not  deigning 

Those  craven  ranks  to  see ; 
Naught  spake  he  to  Lars  Porsena, 

To  Sextus  naught  spake  he;'- 
But  he  saw  on  Palatinus 

The  white  porch  of  his  home; 
And  he  spake  to  the  noble  river 

That  rolls  by  the  towers  of  Rome. 

59. 
«  Oh,  Tiber!  father  Tiber! 

To  whom  the  Romans  pray, 
A  Roman's  life,  a  Roman's  arms, 

Take  thou  in  charge  this  day !" 
80  he  spake,  and  speaking  sheathed 

The  good  sword  by  his  side, 
And,  with  his  harness  on  his  back, 

Plunged  headlong  in  the  ude. 

60. 
No  sound  of  joy  or  sorrow 

Was  heard  from  either  bank; 
But  friends  and  foes  in  dumb  surprise, 
With  parted  lips  and  straining  eyes, 

Stood  gazing  where  he  sank; 
And  when  above  the  surges 

They  saw  his  crest  appear, 
All  Rome  sent  forth  a  rapturous  cry, 
And  even  the  ranks  of  Tuscany 

Could  scarce  forbear  to  cheer. 
VOL.  IV.— 6<J 


61. 

But  fiercely  ran  the  current, 

Swollen  high  bv  months  of  rain: 
And  fast  his  blood  was  flowing; 

And  he  was  sore  in  pain, 
And  heavy  with  his  armour, 

And  spent  with  changing  blows : 
And  oft  they  thought  him  sinking, 

But  still  again  he  rose. 

62. 

Never,  I  ween,  did  swimmer, 

In  such  an  evil  case, 
Struggle  through  such  a  raging  flood 

Safe  to  the  landing  place: 
But  his  limbs  were  borne  up  bravely 

By  the  brave  heart  within, 
And  our  good  father  Tiber 

Bare  bravely  up  his  chin.* 

63. 

"Curse  on  him  !"  quoth  false  Sextus 

"  Will  not  the  villain  drown  1 
But  for  this  stay,  ere  close  of  day 

We  should  have  sacked  the  town  !* 
"Heaven  help  him  !"  quoth  Lars 

"  And  bring  him  safe  to  shore; 
For  such  a  gallant  feat  of  arms 

Was  never  seen  before." 

64. 

And  now  he  feels  the  bottom  ; 

Now  on  dry  earth  he  stands, 
Now  round  him  throng  the  Fathers 

To  press  his  gory  hands; 
And  now  with  shouts  and  clapping, 

And  noise  of  weeping  loud, 
He  enters  through  the  River-gate, 

Borne  by  the  joyous  crowd. 

65. 

They  gave  him  of  the  corn-land, 

That  was  of  public  right, 
As  much  as  two  strong  oxen 

Could  plough  from  morn  till  night, 
And  they  made  a  molten  image, 

And  set  it  up  on  high, 
And  there  it  stands  unto  this  day 

To  witness  if  I  lie. 

66. 

It  stands  in  the  Comitium, 

Plain  for  all  folk  to  see ; 
Horatius  in  his  harness, 

Halting  upon  one  knee; 
And  underneath  is  written, 

In  letters  all  of  gold, 
How  valiantly  he  kept  the  bridge 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 


"Our  ladye  bare  upp  her  chinnu." 

Ballad  of  Childe  Water*. 

"Never  heavier  man  and  horse 
Stemmed  a  midnight  torrent's  force ; 
*  *  *  *  • 

Yet  through  good  heart  and  our  lady's  grace. 
At  length  lie  gained  the  landing-place. 

Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel,  L 

2  Z  2 


646 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


67. 
And  still  his  name  sounds  stirring 

Unto  the  men  of  Rome, 
As  the  trumpet  blast  that  cries  to  them 

To  charge  the  Volscian  home ; 
And  wives  still  pray  to  Juno 

For  boys  with  hearts  as  bold 
As  his  who  kept  the  bridge  so  well 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 

68. 

And  in  the  nights  of  winter, 

When  the  cold  north  winds  blow, 
And  the  long  howling  of  the  wolves 

Is  heard  amidst  the  snow ; 
When  round  the  lonely  cottage 

Roars  ioud  the  tempest's  din, 
And  the  good  logs  of  Algidus 

Roar  louder  yet  within ; 


69. 

When  the  oldest  cask  is  opened, 

And  the  largest  lamp  is  lit, 
When  the  chestnuts  glow  in  the  embers, 

And  the  kid  turns  on  the  spit; 
When  young  and  old  in  circle 

Around  the  firebrands  close; 
When  the  girls  are  weaving  baskets, 

And  the  lads  are  shaping  bows ; 

70. 
When  the  goodman  mends  his  armour, 

And  trims  his  helmet's  plume; 
When  the  goodwife's  shuttle  merrily 

Goes  flashing  through  the  loom; 
With  weeping  and  with  laughter 

Still  is  the  story  told, 
How  well  HoraUus  kept  the  bridge 

In  the  brave  days  of  old. 


THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  REGILLUS. 


517 


THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  KEGILLUS. 


THE  following  poem  is  supposed  to  have 
teen  produced  ninety  years  after  the  lay  of 
Horatius.  Some  persons  mentioned  in  the  lay 
of  Horatius  make  their  appearance  again,  and 
some  appellations  and  epithets  used  in  the  lay 
of  Horatius  have  been  purposely  repeated;  for, 
in  an  age  of  ballad-poetry,  it  scarcely  ever 
fails  to  happen,  that  certain  phrases  come  to 
be  appropriated  to  certain  men  and  things, 
and  are  regularly  applied  to  those  men  and 
things  by  every  minstrel.  Thus  we  find  both 
in  the  Homeric  poems  and  in  Hesiod,  £ 


o;  Q»,2n,  'Etevtif  'ivac  tiUn^uoto.  Thus,  too,  in 
our  own  national  songs,  Douglas  is  almost 
always  the  doughty  Douglas  :  England  is 
merry  England  :  all  the  gold  is  red  ;  and  all 
the  ladies  are  gay. 

The  principal  distinction  between  the  lay  of 
Horatius  and  the  lay  of  the  Lake  Regillus  is, 
that  the  former  is  meant  to  be  purely  Roman, 
while  the  latter,  though  national  in  its  general 
spirit,  has  a  slight  tincture  of  Greek  learning 
and  of  Greek  superstition.  The  story  of  the 
Tarquins,  as  it  has  come  down  to  us,  appears 
to  have  been  compiled  from  the  works  of  seve 
ral  popular  poets  ;  and  one,  at  least,  of  those 
poets  appears  to  have  visited  the  Greek  colo 
nies  in  Italy,  if  not  Greece  itself,  and  to  have 
had  some  acquaintance  with  the  works  of  Ho 
mer  and  Herodotus.  Many  of  the  most  strik 
ing  adventures  of  the  house  of  Tarquin,  till 
Lucretia  makes  her  appearance,  have  a  Greek 
character.  The  Tarquins  themselves  are  re 
presented  as  Corinthian  nobles  of  the  great 
house  of  the  Bacchiadae,  driven  from  their 
country  by  the  tyranny  of  that  Cypselus,  the 
tale  of  whose  strange  escape  Herodotus  has  re 
lated  with  incomparable  simplicity  and  liveli 
ness.*  Livy  and  Dionysius  tell  us  that,  when 
Tarquin  the  Proud  was  asked  what  was  the 
best  mode  of  governing  a  conquered  city,  he 
replied  only  by  beating  down  with  his  staff  all 
the  tallest  poppies  in  his  garden.j-  This  is  ex 
actly  what  Herodotus,  in  the  passage  to  which 
reference  has  already  been  made,  relates  of  the 
counsel  given  to  Periander,  the  son  of  Cypse 
lus.  The  stratagem  by  which  the  town  of 
Gabii  is  brought  under  the  power  of  the  Tar 
quins  is,  again,  obviously  copied  from  Herodo- 
tus4  The  embassy  of  the  young  Tarquins  to 
the  oracle  at  Delphi  is  just  such  a  story  as 
would  be  told  by  a  poet  whose  head  was  full 
of  the  Greek  mythology  ;  and  the  ambiguous 
answer  returned  by  Apollo  is  in  the  exact 
style  of  the  prophecies  which,  according  to  He 
rodotus,  lured  Croesus  to  destruction.  Then 
the  character  of  the  narrative  changes.  From 
the  first  mention  of  Lucretia  to  the  retreat  of 


•Herodotus,  v.  92.     Livy,  i.  34.     Dionysius,  iii.  46. 
fLivy,  i.  54.     Dionysius,  iv.  56. 
$  Her  jdotus,  iii.  154.    Livy,  i.  53. 


Porsena  nothing  seems  to  be  borrowed  from 
foreign  sources.  The  villany  of  Sextus,  the 
suicide  of  his  victim,  the  revolution,  the  death 
of  the  sons  of  Brutus,  the  defence  of  the  bridge, 
Mucius  burning  his  hand,*  Clrelia  swimming 
through  Tiber,  seem  to  be  all  strictly  Roman. 
But  when  we  have  done  with  the  Tuscan  war, 
and  enter  upon  the  war  with  the  Latines,  we 
are  again  struck  by  the  Greek  air  of  the  story. 
The  Battle  of  the  Lake  Regillus  is  in  all  re 
spects  a  Homeric  battle,  except  that  the  com 
batants  ride  astride  on  their  horses,  instead  of 
driving  chariots.  The  mass  of  fighting  men  is 
hardly  mentioned.  The  leaders  single  each 
other  out,  and  engage  hand  to  hand.  The  great 
object  of  the  warriors  on  both  sides  is,  as  in 
the  Iliad,  to  obtain  possession  of  the  spoils  and 
bodies  of  the  slain;  and  several  circumstances 
are  related  which  forcibly  remind  us  of  the 
great  slaughter  round  the  corpses  of  Sarpedon 
and  Patroclus. 

But  there  is  one  circumstance  which  de 
serves  especial  notice.  Both  the  war  of  Troy 
and  the  war  of  Regillus  were  caused  by  the 
licentious  passions  of  young  princes,  who  were 
therefore  peculiarly  bound  not  to  be  sparing  of 
their  own  persons  in  the  day  of  battle.  Now 
the  conduct  of  Sextus  at  Regillus,  as  described 
by  Livy,  so  exactly  resembles  that  of  Paris,  as 
described  at  the  beginning  of  the  third  book  of 
the  Iliad,  that  it  is  difficult  to  believe  the  re 
semblance  accidental.  Paris  appears  before 
the  Trojan  ranks,  defying  the  bravest  Greek  to 
encounter  him  : 


........  'Apyeiwv  irpoKaXi^ero  Trdi/raj  dpiarovst 

avrifiiov  )ia\iaa.atiai  iv  aivy  J/ji'oriJr*. 

Livy  introduces  Sextus  in  a  similar  manner: 
"  Ferocem  juvenem  Tarquinium,  ostentantem 
se  in  prima  exsulum  acie."  Menelaus  rushes 
to  meet  Paris.  A  Roman  noble,  eager  for 
vengeance,  spurs  his  horse  towards  Sextus. 
Both  the  guilty  princes  are  instantly  terror- 
stricken  : 

Tdv  <J'  if  ovv  Iv6riatv  'A\e%av$pos  BeociSris, 
Iv  irpnuaxoiiri  <{>avcvTnt  Karcir^fiyrj  <f>t\uv  JJro/j, 
5  1//  i'  kraa&v  sis  iQvoi  i-^d^tro  icnp  dXccivuv. 

"  Tarquinius,"  says  Livy,  "  retro  in  agmeu 
suorum  infenso  cessit  hosti."  If  this  be  a 
fortuitous  coincidence,  it  is  one  of  the  most  ex 
traordinary  in  literature. 

In  the  following  poem,  therefore,  images 
and  incidents  have  been  borrowed,  not  merely 
without  scruple,  but  on  principle,  from  the  in 
comparable  battle-pieces  of  Homer. 


*  M.  de  Pouilly  attempted,  a  hundred  and  twenty 
years  ago,  to  prove  that  the  slory  of  Mucius  was  of 
Greek  origin  ;  but  he  was  signally  confuted  by  the 
Sallier.  See  the  Memoires  de  VJica.de.mie  dct 
tione,  vi.  '27,  66. 


548 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


The  popular  belief  at  Rome,  from  an  early  \ 
period,  seems  to  have  been  that  the  event  of 
the  great  day  of  Regillus  was  decided  by  su 
pernatural  agency.  Castor  and  Pollux,  it  was 
said,  had  fought,  armed  and  mounted,  at  the 
head  of  the  legions  of  the  commonwealth,  and 
had  afterwards  carried  the  news  of  the  victory 
with  incredible  speed  to  the  city.  The  well  in 
the  Forum  at  which  they  had  alighted  was  point 
ed  out.  Near  the  well  rose  their  ancient  temple. 
A  great  festival  was  kept  lo  their  honour  on 
the  Ides  of  Qumtilis,  supposed  to  be  the  anni 
versary  of  the  battle;  and  on  that  day  sumptu 
ous  sacrifices  were  offered  to  them  at  the  pub 
lic  charge.  One  spot  on  the  margin  of  Lake 
Regillus  was  regarded  during  many  ages  with 
superstitious  awe.  A  mark,  resembling  in 
shape  a  horse's  hoof,  was  discernible  in  the 
volcanic  rock;  and  this  mark  was  believed 
to  have  been  made  by  one  of  the  celestial 
chargers. 

How  the  legend  originated,  cannot  now  be 
ascertained  :  but  we  may  easily  imagine  seve 
ral  ways  in  which  it  might  have  originated: 
nor  is  it  at  all  necessary  to  suppose,  with  Julius 
Frontinus,  that  two  young  men  were  dressed  up 
by  the  Dictator  to  personate  the  sons  of  Leda. 
It  is  probable  that  Livy  is  correct  when  he  says 
that  the  Roman  general,  in  the  hour  of  peril, 
vowed  a  temple  to  Castor.  If  so,  nothing 
could  be  more  natural  than  that  the  multitude 
should  ascribe  the  victory  to  the  favour  of  the 
Twin  Gods.  When  such  was  the  prevailing 
sentiment,  any  man  who  chose  to  declare  that, 
in  the  midst  of  the  confusion  and  slaughter,  he 
had  seen  two  godlike  forms  on  white  horses 
scattering  the  Latines,  would  find  ready  cre 
dence.  We  know,  indeed,  that,  in  modern 
times,  a  very  similar  story  actually  found  cre 
dence  among  a  people  much  more  civilized 
than  the  Romans  of  the  fifth  century  before 
Christ.  A  chaplain  of  Cortes,  writing  about 
thirty  years  after  the  conquest  of  Mexico,  in 
an  age  of  printing-presses,  libraries,  universi 
ties,  scholars,  logicians,  jurists,  and  statesmen, 
had  the  face  to  assert  that,  in  one  engagement 
against  the  Indians,  St.  Jarnes  had  appeared 
on  a  gray  horse  at  the  head  of  the  Castilian 
adventurers.  Many  of  these  adventurers  were 
'dving  when  this  lie  was  printed.  One  of  them, 
honest  Bernal  Diaz,  wrote  an  account  of  the 
expedition.  He  had  the  evidence  of  his  own 
senses  against  the  chaplain's  legend ;  but  he 
seems  to  have  distrusted  even  the  evidence  of 
his  own  senses.  He  says  that  he  was  in  the 
battle,  and  that  he  saw  a  gray  horse  with  a 
man  on  his  back,  but  that  the  man  was,  to  his 
thinking,  Francesco  de  Morla,  and  not  the  ever- 
blessed  apostle  St.  James.  "  Nevertheless," 
he  adds,  "  it  may  be  that  the  person  on  the  gray 
horse  was  the  glorious  apostle  St.  James,  and 
thai  I,  sinner  that  I  am,  was  unworthy  to  see 
him.''  The  Romans  of  the  age  of  Cincinnatus 
were  probably  quite  as  credulous  as  the  Spa 
nish  subjects  of  Charles  the  Fifth.  It  is  there 
fore  conceivable  that  the  appearance  of  Castor 
and  Pollux  may  have  become  an  article  of 
Taitu  before  the  generation  which  had  fought 
at  Regillus  had  passed  away.  Nor  could  any 
thing  be  more  natural  than  that  the  poets  of  the 
next  age  should  embellish  this  story,  and  make 


the  celestial  horsemen  bear  the  tidings  of  vie 
tory  to  Rome. 

Many  years  after  the  temple  of  the  Twin 
Gods  had  been  built  in  the  Forum,  an  import 
ant  addition  was  made  to  the  ceremonial  by 
which  the  state  annually  testified  its  gratitude 
for  their  protection.  Quintus  Fabius  and  Pub- 
lius  Decius  were  elected  Censors  at  a  mo 
mentous  crisis.  It  had  become  absolutely 
necessary  that  the  classification  of  the  citizens 
should  be  revised.  On  that  classification  de 
pended  the  distribution  of  political  power. 
Party  spirit  ran  high  ;  and  the  republic  seemed 
to  be  in  danger  of  falling  under  the  dominion, 
either  of  a  narrow  oligarchy  or  of  an  ignorant 
and  headstrong  rabble.  Under  such  circum 
stances,  the  most  illustrious  patrician  and  the 
most  illustrious  plebeian  of  the  age  were  in 
trusted  with  the  office  of  arbitrating  between 
the  angry  factions ;  and  they  performed  their 
arduous  task  to  the  satisfaction  of  all  honest 
and  reasonable  men. 

One  of  their  reforms  was  a  remodelling  of 
the  equestrian  order;  arid,  having  effected  this 
reform,  the)'-  determined  to  give  to  their  work 
a  sanction  derived  from  religion.  In  the  chi 
valrous  societies  of  modern  times,  societies 
which  have  much  more  than  may  at  first  sight 
appear  in  common  with  the  equestrian  order 
of  Rome,  it  has  been  usual  to  invoke  the  special 
protection  of  some  Saint,  and  to  observe  his 
day  with  peculiar  solemnity.  Thus  the  Com 
panions  of  the  Garter  wear  the  image  of  St. 
George  depending  from  their  collars,  and  meet, 
on  great  occasions,  in  St.  George's  Chapel. 
Thus,  when  Louis  the  Fourteenth  instituted  a 
new  order  of  chivalry  for  the  rewarding  of  mi 
litary  merit,  he  commended  it  to  the  favour  of 
his  own  glorified  ancestor  and  patron,  and 
decreed  that  all  the  members  of  the  fraternity 
should  meet  at  the  royal  palace  on  the  Feast 
of  St.  Louis,  should  attend  the  king  to  chapel, 
should  hear  mass,  and  should  subsequently 
hold  their  great  annual  assembly.  There  is  a 
considerable  resemblance  between  this  rule  of 
the  Order  of  St.  Louis  and  the  rule  which  Fa 
bius  and  Decius  made  respecting  the  Roman 
knights.  It  was  ordained  that  a  grand  muster 
and  inspection  of  the  equestrian  body  should 
be  part  of  the  ceremonial  performed,  on  the 
anniversary  of  the  battle  of  Regillus,  in  honour 
of  Castor  and  Pollux,  the  two  equestrian  Gods. 
All  the  knights,  clad  in  purple  and  crowned 
with  olive,  were  to  meet  at  a  temple  of  Mars  in 
the  suburbs.  Thence  they  were  to  ride  in  state 
to  the  Forum,  where  the  temple  of  the  Twins 
stood.  This  pageant  was,  during  several  cen 
turies,  considered  as  one  of  the  most  splendid 
sights  of  Rome.  In  the  time  of  Dionysius  the 
cavalcade  sometimes  consisted  of  five  thou 
sand  horsemen,  all  persons  of  fair  repute  and 
easy  fortune.* 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  Censors  who 
instituted  this  magnificent  ceremony  acted  in 
concert  with  the  Pontiffs  to  whom,  by  the  con 
stitution  of  Rome,  the  superintendence  of  the 


*  See  Livy.  ix.  46.  Val.  Max.,  ii.  2.  Anrel.  Viet  Do 
Viris  Ilhistfiims,  32.  Dionysins,  vi.  13.  Plin.  Hist 

'  Nat.  xv.  5.  See  al?o  th*  singularly  ingenious  cSn.Uej 
in  Niebulir's  posthumous  volume,  Die  Censiir  dm  Q 

1  Fabius  mid  P.  Decius. 


BATTLE   OF  THE   LAKE  REGILLUS. 


549 


public  worship  belonged;  and  it  is  probable 
'.hat  those  high  religious  functionaries  were, 
as  usual,  fortunate  enough  to  find  in  their 
books  or  traditions  some  warrant  for  the  inno 
vation. 

The  following  poem  is  supposed  to  have 
been  made  for  this  great  occasion.  Songs,  we 
know,  were  chanted  at  the  religious  festivals 
of  Rome  from  an  early  period,  indeed  from  so 
early  a  period  that  some  of  the  sacred  verses 
were  popularly  ascribed  to  Numa,  and  were 
utterly  unintelligible  in  the  age  of  Augustus. 
In  the  Second  Punic  War  a  great  feast  was 
held  in  honour  of  Juno,  and  a  song  was  sung 
in  her  praise.  This  song  was  extant  when 
Livy  wrote;  and,  though  exceedingly  rugged 
and  uncouth,  seemed  to  him  not  wholly  desti 
tute  of  merit.*  A  song,  as  we  learn  from  Ho 
race,  was  part  of  the  established  ritual  at  the 
great  Secular  Jubilee.f  It  is  therefore  likely 
that  the  Censors  and  Pontiffs,  when  they  had 
resolved  to  add  a  grand  procession  of  knights 
to  the  other  solemnities  annually  performed  on 
the  Ides  of  Quintilis,  would  call  in  the  aid  of  a 
poet.  Such  a  poet  would  naturally  take  for 
his  subject  the  battle  of  Regillus,  the  appear 
ance  of  the  Twin  Gods,  and  the  instiiution  of 
their  festival.  He  would  find  abundant  mate 
rials  in  the  ballads  of  his  predecessors;  and  he 
would  make  free  use  of  the  scanty  stock  of 
Greek  learning  which  he  had  himself  acquired. 
He  would  probably  introduce  some  wise  and  i 


holy  Pontiff  enjoining  the  magnificent  ceremo 
nial  which,  after  a  long  interval,  had  at  length 
been  adopted.  If  the  poem  succeeded,  many 
persons  would  commit  it  to  memory.  Parts  of 
it  would  be  sung  to  the  pipe  at  banquets.  It 
would  be  peculiarly  interesting  to  the  great 
Posthumian  house,  which  numbered  among 
its  many  images  that  of  the  Dictator  Aulus,  the 
hero  of  Regillus.  The  orator  who,  in  the  fol 
lowing  generation,  pronounced  the  funeral 
panegyric  over  the  remains  of  Lucius  Posthu- 
mius  Megelltis,  thrice  Consul,  would  borrow 
largely  from  the  lay;  and  thus  some  passages, 
much  disfigured,  would  probably  find  their 
way  into  the  chronicles  which  were  afterwards 
in  the  hands  of  Dionysius  and  Livy. 

Antiquaries  differ  widely  as  to  the  situation 
of  the  field  of  battle.  The  opinion  of  those  who 
suppose  that  the  armies  met  near  Cornufelle, 
between  Frascati  arid  the  Monte  Porzio,  is,  at 
least,  plausible,  and  has  been  followed  in  the 
poem. 

As  to  the  details  of  the  battle,  it  has  not  been 
thought  desirable  to  adhere  minutely  to  the  ac 
counts  which  have  come  down  to  us.  Those 
accounts,  indeed,  differ  widely  from  each  other, 
and,  in  all  probability,  differ  as  widely  from  the 
ancient  poem  from  which  they  were  originally 
derived. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  point  out  the  obvious 
imitations  of  the  Iliad,  which  have  been  pur 
posely  introduced. 


THE 

BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  REGILLUS. 

A  LAY    SUNG    AT   THE    FEAST    OF   CASTOR    AND    POLLUX  ON   THE    IDES  OF  QUINTILIS,  IN   THE    V  K Al 

OF    THE    CITY    CCCCLI. 


1. 

Ho,  trumpets,  sound  a  war-note  ! 

Ho,  lictors,  clear  the  \vay ! 
The  Knights  will  ride,  in  all  their  pride, 

Along  the  streets  to-day. 
To-day  the  doors  and  windows 

Are  hung  with  garlands  all, 
From  Castor  in  the  Forum, 

To  Mars  without  the  wall. 
Each  Knight  is  robed  in  purple, 

With  olive  each  is  crown'd  ; 
A  gallant  war-horse  under  each 

Paws  haughtily  the  ground. 
While  flows  the  Yellow  River, 

While  stands  the  Sacred  Hill, 
The  proud  Ides  of  Quintilis 

Shall  have  such  honour  still. 
Gay  are  the  Martian  Kalends  : 

December's  Nones  are  gay .  [rides, 

But   the   proud  Ides,  when   the   squadron 

Shall  be  Rome's  whitest  day. 

2. 

Unto  the  Great  Twin  Brethren, 
We  keep  this  solemn  feast. 

*  Livy,  xxvTi737~ 


t  Ilor.  Carmen  Seculare. 


Swift,  swift,  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Came  spurring  from  the  east. 
They  came  o'er  wild  Parthenius 

Tossing  in  waves  of  pine, 
O'er  Cirrha's  dome,  o'er  Adria's  foam, 

O'er  purple  Apennine, 
From  where  with  flutes  and  dances 

Their  ancient  mansion  rings, 
In  lordly  Lacedoemon, 

The  City  of  two  kings, 
To  where,  by  Lake  Regillus, 

Under  the  Porcian  height, 
All  in  the  lands  of  Tusculum, 

Was  fought  the  glorious  fight. 

3. 

Now  on  the  place  of  slaughter 

Are  cots  and  sheepfolds  seen, 
And  rows  of  vines,  and  fields  of  whe*< 

And  apple-orchards  green. 
The  swine  crush  the  big  acorns 

That  fall  from  Corne's  oaks : 
Upon  the  turf  by  the  Fair  Foum 

The  reaper's  pottage  smokes. 
The  fisher  baits  his  angle; 

The  hunter  twangs  his  bow  ; 


SCO 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


Little  they  think  on  those  strong  limbs 

That  moulder  deep  below. 
Little  they  think  how  sternly 

That  day  the  trumpets  pealed ; 
How  in  the  slippery  swamp  of  blood 

Warrior  and  war-horse  reeled  ; 
How  wolves  came  with  fierce  gallop, 

And  crows  on  eager  wings, 
To  rear  the  flesh  of  captains, 

And  peck  the  eyes  of  kings ; 
How  thick  the  dead  lay  scattered 

Under  the  Porcian  height; 
How  through  the  gates  of  Tusculum 

Raved  the  wild  stream  of  flight; 
And  how  the  Lake  Regillus     7 

Bubbled  with  crimson  foam, 
What  time  the  Thirty  Cities 

Came  forth  to  war  with  Rome. 

4. 
But,  Roman,  when  thou  standest 

Upon  that  holy  ground, 
Look  thou  with  heed  on  the  dark  rock 

That  girds  the  dark  lake  round. 
So  shall  thou  see  a  hoof-mark 

Stamped  deep  into  the  flint: 
It  was  no  hoof  of  mortal  steed 

That  made  so  strange  a  dint: 
There  to  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Vow  thou  thy  vows,  and  pray 
That  they,  in  tempest  and  in  fight, 

Will  keep  thy  head  alway. 

5. 

Since  last  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Of  mortal  eyes  were  seen, 
Have  years  gone  by  a  hundred 

And  fourscore  and  thirteen. 
That  summer  a  Virginius 

Was  Consul  first  in  place  i 
The  second  was  stout  Aulus, 

Of  the  Posthumian  race. 
The  Herald  of  the  Latines 

From  Gabii  came  in  state: 
The  Herald  of  the  Latines 

Passed  through  Rome's  Eastern  Ga.e : 
The  Herald  of  the  Latines 

Did  in  our  Forum  stand ; 
And  there  he  did  his  office, 

A  sceptre  in  his  hand. 


"  Hear,  Senators  and  people 

Of  the  good  town  of  Rome : 
The  Thirty  Cities  charge  you 

To  bring  the  Tarquins  home : 
And  if  ye  still  be  stubborn, 

To  work  the  Tarquins  wrong, 
The  Thirty  Cities  warn  you, 

Look  that  your  walls  be  strong/ 

7. 
Then  spake  the  Consul  Aulus, 

He  spake  a  bitter  jest ; 
**  Once  the  jays  sent  a  message 

Unto  the  eagle's  nest : — 
Now  yield  thou  up  thine  eyrie 

Unto  the  carrion-kite, 
Or  come  forth  valiantly,  and  face 

The  jays  in  deadly  fight. — 


Forth  looked  in  wrath  the  eagle ; 

And  carrion-kite  and  jay, 
Soon  as  they  saw  his  beak  and  clai7, 

Fled  screaming  far  away." 

8. 
The  Herald  of  the  Latines 

Hath  hied  him  back  in  state. 
The  Fathers  of  the  City 

Are  met  in  high  debate. 
Then  spake  the  elder  Consul, 

An  ancient  man  and  wise : 
"Now  hearken,  Conscript  Fathers^ 

To  that  which  I  advise. 
In  seasons  of  great  peril 

'Tis  good  that  one  bear  sway ; 
Then  choose  we  a  Dictator, 

Whom  all  men  shall  obey. 
Camerium  knows  how  deeply 

The  sword  of  Aulus  bites; 
And  all  our  city  calls  him 

The  man  of  seventy  fights. 
Then  let  him  be  Dictator 

For  six  months  and  no  more, 
And  have  a  Master  of  the  Knights, 

And  axes  twenty-four." 


So  Aulus  was  Dictator, 

The  man  of  seventy  fights ; 
He  made  ^Ebutius  Elva 

His  Master  of  the  Knights. 
On  the  third  morn  thereafter, 

At  dawning  of  the  day, 
Did  Aulus  and  JSbutius 

Set  forth  with  their  array. 
Sempronius  Atratinus 

Was  left  in  charge  at  home 
With  boys  and  with  gray-headed  men, 

To  keep  the  walls  of  Rome. 
Hard  by  the  Lake  Regillus 

Our  camp  was  pitched  at  night ; 
Eastward  a  mile  the  Latines  lay, 

Under  the  Porcian  height. 
Far  over  hill  and  valley 

Their  mighty  host  was  spread; 
And  with  their  thousand  watchfires 

The  midnight  sky  was  red. 

10. 
Up  rose  the  golden  morning 

Over  the  Porcian  height, 
The  proud  ides  of  Quintilis 

Marked  evermore  with  white. 
Not  without  secret  trouble 

Our  bravest  saw  the  foes, 
For,  girt  by  threescore  thousand  spears, 

The  thirty  standards  rose. 
From  every  warlike  city 

That  boasts  the  Latian  name, 
Foredoomed  to  dogs  and  vultures, 

That  gallant  army  came ; 
From  Setia's  purple  vineyards, 

From  Norba's  ancient  wall, 
From  the  white  streets  of  Tusculum, 

The  proudest  town  of  all ; 
From  where  the  Witch's  Fortress 

O'erhangs  the  dark-blue  seas, 
From  the  still  glassy  lake  that  sleep* 

Beneath  Aricia's  trees — 


BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  REGILLUS. 


663 


Those  trees  in  wnose  dim  shadow 

The  ghastly  priest  doth  reign, 
The  priest  who  slew  the  slayer, 

And  shall  himself  be  slain; — 
From  the  drear  banks  of  Ufens, 

Where  flights  of  marsh-fowl  play, 
And  buffaloes  lie  wallowing 

Through  the  hot  summer's  day; 
From  the  gigantic  watch-towers, 

No  work  of  earthly  men, 
Whence  Cora's  sentinels  o'erlook 

The  never-ending  fen ; 
From  the  Laurentian  jungle, 

The  wild  hog's  reedy  home, 
From  the  green  steps  whence  Anio  leaps 

In  floods  of  snow-white  foam. 

11. 
Aricia,  Cora,  Norba, 

Velitroe,  with  the  might 
Of  Setia  and  of  Tusculum, 

Were  marshalled  on  their  right: 
Their  leader  was  Mamilius, 

Prince  of  the  Latian  name ; 
Upon  his  head  a  helmet 

Of  red  gold  shone  like  flame  : 
High  on  a  gallant  charger 

Of  dark-gray  hue  he  rode ; 
Over  his  gilded  armour 

A  vest  cf  purple  flowed, 
Woven  in  the  land  of  sunrise 

By  Syria's  dark -brewed  daughters, 
And  by  the  sails  of  Carthage  brought 

Far  o'er  the  southern  waters. 

12. 
Lavinium  and  Circeium 

Had  on  the  left  their  post, 
With  all  the  banners  of  the  marsh, 

And  banners  of  the  coast. 
Their  leader  was  false  Sextus, 

That  wrought  the  deed  of  shame: 
With  restless  pace  and  haggard  face, 

To  his  last  field  he  came. 
Men  said  he  saw  strange  visions, 

Which  none  beside  might  see; 
And  that  strange  sounds  were  in  his  ears, 

Which  none  might  hear  but  he. 
A  woman  fair  and  stately, 

But  pale  as  are  the  dead, 
Oft  through  the  watches  of  the  night 

Sate  spinning  by  his  bed. 
And  as  she  plied  the  distaff, 

In  a  sweet  voice  and  low, 
She  sang  of  great  old  houses, 

And  fights  fought  long  ago. 
So  spun  she,  and  so  sung  she, 

Until  the  east  was  gray; 
Then  pointed  to  her  bleeding  breast, 

And  shrieked,  and  fled  away. 

13. 

But  in  the  centre  thickest 

Were  ranged  the  shields  of  foes, 
And  from  the  centre  loudest 

The  cry  of  battle  rose. 
There  Tibur  marched  and  Pedum 

Beneath  proud  Tarquin's  rule, 
And  Ferentinum  of  the  rock, 

And  Gabii  of  the  pool. 


There  rode  the  Volscian  succours 

There,  in  a  dark,  stern  ring, 
The  Roman  exiles  gatacred  close 

Around  the  ancient  king. 
Though  white  as  Mount  Soracte, 

When  winter  nights  are  long, 
His  beard  flowed  down  o'er  mail  and  b»lt. 

His  heart  and  hand  were  strong : 
Under  his  hoary  eyebrows 

Still  flashed  forth  quenchless  rage  , 
And  if  the  lance  shook  in  his  gripe, 

'Twas  more  with  hate  than  age. 
Close  at  his  side  was  Titus 

On  an  Apulian  steed, 
Titus,  the  youngest  Tarquin, 

Too  good  for  such  a  breed. 

14. 

Now  on  each  side  the  leaders 

Gave  signal  for  the  charge ; 
And  on  each  side  the  footmen 

Strode  on  with  lance  and  targe ; 
And  on  each  side  the.  horsemen 

Struck  their  spurs  deep  in  gore, 
And  front  to  front  the  armies 

Met  with  a  mighty  roar: 
And  under  that  great  battle 

The  earth  with  blood  was  red ; 
And,  like  the  Pomptine  fog  at  morn, 

The  dust  hung  overhead; 
And  louder  still  and  louder 

Rose  from  the  darkened  field 
The  braying  of  the  war-horns, 

The  clang  of  sword  and  shield, 
The  rush  of  squadrons  sweeping 

Like  whirlwinds  o'er  the  plain, 
The  shouting  of  the  slayers, 

And  screeching  of  the  slain. 

15. 

False  Sextus  rode  out  foremost : 

His  look  was  high  and  bold; 
His  corslet  was  of  bison's  hide, 

Plated  with  steel  and  gold. 
As  glares  the  famished  eagle 

From  the  Digentian  rock, 
On  a  choice  lamb  that  bounds  alone 

Before  Bandusia's  flock, 
Herminius  glared  on  Sextus, 

And  came  with  eagle  speed ; 
Herminius  on  black  Auster, 

Brave  champion  on  brave  steed. 
In  his  right  hand  the  broadsword 

That  kept  the  bridge  so  well, 
And  on  his  helm  the  crown  he  won 

When  proud  Fidensc  fell. 
Wo  to  the  maid  whose  lover 

Shall  cross  his  path  to-day! 
False  Sextus  saw,  and  trembled, 

And  turned,  and  fled  away. 
As  turns,  as  flies,  the  woodman 

In  the  Calabrian  brake, 
When  through  the  reeds  gleams  the  f  un<3 
eye 

Of  that  fell  painted  snake ; 
So  turned,  so  fled,  false  Sextus, 

And  hid  him  in  the  rear, 
Behind  the  dark  Lavinian  ranks, 

Bristling  with  crest  and  spear 


bT.1 


LAYS  OF  ANCJKNT   KOMK. 


10. 


Then  far  to  North 

The  Master  of  the  Knights, 
Cave  Tubero  of  Norbft 

To  feed  the  Porcian  kites. 
Next  under  those  red  horse-hoofs 

Fi.-iee.us  of  Setia  lay; 
Better  had  he  heen  pruning 

Among  his  elms  that  <l;iy. 
Mamilitis  saw  the  slaughter, 

And  tossed  his  golden  crest, 
And  towards  the  Master  of  the  Knights 

Through  the  thick  battle  pressed. 
JEbutiui  smote  Matnilius 

Ho  fiercely  on  the  shield, 
That  the  great  lord  of  Tusculum 

Wellnigh  rolled  on  the  field. 
Mamilius  smote  ./Kbutiiis, 

With  a  good  aim  and  true, 
Just  where  the  neck  and  shoulder  join, 

And  pierced  him  through  and  through; 
And  brave  ^butius  Elva 

Fell  iwooning  to  the  ground: 
But  a  thick  wall  of  bucklers 

Kncompassed  him  around. 
His  clients  from  the  battle 

Bare  him  some  little  space; 
And  filled  a  helm  from  the  dark  lake, 

And  bathed  his  brow  and  face; 
And  when  at  last  he  opened 

His  swimming  eyes  to  light, 
Men  say,  the  earliest  word  he  spake 

Was,  "Friends,  how  goes  the  fight!" 

17. 
But  meanwhile  in  the  centre 

(•real  deeds  of  arms  were  wrought; 
There  Anlus  the  Dictator, 

And  there;  Valerius  fought. 
Aulus,  with  his  good  broadsword, 

A  bloody  passage  cleared 
To  where,  amidst  the  thickest  foes, 

He  saw  the  long  white  beard. 
Flat  lighted  that  good  broadsword 

Upon  proud  Tnrquin's  hea;l. 
lie  dropped  ihe  lance  :  he  dropped  the  reins  : 

He  fell  as  fall  Ihe  dead. 
Down  Aulus  <prings  to  slay  him, 

With  eyes  like  coals  of  fire  ; 
But  faster  Titus  hath  sprung  down, 

And  hath  bestrode  his  sire. 
Latian  captains,  Roman  knights, 

Fast  down  to  earth  they  spring; 
And  hand  to  hand  they  light  on  foot 

Around  the  ancient  king. 
First  Titus  gavn  tall  OtttO 

A  death  wound  in  the  facej 
Tall  Cnrso  was  the  bravest  man 

Of  the  brave  Fabian  race: 
Aulus  slew  Rex  of  (Jabii, 

The  priest  of  Juno's  shrine: 
Valerius  smote  down  Julius, 

Of  Rome's  great  Julian  line; 
Inlius,  who  left  his  mansion 

High  on  the  Velian  hill, 
And  through  all  turns  of  weal  and  wo 

Followed  proud  Tarquin  still. 
Mow  ri'j.lif  across  proud  Tarquin 

A  Ccrpse  was  .Inlius  laid  : 
And  Titus  groaned  with  raj'.e  and  griirf, 

And  .11  \  a'etius  made, 


Valerius  struck  at  Titus, 

And  lopped  nil  hall' his  crest; 
But  Titus  stabbed  Valerius 

A  span  deep  in  ihe  bieast. 
Like  a  mast  snapped  by  the  tempest, 

Valerius  reeled  and  Jell. 
Ah !  wo  is  me  for  the  good  house 

That  loves  the  people  well! 
Then  shouted  loud  the  I, alines; 

And  with  one  rush  they  bore 
The  struggling  Romans  backward 

Three  lances'  length  and  more: 
And  up  they  took  proud  Tarquin, 

And  laid  him  on  a  shield, 
And  four  strong  yeomen  bare  him, 

Still  senseless,  from  the  field. 

18. 
But  fiercer  grew  the  fighting 

Around  Valerius  dead; 
For  Titus  dragged  him  by  the  foot, 

And  Aulus  by  ihe  head. 
"On,  Latines,  on  !"  quoth  Titus, 

"See  how  the  rebels  fly!" 
"Romans,  stand  firm  !"  quoth  Aulus, 

"And  win  this  light  or  die! 
They  must  not  give  Valerius 

To  raven  and  to  kite  ; 
For  aye  Valerius  loathed  the  wrong, 

And  aye  upheld  ihe  right: 
And  for  your  wives  and  babies 

In  the  front  rank  he  fell. 
Now  play  the  men  for  the  good  house 

That  loves  the  people  well !" 

19. 
Then  tenfold  round  the  body 

The  roar  of  battle  rose, 
Like  the  roar  of  a  burning  forest, 

When  a  strong  northwind  blows. 
Now  backward,  and  now  forward, 

Rocked  furiously  the  fray, 
Till  none  could  see  Valerius, 

And  none  wist  where  he  lay. 
For  shivered  arms  and  ensigns 

Wen;  heaped  there  in  a  mound, 
And  corpses  stiff,  and  dying  men 

That  writhed  and  gnawed  the  ground; 
And  wounded  horses  kicking, 

And  snorting  purple  foam  : 
Right  well  did  such  a  couch  befit 

A  Consular  of  Rome. 

20. 

But  north  looked  the  Dictator; 

North  looked  he  long  and  hard; 
And  spake  to  Caius  Cossus, 

The  Captain  of  his  Guard: 
"Caius,  of  all  the  Romans 

Thou  hast  the  keenest  sight; 
Say,  what  through  yonder  storm  ofdu.it 

Domed  from  the  Latian  right  1" 

21. 
Then  answered  Cains  Cossus: 

"  I  see  an  evil  sight ; 
The  bannerol'  proud  Tusculurn 

Comes  from  the  Kalian  right, 
I  see  the  plumed  hors-men; 

And  far  before  ihe  rest 
I  see  the  (lark-"|-;i\r  eh:i  i  "/T, 

1  :;ee  the  purple  vest; 


BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  REGILLUS. 


T  gee  the  golden  helmet 

That  shines  far  off  like  flame; 

So  ever  rides  Mamilius, 

Prince  of  the  Latian  name." 

22. 
"Now,  hearken,  Caius  Cossus; 

Spring  on  thy  horse's  back ; 
Ride  as  the  wolves  of  Apennine 

Were  all  upon  thy  track  ! 
Haste  to  our  southward  battle, 

And  never  draw  thy  rein 
Until  thou  find  Herminius, 

And  bid  him  come  amain." 

23. 

So  Aulus  spake,  and  turned  him 

Again  to  that  fierce  strife ; 
And  Caius  Cossus  mounted, 

And  rode  for  death  and  life. 
Loud  clanged  beneath  his  horse-hoofs 

The  helmets  of  the  dead, 
And  many  a  curdling  pool  of  blood 

Splashed  him  from  heel  to  head. 
So  came  he  far  to  southward, 

Where  fought  the  Roman  host 
Against  the  banners  of  the  marsh 

And  banners  of  the  coast. 
Like  corn  before  the  sickle 

The  stout  Lavinians  fell, 
Beneath  the  edge  of  the  true  sword 

That  kept  the  bridge  so  well. 

24. 
"Herminius!  Aulus  greets  thee ; 

He  bids  thee  come  with  speed 
To  help  our  central  battle, 

For  sore  is  there  our  need: 
There  wars  the  youngest  Tarquin, 

And  there  the  Crest  of  Flame, 
The  Tusculan  Mamilius, 

Prince  of  the  Latian  name. 
Valerius  hath  fallen  fighting 

In  front  of  our  array, 
And  Aulus  of  the  seventy  fields 

Alone  upholds  the  day." 

25. 

Herminius  beat  his  bosom, 

But  never  a  word  he  spake : 
He  clapped  his  hands  on  Auster's  mane; 

He  gave  the  reins  a  shake. 
Away,  away  went  Auster 

Like  an  arrow  from  the  bow; 
Black  Auster  was  the  fleetest  steed 

From  Aufidus  to  Po. 

26. 

Right  glad  were  all  the  Romans 

Who,  in  that  hour  of  dread, 
Against  great  odds  bare  up  the  war 

Around  Valerius  dead, 
When  from  the  south  the  cheering 

Rose  with  a  mighty  swell, — 
**  Herminius  comes,  Herminius, 

Who  kept  the  bridge  so  well!" 

27. 

Mamilius  spied  Herminius, 

And  dashod  aeros*  the  way, 
Von   IV.— 71 


"  Herminius  !  I  have  sought  thee 
Through  many  a  bloody  day. 

One  of  us  two,  Herminius 
Shall  never  more  go  home. 

I  will  lay  on  for  Tusculum, 
And  lay  thou  on  for  Rome !" 

28. 
All  round  them  paused  the  battle, 

While  met  in  mortal  fray 
The  Roman  and  the  Tusculan, 

The  horses  black  and  gray. 
Herminius  smote  Mamilius 

Through  breastplate  and  through  breaft. 
And  fast  flowed  out  the  purple  blood 

Over  the  purple  vest. 
Mamilius  smote  Herminius 

Through  headpiece  and  through  head, 
And  side  by  side  those  chiefs  of  pride 

Together  fell  down  dead. 
Down  fell  they  dead  together 

In  a  great  lake  of  gore ; 
And  still  stood  all  who  saw  them  fall 

While  men  might  count  a  score. 

29. 
Fast,  fast,  with  heels  wild  spurning, 

The  dark-gray  charger  fled ; 
He  burst  through  ranks  of  fighting  men, 

He  sprang  o'er  heaps  of  dead. 
His  bridle  far  out-streaming, 

His  flanks  all  blood  and  foam, 
He  sought  the  southern  mountains, 

The  mountains  of  his  home. 
The  pass  was  steep  and  rugged, 

The  wolves  they  howled  and  whined ; 
But  he  ran  like  a  whirlwind  up  the  pass 

And  he  left  the  wolves  behind. 
Through  many  a  startled  hamlet 

Thundered  his  flying  feet: 
He  rushed  through  the  gate  of  Tusculum, 

He  rushed  up  the  long  white  street; 
He  rushed  by  tower  and  temple, 

And  paused  not  from  his  race 
Till  he  stood  before  his  master's  door 

In  the  stately  market-place. 
And  straightway  round  him  gathered 

A  pale  and  trembling  crowd, 
And  when  they  knew  him  cries  of  rag* 

Brake  forth,  and  wailing  loud: 
And  women  rent  their  tresses 

For  their  great  prince's  fall  : 
And  old  men  girt  on  their  old  swords, 

And  went  to  man  the  wall. 

30. 
But,  like  a  graven  image, 

Black  Auster  kept  his  place, 
And  ever  wistfully  he  looked 

Into  his  master's  face. 
The  raven-mane  that  daily, 

With  pals  and  fond  caresses, 
The  young  Herminia  washed  and  courted, 

And  twined  in  even  tresses, 
And  decked  with  coloured  ribands 

From  her  own  gay  attire, 
Hung  sadly  o'er  her  father's  corpse 

In  carnage  and  in  mire. 
Forth  with  a  shout  sprang  Titus, 

And  seized  black  Auster's  rein, 
Then  Aulus  sware  a  fearful  oath. 

And  ran  at  him  amain. 
3  A 


LAYS  OF   ANCIENT  ROME. 


"  The  furies  of  thy  brother 

With  me  and  mine  abide, 
If  one  of  your  accursed  house 

Upon  black  Auster  ride  !" 
As  on  an  Alpine  watch-tower 

From  heaven  comes  down  the  flame, 
Full  on  the  neck  of  Titus 

The  blade  of  Aulus  came : 
And  out  the  red  blood  spouted, 

In  a  wide  arch  and  tall, 
As  spouts  a  fountain  in  the  court 

Of  some  rich  Capuan's  hall. 
The  knees  of  all  the  Latines 

Were  loosened  with  dismay 
When  dead,  on  dead  Herminius, 

The  bravest  Tarquin  lay. 

31. 

And  Aulus  the  Dictator 

Stroked  Auster's  raven  mane, 
With  heed  he  looked  unto  the  girths, 

With  heed  unto  the  rein. 
"  Now  bear  me  well,  black  Auster, 

Into  yon  thick  array; 
And  thou  and  I  will  have  revenge 

For  thy  good  lord  this  day." 

32. 

So  spake  he ;  and  was  buckling 

Tighter  black  Auster's  band, 
When  he  was  aware  of  a  princely  pair 

That  rode  at  his  right  hand. 
So  like  they  were,  no  mortal 

Might  one  from  other  know : 
White  as  snow  their  armour  was : 

Their  steeds  were  white  as  snow. 
Never  on  earthly  anvil 

Did  such  rare  armour  gleam; 
And  never  did  such  gallant  steeds 

Drink  of  an  earthly  stream. 

33. 

And  all  who  saw  them  trembled, 

And  pale  grew  every  cheek; 
And  Aulus  the  Dictator 

Scarce  gathered  voice  to  speak. 
"Say  by  what  name  men  call  you 7 

What  city  is  your  home? 
And  wherefore  ride  ye  in  such  guise 

Before  the  ranks  of  Rome  1" 


•  By  many  names  men  call  us ; 

In  many  lands  we  dwell: 
<Vell  Samothracia  knows  us : 

Cyrene  knows  us  well. 
Our  house  in  gay  Tarentum 

Is  hung  each  morn  with  flowers : 
High  o'er  the  masts  of  Syracuse 

Our  marble  portal  towers  : 
But  by  the  proud  Eurotas 

Is  our  dear  native  home ; 
And  for  the  right  we  come  to  fight 

Before  the  ranks  of  Rome." 

35. 

Ho  answered  those  strange  horsemen, 
And  each  couched  low  his  spear; 

And  forthwith  all  the  ranks  of  Rome 
Were  bold,  and  of  good  cheer: 

And  on  the  thirty  armies 
Came  wonder  and  affright, 


And  Ardea  wavered  on  the  left, 

And  Cora  on  the  right. 
"Rome  to  the  charge  !"  cried  Aulus  ; 

"  The  foe  begins  to  yield ! 
Charge  for  the  hearth  of  Vesta! 

Charge  for  the  Golden  Shield ! 
Let  no  man  stop  to  plunder, 

But  slay,  and  slay,  and  slay: 
The  gods  who  live  forever 

Are  on  our  side  to-day." 

36. 

Then  the  fierce  trumpet-flourish 

From  earth  to  heaven  arose, 
The  kites  know  well  the  long  stem  swel 

That  bids  the  Romans  close. 
Then  the  good  sword  of  Aulus 

Was  lifted  up  to  slay : 
Then,  like  a  crag  down  Apennine, 

Rushed  Auster  through  the  fray. 
But  under  those  strange  horsemen 

Still  thicker  lay  the  slain  ; 
And  after  those  strange  horses 

Black  Auster  toiled  in  vain. 
Behind  them  Rome's  long  battle 

Came  rolling  on  the  foe, 
Ensigns  dancing  wild  above, 

Blades  all  in  line  below. 
So  comes  the  Po  in  flood-time 

Upon  the  Celtic  plain : 
So  comes  the  squall,  blacker  than  night, 

Upon  the  Adrian  main. 
Now,  by  our  Sire  Quirinus, 

It  was  a  goodly  sight 
To  see  the  thirty  standards 

Swept  down  the  tide  of  flight. 
So  flies  the  spray  of  Adria 

When  the  black  squall  doth  blow; 
So  corn-sheaves  in  the  flood-time 

Spin  down  the  whirling  Po. 
False  Sextus  to  the  mountains 

Turned  first  his  horse's  head: 
And  fast  fled  Ferentinum, 

And  fast  Circeium  fled. 
The  horsemen  of  Nomentum 

Spurred  hard  out  of  the  fray; 
The  footmen  of  Velitrae 

Threw  shield  and  spear  away. 
And  underfoot  was  trampled, 

Amidst  the  mud  and  gore, 
The  banner  of  proud  Tusculum, 

That  never  stooped  before : 
And  down  went  Flavius  Faustus, 

Who  led  his  stately  ranks 
From  where  the  apple  blossoms  wave 

On  Anio'.s  echoing  banks, 
And  Tullus  of  Arpinum, 

Chief  of  the  Volscian  aids, 
And  Metius  with  the  long  fair  curls, 

The  love  of  Anxur's  maids, 
And  the  white  head  of  Vulso 

The  great  Arician  seer 
And  Nepos  of  Laurenturn, 

The  hunter  of  the  deer 
And  in  the  back  false  Sexius 

Felt  the  good  Roman  steel, 
And  wriggling  in  the  dust  he  died, 

Like  a  worm  beneath  the  wheel: 
And  fliers  and  pursuers 

Were  mingled  in  a  mass ; 


BATTLE  OF  THE  LAKE  REGILLUS. 


663 


And  far  away  the  battle 

Went  roaring  through  the  pass. 

37. 

Sempronius  Atratinus 

Sate  in  the  Eastern  Gate. 
Beside  him  were  three  Fathers, 

Each  in  his  chair  of  state ; 
Fabius,  whose  nine  stout  grandsons 

That  day  were  in  the  field, 
And  Manlius,  eldest  of  the  Twelve 

Who  keep  the  Golden  Shield; 
And  Sergius,  the  High  Pontiff, 

For  wisdom  far  renowned ; 
In  all  Etruria's  colleges 

Was  no  such  Pontiff  found. 
And  all  around  the  portal, 

And  high  above  the  wall, 
Stood  a  great  throng  of  people, 

But  sad  and  silent  all; 
Young  lads,  and  stooping  elders 

That  might  not  bear  the  mail, 
Matrons  with  lips  that  quivered, 

And  maids  with  faces  pale. 
Since  the  first  gleam  of  daylight, 

Sempronius  had  not  ceased 
To  listen  for  the  rushing 

Of  horse-hoofs  from  the  east. 
The  mist  of  eve  was  rising, 

The  sun  was  hastening  down, 
When  he  was  aware  of  a  princely  pair 

Fast  pricking  towards  the  town. 
So  like  they  were,  man  never 

Saw  twins  so  like  before ; 
Red  with  gore  their  armour  was, 

Their  steeds  were  red  with  gore. 


"  Hail  to  the  great  Asylum ! 

Hail  to  the  hill-tops  seven ! 
Hail  to  the  fire  that  burns  for  aye, 

And  the  shield  that  fell  from  heaven! 
This  day,  by  Lake  Regillus, 

Under  the  Porcian  height, 
All  in  the  lands  of  Tusculum 

Was  fought  a  glorious  fight. 
To-morrow  your  Dictator 

Shall  bring  in  triumph  home 
The  spoils  of  thirty  cities 

To  deck  the  shrines  of  Rome !" 

39. 

Then  burst  from  that  great  concourse 
A  shout  that  shook  the  towers, 

And  some  ran  north,  and  some  ran  south, 
Crying,  "The  day  is  ours !" 

But  on  rode  these  strange  horsemen, 
With  slow  and  lordly  pace ; 


And  none  who  saw  their  bearing 

Durst  ask  their  name  or  race. 
On  rode  they  to  the  Forum, 

While  laurel-boughs  and  flowers, 
From  housetops  and  from  windows, 

Fell  on  their  crests  in  showers. 
When  they  drew  nigh  to  Vesta, 

They  vaulted  down  amain, 
And  washed  their  horses  in  the  well 

That  springs  by  Vesta's  fane. 
And  straight  again  they  mounted, 

And  rode  to  Vesta's  door ; 
Then,  like  a  blast,  away  they  passed, 

And  no  man  saw  them  more. 

40. 
And  all  the  people  trembled, 

And  pale  grew  every  cheek ; 
And  Sergius  the  High  Pontiff 

Alone  found  voice  to  speak : 
"  The  Gods  who  live  forever 

Have  fought  for  Rome  to-day ! 
These  be  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

To  whom  the  Dorians  pray. 
Back  comes  the  Chief  in  triumph, 

Who,  in  ttu,  hour  of  fight, 
Hath  seen  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

In  harness  on  his  right. 
Safe  comes  the  ship  to  haven, 

Through  billows  and  through  gales 
If  once  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Sit  shining  on  th%  sails. 
Wherefore  they  washed  their  horses 

In  Vesta's  holy  well, 
Wherefore  they  rode  to  Vesta's  door, 

I  know,  but  may  not  tell. 
Here,  hard  by  Vesta's  temple, 

Build  we  a  stately  dome 
Unto  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Who  fought  so  well  for  Rome. 
And  when  the  months  returning 

Bring  back  this  day  of  fight, 
The  proud  Ides  of  Quintilis, 

Marked  evermore  with  white. 
Unto  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Let  all  the  people  throng, 
With  chaplets  and  with  offerings, 

With  music  and  with  song; 
And  let  the  doors  and  windows 

Be  hung  with  garlands  all, 
And  let  the  Knights  be  summoned 

To  Mars  without  the  wall: 
Thence  let  them  ride  in  purple 

With  joyous  trumpet-sound, 
Each  mounted  on  his  war-horse, 

And  each  with  olive  crowned; 
And  pass  in  solemn  order 

Before  the  sacred  dome, 
Where  dwell  the  Great  Twin  Brethren 

Who  fought  so  well  for  Rome." 


556 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


VIRGINIA. 


A  COLLECTION  consisting  exclusively  of  war- 
songs  would  give  an  imperfect,  or  rather  an 
erroneous  notion  of  the  spirit  of  the  old  Latin 
ballads.  The  Patricians,  during  about  a  cen 
tury  and  a  half  after  the  expulsion  of  the 
kings,  held  all  the  high  military  commands.  A 
Plebeian,  even  though,  like  Lucius  Siccius,  he 
were  distinguished  by  his  valour  and  know 
ledge  of  war,  could  serve  only  in  subordinate 
posts.  A  minstrel,  therefore,  who  wished  to 
celebrate  the  early  triumphs  of  his  country, 
could  hardly  tak?  any  but  Patricians  for  his 
heroes.  The  warriors  who  are  mentioned  in 
the  two  preceding  lays,  Horatius,  Lartius,  Her- 
minius,  Aulus  Posthumius,^Ebutius  Elva,  Sem- 
pronius  Atratinus,  Valerius  Poplicola,  were  all 
members  of  the  dominant  order ;  and  a  poet 
who  was  singing  their  praises,  whatever  his 
own  political  opinions  might  be,  would  natu 
rally  abstain  from  insulting  the  class  to  which 
they  belonged,  and  from  reflecting  on  the  sys 
tem  which  had  placed  such  men  at  the  head  of 
the  legions  of  the  commonwealth. 

But  there  was  a  clafts  of  compositions  in 
which  the  great  families  were  by  no  means  so 
courteously  treated.  No  parts  of  early  Roman 
history  are  richer  with  poetical  colouring  than 
those  which  relate  to  the  long  contest  between 
the  privileged  houses  and  the  commonalty. 
The  population  of  Rome  was,  from  a  very  early 
period,  divided  into  hereditary  castes,  which, 
indeed,  readily  united  to  repel  foreign  enemies, 
but  which  regarded  each  other,  during  many 
years,  with  bitter  animosity.  Between  those 
castes  there  was  a  barrier  hardly  less  strong 
than  that  which,  at  Venice,  parted  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Great  Council  from  their  country 
men.  In  some  respects  indeed,  the  line  which 
separated  an  Icilius  or  a  Duilius  from  a  Post- 
humius  or  a  Fabius  was  even  more  deeply 
marked  than  that  which  separated  the  rower 
of  a  gondola  from  a  Contarini  or  a  Morosini. 
At  Venice  the  distinction  was  merely  civil.  At 
Rome  it  was  both  civil  and  religious.  Among 
the  grievances  under  which  the  Plebeians  suf 
fered,  three  were  felt  as  peculiarly  severe. 
They  were  excluded  from  the  highest  magis 
tracies  ;  they  were  excluded  from  all  share  in 
the  public  lands;  and  they  were  ground  down 
to  the  dust  by  partial  and  barbarous  legislation 
touching  pecuniary  contracts.  The  ruling 
class  m  Rome  was  a  moneyed  class ;  and  it 
made  and  administered  the  laws  with  a  view 
solely  to  its  own  interest.  Thus  the  relation 
between  lender  and  borrower  was  mixed  up 
with  the  relation  between  sovereign  and  sub 
ject.  The  great  men  held  a  large  portion  of  the 
community  in  dependence  by  means  of  ad 
vances  at  enormous  usury.  The  law  of  debt, 
framed  by  creditors,  and  for  the  protection  of 
cr_Jitors.  was  the  most  horrible  that  has  ever 
been  known  among  men.  The  liberty,  and 
ev  in  the  life,  of  the  insolvent  were  at  the  mercy 


of  the  Patrician  money-lenders.  Children  often 
became  slaves  in  consequence  of  the  misfor 
tunes  of  their  parents.  The  debtor  was  impri« 
soned,  not  in  a  public  jail  under  the  care  of 
impartial  public  functionaries,  but  in  a  private 
workhouse  belonging  to  the  creditor.  Fright 
ful  stories  were  told  respecting  these  dungeons. 
It  was  said  that  torture  and  brutal  violation, 
were  common  ;  that  tight  stocks,  heavy  chains, 
scanty  measures  of  food,  were  used  to  punish 
wretches  guilty  of  nothing  but  poverty;  and 
that  brave  soldiers,  whose  breasts  were  co 
vered  with  honourable  scars,  were  often  mark 
ed  still  more  deeply  on  the  back  by  the  scourges 
of  high-born  usurers. 

The  Plebeians  were,  however,  not  wholly 
without  constitutional  rights.  From  an  early 
period  they  had  been  admitted  to  some  share 
of  political  power.  They  were  enrolled  in  the 
centuries,  and  were  allowed  a  share,  consider 
able  though  not  proportioned  to  their  numerical 
strength,  in  the  disposal  of  those  high  dignities 
from  which  they  were  themselves  excluded. 
Thus  their  position  bore  some  resemblance  to 
that  of  the  Irish  Catholics  during  the  interval 
between  the  year  1792  and  the  year  1829.  The 
Plebeians  had  also  the  privilege  of  annually 
appointing  officers,  named  Tribunes,  who  had 
no  active  share  in  the  government  of  the  Com 
monwealth,  but  who.  by  degrees,  acquired  a 
power  which  made  them  formidable  even  to  the 
ablest  and  most  resolute  Consuls  and  Dicta 
tors.  The  person  of  the  Tribune  was  inviola 
ble;  and,  though  he  could  directly  effect  little, 
he  could  obstruct  every  thing. 

During  more  than  a  century  after  the  institu 
tion  of  the  Tribuneship,  the  Commons  strug 
gled  manfully  for  the  removal  of  grievances 
under  which  they  laboured;  and,  in  spite  of 
many  checks  and  reverses,  succeeded  in 
wringing  concession  after  concession  from  the 
stubborn  aristocracy.  At  length,  in  the  year 
of  the  city  378,  both  parties  mustered  their 
whole  strength  for  their  last  and  most  desperate 
conflict.  The  popular  and  active  Tribune, 
Caius  Licinius,  proposed  the  three  memorable 
laws  which  are  called  by  his  name,  and  which 
were  intended  to  redress  the  three  great  evils 
of  which  the  Plebeians  complained.  He  was 
supported,  with  eminent  ability  and  firmness, 
by  his  colleague,  Lucius  Scxtius.  The  strug 
gle  appears  to  ha'  e  been  the  fiercest  that  ever 
in  any  community  terminated  without  an  ap 
peal  to  arms.  If  such  a  contest  had  raged  in 
any  Greek  city,  the  streets  would  have  run 
with  blood.  But,  even  in  the  paroxysms  of 
faction,  the  Roman  retained  his  gravity,  his 
respect  for  law,  and  his  tenderness  for  the  lives 
of  his  fellow-citizens.  Year  after  year  Licinius 
and  Sextius  were  re-elected  Tribunes.  Year 
after  year,  if  the  narrative  which  has  come 
down  to  us  is  to  be  trusted,  they  continued  to 
exert,  to  the  full  extent,  their  power  of  flopping 


VIRGINIA. 


557 


the  whole  machine  of  government.  No  curule 
magistrates  could  be  chosen;  no  military  mus 
ter  could  be  held.  We  know  too  little  of  the 
state  of  Rome  in  those  days  to  be  able  to  con 
jecture  how,  during  that  long  anarchy,  the 
peace  was  kept,  and  ordinary  justice  adminis 
tered  between  man  and  man.  The  animosity 
of  both  parties  rose  to  the  greatest  height.  The 
excitement,  we  may  well  suppose,  would  have 
Deen  peculiarly  intense  at  the  annual  election 
of  Tribunes.  On  such  occasions  there  can  be 
little  doubt  that  the  great  families  did  all  that 
could  be  done,  by  threats  and  caresses,  to 
break  the  union  of  the  Plebeians.  That  union, 
however,  proved  indissoluble.  At  length  the 
good  cause  triumphed.  The  Licinian  laws 
were  carried.  Lucius  Sextius  was  the  first 
Plebeian  Consul,  Caius  Licinius  the  third. 

The  results  of  this  great  change  were  singu 
larly  happy  and  glorious.  Two  centuries  of 
prosperity,  harmony,  and  victory  followed  the 
reconciliation  of  the  orders.  Men  who  re 
membered  Rome  engaged  in  waging  petty 
wars  almost  within  sight  of  the  Capitol  lived 
to  see  her  the  mistress  of  Italy.  While  the 
disabilities  of  the  Plebeians  continued,  she  was 
scarcely  able  to  maintain  her  ground  against 
the  Volscians  and  Hernicans.  When  those 
disabilities  were  removed,  she  rapidly  became 
more  than  a  match  for  Carthage  and  Ma- 
cedon. 

DiH-ing  the  great  Licinian  contest  the  Ple 
beian  poets  were,  doubtless,  not  silent.  Even 
in  modern  times  songs  have  been  by  no  means 
without  influence  on  public  affairs ;  and  we 
may  therefore  infer,  that,  in  a  society  where 
printing  was  unknown,  and  where  books  were 
rare,  a  pathetic  or  humorous  party-ballad 
must  have  produced  fleets  such  as  we  can 
but  faintly  conceive.  It  is  certain  that  satiri 
cal  poems  were  common  at  Rome  from  a  very 
early  period.  The  rustics  who  lived  at  a  dis 
tance  from  the  seat  of  government,  and  took 
little  part  in  the  strife  of  factions,  gave  vent  to 
their  petty  local  animosities  in  coarse  Fescen- 
nine  verse.  The  lampoons  of  the  city  were 
doubtless  of  a  higher  order ;  and  their  sting 
was  early  felt  by  the  nobility.  For  in  the 
Twelve  Tables,  long  before  the  time  of  the 
Licinian  laws,  a  severe  punishment  was  de 
nounced  against  the  citizen  who  should  com 
pose  or  recite  verses  reflecting  on  another.* 
Satire  is,  indeed,  the  only  sort  of  composition 
in  which  the  Latin  poets,  whose  works  have 
come  down  to  us,  were  not  mere  imitators  of 
foreign  models ;  and  it  is  therefore  the  only 
sort  of  composition  in  which  they  had  never 
been  rivalled.  It  was  not,  like  their  tragedy, 
their  comedy,  their  epic  and  lyric  poetry,  a 
hot-house  plant  which,  in  return  for  assiduous 
and  skilful  culture,  yielded  only  scanty  and 
sickly  fruits.  It  was  hardy,  and  full  of  sap ; 
and  in  all  the  various  juices  which  it  yielded 
might  be  distinguished  the  flavour  of  the  Au- 
sonian  soil.  "Satire,"  said  Quintilian,  with 
just  pride,  "is  all  our  own."  It  sprang,  in 


*  Cicero  justly  infers  from  this  law  that  there  had 
been  early  Latin  poets  whose  wo-ks  had  been  lost  be 
fore  his  time.  "Quainqiinm  id  quulem  etiam  xii  tabulae 
declarant;  cnndi  jam  turn  solitum  esse  carmen,  quod 
IIP  liccret  Meri  ad  ftlterius  injuriam  lege  sanxerunt."— 
Tuse.  iv.  2. 


truth,  naturally  from  the  constitution  of  the 
Roman  government  and  from  the  spirit  of  the 
Roman  people ;  and,  though  it  submitted  to 
metrical  rules  derived  from  Greece,  it  retained 
to  the  last  its  essentially  Roman  character.  Lu- 
cilius  was  the  earliest  satirist  whose  works 
were  held  in  esteem  under  the  Caesars.  But, 
many  years  before  Lucilius  was  born,  Nsevius 
had  been  flung  into  a  dungeon,  and  guarded 
there  with  circumstances  of  unusual  rigour 
till  the  Tribunes  interfered  in  his  behalf,  on 
account  of  the  bitter  lines  in  which  he  had  at 
tacked  the  great  Ccecilian  family.*  The  ge 
nius  and  spirit  of  the  Roman  satirists  survived 
the  liberties  of  their  country,  and  were  not  ex 
tinguished  by  the  cruel  despotism  of  the  Julian 
and  Flavian  emperors.  The  great  poet  who 
told  the  story  of  Domitian's  turbot  was  the 
legitimate  successor  of  those  forgotten  min 
strels  whose  songs  animated  the  factions  of 
the  infant  Republic. 

Those  minstrels,  as  Niebuhr  has  remarked, 
appear  to  have  generally  taken  the  popular 
side.  We  can  hardly  be  mistaken  in  suppos 
ing  that,  at  the  great  crisis  of  the  civil  conflict, 
they  employed  themselves  in  versifying  all  the 
most  powerful  and  virulent  speeches  of  the 
Tribunes,  and  in  heaping  abuse  on  the  chiefs 
of  the  aristocracy.  Every  personal  defect, 
every  domestic  scandal,  every  tradition  dis 
honourable  to  a  noble  house,  would  be  sought 
out,  brought  into  notice,  and  exaggerated.  The 
illustrious  head  of  the  aristocratical  party, 
Marcus  Furius  Camillus,  might  perhaps  be,  in 
some  measure,  protected  by  his  venerable  age 
and  by  the  memory  of  his  great  services  to  the 
state.  But  Appius  Claudius  Crassus  enjoyed 
no  such  immunity.  He  was  descended  from 
a  long  line  of  ancestors  distinguished  by  their 
haughty  demeanour,  and  by  the  inflexibility 
with  which  they  had  withstood  all  the  demands 
of  the  Plebeian  order.  While  the  political  con 
duct  and  the  deportment  of  the  Claudian  no 
bles  drew  upon  them  the  fiercest  public  hatred, 
they  were  wanting,  if  any  credit  is  due  to  the 
early  history  of  Rome,  in  a  class  of  qualities 
which,  in  a  military  Commonwealth,  is  suffi 
cient  to  cover  a  multitude  of  t.  (fences.  Several 
of  themvappear  to  have  been  eloquent,  versed 
in  civil  business,  and  learned  after  the  fashion 
of  their  age;  but  in  war  the)  were  not  distin 
guished  by  skill  or  valour.  Some  of  them,  as 
if  conscious  where  their  weakness  lay,  had, 
when  filling  the  highest  magistracies,  taken 
internal  administration  as  their  department  of 
public  business,  and  left  the  military  com 
mand  to  their  colleagues.f  One  of  them  hau 
been  intrusted  with  an  army,  and  had  failed 
ignominiously.t  None  of  them  had  been 
honoured  with  a  triumph.  None  of  them  had 
achieved  any  martial  exploit,  such  as  those  by 
which  Lucius  Quinctius  Cincinnatus,  Titus 
Quinctius  Capitolinus,  Aulus  Cornelius  Cossus, 
and,  above  all,  the  great  Camillus,  had  extorted 
the  reluctant  esteem  of  the  multitude.  During 
the  Licinian  conflict,  Appius  Claudius  Crassus 
signalized  himself  by  the  ability  and  severity 
with  which  he  harangued  against  *he  two 

*  Plautiis,  Miles  Gloriosus.     Aulus  Gellius   iii  3 
t  In  the  years  of  the  city  260,  304,  and  330 
j  In  the  year  of  the  city  282. 
'3  A  2 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


great  agitators.  He  would  naturally,  there 
fore,  be  the  favourite  mark  of  the  Plebeian 
satirists ;  nor  would  they  have  been  at  a  loss 
to  find  a  point  on  which  he  was  open  to 
attack. 

His  grandfather,  named  like  himself,  Appius 
Claudius,  had  left  a  name  as  much  detested 
as  that  of  Sextus  Tarquinius.  He  had  been 
Consul  more  than  seventy  years  before  the 
introduction  of  the  Licinian  laws.  By  availing 
himself  of  a  singular  crisis  in  public  feeling, 
he  had  obtained  the  consent  of  the  Commons 
to  the  abolition  of  the  Tribuneship,  and  had 
been  the  chief  of  that  Council  of  Ten  to  which 
the  whole  direction  of  the  State  had  been  com 
mitted.  In  a  few  months  his  administration 
had  become  universally  odious.  It  was  swept 
away  by  an  irresistible  outbreak  of  popular 
fury;  and  its  memory  was  still  held  in  abhor 
rence  by  the  whole  city.  The  immediate 
cause  of  the  downfall  of  this  execrable  govern 
ment  was  said  to  have  been  an  attempt  made 
by  Appius  Claudius  on  the  chastity  of  a  beau 
tiful  young  girl  of  humble  birth.  The  story 
ran,  that  the  Decemvir,  unable  to  succeed  by 
bribes  and  solicitations,  resorted  to  an  outrage 
ous  act  of  tyranny.  A  vile  dependant  of  the 
Claudian  house  laid  claim  to  the  damsel  as  his 
slave.  The  cause  was  brought  before  the  tri 
bunal  of  Appius.  The  wicked  magistrate,  in 
defiance  of  the  clearest  proofs,  gave  judgment 
for  the  claimant ;  but  the  girl's  father,  a  brave 
soldier,  saved  her  from  servitude  and  disho 
nour  by  stabbing  her  to  the  heart  in  the  sight 
of  the  whole  Forum.  That  blow  was  the  sig 
nal  for  a  general  explosion.  Camp  and  city 
rose  at  once  ;  the  Ten  were  pulled  down  ;  the 


Tribuneship  was  re-established;  and  Appius 
escaped  the  hands  of  the  executioner  only  by 
a  voluntary  death. 

It  can  hardly  be  doubted  that  a  story  so  ad 
mirably  adapted  to  the  purposes  both  of  the 
poet  and  of  the  demagogue  would  be  eagerly 
seized  upon  by  minstrels  burning  with  hatred 
against  the  Patrician  order,  against  the  Clau 
dian  house,  and  especially  against  the  grandson 
and  namesake  of  the  infamous  Decemvir. 

In  order  that  the  reader  may  judge  fairly  of 
these  fragments  of  the  lay  of  Virginia,  he  must 
imagine  himself  a  Plebeian  who  has  just  voted 
for  the  re-election  of  Sextius  and  Licinius.  All 
the  power  of  the  Patricians  has  been  exerted 
to  throw  out  the  two  great  champions  of  the 
Commons.  Every  Posthumius,  ^Emilius,  and 
Cornelius  has  used  his  influence  to  the  utmost. 
Debtors  have  been  kt  out  of  the  workhouses 
on  condition  of  voting  against  the  men  of  the 
people ;  clients  have  been  posted  to  hiss  and 
interrupt  the  favourite  candidates ;  Appius 
Claudius  Crassus  has  spoken  with  more  than 
his  usual  eloquence  and  asperity;  all  has  been 
in  vain ;  Licinius  and  Sextus  have  a  fifth  time 
carried  all  the  tribes  ;  work  is  suspended ;  the 
booths  are  closed;  the  Plebeians  bear  on  their 
shoulders  the  two  champions  of  liberty  through 
the  Forum.  Just  at  this  moment  it  is  an 
nounced  that  a  popular  poet,  a  zealous  adherent 
of  the  Tribunes,  has  made  a  new  song  which 
will  cut  the  Claudian  family  to  the  heart.  The 
crowd  gathers  round  him,  and  calls  on  him  to 
recite  it.  He  takes  his  stand  on  the  spot 
where,  according  to  tradition,  Virginia,  more 
than  seventy  years  ago,  was  seized  by  th« 
pander  of  Appius,  and  he  begins  his  story. 


VIRGINIA. 


FRAGMENTS  OF  A  LAY  SUNG  IN  THE  FORUM  ON  THE  DAY  WHEREON  LUCIUS  SEXTIUS  SEXT1- 
NUS  LATERANUS  AND  CAIUS  LICINIUS  CALVUS  STOLO  WERE  ELECTED  TRIBUNES  OF  Till 
COMMONS  THE  FIFTH  TIME,  IN  THE  YEAR  OF  THE  CITY  CCCLXXXII. 


YE  good  men  of  the  Commons,  with  loving  hearts  and  true, 
Who  stand  by  the  bold  Tribunes  that  still  have  stood  by  you, 
Come,  make  a  circle  round  me,  and  mark  my  tale  with  care, 
A  tale  of  what  Rome  once  hath  borne  ;  of  what  Rome  yet  may  bear. 
This  is  no  Grecian  fable,  of  fountains  running  wine, 
Of  maids  with  snaky  tresses,  or  sailors  turned  to  swine. 
Here,  in  this  very  Forum,  under  the  noonday  sun, 
In  sight  of  all  the  people,  the  bloody  deed  was  done. 
Old  men  still  creep  among  u«  who  saw  that  fearful  day, 
Just  seventy  years  and  seven  ago,  when  the  wicked  Ten  bare  sway. 

Of  all  the  wicked  Ten  still  the  names  are  held  accursed, 
And  of  all  the  wicked  Ten,  Appius  Claudius  was  the  worst. 
He  stalked  along  the  Forum  like  King  Tarquin  in  his  pride: 
Twelve  axes  waited  on  him,  six  marching  on  a  side ; 
The  townsmen  shrank  to  right  and  left,  and  eyed  askance  with  fear 
His  lowering  brow,  his  curling  mouth  which  alway  seemed  to  sneer: 
That  brow  of  hate,  that  mouth  of  scorn,  marks  all  the  kindred  still ; 
For  never  was  there  Claudius  yet  but  wished  the  Commons  ill: 
Nor  lacks  he  fit  attendance ;  for  close  behind  his  heels, 
With  outstretched  chin  and  crouching  pace,  the  client  Marcus  steals, 


VIRGINIA. 

His  loins  girt  up  to  run  with  speed,  be  the  errand  what  it  may, 
And  ';he  smile  flickering  on  his  cheek,  for  aught  his  lord  may  sav. 
Such  varlets  pimp  and  jest  for  hire  among  the  lying  Greeks  : 
Such  varlets  still  are  paid  to  hoot  when  brave  Licinius  speaks* 
Where'er  ye  shed  the  honey,  the  buzzing  flies  will  crowd  ; 
Where'er  ye  fling  the  carrion,  the  raven's  croak  is  loud; 
Where'er  down  Tiber  garbage  floats,  the  greedy  pike  ye  see  ; 
And  wheresoe'er  such  lord  is  found,  such  client  still  will  be. 

Just  then,  as  through  one  cloudless  chink  'n  a  black  stormy  sky 
Shines  out  the  dewy  morning-star,  a  fair  young  girl  came  by. 
With  her  small  tablets  in  her  hand,  and  her  satchel  on  her  arm, 
Home  she  went  bounding  from  the  school,  nor  dreamed  of  shame  or  harm 
And  past  tho.se  dreaded  axes  she  innocently  ran, 

With  bright,  frank  brow  that  had  not  learned  to  blush  at  gaze  of  man  ; 
And  up  the  Sacred  Street  she  turned,  and,  as  she  danced  along, 
She  warbled  gayly  to  herself  lines  of  the  good  old  song, 
How  for  a  sport  the  princes  came  spurring  from  the  camp, 
And  found  Lucrece,  combing  the  fleece,  under  the  midnight  lamp. 
The  maiden  sang  as  sings  the  lark,  when  up  he  darts  his  flight, 
From  his  nest  in  the  green  April  corn,  to  meet  the  morning  light; 
And  Appius  heard  her  sweet  young  voice,  and  saw  her  sweet  young  face, 
And  loved  her  with  the  accursed  love  of  his  accursed  race, 
And  all  along  the  Forum,  and  up  the  Sacred  Street, 
His  vulture  eye  pursued  the  trip  of  those  small  glancing  feet. 


Over  the  Alban  mountains  the  light  of  morning  broke; 
From  all  the  roofs  of  the  Seven  Hills  curled  the  thin  wreaths  of  smoke: 
The  city  gates  were  opened;  the  Forum,  all  alive, 
With  buyers  and  with  sellers  was  humming  like  a  hive. 
Blithely  on  brass  and  timber  the  craftsman's  stroke  was  ringing, 
And  blithely  o'er  her  panniers  the  market-girl  was  singing, 
And  blithely  young  Virginia  came  smiling  from  her  home  : 
Ah  !  wo  for  young  Virginia,  the  sweetest  maid  in  Rome  ! 
With  her  small  tablets  in  her  hand,  and  her  satchel  on  her  arm, 
Forth  she  went  bounding  to  the  school,  nor  dreamed  of  shame  or  harm. 
She  crossed  the  Forum  shining  with  stalls  in  alleys  gay, 
And  just  had  reached  the  very  spot  whereon  I  stand  this  day, 
When  up  the  varlet  Marcus  came;  not  such  as  when  erewhile 
He  crouched  behind  his  patron's  heels  with  the  true  client  smile  : 
He  came  with  lowering  forehead,  swollen  features,  and  clenched  fist, 
And  strode  across  Virginia's  path,  and  caught  her  by  the  wrist. 
Hard  strove  the  frighted  maiden,  and  screamed  with  look  aghast; 
And  at  her  scream  from  right  and  left  the  folk  came  running  fast; 
The  mone3r-changer  Crispus,  with  his  thin  silver  hairs, 
And  Hanno  from  the  stately  booth  glittering  with  Punic  wares, 
And  the  strong  smith  Muraena,  grasping  a  half-forged  brand, 
And  Volero  the  flesher,  his  cleaver  in  his  hand. 
All  came  in  wrath  and  wonder  ;  for  all  knew  that  fair  child  ; 
And,  as  she  passed  them  twice  a  day,  all  kissed  their  hands  and  smiled  ; 
And  the  strong  smith  Muraena  gave  Marcus  such  a  blow, 
The  caitiff  reeled  three  paces  back,  and  let  the  maiden  go. 
Yet  glared  he  fiercely  round  him,  and  growled  in  harsh,  fell  tone, 
"  She's  mine,  and  I  will  have  her.     I  seek  but  for  mine  own: 
She  is  my  slave,  born  in  my  house,  and  stolen  away  and  sold, 
The  year  of  the  sore  sickness,  ere  she  was  twelve  hours  old. 
'Twas  in  the  sad  September,  the  mo'nth  of  wail  and  fright, 
Two  augurs  were  borne  forth  that  morn  ;  the  Consul  died  ere  night. 
I  wait  on  Appius  Ciadius  ;  I  waited  on  his  sire: 
Let  him  who  works  the  client  wrong,  beware  the  patron's  ire  !" 

So  spake  the  varlet  Marcus  ;  and  dread  and  silence  came 
On  all  the  people  at  the  sound  of  the  great  Claudian  name. 
For  then  there  was  no  Tribune  to  speak  the  word  of  might, 
Which  makes  the  rich  man  tremble,  and  guards  the  poor  man's  right 
There  was  no  brave  Licinius,  no  honest  Sextius  then  ; 
But  all  the  city,  in  great  fear,  obeyed  the  wicked  Ten. 
Yet  ere  the  valet  Marcus  again  might  seize  the  maid, 
Who  clung  tight  to  Muraena's  skirt,  and  sobbed,  and  shrieked  for  aid, 


460  LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 

Forth  through  the  throng  of  gazers  the  young  Icilius  pressed, 

And  stamped  his  foot,  and  rent  his  gown,  and  smote  upon  his  breast, 

And  sprang  upon  that  column,  by  many  a  minstrel  sung, 

Whereon  three  mouldering  helmets,  three  rustling  swords  are  hung, 

And  beckoned  to  the  people,  and  in  bold  voice  and  clear 

Poured  thick  and  fast  the  burning  words  which  tyrants  quake  to  hear 

"Now,  by  your  children's  cradles,  now,  by  your  father's  graves, 
Be  men  to-day,  Quirites,  or  be  forever  slaves ! 
For  this  did  Servius  give  us  laws  ?     For  this  did  Lucrece  bleed  1 
For  this  was  the  great  vengeance  done  on  Tarquin's  evil  seed  ] 
For  this  did  those  false  sons  make  red  the  axes  of  their  sire  ] 
For  this  did  Scsevola's  right  hand  hiss  in  the  Tuscan  fire  1 
Shall  the  vile  fox-earth  awe  the  race  that  stormed  the  lion's  den? 
Shall  we,  who  could  not  brook  one  lord,  crouch  to  the  wicked  Ten  1 
Oh  for  that  ancient  spirit,  which  curbed  the  Senate's  will ! 
Oh  for  the  tents  which  in  old  time  whitened  the  Sacred  Hill ! 
In  those  brave  days  our  fathers  stood  firmly  side  by  side  ; 
They  faced  the  Marcian  fury;  they  tamed  the  Fabian  pride : 
They  drove  the  fiercest  Quinctius  an  outcast  forth  from  Rome ; 
They  sent  the  haughtiest  Claudius  with  shivered  fasces  home. 
But  what  their  care  bequeathed  us  our  madness  flung  away : 
All  the  ripe  fruit  of  threescore  years  was  blighted  in  a  day. 
Exult,  ye  proud  Patricians  !     The  hard-fought  fight  is  o'er. 
We  strove  for  honours — 'twas  in  vain:  for  freedom — 'tis  no  more. 
No  crier  to  the  polling,  summons  the  eager  throng; 

No  Tribune  breathes  the  word  of  might  that  guards  the  weak  from  wrong 
Our  very  hearts,  that  were  so  high,  sink  down  beneath  your  will. 
Riches,  and  lands,  and  power,  and  state — ye  have  them  : — keep  them  suUL 
Still  keep  the  holy  fillets ;  still  keep  the  purple  gown, 
The  axes,  and  the  curule  chair,  the  car,  and  laurel  crown : 
Still  press  us  for  your  cohorts,  and,  when  the  fight  is  done, 
Still  fill  your  garners  from  the  soil  which  our  good  swords  have  won. 
Still,  like  a  spreading  ulcer,  which  leech-craft  may  not  cure, 
Let  your  foul  usance  eat  away  the  substance  of  the  poor 
Still  let  your  haggard  debtors  bear  all  their  fathers  bore  ; 
Still  let  your  dens  of  torment  be  noisome  as  of  yore; 
No  fire  when  Tiber  freezes  ;  no  air  in  dog-star  heat ; 
And  store  of  rods  for  freeborn  backs,  and  holes  fur  freeborn  feet. 
Heap  heavier  still  the  fetters  ;  bar  closer  still  the  grate ; 
Patient  as  sheep  we  yield  us  up  unto  your  cruel  hate. 
But,  by  the  Shades  beneath  us,  and  by  the  Gods  above, 
Add  not  unto  your  cruel  hate  your  yet  more  cruel  love  ! 
Have  ye  not  graceful  ladies,  whose  spotless  lineage  springs 
From  Consuls,  and  High  Pontiffs,  and  ancient  Alban  kings? 
Ladies,  who  deign  not  on  our  paths  to  set  their  tender  feet, 
Who  from  their  cars  look  down  with  scorn  upon  the  wondering  street 
Who  in  Corinthian  mirrors  their  own  proud  smiles  behold, 
And  breathe  of  Capuan  odours,  and  shine  with  Spanish  gold  1 
Then  leave  the  poor  Plebeian  his  single  tie  to  life — 
The  sweet,  sweet  love  of  daughter,  of  sister,  and  of  wife, 
The  gentle  speech,  the  balm  for  all  that  his  vexed  soul  endures, 
The  kiss,  in  which  he  half  forgets  even  such  a  yoke  as  yours. 
Still  let  the  maiden's  beauty  swell  the  father's  breast  with  pride ; 
Still  let  the  bridegroom's  arms  enfold  an  unpolluted  bride. 
Spare  us  the  inexpiable  wrong,  the  unutterable  shame, 
That  turns  the  coward's  heart  to  steel,  the  sluggard's  blood  to  flame. 
Lest,  when  our  latest  hope  is  fled,  ye  taste  of  our  despair, 
And  learn  by  proof,  in  some  wild  hour,  how  much  the  wretched  dare," 
*******•• 

Straightway  Virginius  led  the  maid  a  little  space  aside, 
To  where  the  reeking  shambles  stood,  piled  up  with  horn  and  hide, 
Close  to  yon  low  dark  archway,  where,  in  a  crimson  flood, 
Leaps  down  to  the  great  sewer  the  gurgling  stream  of  blood. 
Hard  by,  a  flesher  on  a  block  had  laid  his  whittle  down  : 
Virginius  caught  the  whittle  up,  and  hid  it  in  his  gown. 
And  then  his  eyes  grew  very  dim,  and  his  throat  began  to  swell, 
And  m  a  hoarse,  changed  voice  he  spake,  "Farewell,  sweet  child!  Farewell 
Oh  !  how  I  loved  my  darling  !     Though  stern  I  sometimes  be, 
To  thee,  thou  know'st,  I  was  not  so.    Who  could  be  so  to  thee  1 


VIRGINIA.  WJt 

And  how  my  darling  loved  me !     How  glad  she  was  to  hear 

My  footsteps  on  the  threshold  when  I  came  back  last  year! 

And  how  she  danced  with  pleasure  to  see  my  civic  crown, 

And  took  my  sword,  and  hung  it  up,  and  brought  me  forth  my  gown! 

Now,  all  those  things  are  over— yes,  all  thy  pretty  ways, 

Thy  needlework,  thy  prattle,  thy  snatches  of  old  lays  ; 

And  none  will  grieve  when  I  go  forth,  or  smile  when  I  return, 

Or  watch  beside  the  old  man's  bed,  or  weep  upon  his  urn. 

The  house  that  was  the  happiest  within  the  Roman  walls, 

The  house  that  envied  not  the  wealth  of  Capua's  marble  halls, 

Now,  for  the  brightness  of  thy  smile,  must  have  eternal  gloom, 

And  for  the  music  of  thy  voice,  the  silence  of  the  tomb. 

The  time  is  come.    See  how  he  points  his  eager  hand  this  way ! 

See  how  his  eyes  gloat  on  thy  grief,  like  a  kite's  upon  the  prey ! 

With  all  his  wit,  he  little  deems,  that,  spurned,  betrayed,  bereft, 

Thy  father  hath  in  his  despair  one  fearful  refuge  left. 

He  little  deems  that  in  this  hand  I  clutch  what  still  can  save 

Thy  gentle  youth  from  taunts  and  blows,  the  portion  of  the  slave; 

Yea,  and  from  nameless  evil,  that  passeth  taunt  and  blow — 

Foul  outrage  which  thou  know'st  not,  which  thou  shalt  never  know. 

Then  clasp  me  round  the  neck  once  more,  and  give  me  one  more  kissj 

And  now,  mine  own  dear  little  girl,  there  is  no  way  but  this." 

With  that  he  lifted  high  the  steel,  and  smote  her  in  the  side, 

And  in  her  blood  she  sank  to  earth,  and  with  one  sob  she  died. 

Then,  for  a  little  moment,  all  people  held  their  breath  ; 
And  through  the  crowded  Forum  was  stillness  as  of  death ; 
And  in  another  moment  brake  forth  from  one  and  all 
A  cry  as  if  the  Volscians  were  coming  o'er  the  wall. 
Some  with  averted  faces  shrieking  fled  home  amain ; 
Some  ran  to  call  a  leech ;  and  some  ran  to  lift  the  slain  : 
Some  felt  her  lips  and  little  wrist,  if  life  might  there  be  found ; 
And  some  tore  up  their  garments  fast,  and  strove  to  stanch  the  wound. 
In  vain  they  ran,  and  felt,  and  stanched  ;  for  never  truer  blow 
That  good  right  arm  had  dealt  in  fight  against  a  Volscian  foe. 

When  Appius  Claudius  saw  that  deed,  he  shuddered  and  sanJr  down, 
And  hid  his  face  some  little  space  with  the  corner  of  his  gown, 
Till,  with  white  lips  and  bloodshot  eyes,  Virginius  tottered  nigh, 
And  stood  before  the  judgment-seat,  and  held  the  knife  on  high. 
"  Oh  !  dwellers  in  the  nether  gloom,  avengers  of  the  slain, 
By  this  dear  blood  I  cry  to  you,  do  right  between  us  twain ; 
And  even  as  Appius  Claudius  hath  dealt  by  me  and  mine, 
Deal  you  by  Appius  Claudius  and  all  the  Claudian  line !" 
So  spake  the  slayer  of  his  child,  and  turned,  and  went  his  way; 
But  first  he  cast  one  haggard  glance  to  where  the  body  lay, 
And  writhed,  and  groaned  a  fearful  groan  ;  and  then,  with  steadfast  fe€» 
Strode  right  across  the  market-place  unto  the  Sacred  Street. 

Then  up  sprang  Appius  Claudius :  "Stop  him ;  alive  or  dead ! 
Ten  thousand  pounds  of  copper  to  the  man  who  brings  his  head." 
He  looked  upon  his  clients,  but  none  would  work  his  will. 
He  looked  upon  his  lictors,  but  they  trembled  and  stood  still. 
And,  as  Virginius  through  the  press  his  way  in  silence  cleft, 
Ever  the  mighty  multitude  fell  back  to  right  and  left. 
And  he  hath  passed  in  safety  unto  his  woful  home, 
And  there  ta'en  horse  to  tell  the  camp  what  deeds  are  done  in  Rome 

By  this  the  flood  of  people  was  swollen  from  every  side, 
And  streets  and  porches  round  were  filled  with  that  o'erflowing  tide 
And  close  around  the  body  gathered  a  little  train 
Of  them  that  were  the  nearest  and  dearest  to  the  slain. 
They  brought  a  bier,  and  hung  it  with  many  a  cypress  crown, 
And  gently  they  uplifted  her,  and  gently  laid  her  down. 
The  face  of  Appius  Claudius  wore  the  Claudian  scowl  and  sneer, 
And  in  the  Claudian  note  he  cried,  "What  doth  this  rabble  here? 
Have  they  no  crafts  to  mind  at  home,  that  hitherward  they  stray! 
Ho!  lictors,  clear  the  market-place,  and  fetch  the  corpse  away!" 
Till  then  the  voice  of  pity  and  fury  was  not  loud, 
But  a  deep  sullen  murmur  wandered  among  the  crowd. 
VOL.  FV— 71 


B«3  LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 

Like  the  moaning  noise  that  goes  before  the  whirlwind  on  the  deep, 

Or  the  growl  of  a  fierce  watch-dog  but  half-aroused  from  sleep. 

But  when  the  lictors  at  that  word,  tall  yeomen  all  and  strong, 

Each  with  his  axe  and  sheaf  of  twigs,  went  down  into  the  throng, 

Those  old  men  say,  who  saw  that  day  of  sorrow  and  of  sin, 

That  in  the  Roman  Forum  was  never  such  a  din. 

The  wailing,  hooting,  cursing,  the  howls  of  grief  and  hate, 

Were  heard  beyond  the  Pincian  hill,  beyond  the  Latin  gate. 

But  close  around  the  body,  where  stood  the  little  train 

Of  them  that  were  the  nearest  and  dearest  to  the  slain, 

No  cries  were  there,  but  teeth  set  fast,  low  whispers,  and  black  frowns, 

And  breaking  up  of  benches,  and  girding  up  of  gowns. 

'Twas  well  the  lictors  might  not  pierce  to  where  the  maiden  lay, 

Else  surely  had  they  been  all  twelve  torn  limb  from  limb  that  day. 

Right  glad  they  were  to  struggle  back,  blood  streaming  from  their  heads, 

With  axes  all  in  splinters,  and  raiment  all  in  shreds. 

Then  Appius  Claudius  gnawed  his  lip,  and  the  blood  left  his  cheek ; 

And  thrice  he  beckoned  with  his  hand,  and  thrice  he  strove  to  speak; 

And  thrice  the  tossing  Forum  sent  up  a  frightful  yell — 

"See,  see,  thou  dog !  what  thou  hast  done;  and  hide  thy  shame  in  hell! 

Thou  that  wouldst  make  our  maidens  slaves,  must  first  make  slaves  of  mer 

Tribunes  !— Hurrah  for  Tribunes  !     Down  with  the  wicked  Ten !" 

And  straightway,  thick  as  hailstones,  came  whizzing  through  the  air 

Pebbles,  and  bricks,  and  potsherds,  all  round  the  curule  chair: 

And  upon  Appius  Claudius  great  fear  and  trembling  came ; 

For  never  was  a  Claudius  yet  brave  against  aught  but  shame. 

Though  the  great  houses  love  us  not,  we  own,  to  do  them  right, 

That  the  great  houses,  all  save  one,  have,  borne  them  well  in  fight. 

Still  Caius  of  Corioli,  his  triumphs  and  his  wrongs, 

His  vengeance  and  his  mercy,  live  in  our  camp-fire  songs. 

Beneath  the  yoke  of  Furius  oft  have  Gaul  and  Tuscan  bowed; 

And  Rome  may  bear  the  pride  of  him  of  whom  herself  is  proud. 

But  evermore  a  Claudius  shrinks  from  a  stricken  field, 

And  changes  colour  like  a  maid  at  sight  of  sword  and  shield. 

The  Claudian  triumphs  all  were  won  within  the  City-towers ; 

The  Claudian  yoke  was  never  pressed  on  any  necks  but  ours. 

A  Cossus,  like  a  wild  cat,  springs  ever  at  the  face ; 

A  Fabius  rushes  like  a  boar  against  the  shouting  chase; 

But  the  vile  Claudian  litter,  raging  with  currish  spite, 

Still  yelps  and  snaps  at  those  who  run,  still  runs  from  those  who  smite. 

So  now  'twas  seen  of  Appius.     When  stones  began  to  fly, 

He  shook,  and  crouched,  and  wrung  his  hands,  and  smote  upon  his  thigh 

"Kind  clients,  honest  lictors,  stand  by  me  in  this  fray! 

Must  I  be  torn  in  pieces  1     Home,  home  the  nearest  way  !" 

While  yet  he  spake,  and  looked  around  with  a  bewildered  stare, 

Four  sturdy  lictors  put  their  necks  beneath  the  curule  chair; 

And  fourscore  clients  on  the  left,  arid  fourscore  on  the  right, 

Arrayed  themselves  with  swords  and  staves,  and  loins  girt  up  for  fight. 

But,  though  without  or  staffer  sword,  so  furious  was  the  throng, 

That  scarce  the  train  with  might  and  main  could  bring  their  lord  along 

Twelve  times  the  crowd  made  at  him;  five  times  they  seized  his  gown; 

Small  chance  was  his  to  rise  again,  if  once  they  got  him  down: 

And  sharper  came  the  pelting;  and  evermore  the  yell — 

"Tribunes  !  we  will  have  Tribunes  !" — rose  with  a  louder  swell: 

And  the  chair  tossed  as  tosses  a  bark  with  tattered  sail, 

When  raves  the  Adriatic  beneath  an  eastern  gale, 

When  the  Calabrian  sea-marks  are  lost  in  clouds  of  spume, 

And  the  great  Thunder-Cape  has  donned  his  veil  of  inky  gloom. 

One  stone  hit  Appius  in  the  mouth,  and  one  beneath  the  ear; 

And  ere  he  reached  Mount  Palatine,  he  swooned  with  pain  and  fear. 

His  cursed  head,  that  he  was  wont  to  hold  so  high  with  pride, 

Now,  like  a  drunken  man's,  hung  down,  and  swayed  from  side  to  side; 

And  when  his  stout  retainers  had  brought  him  to  his  door, 

His  face  and  neck  were  all  one  cake  of  filth  and  clotted  gore. 

As  Appius  Claudius  was  that  day,  so  may  his  grandson  be ! 

God  send  Rome  one  such  other  sight,  and  send  me  there  to  see ! 

»•••*•• 


THE   PROPHECY   OF   CAPYS. 


563 


THE  PIIOPHECY  OF  CAPYS. 


IT  can  hardly  be  necessary  to  remind  any 
reader  that,  according  to  the  popular  tradition, 
Romulus,  after  he  had  slain  his  grand-uncle 
Amulius,  and  restored  his  grandfather  Numi- 
tor,  determined  to  quit  Alba,  the  hereditary  do 
main  of  the  Sylvian  princes,  and  to  found  a 
new  city.  The  gods,  it  was  added,  vouchsafed 
the  clearest  signs  of  the  favour  with  which 
they  regarded  the  enterprise,  and  of  the  high 
destinies  reserved  for  the  young  colony. 

This  event  was  likely  to  be  a  favourite  theme 
of  the  old  Latin  minstrels.  They  would  natu 
rally  attribute  the  project  of  Romulus  to  some 
divine  intimation  of  the  power  and  prosperity 
which  it  was  decreed  that  his  city  should  at 
tain.  They  would  probably  introduce  seers 
foretelling  the  victories  of  unborn  Consuls  and 
Dictators,  and  the  last  great  victory  would  ge 
nerally  occupy  the  most  conspicuous  place  in 
the  prediction.  There  is  nothing  strange  in  the 
supposition  that  the  poet  who  was  employed  to 
celebrate  the  first  great  triumph  of  the  Romans 
over  the  Greeks  might  throw  his  song  of  exulta 
tion  into  this  form. 

The  occasion  was  one  likely  to  excite  the 
strongest  feelings  of  national  pride.  A  great 
outrage  had  been  followed  by  a  great  retribu 
tion.  Seven  years  before  this  time,  Lucius  Pos- 
thumitis  Megellus,  who  sprang  from  one  of  the 
noblest  houses  of  Rome,  and  had  been  thrice 
Consul,  was  sent  ambassador  to  Tarentum,  with 
charge  to  demand  reparation  for  grievous  in 
juries.  The  Tarentines  gave  him  audience  in 
their  theatre,  where  he  addressed  them  in  such 
Greek  as  he  could  command,  which,  we  may 
well  believe,  was  not  exactly  such  as  Cineas 
would  have  spoken.  An  exquisite  sense  of  the 
ridiculous  belonged  to  the  Greek  character; 
and  closely  connected  with  this  faculty  was  a 
strong  propensity  to  flippancy  and  imperti 
nence.  When  Posthumius  placed  an  accent 
wrong,  his  hearers  burst  into  a  laugh.  When  he 
remonstrated,  they  hooted  him,  and  called  him 
barbarian;  and  at  length  hissed  him  off  the 
stage  as  if  he  had  been  a  bad  actor.  As  the 
grave  Roman  retired,  a  buffoon,  who,  from  his 
constant  drunkenness,  was  nicknamed  the  Pint- 
pot,  came  up  with  gestures  of  the  grossest  in 
decency,  and  bespattered  the  senatorial  gown 
with  filth.  Posthumius  turned  round  to  the 
multitude  and  held  up  the  gown,  as  if  appeal 
ing  to  the  universal  law  of  nations.  The  sight 
only  increased  the  insolence  of  the  Tarentines. 
They  clapped  their  hands,  and  set  up  a  shout 
of  laughter  which  shook  the  theatre.  "Men 
of  Tarentum,"  said  Posthumius,  "it  will  take 
not  a  little  blood  to  wash  this  gown."* 

Rome,  in  consequence  of  this  insult,  declared 
war  against  the  Tarentines.  The  Tarentines 
sought  for  allies  beyond  the  Ionian  sea.  Pyr- 

*  Dion.  Hal.  De  Legationibus. 


rhus,  King  of  Epirus,  came  to  their  help  witn 
a  large  army;  and,  for  the  first  time,  the  two 
great  nations  of  antiquity  were  fairly  matched 
against  each  other. 

The  fame  of  Greece  in  arms,  as  well  as  in 
arts,  was  then  at  the  height.  Half  a  century- 
earlier,  the  career  of  Alexander  had  excited 
the  admiration  and  terror  of  all  nations  from 
the  Ganges  to  the  Pillars  of  Hercules.  Royal 
houses,  founded  by  Macedonian  captains,  still 
reigned  at  Anticch  and  Alexandria.  Thai  bar 
barian  warriors,  led  by  barbarian  chiefs,  should 
win  a  pitched  battle  against  Greek  valour  guid 
ed  by  Greek  science,  seemed  as  incredible  as  it 
would  now  seem  that  the  Burmese  or  the  Siam 
ese  should,  in  the  open  plain,  put  to  flight  an 
equal  number  of  the  best  English  troops.  The 
Tarentines  were  convinced  that  their  country 
men  were  irresistible  in  war;  and  this  convic 
tion  had  emboldened  them  to  treat  with  the 
grossest  indignity  one  whom  they  regarded  as 
the  representative  of  an  inferior  race.  Of  the 
Greek  generals  then  living,  Pyrrhus  was  in 
disputably  the  first.  Among  the  troops  who 
were  trained  in  the  Greek  discipline,  his  Epi- 
rotes  ranked  high.  His  expedition  to  Italy  was 
a  turning-point  in  the  history  of  the  world.  He 
found  there  a  people  who,  far  inferior  to  the 
Athenians  and  Corinthians  in  the  fine  arts,  in 
the  speculative  sciences,  and  in  all  the  refine 
ments  of  life,  were  the  best  soldiers  on  the  face 
of  the  earth.  Their  arms,  their  gradations  of 
rank,  their  order  of  battle,  their  method  of  in- 
trenchment,  were  all  of  Latian  origin,  and  had 
all  been  gradually  brought  near  to  perfection, 
not  by  the  study  of  foreign  models,  but  by  the 
genius  and  experience  of  many  generations 
of  great  native  commanders.  The  first  words 
which  broke  from  the  king,  when  his  practised 
eye  had  surveyed  the  Roman  encampment, 
were  full  of  meaning: — "These  barbarians," 
he  said,  "  have  nothing  barbarous  in  their  mill 
tary  arrangements."  He  was  at  first  victori 
ous  ;  for  his  own  talents  were  superior  to 
those  of  the  captains  who  were  opposed  to 
him,  and  the  Romans  were  not  prepared  for  the 
onset  of  the  elephants  of  the  East,  which  were 
then  for  the  first  time  seen  in  Italy — moving 
mountains,  with  long  snakes  for  hands.*  But 
the  victories  of  the  Epirotes  were  fiercely  dis 
puted,  dearly  purchased,  and  altogether  unpro 
fitable.  At  length  Manius  Curius  Dentatus, 
who  had  in  his  first  consulship  won  two  tri 
umphs,  was  again  placed  at  the  head  of  the 
Roman  Commonwealth,  and  sent  to  encounter 
the  invaders.  A  great  battle  was  fought  near 
Beneventum.  Pyrrhus  was  completely  defeat 
ed.  He  repassed  the  sea;  and  the  world  learned 
with  amazement  that  a  people  had  been  dis 


*  Jlitffuimanus  is  the  old  Latin  epithet  for  an  e'tp*\an* 
Lucretius,  ii.  538,  v.  1302. 


664 


LAYS   OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


covered  who,  in  fair  fighting,  were  superior  to 
the  best  troops  that  had  been  drilled  on  the 
system  01  Parmenio  and  Antigonus. 

The  conquerors  had  a  good  right  to  exult 
in  their  success,  for  their  glory  was  all  their 
own.  They  had  not  learned  from  their  enemy 
how  to  conquer  him.  It  was  with  their  own 
national  arms,  and  in  their  own  national  battle- 
array,  that  they  had  overcome  weapons  and 
tactics  long  believed  to  be  invincible.  The 
pilum  and  the  broadsword  had  vanquished  the 
Macedonian  spear.  The  legion  had  broken  the 
Macedonian  phalanx.  Even  the  elephants, 
when  the  surprise  produced  by  their  first  ap 
pearance  was  over,  could  cause  no  disorder  in 
the  steady  yet  flexible  battalions  of  Rome. 

It  is  said  by  Florus,  and  may  easily  be  be 
lieved,  that  the  triumph  far  surpassed  in  mag 
nificence  any  that  Rome  had  previously  seen. 
The  only  spoils  which  Papirius  Cursor  and 
Fabius  Maximus  could  exhibit  were  flocks  and 
herds,  wagons  of  rude  structure,  and  heaps  of 
spears  and  helmets.  But  now,  for  the  first 
time,  the  riches  of  Asia  and  the  arts  of  Greece 
adorned  a  Roman  pageant.  Plate,  fine  stuffs, 
costly  furniture,  rare  animals,  exquisite  paint 
ings  and  sculptures,  formed  part  of  the  pro 
cession.  At  the  banquet  would  be  assembled 
a  crowd  of  warriors  and  statesmen,  among 
whom  Manius  Curius  Dentatus  would  take  the 
highest  room.  Caius  Fabricius  Luscinus,  then, 
after  two  consulships  and  two  triumphs,  Cen 
sor  of  the  Commonwealth,  would  doubtless  oc 
cupy  a  place  of  honour  at  the  board.  In  situa 
tions  less  conspicuous  probably  lay  some  of 
those  who  were,  a  few  years  later,  the  terror 
of  Carthage;  Caius  Duilius,  the  founder  of  the 
maritime  greatness  of  his  country;  Marcus 
Atilius  Regulus,  who  owed  to  defeat  a  renown 
far  higher  than  that  which  he  had  derived  from 
his  victories  ;  and  Caius  Lutatius  Catulus,  who, 
while  suffering  from  a  grievous  wound,  fought 
the  great  battle  of  the  JEgates,  and  brought  the 


first  Punic  war  to  a  triumphant  close.  It  is 
impossible  to  recapitulate  the  names  of  these 
eminent  citizens  without  reflecting  that  they 
were  all,  without  exception,  Plebeians,  and 
would,  but  for  the  ever  memorable  struggle 
maintained  by  Caius  Lucinius  and  Lucius 
Sextius,  have  been  doomed  to  hide  in  obscu 
rity,  or  to  waste  in  civil  broils,  the  capacity 
and  energy  which  prevailed  against  Pyrrhus 
and  Hamilcar. 

On  such  a  day  we  may  suppose  that  the 
patriotic  enthusiasm  of  a  Latin  poet  would 
vent  itself  in  reiterated  shouts  of  lo  triumphe, 
such  as  were  uttered  by  Horace  on  a  far  less 
exciting  occasion,  and  in  boasts  resembling 
those  which  Virgil,  two  hundred  and  fifty  years 
later,  put  into  the  mouth  of  Anchises.  The 
superiority  of  some  foreign  nations,  and  espe 
cially  of  the  Greeks,  in  the  lazy  arts  of  peace, 
would  be  admitted  with  disdainful  candour; 
but  pre-eminence  in  all  the  qualities  which  fit 
a  people  to  subdue  and  govern  mankind  would 
be  claimed  for  the  Romans. 

The  following  lay  belongs  to  the  latest  age 
of  Latin  ballad-poetry.  Nsevius  and  Livius 
Andronicus  were  probably  among  the  children 
whose  mothers  held  them  up  to  see  the  chariot 
of  Curius  go  by.  The  minstrel  who  sang  on 
that  day  might  possibly  have  lived  to  read  the 
first  hexameters  of  Ennius,  and  to  see  the  first 
comedies  of  Plautus.  His  poem,  as  might  be 
expected,  shows  a  much  wider  acquaintance 
with  the  geography,  manners,  and  production* 
of  remote  nations,  than  would  have  been  fou".«i 
in  compositions  of  the  age  of  Camillus.  Btf . 
he  troubles  himself  little  about  dates;  and 
having  heard  travellers  talk  with  admiration 
of  the  Colossus  of  Rhodes,  and  of  the  struc 
tures  and  gardens  with  which  the  Macedonian 
kings  of  Syria  had  embellished  their  residence 
on  the  banks  of  the  Orontes,  he  has  never 
thought  of  inquiring  whether  these  things  ex 
isted  in  the  age  of  Romulus. 


THE  PROPHECY  OF  CAPYS. 


AT  THE  BANQUET  IN  THE  CAPITOL,  ON  THE  DAY  WHEN  MANIUS  CURIUS  DENTATUS,  A 
SECOND  TIME  CONSUL,  TRIUMPHED  OVER  KING  PYRRHUS  AND  THE  TARENT1NES,  IN  THE  YEAR 
OF  THE  CITY  CCCCLXXIX. 


1. 

slain  is  King  Amulius, 

Of  the  great  Sylvian  line, 
Who  reigned  in  Alba  Longa, 

OP  .he  throne  of  Aventine. 
Sla'.n  is  the  Pontiff  Carriers, 

Who  spake  the  words  of  doom 
"The  children  to  the  Tib«jr. 

The  mother  to  the  tomb/" 

2. 
in  Alba's  lake  no  fisher 

His  net  to-day  is  flinging: 
On  the  dark  rind  of  Alba's  oaks 

To-day  no  axe  is  ringing: 
I  he  yoke  hangs  o'er  the  manger: 

The  scythe  lies  in  the  hay : 


Through  all  the  Alban  villages 
No  work  is  done  to-day. 

3. 

And  every  Alban  burgher 

Hath  donned  his  whitest  gown  ; 
And  every  head  in  Alba 

Weareth  a  poplar  crown; 
And  every  Alban  door-post 

With  boughs  and  flowers  is  gay; 
For  to-day  the  dead  are  living  ; 

The  lost  are  found  to-day. 

4. 

They  were  doomed  by  a  bloody  kins; : 
They  were  doomed  by  a  lying  priest- 


THE  PROPHECY  OF  CAPYS. 


565 


They  were  cast  on  the  racing  flood: 
They  were  tracked  by  the  raging  beast. 

Raging  beast  and  raging  flood 
Alike  have  spared  the  prey; 

And  to-day  the  dead  are  living 
The  lost  are  found  to-day. 


The  troubled  river  knew  them, 

And  smoothed  his  yellow  foam, 
And  gently  rocked  the  cradle 

That  bore  the  fate  of  Rome. 
The  ravening  she-wolf  knew  them, 

And  licked  them  o'er  and  o'er, 
And  gave  them  of  her  own  fierce  milk, 

Rich  with  raw  flesh  and  gore. 
Twenty  winters,  twenty  springs, 

Since  then  have  rolled  away; 
And  to-day  the  dead  are  living, 

The  lost  are  found  to-day. 

6. 

Blithe  it  was  to  see  the  twins, 

Right  goodly  youths  and  tall, 
Marching  from  Alba  Longa 

To  their  old  grandsire's  hall. 
Along  their  path  fresh  garlands 

Are  hung  from  tree  to  tree: 
Before  them  stride  the  pipers, 

Piping  a  note  of  glee. 


On  the  right  goes  Romulus, 

With  arms  to  the  elbows  red, 
And  in  his  hand  a  broadsword, 

And  on  the  blade  a  head — 
A  head  in  an  iron  helmet, 

With  horse  hair  hanging  down, 
A  shaggy  head,  a  swarthy  head, 

Fixed  in  a  ghastly  frown — 
The  head  of  King  Amulius 

Of  the  great  Sylvian  line, 
Who  reigned  in  Alba  Longa, 

On  the  throne  of  Aventine. 


On  the  left  side  goes  Remus, 

With  wrists  and  fingers  red, 
And  in  his  hand  a  boar-spear, 

And  on  the  point  a  head — 
A  wrinkled  head  and  aged, 

With  silver  beard  and  hair, 
And  holy  fillets  round  it, 

Such  as  the  pontiffs  wear — 
The  head  of  ancient  Gamers, 

Who  spake  the  words  of  doom: 
"The  children  to  the  Tiber, 

The  mother  to  the  tomb." 

9. 

Two  and  two  behind  the  twins 

Their  trusty  comrades  go, 
Four-and-twenty  valiant  men, 

With  club,  and  axe,  and  bow. 
On  each  side  every  hamlet 

Pours  forth  its  joyous  crowd, 
Shouting  lads,  and  baying  dogs, 

And  children  laughing  loud, 
And  old  men  weeping  fondly 

As  Rhea's  boys  go  by, 


And  maids  who  shriek  to  see  the  heads, 
Yet,  shrieking,  press  more  nigh. 

10. 
So  they  marched  along  the  lake; 

They  marched  by  fold  and  stall, 
By  corn-field  and  by  vineyard, 

Unto  the  old  man's  hall. 

11. 

In  the  hall-gate  sate  Capys, 
Capys,  the  sightless  seer; 
From  head  to  foot  he  trembled 

As  Romulus  drew  near. 
And  up  stood  stiff  his  thin  white  hair, 

And  his  blind  eyes  flashed  fire: 
"Hail!  foster  child  of  the  wondrous  nurse! 
Hail !  son  of  the  wondrous  sire ! 

12. 
"But  thou — what  dost  thou  here 

In  the  old  man's  peaceful  hall  1 
What  doth  the  eagle  in  the  coop, 

The  bison  in  the  stall  1 
Our  corn  fills  many  a  garner; 

Our  vines  clasp  many  a  tree  ; 
Our  flocks  are  white  on  many  a  hill; 
But  these  are  not  for  thee. 

13. 

"For  thee  no  treasure  ripens 

In  the  Tartessian  mine: 
For  thee  no  ship  brings  precious  bales 

Across  the  Lybian  brine  : 
Thou  shall  not  drink  from  amber; 

Thou  shalt  not  rest  on  down; 
Arabia  shall  not  steep  thy  locks, 

Nor  Sidon  tinge  thy  gown. 

14. 

"Leave  gold  and  myrrh  and  jewels, 

Rich  table  and  soft  bed, 
To  them  who  of  man's  seed  are  born, 

Whom  woman's  milk  hath  fed. 
Thou  wast  not  made  for  lucre, 

For  pleasure,  nor  for  rest;  [loins, 

Thou  that  art  sprung  from  the  War-god's 

And  hast  tugged  at  the  she-wolf's  breauu 

15. 
"From  sunrise  until  sunset 

All  earth  shall  hear  thy  fame: 
A  glorious  city  thou  shall  build, 

And  name  it  by  thy  name  : 
And  there,  unquenched  through  ages, 

Like  Vesta's  sacred  fire, 
Shall  live  the  spirit  of  thy  nurse, 
The  spirit  of  thy  sire 

16. 
"The  ox  toils  through  the  furrcw. 

Obedient  to  the  goad ; 
The  patient  ass,  up  flinty  paths, 

Plods  with  his  weary  load: 
With  whine  and  bound  the  spaniel 

His  master's  whistle  hears; 
And  the  sheep  yields  her  patiently 
To  the  loud  clashing  shears. 

17. 

"But  thy  nurse  will  hear  no  master, 
Thy  nurse  will  bear  no  load* 
3  B 


566 


LAYS  OF  ANCIENT  ROME. 


And  wo  to  them  that  shear  her, 

And  wo  to  them  that  goad  ! 
When  all  the  pack,  loud  baying, 

Her  bloody  lair  surrounds, 
She  dies  in  silence  biting  hard, 

Amidst  the  dying  hounds. 

18. 

"  Pomona  loves  the  orchard ; 

And  Liber  loves  the  vine ; 
And  Pales  loves  the  straw-built  shed 

Warm  with  the  breath  of  kine ; 
And  Venus  loves  the  whispers 

Of  plighted  youth  and  maid, 
In  April's  ivory  moonlight 

Beneath  the  chestnut  shade. 

19. 
"But  thy  father  loves  the  clashing 

Of  broadsword  and  of  shield  : 
He  loves  to  drink  the  stream  that  reeks 

From  the  fresh  battle-field : 
He  smiles  a  smile  more  dreadful 

Than  his  own  dreadful  frown,       [smoke 
When  he  sees  the  thick  black  cloud  of 
Go  up  from  the  conquered  town. 

20. 
"And  such  as  is  the  War-god, 

The  author  of  thy  line, 
And  such  as  she  who  suckled  thee, 

Even  such  be  thou  and  thine. 
Leave  to  the  soft  Campanian 

His  baths  and  his  perfumes  ; 
Leave  to  the  sordid  race  of  Tyre 

Their  dyeing-vats  and  looms ; 
Leave  to  the  sons  of  Carthage 

The  rudder  and  the  oar: 
Leave  to  the  Greek  his  marble  Nymphs 

And  scrolls  of  wordy  lore. 

21. 

"Thine,  Roman,  is  the  pilum: 
Roman,  the  sword  is  thine, 
The  even  trench,  the  bristling  mound, 

The  legion's  ordered  line  ; 
And  thine  the  wheels  of  triumph, 

Which  with  their  laurelled  train 
Move  slowly  up  the  shouting  streets 
To  Jove's  eternal  fane. 

22. 
Beneath  thy  yoke  the  Volscian 

Shall  veil  his  lofty  brow: 
Soft  Capua's  curled  revellers 

Before  thy  chair  shall  bow : 
The  Lucumoes  of  Arnus 

Shall  quake  thy  rods  to  see  : 
And  the  proud  Samnite's  heart  of  steel 

Shall  yield  to  only  thee. 

23. 
"The  Gaul  shall  come  against  thee 

From  the  land  oi  snow  and  night ; 
Thou  shall  give  his  fair-haired  armies 
To  the  raven  and  the  kite. 

24. 
»  The  Greek  shall  come  against  thee, 

The  conqueror  of  the  East. 
B-side  him  stalks  to  battle 
The  huge  earth-shaking  beast, 


The  beast  on  whom  the  castle 

With  all  its  guards  doth  stand, 
The  beast  who  hath  between  his  eyes 

The  serpent  for  a  hand. 
First  march  the  bold  Epirotes, 

Wedged  close  with  shield  and  spear ; 
And  the  ranks  of  false  Tarentum 

Are  glittering  in  the  rear. 

25. 

"The  ranks  of  false  Tarentum 

Like  hunted  sheep  shall  fly: 
In  vain  the  bold  Epirotes 

Shall  round  their  standards  die: 
And  Apennine's  gray  vultures 

Shall  have  a  noble  feast 
On  the  fat  and  on  the  eyes 

Of  the  huge  earth-shaking  beast. 

26. 
"  Hurrah  !  for  the  good  weapons 

That  keep  the  War-god's  land. 
Hurrah  !  for  Rome's  stout  pilum 

In  a  stout  Roman  hand. 
Hurrah !  for  Rome's  short  broadsword, 

That  through  the  thick  array 
Of  levelled  spears  and  serried  shields 
Hews  deep  its  gory  way. 

27. 

"Hurrah  !  for  the  great  triumph 

That  stretches  many  a  mile. 

Hurrah  !  for  the  wan  captives 

That  pass  in  endless  file. 
Ho  !  bold  Epirotes,  whither 

Hath  the  Red  King  ta'en  flight! 
Ho !  dogs  of  false  Tarentum, 
Is  not  the  gown  washed  white  ? 

28. 

"Hurrah  !  for  the  great  triumph 

That  stretches  many  a  mile. 
Hurrah  !  for  the  rich  dye  of  Tyre, 

And  the  fine  web  of  Nile, 
The  helmets  gay  with  plumage 

Torn  from  the  pheasant's  wings, 
The  belts  set  thick  with  starry  gems 

That  shone  on  Indian  kings, 
The  urns  of  massy  silver, 

The  goblets  rough  with  gold, 
The  many-coloured  tablets  bright 

With  loves  and  wars  of  old, 
The  stone  that  breathes  and  struggles, 

The  brass  that  seems  to  speak ; — 
Such  cunning  they  who  dwell  on  high 

Have  given  unto  the  Greek. 

29. 
"Hurrah  !   for  Manius  Curius, 

The  bravest  son  of  Rome, 
Thrice  in  utmost  need  sent  forth, 

Thrice  drawn  in  triumph  home. 
Weave,  weave,  for  Manius  Curius 

The  third  embroidered  gown  : 
Make  ready  the  third  lofty  car, 

And  twine  the  third  green  crown; 
And  yoke  the  steeds  of  Rosea 

With  necks  like  a  bended  bow; 
And  deck  the  bull,  Mevania's  bull, 

The  bull  as  white  as  snow. 


THE  PROPHECY  OF  CAPYS. 


30. 

•  Blest  and  thrice  blest  the  Roman 

Who  sees  Rome's  brightest  day, 
Who  sees  that  long  victorious  pomp 

Wind  down  the  Sacred  Way, 
And  through  the  bellowing  Forum, 

And  round  the  Suppliant's  Grove, 
Up  to  the  everlasting  gates 

Of  Capitolian  Jove. 

31. 
"•Then  where,  o'er  two  bright  havens, 

The  towers  of  Corinth  frown ; 
Where  the  gigantic  King  of  day 
On  his  own  Rhodes  looks  down ; 


Where  soft  Orontes  murmurs 

Beneath  the  laurel  shades ; 
Where  Nile  reflects  the  endless  length 

Of  dark-red  colonnades ; 
Where  in  the  still  deep  water. 

Sheltered  from  waves  and  blasts, 
Bristles  the  dusky  forest 

Of  Byrsa's  thousand  masts ; 
Where  fur-clad  hunters  wander 

Amidst  the  Northern  ice ; 
Where  through  the  sand  of  morning-lanJ 

The  camel  bears  the  spice; 
Where  Atlas  flings  his  shadow 

Far  o'er  the  Western  foam, 
Shall  be  great  fear  on  all  who  hear 

The  mighty  name  of  Rome." 


APPENDIX, 


To  tread  tl 
To  smooth 
And  warm 
Oh!  bidtli 
On  the  Ion 
And  swee 
To  fire  th 
Thy  scei 
Thy  vi 
How 


POMPEII. 


AINED    THE    CHANCELLOR'S    MEDAL    AT    THE    CAMBRIDGE    COMMENCEMENT 
JULY,    1819. 


and  to  Freedom  dear, 
_  lyre  and  conquering  spear, 
i':rj  hill,  the  fragrant  grove, 
of  Genius  and  of  Love, 

Though  now  no  more 
s  awe  the  Atlantic  shore, 
h«  gorgeous  Orient  flings 
_ht  treasures  of  her  tawny  Kings, 
shed  all  that  formed  thine  old  renown, 
;arland,  and  the  jewelled  crown, 
poniard,  the  victorious  sword, 


thine  empire,  or  thy  rights  restored, 
constant  Muses  haunt  thy  shore, 


The  laure 

The  .aven 

Which  re 

Yet  still  t 

And  love  tMlinger  where  they  dwelt  of  yore. 

If  e'er  of  oil  they  deigned,  with  favouring  smile, 

i-girt  shores  of  Albion's  isle, 
ith  classic  arts  our  rugged  tongue, 
*th  classic  glow  the  British  song, 

snalch  their  silent  harps  which  wave 
>ak  that  shades  thy  Maro's  grave,* 
mil  magic  hand  the  slumbering  strings, 
»oet. — For  thy  clime  he  sings, 
r  of  gay  delight  and  wild  despair, 
forms  of  awful  and  of  fair. 

that  climate's  sweets,  how  wild   its 
rms, 

irms  array  it,  and  what  rage  deforms, 
fe  they  mouldering  walls,  Pompeii,  known, 
those  charms,  and  by  that  rage  o'er- 
Tthrown. 

5ity,  gayly  dawned  thy  latest  day, 
Fpoured  its  radiance  on  a  scene  as  gay. 
leaves  scarce  rustled  in  the  sighing  breeze; 
izure  dimples  curled  the  sparkling  seas, 
the  golden  tide  of  light  they  quaffed, 
'ampania's  sunny  meads  and  vineyards  laughed, 
trhile  gleamed  each  lichened  oak  and  giant  pine 
i  the  far  sides  of  swarthy  Apennine. 
Then  mirth  and  music  through  Pompeii  rung; 
Then  verdant  wreaths  on  all  her  portals  hung; 
Her  sons  with  solemn  rite  and  jocund  lay, 
Hailed  the  glad  splendours  of  that  festal  day. 
With  fillets  bound  the  hoary  priests  advance, 
And  rosy  virgins  braid  the  choral  dance. 
The  rugged  warrior  here  unbends  awhile 
His  iron  front,  and  deigns  a  transient  smile ; 
There,  frantic  with  delight,  the  ruddy  boy 
Scarce  treads  on  earth,  and  bounds  and  laughs  with 

joy. 

From  every  crowded  altar  perfumes  rise 
In  billowy  clouds  of  fragrance  to  the  skies. 
The  milk-white  monarch  of  the  herd  they  lead, 
With  gilded  horns,  at  yonder  shrine  to  bleed  ; 
And  while  the  victim  crops  the  broidered  plain, 
And  frisks  and  gambols  towards  the  destined  fane, 
They  little  deem  that  like  himself  they  stray 
To  death,  unconscious,  o'er  a  flowery  way  ; 


*  See  Eustace's  description  of  the  Tomb  of  Virgil,  on 
the  Neapolitan  coast. 

VOL.  IV.— 72  i 


Heedless,  like  him,  the  impending  stroke  await, 
And  sport  and  wanton  on  the  brink  of  fine. 

What  'vails  it  that  where  yonder  heights  aspire, 
With  ashes  piled,  and  scathed  with  rills  of  fire, 
Gigantic  phantoms  dimly  seem  to  glide,* 
In  misty  files,  along  the  mountain's  side, 
To  view  with  threatening  scowl  your  fated  lands, 
And  toward  your  city  point  their  shadowy  hands? 
In  vain  celestial  omens  prompted  fear, 
And  nature's  signal  spoke  the  ruin  near. 
In  vain  through  many  a  night  ye  viewed  from  far 
The  meteor  flag  of  elemental  war 
Unroll  its  blazing  folds  from  yonder  height, 
In  fearful  sign  of  earth's  intestine  fight. 
In  vain  Vesuvius  groaned  with  wrath  supprest, 
And  muttered  thunder  in  his  burning  breast. 
Long  since  the  Eagle  from  that  flaming  peak 
Hath  soared  with  screams  a  safer  nest  to  seek. 
Awed  by  the  infernal  beacon's  fitful  glare, 
The  howling  fox  hath  left  his  wonted  lair; 
Nor  dares  the  browsing  goat  in  venturous  leap 
To  spring,  as  erst,  from  dizzy  steep  to  steep.- 
Man  only  mocks  the  peril.     Man  alone 
Defies  the  sulphurous  flame,  the  warning  groan. 
While  instinct,  humbler  guardian,  wakes  and  saves, 
Proud  reason  sleeps,  nor  knows  the  doom  it  braves. 

But  see  the  opening  theatre  invites 
The  fated  myriads  to  its  gay  delights. 
In,  in,  they  swarm,  tumultuous  as  the  roar 
Of  foaming  breakers  on  a  rocky  shore. 
The  enraptured  throng  in  breathless  t  ran  sport  vie  w§ 
The  gorgeous  temple  of  the  Tragic  Muse. 
There,  while  her  wand  in  shadowy  pomp  arrays 
Ideal  scenes,  and  forms  of  other  days, 
Fair  as  the  hopes  of  youth,  a  radiant  band, 
The  sister  arts  around  her  footstool  stand, 
To  deck  their  Queen,  and  lend  a  milder  grace 
To  the  stern  beauty  of  that  awful  face. 
Far,  far,  around  the  ravished  eye  surveys 
The  sculptured  forms  of  Gods  and  heroes  blaze. 
Above  the  echoing  roofs  the  peal  prolong 
Of  lofty  converse,  or  melodious  song, 
While,  as  the  tones  of  passion  sink  or  swell, 
Admiring  thousands  own  the  moral  spell, 
Melt  with  the  melting  strains  of  fancied  wo, 
With  terror  sicken,  or  with  transport  glow. 

Oh  !  for  a  voice  like  that  which  pealed  of  old 
Through  Salem's  cedar  courts  and  shrines  of  goldj 
And  in  wild  accents  round  the  trembling  dome 
Proclaimed  the  havoc  of  avenging  Rome  ; 
While  every  palmy  arch  and  sculptured  tower 
Shook  with  the  footsteps  of  the  parting  power. 
Such  voice  might  check  your  tears,  which  idly  stream 
For  the  vain  phantoms  of  the  poet's  dream. 


*  Dio  Cassius  relates  that  figures  of  gigantic  size  ap 
peared  for  some  time  previous  to  the  destruction  of  Pom 
peii,  on  the  summits  of  Vesuvius.  This  appearance  was 
probably  occasioned  by  the  fantastic  fnrtns  which  the 
amoke  from  the  crater  of  the  volcano  assumed. 

a  K  a  669 


570 


APPENDIX. 


Might  bid  those  terrors  rise,  those  sorrows  flow ; 
For  other  perils,  and  for  nearer  wo.  [cloud 

The  hour  is  come.    Even  now  the  sulphurous 
Involves  the  city  in  its  funeral  shroud, 
And  far  along  Campania's  azure  sky 
Expands  its  dark  and  boundless  canopy,      [height, 
The  Sun,  tbough  throned  on  heaven's  meridian 
Burns  red  and  rayless  through  that  sickly  night. 
Each  bosom  felt  at  once  the  shuddering  thrill, 
At  once  the  music  stopped.     The  song  was  still. 
None  in  that  cloud's  portentous  shade  might  trace 
The  fearful  changes  of  another's  face. 
But  through  that  horrid  stillness  each  could  hear 
His  neighbour's  throbbing  heart  beat  high  with  fear. 

A  moment's  pause  succeeds.     Then  wildly  rise 
Grief's  sobbing  plaints  and  terror's  frantic  cries. 
The  gates  recoil ;  and  towards  the  narrow  pass 
In  wild  confusion  rolls  the  ihing  mass. 
Death — when  thy  shadowy  sceptre  waves  away 
From  his  sad  couch  the  prisoner  of  decay, 
Though  friendship  view  the  close  with  glistening  eye, 
And  love's  fond  lips  imbibe  the  parting  sigh, 
By  torture  racked,  by  kindness  soothed  in  vain, 
The  soul  still  clings  to  being  and  to  pain. 
But  when  have  wilder  terrors  clothed  thy  brow, 
Or  keener  torments  edged  thy  dart  than  now, 
When  with  thy  regal  horrors  vainly  strove 
The  law  of  Nature  and  the  power  of  Love? 
On  mothers,  babes  in  vain  for  mercy  call, 
Beneath  the  feet  of  brothers,  brothers  fall. 
Behold  the  dying  wretch  in  vain  upraise 
Towards  yonder  well-  known  face  the  accusing  gaze; 
See  trampled  to  the  earth  the  expiring  maid 
Clings  round  her  lover's  feet,  and  shrieks  for  aid. 
Vain  is  the  imploring  glance,  the  frenzied  cry ; 
All,  all  is  fear  ; — to  succour  is  to  die. — 
Saw  ye  how  wild,  how  red,  how  broad  a  light 
Burst  on  the  darkness  of  that  mid-day  night, 
As  fierce  Vesuvius  scattered  o'er  the  vale 
Her  drifted  flames  and  sheets  of  burning  hail, 
Shook  hell's  wan  lightnings  from  his  blazing  cone; 
And  gilded  heaven  with  meteors  not  its  own? 

The  morn  all  blushing  rose  ;  but  sought  in  vain 
The  snowy  villas  and  the  flowery  plain, 
The  purpled  hills  with  marshalled  vineyards  gay, 
The  domes  that  sparkled  in  the  sunny  ray. 
Where  art  or  nature  late  hath  deck'd  the  scene 
With  blazing  marble  or  with  spangled  green, 
There,  streaked  by  many  a  fiery  torrent's  bed, 
A  boundless  waste  of  hoary  ashes  spread. 

Along  that  dreary  waste  where  lately  rung 
The  festal  lay  which  smiling  virgins  sung, 
Where  rapture  echoed  from  the  warbling  lute, 
And  the  gay  dance  resounded,  all  is  mute. — 
Mute  ! — Is  it  Fancy  shapes  that  wailing  sound 
Which  faintly  murmurs  from  the  blasted  ground, 
Or  live  there  still,  who,  breathing  in  the  tomb, 
Curse  the  dark  refuge  which  delays  their  doom, 
In  massive  vaults,  on  which  the  incumbent  plain 
And  ruined  city  heap  their  weight  in  vain  ? 

Oh!  who  may  sing  that  hour  of  mortal  strife, 
When  Nature  calls  on  Death,  yet  clings  to  life? 
Who  paint  the  wretch  that  draws  sepulchral  breath, 
A  living  prisoner  in  the  house  of  Death  ? 
Pale  as  the  corpse  which  loads  the  funeral  pile. 
With  face  convulsed  that  writhes  a  ghastly  smile, 
Behold  him  speechless  move  with  hurried  pace, 
Incessant,  round  his  dungeon's  caverned  space, 
Now  shrink  in  terror,  and  now  groan  in  pain, 
Gnaw  his  white  lips  and  strike  his  burning  brain, 
Till  Fear  o'erstrained  in  stupor  dies  away, 
And  Madness  wrests  her  victim  from  dismay. 
His  arms  sink  down  ;  his  wild  and  stony  eye 
Glares  without  sight  on  blackest  vacancy. 
He  feels  not,  sees  not:  wrapped  in  senseless  trance 
His  soul  is  still  and  listless  as  his  glance. 
One  cheerless  blank,  one  rayless  mist  is  there, 
Thoughts,  senses,  passions,  live  not  with  despair. 

Haste,  Famine,  haste,  to  urge  the  destined  close, 
And  lull  the  horrid  scene  to  stern  repose. 


Yet  ere,  dire  Fiend,  thy  lingering  tortures  cease, 
And  all  be  hushed  in  still  sepulchral  peace, 
Those  caves  shall  wilder,  darker  deeds  behold 
Than  e'er  the  voice  of  song  or  fable  told, 
Whate'er  dismay  may  prompt,  or  madness  dare, 
Feasts  of  the  grave,  and  banquets  of  despair.— 
Hide,  hide  the  scene ;  and  o'er  the  blasting  sight 
Fling  the  dark  veil  of  ages  and  of  night. 

Go,  seek  Pompeii  now : — with  pensive  tread 
Roam  through  the  silent  city  of  the  dead. 
Explore  each  spot,  where  still,  in  ruin  grand, 
Her  shapeless  piles  and  tottering  columns  stand, 
Where  the  pale  ivy's  clasping  wreaths  o'ershade 
The  rained  temple's  moss-clad  colonnade, 
Or  violets  on  the  hearth's  cold  marble  wave, 
And  muse  in  silence  on  a  people's  grave. 

Fear  not. — No   sign  of  death  thine  eyes  shall 

scare, 

No,  all  is  beauty,  verdure,  fragrance  there. 
A  gentle  slope  includes  the  fatal  ground 
With  odorous  shrubs  and  tufted  myrtles  crowned  : 
Beneath,  o'ergrown  with  grass,  or  wreathed  with 

flowers, 

Lie  tombs  and  temples,  columns,  baths,  and  towers. 
As  if,  in  mockery,  Nature  seems  to  dress 
In  all  her  charms  the  beauteous  wilderness, 
And  bids  her  gayest  flowerets  twine  and  bloom 
In  sweet  prolusion  o'er  a  city's  tomb. 
With  roses  here  she  decks  the  untrodden  path, 
With  lilies  fringes  there  the  stately  baih  ; 
The  acanthus'*  spreading  foliage  here  she  weaves 
Round  the  gay  capital  which  mocks  its  leaves ; 
There  hangs  the  sides  of  every  mouldering  room 
With  tapestry  from  her  own  fantastic  loom, 
Wallflowers  and  weeds,  whose  glowing  hues  supply 
With  simple  grace  the  purple's  Tyrian  dye. 
The  ruined  city  sleeps  in  fragrant  shade, 
Like  the  pale  corpse  of  some  Athenian  maid,t 
Whose  marble  arms,  cold  brows,  and  snowy  neck 
The  fairest  flowers  of  fairest  climates  deck, 
Meet  types  of  her  whose  form  their  wreaths  array, 
Of  radiant  beauty,  and  of  swift  decay. 

Advance,  and  wander  on  through  crumbling  halls, 
Through  prostrate  gates  and  ivied  pedestals, 
Arches,  whose  echoes  now  no  chariots  rouse, 
Tombs,  on  whose  summits  goats  undaunted  browse. 
See  where  yon  ruined  wall  on  earth  reclines, 
Through  weeds  and  moss  the  half-seen  painting 

shines, 

Still  vivid  midst  the  dewy  cowslips  glows, 
Or  blends  its  colours  with  the  blushing  rose. 

Thou  lovely,  ghastly  scene  of  fair  decay, 
In  beauty  awful,  and  midst  horrors  gay, 
Renown  more  wide, more  bright  shall  gild  thy  name, 
Than  thy  wild  charms  or  fearful  doom  could  claim. 

Immortal  spirits,  in  whose  deathless  song 
Latium  and  Athens  yet  their  reign  prolong, 
And  from  their  thrones  of  fame  and  empire  hurled, 
Still  sway  the  sceptre  of  the  mental  world, 
You  in  whose  breasts  the  flames  of  Pindus  beamed, 
Whose  copious  lips  with  rich  persuasion  streamed, 
Whose  minds  unravelled  nature's  mystic  plan, 
Or  traced  the  mazy  labyrinth  of  man: 
Bend,  glorious  spirits,  from  your  blissful  bowers, 
And  broidered  couches  of  unfading  flowers, 
While  round  your  locks  the  Elysian  garlands  blow, 
With  sweeter  odours,  and  with  brighter  glow. 
Once  more,  immortal  shades,  atoning  Fame 
Repairs  the  honours  of  each  glorious  name. 
Behold  Pompeii's  opening  vaults  restore 
The  long-lost  treasures  of  your  ancient  lore, 
The  vestal  radiance  of  poetic  fire, 
The  stately  buskin  and  the  tuneful  lyre, 


*  The  capital  of  the  Corinthian  pillar  is  carved,  a«  If 
well  known,  in  imitation  of  the  Acanthus.  MODS.  d« 
Chateauhriand,  as  1  have  found  since  this  Poem  wai 
written,  has  employed  tlje  same  image  in  his  Travels. 

f  It  is  the  custom  of  ihe  modern  Greeks  to  adorB 
corpses  profusely  with  flowers 


THE  BATTLE   OF  IVRY. 


571 


The  wand  of  eloquence,  whose  magic  sway 
The  sceptres  and  the  swords  of  earth  obey, 
And  every  mighty  spell,  whose  strong  control 
Could  nerve  or  melt,  could  fire  or  soothe  the  soul. 

And  thou,  sad  city,  raise  thy  drooping  head, 
And  share  the  honours  of  the  glorious  dead. 
Had  Fate  reprieved  thee  till  the  frozen  North 
Poured  in  wild  swarrns  its  hoarded  millions  forth, 
Till  blazing  cities  marked  where  Albion  trod, 
Or  Europe  quaked  beneath  the  scourge  of  God,* 
No  lasting  wreath  had  graced  thy  funeral  pall, 
No  fame  redeemed  the  horrors  of  thy  fall. 


Now  shall  thy  deathless  memory  five  entwined 
With  all  that   conquers,    rules,    or  charms   the 

mind, 

Each  lofty  thought  of  Poet  or  of  Sage, 
Each  grace  of  Virgil's  lyre  or  Tully's  page. 
Like  theirs  whose  Genius  consecrates  thy  tomb, 
Thy  fame  shall  snatch  from  time  a  greener  bloom. 
Shall  spread  where'er  the  Muse  lias  rear'd  her 

throne, 

And  live  renowned  in  accents  yet  unknown ; 
Earth's  utmost  bounds  shall  join  the  glad  acclaim, 
And  distant  Camus  bless  Pompeii's  name. 


THE   BATTLE    OF   IVRY. 

[KNIGHT'S  QUARTERLY  MAGAZINE,  1824.] 


ourth,  on  his  accession  to  the  French  crown,  was  opposed  by  a  large  part  of  his  subjects,  under 
the  Duke  of  Mayenne,  with  the  assistance  of  Spain  and  Savoy.  In  March,  1590,  he  gained  a  decisive  victory 
over  that  party  at  Ivry.  Before  the  battle,  he  addressed  his  troops,  "My  children,  if  you  lose  sight  of  your 
colours,  rally  to  my  white  plume— you  will  always  find  it  in  the  path  to  honour  and  glory."  His  conduct  waa 
answerable  to  his  promise.  Nothing  could  resist  his  impetuous  valour,  and  the  leaguers  underwent  a  total  and 
bloody  defeat.  In  the  midst  of  the  rout,  Henry  followed,  crying,  "Save  the  French!"  and  his  clemency  added 
a  number  of  the  enemies  to  his  own  army.  Jhkin's  Biographical  Dictionary.} 


Now  glory  to  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  from  whom  all  glories  are ! 
And  glory  to  our  Sovereign  Liege,  King  Henry  of  Navarre  ! 
Now  let  there  be  the  merry  sound  of  music  and  the  dance, 
Through  thy  cornfields  green,  and  sunny  vines,  oh  pleasant  land  of  France 
And  thou,  Rochelle,  our  own  Rochelle,  proud  city  of  the  waters, 
Again  let  rapture  light  the  eyes  of  all  thy  mourning  daughters. 
As  thou  wert  constant  in  our  ills,  be  joyous  in  our  joy, 
For  cold,  and  stiff,  and  still  are  they  who  wrought  thy  walls  annoy. 
Hurrah!  hurrah !  a  single  field  hath  turned  the  chance  of  war; 
Hurrah !  hurrah .  for  Ivry  and  King  Henry  of  Navarre. 

Oh  !  how  our  hearts  were  beating,  when  at  the  dawn  of  day, 
We  saw  the  army  of  the  League  drawn  out  in  long  array ; 
With  all  its  priest-led  citizens,  and  all  its  rebel  peers, 
And  Appenzel's  stout  infantry,  and  Egmont's  Flemish  spears. 
There  rode  the  brood  of  false  Lorraine,  the  curses  of  our  land ! 
And  dark  Mayenne  was  in  the  midst,  a  truncheon  in  his  hand  ; 
And,  as  we  looked  on  them,  we  thought  of  Seine's  empurpled  flood, 
And  good  Coligni's  hoary  hair  all  dabbled  with  his  blood ; 
And  we  cried  unto  the  living  God,  who  rules  the  fate  of  war, 
To  fight  for  his  own  holy  name  and  Henry  of  Navarre. 

The  king  is  come  to  marshal  us,  in  all  his  armour  drest, 
And  he  has  bound  a  snow-white  plume  upon  his  gallant  crest: 
He  looked  upon  his  people,  and  a  tear  was  in  his  eye  ; 
He  looked  upon  the  traitors,  and  his  glance  was  stern  and  high. 
Right  graciously  he  smiled  on  us,  as  rolled  from  wing  to  wing, 
Down  all  our  line,  in  deafening  shout,  "  God  save  our  lord,  the  King.' 
"  And  if  my  standard-bearer  fall,  as  fall  full  well  he  may — 
For  never  saw  I  promise  yet  of  such  a  bloody  fray- 
Press  where  ye  see  my  white  plume  shine,  amidst  the  ranks  of  war, 
And  be  your  oriflamme,  to-day,  the  helmet  of  Navarre." 

Hurrah !  the  foes  are  moving !     Hark  to  the  mingled  din 
Of  fife,  and  steed,  and  trump,  and  drum,  and  roaring  culverin! 
The  fiery  Duke  is  pricking  fast  across  Saint  Andre's  plain, 
With  all  the  hireling  chivalry  of  Guelders  and  Almayne. 
Now  by  the  lips  of  those  ye  love,  fair  gentlemen  of  France, 
Charge  for  the  golden  lilies  now,  upon  them  with  the  lance ! 
A  thousand  spurs  are  striking  dee'p,  a  thousand  spears  in  rest, 
A  thousand  knights  are  pressing  close  behind  the  snow-white  crest; 
And  in  they  burst,  and  on  they  rushed,  while,  like  a  guiding  star, 
Amidst  the  thickest  carnage  blazed  the  helmet  of  Navarre. 


•  The  well-known  name  of  Attila 


573  APPENDIX. 

Now  God  be  praised,  the  day  is  ours !     Mayenne  hath  turned  his  rein 
D'Aurnale  hath  cried  for  quarter — the  Flemisn  Count  is  slain, 
Their  ranks  are  breaking  like  thin  clouds  before  a  Biscay  gale; 
The  field  is  heaped  with  bleeding  steeds,  and  flags,  and  cloven,  mail ; 
And  then  we  thought  on  vengeance,  and  all  along  our  van, 
"  Remember  St.  Bartholomew,"  was  passed  from  man  to  man ; 
But  out  spake  gentle  Henry  then,  "  No  Frenchman  is  my  foe; 
Down,  down  with  every  foreigner ;  but  let  your  brethren  go." 
Oh !  was  there  ever  such  a  knight,  in  friendship  or  in  war, 
As  our  sovereign  lord,  King  Henry,  the  soldier  of  Navarre ! 

Ho !  maidens  of  Vienna  !     Ho !  matrons  of  Lucerne ! 
Weep,  weep,  and  rend  your  hair  for  those  who  never  shall  return: 
Ho  !  Philip,  send  for  charity,  thy  Mexican  pistoles, 
That  Antwerp  monks  may  sing  a  mass  for  thy  poor  spearmen's  souls' 
Ho !  gallant  nobles  of  the  League,  look  that  your  arms  be  bright! 
Ho  !  burghers  of  St.  Genevieve,  keep  watch  and  ward  to-night! 
For  our  God  hath  crushed  the  tyrant,  our  God  hath  raised  the  slave, 
And  mocked  the  counsel  of  the  wise  and  the  valour  of  the  brave. 
Th^n  glory  to  his  holy  name,  from  whom  all  glories  are  ; 
4  nd  glory  to  our  sovereign  lord,  King  Henry  of  Navarre. 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


078 


MADAME    I) 'A  ft  JB  LAY.' 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  JANUARY,  1843.] 


THOUGH  the  world  saw  and  heard  little  of 
Madame  D'Arblay  during  the  last  forty  years 
of  her  life,  and  though  that  little  did  not  add  to 
her  fame,  there  were  thousands,  we  believe, 
who  felt  a  singular  emotion  when  they  learned 
that  she  was  no  longer  among  us.  The  news 
of  her  death  carried  the  minds  of  men  back  at 
one  leap,  clear  over  tvro  generations,  to  the 
time  when  her  first  literary  triumphs  were 
won.  All  those  whom  we  had  been  accus 
tomed  to  revere  as  intellectual  patriarchs, 
seeoed  children  when  compared  with  her;  for 
Burke  had  sat  up  all  night  to  read  her  writ 
ings,  and  Johnson  had  pronounced  her  supe 
rior  to  Fielding  when  Rogers  was  still  a  school 
boy,  and  Southey  still  in  petticoats.  Yet  more 
strange  did  it  seem  that  we  should  just  have 
lost  one  whose  name  had  been  widely  cele 
brated  before  anybody  had  heard  of  some  illus 
trious  men  who,  twenty,  thirty,  or  forty  years  j 
ago,  were,  after  a  long  and  splendid  career, 
borne  with  honour  to  the  grave.  Yet  so  it 
was.  Frances  Burney  was  at  the  height  of 
fame  and  popularity  before  Cowper  had  pub 
lished  his  first  volume,  before  Porson  haci  gone 
up  to  college,  before  Pitt  had  taken  his  seat  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  before  the  voice  of 
Erskine  had  been  once  heard  in  Westminster 
Hall.  Since  the  appearance  of  her  first  work, 
sixty-two  years  had  passed;  and  this  interval 
had  been  crowded,  not  only  with  politico,!,  but 
also  with  intellectual  revolutions.  Thousands 
of  reputations  had,  during  that  period,  sprung 
up?  bloomed,  withered,  and  disappeared.  New 
kii\tls  of  composition  had  come  into  fashion, 
haa  gone  out  of  fashion,  had  been  derided,  had 
j  besii  forgotten.  The  fooleries  of  Delia  Crusca, 
ij  and  the  fooleries  of  Kotzebue,  had  for  a  time 
(bewitched  the  multitude,  who  had  left  no  trace 
1  behind  them  ;  nor  had  misdirected  genius:  been 
S able  to  save  from,  decay  the  once  flourishing 
'!  schools  of  Godwin,  of  Darwin,  and  of  Rad- 
jcliffe.  Many  books,  written  for  temporary 
- 1  effect,  had  run  through  six  or  seven  editions, 
<and  had  then  been  gathered  to  the  novels  of 
,'Afra  Behn,  and  the  epic  poems  of  Sir  Richard 
JBlackmore.  Yet  the  early  works  of  Madame 
D'Arblay,  in  spite  of  the  lapse  of  years,  in 
ispite  of  the  change  of  manners,  in  spite  of  the 
'popularity  deservedly  obtained  by  some  of  her 
rivals,  continued  to  hold  a  high  place  in  the 
public  esteem.  She  lived  to  be  a  classic.  Time 
set  on  her  fame,  before  she  went  hence,  that 
seal  which  is  seldom  set  except  on  the  fame 
of  the  departed.  Like  Sir  Condy  Rackrent  in 
the  tale,  she  survived  her  own  wake,  and  over 
heard  the  judgment  of  posterity. 

Having   always   felt  a  warm   and   sincere,] 
ihough  not  a  blind  admiration  for  her  talents, 
we  rejoiced  to  learn  that  her  Diary  was  about 


*  Diary  and   Lcltem  of   Madame  D'Jlrblay.      5  vols. 
Jvo.  London.   1642 


to  be  made  public.  Our  hopes,  it  is  true,  were 
not  unmixed  with  fears.  We  could  not  forget 
the  fate  of  the  Memoirs  of  Dr.  Burney,  which 
were  published  ten  years  ago.  That  unfortu 
nate  book  contained  much  that  was  curious 
and  interesting.  Yet  it  was  received  with  a 
cry  of  disgust,  and  was  speedily  consigned  to 
oblivion.  The  truth  is,  that  it  deserved  its 
doom.  It  was  written  in  Madame  D'Arblay's 
later  style — the  worst  style  that  has  ever  been 
known  among  men.  No  genius,  no  informa 
tion,  could  save  from  proscription  a  book  so 
written.  We,  therefore,  opened  the  Diary  with 
no  small  anxiety,  trembling  lest  we  should  light 
upon  some  of  that,  particular  rhetoric  which 
deforms  almost  every  page  of  the  Memoirs, 
and  which  it  is  impossible  to  read  without  a 
sensation  made  up  of  mirth,  shame  and  loath 
ing.  We  soon,  however,  discovered  to  our 
great  delight,  that  this  Diary  was  kept  before 
Madame  D'Arblay  became  eloquent.  It  is,  for 
the  most  part,  written  in  her  earliest  and  best 
manner;  in  true  woman's  English,  clear,  na 
tural,  and  lively.  The  two  works  are  lying 
side  by  side  before  us,  and  we  never  turn  from 
the  Memoirs  to  the  Diary  without  a  sense  of 
relief.  The  difference  is  as  great  as  the  differ 
ence  between  the  atmosphere  of  a  perfumer's 
shop,  fetid  with  lavender  water  and  jasmine 
soap,  and  the  air  of  a  heath  on  a  fine  morning 
in  May.  Both  works  ought  to  be  consulted  by 
every  person  who  Avishes  to  be  well  acquainted 
with  the  history  of  our  literature  and  our  man 
ners.  But  to  read  the  Diary  is  a  pleasure;  to 
read  the  Memoirs  will  always  be  a  task. 

We  may,  perhaps,  afford  some  harmless 
amusement  to  our  readers  if  we  attempt,  with 
the  help  of  these  two  books,  to  give  them  an 
account  of  the  most  important  years  of  Madame 
D'Arblay's  life. 

She  was  descended  from  a  family  which  bore 
the  name  of  Macburney,  and  which,  though 
probably  of  Irish  origin,  had  been  long  settled 
in  Shropshire,  and  was  possessed  of  consider 
able  estates  in  that  county.  Unhappily,  man) 
years  before  her  birth,  the  Macburneys  began, 
as  if  of  set  purpose  and  in  a  spirit  of  deter 
mined  rivalry,  to  expose  and  ruin  themselves. 
The  heir-apparent,  Mr.  James  Macburney, 
offended  his  father  by  making  a  runaway 
match  with  an  actress  from  Goodman's  Fields, 
The  old  gentleman  could  devise  no  more  judi 
cious  mode  of  wreaking  vengeance  on  nis 
undutiful  boy  than  by  marrying  the  cook. 
The  cook  gave  birth  to  a  son  named  Joseph, 
who  succeeded  to  all  the  lands  of  the  family, 
while  James  was  cut  off  with  a  shilling.  The 
favorite  son,  however,  was  so  extravagant, 
that  he  soon  became  as  poor  as  his  disin 
herited  brother.  Both  were  forced  to  earn 
their  bread  by  their  labour.  Joseph  turned 
dancing-master,  and  settled  in  Norfolk.  James 
struck  off  the  Mac  from  the  beginning  of  his 


.174 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


name,  and  set  up  as  a  portrait-painter  at 
Chester.  Here  he  had  a  son  named  Charles, 
well  known  as  the  author  of  the  History  of 
Music,  and  as  the  father  of  two  remarkable 
children,  of  a  son  distinguished  by  learning, 
and  of  a  daughter  still  more  honourably  dis 
tinguished  by  genius. 

Charles  early  showed  a  taste  for  that  art,  of 
which,  at  a  later  period,  he  became  the  his 
torian.  He  was  apprenticed  to  a  celebrated 
musician  in  London,  and  applied  himself  to 
study  with  vigour  and  success.  He  early 
found  a  kind  and  munificent  patron  in  Fulk 
Greville,  a  high-born  and  high-bred  man,  who 
seems  to  have  had  in  large  measure  all  the 
accomplishments  and  all  the  follies,  all  the 
virtues  and  all  the  vices  which,  a  hundred 
years  ago,  were  considered  as  making  up  the 
character  of  a  fine  gentleman.  Under  such 
protection,  the  young  artist  had  every  prospect 
of  a  brilliant  career  in  the  capital.  Bur  his 
health  failed.  It  became  necessary  for  him  to 
retreat  from  the  smoke  and  river  fog  of  Lon 
don,  to  the  pure  air  of  the  coast.  He  accepted 
the  place  of  organist  at  Lynn,  and  settled  at 
that  town  with  a  young  lady  who  had  recently 
become  his  wife. 

At  Lynn,  in  June,  1752,  Frances  Burney 
was  born.  Nothing  in  her  childhood  indicated 
that  she  would,  while  still  a  young  woman, 
have  secured  for  herself  an  honourable  and 
permanent  place  among  English  writers.  She 
was  shy  arid  silent.  Her  brothers  and  sisters 
called  her  a  dunce,  and  not  altogether  without 
some  show  of  reason ;  for  at  eight  years  old 
she  did  not  know  her  letters. 

In  1760,  Mr.  Burney  quitted  Lynn  for  Lon 
don,  and  took  a  house  in  Poland  Street ;  a 
situation  which  had  been  fashionable  in  the 
reign  of  Queen  Anne,  but  which,  since  that 
time,  had  been  deserted  by  most  of  its  wealthy  | 
and  noble  inhabitants.  He  afterwards  resided  in 
St.  Martin's  Street,  on  the  south  side  of  Leices 
ter  Square.  His  house  there  is  still  well  known, 
and  will  continue  to  be  well  known,  as  long  as 
our  island  retain*:  any  trace  of  civilization  ;  for 
it  was  the  dwelling  of  Newton,  and  the  square 
turret  which  distinguishes  it  from  all  the  sur 
rounding  buildings  was  Newton's  observatory. 

Mr.  Barney  at  once  obtained  as  many  pupils 
of  the  most  respectable  description  as  he  had 
time  to  attend,  and  was  thus  enabled  to  sup 
port  his  family,  modestly  indeed,  and  frugally, 
but  in  comfort  and  independence.  His  pro 
fessional  merit  obtained  for  him  the  degree  of 
Doctor  of  Music  from  the  University  of  Ox 
ford ;  and  his  works  on  subjects  connected 
with  his  art  gained  for  him  a  place,  respect 
able,  though  certainly  not  eminent,  among 
men  of  letters. 

The  progress  of  the  mind  of  Frances  Bur- 
uey,  from  her  ninth  to  her  twenty-fifth  year, 
well  deserves  to  be  recorded.  When  her  edu 
cation  had  proceeded  no  further  than  the  horn- 
nook,  she  lost  her  mother,  and  thenceforward 
she  educated  herself.  Her  father  appears  to 
have  been  as  bad  a  fatner  as  a  very  honest, 
affectionate,  and  sweet-tempered  man  can  well 
be.  He  loved  his  daughter  dearly,  but  it  never 
have  occurred  to  him  that  a  parent 
othei  duties  to  perform  to  children  than 


that  ofiApndling  them.  It  would  indeed  have 
been  wfpossible  for  him  to  superintend  their 
education  himself.  His  professional  engage 
ments  occupied  him  all  day.  At  seven  in  the 
morning  he  began  to  attend  his  pupils,  and 
when  London  was  full,  was  sometimes  em 
ployed  in  teaching  till  eleven  at  night.  He 
was  often  forced  to  carry  in  his  pocket  a  tin 
box  of  sandwiches,  and  a  bottle  of  wine  and 
water,  on  which  he  dined  in  a  hackney  -coach 
while  hurrying  from  one  scholar  to  another. 
Two  of  his  daughters  he  sent  to  a  seminary  at 
Paris;  but  he  imagined  that  Frances  would 
run  some  risk  of  being  perverted  from  the 
Protestant,  faith  if  she  were  educated  in  a 
Catholic  country,  and  he  therefore  kept  her  al 
home.  No  governess,  no  teacher  of  any  art 
or  of  any  language  was  provided  for  her.  B 
one  of  her  sisters  showed  her  how  to  writ 
and,  before  she  was  fourteen,  she  began  to  fin 
pleasure  in  reading. 

It  was  not,  however,  by  reading  that  her  in 
tellect  was  formed.  Indeed,  when  her  besf 
novels  were  produced,  her  knowledge  of  books 
was  very  small.  When  at  the  height  of  her 
fame,  she  was  unacquainted  with  the  mosl 
celebrated  works  of  Voltaire  and  Moliere, 
and,  what  seems  still  more  extraordinary,  had 
never  heard  or  seen  a  line  of  Churchill,  who, 
when  she  was  a  girl,  was  the  most  popular  of 
living  poets.  It  is  particularly  deserving  of 
observation,  that  she  appears  to  have  been  bj 
no  means  a  novel-reader.  Her  fatner's  library 
was  large;  and  he  had  admitted  into  it  so 
many  books  which  rigid  moralists  generally 
exclude,  that  he  felt  uneasy,  as  he  afterwards 
owned,  when  Johnson  began  to  examine  the 
shelves.  But  in  the  whole  collection  there  was 
only  a  single  novel,  Fielding's  Amelia. 

An  education,  however,  which  to  most  girls 
would  have  been  useless,  but  which  suited 
Fanny's  mind  better  than  elaborate  culture, 
was  in  constant  progress  during  her  passage 
from  childhood  to  womanhood.  The  great 
book  of  human  nature  was  turned  over  before 
her.  Her  father's  social  position  was  very 
peculiar.  He  belonged  in  fortune  and  station 
to  the  middle  class.  His  daughters  seem  to 
have  been  suffered  to  mix  freely  with  those 
whom  butlers  and  waiting-maids  call  vulgar. 

We  are  told  that  they  were  in  the  habit  of 
playing  with  the  children  of  a  wig-maker  who 
lived  in  the  adjoining  house.  Yet  few  nobles 
could  assemble  in  the  most  staiely  mansions 
of  Grosvenor  Square  or  St.  James's  .Square, 
a  society  so  various  and  so  brilliant  as  was 
sometimes  to  be  found  in  Dr.  Burney's  cabin. 
His  mind,  though  not  very  powerful  or  capa 
cious,  was  restlessly  active ;  and,  in  the  inter 
vals  of  his  professional  pursuits,  he  had  con 
trived  to  lay  up  much  miscellaneous  informa 
tion.  His  attainments,  the  suavity  of  his  tem 
per,  and  the  gentle  simplicity  of  his  manner?, 
had  obtained  for  him  ready  admission  to  the 
first  literary  circles.  While  he  was  still  at 
Lynn,  he  had  won  Johnson's  heart  by  sound 
ing  with  honest  zeal  the  praises  of  the  English 
Dictionary.  In  London  the  two  friends  met 
frequently,  and  agreed  most  harmoniously. 
One  tie,  indeed,  was  wanting  to  their  mutual 
attachment.  Burney  loved  his  own  art  pas 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


575 


sionately;  and  Johnson  just  knew  the  bell  of 
St.  Clement's  Church  from  the  organ.  They 
had,  however,  many  topics  in  common  ;  and  on 
winter  nights  their  conversations  were  some 
times  prolonged  till  the  fire  had  gone  out,  and 
the  candles  had  burned  away  to  the  wicks. 
Burney's  admiration  of  the  powers  which  had 
produced  Rasselas  and  The  Rambler,  bordered 
on  idolatry.  He  gave  a  singular  proof  of  this 
at  his  first  visit  to  Johnson's  ill-furnished  gar 
ret.  The  master  of  the  apartment  was  not  at 
home.  The  enthusiastic  visitor  looked  about 
for  some  relique  which  he  might  carry  away; 
but  he  could  see  nothing  lighter  than  the  chairs 
and  the  fire-irons.  At  last  he  discovered  an 
old  broom,  tore  some  bristles  from  the  stump, 
wrapped  them  in  silver  paper,  and  departed  as 
happy  as  Louis  IX,  when  the  holy  nail  of  St. 
Denis  was  "found.  Johnson,  on  the  other  hand, 
condescended  to  growl  out  that  Burney  was 
an  honest  fellow,  a  man  whom  it  was  impossi 
ble  not  to  like. 

Garrick,  too.  was  a  frequent  visitor  in  Po 
land  Street  and  St.  Martin's  Lane.  That  won 
derful  actor  loved  the  society  of  children,  partly 
from  good-nature,  and  partly  from  vanity.  The 
ecstasies  of  mirth  and  terror  which  his  ges- 
•ures  and  play  of  countenance  never  failed  to 
produce  in  a  nursery,  flattered  him  quite  as 
much  as  the  applause  of  mature  critics.  He 
often  exhibited  all  his  powers  of  mimicry  for 
the  amusement  of  the  little  Burneys,  awed  them 
by  shuddering  and  crouching  as  if  he  saw  a 
'ghost,  scared  them  by  raving  like  a  maniac  in 
wt.  Luke's  and  then  at  once  became  an  auc 
tioneer,  a  chimney-swepper,  or  an  old  woman, 
and  made  them  laugh  till  the  tears  ran  down 
their  cheeks. 

But  it  would  be  tedious  to  recount  the  names 
of  all  the  men  of  letters  and  artists  whom  Fran 
ces  Burney  had  an  opportunity  of  seeing  and 
hearing.  Colman,  Twining,  Harris,  Baretti, 
Hawkesworth,  Reynolds,  Barry,  were  among 
those  who  occasionally  surrounded  the  tea- 
table  and  supper-tray  at  her  father's  modest 
dwelling.  This  was  not  all.  The  distinction 
which  Dr.  Burney  had  acquired  as  a  musician, 
and  as  the  historian  of  music,  attracted  to  his 
house  the  most  eminent  musical  performers  of 
that  age.  The  greatest  Italian  singers  who 
visited  England  regarded  him  as  the  dispenser 
of  fame  in  their  art,  arid  exerted  themselves  to 
obtain  his  suffrage.  Pachieroti  became  his  in 
timate  friend.  The  rapacious  Agujari,  who 
sang  for  nobody  else  under  fifty  pounds  an  air, 
sang  her  best  for  Dr.  Burney  without  a  fee; 
and  in  the  company  of  Dr.  Burney  even  the 
haughty  and  eccentric  Gabrielli  constrained 
herself  to  behave  with  civility.  It  was  thus  in 
his  power  to  give,  with  scarcely  any  expense, 
concerts  equal  to  those  of  the  aristocracy.  On 
such  occasions  the  quiet  street  in  which  he 
lived  was  blocked  up  by  coroneted  chariots, 
and  his  little  drawing-room  was  crowded  with 

Seers,  peeresses,  ministers,  and  ambassadors, 
n  one  evening,  of  which  we  happen  to  have 
a  full  account,  there  were  present  Lord  Mul- 
grave,  Lord  Bruce,  Lord  and  Lady  Edgecumbe, 
Lord  Barrington  from  the  War-Office,  Lord 
Sandwich  from  the  Admiralty,  Lord  Ashburn- 
kam,  with  his  gold  key  dangling  from  his 


pocket,  and  the  French  Ambassador,  M.  De 
Guignes,  renowned  for  his  fine  person  and  for 
his  success  in  gallantry.  But  the  great  show 
of  the  night  was  the  Russian  ambassador, 
Count  Orloff,  whose  gigantic  figure  was  all  in 
a  blaze  with  jewels  and  in  whose  demeanour 
the  untamed  ferocity  of  the  Scythian  might  be 
discerned  through  a  thin  varnish  of  French  po 
liteness.  As  he  stalked  about  the  small  par 
lour,  brushing  the  ceiling  with  his  toupee,  the 
girls  whispered  to  each  other,  with  mingled 
admiration  and  horror,  that  he  was  the  favoured 
lover  of  his  august  mistress ;  that  he  had  borne 
the  chief  part  in  the  revolution  to  which  she 
owed  her  throne ;  and  that  his  huge  hands,  now 
glittering  with  diamond  rings,  had  given  the 
last  squeeze  to  the  windpipe  of  her  unfortunate 
husband. 

With  such  illustrious  guests  as  these  were 
mingled  all  the  most  remarkable  specimens  of 
the  race  of  lions — a  kind  of  game  which  is 
hunted  in  London  every  spring  with  more  than 
Meltonian  ardour  and  perseverance.  Bruce, 
who  had  washed  down  steaks  cut  from  living 
oxen  with  water  from  the  fountains  of  the  Nile, 
came  to  swagger  and  talk  about  his  travels. 
Omai  lisped  broken  ^English,  and  made  all  the 
assembled  musicians  hold  their  ears  by  howl 
ing  Otaheitean  love-songs,  such  as  those  with 
which  Oberea  charmed  her  Opano. 

With  ihe  literary  and  fashionable  society 
which  occasionally  met  under  Dr.  Burney's 
roof,  Frances  can  scarcely  be  said  to  rtave 
mingled.  She  was  not  a  musician,  and  could 
therefore  bear  no  part  in  the  concerts.  She 
was  shy  almost  to  awkwardness,  and  scarcely 
ever  joined  in  the  conversation.  The  slightest 
remark  from  a  stranger  disconcerted  her;  and 
even  the  old  friends  of  her  father  who  tried  to 
draw  her  out  could  seldom  extract  more  than  a 
Yes  or  a  No.  Her  figure  was  small,  her  face 
not  distinguished  by  beauty.  She  was  there 
fore  suffered  to  withdraw  quietly  to  the  back 
ground,  and,  unobserved  herself,  to  observe  all 
that  passed.  Her  nearest  relations  were  aware 
that  she  had  good  sense,  but  seemed  not  to 
have  suspected,  that  under  her  demure  and 
bashful  deportment  were  concealed  a  fertile 
invention  and  a  keen  sense  of  the  ridiculous. 
She  had  not,  it  is  true,  an  eye  for  the  fine  shades 
)f  character.  But  every  marked  peculiarity 
nstantly  caught  her  notice  and  remained  en 
graven  on  her  imagination.  Thus,  while  still 
a  girl,  she  had  laid  up  such  a  store  of  materials 
for  fiction  as  few  of  those  who  mix  much  in 
he  world  are  able  to  accumulate  during  a  long 
ife.  She  had  watched  and  listened  to  people 
of  every  class,  from  princes  and  great  officers 
of  state  down  to  artists  living  in  garrets,  and 
Doets  familiar  with  subterranean  cook-shops. 
Hundreds  of  remarkable  persons  had  passed 
in  review  before  her,  English,  French,  Ger 
man,  Italian,  lords  and  fiddlers,  deans  of  cathe 
drals,  and  managers  of  theatres,  travellers  iead- 
ng  about  newly  caught  savages,  and  singing 
women  escorted  by  deputy-husbands. 

So  strong  was  the  impression  made  on  thf. 
nind  of  Frances  by  the  society  which  she  v,ai 
:n  the  habit  of  seeing  and  hearing,  that  she  be 
gan  to  write  little  fictitious  narratives  as  soon 
as  she  could  ustv  her  pen  with  ease,  which,  at 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


we  have  said,  was  not  very  early.  Her  sisters 
"were  amused  by  her  stories.  But  Dr.  Burney 
knew  nothing  of  their  existence ;  and  in  another 
quarter  her  literary  propensities  met  with  se 
rious  discouragement.  When  she  was  fifteen, 
her  father  took  a  second  wife.  The  new  Mrs. 
Burney  soon  found  out  that  her  daughter-in- 
law  was  fond  of  scribbling,  and  delivered  seve 
ral  good-natured  lectures  on  the  subject.  The 
advice  no  doubt  was  well  meant,  and  might 
have  been  given  by  the  most  judicious  friend; 
for  at  that  time,  from  causes  to  which  we  may 
hereafter  advert,  nothing  could  be  more  disad 
vantageous  to  a  young  lady  than  to  be  known 
as  a  novel-writer.  Frances  yielded,  relinquish 
ed  her  favourite  pursuit,  and  made  a  bonfire  of 
all  her  manuscripts.* 

She  now  hemmed  and  stitched  from  break 
fast  to  dinner  with  scrupulous  regularity.  But 
the  dinners  of  that  time  were  early;  and  the 
afternoon  was  her  own.  Though  she  had  given 
up  novel-writing,  she  was  still  fond  of  using 
her  pen.  She  began  to  keep  a  diary,  and  she 
corresponded  largely  with  a  person  who  seems 
to  have  had  fhe  chief  share  in  the  formation  of 
her  mind.  This  was  Samuel  Crisp,  an  old 
friend  of  her  father.  His  name,  well  known 
near  a  century  ago,  in  the  most  splendid  cir 
cles  of  London,  has  long  been  forgotten.  His 
history  is,  however,  so  interesting  and  instruc 
tive,  that  it  tempts  us  to  venture  on  a  digression. 

Long  before  Frances  Burney  was  born,  Mr. 
Crisp  had  made  his  entrance  into  the  world 
ivith  every  advantage.  He  was  well  connected 
and  well  educated.  His  face  and  figure  were 
conspicuously  handsome;  his  manners  were 
polished;  his  fortune  was  easy;  his  character 
was  without  stain  ;  he  lived  in  the  best  society ; 
he  had  read  much ;  he  talked  well ;  his  taste  in 
literature,  music,  painting,  architecture,  sculp 
ture,  was  held  in  high  esteem.  Nothing  that 
the  world  can  give  seemed  to  be  wanting  to 
his  happiness  and  respectability,  except  that 
he  should  understand  the  limits  of  his  powers, 
and  should  not  throw  away  distinctions  which 
were  within  his  reach,  in  the  pursuit  of  dis 
tinctions  which  v/ere  unattainable. 

"It  is  an  um  ^ntrolled  truth,"  says  Swift, 
"that  no  man  ever  made  an  ill  figure  who  un 
derstood  his  own  talents,  nor  a  good  one  who 
mistook  them."  Every  day  brings  with  it  fresh 
illustrations  of  this  weighty  saying;  but  the 
best  commentary  that  we  remember  is  the  his 
tory  of  Samuel  Crisp.  Men  like  him  have  their 
proper  place,  and  it  is  a  most  important  one, 
in  the  Commonwealth  of  Letters.  It  is  by  the 
judgment  of  such  men  that  the  rank  of  authors 
is  finally  determined.  It  is  neither  to  the  mul 
titude,  nor  to  the  few  who  are  gifted  with  great 
creative  genius,  that  we  are  to  look  for  sound 
critical  decisions.  The  multitude,  unacquainted 
with  the  best  models,  are  captivated  by  what 
ever  scuns  and  dazzles  them.  They  deserted 
Mrs.  Siddons  to  run  after  Master  Betty;  and 


*  There  is  some  difficulty  here  as  to  the  chronology. 
"This  sacrifice,"  says  the  editor  of  the  Diary,  "was 
*na-ie  in  the  yaitng  authoress's  fifteenth  year""  Thin 
come!  not  bs  ;  for  the  sacrifice  was  the  effect,  accord 
ing  to  the  editor's  own  showing,  of  the  remonstrances 
of  the  second  Mrs.  iinrnev  ;  and  Frances  was  in  her 
nixteenth  year  when  her  father's  second  marriage  took 


they  now  prefer,  we  have  no  doubt,  Jack  Sh»p- 
pard  to  Von  Artevelde.  A  man  of  great  origi 
nal  genius,  on  the  other  hand,  a  man  who  has 
attained  to  mastery  in  some  high  walk  of  an, 
is  by  no  means  to  be  implicitly  trusted  as  a 
judge  of  the  performances  of  others.  The  er 
roneous  decisions  pronounced  by  such  men 
are  without  number.  It  is  commonly  supposed 
that  jealousy  makes  them  unjust.  But  a  more 
creditable  explanation  may  easily  be  found. 
The  very  excellence  of  a  work  shows  that  some 
of  the  faculties  of  the  author  have  been  devel 
oped  at  the  expense  of  the  rest;  for  it  is  not 
given  to  the  human  intellect  to  expand  itself 
widely  in  all  directions  at  once,  and  to  be  at 
the  same  time  gigantic  and  weil-proportioned. 
Whoever  becomes  pre-eminent  in  any  art,  nay, 
in  any  style  of  art,  generally  does  so  by  devot 
ing  himself  with  intense  and  exclusive  enthu 
siasm  to  the  pursuit  of  one  kind  of  excellence. 
His  perception  of  other  kinds  of  excellence  is 
therefore  too  often  impaired.  Out  of  his  own 
department  he  praises  and  blames  at  random, 
and  is  far  less  to  be  trusted  than  the  mere  con 
noisseur,  who  produces  nothing,  and  whose 
business  is  only  to  judge  and  enjoy.  One 
painter  is  distinguished  by  his  exquisite  finish 
ing.  He  toils  day  after  day  to  bring  the  veins 
of  a  cabbage-leaf,  the  folds  of  a  lace  veil,  the 
wrinkles  of  an  old  woman's  face,  nearer  and 
nearer  to  perfection.  In  the  time  which  he 
employs  on  a  square  foot  of  canvass,  a  master 
of  a  different  order  covers  the  walls  of  a  palace 
with  gods  burying  giants  under  mountains,  or  I 
makes  the  cupola  of  a  church  alive  with  sera 
phim  and  martyrs.  The  more  fervent  the  pas 
sion  of  each  of  these  artists  for  his  art,  the 
higher  the  merit  of  each  in  his  own  line,  the 
more  unlikely  it  is  that  they  will  justly  appre 
ciate  each  other.  Many  persons  who  never 
handled  a  pencil,  probably  do  far  r-ore  justice 
to  Michael  Angelo  than  would  have  be^n  done 
by  Gerhard  Douw,  and  far  more  justice  to  Ger 
hard  Douw  than  would  have  been  done  by  Mi 
chael  Angelo. 

It  is  the  same  with  literature.  Thousands 
who  have  no  spark  of  the  genius  of  Dryden  or 
Wordsworth,  do  to  Dryden  the  justice  which 
has  never  been  done  by  Wordsworth,  and  to 
Wordsworth  the  justice  which,  we  suspect, 
would  never  have  been  done  by  Dryden.  Gray, 
Johnson,  Richardson,  Fielding.,  are  all  highly 
esteemed  by  the  great  body  of  intelligent  and 
well-informed  men.  But  Gray  could  see  no 
merit  in  Rasselas;  and  Johnson  could  see  no 
merit  in  the  Bard.  Fielding  thought  Richard 
son  a  solemn  prig ;  and  Richardson  perpetually 
expressed  contempt  and  disgust  for  Fielding's 
lowness. 

Mr.  Crisp  seems,  as  far  as  we  can  judge,  to 
have  been  a  man  eminently  qualified  for  the 
useful  office  of  a  connoisseur.  His  talents  and 
knowledge  fitted  him  to  appreciate  justly  al 
most  every  species  of  intellectual  superiority 
As  an  adviser  he  was  inestimable.  Nay,  he 
might  probably  have  held  a  respectable  rank 
as  a  writer,  if  he  would  have  confined  himselt 
to  some  department  of  literature  in  which  no 
thing  more  than  sense,  taste,  and  reading  was 
required.  Unhappily  he  set  his  heart  on  be 
ing  a  great  poet,  wrote  a  tragedy  in  five  acts 


MADAME  D'ARBLA'i. 


577 


'on  the  death  of  Virginia,  and  offered  it  to  Gar- 
kricif,  who  was  his   personal  friend.     Garrick 
jad  it,  shook  his  head,  and  expressed  a  doubt 
whether  it  would  be  wise  in  Mr.  Crisp  to  stake 
.reputation  which  stood  high  on  the  success 
such  a  piece.     But  the  author,  blinded  by 
jlf-love,  set  in  motion  a  machinery  such  as 
lone  could  long  resist.     His  intercessors  were 
,the  most  eloquent  man  and  the  most  lovely 
woman  of  that  generation.     Pitt  was  induced 
to  read  Virginia,  and  to  pronounce  it  excellent. 
Lady  Coventry,  with  fingers  which  might  have 
furnished  a  model  to  sculptors,  forced  the  manu 
script  into  the  reluctant  hand  of  the  manager; 
and,  in  the  year  1754,  the  play  was  brought 
forward. 

Nothing  that  skill  or  friendship  could  do  was 
omitted.  Garrick  wrote  both  prologue  and  epi 
logue.  The  zealous  friends  of  the  author  filled 
every  box;  and,  by  their  strenuous  exertions, 
the  life  of  the  play  was  prolonged  during  ten 
nights.  But,  though  there  was  no  clamorous 
reprobation,  it  was  universally  felt  that  the  at 
tempt  had  failed.  When  Virginia  was  printed, 
the  public  disappointment  was  even  greater 
than  at  the  representation.  The  critics,  the 
Monthly  Reviewers  in  particular,  fell  on  plot, 
characters,  and  diction,  without  mercy,  but,  we 
fear,  not  without  justice.  We  have  never  met 
with  a  copy  of  the  play;  but,  if  we  may  judge 
from  the  lines  which  are  extracted  in  the  Gen 
tleman's  Magazine,  and  which  do  not  appear 
to  have  been  malevolently  selected,  we  should 
say  that  nothing  but  the  acting  of  Garrick,  and 
the  partiality  of  the  audience,  could  have  saved 
.  so  feeble  and  unnatural  a  drama  from  instant 
damnation. 

The  ambition  of  the  poet  was  still  unsub 
dued.  When  the  London  season  closed,  he 
applied  himself  vigorously  to  the  work  of  re 
moving  blemishes.  He  does  not  seem  to  have 
suspected,  what  we  are  strongly  inclined  to 
suspect,  that  the  whole  piece  was  one  blemish, 
and  that  the  passages  which  were  meant  to  be 
fine,  v  ere,  in  truth,  bursts  of  that  tame  extra 
vagance  into  which  writers  fall,  when  they  set 
themselves  to  be  sublime  and  pathetic  in  spite 
of  nature.  He  omitted,  added,  retouched,  and 
flattered  himself  with  hopes  of  complete  suc 
cess  in  the  following  year;  but,  in  the  follow 
ing  year,  Garrick  showed  no  disposition  to  bring 
the  amended  tragedy  on  the  stage.  Solicitation 
and  remonstrance  were  tried  in  vain.  Lady 
Coventry,  drooping  under  that  malady  which 
seems  ever  to  select  what  is  loveliest  for  its 
prey,  could  render  no  assistance.  The  mana 
ger's  language  was  civilly  evasive,  but  his 
resolution  was  inflexible. 

Crisp  had  committed  a  great  error;  but  he 
bad  escaped  with  a  very  slight  penance.  His 
play  had  not  been  hooted  from  the  boards.  It 
had,  on  the  contrary,  been  better  received  than 
many  very  estimable  performances  have  been 
— than  Johnson's  Irene,  for  example,  and  Gold 
smith's  Good-Natured  Man.  Had  Crisp  been 
wise,  he  would  have  thought  himself  happy  in 
having  purchased  self-knowledge  so  cheap. 
He  would  have  relinquished  without  vain  re- 
piriings  the  hope  of  poetical  distinction,  and 
would  have  turned  to  the  many  sources  of 
happiness  which  he  still  possessed.  Had  he 
VOL.  V.— 73 


been,  on  the  other  hand,  an  unfeeling  and  un 
blushing  dunce,  he  would  have  gone  on  writ 
ing  scores  of  bad  tragedies  in  defiance  of  cen 
sure  and  derision.  But  he  had  too  much  sense 
to  risk  a  second  defeat,  yet  too  little  to  bear  his 
first  defeat  like  a  man.  The  fatal  delusion  that 
he  was  a  great  dramatist  had  taken  firm  pos 
session  of  his  mind.  His  failure  he  attributed 
to  every  cause  except  the  true  one.  He  com 
plained  of  the  ill-will  of  Garrick,  who  appears 
to  have  done  every  thing  that  ability  and  zeal 
could  do  ;  and  who,  from  selfish  motives,  would 
of  course  have  been  well  pleased  if  Virginia 
had  been  as  successful  as  the  Beggar's  Opera, 
Nay,  Crisp  complained  of  the  languor  of  the 
friends  whose  partiality  had  given  him  three 
benefit-nights  to  which  he  had  no  claim.  He 
complained  of  the  injustice  of  the  spectators, 
when,  in  truth,  he  ought  to  have  been  grateful 
for  their  unexampled  patience.  He  lost  his 
temper  and  spirits,  and  became  a  cynic  and  a 
hater  of  mankind.  From  London  he  retired  to 
Hampton,  and  from  Hampton  to  a  solitary  and 
long-deserted  mansion,  built  on  a  common  in 
one  of  the  wildest  tracts  of  Surrey.  No  road, 
not  even  a  sheep-walk,  connected  his  lonelj 
dwelling  with  the  abodes  of  men.  The  place 
of  his  retreat  was  strictly  concealed  from  his 
old  associates.  In  the  spring  he  sometimes 
emerged,  and  was  seen  at  exhibitions  and  con 
certs  in  London.  But  he  soon  disappeared  and 
hid  himself,  with  no  society  but  his  books,  in 
his  dreary  hermitage.  He  survived  his  failure 
about  thirty  years.  A  new  generation  sprang 
up  around  him.  No  memory  of  his  bad  verses 
remained  among  men.  How  completely  the 
world  had  lost  sight  of  him,  will  appear  from 
a  single  circumstance.  We  looked  for  his 
name  in  a  copious  Dictionary  of  Dramatic 
Authors,  published  while  he  was  still  alive, 
and  we  found  only  that  Mr.  Samuel  Crisp,  of 
the  Custom-House,  had  written  a  play  called 
Virginia,  acted  in  1754.  To  the  last,  however, 
the  unhappy  man  continued  to  brood  over  the 
injustice  of  the  manager  and  the  pit,  and  tried 
to  convince  himself  and  others  that  he  had 
missed  the  highest  literary  honours  only  be 
cause  he  had  omitted  some  fine  passages  in 
compliance  with  Garrick's  judgment.  Alas, 
for  human  nature!  that  the  wounds  of  vanity 
should  smart  and  bleed  so  much  longer  than 
the  wounds  of  affection  !  Few  people,  we  be 
lieve,  whose  nearest  friends  and  relau-ns  died 
in  1754,  had  any  acute  feeling  of  the  urss  in 
1782.  Dear  sisters  and  favourite  daughter*, 
and  brides  snatched  away  before  the  honey 
moon  was  passed,  had  been  forgotten,  or  were 
remembered  only  with  a  tranquil  regret.  But 
Samuel  Crisp  was  still  mourning  for  his  tra 
gedy  like  Rachael  weeping  for  her  children, 
and  would  not  be  comforted.  "Never,"  such 
was  his  language  twenty-eight  years  after  his 
disaster,  "never  give  up  or  alter  a  title  unless 
it  perfectly  coincides  with  your  own  inward 
feelings.  I  can  say  this  to  my  sorrow  and  my 
cost.  But,  mum!"  Soon  after  these  word* 
were  written,  his  life— a  life  which  might  have 
been  eminently  useful  and  happy — ended  iu 
the  same  gloom  in  which,  during  more  than  a 
quarter  of  a  century,  it  had  been  passed.  We 
have  thought  it  worth  while  tc  rescue  fnur 
3C 


678 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


oblivion  this  curious  fragment  of  literary  his 
tory.  It  seems  to  us  at  once  ludicrous,  melan 
choly,  and  full  of  instruction. 

Crisp  was  an  old  and  very  intimate  friend 
of  ihe  Barneys.  To  them  alone  was  confided 
the  name  of  the  desolate  old  hall  in  which  he 
hid  himself  like  a  wild  beast  in  a  den.  For 
them  were  reserved  such  remains  of  his  hu 
manity  as  had  survived  the  failure  of  his  play. 
Frances  Barney  he  regarded  as  his  daughter. 
He  called  her  his  Fannikin,  and  she  in  return 
called  him  her  dear  Daddy.  In  truth,  he  seems 
to  have  done  much  more  than  her  real  father 
for  the  development  of  her  intellect;  for  though 
he  was  a  bad  poet,  he  was  a  scholar,  a  thinker, 
and  an  excellent  counsellor.  He  was  particu 
larly  fond  of  Dr.  Burney's  concerts.  They  had, 
indeed,  been  commenced  at  his  suggestion,  and 
when  he  visited  London  he  constantly  attended 
them.  But  when  he  grew  old,  and  when  gout, 
brought  on  partly  by  mental  irritation,  confined 
him  to  his  retreat,  he  was  desirous  of  having  a 
glimpse  of  that  gay  and  brilliant  world  from 
which  he  was  exiled,  and  he  pressed  Fannikin 
to  send  him  full  accounts  of  her  father's  even 
ing  parties.  A  few  of  her  letters  to  him  have 
been  published;  and  it  is  impossible  to  read 
them  without  discerning  in  them  all  the  powers 
which  afterwards  produced  Evelina  arid  Ceci 
lia,  the  quickness  in  catching  every  odd  pe 
culiarity  of  character  and  manner,  the  skill 
in  grouping,  the  humour,  often  richly  comic, 
sometimes  even  farcical. 

Fanny's  propensity  to  novel-writing  had  for  a 
time  beea  kept  down.  It  now  rose  up  stronger 
than  ever.  The  heroes  and  heroines  of  the 
tales  which  had  perished  in  the  flames,  were 
still  present  to  the  eye  of  her  mind.  One 
favourite  story,  in  particular,  haunted  her  im 
agination.  It  was  about  a  certain  Caroline 
Evelyn,  a  beautiful  damsel  who  made  an  un 
fortunate  love  match,  and  died,  leaving  an 
infant  daughter.  Frances  began  to  imagine  to 
herself  the  various  scenes,  tragic  and  comic, 
through  which  the  poor  motherless  girl,  highly 
connected  on  one  side,  meanly  connected  on 
the  other,  might  have  to  pass.  A  crowd  of 
unreal  beings,  good  and  bad,  grave  and  ludi 
crous,  surrounded  the  pretty,  timid,  young  or 
phan  ;  a  coarse  sea-captain ;  an  ugly  insolent 
fop,  blazing  in  a  superb  court-dress;  another 
fop,  as  ugly  and  as  insolent,  but  lodged  on 
Snow-Hill,  and  tricked  out  in  second-hand 
finery  for  the  Hampstead  ball;  an  old  woman, 
all  wrinkles  and  rouge,  flirting  her  fan  with 
the  air  of  a  Miss  of  seventeen,  and  screaming 
in  a  dialect  made  up  of  vulgar  French  and 
vulgar  English;  a  poet  lean  and  ragged,  with 
a  broad  Scottish  accent.  By  degrees  these 
shadows  acquired  stronger  and  stronger  con 
sistence:  the  impulse  which  urged  Frances  to 
write  became  irresistible;  and  the  result  was 
the  history  of  Evelina. 

Then  came,  naturally  enough,  a  wish,  min 
gled  with  many  fears,  to  appear  before  the 
public;  for,  timid  as  Frances  was,  and  bashful, 
and  altogether  unaccustomed  to  hear  her  own 
praises,  it  is  clear  that  she  wanted  neither  a 
strong  passion  for  distinction,  nor  a  just  con 
fidence  in  her  own  powers.  Her  scheme  was 
to  become,  if  oossible,  a  candidate  for  fame 


without  running  any  risk  of  disgrace.  She 
had  not  money  to  bear  the  expense  of  printing. 
It  was  therefore  necessary  that  some  book 
seller  should  be  induced  to  take  the  risk;  and 
such  a  bookseller  was  not  readily  found.  Dods- 
ley  refused  even  to  look  at  the  manuscript 
unless  he  were  trusted  with  the  name  of  the 
author.  A  publisher  in  Fleet  street,  named 
Lowndes,  was  more  complaisant.  Some  cor 
respondence  took  place  between  this  person 
and  Miss  Burney,  who  took  the  name  of  Graf- 
ton,  and  desired  that  the  letters  addressed  to 
her  might  be  left  at  the  Orange  Coflee-House. 
But,  before  the  bargain  was  finally  struck,  Fan 
ny  thought  it  her  duty  to  obtain  her  father's  con 
sent.  She  told  him  that  she  had  written  a  book, 
that  she  wished  to  have  his  permission  to  pub 
lish  it  anonymously,  but  that  she  hoped  that  he 
would  not  insist  upon  seeing  it.  What  followed 
may  serve  to  illustrate  what  we  meant  when 
we  said  that  Dr.  Burney  was  as  bad  a  father  as 
so  good-hearted  a  man  could  possibly  be.  It 
never  seems  to  have  crossed  his  mind  that 
Fanny  was  about  to  take  a  step  on  which  the 
whole  happiness  of  her  life  might  depend,  a 
step  which  might  raise  her  to  an  honourable 
eminence,  or  cover  her  with  ridicule  and  con 
tempt.  Several  people  had  already  been  trusted, 
and  strict  concealment  was  therefore  not  to  be 
expected.  On  so  grave  an  occasion,  it  was 
surely  his  duty  to  give  his  best  counsel  to  his 
daughter,  to  win  her  confidence,  to  prevent  her 
from  exposing  herself  if  her  book  were  a  bad 
one,  and,  if  it  were  a  good  one,  to  see  that  the 
terms  which  she  made  with  the  publisher  were 
likely  to  be  beneficial  to  her.  Instead  of  this, 
he  only  stared,  burst  out  a  laughing,  kissed  her, 
gave  her  leave  to  do  as  she  liked,  and  never 
even  asked  the  name  of  her  work.  The  con 
tract  with  Lowndes  was  speedily  concluded. 
Twenty  pounds  were  given  for  the  copyright, 
and  were  accepted  by  Fanny  with  delight.  Her 
father's  inexcusable  neglect  of  his  dmy,  hap 
pily,  caused  her  no  worse  evil  than  the  loss  of 
twelve  or  fifteen  hundred  pounds. 

After  many  delays  Evelina  appeared  in  Janu 
ary,  1778.  Poor  Fanny  was  sick  with  terror, 
and  durst  hardly  stir  out  of  doors.  Some  days 
passed  before  any  thing  was  heard  of  the  book. 
It  had,  indeed,  nothing  but  its  own  merits  to 
push  it  into  public  favour.  Its  author  was  un 
known.  The  house  by  which  it  was  published 
was  not,  we  believe,  held  in  high  estimation. 
No  body  of  partisans  had  been  engaged  to 
applaud.  The  better  class  of  readers  expected 
little  from  a  novel  about  a  young  lady's  en 
trance  into  the  world.  There  was,  indeed,  at 
that  time,  a  disposition  among  the  most  re 
spectable  people  to  condemn  novels  generally: 
nor  was  this  disposition  by  any  means  without 
excuse;  for  works  of  that  sort  were  almost 
always  silly,  and  very  frequently  wicked. 

Soon,  however,  the  first  faint  accents  of 
praise  began  to  be  heard.  The  keepers  of  the 
circulating  libraries  reported  that  everybody 
was  asking  for  Evelina,  and  that  some  person 
had  guessed  Anstey  to  be  the  author.  Then 
came  a  favourable  notice  in  the  London  Re 
view;  then  another  still  more  favourable  in 
the  Monthly.  And  now  the  book  found  its 
way  to  tables  which  had  seldom  been  polluted 


MADAME  D'ARfrLAY. 


579 


by  marble-covered  volumes.  Scholars  and 
statesmen  who  contemptuously  abandoned  the 
crowd  of  romances  to  Miss  Lydia  Languish 
and  Miss  Sukey  Saunter,  were  not  ashamed  to 
own  that  they  could  not  tear  themselves  away 
from  Evelina.  Fine  carriages  and  rich  live 
ries,  not  often  seen  east  of  Temple  Bar,  were 
publisher's  shop  in  Fleet 
was  daily  questioned  about 

was  himself  as  much  in  the 

dark  as  any  of  his  questioners.  The  mystery, 
however,  could  not  remain  a  mystery  long. 
It  was  known  to  brothers  and  sisters,  aunts 
and  cousins:  and  they  were  far  too  proud  and 
o  happy  to  be  discreet.  Dr.  Burney  wept 
er  the  book  in  rapture.  Daddy  Crisp  shook 
his  fist  at  Fannikin  in  affectionate  anger  at  not 
having  been  admitted  to  her  confidence.  The 
truth  was  whispered  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  and  then 
it  began  to  spread  fast. 

The  book  had  been  admired  while  it  was 
ascribed  to  men  of  letters  long  conversant 
with  the  world,  and  accustomed  to  composi 
tion.  But  when  it  was  known  that  a  reserved, 
silent  young  woman  had  produced  the  best 
work  of  fiction  that  had  appeared  since  the 
death  of  Smollett,  the  acclamations  were  re 
doubled.  What  she  had  done  was,  indeed, 
extraordinary.  But,  as  usual,  several  reports 
improved  the  story  till  it  became  miraculous. 
Evelina,  it  was  said,  was  the  work  of  a  girl  of 
seventeen.  Incredible  as  this  tale  was,  it  con 
tinued  to  be  repeated  down  to  our  own  time. 
Frances  was  too  honest  to  confirm  it.  Proba 
bly  she  was  too  much  a  woman  to  contradict 
it;  and  it  was  long  before  any  of  her  detractors 
thought  of  this  mode  of  annoyance.  Yet  there 
[was  no  want  of  low  minds  and  bad  hearts  in 
e  generation  which  witnessed  her  first  ap- 
arance.  There  was  the  envious  Kenrick  and 
^avage  Wolcot,  the  asp  George  Steeveris 
e  polecat  John  Williams.  It  did  not, 
occur  to  them  to  search  the  parish- 
Lynn,  in  order  that  they  might  be 
lady  with  having  concealed  her 
chivalrous  exploit  was  re- 
•riterof  our  own  time,  whose 
pked  by  not  furnishing  him 
worthless  edition  of  Bos- 


some  sheets  of  \vhich 
seen  round  par- 


well 
our 
eels  oFWtter  books 

But  wLmust  return  to^^r  story.  The  tri 
umph  was  complete.  The  fwaid  and  obscure 
girl  found  herself  on  the  highest  pinnacle  of 
fame.  Great  men,  on  whom  she  had  gazed  at  a 
distance  with  humble  reverence,  addressed  her 
with  admiration;  tempted  by  the  tenderness 
due  to  her  sex  and  age.  Burke,  Windham, 
Gibbon,  Reynolds,  Sheridan,  were  among  her 
most  ardent  eulogists.  Cumberland  acknow 
ledged  her  merit,  after  his  fashion,  by  biting 
bis  lips  and  wriggling  in  his  chair  whenever 
her  name  was  mentioned.  But  it  was  at  Streat- 
ham  that  she  tasted,  in  the  highest  perfection, 
the  sweets  of  flattery,  mingled  with  the  sweets 
of  friendship.  Mrs.  Thrale,  then  at  the  height 
of  prosperity  and  popularity — with  gay  spirits, 
quick  wit,  showy,  though  superficial  acquire 
ments,  pleasing  though  not  refined  manners,  a 
singularly  amiable  temper,  and  a  loving  heart 


—  felt  toward  Fanny  as  toward  a  vounger  sis 
ter.  With  the  Th  rales  Johnson  was  domesti 
cated.  He  was  an  old  friend  of  Dr.  Burney, 
but  he  had  probably  taken  little  notice  of  Dr. 
Burney's  daughters,  and  Fanny,  we  imagine, 
had  never  in  her  life  dared  to  speak  to  him, 
unless  to  ask  whether  he  wanted  a  nineteenth 
or  a  twentieth  cup  of  tea.  He  was  charmed  by 
her  tale,  and  preferred  :t  to  .he  novels  of  Field 
ing,  to  whom,  indeed,  he  had  always  been 
grossly  unjust.  He  did  not  indeed  carry  his 
partiality  so  far  as  to  place  Evelina  by  the  side 
of  Clarissa  and  Sir  Charles  Grandison  ;  yet  he 
said  that  his  little  favourite  had  done  enough 
to  have  made  even  Richardson  feel  uneasy. 
With  Johnson's  cordial  approbation  of  the 
book  was  mingled  a  fondness,  half  gallant, 
half  paternal,  for  the  writer;  and  this  fondness 
his  age  and  character  entitled  him  to  show 
without  restraint.  He  began  by  putting  her 
hand  to  his  lips.  But  soon  he  clasped  her 
in  his  huge  arms,  and  implored  her  to  be  a 
good  girl.  She  was  his  pet,  his  dear  love,  his 
dear  little  Burney,  his  little  character-monger. 
At  one  time,  he  broke  forth  in  praise  of  the 
good  taste  of  her  caps.  At  another  time,  he 
insisted  on  teaching  her  Latin.  That,  with  all 
his  coarseness  and  irritability,  he  was  a  man 
of  sterling  benevolence,  has  long  been  ac 
knowledged.  But  how  gentle  and  endearing 
his  deportment  could  be,  was  net  known  till 
he  Recollections  of  Madame  D'Arblay  were 
published. 

We  have  mentioned  a  few  of  the  most  emi 
nent  of  those  who  paid  their  homage  to  the 
author  of  Evelina.  The  crowd  of  inferior 
admirers  would  require  a  catalogue  as  long 
as  that  in  the  second  book  of  the  Iliad.  In  that 
catalogue  would  be  Mrs.  Cholmondeley,  the 
sayer  of  odd  things,  and  Seward,  much  given 
to  yawning,  and  Baretti,who  slew  the  man  in 
the  Haymarket,  and  Paoli,  talking  broken  Eng 
lish,  and  Langton,  taller  by  the  head  than  any 
other  member  of  the  club,  and  Lady  Millar, 
who  kept  a  vase  -wherein  fools  were  wont  to 
put  bad  verses,  and  Jerningham,  who  wrote 
verses  fit  to  be  put  into  the  vase  of  Lady 
Millar,  and  Dr.  Franklin  —  not,  as  some  have 
dreamed,  the  great  Pennsylvania  Dr.  Franklin, 
who  could  not  then  have  paid  his  respects 
to  Miss  Burney  without  much  risk  of  being 
hanged,  drawn  and  quartered,  but  Dr.  Franklin 
the  less  — 


,  ovT"t  tfotfoj  ye 
rtoKv  p.e  tw 


Au 


xj, 


it  would  not  have  been  surprising  if  such 
success  had  turned  even  a  strong  head,  and 
corrupted  even  a  generous  and  affectionate  na 
ture.  But,  in  the  Diary,  we  can  find  no  trace 
of  any  feeling  inconsistent  with  a  truly  modest 
and  amiable  disposition.  There  is,  indeed, 
abundant  proof  that  Frances  enjoyed,  with  an 
intense,  though  a  troubled  joy,  the  honours 
which  her  genius  had  won;  but  it  is  equally 
clear  that  her  happiness  sprang  from  the  hap- 
piness  of  her  father,  her  sister,  and  her  Daddy 
Crisp.  While  flattered  by  the  great,  the  opti 
lent,  the  learned;  while  followed  along  th*» 


580 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Steyne  at  Brighton  and  the  Pantiles  at  Tun- 1  live  out  another  day.     Adieu,  my  dear  daddy  I 


bridge  Wells  by  the  gaze  of  admiring  crowd? 
her  heart  seems  to  have  been  still  with  the  lit 
tie  domestic  circle  in  St.  Martin's  street.     I 
she   recorded   with   minute  diligence    all  th 
compliments,  delicate  and  coarse,  which  sh 
heard  wherever  she  turned,  she  recorded  them 
for  the  eyes  of  two  or  three  persons  who  ha 
loved  her  from  infancy,  who  had  loved  her  in 
obscurity,  and  to  whom  her  fame   gave   th 
purest  and  most  exquisite  delight.     Nothing 
can  be  more  unjust  than  to  confound  these  out 
pourings  of  a  kind  heart,  sure  of  perfect  synr 
pathy,  with  the  egotism  of  a  blue-stocking,  Avho 
prates  to  all  who  come  near  her  about  her  own 
novel  or  her  own  volume  of  sonnets. 

It  was  natural  that  the  triumphant  issue  of 
Miss  Burney's  first  venture  should  tempt  her 
to  try  a  second.  Evelina,  though  it  had  raised 
her  fame,  had  added  nothing  to  her  fortune. 
Some  of  her  friends  urged  her  to  write  for  the 
stage.  Johnson  promised  to  give  her  his  ad 
vice  as  to  the  composition.  Murphy,  who  was 
supposed  to  understand  the  temper  of  the  pit 
as  well  as  any  man  of  his  time,  undertook  to 
instruct  her  as  to  stage  effect.  Sheridan  de 
clared  that  he  would  accept  a  play  from  her 
without  even  reading  it.  Thus  encouraged, 
she  Avrote  a  comedy  named  The  Witlings. 
Fortunately,  it  was  never  acted  or  printed.  We 
can,  we  think,  easily  perceive  from  the  little 
which  is  said  on  the  subject  in  the  Diary,  that 
The  Witlings  would  have  been  damned,  and 
that  Murphy  and  Sheridan  thought  so,  though 
they  were  too  polite  to  say  so.  Happily  Frances 
had  a  friend  who  was  not  afraid  to  give  her 
pain.  Crisp,  wiser  for  her  than  he  had  been 
for  himself,  read  the  manuscript  in  his  lonely 
retreat,  and  manfully  told  her  that  she  had 
failed,  that  to  remove  blemishes  here  and  there 
would  be  useless,  that  the  piece  had  abundance 
of  wit  but  no  interest,  that  it  was  bad  as  a  whole, 
that  it  would  remind  every  reader  of  the  '  Feni- 
rnes  Savantes,  which,  strange  to  say,  she  had 
never  read;  and  that  she  could  not  sustain  so 
close  a  comparison  with  Moliere.  This  opi 
nion,  in  which  Dr.  Burney  concurred,  was  sent 
to  Frances  in  what  she  called  "  a  hissing,  groan 
ing,  cat-calling  epistle."  But  she  had  too  much 
sense  not  to  know  that  it  was  better  to  be  hissed 
and  cat-called  by  her  Daddy  than  by  a  whole 
sea  of  heads  in  the  pit  of  Drury-lane  Theatre ; 
and  she  had  too  good  a  heart  not  to  be  grateful 
for  so  rare  an  act  of  friendship.  She  returned 
an  answer  which  shows  how  well  she  deserved 
to  have  a  judicious,  faithful  and  affectionate 
adviser.  "I  intend,"  she  wrote,  "to  console 
myself  for  your  censure  by  this  greatest  proof 
I  have  ever  received  of  the  sincerity,  candour, 
and  let  me  add,  esteem  of  my  dear  daddy.  And 
as  I  happen  to  love  myself  rather  more  than 
my  play,  this  consolation  is  not  a  very  trifling 
one.  This,  however,  seriously  I  do  believe,  that 
when  my  two  daddies  put  their  heads  together 
to  concert  that  hissing,  groaning,  cat-calling 
epistle  they  sent  me,  they  felt  as  sorry  for  poor 
little  Miss  Bayes  as  she  could  possibly  do  for 
herself.  You  see  I  do  not  attempt  to  repay 
your  frankness  with  the  air  of  pretended  care 
lessness.  But,  though  somewhat  disconcerted 


I  wont  be  mortified,  and  I  Avon't  be  droirned;  but 
I  will  be  proud  to  find  I  have,  out  of  my  own 
family,  as  well  as  in  it,  a  friend  who  loves  me 
well  enough  to  speak  plain  truth  to  me." 

Frances  now  turned  from  her  dramatic 
schemes  to  an  undertaking  far  better  suiied  to 
her  talents.  She  determined  to  write  a  new 
tale,  on  a  plan  excellently  contrived  for  the  dis 
play  of  the  powers  in  which  her  superiority  to 
other  writers  lay.  It  was  in  truth  a  grand  and  va 
rious  picture-gallery,  which  presented  to  the  eye 
a  long  series  of  men  and  women,  each  marked 
by  some  strong  peculiar  feature.  There  were 
avarice  and  prodigality,  the  pride  of  blood  and 
the  pride  of  money,  morbid  restlessness  and 
morbid  apathy,  frivolous  garrulity,  supercilious 
silence,  a  Democritus  to  laugh  at  every  thing, 
and  a  Heraclitus  to  lament  over  every  thing. 
The  work  proceeded  fast,  and  in  twelve  months 
was  completed.  It  wanted  something  of  the 
simplicity  which  had  been  among  the  most  at- 
ractive  charms  of  Evelina;  but  it  furnished 
ample  proof  that  the  four  years  which  had 
elapsed  since  Evelina  appeared,  had  not  been 
unprofitably  spent.  Those  who  saw  Cecilia 
n  manuscript  pronounced  it  the  best  novel  of 
he  age.  Mrs.  Thrale  laughed  and  wept  over 
t.  Crisp  was  even  vehement  in  applause,  and 
>fferecl  to  insure  the  rapid  and  complete  suc 
cess  of  the  book  for  half-a-crown.  What  Miss 
Burney  received  for  the  copyright  is  not  men- 
ioned  in  the  Diary ;  but  we  have  observed 
several  expressions  from  which  we  infer  that 
he  sum  was  considerable.  That  the  sale  would 
)e  great  nobody  could  doubt :  and  Frances  now 
lad  shrewd  and  experienced  advisers,  who 
would  not  suffer  her  to  wrong  herself.  We 
lave  been  told  that  the  publishers  gave  her  two 
housancl  pounds,  and  we  have  no  doubt  that 
hey  might  have  given  a  still  larger  sum  with- 
ut  being  losers. 

Cecilia  was  published  in  the  summer  of 
782.  The  curiosity  of  the  town  was  intense. 
We  have  been  informed  by  persons  who  re- 
nember  those  days,  that  no  romance  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott  was  more  impatiently  awaited, 
r  more  eagerly  snatched  from  the  counters  of 
he  booksellers.  High  as  public  expectation 
;as,  it  was  amply  satisfied;  and  Cecilia  was 
laced,  by  general  acclamation,  among  the 
lassical  novels  of  England. 

Miss  Burney  was  now  thirty.  Her  youtn 
ad  been  singularly  prosperous;  but  clouds 
oon  began  to  gather  over  that  clear  and  ra- 
iant  dawn.  Events  deeply  painful  to  a  heart 
o  kind  as  that  of  Frances  followed  each  other 
n  rapid  succession.  She  was  first  called  upon 
o  attend  the  death-bed  of  her  best  friend,  Sam 
el  Crisp.  When  she  returned  to  St.  Martin's 
treet,  after  performing  the  melancholy  duty, 
he  was  appalled  by  hearing  that  Johnson  had 
een  struck  with  paralysis ;  and,  not  many 
nonths  later,  she  parted  from  him  for  the  last 
me  with  solemn  tenderness.  He  wished  to 
ook  on  her  once  more ;  and  on  the  day  before 
is  death  she  long  remained  in  tears  on  the 
tairs  leading  to  his  bed-room,  in  the  hope  that 
he  might  be  called  in  to  receive  his  blessing. 
3ut  he  was  then  sinking  fast,  and  (hough  he 


just  now.  I  will  promise  not  to  let  my  vexation  j  sent  her  an  affectionate  rr.essage,  was  unabl« 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


581 


to  see  her.  But  this  was  not  the  worst.  There  ; 
are  separations  far  more  cruel  than  those ! 
which  are  made  by  death.  Frances  might ' 
weep  with  proud  affection  for  Crisp  and  John 
son.  She  had  to  blush  as  well  as  to  weep  for 
Mrs.  Thrale. 

Life,  however,  still  smiled  upon  her.  Domes 
tic  happiness,  friendship,  independence,  lei 
sure,  letters,  all  these  things  were  hers ;  and 
she  flung  them  all  away. 

Among  the  distinguished  persons  to  whom 
Miss  Burney  had  been  introduced,  none  ap 
pears  to  have  stood  higher  in  her  regard  than 
Mrs.  Delany.  This  lady  was  an  interesting 
and  venerable  relic  of  a  past  age.  She  was  the 
niece  of  George  Granville  Lord  Lansdowne, 
who,  in  his  youth,  exchanged  verses  and  com 
pliments  with  Edmund  Waller,  and  who  was 
among  the  first  to  applaud  the  opening  talents 
of  Pope.  She  had  married  Dr.  Delany,  a  man 
known  to  his  contemporaries  as  a  profound 
scholar  and  an  eloquent  preacher,  but  remem 
bered  in  our  time  chiefly  as  one  of  the  small 
circle  in  which  the  fierce  spirit  of  Swift,  tor 
tured  by  disappointed  ambition,  by  remorse, 
and  by  the  approaches  of  madness,  sought  for 
amusement  and  repose.  Dr.  Delany  had  long 
been  dead.  His  widow,  nobly  descended,  emi 
nently  accomplished,  and  regaining,  in  spite  of 
the  infirmities  of  advanced  age,  the  vigour  of 
her  faculties  and  the  serenity  of  her  temper, 
enjoyed  and  deserved  the  favour  of  the  royal 
family.  She  had  a  pension  of  three  hundred 
a  year;  and  a  house  at  Windsor,  belonging  to 
the  crown,  had  been  fitted  up  for  her  accommo 
dation.  At  this  house  the  king  and  queen  some 
times  called,  and  found  a  very  natural  pleasure 
in  thus  catching  an  occasional  glimpse  of  the 
private  life  of  English  families. 

In  December,  1785,  Miss  Burney  was  on  a 
risit  to  Mrs.  Delany  at  Windsor.  The  dinner 
was  over.  The  old  lady  was  taking  a  nap.  Her 
grandniece,  a  little  girl  of  seven,  was  playing 
at  some  Christmas  game  with  the  visitors, 
when  the  door  opened,  and  a  stout  gentleman 
entered  unannounced,  with  a  star  on  his  breast, 
and  "What!  what]  what]"  in  his  mouth.  A 
cry  of  "  the  king"  was  set  up.  A  general 
scampering  followed.  Miss  Burney  owns  that 
she  could  not  have  been  more  terrified  if  she 
had  seen  a  ghost.  But  Mrs.  Delany  came  for 
ward  to  pay  her  duty  to  her  royal  friend,  and 
the  disturbance  was  quieted.  Frances  was 
then  presented,  and  underwent  a  long  exami 
nation  and  cross-examination  about  all  that 
she  had  written  and  all  that  she  meant  to  write. 
The  queen  soon  made  her  appearance,  and  his 
majesty  repeated,  for  the  benefit  of  his  consort, 
the  information  which  he  had  extracted  from 
Miss  Burney.  The  good-nature  of  the  royal 
pair  might  have  softened  even  the  authors  of 
the  Probationary  Odes,  and  could  not  but  be 
delightful  to  a  young  lady  who  had  been 
brought  up  a  tory.  In  a  few  days  the  visit 
was  repeated.  Miss  Burney  was  more  at  ease 
than  before.  His  majesty,  instead  of  seeking 
for  information,  condescended  to  impart  it,  and 
passed  sentence  on  many  great  writers,  Eng 
lish  and  foreign.  Voltaire  he  pronounced  a 
mons'.er.  Rousseau  he  liked  rather  bettor. 
"  But  was  there  ever,"  he  cried,  "  such  stuff  as  i 


great  part  of  Shakspeare  ?  Only  one  must  not 
say  so.  But  what  think  you  1  What]  Is  there 
not  sad  stuff]  What]  What]" 

The  next  day  Frances  enjoyed  the  privilege 
of  listening  to  some  equally  valuable  criticisms 
uttered  by  the  queen  touching  Goethe  and 
Klopstock,  and  might  have  learned  an  import 
ant  lesson  of  economy  from  the  mode  in  which 
her  majesty's  library  had  been  formed.  "I 
picked  the  book  up  on  a  stall,"  said  the  queen. 
"Oh,  it  is  amazing  what  good  books  there  are 
on  stalls!"  Mrs.  Delany,  who  seems  to  have 
understood  from  these  words  that  her  majesty 
was  in  the  habit  of  exploring  the  booths  of 
Moorfields  and  Holywell  Street  in  person, 
could  not  suppress  an  exclamation  of  surprise. 
"  Why,"  said  the  queen,  "I  don't  pick  them  up 
myself.  But  I  have  a  servant  very  clever;  and, 
if  they  are  not  to  be  had  at  the  booksellers,  they 
are  not  for  me  more  than  for  another."  Miss 
Burney  describes  this  conversation  as  delight 
ful  ;  and,  indeed,  we  cannot  wonder  that,  with 
her  literary  tastes,  she  should  be  delighted  at 
hearing  in  how  magnificent  a  manner  the  great 
est  lady  in  the  land  encouraged  literature. 

The  truth  is,  that  Frances  was  fascinated  by 
the  condescending  kindness  of  the  two  great 
personages  to  whom  she  had  been  presented. 
Her  father  was  even  more  infatuated  than  her 
self.  The  result  was  a  step  of  which  we  can 
not  think  with  patience,  but  which,  recorded  as 
it  is,  with  all  its  consequences,  in  these  vol 
umes,  deserves  at  least  this  praise,  that  it  has 
furnished  a  most  impressive  warning. 

A  German  lady  of  the  name  of  Haggerdorn, 
one  of  the  keepers  of  the  queen's  robes,  retiren 
about  this  lime;  and  her  majesty  offered  the 
vacant  post  to  Miss  Burney.  When  we  con 
sider  that  Miss  Burney  was  decidedly  the  most 
popular  writer  of  fictitious  narrative  then  liv 
ing,  that  competence,  if  not  opulence,  was  with 
in  her  reach,  and  that  she  was  more  than  usu 
ally  happy  in  her  domestic  circle,  and  when  we 
compare  the  sacrifice  which  she  was  invited  to 
make  with  the  remuneration  which  was  held 
out  to  her,  we  are  divided  between  laughter  and 
indignation. 

What  was  demanded  of  her  was,  that  she 
should  consent  to  be  almost  as  completely 
separated  from  her  family  and  friends  as  if 
she  had  gone  to  Calcutta,  and  almost  as  close 
a  prisoner  as  if  she  had  been  sent  to  jail  for  a 
libel;  that  with  talents  which  had  instructed 
and  delighted  the  highest  living  minds,  she 
should  now  be  employed  only  in  mixing  snuff 
and  sticking  pins;  that  she  should  be  sum 
moned  by  a  waiting-woman's  bell  to  a  waiting- 
woman's  duties;  that  she  should  pass  her 
whole  life  under  the  restraints  of  paltry  eti 
quette,  should  sometimes  fast  till  she  was  ready 
to  swoon  with  hunger,  should  sometimes  stand 
till  her  knees  gave  way  with  fatigue;  that  she 
should  not  dare  to  speak  or  move  without  con 
sidering  how  her  mistress  might  like  her  words 
and  gestures.  Instead  of  those  distinguished 
men  and  women,  the  flower  of  all  political  par 
ties,  with  whom  she  had  been  in  the  habit  of 
mixing  on  terms  of  equal  friendship,  she  was 
to  have  for  her  perpetual  companion  the  chief 
keeper  of  the  robes,  an  old  hag  from  Germany 
of  mean  understanding,  of  insolent  manners, 
3  C* 


582 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  of  temper  which,  naturally  savage,  had 
now  been  exasperated  by  disease.  Now  and 
then,  indeed,  poor  Frances  might  console  her 
self  for  the  loss  of  Burke's  and  Windham's 
society,  by  joining  in  the  "celestial  colloquy 
sublime"  of  his  majesty's  equerries. 

And  what  was  the  consideration  for  which 
she  was  to  sell  herself  into  this  slavery1?  A 
peerage  in  her  own  right  7  A  pension  of  two 
thousand  a  year  for  life]  A  seventy-four  for 
her  brother  in  the  navy  1  A  deanery  for  her 
brother  in  the  church  1  Not  so.  The  price  at 
which  she  was  valued  was  her  board,  her  lodg 
ing,  the  attendance  of  a  man-servant,  and  two 
hundred  pounds  a  year. 

The  man  who,  even  when  hard  pressed  by 
hunger,  sells  his  birthright  for  a  mess  of  pot 
tage,  is  unwise.  But  what  shall  we  say  of  him 
who  parts  with  his  birthright,  and  does  not  get 
even  the  pottage  in  return  1  It  is  not  neces 
sary  to  inquire  whether  opulence  be  an  ade 
quate  compensation  for  the  sacrifice  of  bodily 
and  mental  freedom ;  for  Frances  Burney  paid 
for  leave  to  be  a  prisoner  and  a  menial.  It  was 
evidently  understood  as  one  of  the  terms  of  her 
engagement,  that,  while  she  was  a  member  of 
the  royal  household,  she  was  not  to  appear 
before  the  public  as  an  author :  and,  even  had 
there  been  no  such  understanding,  her  avoca 
tions  were  such  as  left  her  no  leisure  for  any 
considerable  intellectual  effort.  That  her  place 
was  incompatible  with  her  literary  pursuits, 
was  indeed  frankly  acknowledged  by  the  king 
when  she  resigned.  "She  has  given  up,"  he 
said,  "  five  years  Of  her  pen."  That  during 
those  five  }ears  she  might,  without  painful 
exertion — without  any  exertion  that  would  not 
have  been  a  pleasure — have  earned  enough  to 
buy  an  annuity  for  life  much  larger  than  the 
precarious  salary  which  she  received  at  court, 
is  quite  certain.  The  same  income,  too,  which 
in  St.  Martin's  Street  would  have  afforded  her 
every  comfort,  must  have  been  found  scanty 
at  St.  James's.  We  cannot  venture  to  speak 
confidently  of  the  price  of  millinery  and  jew 
ellery  ;  but  we  are  greatly  deceived  if  a  lady 
who  had  to  attend  Queen  Charlotte  on  many 
public  occasions,  could  possibly  save  a  far 
thing  out  of  a  salary  of  two  hundred  a  year. 
The  principle  of  the  arrangement  was,  in 
short,  simplv  this,  that  Frances  Burney  should 
become  a  slave,  and  should  be  rewarded  by 
being  made  a  beggar. 

For  what  object  their  majesties  brought  her 
to  their  palace,  we  must  own  ourselves  unable 
to  conceive.  Their  object  could  not  be  to  en 
courage  her  literary  exertions;  for  they  took 
her  from  a  situation  in  which  it  was  almost 
certain  that  she  would  write,  and  put  her  into 
a  situation  in  which  it  was  impossible  for  her 
to  write.  Their  object  could  not  be  to  promote 
her  pecuniary  interest ;  for  they  took  her  from 
a  situation  where  she  was  likely  to  become 
rich,  and  put  her  into  a  situation  in  which  she 
could  not  but  continue  poor.  Their  object 
could  not  be  to  obtain  an  eminently  useful 
waiting-maid ;  for  it  is  clear  that,  though  Miss 
Burney  was  the  only  woman  of  her  time  who 
could  have  described  the  death  of  Harrel,  thou 
sands  might  have  been  found  more  expert  in 
tying  ribbons  and  filling  snuff-boxes.  To  grant 


her  a  pension  on  the  civil  list  would  have  been 
an  act  of  judicious  liberality,  honourable  to  the 
court.  If  this  was  impracticable,  the  next  best 
thing  was  to  let  her  alone.  That  the  king  and 
queen  meant  her  nothing  but  kindness  we  do 
not  in  the  least  doubt.  But  their  kindness  was 
the  kindness  of  persons  raised  high  above  the 
mass  of  mankind,  accustomed  to  be  addressed 
with  profound  deference,  accustomed  to  see  all 
who  approach  them  mortified  by  their  coldness 
and  elated  by  their  smiles.  They  fancied  that 
to  be  noticed  by  them,  to  be  near  them,  to  serve 
them,  was  in  itself  a  kind  of  happiness  ;  and 
that  Frances  Burney  ought  to  be  full  of  grati 
tude  for  being  permitted  to  purchase,  by  the 
surrender  of  health,  wealth,  freedom,  domestic 
affection,  and  literary  fame,  the  privilege  of 
standing  behind  a  royal  chair,  and  holding  a 
pair  of  royal  gloves. 

And  who  can  blame  them  ?  Who  can  won 
der  that  princes  should  be  under  such  a  delu 
sion,  when  they  are  encouraged  in  it  by  the 
very  persons  who  suffer  from  it  most  cruelly! 
Was  it  to  be  expected  that  George  the  Third 
and  Queen  Charlotte  should  understand  the 
interest  of  Frances  Burney  better,  or  promote 
it  with  more  zeal,  than  herself  and  her  father? 
No  deception  was  practised.  The  conditions  of 
the  house  of  bondage  were  set  forth  with  all 
simplicity.  The  hook  was  presented  without 
a  bait;  the  net  was  spread  in  sight  of  the  bird. 
And  the  naked  hook  was  greedily  swallowed ; 
and  the  silly  bird  made  haste  to  entangle  her 
self  in  the  net. 

It  is  not  strange,  indeed,  that  an  invitation  to 
court  should  have  caused  a  fluttering  in  the 
bosom  of  an  inexperienced  woman.  But  it 
was  the  duty  of  the  parent  to  watch  over  the 
child,  and  to  show  her  that  on  the  one  side  were 
only  infantine  vanities  and  chimerical  hopes, 
on  the  other  liberty,  peace  of  mind,  affluence, 
social  enjoyments,  honourable  distinctions. 
Strange  to  say,  the  only  hesitation  was  on  the 
part  of  Frances.  Dr.  Burney  was  transported 
out  of  himself  with  delight.  Not  such  are  the 
raptures  of  a  Circassian  father  who  has  sold 
his  pretty  daughter  well  to  a  Turkish  slave- 
merchant.  Yet  Dr.  Burney  was  an  amiable 
man,  a  man  of  good  abilities,  a  man  who  had 
seen  much  of  the  world.  But  he  seems  to 
have  thought  that  going  to  court  was  like  going 
to  heaven  ;  that  to  see  princes  and  princesses 
was  a  kind  of  beatific  vision;  that  the  exqui 
site  felicity  enjoyed  by  royal  persons  was  not 
confined  to  themselves,  but  was  communicated 
by  some  mysterious  efflux  or  reflection  to  all 
who  were  suffered  to  stand  at  their  toilettes,  or 
to  bear  their  trains.  He  overruled  all  his 
daughter's  objections,  and  himself  escorted  her 
to  her  prison.  The  door  closed.  The  key  was 
turned.  She,  looking  back  with  tender  regret 
on  all  she  had  left,  and  forward  with  anxiety 
and  terror  to  the  new  life  on  which  she  was 
entering,  was  unable  to  speak  or  stand;  and 
he  went  on  his  way  homeward  rejoicing  in  her 
marvellous  prosperity. 

And  now  began  a  slavery  of  five  years,  oi 
five  years  taken  from  the  best  part  of  life,  and 
wasted  in  menial  drudgery,  or  in  recreations 
duller  than  even  menial  drudgery,  under  gall 
ing  restraints  and  amid  unfriendly  or  uninter- 


MADAME   D'ARBLAY. 


588 


asting  companions.  The  history  of  an  ordinary 
day  was  this:  Miss  Barney  had  to  rise  and 
dress  herself  early,  that  she  might  be  ready  to 
answer  the  royal  bell,  which  rung  at  half  after 
seven.  Till  about  eight  she  attended  in  the 
queen's  dressing-room,  and  had  the  honour  of 
lacing  her  august  mistress's  stays,  and  of  put 
ting  on  the  hoop,  gown,  and  neck-handkerchief. 
The  morning  was  chiefly  spent  in  rummaging 
drawers  and  laying  fine  clothes  in  their  proper 
places.  Then  the  queen  was  to  be  powdered 
and  dressed  for  the  day.  Twice  a  week  her 
majesty's  hair  was  curled  and  craped;  and 
this  operation  appears  to  have  added  a  full 
hour  to  the  business  of  the  toilette.  It  Avas 
generally  three  before  Miss  Burney  was  at 
liberty.  Then  she  had  two  hours  at  her  own 
disposal.  To  these  hours  we  owe  great  part 
of  her  Diary.  At  five  she  had  to  attend  her 
colleague,  Madame  Schwellenberg,  a  hateful 
old  toad-eater,  as  illiterate  as  a  chamber-maid, 
as  proud  as  a  whole  German  chapter;  rude, 
peevish,  unable  to  bear  solitude,  unable  to  con 
duct  herself  with  common  decency  in  society. 
With  this  delightful  associate  Frances  Burney 
had  to  dine,  and  pass  the  evening.  The  pair 
generally  remained  together  from  five  to  eleven  ; 
and  often  had  no  other  company  the  whole 
time,  except  during  the  hour  from  eight  to  nine, 
when  the  equerries  came  to  tea.  If  poor  Fran 
ces  attempted  to  escape  to  her  own  apartment, 
and  to  forget  her  wretchedness  over  a  book,  the 
execracle  old  woman  railed  and  stormed,  and 
complained  that  she  was  neglected.  Yet,  when 
Frances  stayed,  she  was  constantly  assailed 
with  insolent  reproaches.  Literary  fame  was, 
in  the  eyes  of  the  German  crone,  a  blemish,  a 
proof  that  the  person  who  enjoyed  it  was 
meanly  born,  and  out  of  the  pale  of  good  so 
ciety.  All  her  scanty  stock  of  broken  English 
was  employed  to  express  the  contempt  with 
which  she  "regarded  the  authoress  of  Evelina 
and  Cecilia.  Frances  detested  cards,  and  in 
deed  knew  nothing  about  them,  but  she  soon 
found  the  least  miserable  way  of  passing  an 
evening  with  Madame  Schwellenberg  was  at 
the  card-table,- and  consented  with  patient  sad 
ness  to  give  hours,  which  might  have  called 
forth  the  laughter  and  tears  of  many  genera 
tions,  to  the  king  of  clubs  and  the  knave  of 
spades.  Between  eleven  and  twelve  the  bell 
rang  again.  Miss  Burney  had  to  pass  twenty 
minutes  or  half  an  hour  undressing  the  queen, 
and  was  then  at  liberty  to  retire,  and  dream  that 
she  was  chatting  with  her  brother  by  the  quiet 
hearth  in  St.  Martin's  Street,  that  she  was  the 
centre  of  an  admiring  assemblage  at  Mrs. 
Crewe's,  that  Burke  was  calling  her  the  first 
woman  of  the  age,  or  that  Dilly  was  giving 
ner  a  check  for  two  thousand  guineas. 

Men,  we  must  suppose,  are  less  patient  than 
women ;  for  we  are  utterly  at  a  loss  to  conceive 
how  any  human  being  could  endure  such  a  life, 
while  there  remained  a  vacant  garret  in  Grubb 
Street,  a  crossing  in  want  of  a  sweeper,  a  parish 
workhouse,  or  a  parish  vault.  And  it  was  for 
such  a  life  that  Frances  Burney  had  given  up 
liberty  and  peace,  a  happy  fireside,  attached 
friends,  a  wide  and  splendid  circle  of  acquaint 
ance,  intellectual  pursuits  in  which  she  was 


qualified  to  excel,  and  the  sure  hope  of  what 
to  her  would  have  been  affluence. 

There  is  nothing  new  under  the  sun.  The 
last  great  master  of  Attic  eloquence  and  Attic 
wit,  has  left  us  a  forcible  and  touching  descrip 
tion  of  the  misery  of  a  man  of  letters,  who,  lured 
by  hopes  similar  to  those  of  Frances,  had  en 
tered  the  service  of  one  of  the  magnates  of 
Rome  :  "  Unhappy  that  I  am,"  cries  the  victim 
of  his  own  childish  ambition  :  "would  nothing 
content  me  but  that  I  must  leave  mine  old  pur 
suits  and  mine  old  companions,  and  the  life 
which  was  without  care,  and  the  sleep  which  had 
no  limit  save  mine  own  pleasure,  and  the  walks 
which  I  was  free  to  take  where  I  listed,  and 
fling  myself  into  the  lowest  pit  of  a  dungeon 
like  this  1  And,  O  God,  for  what"?  Is  this  the 
bait  which  enticed  me!  Was  there  noway 
by  which  I  might  have  enjoyed  in  freedom 
comforts  even  greater  than  those  which  I  now 
earn  by  servitude?  Like  a  lion  which  has 
been  made  so  tame  that  men  may  lead  him 
about  with  a  thread,  T  am  dragged  up  and 
down,  with  broken  and  humbled  spirit,  at  the 
heels  of  those  to  whom,  in  my  own  domain,  I 
should  have  been  an  object  of  awe  and  wonder. 
And,  worst  of  all,  I  feel  that  here  I  gain  no  cre 
dit,  that  here  I  give  no  pleasure.  The  talents 
and  accomplishments,  which  charmed  a  far 
different  circle,  are  here  out  of  place.  I  am 
rude  in  the  arts  of  palaces,  and  can  ill  bear 
comparison  with  those  whose  calling,  from 
their  youth  up,  has  been  to  flatter  and  to  sue. 
Have  I  then  two  lives,  that,  after  I  have  wasted 
one  in  the  service  of  others,  there  may  yet 
remain  to  me  a  second,  which  I  may  live  unto 
myself!" 

Now  and  then,  indeed,  events  occurred  which 
disturbed  the  wretched  monotony  of  Frances 
Burney's  life.  The  court  moved  from  Kew  to 
Windsor,  and  from  Windsor  back  to  Kew. 
One  dull  colonel  went  out  of  waiting,  and 
another  dull  colonel  came  into  waiting.  An 
impertinent  servant  made  a  blunder  about  tea, 
and  caused  a  misunderstanding  between  the 
gentlemen  and  the  ladies.  A  half-witted  French 
Protestant  minister  talked  oddly  about  conjugal 
fidelity.  An  unlucky  member  of  the  household 
mentioned  a  passage  in  the  Morning  Herald 
reflecting  on  the  queen,  and  forthwith  Madame 
Schwellenberg  began  to  storm  in  bad  English, 
and  told  him  that  he  had  made  her  "what  you 
call  perspire !" 

A  more  important  occurrence  was  the  royal 
visit  to  Oxford.  Miss  Burney  went  in  the 
queen's  train  to  Nuneham,  was  utterly  neg 
lected  there  in  the  crowd,  and  could  with  difii- 
ulty  find  a  servant  to  show  the  way  to  her 
bed-room,  or  a  hair-dresser  to  arrange  her 
curls.  She  had  the  honour  of  entering  Oxford 
in  the  last  of  a  long  string  of  carriages  which 
brmed  the  royal-procession,  of  walking  after 
the  queen  all  day  through  refectories  and  cha 
pels,  and  of  standing  half  dead  with  fatigue 
and  hunger,  while  her  august  mistress  was 
seated  at  an  excellent  cold  collation.  At  Mag 
dalene  College,  Frances  was  left  for  a  moment 
in  a  parlour,  where  she  sank  down  on  a  chair 
A  good-natured  equerry  saw  that  she  ~vas  ex 
lausted,  and  shared  with  her  some  apricota 


584 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


and  bread,  which  he  had  wisely  put  into  his  Hastings  with  a  presumptuous  ve'hemence  and 

pockets.     At   that  moment  the  door  opened  ;  acrimony  quite  inconsistent  with  the  modesty 

the  queen   entered;    the  wearied    attendants  and  suavity  of  her  ordinary  deportment.    She 

sprang  up;  the  bread  and  fruit  were  hastily  shudders  when  Burke  enters  the  Hall  at  the 

concealed.   "I  found,"  says  poor  Miss  Burney,  head  of  the  Commons.     She  pronounces  him 


"that  our  appetites  were  to  be  supposed  anni 
hilated,  at  the  same  moment  that  our  strengtl 
was  to  be  invincible." 

Yet  Oxford,  seen  even  under  such  disadvan 
tages,  "  revived  in  her,"  to  use  her  own  words 
"a  consciousness  to  pleasure  which  had  long 
lain  nearly  dormant."  She  forgot,  during  on* 
moment,  that  she  was  a  waiting-maid,  and  fel 
as  a  woman  of  true  genius  might  be  expectec 
to  feel  amid  venerable  remains  of  antiquity 
beautiful  works  of  art,  vast  repositories  of 
knowledge,  and  memorials  of  the  illustrious 
dead.  Had  she  still  been  what  she  was  before 
her  father  induced  her  to  take  the  most  fata 
step  of  her  life,  we  can  easily  imagine  what 
pleasure  she  would  have  derived  from  a  visit 
to  the  noblest  of  English  cities.  She  might, 
indeed,  have  been  forced  to  travel  in  a  hack- 
chaise,  and  might  not  have  worn  so  fine  a 
gown  of  Chambery  gauze  as  that  in  which  she 
tottered  after  the  royal  party;  but  with  what 
delight  would  she  then  have  paced  the  clois 
ters  of  Magdalene,  compared  the  antique  gloom 
of  Merton  with  the  splendour  of  Christ  Church, 
and  looked  down  from  the  dome  of  the  Rad- 
cliffe  Library  on  the  magnificent  sea  of  turrets 
and  battlements  below  !  How  gladly  would 
learned  men  have  laid  aside  for  a  few  hours 
Pindar's  Odes  and  Aristotle's  ethics  to  escort 
the  authoress  of  Cecilia  from  college  to  col 
lege?  What  neat  little  banquets  would  she 
have  found  set  out  in  their  monastic  cells? 
With  what  eagerness  would  pictures,  medals, 
and  illuminated  missals  have  been  brought 
forth  from  the  most  mysterious  cabinets  for 
her  amusement?  How'much  she  would  have 
had  to  hear  and  to  tell  about  Johnson  as  she 
•walked  over  Pembroke,  and  about  Reynolds  in 
the  ante-chapel  of  New  College!  But  these 
indulgences  were  not  for  one  who  had  sold 
herself  into  bondage. 

About  eighteen  months  after  the  visit  to  Ox 
ford,  another  event  diversified  the  wearisome 
life  which  Frances  led  at  court.  Warren 
Hastings  was  brought  to  the  bar  of  the  House 
ol  Peers.  The  queen  and  princesses  were 
present  when  the  trial  commenced,  and  Miss 
Burney  was  permitted  to  attend.  During  the 
subsequent  proceedings  a  day-rule  for  the  same 
purpose  was  occasionally  granted  to  her ;  for 
the  queen  took  the  strongest  interest  in  the 
trial,  and,  when  she  could  not  go  herself  to 
Westminster  Hall,  liked  to  receive  a  report  of 
what  passed  from  a  person  who  had  singular 
powers  of  observation,  and  who  was,  more 
over,  personally  acquainted  with  some  of  the 
most  distinguished  managers.  The  portion  of 
the  Diary  which  relates  to  this  celebrated  pro 
ceeding  is  lively  and  picturesque.  Yet  we 
read  it,  we  own,  with  pain;  for  it  seems  to  us 
to  prove  that  the  fine  understanding  of  Frances 
Burnev  was  beginning  to  feel  the  pernicious 
influence  of  a  mode  of  life  which  is  as  incom 
patible  with  health  of  mind  as  the  air  of  the 
Pomptine  marshes  is  with  health  of  body. 
From  the  first  day  she  espouses  the  cause  of 


the  cruel  oppressor  of  an  innocent  man.     She 
is  at  a  loss  to  conceive  how  the  managers  can 
look  at  the  defendant,  and  not  blush.     Wind- 
ham  comes  to  her  from  the  manager's  box  to 
offer  her  refreshment.    "But,"  says  she,   "I 
could  not  break  bread  with  him."  Then,  again, 
she  exclaims — "  Ah,  Mr.  Windham,  how  came 
you   ever  engaged  in  so   cruel,  so  unjust  a 
cause?"      "Mr.   Burke   saw  me,"   she   says, 
"and  he  bowed  with  the  most  marked  civility 
of  manner."     This,  be  it  observed,  was  just 
after  his  opening  speech,  a  speech  which  had 
produced  a  mighty  effect,  and  which  certainly 
no  other  orator  that  ever  lived  could   have 
made.     "My  curtsy,"  she  continues,  "  was  the 
most  ungrateful,  distant,  and  cold  ;  I  could  not 
do  otherwise ;  so  hurt  I  felt  to  see  him  at  the 
head  of  such  a  cause."     Now,  not  only  had 
Burke  treated  her  with  constant  kindness,  but 
the  very  last  act  which   he  performed  on  the 
day  on  which  he  was  turned  out  of  the  Pay- 
Office,  about  four  years  before  this  trial,  was 
to  make  Dr.  Burney  organist  of  Chelsea  Hos 
pital.    W7hen,  at  the  Westminster  election,  Dr. 
Burney  was  divided  between  his  gratitude  for 
this  favour  and  his  tory  opinions,  Burke  in  the 
noblest  manner  disclaimed  all  right  to  exact  a 
sacrifice  of  principle.     "You  have  little  or  no 
obligations  to  me,"  he  wrote;  "  but  if  you  had 
as  many  as  I  really  wish  it  were  in  my  power, 
as  it  certainly  is   my  desire,  to  lay  on  you,  I 
hope  you  do  not  think  me  capable  of  confer- 
ing  them,  in  order  to  subject  your  mind  or 
your  affairs  to  a  painful  and  mischievous  ser 
vitude."  Was  this  a  man  to  be  uncivilly  treated 
a  daughter  of  Dr.  Burney,  because    she 
chose  to  differ  from  him  respecting  a  vast  and 
mist  complicated  question,  which  he  had  stu 
died  deeply  during  many  years,  and  which  she 
lad  never  studied  at  all  ?  It  is  clear  from  Miss 
Burney's   own   statement,  that  when  she  be- 
laved  so  unkindly  to  Mr.  Burke,  she  did  not 
even  know  of   what  Hastings  was   accused. 
One  thing,  however,  she   must   have  known, 
hat  Burke  had  been  able  to  convince  a  House 
of  Commons,  bitterly  prejudiced  against  him, 
hat  the  charges  were  well-founded;  and  that 
3itt  and  Dundas  had  concurred  with  Fox  and 
Sheridan    in     supporting    the    impeachment. 
Surely  a  woman  of  far  inferior  abilities  to 
Vliss  Burney  might  have  been  expected  to  see 
hat  this  never  could  have  happened  unless 
here  had  been  a  strong  case  against  the  late 
governor-general.     And  there  was,  as  all  rea- 
onable  men  now  admit,  a  strong  case  against 
dm.     That  there  were  great  public  services  to 
)e  set  off  against  his  great  crimes,  is  perfectly 
rue.    But  his  services  and  his  crimes  were 
qually  unknown  to  the  lady  who  so  confidently 
asserted  his  perfect  innocence,  and  imputed  to 
is  accusers,  that  is  to  say,  to  all  the  greatest 
nen  of  all  parties  in  the   state,  not  merely 
rror,  but  gross  injustice  and  barbarity. 

She  had,  it  is  true,  occasionally  seen  Mr, 
Hastings,  and  had  found  his  manners  and  con- 
versation  agreeable.  But  surely  she  could  not 


MADAME   D'ARBLAY. 


585 


be  so  weak  as  to  infer  from  the  gentleness  of 
his  deportment  in  a  drawing-room  that  he  was 
incapable  of  committing  a  great  state  crime, 
under  the  influence  of  ambition  and  revenge. 
A  silly  Miss,  fresh  from  a  boarding-school, 
might  fall  into  such  a  mistake;  but  the  woman 
who  had  drawn  the  character  of  Mr.  Monck- 
ton  should  have  known  better. 

The  truth  is,  that  she  had  been  too  long  at 
court.  She  was  sinking  into  a  slavery  worse 
than  that  of  the  body.  The  iron  was  beginning 
to  enter  into  the  soul.  Accustomed  during 
many  months  to  watch  the  eye  of  a  mistress, 
to  receive  with  boundless  gratitude  the  slightest 
markatroyal  condescension,  to  feel  wretched 
at  eve^symptom  of  royal  displeasure,  to  asso 
ciate  only  with  spirits  long  tamed  and  broken 
in,  she  was  degenerating  into  something  fit  for 
her  place.  Queen  Charlotte  was  a  violent  par 
tisan  of  Hastings;  had  received  presents  from 
him,  and  had  so  far  departed  from  the  severity 
of  her  virtue  as  to  lend  her  countenance  to  his 
wife,  whose  conduct  had  certainly  been  as  re 
prehensible  as  that  of  any  of  the  frail  beauties 
who  were  then  rigidly  excluded  from  the  Eng 
lish  court.  The  king,  it  was  well  known, 
took  the  same  side.  To  the  king  and  queen 
all  the  members  of  the  household  looked  sub 
missively  for  guidance.  The  impeachment, 
therefore,  was  an  atrocious  persecution  ;  the 
managers  were  rascals;  the  defendant  was  the 
most  deserving  and  the  worst  used  man  in  the 
kingdom.  This  was  the  cant  of  the  whole 
palace,  from  gold  stick  in  waiting,  down  to  the 
table-deckers  and  yeomen  of  the  silver  scul 
lery;  ami  Miss  Burney  canted  like  the  rest, 
though  in  livelier  tones,  and  with  less  bitter 
feelings. 

The  account  which  she  has  given  of  the 
king's  illness,  contains  much  excellent  narra 
tive  and  description,  and  will,  we  think,  be 
more  valued  by  the  historians  of  a  future  age 
than  any  equal  portion  of  Pepy's  or  Evelyn's 
Diaries.  That  account  shows,  also,  how  affec 
tionate  and  compassionate  her  nature  was. 
But  it  shows  also,  we  must  say,  that  her  way 
of  life  was  rapidly  impairing  her  powers  of 
reasoning,  and  her  sense  of  justice.  We  do 
not  mean  to  discuss,  in  this  place,  the  question, 
whether  the  views  of  Mr.  Pitt  or  those  of  Mr. 
Fox  respecting  the  regency  were  the  more  cor 
rect.  It  is,  indeed,  quite  needless  to  discuss 
that  question  :  for  the  censure  of  Miss  Burney 
falls  alike  on  Pitt  and  Fox,  on  majority  and 
minority.  She  is  angry  with  the  House  of 
Commons  for  presuming  to  inquire  whether 
the  king  was  mad  or  not,  and  whether  there 
was  a  chance  of  him  recovering  his  senses. 
«A  melancholy  day,"  she  writes;  "news  bad 
both  at  home  and  abroad.  At  home  the  dear 
unhappy  king  still  worse;  abroad  new  exam 
inations  voted  of  the  physicians.  Good  hea 
vens  !  what  an  insult  does  this  seem  from  par 
liamentary  power,  to  investigate  and  bring 
forth  to  the  world  every  circumstance  of  such 
a  malady  as  is  ever  held  sacred  to  secrecy  in 
the  most  private  families  !  How  indignant  we 
all  feel  here  no  words  can  say."  It  is  proper 
to  observe,  that  the  motion  which  roused  all 
this  indignation  at  Kew  was  made  by  Mr.  Pitt 
himself;  and  that,  if  withstood  by  Mr.  Pitt,  it 

Yoi.  V.-74 


would  certainjy  have  been  rejected.  We  see, 
therefore,  that  the  loyalty  of  the  minister,  who 
was  then  generally  regarded  as  the  most  heroic 
champion  of  his  prince,  was  lukewarm,  indeed, 
when  compared  with  the  boiling  zeal  which 
filled  the  pages  of  the  back-stairs  and  the  wo 
men  of  the  bed-chamber.  Of  the  regency  bill, 
Pitt's  own  bill,  Miss  Burney  speaks  with  hor 
ror.  "  I  shuddered,"  she  says,  "  to  hear  it 
named."  And  again — "  0,  how  dreadful  will 
be  the  day  when  that  unhappy  bill  takes  place  » 
I  cannot  approve  the  plan  of  it."  The  truth 
is,  that  Mr.  Pitt,  whether  a  M  se  and  upright 
statesman  or  not,  was  a  statesman  ;  and  what 
ever  motives  he  might  have  for  imposing  re 
strictions  on  the  regent,  felt  that  in  some  way 
or  other  there  must  be  some  provision  made 
for  the  execution  of  some  part  of  the  kingly 
office,  or  that  no  government  would  be  left  in 
the  country.  But  this  was  a  matter  of  which 
the  household  never  thought.  It  never  occurred, 
as  far  as  we  can  see,  to  the  exons  and  keepers 
of  the  robes,  that  it  was  necessary  that  there 
should  be  somewhere  or  other  a  power  in  the 
state  to  pass  laws,  to  preserve  order,  to  pardon 
criminals,  to  fill  up  offices,  to  negotiate  with 
foreign  governments,  to  command  the  army 
and  navy.  Nay,  these  enlightened  politicians, 
and  Miss  Burney  among  ihe  rest,  seem  to  have 
thought  that  any  person  who  considered  the 
subject  with  reference  to  the  public  interest, 
showed  himself  to  be  a  bad-hearted  man.  No 
body  wonders  at  this  in  a  gentleman-usher; 
but  it  is  melancholy  to  see  genius  sinking  into 
such  debasement. 

During  more  than  two  years  after  ihe  king's 
recovery,  Frances  dragged  on  a  miserable  ex 
istence  at  the  palace.  The  consolations  which 
had  for  a  time  mitigated  the  wretchedness  of 
servitude,  Avere  one  by  one  withdrawn.  Mrs. 
Delany,  whose  society  had  been  a  great  re 
source  when  the  court  was  at  Windsor,  was 
now  dead.  One  of  the  gentlemen  at  the  royal 
establishment,  Colonel  Digby,  appears  to  have 
been  a  man  of  sense,  of  taste,  of  some  read 
ing,  and  of  prepossessing  manners.  Agreeable 
associates  were  scarce  in  the  prison-house,  and 
he  and  Miss  Burney  were  therefore  naturally 
attached  to  each  other.  She  owns  that  she 
valued  him  as  a  friend  ;  and  it  would  not  have 
been  strange  if  his  attentions  had  led  her  t& 
entertain  for  him  a  sentiment  warmer  than 
friendship.  He  quitted  the  court,  and  married 
in  a  way  which  astonished  Miss  Burney  greatly, 
and  which  evidently  wounded  her  feelings,  and 
lowered  him  more  in  her  esteem.  The  palace 
s:rew  duller  and  duller;  Madame  Schwelleu 
berg  became  more  and  more  savage  and  inso 
lent.  And  now  the  health  of  poor  Frances 
began  to  give  way  ;  and  all  who  saw  her  pale 
face,  her  emaciated  fisure,  and  her  feeble  walk, 
predicted  that  her  sufferings  would  soon  be  over. 

Frances  uniformly  speaks  of  her  royal  mis 
tress  and  of  the  princesses  with  respect  and 
affection.  The  princesses  seem  to  have  well 
deserved  all  the  praise  which  is  bestowed  on 
them  in  the  Diary.  They  were,  we  doubt  not, 
most  amiable  women.  But  "the  sweet  q^een," 
as  she  is  constantly  called  in  these  volumes,  is 
not  by  any  means  an  object  of  admiration  to 
us.  She  had  undoubtedly  sense  enough  te 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


know  what  kind  of  deportment  suited  her  high 
station,  and  self-command  enough  to  maintain 
that  deportment  invariably.  She  was,  in  her 
intercourse  with  Miss  Burney,  generally  gra 
cious  and  affable,  sometimes,  when  displeased, 
cold  and  reserved,  but  never,  under  any  cir 
cumstances,  rude,  peevish,  or  violent.  She 
knew  how  to  dispense,  gracefully  and  skillfully, 
those  little  civilities  which,  when  paid  by  a 
sovereign,  are  prized  at  many  times  their  in 
trinsic  value;  how  to  pay  a  compliment;  how 
to  lend  a  book ;  how  to  ask  after  a  relation. 
But  she  seems  to  have  been  utterly  regardless 
of  the  comfort,  the  health,  the  life  of  her  at 
tendants,  when  her  own  convenience  was  con 
cerned.  Weak,  feverish,  hardly  able  to  stand, 
Frances  had  still  to  rise  before  seven,  in  order 
to  dress  the  sweet  queen,  and  sit  up  till  mid 
night,  in  order  to  undress  the  sweet  queen. 
The  indisposition  of  the  handmaid  could  not, 
and  did  not,  escape  the  notice  of  her  royal 
mistress.  But  the  established  doctrine  of  the 
court  was,  that  all  sickness  was  to  be  con 
sidered  as  a  pretence  until  it  proved  fatal.  The 
only  way  in  which  the  invalid  could  clear  her 
self  from  suspicion  of  malingering,  as  it  is 
called  in  the  army,  was  to  go  on  lacing  and 
unlacing  till  she  dropped  down  dead  at  the 
royal  feet.  "This,"  Miss  Burney  wrote,  when 
she  was  suffering  cruelly  from  sickness,  watch 
ing,  and  labour,  "  is  by  no  means  from  hardness 
of  heart;  far  otherwise.  There  is  no  hardness 
Df  heart  in  any  one  of  them  ;  but  it  is  preju 
dice,  and  want  of  personal  experience." 

Many  strangers  sympathized  with  the  bodily 
and  mental  sufferings  of  this  distinguished 
woman.  All  who  saw  her  saw  that  her  frame 
was  sinking,  that  her  heart  was  breaking.  The 
last,  it  should  seem,  to  observe  the  change  was 
her  father.  At  length,  in  spite  of  himself,  his 
eyes  were  opened.  In  May  1790,  his  daughter 
had  an  interview  of  three  hours  with  him,  the 
only  long  interview  which  they  had  since  he 
took  her  to  Windsor  in  1786.  She  told  him 
that  she  was  miserable,  that  she  was  worn 
with  attendance  and  want  of  sleep,  that  she 
had  no  comfort  in  life,  nothing  to  love,  nothing 
to  hope,  that  her  family  and  friends  were  to  her 
as  though  they  were  not,  and  were  remembered 
by  her  as  men  remember  the  dead.  From 
daybreak  to  midnight  the  same  killing  labour, 
the  same  recreations,  more  hateful  than  labour 
itself,  followed  each  other  without  variety, 
without  any  interval  of  liberty  and  repose. 

The  doctor  was  greatly  dejected  by  this 
news;  but  was  too  good-natured  a  man  not  to 
say  that,  if  she  wished  to  resign,  his  house  and 
arms  were  open  to  her.  Still,  however,  he 
could  not  bear  to  remove  her  from  the  court. 
His  veneration  for  royalty  amounted,  in  truth, 
to  idolatry.  It  can  be  compared  only  to  the 
grovelling  superstition  of  those  Syrian  devo 
tees  who  made  their  children  pass  through  the 
fire  to  Moloch.  When  he  induced  his  daughter 
to  accept  the  place  of  keeper  of  the  robes,  he 
entertained,  as  she  tells  us,  a  hope  that  some 
worldly  advantage  or  other,  not  set  down  in  the 
contract  of  service,  would  be  the  result  of  her 
connection  wifL  the  court.  What  advantage 
he  expected  we  do  not  know,  nor  did  he  proba- 
Hy  know  himself.  But,  whatever  he  expected, 


he  certainly  got  nothing.  Miss  Burney  had 
been  hired  for  board,  lodging,  and  two  hundred 
a  year.  Board,  lodging,  and  two  hundred  a 
year  she  had  duly  received.  WTe  have  looked 
carefully  through  She  Diary,  in  the  hope  of 
finding  some  trace  of  those  extraordinary  be- 
nefactions  on  which  the  doctor  reckoned.  But 
we  can  discover  only  a  promise,  never  per 
formed,  of  a  gown;  and  for  this  promise  Miss 
Burney  was  expected  to  return  thanks  such  as 
might  have  suited  the  beggar  with  whom  St. 
Martin,  in  the  legend,  divided  his  cloak.  The 
experience  uf  four  years  was,  however,  insuffi 
cient  to  dispel  the  illusion  which  had  taken 
possession  of  the  doctor's  mind ;  andJichveen 
the  dear  father  and  the  sweet  qu^P  there 
seemed  to  be  little  doubt  that  some  day  or  other 
Frances  would  drop  down  a  corpse.  Six 
months  had  elapsed  since  the  interview  be 
tween  the  parent  and  the  daughter.  The  resig 
nation  was  not  sent  in.  The  sufferer  grew 
worse  and  worse.  She  took  bark  ;  but  it  soon 
ceased  to  produce  a  beneficial  effect.  She  was 
stimulated  with  wine ;  she  was  soothed  with 
opium,  but  in  vain.  Her  breath  began  to  fail. 
The  whisper  that  she  was  in  a  decline  spread 
through  the  court.  The  pains  in  her  side  be 
came  so  severe  that  she  was  forced  to  crawl 
from  the  card-table  of  the  old  fury  to  whom 
she  was  tethered,  three  or  four  times  in  an 
evening,  for  the  purpose  of  taking  hartshorn. 
Had  she  been  a  negro  slave,  a  humane  planter 
would  have  excused  her  from  work.  But  her 
majesty  showed  no  mercy.  Thrice  a  day  the 
accursed  bell  still  rang;  the  queen  was  still  to 
be  dressed  for  the  morning  at  seven,  and  to  be 
dressed  for  the  day  at  noon,  and  to  be  undressed 
at  eleven  at  night. 

But  there  had  arisen  in  literary  and  fashion 
able  society,  a  general  feeling  of  compassion 
for  Miss  Burney,  and  of  indignation  both 
against  her  father  and  the  queen.  "Is  it  pos 
sible,"  said  a  great  French  lady  to  the  doctor, 
"  that  your  daughter  is  in  a  situation  where  she 
is  never  allowed  a  holiday  1"  Horace  Wai- 
pole  wrote  to  Frances  to  express  his  sympathy. 
Boswell,  boiling  over  with  good-natured  rage, 
almost  forced  an  entrance  into  the  palace  to 
see  her.  "  My  dear  ma'am,  why  do  you  stay  1 
It  won't  do,  ma'am  ;  you  must  resign.  We 
can  put  up  with  it  no  longer.  Some  very  vio 
lent  measures,  I  assure  you,  will  be  taken. 
We  shall  address  Dr.  Burney  in  a  body." 
Burke  and  Reynolds,  though  less  noisy,  were 
zealous  in  the  same  cause.  Windham  spoke 
to  Dr.  Burney;  but  found  him  still  irresolute. 
"I  will  set  the  Literary  Club  upon  him,"  cried 
Windham  ,  k'  Miss  Burney  has  some  very  true 
admirers  there,  and  I  am  sure  they  will  eagerly 
assist."  Indeed,  the  Burney  family  seems  to 
have  been  apprehensive  that  some  public 
affront,  such  as  the  doctor's  unpardonable  folly, 
to  use  the  mildest  term,  had  richly  deserved, 
would  be  put  upon  him.  The  medical  men 
spoke  out,  and  plainly  told  him  that  his  daugh 
ter  must  resign  or  die. 

At  last  paternal  affection,  medical  authority, 
and  the  voice  of  all  London  crying  shame, 
triumphed  over  Dr.  Burney's  love  of  courts. 
He  determined  that  Frances  should  write  a 
letter  of  resignation.  It  was  with  difficulty 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


587 


;hat,  though  her  life  was  at  stake,  she  mustered 
spirit  to  put  the  paper  into  the  queen's  hands 
"I  could  not,"  so  runs  the  Diary,  "summon 
courage  to  present  my  memorial — my  heart 
always  failed  me  from  seeing  the  queen's  en 
tire  freedom  from  such  an  expectation.  For 
though  I  was  frequently  so  ill  in  her  presence 
that  I  could  hardly  stand,  I  saw  she  concluded 
me,  while  life  remained,  inevitably  hers." 

At  last  with  a  trembling  hand  the  paper  was 
delivered.    Then  came  the  storm.    Juno,  as  in 
the  ^Eneid,  delegated  the  work  of  vengeance 
to  Alecto.     The  queen  was  calm  and  gentle ; 
but  Madame  Schwellenberg  raved  like  a  ma 
niac  in  the  incurable  ward  of  Bedlam.     Such 
insolence  !      Such  ingratitude  !      Such  folly  ! 
Would  Miss  Burney  bring  utter  destruction  on 
herself  and  her  family  1     Would  she  throw 
away  the  inestimable  advantage  of  royal  pro 
tection]      Would    she    part  with    privileges 
I    which,  once  relinquished,  could  never  be  re 
gained  1     It  was  idle  to  talk  of  health  and  life. 
If  people  could  not  live  in  the  palace,  the  best 
thing  that  could  befall  them  was  to  die  in  it. 
!   The  resignation  was  not  accepted.     The  lan- 
;   guage  of  the  medical  men  became  stronger  and 
;   stronger.     Dr.  Burney's  parental  fears  were 
fully  roused;  and  he  explicitly  declared,  in  a 
i  letter  meant  to  be  shown  to  the  queen,  that  his 
daughter    must   retire.      The    Schwellenberg 
:  raged  like  a  wild-cat.     "  A  scene  almost  horri- 
j  ble  ensued,"  says  Miss  Burney.     "  She  was  too 
i  much  enraged  for  disguise,  and  uttered  the 
j  most  furious  expressions  of  indignant  contempt 
at  our  proceedings.      I  am   sure   she   would 
gladly  have  confined  us  both  in  the  Bastile, 
had  England  such  a  misery,  as  a  fit  place  to 
bring  us  tc  ourselves,  from  a  daring  so  out 
rageous  against  imperial  wishes."     This  pas 
sage  deserves  notice,  as  being  the  only  one  in 
the  Diary,  as   far  as  we  have  observed,  which 
shows  Miss  Burney  to  have  been  aware  that 
she  was  a  native  of  a  free  country,  that  she 
i  could  not  be  pressed  fora  waiting-maid  against 
her  will,  and  that  she  had  just  as  good  a  right 
to  live,  if  she  chose,  in  St.  Martin's  street,  as 
:  Queen  Charlotte  had  to  live  at  St.  James's. 

The   queen  promised    that,   after  the   next 
:  birth-day,  Miss  Burney  should  be  set  at  liberty. 
1  But  the  promise  was  ill  kept ;  and  her  majesty 
showed  displeasure  at  being  reminded  of  it. 
At  length  Frances  was  informed  that  in  a  fort 
night  her  attendance  should  cease.     "  I  heard 
this,"  she  says,  "  with  a  fearful  presentiment 
I  should  surely  never  go  through  another  fort- 
i  night,  in  so  weak  and  languishing  and  painful 
J  a  state  of  health.  .  .  .  As  the  time  of  separation 
I  approached,  the  queen's  cordiality  rather  di 
minished,  and  traces  of  internal  displeasure 
appeared,  sometimes  arising  from  an  opinion  I 
|  ought  rather  to  have  struggled  on,  live  or  die, 
than  to  quit  her.     Yet  I  am  sure  she  saw  how 
poor  was  my  own  chance,  except  by  a  change 
in  the  mode  of  life,  and  at  least  ceased  to  won 
der,  though  she  could  not  approve."     Sweet 
queen !      What  noble  candour  to  admit  that 
the  undutifulness  of  people  who  did  not  think 
the  honour  of  adjusting  her  tuckers  worth  the 
sacrifice  of  their  own  lives,  was,  though  highly 
criminal,  not  altogether  unnatural ! 

We  perfectly  understand  her  majesty's  con 


tempt  for  the  lives  of  others  where  her  own 
pleasure  was  concerned.  But  what  pleasure 
she  can  have  found  in  having  Miss  Burney 
about  her,  it  is  not  so  easy  to  comprehend.  That 
Miss  Burney  was  an  eminently  skilful  keeper 
of  the  robes  is  not  very  probable.  Few  wo 
men,  indeed,  had  paid  less  attention  to  dress. 
Now  and  then,  in  the  course  of  five  years,  she 
had  been  asked  to  read  aloud  or  to  write  a 
copy  of  verses.  But  better  readers  might 
easily  have  been  found :  and  her  verses  were 
worse  than  even  the  poet-laureate's  birth-day 
odes.  Perhaps  that  economy  which  was  among 
her  majesty's  most  conspicuous  virtues,  had 
something  to  do  with  her  conduct  on  this  occa 
sion.  Miss  Burney  had  never  hinted  that  she 
expected  a  retiring  pension  ;  and  indeed  would 
gladly  have  given  the  little  that  she  had  for 
freedom.  But  her  majesty  knew  what  the 
public  thought,  and  what  became  her  dignity. 
She  could  not  for  very  shame  suffer  a  woman 
of  distinguished  genius,  who  had  quitted  a  lu 
crative  career  to  wait  on  her,  who  had  served 
her  faithfully  for  a  pittance  during  five  years, 
and  whose  constitution  had  been  impaired  by 
labour  and  watching,  to  leave  the  court  without 
some  mark  of  royal  liberality.  George  the 
Third,  who,  on  all  occasions  where  Miss  Bur 
ney  was  concerned,  seems  to  have  behaved 
like  an  honest,  good-natured  gentleman,  felt 
this,  and  said  plainly  that  she  was  entitled  to  a 
provision.  At  length,  in  return  for  all  the 
misery  which  she  had  undergone,  and  for  the 
health  which  she  had  sacrificed,  an  annuity  of 
one  hundred  pounds  was  granted  to  her,  de 
pendent  on  the  queen's  pleasure. 

Then  the  prison  was  opened,  and  Frances 
was  free  once  more.  Johnson,  as  Burke  ob 
served,  might  have  added  a  striking  page  to 
his  poem  on  the  Vanity  of  Human  Wishes,  if 
he  had  lived  to  see  his  little  Burney  as  she 
went  into  the  palace  and  as  she  came  out  of  it. 

The  pleasures,  so  long  untasted,  of  liberty, 
of  friendship,  of  domestic  affection,  were  al 
most  too  acute  for  her  shattered  frame.  But 
happy  days  and  tranquil  nights  soon  restored 
the  health  which  the  queen's  toilette  and  Ma 
dame  Schwellenberg's  card-table  had  impaired. 
Kind  and  anxious  faces  surrounded  the  invalid. 
Conversation  the  most  polished  and  brilliant 
revived  her  spirits.  Travelling  was  recom 
mended  to  her;  and  she  rambled  by  easy  jour 
neys  from  cathedral  to  cathedral,  and  from 
watering-place  to  watering-place.  She  crossed 
the  New  Forest,  and  visited  Stonehenge  and 
Wilton,  the  cliffs  of  Lyme,  and  the  beautiful 
valley  of  Sidmouth.  Thence  she  journeyed 
by  Powderham  Castle,  and  by  the  ruins  of 
Glastonbury  Abbey,  to  Bath,  and  from  Bath 
when  the  winter  was  approaching,  returned 
well  and  cheerful  to  London.  There  she  visited 
her  old  dungeon,  and  found  her  successor  al 
ready  far  on  the  way  to  the  grave,  and  kept  to 
strict  duty,  from  morning  till  midnight,  with  a 
sprained  ankle  and  a  nervous  fever. 

At  this  time  England  swarmed  with  French 
exiles,  driven  from  their  country  by  the  Revo 
lution.  A  colony  of  these  refugees  settled  at 
Juniper  Hall,  in  Surrey,  not  far  from  Norbury 
Park,  where  Mr.  Lock,  an  intimate  friend  of 
the  Barney  family  resided.  Frances  visited 


588 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Norbury,  and  was  introduced  to  the  strangers. 
She  had  strong  prejudices  against  them;  for 
her  toryism  was  far  beyond,  we  do  not  say  that 
of  Mr.  Pitt,  but  that  of  Mr.  Reeves;  and  the 
inmates  of  Juniper  Hall  were  all  attached  to 
the  constitution  of  1791,  and  were  therefore 
more  detested  by  the  royalists  of  the  first  emi 
gration  than  Petion  or  Marat.  But  such  a 
woman  as  Miss  Barney  could  not  long  resist 
the  fascination  of  that  remarkable  society. 
She  had  lived  with  Johnson  and  Windham, 
with  Mrs.  Montague  and  Mrs.  Thrale.  Yet  she 
was  forced  to  own  that  she  had  never  heard 
conversation  before.  The  most  animated 
eloquence,  the  keenest  observation,  the  most 
sparkling  wit,  the  most  courtly  grace,  were 
united  to  charm  her.  For  Madame  de  Stael 
was  there,  and  M.  de  Talleyrand.  There,  too, 
was  M.  de  Narbonne,  a  noble  representative  of 
French  aristocracy;  and  with  M.  de  Narbonne 
was  his  friend  and  follower,  General  D'Arblay, 
an  honourable  and  amiable  man,  with  a  hand 
some  per?  jn,  frank,  soldier-like  manners,  and 
some  taste  for  letters. 

The  prejudices  which  Frances  had  conceived 
against  the  constitutional  royalists  of  France 
rapidly  vanished.  She  listened  with  rapture 
to  Talleyrand  arid  Madame  de  Stael,  joined 
with  M.  D'Arblay  in  execrating  the  Jacobins, 
and  in  weeping  for  the  unhappy  Bourbons, 
took  French  lessons  from  him,  fell  in  love  with 
hijan,  and  married  him  on  no  better  provision 
than  a  precarious  annuity  of  one  hundred 
pounds. 

Here  the  Diary  stops  for  the  present.  We 
will,  therefore,  bring  our  narrative  to  a  speedy 
close,  by  rapidly  recounting  the  most  impor 
tant  events  which  we  know  to  have  befallen 
Madame  D'Arblay  during  the  latter  part  of  her 
life. 

M.  D'Arblay's  fortune  had  perished  in  the 
general  wreck  of  the  French  Revolution  ;  and 
in  a  foreign  country  his  talents,  whatever  they 
may  have  been,  could  scarcely  make  him  rich. 
The  task  of  providing  for  the  family  devolved 
on  his  wife.  In  the  year  1796,  she  published 
by  subscription  her  third  novel,  Camilla.  It 
was  impatiently  expected  by  the  public  ;  and 
the  sum  which  she  obtained  by  it  was,  we  be 
lieve,  greater  than  had  ever  at  that  time  been 
received  for  a  novel.  We  have  heard  that  she 
cleared  more  than  three  thousand  guineas. 
But  we  give  this  merely  as  a  rumour.  Camil 
la,  however,  never  attained  popularity  like  that 
which  Evelina  and  Cecilia  had  enjoyed;  and 
it  must  be  allowed  that  there  was  a  perceptible 
falling  off,  not  indeed  in  humour,  or  in  power 
of  portraying  character,  but  in  grace  and  pu 
rity  of  style. 

We  have  heard  that,  about  this  time,  a  tragedy 
by  Madame  D'Arblay  was  performed  without 
success.  We  do  not  know  whether  it  was  ever 
printed  ;  nor  indeed  have  we  had  time  to  make 
any  researches  into  its  history  or  merits. 

During  the  short  time  which  followed  the 
treaty  of  Amiens,  M.  D'Arblay  visited  France. 
LauristonandLaFayette  represented  his  claims 
to  the  French  government,  and  obtained  a  pro 
mise  that  he  should  be  reinstated  in  his  military 
rank.  M.  D'Arblay,  however,  insisted  that  he 
sliould  never  be  required  to  serve  against  the 


countrymen  of  his  wife.  The  First  Consul,  of 
course,  would  not  hear  of  such  a  condition' 
and  ordered  the  general's  commission  to  be  in 
stantly  revoked. 

Madame  D'Arblay  joined  her  husband  at 
Paris  a  short  time  before  the  war  of  It03  broke 
out;  and  remained  in  France  ten  years,  cut  off 
from  almost  all  intercourse  with  the  land  of  her 
birth.  At  length,  when  Napoleon  was  on  his 
march  to  Moscow,  she  with  great  difficulty  ob 
tained  from  his  ministers  permission  to  visit 
her  own  country,  in  company  with  her  son, 
who  was  a  native  of  England.  She  returned 
in  time  to  receive  the  last  blessing  of  her  father, 
who  died  in  his  eighty-seventh  year.  In  1814 
she  published  her  last  novel,  The  Wanderer,  a 
book  which  no  judicious  friend  to  her  memory 
will  attempt  to  draw  from  the  oblivion  into 
which  it  has  justly  fallen.  In  the  same  year 
her  son  Alexander  was  sent  to  Cambridge.  He 
obtained  an  honourable  place  among  the  wran 
glers  of  his  year,  and  was  elected  a  fellow  of 
Christ's  College.  But  his  reputation  at  the 
University  was  higher  than  might  be  inferred 
from  his  academical  contests.  His  French 
education  had  not  fitted  him  for  the  examina 
tions  of  the  Senate-House;  but  in  pure  mathe 
matics,  we  have  been  assured  by  some  of  his 
competitors  that  he  had  very  few  equals.  He 
went  into  the  church,  and  it  was  thought  likely 
that  he  would  attain  high  eminence  as  a  preach 
er  ;  but  he  died  before  his  mother.  All  that  we 
have  heard  of  him  leads  us  to  believe  that  he 
was  such  a  son  as  such  a  mother  deserved  to 
have.  In  1832,  Madame  D'Arblay  published 
the  "  Memoirs  of  her  Father,"  and,  on  the  6th 
of  January,  1840,  she  died,  in  her  eighty-eighth 
year. 

We  now  turn  from  the  life  of  Madame 
D'Arblay  to  her  writings.  There  can,  we  ap 
prehend,  be  little  difference  of  opinion  as  to 
the  nature  of  her  merit,  whatever  differences 
may  exist  as  to  its  degree.  She  was  emphati 
cally  what  Johnson  called  her,  a  character- 
monger.  It  was  in  the  exhibition  of  human 
passions  and  whims  that  her  strength  lay  ;  and 
in  this  department  of  art  she  had,  we  think, 
very  distinguished  skill. 

But  in  order  that  we  may,  according  to  our 
duty  as  kings-at-arms,  versed  in  the  laws  of 
literary  precedence,  marshal  her  to  the  exact 
seat  in  which  she  is  entitled,  we  must  carry  our 
examination  somewhat  further. 

There  is,  in  one  respect,  a  remarkable  ana 
logy  between  the  faces  and  the  minds  of  men. 
No  two  faces  are  alike  ;  and  yet  very  few  faces 
deviate  very  widely  from  the  common  standard. 
Among  the  eighteen  hundred  thousand  human 
beings  who  inhabit  London,  there  is  not  one 
who  could  be  taken  by  his  acquaintance  for* 
another ;  yet  we  may  walk  from  Paddington  to 
Mile-end  without  seeing  one  person  in  whom 
any  feature  is  so  overcharged  that  we  turn 
around  to  stare  at  it.  An  infinite  number  of 
varieties  lies  between  limits  which  are  not  very 
far  asunder.  The  specimens  which  pass  those 
limits  on  either  side,  form  a  very  small  mino 
rity. 

It  is  the  same  with  the  characters  of  men. 
Here,  too,  the  variety  passes  all  enumeration. 
But  the  cases  in  which  the  deviation  from  the 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


589 


common  standard  is  striking  and  grotesque,  are 
very  few.  In  one  mind  avarice  predominates  ; 
in  another,  pride ;  in  a  third,  love  of  pleasure 
— just  as  in  one  countenance  the  nose  is  the 
most  marked  feature,  while  in  others  the  chief 
expression  lies  in  the  brow,  or  in  the  lines  of 
the  mouth.  Bvit  there  are  very  few  counte 
nances  in  which  nose,  brow,  and  mouth  do  not 
contribute,  though  in  unequal  degrees,  to  the 
general  effect ;  and  so  there  are  few  characters 
in  which  one  over-grown  propensity  makes  all 
others  utterly  insignificant. 

It  is  evident  that  a  portrait-painter,  who  was 
able  only  to  represent  faces  and  figures  such  as 
those  whirh  we  pay  money  to  see  at  fairs, 
would  not,  however  spirited  his  execution 
might  be,  take  rank  among  the  highest  artists. 
He  must  always  be  placed  below  those  who 
have  the  skill  to  seize  peculiarities  which  do 
not  amount  to  deformity.  The  slighter  those 
peculiarities  the  greater  is  the  merit  of  the 
lirnner  who  can  catch  them  and  transfer  them 
to  his  canvass.  To  paint  Daniel  Lambert  or 
the  Living  Skeleton,  the  Pig-faced  lady  or  the 
Siamese  Twins,  so  that  nobody  can  mistake 
them,  is  an  exploit  within  the  reach  of  a  sign- 
painter.  A  third-rate  artist  might  give  us  the 
squint  of  Wilkes,  and  the  depressed  nose  and 
protuberant  cheeks  of  Gibbon.  It  would  re 
quire  a  much  higher  degree  of  skill  to  paint 
two  such  men  as  Mr.  Canning  and  Sir  Thomas 
Lawrence,  so  that  nobody  who  had  ever  seen 
them  could  for  a  moment  hesitate  to  assign 
each  picture  to  its  original.  Here  the  mere 
caricaturist  would  be  quite  at  fault.  He  would 
find  in  neither  face  any  thing  on  which  he  could 
lay  hold  for  the  purpose  of  making  a  distinc 
tion.  Two  ample  bald  foreheads,  two  regular 
profiles,  two  full  faces  of  the  same  oval  form, 
would  baffle  his  art;  and  he  would  be  reduced 
to  the  miserable  shift  of  writing  their  names 
at  the  foot  of  his  picture.  Yet  there  was  a  great 
difference;  and  a  person  who  had  seen  them 
once,  would  no  more  have  mistaken  one  of 
them  for  the  other  than  he  would  have  mis 
taken  Mr.  Pitt  for  Mr.  Fox.  But  the  difference 
lay  in  delicate  lineaments  and  shades,  reserved 
for  pencils  of  a  rare  order. 

This  distinction  runs  through  all  the  imita 
tive  arts.  Foote's  mimicry  was  exquisitely 
ludicrous,  but  it  was  all  caricature.  He  could 
take  off  only  some  strange  peculiarity,  a  stam 
mer  or  a  lisp,  a  Northumbrian  burr  or  an  Irish 
brogue,  a  stoop  or  a  shuffle.  "  If  a  man,"  said 
Johnson,  "  hops  on  one  leg,  Foote  can  hop  on 
one  leg."  Garrick,  on  the  other  hand,  could 
seize  those  differences  of  manner  and  pronun 
ciation,  which,  though  highly  characteristic, 
are  yet  too  slight  to  be  described.  Foote,  we 
have  no  doubt,  could  have  made  the  Hay  mar 
ket  theatre  shake  with  laughter  by  imitating  a 
dialogue  between  a  Scotchman  and  a  Somer- 
setshirernan.  But  Garrick  could  have  imitated 
a  dialogue  between  two  fashionable  men,  both 
models  of  the  best  breeding,  Lord  Chesterfield 
for  example,  and  Lord  Albemarle ;  so  that  no 
person  could  doubt  which  was  which,  although 
no  person  could  say  that  in  any  point  either 
Lord  Chesterfield  or  Lord  Albemarle  spoke  or 
moved  otherwise  than  in  conformity  with  the 
Usages  of  the  best  society. 


The  same  distinction  is  found  in  the  drama 
and  in  fictitious  narrative.  Highest  among 
those  who  have  exhibited  human  nature  by 
means  of  dialogue,  stands  Shakspeare.  His 
1  variety  is  like  the  variety  of  nature,  endless 
diversity,  scarcely  any  monstrosity.  The  cha 
racters  of  which  he  has  given  us  an  impression, 
as  vivid  as  that  which  we  receive  from  the 
characters  of  our  own  associates,  are  to  be  reck 
oned  by  scores.  Yet  in  all  these  scores  hardly 
one  character  is  to  be  found  which  deviates 
widely  from  the  common  standard,  and  which 
we  should  call  very  eccentric  if  we  met  it  in 
real  life. 

The  silly  notion  t-hat  every  man  has  one  rul 
ing  passion,  and  that  this  clue,  once  known, 
unravels  all  the  mysteries  of  his  conduct,  finds 
no  countenance  in  the  plays  of  Shakspeare. 
There  man  appears  as  he  is,  made  up  of  a 
crowd  of  passions,  which  contend  for  the  mas 
tery  over  him,  and  govern  him  in  turn.  What 
is  Hamlet's  ruling  passion  1  Or  Othello's  !  Or 
Harry  the  Fifth's  1  Or  Wolsey's  1  Or  Lear's  ? 
OrShylock's'!  Or  Benedick's]  OrMacbeth's? 
Or  that  of  Cassius  ]  Or  that  of  Falconbridge  1 
But  we  might  go  on  for  ever.  Take  a  single 
example — Shylock.  Is  he  so  eager  for  money 
as  to  be  indifferent  to  revenge  7  Or  so  eager 
for  revenge  as  to  be  indifferent  to  money  ]  Or 
so  bent  on  both  together  as  to  be  indifferent  to 
the  honour  of  his  nation  and  the  law  of  Moses  1 
All  his  propensities  are  mingled  with  eacji 
other;  so  that,  in  trying  to  apportion  to  each  its 
proper  part,  we  find  the  same  difficulty  which 
constantly  meets  us  in  real  life.  A  superficial 
critic  may  say,  that  hatred  is  Shylock's  ruling 
passion.  But  how  many  passions  have  amal 
gamated  to  form  that  hatred  1  It  is  partly  the 
result  of  wounded  pride  :  Antonio  has  called 
him  dog.  It  is  partly  the  result  of  covetous- 
ness  :  Antonio  has  hindered  him  of  half  a  mil 
lion,  and,  when  Antonio  is  gone,  there  will  be 
no  limit  to  the  gains  of  usury.  It  is  partly  the 
result  of  national  and  religious  feeling:  Anfo- 
nio  has  spit  on  the  Jewish  gaberdine;  and  the 
oath  of  revenge  has  been  sworn  by  the  Jewish 
Sabbath.  We  might  go  through  all  the  char 
acters  which  we  have  mentioned,  and  through 
fifty  more  in  the  same  way ;  for  it  is  the  con 
stant  manner  of  Shakspeare  to  represent  the 
human  mind  as  lying,  riot  under  the  absolute 
dominion  of  one  domestic  propensity,  but  under 
a  mixed  government,  in  which  a  hundred  pow 
ers  balance  each  other.  Admirable  as  he  was 
in  all  parts  of  his  art,  we  most  admire  him  for 
this,  that,  while  he  has  left  us  a  greater  num 
ber  of  striking  portraits  than  all  other  drama 
tists  put  together,  he  has  scarcely  left  us  a 
single  caricature. 

Shakspeare  has  had  neither  equal  nor  second. 
But  among  the  writers  who,  in  the  point  which 
we  have  noticed,  have  approached  nearest  to 
the  manner  of  the  great  master,  we  have  no 
hesitation  in  placing  Jane  Austen,  a  woman  of 
whom  England  is  justly  proud.  She  has  given 
us  a  multitude  of  characters,  all,  in  a  certain 
sense,  commonplace,  all  such  as  we  meet  every 
day.  Yet  they  are  all  as  perfectly  discriminat 
ed  from  each  other  as  if  they  were  the  most 
eccentric  of  human  beings.  There  are,  for 
example,  four  clergymen,  none  of  whom  w* 
"  3D 


590 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


be  surprised  to  find  in  any  parsonage  in 
the  kingdom,  Mr.  Edward  Ferrars,  Mr.  Henry 
Tilney,  Mr.  Edmund  Bertram,  and  Mr.  Elton. 
They  are  all  specimens  of  the  upper  part  of  the 
middle  class.  They  have  all  been  liberally 
educated.  They  all  lie  under  the  restraints  of 
the  same  sacred  profession.  They  are  all 
young.  They  are  all  in  love.  Not  one  of  them 
has  any  hobby-horse,  to  use  the  phrase  of 
Sterne.  Not  one  has  a  ruling  passion,  such  as 
we  read  of  in  Pope.  Who  would  not  have  ex 
pected  them  to  be  insipid  likenesses  of  each 
other !  No  such  thing.  Harpagon  is  not  more 
unlike  to  Jourdain,  Joseph  Surface  is  not  more 
unlike  to  Sir  Lucius  O'Trigger,  than  everyone 
of  Miss  Austen's  young  divines  to  all  his  re 
verend  brethren.  And  almost  all  this  is  done 
by  touches  so  delicate,  that  they  elude  analysis, 
that  they  defy  the  powers  of  description,  and 
that  we  know  them  to  exist  only  by  the  general 
effect  to  which  they  have  contributed. 

A  line  must  be  drawn,  we  conceive,  between 
artists  of  this  class,  and  those  poets  and  novel 
ists  whose  skill  lies  in  the  exhibiting  of  what 
Ben  Jonson  called  humours.  The  words  of 
Ben  are  so  much  to  the  purpose,  that  we  will 
quote  them : — 

"When  some  one  peculiar  quality 
Doth  so  possess  a  man,  that  it  doth  draw 
All  his  effects,  his  spirits,  and  his  powers, 
In  their  conttuxions  all  to  run  one  way, 
This  may  be  truly  said  to  be  a  humour." 

There  are  undoubtedly  persons,  in  whom 
humours  such  as  Ben  describes  have  attained 
a  complete  ascendency.  The  avarice  of  El  wes, 
the  insane  desire  of  Sir  Egerton  Brydges  for  a 
barony  to  \.'hich  he  had  no  more  right  than  to 
the  crown  of  Spain,  the  malevolence  which 
long  meditation  on  imaginary  wrongs  gene 
rated  in  the  gloomy  mind  of  Bellingham,  are 
instances.  The  feeling  which  animated  Clark- 
son  and  other  virtuous  men  against  the  slave- 
trade  and  slavery,  is  an  instance  of  a  more 
honourable  kind. 

Seeing  lhat  such  humours  exist,  we  cannot 
deny  that  they  are  proper  subjects  for  the  imi 
tations  of  art.  But  we  conceive  that  the  imita 
tion  of  such  humours,  however  skilful  and 
amusing,  is  not  an  achievement  of  the  high 
est  order ;  and,  as  such  humours  are  rare  in 
real  life,  they  ought,  we  conceive,  to  be  sparing 
ly  introduced  into  works  which  profess  to  be 
pictures  of  real  life.  Nevertheless,  a  writer 
may  show  so  much  genius  in  the  exhibition  of 
these  humours,  as  to  be  fairly  entitled  to  a  dis 
tinguished  and  permanent  rank  among  classics. 
The  chief  seats  of  all,  however,  the  places  on 
the  dais  and  under  the  canopy,  are  reserved  for 
the  few  who  have  excelled  in  the  difficult  art 
of  portraying  characters  in  which  no  single 
feature  is  extravagantly  overcharged. 

If  we  have  expounded  the  law  soundly,  we 
can  have  no  difficulty  in  applying  it  to  the  par 
ticular  case  before  us.  Madame  D'Arblay  has 
left  us  scarcely  any  thing  but  humours.  Al 
most  every  one  of  her  men  and  women  has 
some  one  propensity  developed  to  a  morbid 
degree.  In  Cecilia,  for  example,  Mr.  Delvile 
never  opens  his  lips  without  some  allusion  to 
his  own  birth  and  station;  or  Mr.  Briggs,  with 


out  some  allusion  to  the  hoarding  of  money; 
or  Mr.  Hobson,  without  betiaying  the  self-in 
dulgence  and  self-importance  of  a  purse-proud 
upstart ;  or  Mr.  Simkins,  without  uttering  some 
sneaking  remark  for  the  purpose  of  currying 
favour  with  his  customers ;  or  Mr.  Meadows, 
without  expressing  apathy  and  weariness  of 
life;  or  Mr.  Albany,  without  declaiming  about 
the  vices  of  the  rich  and  the  misery  of  the 
poor;  or  Mrs.  Belfield,  without  some  inde 
licate  eulogy  on  her  son ;  or  Lady  Margaret, 
without  indicating  jealousy  of  her  husband. 
Morrice  is  all  skipping,  officious  impertinence, 
Mr.  Gosport  all  sarcasm,  Lady  Honoria  all 
lively  prattle,  Miss  Larolles  all  silly  prattle. 
If  ever  Madame  D'Arblay  aimed  at  more,  as  in 
the  character  of  Monckton,  we  do  not  think 
that  she  succeeded  well. 

We  are,  therefore,  forced  to  refuse  Madame 
D'Arblay  a  place  in  the  highest  rank  of  art; 
but  we  cannot  deny  that,  in  the  rank  to  which 
she  belonged,  she  had  few  equals,  and  scarcely 
any  superior.  The  variety  of  humours  which 
is  to  be  found  in  her  novels  is  immense  ;  and 
though  the  talk  of  each  person  separately  is 
monotonous,  the  general  effect  is  not  monotony, 
but  a  very  lively  and  agreeable  diversity.  Her 
plots  are  rudely  constructed  and  improbable, 
if  we  consider  them  in  themselves.  But  they 
are  admirably  framed  for  the  purpose  of  ex 
hibiting  striking  groups  of  eccentric  characters, 
each  governed  by  his  own  peculiar  whim,  each 
talking  his  own  peculiar  jargon,  and  each 
bringing  out  by  opposition  the  peculiar  oddi 
ties  of  all  the  rest.  We  will  give  one  exam 
ple  out  of  many  which  occur  to  us.  All  pro 
bability  is  violated  in  order  to  bring  Mr.  Del- 
vile,  Mr.  Briggs,  Mr.  Hobson,  and  Mr.  Albany 
into  a  room  together.  But  when  we  have 
them  there,  we  soon  forget  probability  in  the 
exquisitely  ludicrous  effect  which  is  produced 
by  the  conflict  of  four  old  fools,  each  raging 
with  a  monomania  of  his  own,  each  talking  a 
dialect  of  his  own,  and  each  inflaming  all  the 
others  anew  every  time  he  opens  his  mouth. 

Madame  D'Arblay  was  most  successful  in 
comedy,  and  indeed  in  comedy  which  bordered 
on  farce.  But  we  are  inclined  to  infer  from 
some  passages,  both  in  Cecilia  and  Camilla, 
that  she  might  have  attained  equal  distinction 
in  the  pathetic.  We  have  formed  this  judg 
ment  less  from  those  ambitious  scenes  of  dis 
tress  which  lie  near  the  catastrophe  of  each  of 
those  novels  than  from  some  exquisite  strokes 
of  natural  tenderness  which  take  us  here  and 
there  by  surprise.  We  would  mention  as  ex 
amples,  Mrs.  Hill's  account  of  her  little  boy's 
death  in  Cecilia,  and  the  parting  of  Sir  Hugh 
Tyrold  and  Camilla,  when  the  honest  baronet 
thinks  himself  dying. 

It  is  melancholy  to  think  that  the  whole  fame 
of  Madame  D'Arblay  rests  on  what  she  did  dur 
ing  the  early  half  of  her  life,  and  that  every 
thing  which  she  published  during  the  forty- 
three  years  which  preceded  her  death,  lowered 
her  reputation.  Yet  we  have  no  reason  to 
think  that  at  the  time  when  her  faculties  ojght  i 
to  have  been  in  their  maturity,  they  were  smitten 
with  any  blight.  In  the  Wanderer,  we  catch  >. 
now  and  then  a  gleam  of  her  genius.  Even  in 
the  Memoirs  of  her  Father,  there  is  no  trace  of 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


59i 


dotage.  They  are  very  bad;  but  they  are  so, 
as  it'seems  to  us,  not  from  a  decay  of  power, 
but  from  a  total  perversion  of  power. 

The  truth  is,  that  Madame  D'Arblay's  style 
underwent  a  gradual  and  most  pernicious 
change— a  change  which,  in  degree  at  least, 
we  believe  to  be  unexampled  in  literary  his 
tory,  and  of  which  it  may  be  useful  to  trace 
the  progress. 

When  she  wrote  her  letters  to  Mr.  Crisp, 
her  early  journals,  and  the  novel  of  Evelina, 
her  style  was  not  indeed  brilliant  or  energetic  ; 
but  it  was  easy,  clear,  and  free  from  all  offen 
sive  faults.  When  she  wrote  Cecilia  she  aim 
ed  higher.  She  had  then  lived  much  in  a  cir 
cle  of  which  Johnson  was  the  centre;  and  she 
was  herself  one  of  his  most  submissive  wor 
shippers.  It  seems  never  to  have  crossed  her 
mind  that  the  style  even  of  his  best  writings 
was  by  no  means  faultless,  and  that  even  had 
it  been  faultless,  it  might  not  be  wise  in  her  to 
imitate  it.  Phraseology  which  is  proper  in  a 
disquisition  on  the  Unities,  or  in  a  preface  to  a 
dictionary,  may  be  quite  out  of  place  in  a  tale 
of  fashionable  life.  Old  gentlemen  do  not  criti 
cise  the  reigning  modes,  nor  do  young  gentle 
men  make  love  with  the  balanced  epithets  and 
sonorous  cadences  which,  on  occasions  of 
great  dignity,  a  skilful  writer  may  use  with 
happy  effect. 

In  an  evil  hour  the  authoress  of  Evelina  took 
the  Rambler  for  her  model.  This  would  not 
have  been  wise  even  if  she  could  have  imitated 
her  pattern  as  well  as  Hawkes worth  did.  But 
such  imitation  was  beyond  her  power.  She 
had  her  own  style.  It  was  a  tolerably  good 
one;  one  which  might,  without  any  violent 
change,  have  been  improved  into  a  very  good 
one.  She  determined  to  throw  it  away,  and  to 
adopt  a  style  in  which  she  could  attain  excel 
lence  only  by  achieving  an  almost  miraculous 
victory  over  nature  and  over  habit.  She  could 
cease  to  be  Fanny  Burney;  it  was  not  so  easy 
to  become  Samuel  Johnson. 

In  Cecilia  the  change  of  manner  began  to 
appear.  But  in  Cecilia  the  imitation  of  John 
son,  though  not  always  in  the  best  taste,  is 
sometimes  eminently  happy;  and  the  passages 
which  are  so  verbose  as  to  be  positively  offen 
sive,  are  few.  There  were  people  who  whis 
pered  that  Johnson  had  assisted  his  young 
friend,  and  that  the  novel  owed  all  its  finest 
passages  to  his  hand.  This  was  merely  a  fa 
brication  of  envy.-  Miss  Burney's  real  excel 
lences  were  as  much  beyond  the  reach  of 
Johnson  as  his  real  excellences  were  beyond 
her  reach.  He  could  no  more  have  written 
the  masquerade  scene,  or  the  Vauxhall  scene, 
than  she  could  have  written  the  Life  of  Cowley 
or  the  Review  of  Soame  Jenyns.  But  we  have 
not  the  smallest  doubt  that  he  revised  Cecilia, 
and  that  he  retouched  the  style  of  many  pass 
ages.  We  know  that  he  wa?  in  the  habit 
of  giving  assistance  of  this  kind  most  free 
ly.  Goldsmith,  Hawkesworth,  Boswell,  Lord 
Hailes,  Mrs.  Williams,  were  among  those  who 
obtained  his  help.  Nay,  he  even  corrected  the 
poetry  of  Mr.  Crabbe,  whom,  we  believe,  he  had 
never  seen.  When  Miss  Burney  thought  of 
writing  a  comedy,  he  promised  to  give  her  his 
best  counsel,  though  he  owned  that  he  was  not 


i  particularly  well  qualified  to  advise  on  matters 
j  relating  to  the  stage.  We  therefore  think  it  in 
j  the  highest  degree  improbable  that  his  little 
Fanny,  when  living  in  habits  of  the  most  affec 
tionate  intercourse  with  him,  would  haw 
brought  out  an  important  work  without  con 
suiting  him;  and,  when  we  look  into  Cecilia 
we  see  such  traces  of  his  hand  in  the  gravt 
and  elevated  passages  as  it  is  impossible  tc 
mistake.  Before  we  conclude  this  avticle,  we 
will  give  two  or  three  examples. 

WThen  next  Madame  D'Arblay  appeared  be 
fore  the  world  as  a  writer,  she  was  in  a  very  dif 
ferent  situation.  She  would  not  content  herself 
with  the  simple  English  in  which  Evelina  had 
been  written.  She  had  no  longer  the  friend  who, 
we  are  confident,  had  polished  and  strengthened 
the  style  of  Cecilia.  She  had  to  write  in  John 
son's  manner  without  Johnson's  aid.  The  con 
sequence  was,  that  in  Camilla  every  passage 
which  she  meant  to  be  fine  is  detestable  ;  and 
that  the  book  has  been  saved  from  condemna 
tion  only  by  the  admirable  spirit  and  force  of 
those  scenes  in  which  she  was  content  to  be 
familiar. 

But  there  was  to  be  a  still  deeper  descent. 
After  the  publication  of  Camilla,  Madame 
D'Arblay  resided  ten  years  at  Paris.  During 
those  years  there  was  scarcely  any  intercourse 
between  France  and  England.  It  was  with 
difficulty  that  a  short  letter  could  occasionally 
be  transmitted.  All  Madame  D'Arblay's  coin 
panions  were  French.  She  must  have  written, 
spoken,  thought,  in  French.  Ovid  expressed 
his  fear  that  a  shorter  exile  might  have  affected 
the  purity  of  his  Latin.  During  a  shorter  exile, 
Gibbon  unlearned  his  native  English.  Madame 
D'Arblay  had  carried  a  bad  style  to  France. 
She  brought  back  a  style  which  we  are  really 
at  a  loss  to  describe.  It  is  a  sort  of  broken 
Johnsonese,  a  barbarous  patois,  bearing  the 
same  relation  to  the  language  of  Rasselas 
which  the  gibberish  of  the  negroes  of  Jamaica 
bears  to  the  English  of  the  House  of  Lords. 
Sometimes  it  reminds  us  of  the  finest,  that  is 
to  sav,  the  vilest  parts,  of  Mr.  Gait's  novels; 
sometimes  of  the  perorations  of  Exeter  Hall; 
sometimes  of  the  leading  articles  of  the  Morn 
ing  Post.  But  it  most  resembles  the  puffs  of 
Mr.  Rowland  and  Dr.  Gross.  It  matters  not 
what  ideas  are  clothed  in  such  a  style.  The 
genius  of  Shakspeare  and  Bacon  united  would 
not  save  a  work  so  written  from  general  deri 
sion. 

It  is  only  by  means  of  specimens  that  we 
can  enable  our  readers  to  judge  how  widely 
Madame  D'Arblay's  three  styles  differ  from 
each  other. 

The  following  passage  was  written  before 
she  became  intimate  with  Johnson.  It  is  from 
Evelina: 

"  His  son  seems  weaker  in  his  understand 
ing,  and  more  gay  in  his  temper ;  but  his  gayety 
is  that  of  the  foolish  overgrown  schoolboy, 
whose  mirth  consists  in  noise  and  disturbance, 
He  disdains  his  father  for  his  close  attention 
to  business  and  love  of  money,  though  he  seems 
himself  to  have  no  talents,  spirit,  or  generosmy 
to  make  him  superior  to  either.  His  chief  de 
light  appears  to  be  in  tormenting  and  ridiculing 
his  sisters,  who  in  return  most  cordially  d^ 


592 


MACAl rLAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


spise  him.  Miss  Branghton,  the  eldest  daugh 
ter,  is  by  no  means  ugly:  but  looks  proud,  ill- 
tempered,  and  conceited.  She  hates  the  city, 
though  without  knowing  why;  for  it  is  easy  to 
discover  she  has  lived  no  where  else.  Miss 
Polly  Branghton  is  rather  pretty,  very  foolish, 
Very  giddy,  and,  I  believe,  very  good-natured." 

This  is  not  a  fine  style,  but  simple,  perspicu 
ous,  and  agreeable.  We  now  come  to  Cecilia, 
wrtten  during  Miss  Burney's  intimacy  with 
Johnson  ;  and  we  leave  it  to  our  readers  to 
judge  whether  the  following  passage  was  not 
at  least  corrected  by  his  hand: 

"It  is  rather  an  imaginary  than  an  actual 
evil,  and,  though  a  deep  wound  to  pride,  no 
offence  to  morality.  Thus  have  I  laid  open  to 
you  my  whole  heart,  confessed  my  perplexi 
ties,  acknowledged  my  vain-glory,  and  exposed 
with  equal  sincerity  the  sources  of  my  doubts 
and  the  motives  of  my  decision.  But  now,  in 
deed,  how  to  proceed  I  know  not.  The  diffi 
culties  which  are  yet  to  encounter  I  fear  to 
enumerate,  and  the  petition  I  have  to  urge  I 
have  scarce  courage  to  mention.  My  family, 
mistaking  ambition  for  honour,  and  rank  for 
dignity,  have  long  planned  a  splendid  connec 
tion  for  me,  to  which,  though  my  invariable 
repugnant. e  has  stopped  any  advances,  their 
wishes  and  their  views  immovably  adhere.  But 
I  am  loo  certain  they  will  now  listen  to  no 
other.  I  dread,  therefore,  to  make  a  trial  where 
I  despair  of  success.  I  know  not  how  to  risk 
a  prayer  with  those  who  may  silence  me  by  a 
command." 

Take  now  a  specimen  of  Madame  D'Arblay's 
later  style.  This  is  the  way  in  which  she  tells 
us  that  her  father,  on  his  journey  back  from  the 
continent,  caught  the  rheumatism: 

"He  was  assaulted,  during  his  precipitated 
return,  by  the  rudest  fierceness  of  wintry  ele 
mental  strife;  through  which,  with  bad  accom 
modations  and  innumerable  accidents,  he  be 
came  a  prey  to  the  merciless  pangs  of  the 
acutest  spasmodic  rheumatism,  which  barely 
suffered  him  to  reach  his  home,  ere,  long  and 
piteously,  it  confined  him,  a  tortured  prisoner, 
to  his  bed.  Such  was  the  check  that  almost 
instantly  curbed,  though  it  could  not  subdue, 
the  rising  pleasure  of  his  hopes  of  entering 
upon  a  new  species  of  existence — that  of  an 
approved  man  of  letters  ;  for  it  was  on  the  bed 
of  sickness,  exchanging  the  light  wines  of 
France,  Italy,  and  Germany,  for  the  black  and 
loathsome  potions  of  the  Apothecaries'  Hall, 
writhed  by  darting  stitches,  and  burning  with 
fiery  tever,  that  he  felt  the  full  force  of  that 
sublunary  equipoise  that  seems  evermore  to 
hang  suspended  over  the  attainment  of  long 
sought  and  uncommon  felicity,  just  as  it  is 
ripening  to  burst  forth  with  enjoyment!" 

Here  is  a  second  passage  from  Evelina: 

"  Mrs.  Selwyn  is  very  kind  and  attentive  to 
me.  She  is  extremely  clever.  Her  understand 
ing,  indeed,  may  be  called  masculine ;  but 
unfortunately  her  manners  deserve  the  same 
epithet.  For,  in  studying  to  acquire  the  know 
ledge  of  the  other  sex,  she  has  lost  all  the  soft 
ness  of  her  own.  In  regard  to  myself,  how 
ever,  as  I  have  neither  courage  nor  inclination 
to  argue  with  her,  I  have  never  been  personally 
hait  at  her  want  of  gentleness — a  virtue  which. 


nevertheless,  seems  so  essential  a  part  of  the 
female  character,  thaul  find  myself  more  awk 
ward  and  less  at  ease  with  a  woman  who  wants 
it  than  I  do  with  a  man." 

This  is  a  good  style  of  its  kind ;  and  the  fol 
lowing  passage  from  Cecilia  is  also  in  good 
style,  though  not  in  a  faultless  one.  We  say 
with  confidence — Either  Sam  Johnson  or  the 
Devil. 

"Even  the  imperious  Mr.  Delvile  was  more 
supportable  here  than  in  London.  Secure  in 
his  own  castle,  he  looked  round  him  with  a 
pride  of  power  and  possession  which  softened 
while  it  swelled  him.  His  superiority  was  un 
disputed;  his  will  was  without  control.  He 
was  not,  as  in  the  great  capital  of  the  king 
dom,  surrounded  by  competitors.  No  rival 
disturbed  his  peace;  no  equality  mortified  his 
greatness.  All  he  saw  were  either  vassals  of 
his  power,  or  guests  bending  to  his  pleasure. 
He  abated,  therefore,  considerably  the  stern 
gloom  of  his  haughtiness,  and  soothed  his 
proud  mind  by  the  courtesy  of  condescension.*' 

We  will  stake  our  reputation  for  critical 
sagacity  on  this,  that  no  such  paragraph  as 
that  which  we  have  last  quoted,  can  be  found 
in  any  of  Madame  D'Arblay's  works  except 
Cecilia.  Compare  with  it  the  following  sample 
of  her  later  style  : 

"If  beneficence  be  judged  by  the  happiness 
which  it  diffuses,  whose  claim,  by  that  proof, 
shall  stand  higher  than  that  of  Mrs.  Montagu, 
from  the  munificence  with  which  she  cele 
brated  her  annual  festival  for  those  hapless 
artificers  who  perform  the  most  abject  offices 
of  any  authorized  calling,  in  being  the  active 
guardians  of  our  blazing  hearths'?  Not  to 
vain-glory,  then,  but  to  kindness  of  heart, 
should  be  adjudged  the  publicity  of  that  superb 
charity  which  made  its  jetty  objects,  for  one 
bright  morning,  cease  to  consider  themselves 
as  degraded  outcasts  from  all  society." 

We  add  one  or  two  shorter  samples.  Sheri 
dan  refused  to  permit  his  lovely  wife  to  sing  in 
public,  and  was  warmly  praised  on  this  ac 
count  by  Johnson. 

"  The  last  of  men,"  says  Madame  D'Arblay, 
"was  Doctor  Johnson  to  have  abetted  squan 
dering  the  delicacy  of  integrity  by  nullifying 
the  labours  of  talents." 

The  club,  Johnson's  club,  did  itself  no  honour 
by  rejecting  on  political  grounds  two  distin 
guished  men,  the  one  a  tory,  the  other  a  whig. 
Madame  D'Arblay  tells  the  story  thus:  "A 
similar  ebullition  of  political  rancour  with  that 
which  so  difficultly  had  been  conquered  for  Mr. 
Canning,  foamed  over  the  ballot-box  to  the  ex 
clusion  of  Mr.  Rogers." 

An  offence  punishable  with  imprisonment 
is,  in  this  language,  an  offence  "which  pro 
duces  incarceration."  To  be  starved  to  death 
is,  "to  sink  from  inanition  into  nonentity.'* 
Sir  Isaac  Newton  is,  "the  developer  of  the 
skies  in  their  embodied  movements  :"  and  Mrs. 
Thrale,  when  a  party  of  clever  people  sat 
silent,  is  said  to  have  been  "provoked  by  the 
dulness  of  a  taciturnity  that,  in  the  midst  of 
such  renowned  interlocutors,  produced  as  nar 
cotic  a  torpor  as  could  have  been  caused  by  a 
dearth  the  most  barren  of  all  human  faculties." 
In  truth,  it  is  impossible  to  look  in  any  page 


MADAME  D'ARBLAY. 


693 


of  Madame  D'Arblay's  later  works,  without 
finding  [lowers  of  rhetoric  like  these.  Nothing 
in  the  language  of  those  jargoriists  at  whom 
Mr.  Gosport  laughed,  nothing  in  the  language 
of  Sir  Sedley  Clarendel,  approaches  this  new 
euphuism. 

It  is  from  no  unfriendly  feeling  to  Madame 
D'Arblay's.  memory  that  we  have  expressed 
ourselves  so  strongly  on  the  subject  of  her 
style.  On  the  contrary,  we  conceive  that  we 
have  really  rendered  a  service  to  her  reputa 
tion.  That  her  later  works  were  complete  fail 
ures  is  a  fact  too  notorious  to  be  dissembled; 
and  some  persons,  we  believe,  have  conse 
quently  taken  up  a  notion  that  she  was  from 
the  first  an  overrated  writer,  and  that  she  had 
not  the  powers  which  were  necessary  to  main 
tain  her  on  the  eminence  on  which  good-luck 
and  fashion  had  placed  her.  We  believe,  on 
the  contrary,  that  her  early  popularity  was  no 
more  than  the  just  reward  of  distinguished 
merit,  and  would  never  have  undergone  an 
eclipse,  if  she  had  only  been  content  to  go  on 
writing  in  her  mother-tongue.  If  she  failed 
when  she  quitted  her  own  province,  and  at 
tempted  to  occupy  one  in  which  she  had  nei 
ther  part  nor  lot,  this  reproach  is  common  to 
her  with  a  crowd  of  distinguished  men.  New 
ton  failed  when  he  turned  from  the  courses  of 
the  stars,  and  the  ebb  and  flow  of  the  ocean,  to 
apocalyptic  seals  and  vials.  Bentley  failed 
when  he  turned  from  Homer  and  Aristophanes 
to  edit  Paradise  Lost.  Inigo  failed  when  he 
attempted  to  rival  the  Gothic  churches  of  (he 
fourteenth  century.  Wilkie  failed  when  he 
took  into  his  head  that  the  Blind  Fiddler  and 
the  Rent-Day  were  unworthy  of  his  powers, 
and  challenged  competition  with  Lawrence  as 
a  portrait  painter.  Such  failures  should  be 
noted  for  the  instruction  of  posterity ;  but  they 
detract  little  from  the  permanent  reputation  of 
those  who  have  really  done  great  things. 

Yet  one  word  more.  It  is  not  only  on  ac 
count  of  the  intrinsic  merit  of  Madame  D'Ar 
blay's  early  works  that  she  is  entitled  to  hon 
ourable  mention.  Her  appearance  is  an 
important  epoch  in  our  literary  history.  Eve 
lina  was  the  first  tale  written  by  a  woman,  and 
purporting  to  be  a  picture  of  life  and  manners, 
that  lived  or  deserved  to  live.  The  Female 
Quixote  is  no  exception.  That  work  has  un 
doubtedly  great  merit  when  considered  as  a 


wild  satirical  harlequinade;  but,  if  we  con 
sider  it  as  a  picture  of  life  and  manners,  we 
must  pronounce  it  more  absurd  than  any  of  the 
romances  which  it  was  designed  lo  ridicule. 

Indeed,  most  of  the  popular  novels  which 
preceded  Evelina  were  such  as  no  lady  would 
have  written ;  and  many  of  them  were  such 
as  no  lady  could  without  confusion  c  -vn  that 
she  had  read.  The  very  name  of  ncvel  vas 
held  in  horror  among  religious  people.  In 
decent  families  which  did  not  profess  extra 
ordinary  sanctity,  there  was  a  strong  feeling; 
against  all  such  works.  Sir  Anthony  Absolute,' 
two  or  three  years  before  Evelina  appeared, 
spoke  the  sense  of  the  great  body  of  sober 
fathers  and  husbands,  when  he  pronounced  the 
circulating  library  an  evergreen  tree  of  dia 
bolical  knowledge.  This  feeling,  on  the  part 
of  the  grave  and  reflecting,  increased  the  evil 
from  which  it  had  sprung.  The  novelist,  hav 
ing  little  character  to  lose,  and  having  fe\r 
readers  among  serious  people,  took  without 
scruple  liberties  which  in  our  generation  seem> 
almost  incredible. 

Miss  Burney  did  for  the  English  novel  what 
Jeremy  Collier  did  for  the  English  drama;  and 
she  did  it  in  a  better  way.  She  first  showed 
that  a  tale  might  be  written  in  which  both  the 
fashionable  and  the  vulgar  life  of  London 
might  be  exhibited  with  great  force,  and  with 
broad  comic  humour,  and  which  yet  should 
not  contain  a  single  line  inconsistent  with  rigid 
morality,  or  even  with  virgin  delicacy.  She 
took  away  the  reproach  which  lay  on  a  mosi 
useful  and  delightful  species  of  composition. 
She  vindicated  the  right  of  her  sex  to  an  equal 
share  in  a  fair  and  noble  province  of  letters. 
Several  accomplished  women  have  followed 
in  her  track.  At  present,  the  novels  which  we, 
owe  to  English  ladies  form  no  small  part  of 
the  literary  glory  of  our  country.  No  class  of 
works  is  more  honourably  distinguished  by 
fine  observation,  by  grace,  by  delicate  wit,  by 
pure  moral  feeling.  Several  among  the  suc 
cessors  of  Madame  D'Arblay  have  equalled 
her;  two,  we  think,  have  surpassed  her.  But 
the  fact  that  she  has  been  surpassed  gives  her 
an  additional  claim  to  our  respect  and  grati 
tude;  for  in  truth  we  owe  to  her,  not  only  Eve 
lina,  Cecilia,  and  Camilla,  but  also  Mansfieid 
Park  and  the  Absentee. 


VOL.  V.— 75 


3D* 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  JULY,  1843.J 


SOME  reviewers  are  of  opinion  that  a  lady  | 
who  dares  to  publish  a  book  renounces  by  that ' 
act  the  franchises  appertaining  to  her  sex,  and 
can  claim  no  exemption  from  the  utmost  rigour 
of  critical  procedure.  From  that  opinion  we 
dissent.  We  admit,  indeed,  that  in  a  country 
which  boasts  of  many  female  writers,  eminently 
qualified  by  their  talents  and  acquirements  to 
influence  the  public  mind,  it  would  be  of  most 
pernicious  consequence  that  inaccurate  history 
or  unsound  philosophy  should  be  suffered  to 
pass  uncensured,  merely  because  the  offender 
chanced  to  be  a  lady.  But  we  conceive  that, 
on  such  occasions,  a  critic  would  do  well  to 
imitate  that  courteous  knight  who  found  him 
self  compelled  by  duty  to  keep  the  lists  against 
Bradamante.  He,  we  are  told,  defended  suc 
cessfully  the  cause  of  which  he  was  the  cham 
pion  ;  but,  before  the  fight  began,  exchanged 
Balisarda  for  a  less  deadly  sword,  of  which  he 
carefully  blunted  the  point  and  edge.f 

Nor  are  the  immunities  of  sex  the  only  im 
munities  which  Miss  Aikin  may  rightfully 
plead.  Several  of  her  works,  and  especially 
the  very  pleasing  Memoirs  of  the  Reign  of 
James  the  First,  have  fully  entitled  her  to  the 
privileges  enjoyed  by  good  writers.  One  of 
those  privileges  we  hold  to  be  this,  that  such 
writers,  when,  either  from  the  unlucky  choice 
of  a  subject,  or  from  the  indolence  too  often 
produced  by  success,  they  happen  to  fail,  shall 
not  be  subjected  to  the  severe  discipline  which 
it  is  sometimes  necessary  to  indict  upon  dunces 
and  impostors;  but  shall  merely  be  reminded 
by  a  gentle  touch,  like  that  with  which  the  La- 
putan  flapper  roused  his  dreaming  lord,  that  it 
is  high  time  to  wake. 

Our  readers  will  probably  infer  from  what 
we  have  said  that  Miss  Aikin's  book  has  dis 
appointed  us.  The  truth  is,  that  she  is  not  weli 
acquainted  with  her  subject.  No  person  who 
:s  not  familiar  with  the  political  and  literary 
history  of  England  during  the  reigns  of  William 
III.,  of  Anne,  and  of  George  I.,  can  possibly 
write  a  good  life  of  Addison.  Now,  we  mean 
no  reproach  to  Miss  Aikin,  and  many  will 
think  that  we  pay  her  a  compliment,  when  we 
say  that  her  studies  have  taken  a  different  di 
rection.  She  is  better  acquainted  with  Shaks- 
peare  and  Raleigh,  than  with  Congreve  and 
Prior;  and  is  far  more  at  home  among  the  ruffs 
and  peaked  beards  of  Theobald's  than  among 
the  Steenkirks  and  flowing  periwigs  which  sur 
rounded  Queen  Anne's  tea-table  at  Hampton. 
She  seems  to  have  written  about  the  Elizabethan 
age,  because  she  had  read  much  about  it;  she 
seems,  on  the  other  hand,  to  have  read  a  little 
about  the  age  of  Addison,  because  she  had  de 
termined  to  write  about  it.  The  consequence 


*  The  Life  of.  Joseph  Jlddison.   By  LUCY  AIKIN.   2  vols. 
bvo.    London.  1^43. 

f  Or'ando  Furioao,  xlv.  68. 


is,  that  she  has  had  to  describe  men  and  things 
without  having  either  a  correct  or  a  vivid  idea 
of  them,  and  that  she  has  often  fallen  into  er 
rors  of  a  very  serious  kind.  Some  of  these 
errors  we  may,  perhaps,  take  occasion  to  point 
out.  But  we  have  not  time  to  point  out  one 
half  of  those  which  we  have  observed;  and  it 
is  but  too  likely  that  we  may  not  have  ob 
served  all  those  which  exist.  The  reputation 
which  Miss  Aikin  has  justly  earned  stands  so 
high,  and  the  charm  of  Addison's  letters  is  so 
great,  that  a  second  edition  of  this  work  may 
probably  be  required.  If  so,  we  hope  that 
every  paragraph  will  be  revised,  arid  that  every 
date  and  statement  of  fact  about  which  there 
can  be  the  smallest  doubt  will  be  carefully  veri 
fied. 

To  Addison  himself  we  are  bound  by  a  sen 
timent  as  much  like  affection  as  any  sentiment 
can  be  which  is  inspired  by  one  who  has  been, 
sleeping  a  hundred  and  twenty  years  in  West 
minster  Abbey.  We  trust,  however,  that  this 
feeling  will  not  betray  us  into  that  abject  idola 
try  which  we  have  often  had  occasion  to  repre 
hend  in  others,  and  which  seldom  fails  to  make 
both  the  idolater  and  the  idol  ridiculous.  A 
man  of  genius  and  virtue  is  but  a  man.  All 
his  powers  cannot  be  equally  developed;  nor 
can  we  expect  from  him  perfect  self-knowledge. 
We  need  not,  therefore,  hesitate  to  admit  that 
Addison  has  left  us  some  compositions  which 
do  not  rise  above  mediocrity,  some  heroic 
poems  hardly  equal  to  Parnell's,  some  criticism, 
as  superficial  as  Dr.  Blair's,  and  a  tragedy  not 
very  much  better  than  Dr.  Johnson's.  Jt  is 
praise  enough  to  say  of  a  writer,  that,  in  a  high 
department  of  literature,  in  which  many  emi 
nent  writers  have  distinguished  themselves,  he 
has  had  no  equal;  and  this  may  with  strict 
justice  be  said  of  Addison. 

As  a  man  he  may  not  have  deserved  the  ado 
ration  which  he  received  from  those,  who,  be 
witched  by  his  fascinating  society,  and  indebted 
for  all  the  comforts  of  life  to  his  generous  and 
delicate  friendship,  worshipped  him  nightly  in 
his  favourite  temple  at  Button's.  But,  after  full 
inquiry  and  impartial  reflection,  we  have  long 
been  convinced,  that  he  deserved  as  much  love 
and  esteem  as  can  be  justly  claimed  by  any  of  our 
infirm  and  erring  race.  Some  blemishes  may 
undoubtedly  be  detected  in  his  character;  but  the 
more  carefully  it  is  examined,  the  more  will  it  ap 
pear,  louse  the  phraseof  the  old  anatomists,  sound 
in  the  noble  parts — free  from  all  taint  of  perfidy, 
of  cowardice,  of  cruelty,  of  ingratitude,  of  envy. 
Men  may  easily  be  named  in  whom  some  par 
ticular  good  disposition  has  been  more  con 
spicuous  than  in  Addison.  But  the  just  har 
mony  of  qualities,  the  exact  temper  between  the 
stern  and  the  humane  virtues,  the  habitual  ob 
servance  of  every  law,  not  only  of  moral  rec 
titude,  but  of  moral  grace  and  dignity,  distin- 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


595 


guish  him  from  all  men  who  have  been  tried  by 
equally  full  information. 

His  father  was  the  Reverend  Lancelot  Ad- 
dison,  who,  though  eclipsed  by  his  more  cele 
brated  son,  made  some  figure  in  the  world,  and 
occupies  with  credit  two  folio  pages  in  the 
"Biographia  Britannica."  Lancelot  was  sent 
up,  as  a  poor  scholar,  from  Westmoreland  to 
Queen's  College,  Oxford,  in  the  time  of  the 
Commonwealth;  made  some  progress  in  learn 
ing;  became,  like  most  of  his  fellow-students, 
a  violent  royalist;  lampooned  the  heads  of  the 
university,  and  was  forced  to  ask  pardoa  on  his 
bended  knees.  When  he  had  left  college,  he 
earned  an  humble  subsistence  by  reading  the 
liturgy  of  the  fallen  church  to  the  families  of 
those  sturdy  squires  whose  manor-houses  were 
scattered  over  the  Wild  of  Sussex.  After  the 
restoration,  his  royalty  was  rewarded  with  the 
post  of  chaplain  to  the  garrison  of  Dunkirk. 
When  Dunkirk  was  sold  to  France,  he  lost  his 
employment.  But  Tangier  had  been  ceded  by 
Portugal  to  England  as  part  of  the  marriage 
portion  of  the  Infanta  Catharine  ;  and  to  Tan 
gier  Lancelot  Addison  was  sent.  A  more  mise 
rable  situation  can  hardly  be  conceived.  It  was 
difficult  to  say  whether  the  unfortunate  settlers 
were  more  tormented  by  the  heats  or  by  the 
rains;  by  the  soldiers  within  the  wall  or  the 
Moors  without  it.  One  advantage  the  chaplain 
had.  He  enjoyed  an  excellent  opportunity  of 
studyingthe  historyandmannersof  theJews  and 
Mohammedans;  and  of  this  opportunity  he  ap 
pears  to  have  made  excellent  use.  On  his  return 
to  England,  after  some  years  of  banishment,  he 
published  an  interesting  volume  on  the  polity 
and  religion  of  Barbary;  and  another  on  the 
Hebrew  customs,  and  the  state  of  rabbinical 
learning.  He  rose  to  eminence  in  his  profes 
sion,  and  became  one  of  the  royal  chaplains,  a 
doctor  of  divinity,  archdeacon  of  Salisbury  and 
dean  of  Litchfield.  It  is  said  that  he  would 
have  been  made  a  bishop  after  the  Revolution, 
if  he  had  not  given  offence  to  the  government 
by  strenuously  opposing  the  convocation  of 
1689,  i he  liberal  policy  of  William  and  Tillotson. 

In  1672,  not  long  after  Dr.  Addison's  return 
from  Tangier,  his  son  Joseph  was  born.  Of 
Joseph's  childhood  we  know  little.  He  learned 
his  rudiments  at  schools  in  his  father's  neigh 
bourhood,  and  was  then  sent  to  the  Charter 
House.  The  anecdotes  which  are  popularly 
related  about  his  boyish  tricks  do  not  harmo 
nize  very  well  with  what  we  know  of  his  riper 
years.  There  remains  a  tradition  that  he  was 
the  ringleader  in  a  barring-out;  and  another 
tradition  that  he  ran  away  from  school,  and  hid 
himself  in  a  wood,  where  he  fed  on  berries  and 
slept  in  a  hollow  tree,  till  after  a  long  search 
he  was  discovered  and  brought  home.  If  these 
stories  be  true,  it  would  be  curious  to  know 
by  what  moral  discipline  so  mutinous  and  en 
terprising  a  lad  was  transformed  into  the  gen 
tlest  and  most  modest  of  men. 

We  have  abundant  proof  that,  whatever  Jo 
seph's  pranks  may  have  been,  he  pursued  his 
studies  vigorously  and  successfully.  At  fifteen 
he  was  not  only  fit  for  the  university,  but  car 
ried  thither  a  classical  taste,  and  a  stock  of 
learning  which  would  have  done  honour  to  a 
master  of  arts.  He  was  entered  at  Queen's 


College,  Oxford  ;  but  he  had  not  been  many 
months  there,  when  some  of  his  Latin  verses 
fell  by  accident  into  the  hands  of  Dr.  Lancas 
ter,  dean  of  Magdalene  College.  The  young 
scholar's  diction  and  versification  were  already 
such  as  veteran  professors  might  envy.  Dr 
Lancaster  was  desirous  to  serve  a  boy  of  such 
promise  ;  nor  was  an  opportunity  long  want 
ing.  The  Revolution  had  just  taken  place; 
and  nowhere  had  it  been  hailed  with  more  de 
light  than  at  Magdalene  College.  That  great 
and  opulent  corporation  had  been  treated  by 
James,  and  by  his  chancellor,  with  an  insolence 
and  injustice  which,  even  in  such  a  prince  and 
in  such  a  minister,  may  justly  excite  amaze 
ment;  and  which  had  done  more  than  even  the 
prosecution  of  the  bishops  to  alienate  the 
Church  of  England  from  the  throne.  A  pre 
sident,  duly  elected,  had  been  violently  expelled 
from  his  dwelling.  A  papist  had  been  set  over 
the  society  by  a  royal  mandate:  the  Fellows, 
who,  in  conformity  with  their  oaths,  refused  to 
submit  to  this  usurper,  had  been  driven  forth 
from  their  quiet  cloisters  and  gardens,  to  die 
of  want  or  to  live  on  charity.  But  the  day  of 
redress  and  retribution  speedily  came.  The 
intruders  were  ejected  ;  the  venerable  house 
was  again  inhabited  by  its  old  inmates:  learn 
ing  flourished  under  the  rule  of  the  wise  and 
virtuous  Hough  ;  and  with  learning  was  united 
a  mild  and  liberal  spirit,  too  often  wanting  in 
the  princely  colleges  of  Oxford.  In  conse 
quence  of  the  troubles  through  which  the  so 
ciety  had  passed,  there  had  been  no  election  of 
new  members  during  the  year  1688.  In  1689, 
therefore,  there  was  twice  the  ordinary  number 
of  vacancies  ;  and  thus  Dr.  Lancaster  found  it 
easy  to  procure  for  his  young  friend  admittance 
to  the  advantages  of  a  foundation  then  generally 
esteemed  the  wealthiest  in  Europe. 

At  Magdalene,  Addison  resided  during  ten 
years.  He  was,  at  first,  one  of  those  scholars 
who  are  called  demies;  but  was  subsequently 
elected  a  fellow.  His  college  is  still  proud  of 
his  name;  his  portrait  still  hangs  in  the  hall; 
and  strangers  are  still  told  that  his  favourite 
walk  was  under  the  elms  which  fringe  the 
meadow  on  the  banks  of  the  Cherwell.  It  is 
said,  and  is  highly  probable,  that  he  was  dis 
tinguished  among  his  fellow-students  by  the 
delicacy  of  his  feelings,  by  the  shyness  of  his 
manners,  and  by  the  assiduity  with  which  he 
often  prolonged  his  studies  far  into  the  night. 
It  is  certain  that  his  reputation  for  ability  and 
learning  stood  high.  Many  years  later  the 
ancient  doctors  of  Magdalene  continued  to 
talk  in  their  common  room  of  boyish  com 
positions,  and  expressed  their  sorrow  that  no 
copy  of  exercises  so  remarkable  had  been 
preserved. 

It  is  proper,  however,  to  remark,  that  Miss 
Aikin  has  committed  the  error,  very  pardon 
able  in  a  lady,  of  overrating  Addison's  classi 
cal  attainments.  In  one  department  of  learn 
ing,  indeed,  his  proficiency  was  such  as  it  is 
hardly  possible  to  overrate.  His  knowledge 
of  the  Latin  poets,  from  Lucretius  and  Ca 
tullus  down  to  Claudian  and  Prudentius,  was 
singularly  exact  and  profound.  H»?  understood 
them  thoroughly,  entered  into  their  spirit,  and 
had  the  finest  and  most  discriminating  percep 


596 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


lion  of  all  their  peculiarities  of  style  and 
melody;  nay,  he  copied  their  manner  with 
admirable  skill,  and  surpassed,  we  think,  all 
their  British  imitators  who  had  preceded  him, 
Buchanan  and  Milton  alone  excepted.  This  is 
high  praise;  and  beyond  this  we  cannot  with 
justice  go.  It  is  clear  that  Addison's  serious 
attention,  during  his  residence  at  the  univer 
sity,  was  almost  entirely  concentrated  on  Latin 
poetry;  and  that,  if  he  did  not  wholly  neglect 
other  provinces  of  ancient  literature,  he  vouch 
safed  to  them  only  a  cursory  glance.  He  does 
not  appear  to  have  attained  more  than  an  or 
dinary  acquaintance  with  the  political  and 
moral  writers  of  Rome ;  nor  was  his  own 
Latin  prose  by  any  means  equal  to  his  Latin 
verse.  His  knowledge  of  Greek,  though  doubt 
less  such  as  was,  in  his  time,  thought  respect 
able  at  Oxford,  was  evidently  less  than  that 
which  many  lads  now  carry  away  every  year 
from  Eton  and  Rugby.  A  minute  examination 
of  his  work,  if  we  had  time  to  make  such  an 
examination,  would  fully  bear  out  these  re 
marks.  We  will  briefly  advert  to  a  few  of  the 
facts  on  which  our  judgment  is  grounded. 

Great  praise  is  due  to  the  notes  which  Ad- 
dison  appended  to  his  version  of  the  second 
and  third  books  of  the  Metamorphoses.  Yet 
these  notes,  while  they  show  him  to  have  been, 
in  his  own  domain,  an  accomplished  scholar, 
show  also  how  confined  that  domain  was. 
They  are  rich  in  apposite  references  to  Virgil, 
Statins,  and  Claudian;  but  they  contain  not  a 
single  illustration  drawn  from  the  Greek  poets. 
Now  if,  in  the  whole  compass  of  Latin  litera 
ture,  there  be  a  passage  which  stands  in  need 
of  illustration  drawn  from  the  Greek  poets,  it 
is  the  story  of  Pentheus  in  the  third  book  of 
the  Metamorphoses.  Ovid  was  indebted  for 
that  story  to  Euripides  and  Theocritus,  both 
of  whom  he  has  sometimes  followed  minutely. 
But  neither  to  Euripides  nor  to  Theocritus 
does  Addison  make  the  faintest  allusion;  and 
we,  therefore,  believe  that  we  do  not  wrong 
him  by  supposing  that  he  had  little  or  no  know 
ledge  of  their  works. 

His  travels  in  Italy,  again,  bound  with  clas 
sical  quotations,  happily  introduced;  but  his 
quotations,  with  scarcely  a  single  exception, 
are  taken  from  Latin  verse.  He  draws  more 
illustrations  from  Ausonius  and  Manilius  than 
from  Cicero.  Even  his  notions  of  the  political 
and  military  affairs  of  the  Romans  seem  to  be 
derived  from  poets  and  poetasters.  Spots  made 
memorable  by  events  which  have  changed  the 
destinies  of  the  world,  and  have  been  worthily 
recorded  by  great  historians,  bring  to  his  mind 
only  scraps  of  some  ancient  Pye  or  Hayley. 
In  the  gorge  of  the  Appennines  he  naturally 
remembers  the  hardships  which  Hannibal's 
army  endured,  and  proceeds  to  cite,  not  the 
authentic  narrative  of  Polybius,  not  the  pic 
turesque  narrative  of  Livy,  but  the  languid 
hexameters  of  Silius  Italicus.  On  the  banks 
of  the  Rubicon  he  never  thinks  of  Plutarch's 
lively  description  ;  or  of  the  stern  conciseness 
of  the  commentaries;  or  of  those  letters  to 
Atticus  which  so  forcibly  express  the  alterna 
tions  of  hope  and  fear  in  a  sensitive  mind  at  a 
great  crisis.  His  only  authority  for  the  events 
f  ihe  civil  war  is  Lucan. 


All  the  best  ancient  works  of  art  at  Rome 
and  Florence  are  Greek.  Addison  saw  them, 
however,  without  recalling  one  single  verse 
of  Pindar,  of  Callimachus,  or  of  the  Attic 
dramatists;  but  they  brought  to  his  recollec 
tion  innumerable  passages  in  Horace,  Juvenal, 
Statius,  and  Ovid. 

The  same  may  be  said  of  the  "Treatise  on 
Medals."  In  that  pleasing  work  we  find  about 
three  hundred  passages  extracted  with  great 
judgment  from  the  Roman  poets;  but  we  do 
not  recollect  a  single  passage  taken  from  any 
Roman  orator  or  historian ;  and  we  are  confi 
dent  that  not  a  line  is  quoted  from  any  Greek 
writer.  No  person  who  had  derived  all  his 
information  on  the  subject  of  medals  from  Ad 
dison,  would  suspect  that  the  Greek  coins  were 
in  historical  interest  equal,  and  in  beauty  of 
execution  far  superior  to  those  of  Rome. 

If  it  were  necessary  to  find  any  further  proof 
that  Addison's  classical  knowledge  was  con 
fined  within  narrow  limits,  that  proof  would  be 
furnished  by  his  "Essay  on  the  Evidences  'of 
Christianity."  The  Roman  poets  throw  little 
or  no  light  on  the  literary  and  historical  ques 
tions  which  he  is  under  the  necessity  of  ex 
amining  in  that  essay.  He  is,  therefore,  left 
completely  in  the  dark;  audit  is  melancholy 
to  see  how  helplessly  he  gropes  his  way  from 
blunder  to  blunder.  He  assigns  as  grounds  for 
his  religious  belief,  stories  as  absurd  as  that 
of  the  Cock-lane  ghost,  and  forgeries  as  rank 
as  Ireland's  "  Vortigern  ;"  puts  faith  in  the  lie 
about  the  thundering  legion  ;  is  convinced  that 
Tiberius  moved  the  senate  to  admit  Jesus 
among  the  gods  ;  and  pronounces  the  letter  of 
Agbarus,  king  of  Edessa,  to  be  a  record  of 
great  authority.  Nor  were  these  errors  the 
effects  of  superstition  ;  for  to  superstition  Ad 
dison  was  by  no  means  prone.  The  truth  is, 
that  he  was  writing  about  what  he  did  not  un 
derstand. 

Miss  Aikin  has  discovered  a  letter  from 
which  it  appears  that,  while  Addison  resided 
at  Oxford,  he  was  one- of  several  writers  whom 
the  booksellers  engaged  to  make  an  English 
version  of  Herodotus;  and  she  infers  that  he 
must  have  been  a  good  Greek  scholar.  We 
can  allow  very  little  weight  to  this  argument, 
when  we  consider  that  his  fellow-labourers 
were  to  have  been  Boyle  and  Blackmore. 
Boyle  is  remembered  chiefly  as  the  nominal 
author  of  the  worst  book  on  Greek  history  and 
philology  that  ever  was  printed  ;  and  this  book, 
bad  as  it  is,  Boyle  was  unable  to  produce  with 
out  help.  Of  Blackmore's  attainments  in  the 
ancient  tongues,  it  may  be  sufficient  to  say 
that,  in  his  prose,  he  has  confounded  an  apho 
rism  with  an  apophthegm,  and  that  when,  in 
his  verse,  he  treats  of  classical  subjects,  his 
habit  is  to  regale  his  readers  with  four  false 
quantities  to  a  page  ! 

It  is  probable  that  the  classical  acquirements 
of  Addison  were  of  as  much  service  to  him  as 
if  they  had  been  more  extensive.  The  world 
generally  gives  its  admiration,  not  to  the  man 
who  does  what  nobody  else  even  attempts  to 
do,  but  to  the  man  who  does  best  what  multi 
tudes  do  well.  Bentley  was  so  immeasurably 
superior  to  all  the  other  scholars  of  his  time 
that  very  few  among  them  could  discover  hi« 


LIFE    AND   WRITINGS   OF  ADDTSON. 


697 


superiority.  But  the  accomplishment  in  which 
Addison  excelled  his  contemporaries  was  then, 
as  it  is  now,  highly  valued  and  assiduously 
cultivated  at  all  English  seats  of  learning. 
Everybody  who  had  been  at  a  public  school 
had  written  Latin  verses  ;  many  had  written 
such  verses  with  tolerable  success;  and  were 
quite  able  to  appreciate,  though  by  no  means 
able  to  rival,  the  skill  with  which  Addison 
imitated  Virgil.  His  lines  on  the  Barometer, 
and  the  Bowling-Green,  were  applauded  by 
hundreds  to  whom  the  "Dissertation  on  the 
Epistles  of  Phalaris"  was  as  unintelligible  as 
the  hieroglyphics  on  an  obelisk. 

Puriiy  of  style,  and  an  easy  flow  of  num 
bers,  are  common  to  all  Addison's  Latin  poems. 
Our  favourite  piece  is  the  Battle  of  the  Cranes 
and  Pygmies;  for  in  that  piece  we  discern  a 
gleam  of  the  fancy  and  humour  which  many 
years  later  enlivened  thousands  of  breakfast 
tables.  Swift  boasted  that  he  was  never  known 
to  steal  a  hint:  and  he  certainly  owed  as  little 
to  "his  predecessors  as  any  modern  writer. 
Yet  we  cannot  help  suspecting  ihat  he  bor 
rowed,  perhaps  unconsciously,  one  of  the  hap 
piest  touches  in  his  Voyage  to  Lilliput  from 
Addison's  verses.  Lei  our  readers  judge. 

"The  Emperor,"  says  Guil-ver,  "  is  taller  by 
about  the  breadth  of  my  nail  than  any  of  his 
court,  which  alone  is  enough  to  strike  an  awe 
into  the  beholders." 

About  thirty  years  before  Gulliver's  Travels 
appeared,  Addison  wrote  these  lines  : — 

".Tamque  acii>s  inter  medias  spse  arduus  infert 
Pygmeadum  ductor,  qui,  majestate  verendus, 
IliceMUquc  gravis,  ivliqnos  supereminet  onines 
Mole  gigantea,  mediarnqne  exsurgit  in  ulnam." 

The  Latin  poems  of  Addison  were  greatly 
and  justly  admired  both  at  Oxford  and  Cam 
bridge  before  his  name  had  ever  been  heard  by 
the  wits  who  thronged  the  coffee-houses  round 
Drury-Lane  theatre.  In  his  twenty-second 
year,  he  ventured  to  appear  before  the  public 
as  a  writer  of  English  verse.  He  addressed 
some  complimentary  lines  to  Dryden,  who, 
after  many  triumphs  and  many  reverses,  had 
at  length  reached  a  secure  and  lonely  eminence 
among  the  literary  men  of  that  age.  Dryden  ap 
pears  to  have  been  much  gratified  by  the  young 
scholar's  praise;  and  an  interchange  of  civili 
ties  and  good  offices  followed.  Addison  was 
probably  introduced  by  Dryden  to  Congreve, 
and  was  certainly  presented  by  Congreve  to 
Charles  Montagu,  who  was  then  chancellor  of 
the  exchequer,  and  leader  of  the  whig  party 
in  the  House  of  Commons. 

At  this  time  Addison  seemed  inclined  to  de 
vote  himself  to  poetry.  He  published  a  trans 
lation  of  part  of  the  fourth  Georgic,  Lines  to 
King  William,  and  other  performances  of  equal 
value;  that  is  to  say,  of  no  value  at  all.  But 
in  those  days  the  public  were  in  the  habit  of 
receiving  with  applause  pieces  which  would 
now  have  little  chance  of  obtaining  the  New- 
digate  prize,  or  the  Seatonian  prize.  And  the 
reason  is  obvious.  The  heroic  couplet  was 
then  the  favourite  measure.  The  art  of  arrang 
ing  words  in  that  measure,  so  that  the  lines 
may  flow  smoothly,  that  the  accents  may  fall 
correctly,  that  the  rhymes  may  strike  the  ear 
strongly,  and  that  there  may  be  a  pause  at  the 


end  of  every  distich,  is  an  art  as  mechanical 
as  that  of  mending  a  kettle,  or  shoeing  a  horse  ; 
and  may  be  learned  by  any  human  being  who 
has  sense  enough  to  learn  any  thing.  Bat,  like 
other  mechanical  arts,  it  was  gradually  ins- 
proved  by  means  of  many  experiments  and 
many  failures.  It  was  reserved  for  Pope  to 
discover  the  trick,  to  make  himself  complete 
master  of  it,  and  to  teach  it  to  everybody  else. 
From  the  time  when  his  "  Pastorals"  appeared, 
heroic  versification  became  matter  of  rule  and 
compass;  and,  before  long,  all  artists  were  on. 
a  level.  Hundreds  of  dunces  who  never  1  lun- 
dered  on  one  happy  thought  or  expression  were 
able  to  write  reams  of  couplets  which,  as  far 
as  euphony  was  concerned,  could  not  be  dis 
tinguished  from  those  of  Pope  himself,  and 
which  very  clever  writers  of  the  reign  of  Charles 
the  Second — Rochester,  for  example,  or  Marvel, 
or  Oldham — would  have  contemplated  with 
admiring  despair. 

Ben  Jonson  was  a  great  man,  Hoole  a  very 
small  man.  But  Hoole,  coming  after  Pope, 
had  learned  how  to  manufacture  decasyllabic 
verses ;  and  poured  them  forth  by  thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands,  all  as  well  turned,  as 
smooth,  and  as  like  each  other  as  the  blocks 
which  have  passed  through  Mr. BrunelPs  mill, 
in  the  dockyard  at  Portsmouth.  Ben's  heroic 
couplets  resemble  blocks  rudely  hewn  out  by 
an  unpractised  hand,  with  a  blunt  hatchet. 
Take  as  a  specimen  his  translation  of  a  cele 
brated  passage  in  the  ^Eneid: — 

"This  child  our  parent  earth,  stirred  up  with  spite 
Of  all  the  gods,  brought  forth,  and,  as  some  write, 
'She  was  last  sister  of  tiint  giant  race 
Th-it  sought  to  si-ale  Jove's  court,  right  swift  of  pac«, 
AnJ  swifter  far  of  wing,  a  monster  vast 
And  dreadful.     Look,  how  many  plumes  are  placed 
On  her  huge  corpse,  s<>  many  waking  eyes 
Stick  underneath,  and,  which  may  stranger  rise 
In  the  report,  as  many  tongues  slie  wears." 

Compare  with  these  jagged  misshapen  dis- 
tichs  the  neat  fabric  which  Hoole's  machine 
produces  in  unlimited  abundance.  We  take 
the  first  lines  on  which  we  open  in  his  version 
of  Tasso.  They  are  neither  better  nor  worse 
than  the  rest: — 

"O  thou,  whoe'er  thou  art,  whose  steps  are  led 
By  choice  or  fate,  these  lonely  shores  to  tread, 
No  greater  wonders  east  or  west  can  boast 
Than  yon  small  island  on  the  pleasing  coast. 
If  e'er  thy  sight  would  blissful  scenes  explore, 
The  current  pass,  and  seek  the  further  shore." 

Ever  since  the  time  of  Pope  there  has  ueen 
a  glut  of  lines  of  this  sort;  and  we  are  now  as 
little  disposed  to  admire  a  man  for  being  able 
to  write  them  as  for  being  able  to  write  his 
name.  But  in  the  days  of  William  the  Third 
such  versification  was  rare  ;  and  a  rhymer  who 
had  any  skill  in  it  passed  for  a  great  poet ;  just 
as  in  the  dark  ages  a  person  who  could  write 
his  name  passed  for  a  great  clerk.  Accord 
ingly,  Duke,  Stepney,  Granville,  Walsh,  and 
others,  whose  only  title  to  fame  was  that  they 
said  in  tolerable  metre  what  might  have  beea 
as  well  said  in  prose,  or  what  was  not  worth 
saying  at  all,  were  honoured  with  marks  of 
distinction  which  ought  to  be  reserved  for  ge 
nius.  With  these  Addison  must  have  ranked, 
if  he  had  not  earned  true  and  lasting  glory  by 
performances  which  very  little  resembled  hi* 
juvenile  poems. 


598 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Dryden  was  now  busied  with  Virgil,  and  ob 
tained  from  Addison  a  critical  preface  to  the 
Gcurgics.  In  return  for  this  service,  and  for 
other  services  of  the  same  kind,  the  veteran 
poet,  in  the  postscript  to  the  translation  of  the 
JEneid,  complimented  his  young  friend  with 
great  liberality,  and  indeed  with  more  liberality 
than  sincerity.  He  affected  to  be  afraid  that 
his  own  performance  would  not  sustain  a  com 
parison  with  the  version  of  the  fourth  Georgic, 
by  "the  most  ingenious  Mr.  Addison  of  Ox 
ford."  "After  his  bees,"  added  Dryden,  "  my 
latter  swarm  is  scarcely  worth  the  hiving."* 

The  time  had  now  arrived  when  it  was  ne 
cessary  for  Addison  to  chose  a  calling.  Every 
thing  seemed  to  point  his  course  toward  the 
clerical  profession.  His  habits  were  regular, 
his  opinions  orthodox.  His  college  had  large 
ecclesiastical  preferment  in  its  gift,  and  boasts 
that  it  has  given  at  least  one  bishop  to  almost 
every  see  in  England.  Dr.  Lancelot  Addison 
held  an  honourable  place  in  the  church,  and 
had  set  his  heart  on  seeing  his  son  a  clergy 
man.  It  is  clear,  from  some  expressions  in  the 
young  man's  rhymes,  that  his  intention  was  to 
take  orders.  But  Charles  Montagu  interfered. 
Montagu  first  brought  himself  into  notice  by 
verses,  well-timed  and  not  contemptibly  writ 
ten,  but  never,  we  think,  rising  above  medioc 
rity.  Fortunately  for  himself  and  for  his 
tountry,  he  early  quitted  poetry,  in  which  he 
could  never  have  obtained  a  rank  as  high  as 
that  of  Dorset  or  Roscommon,  and  turned  his 
mind  to  official  and  parliamentary  business. 
It  is  written  that  the  ingenious  person  who  un 
dertook  to  instruct  Rasselas,  prince  of  Abys 
sinia,  in  the  art  of  Hying,  ascended  an  eminence, 
waved  his  wings,  sprang  into  the  air,  and  in 
stantly  dropped  into  the  lake.  But  it  is  added 
that  the  wings  which  were  unable  to  support 
him  through  the  sky,  bore  him  up  effectually  as 
soon  as  he  was  in  the  water.  This  is  no  bad 
type  of  the  fate  of  Charles  Montagu,  and  of 
men  like  him.  When  he  attempted  to  soar 
into  the  regions  of  poetical  invention,  he  alto 
gether  failed  ;  but  as  soon  as  he  had  descended 
from  his  ethereal  elevation  into  a  lower  and 
grosser  element,  his  talents  instantly  raised  him 
above  the  mass.  He  became  a  distinguished 
financier,  debater,  courtier,  and  party  leader. 
He  still  retained  his  fondness  for  the  pursuits 
of  his  early  days ;  but  he  showed  that  fondness, 
not  by  wearying  the  public  with  his  own  feeble 
performances,  but  by  discovering  and  encou 
raging  literary  excellence  in  others.  A  crowd 
of  wits  and  poets,  who  would  easily  have 
vanquished  him  as  a  competitor,  revered  him 
as  a  judge  and  a  patron.  In  his  plans  for  the 
encouragement  of  learning,  he  was  cordially 
supported  by  the  ablest  and  most  virtuous  of  his 
colleagues,  the  lord  keeper  Somers.  Though 
l»oth  these  great  statesmen  had  a  sincere  love  of 
letters,  it  was  not  solely  from  a  love  of  letters 
that  they  were  de.'.irous  to  enlist  youths  of  high 
intellectual  qualifications  in  the  public  service. 
The  Revolution  had  altered  the  whole  system  of 
government.  Before  that  event,  the  press  had 
b«nn  controlled  by  censors,  and  the  Parliament 


*  Miss  Aikin  rnikcs  this  compliment  alt  «g«t.httr  un 
meaning  hy  saying  tint  it  was  paid  to  a  translation  of 
tlie  secoml  Georgic,  (i.  30.) 


had  sat  only  two  months  in  eight  years.  Now 
the  press  was  free,  and  had  begun  to  exercise 
unprecedented  influence  on  the  public  mind. 
Parliament  met  annually  and  sat  long.  The 
chief  power  in  the  state  had  passed  to  the 
House  of  Commons.  At  such  a  conjuncture, 
it  was  natural  that  literary  and  oratorical 
talents  should  rise  in  value.  There  was  dan 
ger  that  a  government  which  neglected  such 
talents  might  be  subverted  by  them.  It  was, 
therefore,  a  profound  and  enlightened  policy 
which  led  Montagu  and  Somers  to  attach  such 
talents  to  the  whig  party,  by  the  strongest  ties 
both  of  interest  and  of  gratitude. 

It  is  remarkable  that,  in  a  neighbouring 
country,  we  have  recently  seen  similar  effects 
from  similar  causes.  The  Revolution  of  July, 
1830,  established  representative  government  in, 
France.  The  men  of  letters  instantly  rose  to 
the  highest  importance  in  the  state.  At  the 
present  moment,  mo3t  of  the  persons  whom 
we  see  at  the  head  both  of  the  administration 
and  of  the  opposition  have  been  professors, 
historians,  journalists,  poets.  The  influence 
of  the  literary  class  in  England,  during  the 
generation  which  followed  the  Revolution  was 
great,  but  by  no  means  so  great  as  it  has  lately 
been  in  France.  For,  in  England,  the  aristo 
cracy  of  intellect  had  to  contend  with  a  power 
ful  and  deeply  rooted  aristocracy  of  a  very 
different  kind.  France  has  no  Somersets  and 
Shrewsburies  to  keep  down  her  Addisons  and 
Priors. 

It  was  in  the  year  1699,  when  Addison  had 
just  completed  his  twenty-seventh  year,  that  the 
course  of  his  life  was  finally  determined.  Both 
the  great  chiefs  of  the  ministry  were  kindly 
disposed  towards  him.  In  political  opinions  he 
already  was,  what  he  continued  to  be  through 
life,  a  firm,  though  moderate  whig.  He  had[ 
addressed  the  most  polished  and  vigorous  of 
his  early  English  lines  to  Somers;  and  had 
dedicated  to  Montagu  a  Latin  poem,  truly  Vir- 
gilian,  both  in  style  and  rhythm,  on  the  peace 
of  Ryswick.  The  wish  of  the  young  poet's 
great  friends  was,  it  should  seem,  to  employ 
him  in  the  service  of  the  crown  abroad.  But 
an  intimate  knowledge  of  the  French  language 
was  a  qualification  indispensable  to  a  diplo 
matist;  and  this  qualification  Addison  had  not 
acquired.  It  was,  therefore,  thought  desirable 
that  he  should  pass  some  time  on  the  Continent 
in  preparing  himself  for  official  employment. 
His  own  means  were  not  such  as  would  enable 
him  to  travel;  but  a  pension  of  £300  a  year 
was  procured  for  him  by  the  interest  of  the 
lord  keeper.  It  seems  to  have  been  appre 
hended  that  some  difficulty  might  be  started  by 
the  rulers  of  Magdalene  College.  But  the 
chancellor  of  the  exchequer  wrote  in  the  strong 
est  terms  to  Hough.  The  state — such  was  the 
purport  of  Montagu's  letter — could  not,  at  that 
lime,  spare  to  the  church  such  a  man  as  Addi 
son.  Too  many  high  posts  were  already  occu 
pied  by  adventurers,  who,  destitute  of  every 
liberal  art  and  sentiment,  at  once  pillaged  and 
disgraced  the  country  which  they  pretended  to 
serve.  It  had  become  necessary  to  recruit  for  the 
public  service  from  a  very  different  class,  from 
that,  class  of  which  Addison  was  the  representa 
tive.  The  close  of  the  ministers  letter  wa*  re- 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


599 


markable.  "  I  am  called,"  he  said,  "  an  enemy 
of  the  church.  But  I  will  never  do  it  any  other 
injury  than  keeping  Mr.  Addison  out  of  it." 

This  interference  was  successful ;  and  in  the 
summer  of  1699,  Addison,  made  a  rich  man 
by  his  pension,  and  still  retaining  his  fellow 
ship,  quitted  his  beloved  Oxford,  and  set  out 
on  his  travels.  He  crossed  from  Dover  to 
Calais,  proceeded  to  Paris,  and  was  received 
there  with  great  kindness  and  politeness  by  a 
kinsman  of  his  friend  Montagu,  Charles  Earl 
of  Manchester,  who  had  just  been  appointed 
ambassador  to  the  court  of  France.  The 
countess,  a  whig  and  a  toast,  was  probably  as 
gracious  as  her  lord;  for  Addison  long  retained 
an  agreeable  recollection  of  the  impression 
which  she  at  this  time  made  on  him,  and,  in 
some  lively  lines  written  on  the  glasses  of  the 
Kit-Cat  club,  described  the  envy  which  her 
cheeks,  glowing  with  the  genuine  bloom  of 
England,  had  excited  among  the  painted  beau 
ties  of  Versailles. 

Louis  XIV.  was  at  this  time  expiating  the 
vices  of  his  youth  by  a  devotion  which  had  no 
root  in  reason,  and  bore  no  fruit  in  charity. 
The  servile  literature  of  France  had  changed 
its  character  to  suit  the  changed  character  of 
the  prince.  No  book  appeared  that  had  not  an 
air  of  sanctity.  Racine,  who  was  just  dead, 
had  passed  the  close  of  his  life  in  writing  sa 
cred  dramas;  and  Dacier  was  seeking  for  the 
Athanasian  mysteries  of  Plato.  Addison  de 
scribed  this  state  of  things  in  a  short  but  lively 
and  graceful  letter  to  Montagu.  Another  letter, 
written  about  the  same  time  to  the  lord  keeper, 
conveyed  the  strongest  assurances  of  gratitude 
and  attachment.  "The  only  return  I  can  make 
to  your  lord.ship,"  said  Addison,  "will  be  to 
apply  myself  entirely  to  my  business."  With 
this  view  he  quitted  Paris  and  repaired  to  Blois ; 
a  place  where  it  was  supposed  that  the  French 
language  was  spoken  in  its  highest  purity,  and 
where  not  a  single  Englishman  could  be  found. 
Here  he  passed  some  months  pleasantly  and 
profitably.  Of  his  way  of  life  at  Blois,  one  of 
his  associates,  an  abbe  named  Philippeaux, 
gave  an  account  to  Joseph  Spetice.  If  this 
account  is  to  be  trusted,  Addison  studied  much, 
mused  much,  talked  little,  had  fits  of  absence, 
and  either  had  no  love  affairs,  or  was  too  dis 
creet  to  confide  them  to  the  abbe.  A  man  who, 
even  when  surrounded  by  fellow-countrymen 
and  fellow-students,  had  always  been  remark 
ably  shy  and  silent,  was  not  likely  to  be  loqua 
cious  in  a  foreign  tongue,  and  among  foreign 
companions.  But  it  is  clear  from  Addison's 
letters,  some  of  which  were  long  after  publish 
ed  in  the  "Guardian,"  that  while  he  appeared 
to  be  absorbed  in  his  own  meditations,  he  was 
really  observing  French  society  with  that  keen 
and  sly,  yet  not  ill-natured  side-glance  which 
was  peculiarly  his  own. 

From  Blois  he  returned  to  Paris  ;  and  hav 
ing  now  mastered  the  French  language,  found 
great  pleasure  in  the  society  of  French  philo 
sophers  and  poets.  He  gave  an  account,  in  a 
letter  to  Bishop  Hough,  of  two  highly  interest 
ing  conversations,  one  with  Malebranche,  the 
other  with  Boileau.  Malebranche  expressed 
great  partiality  for  the  English,  and  extolled 
the  genius  of  Newton,  but  shook  his  head  when 


Hobbes  was  mentioned,  and  was  indeed  so 
unjust  as  to  call  the  author  of  the  "Leviathan" 
a  poor  silly  creature.  Addison's  modesty  re 
strained  him  from  fully  relating,  in  his  letter, 
the  circumstances  of  his  introduction  to  Boi 
leau.  Boileau,  having  survived  the  friends 
and  rivals  of  his  youth,  old,  deaf,  and  melan 
choly,  lived  in  retirement,  seldom  went  either 
to  court  or  to  the  academy,  and  was  almost  in 
accessible  to  strangers.  Of  the  English  and 
of  English  literature  he  knew  nothing.  He 
had  hardly  heard  the  name  of  Dryden.  Some 
of  our  countrymen,  in  the  warmth  of  their 
patriotism,  have  asserted  that  this  ignorance 
must  have  been  affected.  We  own  that  we  see 
no  ground  for  such  a  supposition.  English 
literature  was  to  the  French  of  the  age  of  Louis 
XIV.  what  German  literature  was  to  our  own 
grandfathers.  Very  few,  we  suspect,  of  the 
accomplished  men  who,  sixty  or  seventy  years 
ago,  used  to  dine  in  Leicester  Square  with  Sir 
Joshua,  or  at  Streatham  with  Mrs.  Thrale,  had 
the  slightest  notion  lhat  Wieland  was  one  of 
the  first  wits  and  poets,  and  Lessing,  beyond 
all  dispute,  the  first  critic  in  Europe.  Boileau 
knew  just  as  little  about  the  "Paradise  Lost," 
and  about  "  Absalom  and  Ahitophel  ;"  but  he 
had  read  Addison's  Latin  poems,  and  admired 
them  greatly.  They  had  given  him,  he  said, 
quite  a  new  notion  of  the  state  of  learning  and 
taste  among  the  English.  Johnson  will  have 
it  that  these  praises  were  insincere.  "No 
thing,"  says  he,  "is  better  known  of  Boileau 
than  that  he  had»  an  injudicious  and  peevish 
contempt  of  modern  Latin;  and  therefore  his 
profession  of  regard  was  probably  the  effect 
of  his  civility  rather  than  approbation."  Now, 
nothing  is  better  known  of  Boileau  than  that 
he  was  singularly  sparing  of  compliments. 
We  do  not  remember  that  either  friendship  or 
fear  ever  induced  him  to  bestow  praise  on  any 
composition  which  he  did  not  approve.  On 
literary  questions,  his  caustic,  disdainful,  and 
self-confident  spirit  rebelled  against  that  au 
thority  to  which  every  thing  else  in  France 
bowed  down.  He  had  the  spirit  to  tell  Louis 
XIV.  firmly,  and  even  rudely,  that  his  majesty 
knew  nothing  about  poetry,  and  admired  verses 
which  were  detestable.  What  was  there  in 
Addison's  position  that  could  induce  the  sa 
tirist,  whose  stern  and  fastidious  temper  had 
been  the  dread  of  two  generations,  to  turn  sy 
cophant  for  the  first  and  last  time  1  Nor  was 
Boileau's  contempt  of  modern  Latin  either  .n- 
judicious  or  peevish.  He  thought,  indeed,  that 
no  poem  of  the  first  order  would  ever  be 
written  in  a  dead  language.  And  did  he  think 
amiss?  Has  not  the  experience  of  centuries 
confirmed  his  opinion'?  Boileau  also  thought 
it  probable  that,  in  the  best  modern  Latin,  a 
writer  of  the  Augustan  age  would  have  de 
tected  ludicrous  improprieties.  And  who  can 
think  otherwise  7  What  modern  scholar  can. 
honestly  declare  that  he  sees  the  smallest  im 
purity  in  the  style  of  Livy?  Yet  is  it  not  cer 
tain  that,  in  the  style  of  Livy,  Pollio,  whose  taste 
had  been  formed  on  the  banks  of  the  Tiber, 
detected  the  inelegant  idiom  of  the  Po  ?  Has 
any  modern  scholar  understood  Latin  better 
than  Frederick  the  Great  understood  French  ? 
Yet  is  it  not  notorious  that  Frederick  the  Great 


eoo 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


after  reading,  speaking,  writing  French,  and 
nothing  but  French,  during  more  than  half  a 
century — after  unlearning  his  mother  tongue 
in  order  to  learn  French,  after  living  familiarly 
during  many  years  with  French  associates — 
could  not,  to  the  last,  compose  in  French,  with 
out  imminent  risk  of  committing  some  mistake 
which  would  have  moved  a  smile  in  the  literary 
circles  of  Paris  1  Do  we  believe  that  Erasmus 
and  Fracastorius  wrote  Latin  as  well  as  Dr. 
Robertson  and  Sir  Walter  Scott  wrote  English  7 
And  are  there  not  in  the  Dissertation  on  India, 
(the  last  of  Dr.  Robertson's  works,)  in  Waver- 
ley,  in  Marmion,  Scotticisms  at  which  a  Lon 
don  apprentice  would  laugh  7  But  does  it 
follow,  because  we  think  thus,  that  we  can  find 
nothing  to  admire  in  the  noble  alcaics  of  Gray, 
or  in  the  playful  elegiacs  of  Vincent  Bourne  7 
Surely  not.  Nor  was  Boileau  so  ignorant  or 
tasteless  as  to  be  incapable  of  appreciating 
good  modern  Latin.  In  the  very  letter  to  which 
Johnson  alludes.  Boileau  says — "Ne  croyez 
pas  pourtant  que  je  veuille  par  la.  blamer  les 
vers  Latins  que  vous  m'avez  envoyes  d'un  de 
vos  illustres  academiciens.  Je  les  ai  trouves 
fort  beaux,  et  dignes  de  Vida  et  de  Sannazar, 
liiais  non  pas  d'Horace  et  de  Virgile."  Several 
poems,  in  modern  Latin,  have  been  praised  by 
Boileau  quite  as  liberally  as  it  was  his  habit  to 
praise  any  thing.  He  says,  for  example,  of 
Pere  Fraguier's  epigrams,  that  Catullus  seems 
to  have  come  to  life  again.  But  the  best  proof 
that  Boileau  did  not  feel  the  undiscerning  con 
tempt  for  modern  Latin  verses  which  has  been 
imputed  to  him,  is,  that  he  wrote  and  published 
Latin  verses  in  several  metres.  Indeed,  it 
happens, curiously  enough,  that  the  most  severe 
censure  ever  pronounced  by  him  on  moden 
Latin,  is  conveyed  in  Latin  hexameters.  We 
allude  to  the  fragment  which  begins — 

"Quid  numeris  iterum  me  balbutire  Latinis, 
Lnnge  Alpes  citra  natumde  patre  Sicambro, 
Musa,  jubesl" 

For  these  reasons  we  feel  assured  that  the 
praise  which  Boileau  bestowed  on  the  Machine 
Gesticulantes,  and  the  Gerano-Pygm&omachiu,  was 
sincere.  He  certainly  opened  himself  to  Ad- 
dison  with  a  freedom  which  was  a  sure  indica 
tion  of  esteem.  Literature  was  the  chief  subject 
of  conversation.  The  old  man  talked  on  his 
favourite  theme  much  and  well ;  indeed,  as  his 
young  hearer  thought, incomparably  well.  Boi 
leau  had  undoubtedly  some  of  the  qualities  of  a 
great  critic.  He  wanted  imagination ;  but  he 
had  strong  sense.  His  literary  code  was  formed 
on  narrow  principles;  but  in  applying  it,  he 
showed  great  judgment  and  penetration.  In 
mere  style,  abstracted  from  the  ideas  of  which 
style  is  the  garb,  his  taste  was  excellent.  He 
was  well  acquainted  with  the  great  Greek  writ 
ers  ;  and,  though  unable  fully  to  appreciate  their 
creative  genius,  admired  the  majestic  simpli 
city  of  their  manner,  and  had  learned  from 
them  to  despise  bombast  and  tinsel.  It  is  easy, 
we  think,  to  discover,  in  the  "  Spectator"  and 
the  "Guardian,"  traces  of  the  influence,  in  part 
salutary  and  in  part  pernicious,  which  the  mind 
of  Boileau  had  on  the  mind  of  Addison. 

While  Addison  was  at  Paris,  an  event  took 
place  which  made  that  capital  a  disagreeable 
residence  tor  an  Englishman  and  a  whig. 


Charles,  second  of  the  name,  King  of  Spam, 
died;  and  bequeathed  his  dominions  to  Philip, 
Uuke  of  Anjou,  a  younger  son  of  the  dauphin. 
The  King  of  France,  in  direct  violation  of  his 
engagements  both  with  Great  Britain  and  with 
the  states-general,  accepted  the  bequest  on  be 
half  of  his  grandson.  The  house  of  Bourbon 
was  at  the  summit  of  human  grandeur.  Eng 
land  had  been  outwitted,  and  found  herself  in 
a  situation  at  once  degrading  and  perilous. 
The  people  of  France,  not  presaging  the  cala 
mities  by  which  they  were  destined  to  expiate 
the  perfidy  of  their  sovereign,  went  mad  with 
pride  and  delight.  Every  man  looked  as  if  a 
great  estate  had  just  been  left  him.  "The 
French  conversation,"  said  Addison,  "begins 
to  grow  insupportable ;  that  which  was  before 
the  vainest  nation  in  the  world,  is  now  worse 
than  ever."  Sick  of  the  arrogant  exultation  of 
the  Parisians,  and  probably  foreseeing  that  the 
peace  between  France  and  England  could  not 
be  of  long  duration,  he  set  oflT  for  Italy. 

In  December,  1700,*  he  embarked  at  Mar 
seilles.  As  he  glided  along  the  Ligurian  coast, 
he  was  delighted  by  the  sight  of  myrtles  and 
olive-trees,  which  retained  their  verdure  under 
the  winter  solstice.  Soon,  however,  he  en 
countered  one  of  the  black  storms  of  the  Me 
diterranean.  The  captain  of  the  ship  gave  up 
all  for  lost,  and  confessed  himself  to  a  capuchin 
who  happened  to  be  on  board.  The  English 
heretic,  in  the  mean  time,  fortified  himself 
against  the  terrors  of  death  with  devotions  of 
a  very  different  kind.  How  strong  an  impres 
sion  this  perilous  voyage  made  on  him,  appears 
from  the  ode — "How  are  thy  servants  blest, 
O  Lord !"  which  was  long  after  published  in 
the  Spectator.  After  some  days  of  discomfort 
and  danger,  Addison  was  glad  to  land  at  Savo- 
na,  and  to  make  his  way,  over  mountains 
wh^re  no  road  had  yet  been  hewn  out  by  art, 
to  the  city  of  Genoa. 

At  Genoa,  still  ruled  by  her  own  doge,  and 
by  the  nobles  whose  names  were  inscribed  on 
her  book  cf  gold,  Addison  made  a  short  stay. 
He  admired  the  narrow  streets  overhung  by 
long  lines  of  towering  palaces,  the  walls  rich 
with  frescoes,  the  gorgeous  temple  cf  the  An 
nunciation,  and  the  tapestries  whereon  were 
recorded  the  long  glories  of  the  house  of  Doria. 
Thence  he  hastened  to  Milan,  where  he  con 
templated  the  Gothic  magnificence  of  the  r.athe- 
dral  with  more  wonder  than  pleasure.  He 
passed  lake  Benacus  while  a  gale  was  blow 
ing,  and  saw  the  waves  raging  as  they  raged 
when  Virgil  looked  upon  them.  At  Venice, 
then  the  gayest  spot  in  Europe,  the  traveller 
spent  the  carnival,  the  gayest  season  of  the 
year,  in  the  midst  of  masques,  dances,  and  se 
renades.  Here  he  was  at  once  diverted  and 
provoked  by  the  absurd  dramatic  pieces  which 
then  disgraced  the  Italian  stage.  To  one  of 
those  pieces,  however,  he  was  indebted  for  a 
valuable  hint.  He  was  present  when  a  ridi 
culous  play  on  the  death  of  Cato  was  perform 
ed.  Cato,  it  seems,  was  in  love  with  a  daughter 


*  It  is  strange  that  Addison  should,  in  the  first  line  of  his 
travels,  have  misdated  his  departure  from  Marseilles  by 
a  whole  year,  and  still  mere  strange  that  this  slip  of  the 
pen,  which  throws  the  whole  narrative  into  inextricable 
confusion,  should  have  been  repeated  in  a  suc'-ession  of 
I  editions,  and  never  detected  by  Tickeil  or  by  liurd. 


LIFE   AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


col 


of  Scipio.  The  lady  had  given  her  heart  to 
Caesar.  The  rejected  lover  determined  to 
destroy  himself.  He  appeared  seated  in  his 
library,  a  dagger  in  his  hand,  a  Plutarch  and 
a  Tasso  before  him  ;  and,  in  this  position  he 
pronounced  a  soliloquy  before  he  struck  the 
blow.  We  are  surprised  that  so  remarkable  a 
circumstance  as  this  should  have  escaped  the 
notice  of  all  Addison's  biographers.  There 
cannot,  we  conceive,  be  the  smallest  doubt  that 
this  scene,  in  spite  of  its  absurdities  and  ana 
chronisms,  struck  the  traveller's  imagination, 
and  suggested  to  him  the  thought  of  bringing 
Cato  on  the  English  stage.  It  is  well  known 
that  about  this  time  he  began  his  tragedy,  and 
that  he  finished  the  first  four  acts  before  he  re 
turned  to  England. 

On  his  way  from  Venice  to  Rome,  he  was 
drawn  some  miles  out  of  the  beaten  road,  by  a 
wish  to  see  the  smallest  independent  state  in 
Europe.  On  a  rock  where  the  snow  still  lay, 
though  the  Italian  spring  was  now  far  ad 
vanced,  was  perched  the  little  fortress  of  San 
Marino.  The  roads  which  led  to  the  secluded 
town  were  so  bad  that  few  travellers  had  ever 
visited  it,  and  none  had  ever  published  an  ac 
count  of  it.  Addison  could  not  suppress  a 
good-natured  smile  at  the  simple  manners  and 
institutions  of  this  singular  community.  But 
he  observed,  with  the  exultation  of  a  whig,  that 
the  rude  mountain  tract  which  formed  the  terri 
tory  of  the  republic,  swarmed  with  an  honest, 
healthy,  contented  peasantry:  while  the  rich 
plain  which  surrounded  the  metropolis  of  civil 
and  spiritual  tyranny,  was  scarcely  less  deso 
late  than  the  uncleared  wilds  of  America. 

At  Rome,  Addison  remained  on  his  first  visit 
only  long  enough  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  St. 
Peter's,  and  of  the  Pantheon.  His  haste  is  the 
more  extraordinary,  because  the  holy  week  was 
close  at  hand.  He  has  given  no  hint  which  can 
enable  us  to  pronounce  why  he  chose  to  fly 
from  a  spectacle  which  every  year  allures  from 
distant  regions  persons  of  far  less  taste  and 
sensibility  than  his.  Possibly,  travelling,  as  he 
did,  at  the  charge  of  a  government  distinguished 
by  its  enmity  to  the  church  of  Rome,  he  may 
have  thought  that  it  would  be  imprudent  in 
him  to  assist  at  the  most  magnificent  rite  of 
that  church.  Many  eyes  would  be  upon  him; 
and  he  might  find  it  difficult  to  behave  in  such 
a  manner  as  to  give  offence  neither  to  his  pa 
trons  in  England,  nor  to  those  among  whom  he 
resided.  Whatever  his  motives  may  have 
been,  he  turned  his  back  on  the  most  august 
and  affecting  ceremony  which  is  known  among 
men,  and  posted  along  the  Appian  way  to 
Naples. 

Naples  was  then  destitute  of  what  are  now, 
perhaps,  its  chief  attractions.  The  lovely  bay 
and  the  awful  mountain  were  indeed  there. 
But  a  farm  house  stood  on  the  theatre  of  Her- 
culaneum,  and  rows  of  vines  grew  over  the 
streets  of  Pompeii.  The  temples  of  Paestum 
had  not  indeed  been  hidden  from  the  eye  of 
man  by  any  great  convulsion  of  nature;  but, 
strange  to  say,  their  existence  was  a  secret 
even  to  artists  and  antiquaries.  Though  si 
tuated  within  a  few  hours'  journey  of  a  great 
capital,  where  Salvator  had  not  long  before 
painted,  and  where  Vico  was  then  lecturing, 

VOL.  V.— 76 


those  noble  remains  were  as  litt.e  known  to 
Europe  as  the  ruined  cities  overgrown  by  the 
forests  of  Yucatan.  What  was  to  be  seen  at 
Naples,  Addison  saw.  He  climbed  Vesuvius, 
explored  the  tunnel  of  Posilipo,  and  wandered 
among  the  vines  and  almond-trees  of  Capreoe. 
But  neither  the  wonders  of  nature  nor  those 
of  art  could  so  occupy  his  attention  as  to  pre 
vent  him  from  noticing,  though  cursorily,  the 
abuses  of  the  government  and  the  misery  of 
the  people.  The  great  kingdom  which  had 
just  descended  to  Philip  V.  was  in  a  state  of 
paralytic  dotage.  Even  Castile  and  Arragon 
were  sunk  in  wretchedness.  Yet,  compared 
with  the  Italian  dependencies  of  the  Spanish 
crown,  Castile  and  Arragon  might  be  called 
prosperous.  It  is  clear  that  all  the  observa 
tions  which  Addison  made  in  Italy  tended  to 
confirm  him  in  the  political  opinions  which  he 
had  adopted  at  home.  To  the  last  he  always 
spoke  of  foreign  travel  as  the  best  cure  for 
Jacobitism.  In  his  Freeholder,  the  tory  fox- 
hunter  asks  what  travelling  is  good  for,  except 
to  teach  a  man  to  jabber  French,  and  to  talk 
against  passive  obedience. 

From  Naples  Addison  returned  to  Rome  by 
sea,  along  the  coast  which  his  favourite  Virgil 
had  celebrated.  The  felucca  passed  the  head 
land  where  the  oar  and  trumpet  were  placed 
by  the  Trojan  adventurers  on  the  tomb  of  Mi- 
senus,  and  anchored  at  night  under  the  shelter 
of  the  fabled  promontory  of  Circe.  The  voy 
age  ended  in  the  Tiber,  still  overhung  with 
dark  verdure,  and  still  turbid  wiih  yellow  sand, 
as  when  it  met  the  eyes  of  ^Eneas.  From  the 
ruined  port  of  Ostia,  the  stranger  hurried  to 
Rome;  and  at  Rome  he  remained  during  those 
hot  and  sickly  months  when,  even  in  the  Au 
gustan  age,  all  who  could  make  their  escape 
fled  from  mad  dogs  and  from  streets  black  with 
funerals,  to  gather  the  first  figs  of  the  season 
in  the  country.  It  is  probable  that  when  he, 
long  after,  poured  forth  in  verse  his  gratitude 
to  the  Providence  which  had  enabled  him  to 
breathe  unhurt  in  tainted  air,  he  was  thinking 
of  the  August  and  September  which  he  passed 
at  Rome. 

It  was  not  till  the  latter  end  of  October  tha4 
he  tore  himself  away  from  the  masterpieces 
of  ancient  and  modern  art,  which  are  collected 
in  the  city  so  long  the  mistress  of  the  world. 
He  then  journeyed  northward,  passed  through 
Sienna,  and  for  a  moment  forgot  his  prejudices 
in  favour  of  classic  architecture  as  he  looked 
on  the  magnificent  cathedral.  At  Florence  he 
spent  some  days  with  the  Duke  of  Shrewsbury, 
who,  cloyed  with  the  pleasures  of  ambition, 
and  impatient  of  its  pains,  fearing  both  parties, 
and  loving  neither,  had  determined  to  hide  in 
an  Italian  retreat,  talents  and  accomplishments 
which,  if  they  had  been  united  with  fixed  prin 
ciples  and  civil  courage,  might  have  made  him 
the  foremost  man  of  his  age.  These  davs,  we 
are  told,  passed  pleasantly;  and  we  can'easily 
believe  it.  For  Addison  was  a  delightful  com- 
pan  ion  when  he  was  at  his  ease;  and  the  duke, 
though  he  seldom  forgot  that  he  was  a  Talbot, 
had  the  invaluable  art  of  putting  at  ease  all 
who  came  near  him. 

Addison  gave  some  time  to  Florence,  and 
especially  to  the  sculptures  in  the  Museum, 
3E 


602 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


which  he  preferred  even  to  those  of  the  Va 
tican.  He  then  pursued  his  journey  through 
a  country  in  which  the  ravages  of  the  last  war 
were  still  discernible,  and  in  which  all  men 
were  looking  forward  with  dread  to  a  still  fiercer 
conflict.  Eugene  had  already  descended  from 
the  Rhoetian  Alps,  to  disp.ute  with  Catinat  the 
rich  plain  of  Lombardy.  The  faithless  ruler 
of  Savoy  was  still  reckoned  among  the  allies 
of  Louis.  England  had  not  yet  actually  de 
clared  war  against  France.  But  Manchester 
had  left  Paris;  and  the  negotiations  which 
produced  the  grand  alliance  against  the  house 
of  Bourbon  were  in  progress.  Under  such 
circumstances,  it  was  desirable  for  an  English 
traveller  to  reach  neutral  ground  without  de 
lay.  Addison  resolved  to  cross  Mont  Cenis. 
It  was  December ;  arid  the  road  was  very  dif 
ferent  from  that  which  now  reminds  the  stran 
ger  of  the  power  and  genius  of  Napoleon. 
The  winter,  however,  was  mild,  and  the  pas 
sage  was,  for  those  limes,  easy.  To  this  jour 
ney  Addison  alluded,  when,  in  the  ode  which 
we  have  already  quoted,  he  said  that  for  him 
the  Divine  goodness  had  "warmed  the  hoary 
Alpine  hills." 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  the  eternal  snow  that 
he  composed  his  Epistle  to  his  friend  Montagu, 
now  Lord  Halifax.  That  Epistle,  once  widely 
renowned,  is  now  known  only  to  curious  read 
ers;  and  will  hardly  be  considered  by  those  to 
whom  it  is  known  as  in  any  perceptible  degree 
heightening  Addison's  fame.  It  is,  however, 
decidedly  superior  to  any  English  composition 
which  he  had  previously  published.  Nay,  we 
think  it  quite  as  good  as  any  poem  in  heroic 
metre  which  appeared  during  the  interval  be 
tween  the  death  of  Dryden  and  the  publication 
of  the  "Essay  on  Criticism."  It  contains  pas 
sages  as  good  as  the  second  rate  passages  of 
Pope,  and  would  have  added  to  the  reputation 
of  Parnell  or  Prior. 

But,  whatever  be  the  literary  merits  or  de 
fects  of  the  Epistle,  it  undoubtedly  docs  honour 
to  the  principles  and  spirit  of  the  author. 
Halifax  had  now  nothing  to  give.  He  had 
fallen  from  power,  had  been  held  up  to  oblo 
quy,  had  been  impeached  by  the  House  of 
Commons ;  and,  though  his  peers  had  dismissed 
the  impeachment,*  had,  as  it  seemed,  little 
chance  of  e/er  again  filling  high  office.  The 
Epistle,  written  at  such  a  time,  is  one  among 
many  proofs  that  there  was  no  mixture  of 
cowaidice  or  meanness  in  the  suavity  and 
moderation  which  distinguished  Addison  from 
all  the  other  public  men  of  those  stormy  times. 

At  Geneva,  the  traveller  learned  that  a  par 
tial  change  of  ministry  had  taken  place  in 
England,  and  that  the  Earl  of  Manchester  had 
become  secretary  of  state.f  Manchester  ex 
erted  himself  to  serve  his  young  friend.  It 
was  thought  advisable  that  an  English  agent 
should  be  near  the  person  of  Eugene  in  Italy; 
and  Addison,  whose  diplomatic  education  was 
ow  finished,  was  the  man  selected.  He  was 


*  Miss  Aikin  says,  (i.  121,)  that  the  Epistle  was  writ 
ten  before  Halifax  was  justified  by  the  Lords.  This  is  a 
mistake.  The  Epistle  was  written  in  December,  1701  ; 
t.'ie  impeachment  had  been  dismissed  in  the  preceding 
June. 

t  Miss  Aikin  misdates  this  event  by  a  year,  (i.  93.) 


preparing  to  enter  on  his  honourable  functions, 
when  all  his  prospects  were  for  a  time  dark 
ened  by  the  death  of  William  III. 

Anne  had  long  felt  a  strong  aversion, personal, 
political,  and  religious,  to  the  whig  party.  That 
aversion  appeared  in  the  first  measures  of  her 
reign.  Manchester  was  deprived  of  the  seals 
after  he  had  held  them  only  a  few  weeks. 
Neither  Somers  nor  Halifax  was  sworn  of  the 
Privy  Council.  Addison  shared  the  fate  of  his 
three  patrons.  His  hopes  of  employment  in  the 
public  service  were  at  an  end ;  his  pension  was 
stopped;  and  it  was  necessary  for  him  to  sup 
port  himself  by  his  own  exertions.  He  became 
tutor  to  a  young  English  traveller ;  and  appears 
to  have  rambled  with  his  pupil  over  great  part 
of  Switzerland  and  Germany.  At  this  time  he 
wrote  his  pleasing  treatise  on  "  Medals."  It 
was  not  published  till  after  his  death  ;  but  seve 
ral  distinguished  scholars  saw  the  manuscript, 
and  gave  just  praise  to  the  grace  of  the  style, 
and  to  the  learning  and  ingenuity  evinced  by 
the  quotations. 

From  Germany  Addison  repaired  to  Holland, 
where  he  learned  the  news  of  his  father's  death, 
After  passing  some  months  in  the  United  Pro 
vinces  he  returned  about  the  close  of  the  year 
1703  to  England.  He  was  there  cordially  re 
ceived  by  his  friends,  and  introduced  by  them 
into  the  Kit-Cat  Club — a  society  in  which  were 
collected  all  the  various  talents  and  accom 
plishments  which  then  gave  lustre  to  the  whig 
party. 

Addison  was,  during  some  months  after  his 
return  from  the  Continent,  hard  pressed  by  pe 
cuniary  difficulties.  But  it  was  soon  in  the 
power  of  his  noble  patrons  to  serve  him  effect 
ually.  A  political  change,  silent  and  gradual, 
but  of  the  highest  importance,  was  in  daily 
progress.*  The  accession  of  Anne  had  been 
hailed  by  the  tories  with  transports  of  joy  and 
hope;  and  for  a  time  it  seemed  that  the  whigs 
had  fallen  never  to  rise  again.  The  throne  was 
surrounded  by  men  supposed  to  be  attached  to 
the  prerogative  and  to  the  church;  and  among 
these  none  stood  so  high  in  the  favour  of  the 
sovereign  as  the  lord-treasurer  Godolphin  and 
the  captain-general  Marlborough. 

The  country  gentlemen  and  country  clergy 
men  had  fully  expected  that  the  policy  of  these 
ministers  would  be  directly  opposed  to  that 
which  had  been  almost  constantly  followed  by 
William  ;  that  the  landed  interest  would  be 
favoured  at  the  expense  of  trade  ;  that  no  addi 
tion  would  be  made  to  the  funded  debt;  that  the 
privileges  conceded  to  dissenters  by  the  late 
king  would  be  curtailed,  if  not  withdrawn  ;  that 
the  war  with  France,  if  there  must  be  such  a 
war,  would,  on  our  part,  be  almost  entirely  na 
val;  and  that  the  government  would  avoid 


*  We  are  sorry  to  say  that  in  the  account  which  Miss 
Aikin  gives  of  the  politics  of  this  period,  there  are  moro 
errors  than  sentences.  Rochester  was  the  queen's  uncle; 
Miss  Aikin  calls  him  the  queen's  cousin.  The  battle  of 
Blenheim  was  fought  in  Marlborouirh's  third  campaign; 
Miss  Aikin  says  that  it  was  roujfht  in  Marlhorouch's 
second  campaign.  She  confounds  the  dispute  wbich 
arose  in  1703,  between  the  two  Houses,  about  Lord  Hali 
fax,  with  the  dispute  about  the  Aylesbnry  men.  which 
was  terminated  by  the  dissolution  of  1705.  Th,-se  mis 
takes,  and  four  or  five  others,  will  bo  found  within  th« 
space  of  about  two  pages,  (i.  165,  ICO,  167.) 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


€03 


close  connections  with   foreign  powers,  and, 
above  all,  with  Holland. 

But  the  country  gentlemen  and  country  cler 
gymen  were  fated  to  be  deceived,  not  for  the 
last  lime.  The  prejudices  and  passions  which 
raged  without  control  in  vicarages,  in  cathedral 
closes,  and  in  the  manor-houses  of  fox-hunting 
squires,  were  not  shared  by  the  chiefs  of  the 
ministry.  Those  statesmen  saw  that  it  was 
both  for  the  public  interest,  and  for  their  own 
interest,  to  adopt  a  whig  policy  ;  at  least  as  re 
spected  the  alliances  of  the  country  and  the 
conduct  of  the  war.  But  if  the  foreign  policy 
of  the  whigs  were  adopted,  it  was  impossible 
to  abstain  from  adopting  also  their  financial 
policy.  The  natural  consequences  followed. 
The  rigid  tories  were  alienated  from  the  govern 
ment.  The  votes  of  the  whigs  became  neces 
sary  to  it.  The  votes  of  the  whigs  could  be 
secured  only  by  further  concessions;  and  fur- 

!   ther  concessions    the  queen  was   induced  to 

i   make. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  year  1704,  the  state 

|  of  parties  bore  a  close  analogy  to  the  state  of 
parties  in  1826.  In  1826,  as  in  1704,  there  was 

.  a  tory  ministry  divided  into  two  hostile  sections. 
The  position  of  Mr.  Canning  and  his  friends 

'  in  1826,  corresponded  to  that  which  Marlbo- 
rough  and  Godolphin  occupied  in  1704.  Not 
tingham  and  Jersey  were,  in  1704,  what  Lord 
Eldon  and  Lord  Westmoreland  were  in  1826. 
The  whigs  of  1704  were  in  a  situation  resem 
bling  that  in  which  the  whigs  of  1826  stood. 
In  1704,  Sorners,  Halifax,  Sunderland,  Cowper, 
were  not  in  office.  There  was  no  avowed  co 
alition  between  them  and  the  moderate  tories. 
It  is  probable  that  no  direct  communication 
tending  to  such  a  coalition  had  yet  taken  place ; 
yet  all  men  saw  that  such  a  coalition  was  in 
evitable,  nay,  that  it  was  already  half  formed. 
Such,  or  nearly  such,  was  the  state  of  things 
when  tidings  arrived  of  the  great  battle  fought 
at  Blenheim  on  the  13th  August,  1704.  By  the 
whigs  the  news  was  now  hailed  with  transports 
of  joy  and  pride.  No  fault,  no  cause  of  quar 
rel,  could  be  remembered  by  them  against  the 
commander  whose  genius  had,  in  one  day, 
changed  the  face  of  Europe,  saved  the  impe 
rial  throne,  humbled  the  House  of  Bourbon, 
and  secured  the  act  of  settlement  against  foreign 
hostility.  The  feeling  of  the  tories  was  very 
different.  They  could  not,  indeed,  without  im 
prudence,  openly  express  regret  at  an  event  so 
glorious  to  their  country;  but  their  congratula 
tions  were  so  cold  and  sullen  as  to  give  deep  dis 
gust  to  the  victorious  general  and  his  friends. 

Godolphin  was  not  a  reading  man.  What 
ever  time  he  could  spare  from  business  he 
was  in  the  habit  af  spending  at  Newmarket  or 
at  the  card-tablef  But  he  was  not  absolutely 
indifferent  to  poetry;  and  he  was  too  intelli 
gent  an  observer  not  to  perceive  that  literature 
was  a  formidable  engine  of  political  warfare  ; 
and  that  the  great  whig  leaders  had  strength 
ened  tneir  party,  and  raised  their  character,  by 
extending  a  liberal  and  judicious  patronage  to 
good  writers.  He  was  mortified,  and  not  with 
out  reason,  by  the  exceeding  badness  of  the 
poems  which  appeared  in  honour  of  the  battle 
of  Blenhe'.m.  One  of  these  poems  has  been 


rescued   from  oblivion  by  the   exquisite   ab 
surdity  of  three  lines: 

"  Think  of  two  thousand  gentlemen  it  least, 
And  each  man  mounted  on  his  capering  Iteasr ; 
Into  the  Danube  they  were  pushed  by  shoals.  ' 

Where  to  procure  better  verses  the  treasurer 
did  not  know.  He  understood  how  to  negotiate 
a  loan,  or  remit  a  subsidy.  He  was  also  well 
versed  in  the  history  of  running  horses  and 
fighting  cocks;  but  his  acquaintance  among 
the  poets  was  very  small.  He  consulted  Hali 
fax;  but  Halifax  affected  to  decline  the  office 
of  adviser.  He  had,  he  said,  done  his  best, 
when  he  had  power,  to  encourage  men  whose 
abilities  and  acquirements  might  do  honour  to 
their  country.  Those  times  were  over.  Oiher 
maxims  had  prevailed.  Merit  was  suffered  to 
pine  in  obscurity;  the  public  money  was 
squandered  on  the  undeserving.  "I  do  know,'* 
he  added,  "a  gentleman  who  would  celebrate 
the  battle  in  a  manner  worthy  of  the  subject. 
But  I  will  not  name  him."  "Godolphin,  who 
was  expert  at  the  soft  answer  which  turneth 
away  wrath,  and  who  was  under  the  necessity 
of  paying  court  to  the  whigs,  gently  replied, 
that  there  was  too  much  ground  for  Halifax's 
complaints,  but  that  what  was  amiss  should  in 
time  be  rectified;  and  that  in  the  mean  time 
the  services  of  a  man  such  as  Halifax  had 
described  should  be  liberally  rewarded.  Hali 
fax  then  mentioned  Addison,  but,  mindful  of 
the  dignity  as  well  as  of  the  pecuniary  inte 
rest  of  his  friend,  insisted  that  the  minister 
should  apply  in  the  most  co-urteous  manner  to 
Addison  himself;  and  this  Godolphin  promised 
to  do. 

Addison  then  occupied  a  garret  up  three 
pair  of  stairs,  over  a  small  shop  in  the  Hay 
market.  In  this  humble  lodging  he  was  Mir- 
prised,  on  the  morning  which  followed  tha 
conversation  between  Godolphin  and  Halifax, 
by  a  visit  from  no  less  a  person  than  the  Righ* 
Honourable  Henry  Boyle,  then  chancellor  of 
the  exchequer,  and  afterwards  Lord  Carleton.* 
This  high-born  minister  had  been  sent  by  the 
lord-treasurer  as  ambassador  to  the  needy 
poet.  Addison  readily  undertook  the  proposed 
task,  a  task  which,  to  so  good  a  whig,  was 
probably  a  pleasure.  When  the  poem  was 
little  more  than  half  finished,  he  showed  it  to 
Godolphin,  who  was  delighted  with  it,  arid  par 
ticularly  with  the  famous  similitude  of  the 
angel.  Addison  was  instantly  appointed  to  a 
commissionenship,  with  about  two  hundred 
pounds  a  year,  and  was  assured  that  this  ap 
pointment  was  only  an  earnest  of  greater  fa 
vours. 

The  "Campaign"  came  forth,  and  was  as 
much  admired  by  the  public  as  by  the  minis 
ter.  It  pleases  us  less  on  the  whole  than  the 
"Epistle  to  Halifax."  Yet  it  undoubtedly 
ranks  high  among  the  poems  which  appeared 
curing  the  interval  between  the  death  of  Dry- 
den  and  the  dawn  of  Pope's  genius.  The 
chief  merit  of  the  «  Campaign,"  we  th  nk,  is 
that  which  was  noticed  by  Johnson — the  manly 
and  rational  rejection  of  fiction.  The  first  great 
poet  whose  works  have  come  down  to  us  sang 


*  Miss  Aikin  says  that  he  was  afterwards  Lord  Or/err, 
This  is  a  miitakc,  (i.  170.) 


G01 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  war  long  before  war  became  a  science  or  a 
trade.  If,  in  his  time,  there  was  enmity  be 
tween  two  little-  Greek  towns,  each  poured 
forth  its  crowd  of  citizens,  ignorant  of  disci 
pline,  and  armed  with  implements  of  labour 
rudely  turned  into  weapons.  On  each  side  ap 
peared  conspicuous  a  few  chiefs,  whose  wealth 
had  enabled  them  to  procure  good  armour, 
horses,  and  chariots,  and  whose  leisure  had 
enabled  them  to  practise  military  exercises. 
One  such  chief,  if  he  were  a  man  of  great 
strength,  agility,  and  courage,  would  probably 
be  more  formidable  than  twenty  common  men; 
and  the  force  and  dexterity  with  which  he 
hurled  his  spear  might  have  no  inconsiderable 
share  in  deciding  the  event  of  the  day.  Such 
were  probably  the  battles  with  which  Homer 
was  familiar.  But  Homer  related  the  actions 
of  men  of  a  former  generation — of  men  who 
sprang  from  the  gods,  and  communed  with  the 
gods  face  to  face — of  men,  one  of  whom  could 
with  ease  hurl  rocks  which  two  sturdy  hinds 
of  a  later  period  would  be  unable  even  to  lift. 
He  therefore  naturally  represented  their  mar 
tial  exploits  as  resembling  in  kind,  but  far  sur 
passing  in  magnitude,  those  of  the  stoutest  and 
most  expert  combatants  of  his  own  age.  Achil 
les,  clad  in  celestial  armour,  drawn  by  celes 
tial  coursers,  grasping  the  spear  which  none 
but  him.self  could  raise,  driving  all  Troy  and 
Lycia  before  him,  and  choking  the  Scamander 
\vith  dead,  was  only  a  magnificent  exaggera 
tion  of  the  real  hero,  who,  strong,  fearless,  ac 
customed  to  the  use  of  weapons,  guarded  by  a 
shield  and  helmet  of  the  best  Sidonian  fabric, 
and  whirled  along  by  horses  of  Thessalian 
breed,  struck  down  with  his  own  right  arm 
foe  after  foe.  In  all  rude  societies  similar  no 
tions  are  found.  There  are  at  this  day  coun 
tries  where  the  life-guardsman  Shaw  would  be 
considered  as  a  much  greater  warrior  than  the 
Duke  of  Wellington.  Bonaparte  loved  to  de 
scribe  the  astonishment  with  which  the  Mame 
lukes  looked  at  his  diminutive  figure.  Mourad 
Bey,  distinguished  abovs  all  his  fellows  by  his 
bodily  strength,  and  by  the  skill  with  which 
he  managed  his  horse  and  his  sabre,  could  not 
believe  that  a  man  who  was  scarcely  five  feet 
high,  and  rode  like  a  butcher,  was  the  greatest 
soldier  in  Europe. 

Homer's  descriptions  of  war  had  therefore 
as  much  truth  as  poetry  requires.  But  truth 
was  altogether  wanting  to  the  performances 
of  those  who,  writing  about  battles  which  had 
scarcely  any  thing  in  common  with  the  battles 
cf  his  times,  servilely  imitated  his  manner. 
The  folly  of  Silius  Italicus,  in  particular,  is 
positively  nauseous.  He  undertook  to  record 
in  verse  the  vicissitudes  of  a  great  struggle 
between  generals  of  the  first  order;  and  his 
narrative  is  made  up  of  the  hideous  wounds 
which  these  generals  inflicted  with  their  own 
hands.  Asdrubal  flings  a  spear  which  grazes 
trie  shoulder  of  consul  Nero;  but  Nero  sends 
his  spear  into  Asdrubal's  side.  Fabius  slays 
Thuris,  and  Butes,  and  Man's,  and  Arses,  and 
the  long-haired  Adherbes,  and  the  gigantic 
Thylis,  and  Sapharus,  and  Monaesus,and  the 
trumpeter  Morinus.  Hannibal  runs  Perusinus 
through  the  groin  with  a  stake,  and  breaks  the 
bone  of  Telesinus  with  a  huge  stone.  This 


]  detestable  fashion  was  copied  in  modern  times, 
and  continued  to  prevail  down  to  the  age  of 
Addison.  Several  versifiers  had  described 
William  turning  thousands  to  flight  by  his 
single  prowess,  and  dyeing  the  Boyne"  with 
Irish  blood.  Nay,  so  estimable  a  writer  as 
John  Philips,  the  author  of  the  "Splendid  Shill 
ing,"  represented  Marl  borough  as  having  won. 
the  battle  of  Blenheim  merely  by  strength  of 
muscle  and  skill  in  fence.  The  following  lines 
may  serve  as  an  example : — 

"  Churchill,  viewing  where 
The  violence  of  Tallard  most  prevailed, 
Came  to  oppose  his  slaughtering  arm.     With  speed 
Precipitate  he  rode,  urging  his  way 
O'er  hills  of  gasping  heroes,  and  fallen  steeds 
llolliug  in  death.     Destruction,  grim  with  hlood, 
Attends  his  furi.ms  course.     Around  his  head 
The  glowing  balls  play  innocent,  while  he 
With  dire  impetuous  sway  deals  fatal  blows 
Among  the  flying  Gauls.     In  Gallic  blood 
lie  dyes  his  reeking  sword,  and  strews  the  ground 
With  headless  ranks.     What  can  they  do?     Or  how 
Withstand  his  wide-destroying  sword?" 

Addison,  with  excellent  sense  and  taste,  de 
parted  from  this  ridiculous  fashion.  He  re 
served  his  praise  for  the  qualities  which  made 
MartboTOogh  truly  great,  energy,  sagacity,  mi 
litary  science.  But,  above  all,  the  poet  extolled 
the  firmness  of  that  mind  which,  in  the  midst; 
of  confusion,  uproar,  and  slaughter,  examined 
and  disposed  every  thing  with  the  serene  wis 
dom  of  a  higher  intelligence. 

Here  it  was  that  he  introduced  the  famous 
comparison  of  Maryborough  to  an  angel  guid 
ing  the  whirlwind.  We  will  not  dispute  the 
general  justice  of  Johnson's  remarks  on  this 
passage.  But  we  must  point  out  one  circum 
stance  which  appears  to  have  escaped  all  the 
critics.  The  extraordinary  effect  which  this1 
simile  produced  when  it  first  appeared,  and 
which  to  the  following  generation  seemed  in 
explicable,  is  doubtless  to  be  chiefly  attributed 
to  a  line  which  most  readers  now  regard  as  a 
feeble  parenthesis — 

"  Such  as  of  late,  o'er  pale  Britannia  pass'd." 

Addison  spoke,  not  of  a  storm,  but  of  the  storm. 
The  great  tempest  of  November,  1703,  the 
only  tempest  which  in  our  latitude  has  equalled 
the  rage  of  a  tropical  hurricane,  had  left  a 
dreadful  recollection  in  the  minds  of  all  m^n. 
No  other  tempest  was  ever  in  this  country  the 
occasion  of  a  parliamentary  address  or  of  a 
public  fast.  Whole  fleets  had  been  cast  away. 
Large  mansions  had  been  blown  down.  One 
prelate  had  been  buried  beneath  the  ruins  of 
his  palace.  London  and  Bristol  had  presented 
the  appearance  of  cities  just  sacked.  Hun 
dreds  of  families  were  still  in  mourning.  The 
prostrate  trunks  of  large  trfes,  and  the  ruins 
of  houses,  still  attested,  in  all  the  southern 
counties,  the  fury  of  the  blast.  The  popularity 
which  the  simile  of  the  angel  enjoyed  among' 
Addison's  contemporaries,  has  always  seemed 
to  us  to  be  a  remarkable  instance  of  the  ad 
vantage  which,  in  rhetoric  and  poetry,  the  par 
ticular  has  over  the  general. 

Soon  after  the  Campaign,  was  published 
Addison's  Narrative  of  his  Travels  in  Italy, 
The  first  effect  produced  by  this  narrative  was 
disappointment.  The  crowd  of  readers  who 
expected  politics  and  scandal,  speculations  on 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


605 


the  projects  of  Victor  Amadeus,  and  anecdotes 
>  about  the  jollities  of  convents  and  the  amours 
of  cardinals   and  nuns,  were   confounded   by 
I  finding  that  the  writer's  mind  was  much  more 
|  occupied  by  the  war  between  the  Trojans  and 
Rutulians  than  by  the  war  between  France  and 
I  Austria;  and  that  he  seemed  to  have  heard  no 
I  scanda.  of  later  date  than  the  gallantries  of 
I  the  Empress  Faustina.     In  time,  however,  the 
I  judgment  of  the  many  was  overruled  by  that 
I  of  the  few  ;  and  before  the  book  was  reprinted, 
I  it  was  so  eagerly  sought  that  it  sold  for  five 
I  times  the  original  price.     It  is  still  read  with 
I  pleasure :  the  style  is  pure  and  flowing;   the 
I  classical  quotations  and  allusions  are  numerous 
I  and  happy;  and  we  are  now  and  then  charmed 
I  by  that  singularly  humane  and  delicate  humour 
I  in  which  Addison  excelled  all  men.     Yet  this 
agreeable  work,  even  when  considered  merely 
I  as  the  history  of  a  literary  tour,  may  justly  be 
censured  on  account  of  its  faults  of  omission. 
j  We  have  already  said  that,  though  rich  in  ex- 
I  tracts  from  the  Latin  poets,  it  contains  scarcely 
any  references   to  the  Latin  orators  and  his- 
|  torians.     We  must  add  that  it  contains  little, 
or  rather  no  information, respecting  the  history 
and  literature  of  modern  Italy.     To  the  best  of 
our  remembrance,  Addison  'does  not  mention 
Dante,   Petrarch,   Boccaccio,   Boiardo,   Berni, 
Lorenzo   de'  Medici,  Machiavelli.     He  coldly 
!  tells  us,  that  at  Ferrara  he  saw  the  tomb  of 
(  Ariosto,  and  that  at  Venice  he  heard  the  gon- 
i  doiiers  sing  verses  of  Tasso.     But  for  Tasso 
and  Ariosto  he  cared  far  less  than  for  Valerius 
Flaccus  and  Sidonius  Apollinaris.     The  gentle 
flow  of  the  Ticin  brings  a  line  of  Silius  to  his 
mind.     The  sulphurous  stream  of  Albula  sug 
gests  to  him  several  passages  of  Martial.     But 
he  has  not  a  word  to  say  of  the  illustrious  dead 
of  Santa  Croce ;  he  crosses  the  wood  of  Ra- 
i  venna  without  recollecting  the  Spectre  Hunts 
man  ;  and  wanders  up  and  down  Rimini  with 
out  one  thought  of  Francesca.     At  Paris,  he 
j  eagerly  sought  an  introduction  to  Boileau  ;  but 
;  he  seems  not  to  have  been  at  all  aware,  that  at 
Florence  he  was  in  the  vicinity  of  a  poet  with 
whom  Boileau  could  not  sustain  a  comparison, 
;  of  the  greatest  lyric  poet  of  modern  times,  of 
;  Vincenzio  Filicaja.    This  is  the  more  remark- 
]  able,  because  Filicaja  was  the  favourite  poet 
of  the  all-accomplished  Somers,  under  whose 
protection  Addison  travelled,  and  to  whom  the 
account  of   the   Travels   is  dedicated.      The 
truth  is,  that  Addison  knew  little,  and  cared 
less,  about  the  literature  of  modern  Italy.     His 
favourite  models  were    Latin.     Hi.s  favourite 
critics  were  French.     Half  the  Tuscan  poetry 
that  he  had  read  seemed  to   him   monstrous, 
and  the  other  half  tawdry. 

His  Travels  were  followed  by  the  lively 
opera  of  "Rosamond."  This  piece  was  ill  set 
to  music,  and  therefore  failed  on  the  stage  ;  but 
it  completely  succeeded  in  print,  and  is  indeed 
excellent  in  its  kind.  The  smoothness  with 
which  the  verses  glide,  and  the  elasticity  with 
which  they  bound,  is,  to  our  ears  at  least,  very 
pleasing.  We  are  inclined  to  think  that  if 
Addison  had  left  heroic  couplets  to  Pope, 
and  blank  verse  to  Rowe,  and  had  employed 
himself  in  writing  airy  and  spirited  songs,  his 
reputation,  as  a  noet  would  have  stood  far  higher 


than  it  now  does.  Some  years  after  his  death, 
"Rosamond"  was  set  to  new  music  by  Doctor 
Arne;  and  was  performed  with  complete  suc 
cess.  Several  passages  long  retained  their  po 
pularity,  and  were  daily  sung,  during  the  latter 
part  of  George  the  Second's  reign,  at  all  the 
harpsichords  in  England. 

While  Addison  thus  amused  himself,  his 
prospects,  and  the  prospects  of  his  party  were 
constantly  becoming  brighter  and  brighter.  In 
the  spring  of  1705,  the  ministry  were  freed 
from  the  restraint  imposed  by  a  House  of  Com 
mons,  in  which  tories  of  the  most  perverse  class 
had  the  ascendancy.  The  elections  were  fa 
vourable  to  the  whigs.  The  coalition  which 
had  been  tacitly  and  gradually  formed  was  now 
openly  avowed.  The  great  seal  was  given  to 
Cowper.  Somers  and  Halifax  were  sworn  of 
the  council.  Halifax  was  sent  in  the  following 
year  to  carry  the  decorations  of  the  garter  to 
the  electoral  prince  of  Hanover,  and  was  ac 
companied  on  this  honourable  mission  by  Ad 
dison,  who  had  just  been  made  undersecretary 
of  state.  The  secretary  of  state  under  whom 
Addison  first  served  was  Sir  Charles  Hedges,  a 
tory.  But  Hedges  was  soon  dismissed  to  make 
room  for  the  most  vehement  of  whigs,  Charles, 
Earl  of  Sunderland.  In  every  department  of  the 
state,  indeed,  the  high  church  men  werecompelled 
to  give  place  to  their  opponents.  At  the  close 
of  1707,  the  tories  who  still  remained  in  office 
strove  to  rally,  with  Harley  at  their  head.  But 
the  attempt,  though  favoured  by  the  queen,  who 
had  always  been  a  tory  at  heart,  and  who  had 
now  quarrelled  with  the  duchess  of  Marl  bo 
rough,  was  unsuccessful.  The  time  was  not 
yet.  jfhe  captain-general  was  at  the  height  ot 
popularity  and  glory.  The  low-church  party 
had  a  majority  in  Parliament.  The  country 
squires  and  rectors,  though  occasionally  utter 
ing  a  savage  growl,  were  for  the  most  part  in, 
a  state  of  torpor,  which  lasted  till  they  were 
roused  into  activity,  and  indeed  into  madness, 
by  the  prosecution  of  Sacheverell.  Harley  and 
his  adherents  were  compelled  to  retire.  The 
victory  of  the  whigs  was  complete.  At  the 
general  election  of  1708,  their  strength  in  the 
House  of  Commons  became  irresistible;  and, 
before  the  end  of  that  year,  Somers  was  made 
lord-president  of  the  council,  and  Wharton 
lord-lieutenant  of  Ireland.* 

Addison  sat  for  Malmsbury  in  the  House  of 
Commons  which  was  elected  in  1708.  But 
the  House  of  Commons  was  not  the  field  for 


*  Miss  Aikin  has  not  informed  herself  accurately  an 
To  the  politics  of  that  time.  We  srive  a  single  specimen. 
We  could  easily  give  many.  "The  Earl  of  Sunderland," 
she  says,  "was  not  suffered  lonir  to  retain  his  hard-won, 
secretaryship.  In  the  last  month  of  1708  he  wns  dis 
missed  to  make  room  for  Lord  Dartmouth,  who  ranked 
with  the  tories.  Just  at  this  time  the  Earl  of  Whnrton, 
being  appointed  Lord-lieutenant  of  Ireland,  named  Mr. 
Addison  his  chief  secretary."  (i  235.)  Sumlerlnnd  was 
not  dismissed  to  make  ro'orri  for  Dartmouth  till  June, 
1710;  and  mo-t  certainly  Wharton  would  never  have 
been  appointed  lord-lieutenant  at  all, if  he  had  not  teen  ap 
pointed  long  before  Sutherland's  dismissal.  Miss  Aikin'a 
mistake  exactly  resembles  that  of  a  person  who  should 
relate  the  hist,  ry  of  our  times  as  follows:  "Lord  John 
Russell  was  dismissed  in  1839  from  the  Hoine-Ollice,  to 
make  room  fir  Sir  James  'Graham,  who  ranked  with  the 
I  tories;  but  just  at  this  time  Earl  Fortescue  \va>  appoint- 
;  ed  lord-lieutenant  of  Ireland,  with  Lord  Morpeth  for  hia 
secretary."  Such  a  narrative  would  give  to  posterity 
rather  a  strange  notion  of  the  ministerial  revolufcm,  of 
j  Queen  Victoria's  days. 

3E* 


606 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITING. 


him.  The  bashfulness  of  his  nature  made  his 
tvit  and  eloquence  useless  in  debate.  He  once 
rose,  but  could  not  overcome  his  diffidence,  and 
ever  after  remained  silent.  Nobody  can  think 
it  strange  that  a  great  writer  should  fail  as  a 
speaker.  But  many,  probably,  will  think  it 
strange  that  Addison's  failure  as  a  speaker 
should  have  had  no  unfavourable  effect  on  his 
success  as  a  politician.  In  our  time,  a  man  of 
high  rank  and  great  fortune  might,  though 
speaking  very  little  and  very  ill,  hold  a  consi 
derable  post.  But  it  is  inconceivable  that  a 
mere  adventurer,  a  man  who,  when  out  of  of 
fice,  must  live  by  his  pen,  should  in  a  few 
years  become  successively  under-secretary  of 
state,  chief  secretary  for  Ireland,  and  secretary 
of  state,  without  some  oratorical  talent.  Addi- 
son,  without  high  birth,  and  with  little  property, 
rose  to  a  post  which  dukes,  the  heads  of  the 
great  houses  of  Talbot,  Russell,  and  Bentinck, 
have  thought  it  an  honour  to  fill.  Without 
opening  his  lips  in  debate,  he  rose  to  a  post  the 
highest  that  Chatham  or  Fox  ever  reached. 
And  this  he  did  before  he  had  been  nine  years 
in  Parliament.  We  must  look  for  the  explana 
tion  of  this  seeming  miracle  to  the  peculiar 
circumstances  in  which  that  generation  was 
plated.  During  the  interval  which  elapsed  be 
tween  the  time  when  the  censorship  of  the 
press  ceased  and  the  time  when  parliamentary 
proceedings  began  to  be  freely  reported,  literary 
talents  were,  to  a  public  man,  of  much  more 
importance,  oratorical  talents  of  much  less  im 
portance,  than  in  our  time.  At  present,  the 
best  way  of  giving  rapid  and  wide  publicity  to 
a  statement  or  an  argument,  is  to  introduce 
that  statement  or  argument  into  a  speeo^  made 
in  Parliament.  If  a  political  tract  were  to  ap 
pear  superior  to  the  conduct  of  the  Allies,  or  to 
the  best  numbers  of  the  Freeholder,  the  circu 
lation  of  such  a  tract  would  be  languid  indeed 
when  compared  with  the  circulation  of  every 
remarkable  word  uttered  in  the  deliberations  of 
the  legislature.  A  speech  made  in  the 
House  of  Commons  at  four  in  the  morning, 
is  on  thirty  thousand  tables  before  ten.  A 
speech  made  on  the  Monday  is  read  on  the 
Wednesday  by  multitudes  in  Antrim  and  Aber- 
deenshire.  The  orator,  by  the  help  of  the 
short-hand  writer,  has  to  a  great  extent  super 
seded  the  pamphleteer.  It  was  not  so  in  the 
reign  of  Anne.  The  best  speech  could  then 
produce  no  effect  except  on  those  who  heard  it. 
It  was  only  by  means  of  the  press  that,  the 
opinion  of  the  public  without  doors  could  be 
influenced;  and  the  opinion  of  the  public  with 
out  doors  could  not  but  be  of  the  highest  im 
portance  in  a  country  governed  by  parliaments ; 
and  indeed  at  that  time  governed  by  triennial 
parliaments.  The  pen  was,  therefore,  a  more 
formidable  political  engine  than  the  tongue. 
Mr.  Pitt  and  Mr.  Fox  contended  only  in  Parlia 
ment.  But  Walpole  and  Pulteney,  the  Pitt  and 
Fox  of  an  earlier  period,  had  not  done  half  of 
what  was  necessary,  when  they  sat  down 
amidst  the  acclamations  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  They  had  still  to  plead  their  cause  be 
fore  the  country,  and  this  they  could  do  only 
by  means  of  the  press.  Their  works  are  now 
forgotten.  But  it  is  certain  that  there  were  in 
(irub  street  few  more  assiduous  scribblers  of 


j  thoughts,  letters,  answers,  remarks,  than  these 
two  great  chiefs  of  parties.  Pulteney,  when 
leader  of  the  opposition,  and  possessed  of 
£30,000  a  year,  edited  the  "Craftsman." 
Walpole,  though  not  a  man  of  literary  habits, 
was  the  author  of  at  least  ten  pamphlets; 
and  retouched  and  corrected  many  more. 
These  facts  sufficiently  show  of  how  great  im 
portance  literary  assistance  then  was  to  the 
contending  parties.  St.  John  was,  certainly,  in 
Anne's  reign,  the  best  tory  speaker;  Cowper 
was  probably  the  best  whig  speaker.  But  it 
may  well  be  doubted  whether  St.  John  did  so 
much  for  the  tories  as  Swift,  and  whether  Cow 
per  did  so  much  for  the  whigs  as  Addison. 
When  these  things  are  duly  considered,  it  will 
not  be  thought  strange  that  Addison  should  have 
climbed  higher  in  the  state  than  any  other  En 
glishman  has  ever,  by  means  merely  of  literary 
talents,  been  able  to  climb.  Swift  would,  in  all 
probability,  have  climbed  as  high,  if  he  had 
not  been  encumbered  by  his  cassock  and  his 
pudding-sleeves.  As  far  as  the  homage  of  the 
great  went,  Swift  had  as  much  of  it  as  if  he 
had  been  lord-treasurer. 

To  the  influence  which  Addison  derived  from 
his  literary  talents,  was  added  all  the  influence 
which  arises  from  character.  The  world, 
always  ready  to  think  the  worst  of  needy  po 
litical  adventurers,  was  forced  to  make  one 
exception.  Restlessness,  violence,  audacity, 
laxity  of  principle,  are  the  vices  ordinarily 
attributed  to  that  class  of  men.  But  faction 
itself  could  not  deny  that  Addison  had,  through 
all  changes  of  fortune,  been  strictly  faithful  to 
his  early  opinions,  and  to  his  early  friends; 
that  his  integrity  was  without  stain;  that  his 
whole  deportment  indicated  a  fine  sense  of  the 
becoming;  that,  in  the  utmost  heat  of  contro 
versy,  his  zeal  was  tempered  by  a  regard  for 
truth,  humanity,  and  social  decorum;  that  no 
outrage  could  ever  provoke  him  to  retaliation 
unworthy  of  a  Christian  and  a  gentleman  ;  and 
that  his  only  faults  were  a  too  sensitive  deli 
cacy,  and  a  modesty  which  amounted  to  bash- 
fulness. 

He  was  undoubtedly  one  of  the  most  popular 
men  of  his  time;  and  much  of  his  popularity 
he  owed,  we  believe,  to  that  very  timidity  which 
his  friends  lamented.  That  timidity  often  pre 
vented  him  from  exhibiting  his  talents  to  the 
best  advantage.  But  it  propitiated  Nemesis. 
It  averted  that  envy  which  would  otherwise 
have  been  excited  by  fame  so  splendid,  and  by 
so  rapid  an  elevation.  No  man  is  so  great  a 
favourite  with  the  public,  as  he  who  is  at  once 
an  object  of  admiration,  of  respect,  and  of  pity ; 
and  such  were  the  feelings  which  Addison  in 
spired.  Those  who  enjoyed  the  privilege  of 
hearing  his  familiar  conversation,  declared 
with  one  voice  that  it  was  superior  even  to  his 
writings.  The  brilliant  Mary  Montagu  said 
that  she  had  known  all  the  wits,  and  that  Ad 
dison  was  the  best  company  in  the  world.  The 
malignant  Pope  was  forced  to  own,  that  there 
was  a  charm  in  Addison's  talk  which  could  be 
found  nowhere  else.  Swift,  when  burning 
with  animosity  against  the  whigs,  could  not 
but  confess  to  Stella,  that,  after  all,  he  had 
never  known  any  associate  so  agreeable  ao 
Addison.  Steele,  an  excellent  judge  of  lively 


LIFE   AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


607 


conversation,  said,  that  the  conversation  of  i 
Addison  was  at  once  the  most  polite,  and  the 
most  mirthful,  that  could  be  imagined  ; — that 
it  was  Terence  and  Catullus  in  one,  heightened 
by  an  exquisite  something  which  was  neither 
Terence norCatullus, but  Addison  alone.  Young, 
an  excellent  judge  of  serious  conversation, 
said,  that  when  Addison  was  at  his  ease,  he 
went  on  in  a  noble  strain  of  thought  and  lan 
guage,  so  as  to  chain  the  attention  of  every 
hearer.  Nor  were  his  great  colloquial  powers 
more  admirable  than  the  courtesy  and  softness 
of  heart  which  appeared  in  his  conversation. 
At  the  same  time,  it  would  be  too  much  to  say 
that  he  was  wholly  devoid  of  the  malice  which 
is,  perhaps,  inseparable  from  a  keen  sense  of 
the  ludicrous.  He  had  one  habit  which  both 
Swift  and  Stella  applauded,  and  which  we 
hardly  know  how  to  blame.  If  his  first  at 
tempts  to  set  a  presuming  dunce  right  were  ill 
received,  he  changed  his  tone,  "assented  with 
civil  leer,"  and  lured  the  flattered  coxcomb 
deeper  and  deeper  into  absurdity.  That  such 
was  his  practice  we  should,  we  think,  have 
guessed  from  his  works.  The  Tatler's  criti 
cisms  on  Mr.  Softly's  sonnet,  and  the  Specta 
tor's  dialogue  with  the  politician,  who  is  so 
zealous  for  the  honour  of  Lady  Q — p — t — s, 
are  excellent  specimens  of  this  innocent  mis 
chief. 

Such  were  Addison's  talents  for  conversation. 
But  his  rare  gifts  were  not  exhibited  to  crowds 
or  to  strangers.  As  soon  as  he  entered  a  large 
company,  as  soon  as  he  saw  an  unknown  face, 
his  lips  were  sealed,  and  his  manners  became 
constrained.  None  who  met  him  only  in  great 
assemblies,  would  have  been  able  to  believe 

:  that  he  was  the  same  man  who  had  often  kept 
a  few  friends  listening  and  laughing  round  a 
table,  from  the  time  when  the  play  ended,  till 

I  the  clock  of  St.  Paul's  in  Covent-Garden  struck 
four.  Yet,  even  at  such  a  table,  he  was  not 
seen  to  the  best  advantage.  To  enjoy  his  con- 

i  versation  in  the  highest  perfection,  it  was  ne 
cessary  to  be  alone  with  him,  and  to  hear  him, 

j  in  his  own  phrase,  think  aloud.     "There  is  no 

I  such  thing,"  he  used  to  say,  "as  real  conversa- 

j  tion,  but  between  two  persons." 

This  timidity,  a  timidity  surely  neither  un- 

i  graceful  nor  unamiable,  led  Addison  into  the 
two  most  serious  faults  which  can  with  justice 
be  imputed  to  him.  He  found  that  wine  broke 
the  spell  which  lay  on  his  fine  intellect,  and 
was  therefore  too  easily  seduced  into  convivial 
excess.  Such  excess  was  in  that  age  regarded, 
even  by  grave  men,  as  the  most  venial  of  all 
peccadilloes;  and  was  so  far  from  being  a 
mark  of  ill-breeding  that  it  was  almost  essen 
tial  to  the  character  of  a  fine  gentleman.  But 
the  smallest  speck  is  seen  on  a  white  ground; 
and  almost  all  the  biographers  of  Addison  have 
said  something  about  this  failing.  Of  an)' 
other  statesman  or  writer  of  Queen  Anne's 
reign,  we  should  no  more  think  of  saying  that 
he  sometimes  took  too  much  wine,  than  that  he 
wore  a  long  wig  and  a  sword. 

To  the  excessive  modesty  of  Addison's  na 
ture,  we  must  ascribe  another  fault  which 
generally  a?ises  from  a  very  different  cause. 
He  became  a  little  too  fond  of  seeing  himself 
surrounded  by  a  small  circle  of  admirers,  to 


whom  he  was  as  a  king  or  rather  as  a  god. 
All  these  men  were  far  inferior  to  him  in  abi 
lity,  and  some  of  them  had  very  serious  faults. 
Nor  did  those  faults  escape  his  observation  ; 
for,  if  ever  there  was  an  eye  which  saw  through 
and  through  men,  it  was  the  eye  of  Addison. 
But  with  the  keenest  observation,  and  the  finest 
sense  of  the  ridiculous,  he  had  a  large  charity. 
The  feeling  with  which  he  looked  on  most  of 
his  humble  companions  was  one  of  benevo 
lence,  slightly  tinctured  with  contempt.  He 
was  at  perfect  ease  in  their  company  ;  he  was 
grateful  for  their  devoted  attachment;  and  he 
loaded  them  with  benefits.  Their  veneratior 
for  him  appears  to  have  exceeded  that  with 
which  Johnson  was  regarded  by  Boswell,  or 
Warburton  by  Hurd.  It  was  not  in  the  power 
of  adulation  to  turn  such  a  head,  or  deprave 
such  a  heart  as  Addison's.  But  it  must  in 
candour  be  admitted,  that  he  contracted  some 
of  the  faults  which  can  scarcely  be  avoided  by 
any  person  who  is  so  unfortunate  as  to  be  the 
oracle  of  a  small  literary  coterie. 

One  member  of  this  little  society  was  Eu 
stacc  Budgell,  a  young  templar  of  some  litera 
ture,  and  a  distant  relation  of  Addison.  There 
was  at  this  time  no  stain  on  the  character  of 
Budgell,  and  it  is  not  improbable  that  his  ca 
reer  would  have  been  prosperous  and  honour 
able,  if  the  life  of  his  cousin  had  been  pro 
longed.  But  when  the  master  was  laid  in  the 
grave,  the  disciple  broke  loose  from  all  re 
straint;  descended  rapidly  from  one  degree  of 
vice  and  misery  to  another;  ruined  his  fortune 
by  follie;: ;  attempted  to  repair  it  by  crimes  ;  and 
at  length  closed  a  wicked  and  unhappy  life  by 
self-m.urder.  Yet,  to  the  last,  the  \vretched 
man,  gambler,  lampooner,  cheat,  forger,  as  he 
was,  retained  his  affection  and  veneration  for 
Addison;  and  recorded  those  feelings  in  the 
last  lines  which  he  traced  before  he  hid  him 
self  from  infamy  under  London  Bridge. 

Another  of  Addison's  favourite  companions 
was  Ambrose  Phillipps,  a  good  whig  and  a  mid 
dling  poet,  who  had  the  honour  of  bringing 
into  fashion  a  species  of  composition  which 
has  been  called  after  his  name,  Namby-Pamby 
But  the  most  remarkable  members  of  the  little 
senate,  as  Pope  long  afterwards  called  it,  were 
Richard  Steele  and  Thomas  Tickell. 

Steele  had  known  Addison  from  childhood 
They  had  been  together  at  the  Charier  House 
and  at  Oxford;  but  circumstances  had  then, 
for  a  time,  separated  them  widely.  Steele  had 
left  college  without  taking  a  degree,  had  been 
disinherited  by  a  rich  relation,  had  led  a  va 
grant  life,  had  served  in  the  army,  had  tried  to 
find  the  philosopher's  stone,  and  had  written 
a  religious  treatise  and  several  comedies.  He 
was  one  of  those  people  whom  it  is  impossible 
cither  to  hate  or  to  respect.  His  temper  was 
sweet,  his  affections  warm,  his  spirits  lively, 
i  his  passions  strong,  and  his  principles  weak. 
1  His  life  was  spent  in  sinning  and  repenting, 
I  in  inculcating  what  \vas  right,  and  doing  what 
was  wrong.  In  speculation,  he  was  a  man  of 
piety  and  honour;  in  practice,  he  was  much 
of  the  rake  and  a  little  of  the  swindler.  He 

as,  however,  so  good-natured  that  it  was  not 

easy  to  be  seriously  angry  with  him,  and  that 

,  even  rigid  moralists  felt  more  inclined  to  piVy 


60S 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


than  to  blame  him,  when  he  diced  himself  into 
a  spunging-house,  or  drank  himself  into  a 
fever.  Addison  regarded  Steele  with  kindness 
not  unmingled  with  scorn, — tried,  with  little 
success,  to  keep  him  out  of  scrapes,  intro 
ducing  him  to  the  great,  procured  a  good  place 
for  him.  corrected  his  plays,  and,  though  by  no 
means  rich,  lent  him  large  sums  of  money. 
One  of  these  loans  appears,  from  a  letter  dated 
in  August,  1708,  to  have  amounted  to  a  thou 
sand  pounds.  These  pecuniary  transactions 
probably  led  to  frequent  bickerings.  It  is  said 
that,  on  one  occasion,  Steele's  negligence,  or 
dishonesty,  provoked  Addison  to  repay  him 
self  by  the  help  of  a  bailiff.  We  cannot  join 
with  Miss  Aikin  in  rejecting  this  story.  John 
son  heard  it  from  Savage,  who  heard  it  from 
Steele.  Few  private  transactions  which  took 
place  a  hundred  and  twenty  years  ago  are 
proved  by  stronger  evidence  than  this.  But 
we  can  by  no  means  agree  with  those  who 
condemn  Addison's  severity.  The  most  ami 
able  of  mankind  may  well  be  moved  to  indig 
nation,  when  what  he  has  earned  hardly,  and 
lent  with  great  inconvenience  to  himself,  for 
the  purpose  of  relieving  a  friend  in  distress, 
is  squandered  with  insane  profusion.  We  will 
illustrate  our  meaning  by  an  example,  which 
is  not  the  less  striking  because  it  is  taken  from 
fiction.  Dr.  Harrison,  in  Fielding's  "Amelia," 
is  represented  as  the  most  benevolent  of  hu 
man  beings  ;  yet  he  takes  in  execution,  not 
only  the  goods,  but  the  person  of  his  friend 
Booth.  Dr.  Harrison  resorts  to  this  strong 
measure  because  he  has  been  informed  that 
Booth,  while  pleading  poverty  as  an  excuse 
for  not  paying  just  debts,  has  been  buying  fine 
jewellery,  and  setting  up  a  coach.  No  person 
who  is  well  acquainted  with  Steele's  life  and 
correspondence,  can  doubt  that  he  behaved 
quite  as  ill  to  Addison  as  Booth  was  accused 
of  behaving  to  Dr.  Harrison.  The  real  his 
tory,  we  have  little  doubt,  was  something  like 
this: — A  letter  comes  to  Addison,  imploring 
help  in  pathetic  terms,  and  promising  reforma 
tion  and  speedy  repayment.  Poor  Dick  de 
clares  that  he  has  not  an  inch  of  candle,  or  a 
bushel  of  coals,  or  credit  with  the  butcher  for 
a  shoulder  of  mutton.  Addison  is  moved.  He 
determines  to  deny  himself  some  medals  which 
are  wanting  to  his  series  of  the  Twelve  Caesars; 
to  put  off  buying  the  new  edition  of  "Bayle's 
Dictionary  *'  and  to  wear  his  old  sword  and 
buckles  another  year.  In  this  way  he  manages 
to  send  a  hundred  pounds  to  his  friend.  The 
next  day  he  calls  on  Steele,  and  finds  scores 
of  gentlemen  and  ladies  assembled.  The 
fiddles  are  playing.  The  table  is  groaning 
under  Champagne,  Burgundy,  and  pyramids 
of  sweetmeats.  Is  it  strange  that  a  man  whose 
kindness  is  thus  abused,  should  send  sheriff's 
officers  to  reclaim  what  is  due  to  him  1 

Tickell  was  a  young  man,  fresh  from  Ox 
ford,  who  had  introduced  himself  to  public 
notice  by  writing  a  most  ingenious  and  grate 
ful  little  poem  in  praise  of  the  opera  of  "Rosa 
mond."  He  deserved,  and  at  length  attained, 
the  first  place  in  Addison's  friendship.  For  a 
time  Steele  and  Tickell  were  on  good  terms. 
But  they  loved  Addison  too  much  to  love  each 


other;  and  at  length  became  as  bitter  enemies 
as  the  rival  bulls  in  Virgil. 

At  the  close  of  1708,  Wharton  became  lord- 
lieutenant  of  Ireland,  and  appointed  Addison. 
chief  secretary.  Addison  was  consequently 
under  the  necessity  of  quitting  London  for 
Dublin.  Besides  the  chief  secretaryship, 
which  was  then  worth  about  two  thousand 
pounds  a  year,  he  obtained  a  patent  appoint 
ing  him  keeper  of  the  Irish  records  fot  life, 
with  a  salary  of  three  or  four  hundred  a  year, 
Budgell  accompanied  his  cousin  in  the  capa 
city  of  private  secretary. 

Wharton  and  Addison  had  nothing  in  com 
mon  but  whiggism.  The  lord-lieutenant  was 
not  only  licentious  and  corrupt,  but  was  dis 
tinguished  from  other  libertines  and  jobbers 
by  a  callous  impudence  which  presented  the 
strongest  contrast  to  the  secretary's  gentleness 
and  delicacy.  Many  parts  of  the  Irish  admi 
nistration  at  this  time  appear  to  have  deserved 
serious  blame.  But  against  Addison  there  was 
not  a  murmur.  He  long  afterwards  asserted, 
what  all  the  evidence  which  we  have  ever 
seen  tends  to  prove,  that  his  diligence  and  in 
tegrity  gained  the  friendship  of  all  the  most 
considerable  persons  in  Ireland. 

The  parliamentary  career  of  Addison  in  Ire 
land  has,  we  think,  escaped  the  notice  of  all 
his  biographers.  He  was  elected  member  for 
the  borough  of  Cavan  in  the  summer  of  1709; 
and  in  the  journals  of  two  sessions  his  name 
frequently  occurs.  Some  of  the  entries  appear 
to  indicate  that  he  so  far  overcame  his  timidity 
as  to  make  speeches.  Nor  is  this  by  any 
means  improbable;  for  the  Irish  House  of 
Commons  was  a  far  less  formidable  audience 
than  the  English  house;  and  many  tongues 
which  were  tied  by  fear  in  the  greater  assem 
bly  became  fluent  in  the  smaller.  Gerard  Ha 
milton,  for  example,  who,  from  fear  of  losing 
the  fame  gained  by  his  "single  speech,"  sat 
mute  at  Westminster  during  forty  years,  spoke 
with  great  effect  at  Dublin  when  he  was  secre 
tary  to  Lord  Halifax. 

While  Addison  was  in  Ireland,  an  event  oc 
curred  to  which  he  owes  his  high  and  perma 
nent  rank  among  British  writers.  As  yet  his 
fame  rested  on  performances  which,  though 
highly  respectable,  were  not  built  for  duration, 
and  would,  if  he  had  produced  nothing  else, 
have  now  been  almost  forgotten,  on  some  ex 
cellent  Latin  verses,  on  some  English  verses 
which  occasionally  rose  above  mediocrity,  and 
on  a  book  of  travels,  agreeably  written,  but  not 
indicating  any  extraordinary  powers  of  mind. 
These  works  showed  him  to  be  a  man  of  taste, 
sense,  and  learning.  The  time  had  come  when 
he  was  to  prove  himself  a  man  of  genius,  and 
to  enrich  our  literature  with  compositions 
which  will  live  as  long  as  the  English  Ian- 
guage. 

In  the  spring  of  1709,  Steele  formed  a  literary 
project,  of  which  he  was  far  indeed  from  fore 
seeing  the  consequences.  Periodical  papers 
had  during  many  years  been  published  in  Lon 
don.  Most  of  these  were  political ;  but  in  some 
of  them  questions  of  morality,  taste,  and  love- 
casuistry  had  been  discussed.  The  literary 
merit  of  these  works  was  small  indeed;  and 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


609 


even  their  names  are  now  known  only  to  the 
curious. 

Steele  had  been  appointed  gazetteer  by  Sun- 
derland,  at  the  request,  it  is  said,  of  Addison ; 
and  thus  had  access  to  foreign  intelligence 
earlier  and  more  authentic  than  was  in  those 
times  within  the  r^ach  of  an  ordinary  news- 
writer.  This  circumstance  seems  to  have 
suggested  to  him  the  scheme  of  publishing  a 
periodical  paper  on  a  new  plan.  It  was  to  ap 
pear  on  the  days  on  which  the  post  left  London 
for  the  country,  which  were,  in  that  generation. 
the  Tuesdays,  Thursdays,  and  Saturdays.  It 
was  to  contain  the  foreign  news,  accounts  of 
theatrical  representations,  and  the  literary  gos 
sip  of  Will's  and  of  the  Grecian.  It  was  also 
to  contain  remarks  on  the  fashionable  topics 
of  the  day,  compliments  to  beauties,  pasqui 
nades  on  noted  sharpers,  and  criticisms  on  po 
pular  preachers.  The  aim  of  Steele  does  not 
appear  to  have  been  at  first  higher  than  this. 
He  was  not  ill  qualified  to  conduct  the  work 
which  he  had  planned.  His  public  intelligence 
he  drew  from  the  best  sources.  He  knew  the 
town,  and  had  paid  dear  for  his  knowledge. 
He  had  read  much  more  than  the  dissipated 
men  of  that  time  were  in  the  habit  of  reading. 
He  was  a  rake  among  scholars,  and  a  scholar 
among  rakes.  His  style  was  easy  and  not  in 
correct;  and  though  his  wit  and  humour  were 
of  no  higher  order,  his  gay  animal  spirits  im 
parted  to  his  compositions  an  air  of  vivacity 
which  ordinary  readers  could  hardly  distin 
guish  from  comic  genius.  His  writings  have 
been  well  compared  to  those  light  wines,  which, 
though  deficient  in  body  and  flavour,  are  yet  a 
pleasant  small  drink,  if  not  kept  too  long,  or 
Carried  too  far. 

Isaac  Bickerstaff,  Esquire,  Astrologer,  was 
»n  imaginary  person,  almost  as  well  known  in 
that  age  as  Mr.  Paul  Pry  or  Mr.  Pickwick  in 
ours.  Swift  had  assumed  the  name  of  Bicker- 
Btaff  in  a  satirical  pamphlet  against  Partridge, 
the  almanac-maker.  Partridge  had  been  fool 
er  ough  to  publish  a  furious  reply.  Bickerstaff 
had  rejoined  in  a  second  pamphet  still  more 
diverting  than  the  first.  All  the  wits  had  com 
bined  to  keep  up  the  joke,  and  the  town  was 
long  in  convulsions  of  laughter.  Steele  de 
termined  to  employ  the  name  which  this  con 
troversy  had  made  popular;  and,  in  April,  1709, 
it  was  announced  that  Isaac  BickerstarT,  Es 
quire,  Astrologer,  was  about  to  publish  a  paper 
called  the  "Taller." 

Addison  had  not  been  consulted  about  this 
scneme ;  but  as  soon  as  he  heard  of  it,  he  de 
termined  to  give  it  his  assistance.  The  effect 
of  that  assistance  cannot  be  better  described 
than  in  Steele's  own  words.  "I  fared,"  he 
said,  "like  a  distressed  prince  who  calls  in  a 
pcwerful  neighbour  to  his  aid.  I  was  undone 
by  my  auxiliary.  When  I  had  once  called  him 
in,  I  could  not  subsist  without  dependence  on 
h'm."  "  The  paper,"  he  says  elsewhere,  "  was 
advanced  indeed.  It  was  raised  to  a  greater 
thing  than  I  intended  it." 

It  is  probable  that  Addison,  when  he  sent 
across  St.  George's  Channel  his  first  contribu 
tions  to  the  Taller,  had  no  notion  of  the  extent 
and  variety  of  his  own  powers.  He  was  the 
possessor  of  a  vast  mine,  rich  with  a  hundred 

Voi.  V.— 77 


ores.  But  he  had  been  acquainted  only  with 
the  least  precious  part  of  his  treasures  ;  and 
had  hitherto  contented  himself  with  producing 
sometimes  copper  and  sometimes  lead,  inter 
mingled  with  a  little  silver.  All  at  once,  and 
by  mere  accident,  he  had  lighted  on  an  inex 
haustible  vein  of  the  finest  gold.  The  mere 
choice  and  arrangement  of  his  words  would 
have  sufficed  to  make  his  essays  classical. 
For  never,  not  even  by  Dryden,  not  even  by 
Temple,  had  the  English  language  been  written 
with  such  sweetness,  grace,  and  facility.  But 
this  was  the  smallest  part  of  Addison's  praise. 
Had  he  clothed  his  thoughts  in  the  half  French 
style  of  Horace  Walpole,  or  in  the  hall' Latin 
style  of  Dr.  Johnson,  or  in  the  half  German 
jargon  of  the  present  day,  his  genius  would 
have  triumphed  over  all  faults  of  manner. 

As  a  moral  satirist,  he  stands  unrivalled.  If 
ever  the  best  Tatlers  and  Spectators  were 
equalled  in  their  own  kind,  we  should  be  in 
clined  to  guess  that  it  must  have  been  by  the 
lost  comedies  of  Menander. 

In  wit,  properly  so  called,  Addison  was  not 
inferior  to  Cowley  or  Butler.  No  single  ode 
of  Cowley  contains  so  many  happy  analogies 
as  are  crowded  into  the  lines  to  Sir  Godfrey 
Kneller;  and  we  would  undertake  to  collect 
from  the  "Spectators"  as  great  a  number  of 
ingenious  illustrations  as  can  be  found  in  "  Hu- 
dibras."  The  still  higher  faculty  of  invention 
Addison  possessed  in  still  larger  measure. 
The  numerous  fictions,  generally  original,  often 
wild  and  grotesque,  but  always  singularly 
graceful  and  happy,  which  are  found  in  his 
essays,  fully  entitle  him  to  the  rank  of  a  great 
poet — a  rank  to  which  his  metrical  composi 
tions  give  him  no  claim.  As  an  observer  of 
life,  of  manners,  of  all  the  shades  of  human 
character,  he  stands  in  the  first  class.  And 
what  he  observed  he  had  the  art  of  communi 
cating  in  two  widely  different  ways.  He  could 
describe  virtues,  vices,  habits,  whims,  as  well 
as  Clarendon.  But  he  could  do  something 
better.  He  could  call  human  beings  into  ex 
istence,  and  make  them  exhibit  themselves. 
[f  we  wish  to  find  any  thing  more  vivid  than 
Addison's  best  portraits,  we  must  go  either  to 
Shakspeare  or  to  Cervantes. 

But  what  shall  we  say  of  Addison's  humour, 
of  his  sense  of  the  ludicrous,  of  his  power  of 
awakening  that  sense  in  others,  and  of  drawing 
mirth  from  incidents  which  occur  every  day, 
and  from  little  peculiarities  of  temper  and 
manner,  such  as  may  be  found  in  every  man  t 
We  feel  the  charm.  We  give  ourselves  up  to 
it.  But  we  strive  in  vain  to  analyze  it. 

Perhaps  the  best  way  of  describing  Addison's 
peculiar  pleasantry,  is  to  compare  it  with  the 
pleasantry  of  some  other  great  satirist.  The 
ihree  most  eminent  masters  of  the  art  of  ridi 
cule,  during  the  eighteenth  century,  were,  we 
conceive,  Addison,  Swift,  and  Voltaire.  Whicn 
of  the  three  had  the  greatest  power  of  moviris 
laughter  may  be  questioned.  But  each  of  them,, 
within  his  own  domain,  was  supreme.  Voi- 
taire  is  the  prince  of  buffoons.  His  merriment 
is  without  disguise  or  restraint.  He  gambols  . 
he  grins;  he  shakes  his  sides;  he  points  tn«. 
finger;  he  turns  up  the  nose;  he  shoots  out 
the  tongue.  The  manner  of  Swift  is  ihe  ven> 


610 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


opposite  to  this.  He  moves  laughter,  but  never 
joins  in  it.  He  appears  in  his  works  such  as 
he  appeared  in  society.  All  the  company  are 
convulsed  with  merriment,  while  the  dean,  ihe 
author  of  all  the  mirth,  preserves  an  invincible 
gravity,  and  even  sourness  of  aspect;  and 
gives  utterance  to  the  most  eccentric  and  ludi 
crous  fancies,  with  the  air  of  a  man  reading 
the  commination-servicc. 

The  mariner  of  Addi.son  is  as  remote  from 
that  of  Swift  as  from  that  of  Voltaire.  He 
neither  laughs  out  like  the  French  wit,  nor, 
like  the  Irish  wit,  throws  a  double  portion  of 
severity  into  his  countenance  while  laughing 
inly  ;  but  preserves  a  looA-  peculiarly  his  own, 
a  look  of  demure  sererity,  disturbed  only  by 
an  arch  sparkle  of  the  eye,  an  almost  imper 
ceptible  elevation  of  the  brow,  an  almost  im 
perceptible  curl  of  the  lip.  His  tone  is  never 
that  either  of  a  Jack  Pudding  or  of  a  cynic.  It 
is  that  of  a  gentleman,  in  whom  the  quickest 
sense  of  the  ridiculous  is  constantly  tempered 
by  good  nature  and  good  breeding. 

We  own  that  the  humour  of  Addison  is,  in 
our  opinion,  of  a  more  delicious  flavour  than 
the  humour  of  either  Swift  or  Voltaire.  Thus 
much,  at  least,  is  certain,  that  both  Swift  and 
Voltaire  have  been  successfully  mimicked,  and 
that  no  man  has  yet  been  able  to  mimic  Addi 
son.  The  letter  of  the  Abbe  Coyer  to  Pan- 
sophe  is  Voltaire  all  over,  and  imposed,  dur 
ing  a  long  time,  on  the  academicians  of  Paris. 
There  are  passages  in  Arbuthnot's  satirical 
works,  which  we,  at  least,  cannot  distinguish 
from  Swift's  best  writing.  But  of  the  many 
eminent  men  who  have  made  Addison  their 
rncdel,  though  several  have  copied  his  mere 
diction  with  happy  effect,  none  has  been  able 
to  catch  the  tone  of  his  pleasantry.  In  the 
World,  in  the  Connoisseur,  in  the  Mirror,  in 
the  Lounger,  there  are  numerous  papers  writ 
ten  in  obvious  imitation  of  his  Tatlers  and 
Spectators.  Most  of  these  papers  have  some 
merit ;  many  are  very  lively  and  amusing;  but 
there  is  not  a  single  one  which  could  be  passed 
off  as  Addison's  on  a  critic  of  the  smallest  per 
spicacity. 

But  that  which  chiefly  distinguishes  Addison 
from  Swift,  from  Voltaire,  from  almost  all  the 
other  great  masters  of  ridicule,  is  the  grace, 
the  nobleness,  the  moral  purity,  which  we  find 
even  in  his  rperriment.  Severity,  gradually 
hardening  and  darkening  into  misanthropy, 
characterizes  tn/;  works  of  Swift.  The  nature 
of  Voltaire  was,  indeed,  not  inhuman  ;  but  he 
venerated  nothing.  Neither  in  the  master 
pieces  of  aft  nor  in  the  purest  examples  of 
virtue,  neither  in  the  Great  First  Cause  nor  in 
the  awful  enignsa  of  the  grave,  could  he  see 
any  thing  but  subjects  for  drollery.  The  more 
solemn  and  august  the  theme,  the  more  monkey- 
like  was  his  grimacing  and  chattering.  The 
mirth  of  Swift  is  the  mirth  of  Mephistophiles; 
the  mirth  of  Voltaire  is  the  mirth  of  Puck.  If, 
as  Soame  Jennings  oddly  imagined,  a  portion 
of  the  happiness  of  seraphim  and  just  men 
made  perfect  be  derived  from  an  exquisite  per 
ception  of  the  ludicrous,  their  mirth  must 
surely  be  none  other  than  the  mirth  of  Addi- 
»cn; — a  mirth  consistent  with  tender  compas- 
n  for  all  that  is  frail,  and  with  profound 


reverence  for  all  that  is  sublime.  Nothing 
grsat,  nothing  amiable,  no  moral  duty,  no  doc 
trine  of  natural  or  revealed  religion,  has  ever 
been  associated  by  Addison  with  any  degrading 
idea.  His  humanity  is  without  a  "parallel  in 
literary  history.  The  highest  proof  of  human 
virtue  is  to  possess  boundless  power  without 
abusing  it.  No  kind  of  power  is  more  formi 
dable  than  the  power  of  making  men  ridicu 
lous;  and  that  power  Addison  possessed  in 
boundless  measure.  How  grossly  that  power 
was  abused  by  Swift  and  Voltaire  is  well 
known.  But  of  Addison  it  may  be  confidently 
affirmed  that  he  has  blackened  no  man's  cha 
racter,  nay,  that  it  would  be  difficult,  if  not  im 
possible,  to  find  in  all  the  volumes  which  he 
has  left  us  a  single  taunt  which  can  be  called 
ungenerous  or  unkind.  Yet  he  had  detractors, 
whose  malignity  might  have  seemed  to  justify 
as  terrible  a  revenge  as  that  which  men,  not 
superior  to  him  in  genius,  wreaked  on  Belles- 
worth  and  on  Franc  de  Pompignan.  He  was 
a  politician ;  he  was  the  best  writer  of  his 
party;  he  lived  in  times  of  fierce  excitement — 
in  times  when  persons  of  high  character  and 
station  stooped  to  scurrility  such  as  is  now 
practised  by  the  basest  of  mankind.  Yet  no 
provocation  and  no  example  could  induce  him, 
to  return  railing  for  railing. 

Of  the  service  which  his  essays  rendered  to 
morality  it  is  difficult  to  speak  too  highly.  It 
is  true  that,  when  the  Taller  appeared,  that 
age  of  outrageous  profaneness  and  licentious 
ness  which  followed  the  Restoration  had  pa3sed 
away.  Jeremy  Collier  had  shamed  the  theatres 
into  something  which,  compared  with  the  ex 
cesses  of  Etherege  and  Wycherley,  might  be 
called  decency.  Yet  there  still  lingered  in  the 
public  mind  a  pernicious  notion  that  there  was 
some  connection  between  genius  and  profli 
gacy — belween  the  domestic  virtues  and  the 
sullen  formality  of  the  Puritans.  That  error 
it  is  the  glory  of  Addison  to  have  dispelled.  He 
taught  the  nation  that  the  faith  and  the  morali 
ty  of  Hale  and  Tillotson  might  be  found  in 
company  with  wit  more  sparkling  than  the  wit 
of  Congreve,  and  with  humour  richer  than  the 
humour  of  Vanbrugh.  So  effectually,  indeed, 
did  he  retort  on  vice  the  mockery  which  had 
recently  been  directed  against  virtue,  that,  since 
his  time,  the  open  violation  of  decency  has 
always  been  considered  among  us  as  the  sure 
mark  of  a  fool.  And  this  revolution,  the  great 
est  and  most  salutary  ever  effected  by  any  sa 
tirist,  he  accomplished,  be  it  remembered, 
without  writing  one  personal  lampoon. 

In  the  early  contributions  of  Addison  to  the 
Taller,  his  peculiar  powers  were  not  fully  ex 
hibited.  Yet  from  the  first  his  superiority  to 
all  his  coadjutors  was  evident.  Some  of  his 
later  Tailers  are  fully  equal  to  any  thing  that 
he  ever  wrote.  Among  the  portraits,  we  most 
admire  Tom  Folio,  Ned  Softly,  and  the  Politi 
cal  Upholsterer.  The  proceedings  of  the  Court 
of  Honour,  the  Thermometer  of  Zeal,  the  story 
of  the  Frozen  Words,  the  Memoirs  of  the  Shill 
ing,  are  excellent  specimens  of  that  ingenious 
and  lively  species  of  fiction  in  which  Addison 
excelled  all  men.  There  is  one  still  better 
paper,  of  the  same  class,  but  though  that  pa 
per,  a  hundred  and  thirty-three  years  ago,  was 


LIFE   AND   WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


611 


probably  thought  as  edifying  as  one  of  Smal- 
ridge's  sermons,  we  dare  not  indicate  it  to  the 
squeamish  readers  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

During  the  session  of  parliament  which 
commenced  in  November,  1709,  and  which  the 
impeachment  of  Sacheverell  has  made  memo 
rable,  Addison  appears  to  have  resided  in  Lon 
don.  The  Taller  was  now  more  popular  than 
any  periodical  paper  had  ever  been  ;  and  his 
connection  with  it  was  generally  known.  It 
was  not  known,  however,  that  almost  every 
thing  good  in  the  Taller  was  his.  The  truth 
is,  that  the  fifty  or  sixly  numbers  which  we 
owe  to  him  were  not  merely  the  best,  but  so 
decidedly  the  best,  that  any  five  of  them  are 
more  valuable  than  all  the  two  hundred  num 
bers  in  which  he  had  no  share. 

He  required,  at  this  time,  all  the  solace  which 
he  could  derive  from  literary  success.  The 
queen  had  always  disliked  the  whigs.  She  had 
during  some  years  disliked  the  Marlborough 
family.  But,  reigning  by  a  disputed  title,  she 
could  not  venture  directly  to  oppose  herself  to 
a  majority  of  both  Houses  of  Parliament;  and, 
engaged  as  she  was  in  a  war,  on  the  event  of 
which  her  own  crown  was  staked,  she  could 
not  venture  to  disgrace  a  great  and  successful 
general.  But  at  length,  in  the  year  1710,  the 
causes  which  had  restrained  her  from  showing 
her  aversion  to  the  low  church  party  ceased  to 
operate.  The  trial  of  Sacheverell  produced  an 
outbreak  of  public  feeling  scarcely  less  violent 
than  those  which  we  can  ourselves  remember 
in  1820,  and  in  1831.  The  country  gentlemen, 
the  country  clergymen,  the  rabble  of  the  towns, 
were  all,  for  once,  on  the  same  side.  It  was 
clear  that,  if  a  general  election  took  place 
before  the  excitement  abated,  the  lories  would 
have  a  majorily.  The  services  of  Marlbo 
rough  had  been  so  splendid,  lhat  they  were  no 
longer  necessary.  The  queen's  ihrone  was 
secure  from  all  allack  on  ihe  part  of  Louis. 
Indeed,  it  seemed  much  more  likely  that  the 
English  and  German  armies  would  divide  the 
spoils  of  Versailles  and  Marli,  than  that  a 
marshal  of  France  would  bring  back  the  Pre 
tender  to  St.  James's.  The  queen,  acting  by 
the  advice  of  Harley,  determined  to  dismiss 
her  servants.  In  June  the  change  commenced. 
Sunderland  was  the  firsl  who  fell.  The  tories 
exulted  over  his  fall.  The  whigs  Iried,  during 
a  few  weeks,  to  persuade  themselves  that  her 
majesty  had  acted  only  from  personal  dislike 
to  the  secretary,  and  that  she  meditated  no 
further  alteration.  But,  early  in  August,  Go- 
dolphin  was  surprised  by  a  letter  from  Anne, 
which  directed  him  to  break  his  white  staff*. 
Even  after  this  event,  ihe  irresolution  or  dis- 
simulation  of  Harley  kept  up  the  hopes  of  the 
whigs  during  another  month;  and  then  the 
ruin  became  rapid  and  violent.  The  Parlia 
ment  was  dissolved.  The  ministers  were 
turned  out.  The  tories  were  called  to  office. 
The  tide  of  popularity  ran  violently  in  favour 
of  the  high  church  party.  That  party,  feeble 
in  the  late  House  of  Commons,  was  now  irre 
sistible.  The  power  which  the  tories  had  thus 
suddenly  acquired,  they  used  with  blind  and 
stupid  ferocity.  The  howl  which  Ihe  whole 
pack  set  up  for  prey  and  for  blood,  appalled 
even  him  who  had  roused  and  unchained  them. 


When  at  this  distance  of  time,  v,  ialml> 
review  the  conduct  of  the  discarded  ministers^ 
we  cannot  but  feel  a  movement  of  indignatioa 
at  the  injuslice  with  which  they  were  treated. 
No  body  of  men  had  ever  administered  the 
government  with  more  energy,  ability,  and 
moderation;  and  their  success  had  been  pro- 
porlioned  to  their  wisdom.  They  had  saved 
Holland  and  Germany.  They  had  humbled 
France.  They  had,  as  it  seemed,  all  but  torn 
Spain  from  the  house  of  Bourbon.  They  had 
made  England  the  first  power  in  Europe.  At 
home  they  had  united  England  and  Scotland. 
They  had  respected  the  rights  of  conscience 
and  the  liberty  of  the  subject.  They  relired, 
leaving  Iheir  country  at  the  height  of  pros 
perity  and  glory.*  And  yet  they  were  pursued 

10  their  retreat  by  such  a  roar  of  obloquy  as 
was  never  raised  against  the  government  which 
threw  away  thirleen  colonies;  or  against  the 
government  which    sent   a    gallant    army  to 
perish  in  the  ditches  of  Walcheren. 

None  of  the  whigs  suffered  more  in  the 
general  wreck  than  Addison.  He  had  just  sus 
tained  some  heavy  pecuniary  losses,  of  the 
nature  of  which  we  are  imperfeclly  informed, 
when  his  secrelaryship  was  laken  from  him. 
He  had  reason  lo  believe  lhat  he  should  also 
be  deprived  of  the  small  Irish  office  which  he 
held  by  patent.  He  had  just  resigned  his  fel 
lowship.  It  seems  probable  that  he  had  already 
venlured  lo  raise  his  eyes  to  a  greal  lady;  and 
that,  while  his  political  friends  were  all-power 
ful,  and  while  his  own  fortunes  were  rising,  he 
had  been,  in  the  phrase  of  the  romances  which 
were  then  fashionable,  permitted  to  hope.  But 
Mr.  Addison,  Ihe  ingenious  writer,  and  Mr.  Ad 
dison,  the  chief  secretary,  were,  in  her  lady 
ship's  opinion,  two  very  different  persons.  All 
these  calamities  united,  however,  could  not 
disturb  the  serene  cheerfulness  of  a  mind  con 
scious  of  innocence,  and  rich  in  its  own  wealth. 
He  told  his  friends,  with  smiling  resignation, 
that  they  ought  to  admire  his  philosophy,  that 
he  had  lost  at  once  his  fortune,  his  place,  his 
fellowship,  and  his  mistress,  thai  he  must  ihink 
of  turning  tutor  again,  and  yet  that  his  spirits 
were  as  good  as  ever. 

He  had  one  consolation.  Of  the  unpopu 
larity  which  his  friends  had  incurred,  he  had 
no  share.  Such  was  the  esteem  wilh  which 
he  was  regarded,  lhat  while  the  most  violent 
measures  were  taken  for  the  purpose  of  forcing 
tory  members  on  whig  corporations,  he  was 
relurned  to  Parliarnenl  without  even  a  contest. 
Swift,  who  was  now  in  London,  and  who  had 
already  determined  on  quilling  ihe  whigs,  wrote 
to  Stella  in  these  words : — "  The  tories  carry  it 
among  the  new  members  six  to  one.  Mr.  Addi- 
son's  election  has  passed  easy  and  undisputed ; 
and  I  believe  if  he  had  a  mind  to  be  king,  he 
would  hardly  be  refused." 

The  good-will  with  which  the  tories  regarded 
Addison  is  the  more  honourable  lo  him,  because 

11  had  nol  been  purchased  by  any  concession 
on  his  part.     During  the  general  election  he 


*  Miss  Aikin  attributes  the  unpopularity  of  the  whigs, 
and  the  change  of  government  to  the  surrender  of  Stan 
hope's  army.  (ii.  13.)    The  fact  is,  that  the  ministry  waa 
chanced,  and  the  new  House  of  Commons  elected,  befor 
that  surrender  took  place. 


612 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


published  a  political  journal,  entitled  the 
•'Whig:  Examiner."  Of  that  journal  it  may 
be  sufficient  to  say  that  Johnson,  in  spite  of  his 
strong  political  prejudices,  pronounced  it  lo  be 
superior  in  wit  to  any  of  Swift's  writings  on 
the  other  side.  When  it  ceased  to  appear,  f 
Swift,  in  a  letter  to  Stella,  expressed  his  exulta 
tion  at  the  death  of  so  formidable  an  antagonist. 
"He  might  well  rejoice,"  says  Johnson,  "at  the 
death  of  that  which  he  could  not  have  killed." 
"On  no  occasion,"  he  adds,  "was  the  genius 
of  Addison  more  vigorously  exerted,  and  in 
none  did  the  superiority  of  his  powers  more 
evidently  appear." 

The  only  use  which  Addison  appears  to  have 
made  of  the  favour  with  which  he  was  regarded 
by  the  tories,  was  to  save  some  of  his  friends 
from  the  general  ruin  of  the  whig  party.  He 
felt  himself  to  be  in  a  situation  which  made  it 
his  duty  to  take  a  decided  part  in  politics.  But 
thecase  of  Sieele  andof  Ambrose  Phillipps  was 
different.  For  Phillipps,  Addison  even  conde 
scended  to  solicit;  with  what  success  we  have 
not  ascertained.*  Sieele  held  two  places.  He 
was  gazetteer,  and  he  was  also  a  commissioner 
of  stamps.  The  gazette  was  taken  from  him. 
But  he  was  suffered  to  retain  his  place  in  the 
stamp-office,  on  an  implied  understanding  that 
he  should  not  be  active  against  the  new  govern 
ment;  and  he  was,  during  more  than  two  years, 
induced  by  Addison  to  observe  this  armistice 
with  tolerable  fidelity. 

Isaac  BickerstafT  accordingly  became  silent 
upon  politics,  and  the  article  of  news,  which 
had  once  formed  about  one-third  of  his  paper, 
altogether  disappeared.  The  Taller  had  com 
pletely  changed  its  character.  It  was  now  no 
thing  but  a  series  of  essays  on  books,  morals, 
and  manners.  Steele,  therefore,  resolved  to 
bring  it  to  a  close,  and  to  commence  a  new 
work  on  an  improved  plan.  It  was  announced 
that  this  new  work  would  be  published  daily. 
The  undertaking  was  generally  regarded  as 
bold,  or  rather  rash  ;  but  the  event  amply  justi 
fied  the  confidence  with  which  Steele  relied  on 
the  fertility  of  Addison's  genius.  On  the  2d 
of  January,  171 1,  appeared  the  last  Tatler.  On 
the  1st  of  March  following,  appeared  the  first 
of  an  incomparable  series  of  papers, containing 
observations  on  life  and  literature  by  an  imagi 
nary  spectator. 

The  Spectator  himself  was  conceived  and 
drawn  by  Addison  ;  and  it  is  not  easy  to  doubt 
that  the  portrait  was  meant  to  be  in  some  fea 
tures  a  likeness  of  the  painter.  The  Spectator 
is  a  gentleman  who,  after  passing  a  studious 
youth  at  the  university,  has  travelled  on  classic 
ground,  and  has  bestowed  much  attention  on 
curious  points  of  antiquity.  He  has,  on  his 
return,  fixed  his  residence  in  London,  and  has 
observed  all  the  forms  of  life  which  are  to  be 
found  in  that  great  city; — has  daily  listened  to 
the  wits  of  Will's,  has  smoked  with  the  phi 
losophers  of  the  Grecian,  and  has  mingled  with 


*  Miss  Aikin  mentions  the  exertions  which  Addison 
made  in  1710,  before  the  change  of  ministry,  to  serve 
Phillipps,  and  adds  that  "Phillipps  appears  some  time 
afterwards  to  have  obtained  a  mission  to  Copenhagen 
which  eiiatth-d  him  to  pratify  the  world  with  his  poetica 
description  of  a  frozen  shower."  (ii.  14.)  This  is  a! 
wrong.  The  poem  was  written  in  March,  1709,  ant 
uriuu-d  u:  »»ie  Tatler  -if  the  6th  of  May  following. 


the  parsons  at  Child's,  and  with  the  politicians 
at  the  St.  James's.  In  the  morning  he;  often 
listens  to  the  hum  of  the  Exchange;  in  the 
evening  his  face  is  constantly  to  be  seen  in 
he  pit  of  Drury-lane  theatre.  But  an  insur 
mountable  bashfulness  prevents  him  from 
opening  his  mouth,  except  in  a  small  circle  of 
ntimate  friends. 

These  friends  were  first  sketched  by  Steele. 
Four  of  the  club,  the  templar,  the  clergyman, 
he  soldier,  and  the  merchant,  were  uninterest- 
ng  figures,  fit  only  for  a  background.  But  the 
other  two,  an  old  country  baronet,  and  an  old 
own  rake,  though  not  delineated  with  a  very- 
delicate  pencil,  had  some  good  strokes.  Addi 
son  took  the  rude  outlines  into  his  own  hands, 
retouched  them,  coloured  them,  and  is  in  truth 
he  creator  of  the  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  and 
the  Will  Honeycomb  with  whom  we  are  all 
amiliar. 

The  plan  of  the  Spectator  must  be  allowed 
o  be  both  original  and  eminently  happy. 
Every  valuable  essay  in  the  series  may  be 
read  with  pleasure  separately ;  yet  the  five 
or  six  hundred  essays  form  a  whole,  and  a 
whole  which  has  the  interest  of  a  novel.  It 
must  be  remembered,  too,  that  at  that  time,  no 
novel,  giving  a  lively  and  powerful  picture  of 
the  common  life  and  manners  of  England  had 
appeared.  Richardson  was  working  as  a  com 
positor.  Fielding  was  robbing  bird's  nests. 
Smollett  was  not  yet  born.  The  narrative, 
therefore,  which  connects  together  th?  Spec 
tator's  essays,  gave  to  our  ancestors  their  first 
taste  of  an  exquisite  and  untried  pleasure. 
That  narrative  was  indeed  constructed  with  no 
art  or  labour.  The  events  were  such  events  as 
occur  every  day.  Sir  Roger  comes  up  to  town 
to  see  Eugenio,  as  the  worthy  baronet  always 
calls  Prince  Eugene,  goes  with  the  Spectator 
on  the  water  to  Spring  Gardens,  walks  among 
the  tombs  in  the  abbey,  is  frightened  by  the 
Mohawks,  but  conquers  his  apprehension  so 
far  as  to  go  to  the  theatre,  when  the  "  Distressed 
Mother"  is  acted.  The  Spectator  pays  a  visit 
in  the  summer  to  Coverley  Hall,  is  charmed 
with  the  old  house,  the  old  butler,  and  the  old 
chaplain,  eats  a  Jack  caught  by  Will  Wimble, 
rides  to  the  assizes,  and  hears  a  point  of  law- 
discussed  by  Tom  Touchy.  At  last  a  letter 
from  the  honest  butler  brings  to  the  club  the 
news  that  Sir  Roger  is  dead.  Will  Honeycomb 
marries  and  reforms  at  sixty.  The  club  breaks 
up  ;  and  the  Spectator  resigns  his  functions. 
Such  events  can  hardly  be  said  to  form  a  plot, 
yet  they  are  related  with  such  truth,  such  grace, 
such  wit,  such  humour,  such  pathos,  such 
knowledge  of  the  human  heart,  such  know 
ledge  of  the  ways  of  the  world,  that  they 
charm  us  «n  the  hundredth  perusal.  WTe  have 
not  the  least  doubt  that,  if  Addison  had  writ 
ten  a  novel,  on  an  extensive  plan,  it  would 
have  been  superior  to  any  that  we  possess.  As 
it  is,  he  is  entitled  to  be  considered,  not  only  as 
the  greatest  of  the  English  essayists,  but  as» 
the  forerunner  of  the  great  English  novelists. 

We  say  this  of  Addison  alone;  for  Addjson 
is  the  Spectator.  About  three-sevenths  of  the 
work  are  his;  and  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say, 
that  his  first  essay  is  as  good  as  the  best  essay 
of  any  of  his  coadjutors.  His  best  essays  ap 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


613 


proach  near  to  absolute  perfection  ;  nor  is  their 
excellence  more  wonderful  than  their  variety. 
His  invention  never  seems  to  flag;  nor  is  he 
ever  under  the  necessity  of  repeating  himself, 
or  of  wearing  out  a  subject.  There  are  no 
dregs  in  his  wine.  He  regales  us  after  the 
fashion  of  that  prodigal  nabob  who  held  that 
there  was  only  one  good  glass  in  a  bottle.  As 
soon  as  we  have  tasted  the  first  sparkling  foam 
of  a  jest,  it  is  withdrawn,  and  a  fresh  glass  of 
nectar  is  at  our  lips.  On  th^  Monday  we  have 
an  allegory  as  lively  and  ingenious  as  Lucian's 
A  cation  of  Lives;  on  the  Tuesday  an  eastern 
ap.:logue  as  richly  coloured  as  the  Tales  of 
8c.;erezade;  on  the  Wednesday,  a  character 
described  with  the  skill  of  La  Bruyere;  on  the 
Thursday,  a  scene  from  common  life  equal  to 
the  best  chapters  in  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield  ;  on 
the  Friday,  some  sly  Horatian  pleasantry  on 
the  fashionable  follies — on  hoops,  patches,  or 
puppet-shows;  and  on  the  Saturday  a  religious 
meditation  which  will  bear  a  comparison  with 
the  finest  passages  in  Massillon. 

It  is  dangerous  to  select  where  there  is  so 
much  that  deserves  the  highest  praise.  We 
will  venture,  however,  to  say»  that  any  persons 
who  wish  to  form  a  just  notion  of  the  extent 
and  variety  of  Addison's  powers,  will  do  well 
to  read  at  one  sitting  the  following  papers; — 
the  two  Visits  to  the  Abbey,  the  Visit  to  the 
Exchange,  the  Journal  of  the  Retired  Citizen, 
*he  Vision  of  Mirza,  the  Transmigrations  of 
Pug  the  M»nkey,  and  the  Death  of  Sir  Roger 
de  Coverley.* 

The  least  valuable  of  Addison's  contributions 
to  the  Spectator  are,  in  the  judgment  of  our 
age,  his  critical  papers.  Yet  his  critical  pa 
pers  are  always  luminous,  and  often  ingenious. 
The  very  worst  of  them  must  be  regarded  as 
creditable  to  him,  when  the  character  of  the 
school  in  which  he  had  been  trained  is  fairly 
considered.  The  best  of  them  were  much  too 
good  for  his  readers.  In  truth,  he  was  not  so 
far  behind  our  generation  as  he  was  before 
his  own.  No  essays  in  the  Spectator  were 
more  censured  and  derided  than  those  in  which 
he  raised  his  voice  against  the  contempt  with 
which  our  fine  old  ballads  were  regarded;  and 
showed  the  scoffers  that  the  same  gold  which, 
burnished  and  polished,  gives  lustre  to  the 
y3Eneid  and  the  Odes  of  Horace,  is  mingled 
with  the  rude  dross  of  Chevy  Chace. 

It  is  not  strange  that  the  success  of  the 
Spectator  should  have  been  such  as  no  similar 
work  has  ever  obtained.  The  number  of  co 
pies  daily  distributed  was  at  first  three  thou 
sand.  It  subsequently  increased,  and  had  risen 
to  near  four  thousand  when  the  stamp-tax  was 
imposed.  That  tax  was  fatal  to  a  crowd  of 
journals.  The  Spectator,  however,  stood  its 
ground,  doubled  its  price,  and  though  its  circu 
lation  fell  off,  still  yielded  a  large  revenue  both 
to  the  state  and  to  the  authors.  For  particular 
papers,  the  demand  was  immense;  of  some,  it 
is  said  twenty  thousand  copies  were  required. 
But  this  was  not  all.  To  have  the  Spectator 
served  up  every  morning  with  the  bohea  and 


*  \Tos.  2fi.  329.  69,  317,  159,  343.  517.  These  papers  sire 
all  in  the  first  seven  volumes  The  eighth  must  be  con- 
lid'Ted  us  a  separate  work. 


rolls,  was  a  luxury  for  the  few;  the  majority 
were  content  to  wait  till  essays  enough  had  ap 
peared  to  form  a  volume.  Ten  thousand  copies 
of  each  volume  were  immediately  taken  off,  and 
new  editions  were  called  for.  It  must  be  re 
membered,  that  the  population  of  England  was 
then  hardly  a  third  of  what  it  now  is.  The 
number  of  Englishmen  who  were  in  the  habit 
of  reading,  was  probably  not  a  sixth  of  what  it 
now  is.  A  shopkeeper  or  a  farmer  who  found 
any  pleasure  in  literature,  was  a  rarity.  Nay, 
there  was  doubtless  more  than  one  knight  of  the 
shire  whose  country-seat  did  not  contain  tea 
books — receipt-books,  and  books  on  farriery  in 
cluded.  Under  these  circumstances,  the  sale 
of  the  Spectator  must  be  considered  as  indicat 
ing  a  popularity  quite  as  great  as  that  of  the 
most  successful  works  of  Sir  Walter  Scott  and 
Mr.  Dickens  in  our  own  time. 

At  the  close  of  1712,  the  Spectator  ceased  to 
appear.  It  was  probably  felt  that  the  short- 
faced  gentleman  and  his  club  had  been  long 
enough  before  the  town  ;  and  that  it  was  time 
to  withdraw  them,  and  to  replace  them  by  a  new 
set  of  characters.  In  a  few  weeks  the  first  num 
ber  of  the  "Guardian"  was  published.*  But 
the  Guardian  was  unfortunate  both  in  its  birth 
and  in  its  death.  It  began  in  dullness,  and  dis 
appeared  in  a  tempest  of  faction.  The  origi 
nal  plan  was  had.  Addison  contributed  no 
thing  till  sixty-six  numbers  had  appeared;  and 
it  was  then  impossible  even  for  him  to  make 
the  Guardian  what  the  Spectator  had  been. 
Nestor  Ironside  and  the  Miss  Lizards  were  peo 
ple  to  whom  even  he  could  impart  no  interest. 
He  could  only  furnish  some  excellent  little  es 
says,  both  serious  and  comic;  and  this  he  did. 

Why  Addison  gave  no  assistance  to  the 
Guardian  during  the  first  two  months  of  its 
existence,  is  a  question  which  has  puzzled 
the  editors  and  biographers,  but  which  seems 
to  us  to  admit  of  a  very  easy  solution.  He 
was  then  engaged  in  bringing  his  Cato  on  the 
stasre. 

The  first  four  acts  of  this  drama  had  been, 
lying  in  his  desk  since  his  return  from  Italy. 
His  .modest  and  sensitive  nature  shrank  from 
the  risk  of  a  public  arid  shameful  failure;  and, 
though  all  who  saw  the  manuscript  were  loud 
in  praise,  some  thought  it  possible  that  an  au 
dience  might  become  impatient  even  of  very 
good  rhetoric;  and  advised  Addison  to  print 
the  play  without  hazarding  a  representation. 
At  length,  after  many  fits  of  apprehension,  ihe 
poet  yielded  to  the  urgency  of  his  political 
friends,  who  hoped  that  the  public  would  dis 
cover  some  analogy  between  the  followers  of 
Caesar  and  the  lories,  between  Sempronius  and 
the  apostate  whigs,  between  Cato,  struggling 
to  the  last  for  the  liberties  of  Rome,  and  the 
band  of  patriots  who  still  stood  firm  lound 
Halifax  and  Wharton. 

Addison  gave  the  play  to  the  managers  of 
Drury-lane  theatre,  without  stipulating  for  any 
advantage  to  himself.  They,  therefore,  thought 
themselves  bound  to  spare  no  cost  in  scenery 
and  dresses.  The  decorations,  it  is  true,  would 


*  Miss  Aikin  snys  that  the  Oiuirdhin  was  launcher!  In 
Novemtwr,  1713.  (ii.  lOfi.)  It  \V;is  Irmt.cli.-d  in  March, 
1713,  and  was  given  over  in  the  following  September. 

3F 


614 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


not  have  pleased  the  skilful  eye  of  Mr.  Mac- 
ready.  Juba's  waistcoat  blazed  with  gold  lace; 
Marcia's  hoop  was  worthy  of  a  duchess  on  the 
birthday;  and  Cato  wore  a  wig  worth  fifty 
guineas.  The  prologue  was  written  by  Pope, 
and  is  undoubtedly  a  dignified  and  spirited 
composition.  The  part  of  the  hero  was  excel 
lently  played  by  Booth.  Steele  undertook  to 
pack  a  house.  The  boxes  were  in  a  blaze 
with  the  stars  of  the  peers  in  opposition.  The 
pit  was  crowded  with  attentive  and  friendly 
listeners  from  the  inns  of  court  and  the  lite 
rary  coffee-houses.  Sir  Gilbert  Heaihcote,  go 
vernor  of  the  Bank  of  England,  was  at  the 
head  of  a  powerful  body  of  auxiliaries  from 
the  city; — warm  men  and  true  whigs,  but  bet 
ter  known  at  Jonathan's  and  Garrowy's  than 
in  the  haunts  of  wits  and  critics. 

These  precautions  were  quite  superfluous. 
The  tories,  as  a  body,  regarded  Addison  with 
no  unkind  feelings.  Nor  was  it  for  their  inte 
rest, — professing,  as  they  did,  profound  reve 
rence  for  law  and  prescription,  and  abhorrence 
both  of  popular  insurrections  and  of  standing 
armies — to  appropriate  to  themselves  reflec 
tions  thrown  on  the  great  military  chief  and 
demagogue,  who,  with  the  support  of  the  legions 
and  of  the  common  people,  subverted  all  the 
ancient  institutions  of  his  country.  Accord 
ingly,  every  shout  that  was  raised  by  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Kit-C?rt  was  re-echoed  by  the  high 
churchmen  of  the  October;  and  the  curtain  at 
length  fell  amidst  thunders  of  unanimous  ap 
plause. 

The  delight  and  admiration  of  the  town  were 
described  by  the  Guardian  in  terms  which  we 
might  attribute  to  partiality,  were  it  not  that 
the  Examiner,  the  organ  of  the  ministry,  held 
similar  language.  The  tories,  indeed,  found 
much  to  sneer  at  in  the  conduct  of  their  oppo 
nents.  Steele  had  on  this,  as  on  other  occa 
sions,  shown  more  zeal  than  taste  or  judgment. 
The  honest  citizens  who  marched  under  the 
orders  of  Sir  Gibby,  as  he  was  facetiously 
called,  probably  knew  better  when  to  buy  and 
when  to  sell  stock  than  when  to  clap  and  when 
to  hiss  at  a  play  ;  and  incurred  some  ridicule 
by  making  the  hypocritical  Sempronius  their 
favourite,  and  by  giving  to  his  insincere  rants 
louder  plaudits  than  they  bestowed  on  the  tem 
perate  eloquence  of  Cato.  Wharton,  too,  who 
had  the  incredible  effrontery  to  applaud  the 
lines  about  flying  from  prosperous  vice  and 
from  the  power  of  impious  men  to  a  private 
station,  did  not  escape  the  sarcasms  of  those 
who  justly  thought  that  he  could  fly  from  no 
thing  more  vicious  or  impious  than  himself. 
The  epilogue,  which  was  written  by  Garth,  a 
7ealous  whig,  was  severely  and  not  unreasona 
bly  censured  as  ignoble  and  out  of  place.  But 
Addison  was  described,  even  by  the  bitterest 
tory  writers,  as  a  gentleman  of  wit  and  virtue, 
in  whose  friendship  many  persons  of  both  par 
ties  were  happy,  and  whose  name  ought  not  to 
be  mixed  up  with  factious  squabbles. 

Of  the  jests  by  which  the  triumph  of  the 
whig  party  was  disturbed,  the  most  severe  and 
happy  was  Bolingbroke's.  Between  two  acts, 
he  sent  for  Booth  to  his  box,  and  presented 
him,  before  the  whole  theatre,  with  a  purse  of 


fifty  guineas,  for  defending  the  cause  of  liberty 
so  well  against  a  perpetual  dictator.* 

It  was  April ;  and  in  April,  a  hundred  and 
thirty  years  ago,  the  London  season  was  thought 
to  be  far  advanced.  Daring  a  whole  month,  how 
ever,  Cato  was  performed  to  overflowing  houses, 
and  brought  into  the  treasury  of  the  theatre 
twice  the  gains  of  an  ordinary  spring.  In  the 
summer,  the  Drury  Lane  company  went  dowa 
to  act  at  Oxford,  and  there,  before  an  au 
dience  which  retained  an  affectionate  remem 
brance  of  Addison's  accomplishments  and  vir 
tues,  his  tragedy  was  acted  during  several 
days.  The  gownsmen  began  to  besiege  the 
theatre  in  the  forenoon,  and  by  one  in  the  after 
noon  all  the  seats  were  filled. 

About  the  merits  of  the  piece  which  had  so 
extraordinary  an  effect,  the  public,  we  sup 
pose,  has  made  up  its  mind.  To  compare  it 
with  the  masterpieces  of  the  Attic  stage,  with 
the  great  English  dramas  of  the  time  of  Eliza 
beth,  or  even  with  the  productions  of  Schiller's 
manhood,  would  be  absurd  indeed.  Yet  it 
contains  excellent  dialogue  and  declamation; 
and,  among  plays  fashioned  on  the  French 
model,  must  be  allowed  to  rank  high  ;  not  in 
deed  with  Athalie,  Zaire,  or  Saul,  but,  we  think, 
not  below  Cinna ;  and  certairly  above  any 
other  English  tragedy  of  the  sam»  school,  above 
many  of  the  plays  of  Corneille,  above  many 
of  the  plays  of  Voltaire  and  Alfieri,  and  above 
some  plays  of  Racine.  Be  this  as  it  may,  we 
have  little  doubt  that  Cato  did  as  much  as  the 
Tatlers,  Spectators,  and  Freeholders  united,  to 
raise  Addison's  fame  among  his  contempo 
raries. 

The  modesty  and  good  nature  of  the  success 
ful  dramatist  had  tamed  even  the  malignity  of 
faction.  But  literary  envy,  it  should  seem,  is 
a  fiercer  passion  than  party  spirit.  It  was  by 
a  zealous  whig  that  the  fiercest  attack  on  the 
whig  tragedy  was  made.  John  Dennis  pub 
lished  Remarks  on  Cato,  which  were  written 
with  some  acuteness  and  with  much  coarse 
ness  and  asperity.  But  Addison  neither  defend 
ed  himself  nor  retaliated.  On  many  points  he 
had  an  excellent  defence;  and  nothing  would 
have  been  easier  than  to  retaliate ;  for  Dennis 
had  written  bad  odes,  bad  tragedies,  bad  come 
dies  :  he  had,  moreover,  a  larger  share  than 
most  men  of  those  infirmities  and  eccentrici 
ties  which  excite  laughter ;  and  Addison's 
power  of  turning  either  an  absurd  book  or  an 
absurd  man  into  ridicule  was  unrivalled.  Ad 
dison,  however,  serenely  conscious  of  his  su 
periority,  looked  with  pity  on  his  assailant, 
whose  temper,  naturally  irritable  and  gloomy, 
had  been  soured  by  want,  by  controversy,  and 
by  literary  failures. 

But  among  the  young  candidates  for  Addi 
son's  favour  there  was  one  distinguished  by 
talents  above  the  rest,  and  distinguished,  we 
fear,  not  less  by  malignity  and  insincerity. 
Pope  was  only  twenty-five.  But  his  powers 


*  "The  lone  sway  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborousrh,"  says 
Miss  Aikin,  "was  here  planced  at."  Under  'i von r,  if 
Bolinsrbroke  hud  meant,  no  more  than  this,  his  sarcasm 
would  have  been  pointless.  The  allusion  was  to  the  at 
tempt  which  Marlbnroush  had  made  to  convert  the.  cap- 
tain-sreMeralship  into  a  patent,  office,  to  he  held  l>y  him 
self  for  life.  The  patent  was  stopped  by  Lord  Cowper. 


LIFE   AND  WRITINGS   OF  ADDISON. 


615 


had  expanded  to  their  full  maturity ;  and  his 
best  poem,  the  "Rape  of  the  Lock,"  had  re 
cently  been  published.  Of  his  genius,  Addison 
had  always  expressed  high  admiration.  But 
Addison  had  clearly  discerned,  what  might  in 
deed  have  been  discerned  by  an  eye  less  pene 
trating  than  his,  that  the  diminutive,  crooked, 
sickly  boy  was  eager  to  revenge  himself  on 
society  for  the  unkindness  of  nature.  In  the 
Spectator,  the  Essay  on  Criticism  had  been 
praised  with  cordial  warmth;  but  a  gentle  hint 
had  been  added,  that  the  writer  of  so  excellent 
a  poem  would  have  done  well  to  avoid  ill-na 
tured  personalities.  Pope,  though  evidently 
more  galled  by  the  censure  than  gratified  by 
the  praise,  returned  thanks  for  the  admonition, 
and  promised  to  profit  by  it.  The  two  writers 
continued  to  exchange  civilities,  counsel,  and 
small  good  offices.  Addison  publicly  extolled 
Pope's  miscellaneous  pieces,  and  Pope  fur 
nished  Addison  with  a  prologue.  This  did  not 
last  long.  Pope  hated  Dennis,  whom  he  had 
injured  without  provocation.  The  appearance 
of  the  Remarks  on  Cato,  gave  the  irritable 
poet  an  opportunity  of  venting  his  malice  un 
der  the  show  of  friendship ;  and  such  an  op 
portunity  could  not  but  be  welcome  to  a  nature 
which  v/as  implacable  in  enmity,  and  which 
always  preferred  the  tortuous  to  the  straight 
path.  He  published,  accordingly,  the  "Narra 
tive  of  the  Frenzy  of  John  Dennis."  But  Pope 
had  mistaken  his  powers.  He  was  a  great 
master  of  invective  and  sarcasm.  He  could 
dissect  a  character  in  terse  and  sonorous 
couplets,  brilliant  with  antithesis.  But  of  dra 
matic  talent  he  was  altogether  destitute.  If  he 
had  written  a  lampoon  on  Dennis,  such  as  that 
on  Atticus,  or  that  on  Sporus,  the  old  grumbler 
would  have  been  crushed.  But  Pope  writing 
dialogue  re,sembled — to  borrow  Horace's  ima 
gery  and  his  own — a  wolf  which,  instead  of 
biting,  should  take  *:  kicking,  or  a  monkey 
which  should  try  to  sting.  The  Narrative  is 
utterly  contemptible.  Of  argument  there  is 
not  even  the  show;  and  the  jests  are  such  as, 
if  they  were  introduced  into  a  farce,  would 
call  forth  the  hisses  of  the  shilling  gallery. 
Dennis  raves  about  the  drama;  and  the  nurse 
thinks  that  he  is  calling  for  a  dram.  "There 
is,"  he  cries,  "  no  peripetia  in  the  tragedy,  no 
change  of  fortune,  no  change  at  all."  "Pray, 
good  sir,  be  not  angry,"  said  the  old  woman ; 
"I'll  fetch  change."  This  is  not  exactly  the 
pleasantry  of  Addison. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Ad  lison  saw 
through  this  officious  zeal,  and  felt  himself  deeply 
aggrieved  by  it.  So  foolish  and  spiteful  a 
pamphlet  could  do  him  no  good,  and,  if  he 
were  thought  to  have  any  hand  in  it,  must  do 
him  harm.  Gifted  with  incomparable  powers 
of  ridicule,  he  had  never,  even  in  self-defence, 
used  those  powers  inhumanly  or  uncourteous- 
ly ;  and  he  was  not  disposed  to  let  others  make 
his  fame  and  his  interests  a  pretext  under 
whicn  they  might  commit  outrages  from  which 
he  had  himself  constantly  abstained.  He  ac 
cordingly  declared  that  he  had  no  concern  in 
the  "Narrative,"  that  he  disapproved  of  it,  and 
that,  if  he  answered  the  "Remarks,"  he  would 
answer  them  like  a  gentleman ;  and  he  took 
eare  to  communicate  this  to  Dennis.  Pope 


was  bitterly  mortified;  and  !o  this  transaction 
we  are  inclined  to  ascribe  the  hatred  with 
which  he  ever  after  regarded  Addison. 

In  September,  1713,  the  Guardian  ceased  to 
appear.  Steele  had  gone  mad  about  politics. 
A  general  election  had  just  taken  place;  he 
had  been  chosen  member  for  Stockbridge,  and 
fully  expected  to  play  a  first  part  in  Parlia 
ment.  The  immense  success  of  the  Tatler  and 
Spectator  had  turned  his  head.  He  had  been 
the  editor  of  both  those  papers ;  and  was  not 
aware  how  entirely  they  owed  their  influence 
and  popularity  to  the  genius  of  his  friend.  His 
spirits,  always  violent,  were  now  excited  by 
vanity,  ambition  and  faction,  to  such  a  pitch 
that  he  every  day  committed  some  offence 
against  good  sense  and  good  taste.  All  the 
discreet  and  moderate  members  of  his  own 
party  regretted  and  condemned  his  folly.  "I 
am  in  a  thousand  troubles,"  Addison  wrote, 
"  about  poor  Dick,  and  wish  that  his  zeal  for 
the  public  may  not  be  ruinous  to  himself. 
But  he  has  sent  me  word  that  he  is  determined 
to  go  on,  and  that  any  advice  I  may  give  him 
in  this  particular  will  have  no  weight  with 
him." 

Steele  set  up  a  political  paper  called  "  The 
Englishman,"  which,  as  it  was  not  supported 
by  contributions  from  Addison,  completely 
failed.  By  this  work,  by  some  other  writings 
of  the  same  kind,  and  by  the  airs  which  he  gave 
himself  at  the  first  meeting  of  the  new  Parlia 
ment,  he  made  the  lories  so  angry  that  they 
determined  to  expel  him.  The  whigs  stood  by 
him  gallantly;  but  were  unable  to  save  him. 
The  vote  of  expulsion  was  regarded  by  all 
dispassionate  men  as  a  tyrannical  exercise  of 
the  power  of  the  majority.  But  Steele's  vio 
lence  and  folly,  though  they  by  no  means  jus 
tified  the  steps  which  his  enemies  took,  had 
completely  disgusted  his  friends;  nor  did  he 
ever  regain  the  place  which  he  had  held  in  the 
public  estimation. 

Addison  about  this  time  conceived  the  design 
of  adding  an  eighth  volume  to  the  Spectator. 
In  June,  1714,  the  first  number  of  the  new 
series  appeared,  and  during  about  six  months 
three  papers  were  published  weekly.  Nothing 
can  be  more  striking  than  the  contrast  between 
the  Englishman  and  the  eighth  volume  of  the 
Spectator — between  Steele  without  Addison, 
and  Addison  without  Steele.  The  "English 
man"  is  forgotten ;  the  eighth  volume  of  the 
Spectator  contains,  perhaps,  the  finest  essays, 
both  serious  and  playful,  in  the  English  lan 
guage. 

Before  this  volume  was  completed,  the  death 
of  Anne  produced  an  entire  change  in  the  ad 
ministration  of  public  affairs.  The  blow  fell 
suddenly.  It  found  the  tory  party  distracted  by 
internal  feuds,  and  unprepared  for  any  great 
effort.  Harley  had  just  been  disgraced.  Bo- 
lingbroke,  it  was  supposed,  would  be  the  chief 
minister.  But  the  queen  was  on  her  deathbed 
before  the  white  staff  had  been  given,  and  her 
last  public  act  was  to  deliver  it  with  a  feeble 
hand  to  the  Duke  of  Shrewsbury.  The  emer^ 
gency  produced  a  coalition  between  all  sec 
tions  of  public  men  who  were  attached  to  the 
Protestant  succession.  George  the  First  wa% 
proclaimed  without  opposition.  A  council,  in 


616 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


wmch  the  leading  whigs  had  seats,  took  the 
direction  of  affairs  till  the  new  king  should 
arrive.  The  first  act  of  the  lords  justices  was 
to  appoint  Addison  their  secretary. 

There  is  an  idle  tradition  that  he  was  di 
rected  to  prepare  a  letter  to  the  king,  that  he 
could  not  satisfy  himself  as  to  the  style  of  this 
composition,  and  that  the  lords  justices  called 
i  a  clerk  who  at  once  did  what  was  wanted. 
It  is  not  strange  that  a  story  so  flattering  to 
mediocrity  should  be  popular;  and  we  are 
sorry  to  deprive  dunces  of  their  consolation. 
But  the  truth  must  be  told.  It  was  well  ob 
served  by  Sir  James  Mackintosh,  whose  know 
ledge  of  these  times  was  unequalled,  that  Ad 
dison  never,  in  any  official  document,  affected 
wit  or  eloquence  ;  and  that  his  despatches  are, 
without  exception,  remarkable  for  unpretend 
ing  simplicity.  Everybody  who  knows  with 
what  ease  Addison's  finest  essays  were  pro 
duced,  must  be  convinced  that  if  well-turned 
phrases  had  been  wanted  he  would  have  had 
no  difficulty  in  finding  them.  We  are,  how 
ever,  inclined  to  believe  that  the  story  is  not 
absolutely  without  a  foundation.  It  may  well 
be  that  Addison  did  not  know,  till  he  had  con 
sulted  experienced  clerks,  who  remembered  the 
times  when  William  was  absent  on  the  Con 
tinent,  in  what  form  a  letter  from  the  council 
of  regency  to  the  king  ought  to  be  drawn.  We 
think  it  very  likely  that  the  ablest  statesmen 
of  our  time,  Lord  John  Russell,  Sir  Robert 
Peel,  Lord  Palmerston,  for  example,  would,  in 
similar  circumstances,  be  found  quite  as  igno 
rant.  Every  office  has  some  little  mysteries 
which  the  dullest  man  may  learn  with  a  little 
attention,  and  which  the  greatest  man  cannot 
possibly  know  by  intuition.  One  paper  must 
be  signed  by  the  chief  of  the  department, 
another  by  his  deputy.  To  a  third  the  royal 
sign-manual  is  necessary.  One  communica 
tion  is  to  be  registered,  and  another  is  not. 
One  sentence  must  be  in  black  ink  and  another 
in  red  ink.  If  the  ablest  secretary  for  Ireland 
were  moved  to  the  India  board,  if  the  ablest 
president  of  the  India  board  were  moved  to  the 
War  Office,  he  would  require  instruction  on 
points  like  these  ;  and  we  do  not  doubt  that 
Addison  required  such  instruction  when  he 
became,  for  the  first  time,  secretary  to  the 
lords  justices. 

George  the  First  took  possession  of  his  king 
dom  without  opposition.  A  new  ministry  was 
formed,  and  a  new  Parliament  favourable  to 
the  whigs  chosen.  Sunderland  was  appointed 
lord-lieutenant  of  Ireland,  and  Addison  again 
went  to  Dublin  as  chief  secretary. 

At  Dublin  Swift  resided,  and  there  was  much 
speculation  about  the  way  in  which  the  dean 
and  the  secretary  would  behave  towards  each 
other.  The  relations  which  existed  between 
these  remarkable  men  form  an  interesting  and 
pleasing  portion  of  literary  history.  They  had 
early  attached  themselves  to  the  same  political 
party  and  to  the  same  patrons.  While  Anne's 
whig  ministry  was  in  power,  the  visits  of  Swift 
to  London  and  the  official  residence  of  Addison 
in  Ireland  had  given  them  opportunities  of 
knowing  each  other.  They  were  the  two 
?h re \vdest  observers  of  their  age.  But  their 
cbservations  on  eacn,  other  had  led  them  to 


favourable  conclusions.  Swift  did  full  justice 
to  the  rare  powers  of  conversation  which  were 
latent  under  the  bashful  deportment  of  Addison. 
Addison,  on  the  other  hand,  discerned  much 
good  nature  under  the  severe  look  and  manner 
of  Swift;  and,  indeed,  the  Swift  of  1708  and 
the  Swift  of  1738  were  two  very  different  men. 

But  the  paths  of  the  two  friends  diverged 
widely.  The  whig  statesmen  loaded  Addison 
with  solid  benefits.  They  praised  Swift,  asked 
him  to  dinner,  and  did  nothing  more  for  him. 
His  profession  laid  them  under  a  difficulty.  In, 
the  state  they  could  not  promote  him;  and  they 
had  reason  to  fear  that,  by  bestowing  prefer 
ment  in  the  church  on  the  author  of  the  Tale 
of  a  Tub,  they  might  give  scandal  to  the  public, 
which  had  no  high  opinion  of  their  orthodoxy. 
He  did  not  make  fair  allowance  for  the  difficul 
ties  which  prevented  Halifax  and  Sorners  from 
serving  him;  thought  himself  an  ill-used  man; 
sacrificed  honour  and  consistency  to  revenge; 
joined  the  tories,  and  became  their  most  formi 
dable  champion.  He  soon  found,  however, 
that  his  old  friends  were  less  to  blame  than  he 
had  supposed.  The  dislike  with  which  the 
queen  and  the  heads  of  the  church  regarded 
him  was  insurmountable;  and  it  was  with  the 
greatest  difficulty  that  he  obtained  an  eccle 
siastical  dignity  of  no  great  value,  on  condition 
of  fixing  his  residence  in  a  country  which  he 
detested. 

Difference  of  political  opinion  had  produced, 
not,  indeed,  a  quarrel,  but  a  coolness  between 
Swift  and  Addison.  They  at  length  ceased 
altogether  to  see  each  other.  Yet  there  was 
between  them  a  tacit  compact  like  that  between 
the  hereditary  guests  in  the  Iliad. 


Xfi\wv  dXe'o/tsOa  xal  5i  b^iXnv' 
TluXXol  niv  yap  ipni  Tp'0£$  K\£ITOI  r   lirtKovpotj 
Krcivetv,  Sv  KS  S-£o?  ye  ir6pr)  Kal  vocal  Ki\eiMt 
IloXXoi  8'  av  aol  'Axa''^>  ivaipenev,  Sv  KE  dvvtjat. 

It  is  not  strange  that  Addison,  who  calum 
niated  and  insulted  nobody,  should  not  have 
calumniated  or  insulted  Swift.  But  it  is  re 
markable  that  Swift,  to  whom  neither  genius 
nor  virtue  was  sacred,  and  who  generally 
seemed  to  find,  like  most  other  renegades,  a 
peculiar  pleasure  in  attacking  old  friends, 
should  have  shown  so  much  respect  and  ten 
derness  to  Addison. 

Fortune  had  now  changed.  The  accession 
of  the  house  of  Hanover  had  secured  in  Eng 
land  the  liberties  of  the  people,  and  in  Ireland 
the  dominion  of  the  Protestant  caste.  To  that 
caste  Swift  was  more  odious  than  any  other 
man.  He  was  hooted  and  even  pelted  in  the 
streets  of  Dublin  ;  and  could  not  venture  to  ride 
along  the  Strand  for  his  health  without  the 
attendance  of  armed  servants.  Many  whom 
he  had  formerly  served  now  libelled  and  in 
sulted  him.  At  this  time  Addison  arrived.  He 
had  been  advised  not  to  show  the  smallest 
civility  to  the  dean  of  St.  Patrick's.  But  he 
answered  with  admirable  spirit,  that  it  might 
be  necessary  for  men  whose  fidelity  to  their 
party  was  suspected  to  hold  no  intercourse  with 
political  opponents  ;  but  that  one  who  had  been, 
a  steady  whig  in  the  worst  times  might  vent  ire, 
when  the  good  cause  was  triumphant,  to  shake 
hands  with  an  old  friend  who  was  one  of  the 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


617 


vanquished  lories.  His  kindness  was  soothing 
to  the  proud  and  cruelly  wounded  spirit  of 
Swift;  and  the  two  great  satirists  resumed 
their  habits  of  friendly  intercourse. 

Those  associates  of  Addison,  whose  political 
opinions  agreed  with  his,  shared  his  good  for 
tune.  He  took  Tickell  with  him  to  Ireland. 
He  procured  for  Budgell  a  lucrative  place  in 
the  same  kingdom.  Ambrose  Phillipps  was 
provided  for  in  England.  Steele  had  injured 
himself  so  much  by  his  eccentricity  and  per- 
verseness,  that  he  obtained  but  a  very  small 
part  of  what  he  thought  his  due.  He  was, 
however,  knighted.  He  had  a  place  in  the 
household;  and  he  subsequently  received  other 
marks  of  favour  from  the  court. 

Addison  did  not  remain  long  in  Ireland.  In 
1715  he  quitted  his  secretaryship  for  a  seat 
at  the  Board  of  Trade.  In  the  same  year  his 
comedy  of  the  Drummer  was  brought  on  the 
stage.  The  name  of  the  author  was  not  an 
nounced  ;  the  piece  was  coldly  received  ;  and 
some  critics  have  expressed  a  doubt  whether 
it  were  really  Addison's.  To  us  the  evidence, 
both  external  and  internal,  seems  decisive.  It 
is  not  in  Addison's  best  manner;  but  it  con 
tains  numerous  passages  which  no  other  writer 
known  to  us  could  have  produced.  It  was 
again  performed  after  Addison's  death,  and, 
being  known  to  be  his,  was  loudly  applauded. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  year  1715,  while 
the  Rebellion  was  still  raging  in  Scotland,* 
Addison  published  the  first  number  of  a  paper 
called  the  "Freeholder."  Among  his  political 
works  the  Freeholder  is  entitled  to  the  first 
place.  Even  in  the  Spectator  there  are  few 
serious  papers  nobler  than  the  character  of  his 
friend  Lord  Somers;  and  certainly  no  satiri 
cal  papers  superior  to  those  in  which  the  tory 
fox-hunter  is  introduced.  This  character  is  the 
original  of  Squire  Western,  and  is  drawn  with 
all  Fielding's  force,  and  with  a  delicacy  of 
which  Fielding  was  altogether  destitute.  As 
none  of  Addison's  works  exhibits  stronger 
marks  of  his  genius  than  the  Freeholder,  so 
none  does  more  honour  to  his  moral  character. 
It  is  difficult  to  extol  too  highly  the  candour 
and  humanity  of  a  political  writer,  whom  even 
the  excitement  of  civil  war  cannot  hurry  into 
unseemly  violence.  Oxford,  it  is  well  known, 
was  then  the  stronghold  of  toryism.  The  High 
street  had  been  repeatedly  lined  with  bayonets 
in  order  to  keep  down  the  disaffected  gowns 
men ;  and  traitors  pursued  by  the  messengers 
of  the  government  had  been  concealed  in  the 
garrets  of  several  colleges.  Yet  the  admoni 
tion  which,  even  under  such  circumstances, 
Addison  addressed  to  the  university,  is  singu 
larly  gentle,  respectful,  and  even  affectionate. 
Indeed,  he  could  not  find  it  in  his  heart  to  deal 
harshly  even  with  imaginary  persons.  His 
fox-hunter,  though  ignorant,  stupid,  and  vio 
lent,  is  av.  heart  a  good  fellow,  and  is  at  last 
reclaimed  by  the  clemency  of  the  kin?.  Steele 
was  dissatisfied  with  his  friend's  moderation, 


*Miss  Aikin  has  been  most  unfortunate  in  her  account 
of  this  Rendition.  We  will  notice  only  two  error*  which 
%<tccnr  in  one  pas.re.  She  says  that  the  Rebellion  was  un 
dertaken  in  favour  of  James  IT.,  who  had  heen  fourteen 
years  dend.  and  that  it  was  headed  by  Charles  Edward, 
wiio  was  not  !>orn.  (ii.  172.) 
Vol..  V  —78 


and  though  he  acknowledged  that  the  Free 
holder  was  excellently  written, complained  that 
the  ministry  played  on  a  lute  when  it  was  ne 
cessary  to  blow  the  trumpet.  He  accordingly 
determined  to  execute  a  flourish  after  his  own 
fashion  ;  and  tried  to  rouse  the  public  spirit  of 
the  nation  by  means  of  a  paper  called  the  Town 
Talk,  which  is  now  as  utterly  forgotten  as  his 
Englishman,  as  his  Crisis,  as  his  Letter  to  the 
Bailiff  of  Stockbridge,  as  his  Reader — in  short, 
as  every  thing  that  he  wrote  without  the  help 
of  Addison. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  the  Drummer  was 
acted,  and  in  which  the  first  numbers  of  the 
Freeholder  appeared,  the  estrangement  of  Pope 
and  Addison  became  complete.  Addison  had 
from  the  first  seen  that  Pope  was  false  and  ma 
levolent.  Pope  had  discovered  that  Addison 
was  jealous.  The  discovery  was  made  in  a 
strange  manner.  Pope  had  written  the  Rape 
of  the  Lock,  in  two  cantos,  without  supernatu 
ral  machinery.  These  two  cantos  had  been 
loudly  applauded,  and  by  none  more  loudly 
than  by  Addison.  Then  Pope  thought  of  the 
Sylphs  and  Gnomes,  Ariel,  Momentilla,  Cris- 
pissa,  and  Umbriel ;  and  resolved  to  interweave 
the  Rosicrucian  mytholpgy  with  the  original 
fabric.  He  asked  Addison's  advice.  Addison 
said  that  the  poem  as  it  stood  was  a  delicious 
little  thing,  and  entreated  Pope  not  to  run  the 
risk  of  marring  what  was  so  excellent  in  try 
ing  to  mend  it.  Pope  afterwards  declared  that 
this  insidious  counsel  first  opened  his  eyes  to 
the  baseness  of  him  who  gave  it. 

Now  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Pope's  plan 
was  most  ingenious,  and  that  he  afterwards 
executed  it  with  great  skill  and  success.  But 
does  it  necessarily  follow  that  Addison's  advicr 
was  bad  ?  And  if  Addison's  advice  was  bad, 
does  it  necessarily  follow  that  it  was  given  from 
bad  motives  1  If  a  friend  were  to  ask  us  whe 
ther  we  would  advise  him  to  risk  a  small  com 
petence  in  a  lottery  of  which  the  chances  were 
ten  to  one  against  him,  we  should  do  our  best 
to  dissuade  him  from  running  such  a  risk. 
Even  if  he  were  so  lucky  as  to  get  the  thirty 
thousand  pound  prize,  we  should  not  admit  that 
we  had  counselled  him  ill;  and  we  should  cer 
tainly  think  it  the  height  of  injustice  in  him  to 
accuse  us  of  having  been  actuated  by  malice. 
We  think  Addison's  advice  good  advice.  It 
rested  on  a  sound  principle,  the  result  of  long 
and  wide  experience.  The  general  rule  un 
doubtedly  is,  that,  when  a  successful  work  of 
imagination  has  been  produced,  it  should  not 
be  recast.  We  cannot  at  this  moment  call  to 
mind  a  single  instance  in  which  this  rule  has 
been  transgressed  with  happy  effect,  except  the 
instance  of  the  Rape  of  the  Lock.  Tasso  re 
cast  his  Jerusalem.  Akenside  recast  his  Plea 
sures  of  the  Imagination,  and  his  Epistle  to 
Curio.  Pope  himself,  emboldened  no  doubt  by 
the  success  with  which  he  had  expanded  and 
remodelled  the  Rape  of  the  Lock,  made  »he 
same  experiment  on  the  Dunciad.  All  these 
attempts  failed.  Who  was  to  foresee  that  Pope 
would,  once  in  his  life,  be  able  to  do  what  he 
could  not  himself  do  twice,  and  what  nobody 
else  has  ever  done  1 

Addison's  advice  was  good.     But  had  it  been 
bad,  why  should  we  pronounce  it  dishonest  1 
3F» 


613 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Scott  tells  us  that  one  of  his  best  friends  pre 
dicted  the  failure  of  Waverley.  Herder  adjured 
Gothe  not  to  take  so  unpromising  a  subject  as 
Faust.  Hume  tried  to  dissuade  Robertson  from 
writing  the  History  of  Charles  V.  Nay,  Pope 
himself  was  one  of  those  who  prophesied  that 
Cato  would  never  succeed  on  the  stage ;  and 
advised  Addison  to  print  it  without  risking  a 
representation.  But  Scott,  Gothe,  Robertson, 
Ad.lison,  had  the  good  sense  and  generosity  to 
give  their  advisers  credit  for  the  best  inten 
tions.  Pope's  heart  was  not  of  the  same  kind 
with  theirs. 

In  1715,  while  he  was  engaged  in  translating 
the  Iliad,  he  met  Addison  at  a  coffee-house. 
Phillipps  and  Budgell  were  there.  But  their 
sovereign  got  rid  of  them,  and  asked  Pope  to 
dine  with  him  alone.  After  dinner,  Addison 
said  that  he  lay  under  a  difficulty  which  he  had 
for  some  time  wished  to  explain.  "Tickell," 
he  said,  "translated  some  time  ago  the  first 
book  of  the  Iliad.  I  have  promised  to  look  it 
over  and  correct  it.  I  cannot,  therefore,  ask  to 
see  yours;  for  that  would  be  double-dealing." 
Pope  made  a  civil  reply,  and  begged  that  his 
second  book  might  have  the  advantage  of  Addi 
son's  revision.  Addison  readily  agreed,  looked 
over  the  second  book,  and  sent  it  back  with 
warm  commendations. 

Tickell's  version  of  the  first  book  appeared 
soon  after  this  conversation.  In  the  preface 
all  rivalry  was  earnestly  disclaimed.  Tickell 
declared  that  he  should  not  go  on  with  the  Iliad. 
That  enterprise  he  should  leave  to  powers 
which  he  admitted  to  be  superior  to  his  own. 
His  only  view,  he  said,  in  publishing  this  spe 
cimen  was  to  bespeak  the  favour  of  the  public 
to  a  translation  of  the  Odyssey,  in  which  he 
had  made  some  progress. 

Addison,  and  Addison's  devoted  followers, 
pronounced  both  the  versions  good,  but  main 
tained  that  Tickell's  had  more  of  the  original. 
The  town  gave  a  decided  preference  to  Pope's. 
We  do  not  think  it  worth  while  to  settle  such 
a  question  of  precedence.  Neither  of  the  rivals 
can  be  said  to  have  translated  the  Iliad,  unless, 
indeed,  the  word  translation  be  used  in  the 
sense  which  it  bears  in  the  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream.  When  Bottom  makes  his  appearance 
with  an  ass's  head  instead  of  his  own,  Peter 
Quince  exclaims,  "  Bless  thee  !  Bottom,  bless 
thee !  thou  art  translated."  In  this  sense,  un 
doubtedly,  the  readers  of  either  Pope  or  Tickeli 
may  very  properly  exclaim,  "  Bless  thee  !  Ho 
mer;  thou  art  translated  indeed." 

Our  readers  will,  we  hope,  agree  with  us  in 
thinking  that  no  man  in  Addison's  situation 
could  have  acted  more  fairly  and  kindly,  both 
towards  Pope  and  towards  Tickell,  than  he 
appears  to  have  done.  But  an  odious  suspi 
cion  had  sprung  up  in  the  mind  of  Pope.  He 
fancied,  and  he  soon  firmly  believed  that  there 
was  a  deep  conspiracy  against  his  fame  and 
his  fortunes.  The  work  on  which  he  had 
staked  his  reputation  was  to  be  depreciated. 
The  subscription,  on  which  rested  his  hopes 
of  a  competence,  was  to  be  defeated.  With 
this  view  Addison  had  made  a  rival  transla 
tion ;  Tickell  had  consented  to  father  it;  and 
the  wits  of  Button's  had  aniied  to  puff  it. 


Is  there  any  external  evidence  to  support 
this  grave  accusation  ?  The  answer  is  short. 
There  is  absolutely  none. 

Was  there  any  internal  evidence  which 
proved  Addison  to  be  the  author  of  this  ver 
sion?  Was  it  a  work  which  Tickeli  was  in 
capable  of  producing?  Surely  not.  Tickell 
was  a  fellow  of  a  college  at  Oxford,  and  must 
be  supposed  to  have  been  able  to  construe  the 
Iliad;  and  he  was  a  better  versifier  than  his 
friend.  We  are  not  aware  that  Pope  pretend 
ed  to  have  discovered  any  turns  of  expression 
peculiar  to  Addison.  Had  such  turns  of  ex 
pression  been  discovered,  they  would  be  suffi 
ciently  accounted  for  by  supposing  Addison  to 
have  corrected  his  friend's  lines,  as  he  owned 
that  he  had  done. 

Is  there  any  thing  in  the  character  of  the  ac 
cused  perscvns  which  makes  the  accusation 
probable?  We  answer  confidently — nothing. 
Tickell  was  long  after  this  time  described  by- 
Pope  himself  as  a  very  fair  and  worthy  man. 
Addison  had  been,  during  many  years,  before 
the  public.  Literary  rivals,  political  opponents, 
had  kept  their  eyes  on  him.  But  neither  envy 
nor  faction,  in  their  utmost  rage,  had  ever  im 
puted  to  him  a  single  deviation  from  the  laws 
of  honour  and  of  social  'morality.  Had  he 
been  indeed  a  man  meanly  jealous  of  fame, 
and  capable  of  stooping  to  base  and  wicked 
arts  for  the  purpose  of  injuring  his  competi 
tors,  would  his  vices  have  remained  latent  so 
long?  He  was  a  writer  of  tragedy;  had  he 
ever  injured  Rowe  ?  He  was  a  writer  of  co 
medy:  had  he  not  done  ample  justice  to  Con- 
greve,  and  given  valuable  help  to  Steele?  He 
was  a  pamphleteer:  have  not  his  good-nature 
and  generosity  been  acknowledged  by  Swift, 
his  rival  in  fame  and  his  adversary  in  poli 
tics? 

That  Tickell  should  have  been  guilty  of  a 
villany  seems  to  us  highly  improbable.  That 
Addison  should  have  been  guilty  of  a  villany 
seems  to  us  highly  improbable.  But  that  these 
two  men  should  have  conspired  together  to 
commit  a  villany  seems  to  us  improbable  in  a 
tenfold  degree.  All  that  is  known  to  us  of 
their  intercourse  tends  to  prove  that  it  was 
not  the  intercourse  of  two  accomplices  in 
crime.  These  are  some  of  the  lines  in  which 
Tickell  poured  forth  his  sorrow  over  '.he  coffin 
of  Addison: — 

"  Or  dost  thou  warn  poor  mortals  left  behind, 
A  task  well  suited  to  thy  gentle  mind? 
Oh,  if  sometimes  thy  spotless  form  descend, 
To  me  thine  aid,  thou  guardian  genius,  lend, 
When  rage  misguides  me,  or  when  (ear  alarms, 
When  pain  distresses,  or  when  pleasure  charms, 
In  silent  whisperings  purer  thoughts  impart, 
And  turn  from  ill  a  frail  and  feeble  heart; 
Lead  through  the  paths  thy  virtue  trod  before, 
Till  bliss  shall  join,  nor  death  can  part  us  more." 

In  what  words,  we  should  like  to  know,  did 
this  guardian  genius  invite  his  pupil  to  join  in 
a  plan  such  as  the  editor  of  the  Satirist  would 
hardly  dare  to  propose  to  the  editor  of  the 
Age? 

We  do  not  ac-cuse  Pope  of  bringing  an  ac 
cusation  which  he  knew  to  be  false.  We  have 
not  the  smallest  doubt  that  he  believed  it  to  be 
true ;  and  the  evidence  on  which  he  believed' 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


619 


it  he  found  in  his  own  bad  heart.  His  own 
life  was  one  long  series  of  tricks,  as  mean 
and  as  malicious  as  that  of  which  he  suspect 
ed  Addison  and  Tickell.  He  was  all  stiletto 
und  mask.  To  injure,  to  insult,  to  save  him 
self  from  the  consequence  of  injury  and  insult 
by  lying  and  equivocating,  was  the  habit  of 
his  life.  He  published  a  lampoon  on  the  Duke 
of  Chandos;  he  was  taxed  with  it;  and  he  lied 
and  equivocated.  He  published  a  lampoon  on 
Aaroa  Hill;  he  was  taxed  with  it;  and  he  lied 
and  equivocated.  He  published  a  still  fouler 
lampoon  on  Lady  Mary  Wortley  Montagu  ;  he 
was  taxed  with  it;  and  he  lied  with  more  than 
usual  effrontery  and  vehemence.  He  puffed 
himself  and  abused  his  enemies  under  feigned 
namos.  He  robbed  himself  of  his  own  letters, 
and  then  raised  the  hue  and  cry  after  them. 
Besides  his  frauds  of  malignity,  of  fear,  of  in 
terest,  and  of  vanity,  there  were  frauds  which 
he  seems  to  have  committed  from  love  of  fraud 
alone.  He  had  a  habit  of  stratagem — a  plea 
sure  in  outwitting  all  who  came  near  him. 
"Whatever  his  object  might  be,  the  indirect 
road  to  it  was  that  which  he  preferred.  For 
BoHrigbroke  Pope  undoubtedly  felt  as  much 
love  and  veneration  as  it  was  in  his  nature  to 
feel  for  any  human,  being.  Yet  Pope  was 
scarcely  dead  when  it  was  discovered  that, 
from  no  motive  except  the  mere  love  of  arti 
fice,  he  had  been  guilty  of  an  act  of  gross  per 
fidy  to  Bolingbroke. 

Nothing  was  more  natural  than  that  such  a 
man  as  this  should  attribute  to  others  that 
which  he  felt  within  himself.  A  plain,  proba 
ble,  coherent  explanation  is  frankly  given  to 
him.  He  is  certain  that  it  is  all  a  romance.  A 
line  of  conduct  scrupulously  fair,  and  even 
friendly,  is  pursued  towards  him.  He  is  con 
vinced  that  it  is  merely  a  cover  for  a  vile  in 
trigue  by  which  he  is  to  be  disgraced  and 
ruined.  It  is  vain  to  ask  him  for  proofs. 
He  has  none,  and  wants  none,  except  those 
which  he  carries  in  his  own  bosom. 

Whether  Pope's  malignity  at  length  pro 
voked  Addison  to  retaliate  for  the  first  and 
last  time,  cannot  now  be  known  with  certain 
ty.  We  have  only  Pope's  story,  which  runs 
thus.  A  pamphlet  appeared  containing  some 
reflections  which  stung  Pope  to  the  quick. 
What  those  reflections  were,  and  whether  they 
were  reflections  of  which  he  had  a  right  to 
complain,  we  have  now  no  means  of  deciding. 
The  Earl  of  Warwick,  a  foolish  and  vicious 
lad,  who  regarded  Addison  with  the  feelings 
with  which  such  lads  generally  regard  their 
best  friends,  told  Pope,  truly  or  falsely,  that 
this  pamphlet  had  been  written  by  Addison's 
direction.  When  we  consider  what  a  tendency 
stories  have  to  grow,  in  passing  even  from 
one  honest  man  to  another  honest  man,  and 
when  we  consider  that  10  the  name  of  honest 
man  neither  Pope  nor  the  Earl  of  Warwick 
had  a  claim,  we  are  not  disposed  to  attach 
much  importance  to  this  anecdote. 

It  is  certain,  however,  that  Pope  was  furious. 
He  had  already  sketched  the  character  of  Atti- 
cus  in  prose.  In  his  anger  he  turned  this 
prose  into  the  brilliant  and  energetic  lines 
which  everybody  knows  by  heart,  or  ought  to 


know  by  heart,  and  sent  them  to  Addison.  One 
charge  which  Pope  has  enforced  with  great 
skill  is  probably  not  without  foundation.  Ad 
dison  was,  we  are  inclined  to  believe,  too  fond 
of  presiding  over  a  circle  of  humble  friends. 
Of  the  other  imputations  which  these  famous 
lines  are  intended  to  convey,  scarcely  one  has 
ever  been  proved  to  be  just,  and  some  are  cer 
tainly  false.  That  Addison  was  not  in  the 
habit  of  "damning  with  faint  praise,"  appears 
from  innumerable  passages  in  his  writings; 
and  from  none  more  than  from  those  in  which 
he  mentions  Pope.  And  it  is  not  merely  un 
just,  but  ridiculous,  to  describe  a  man  who 
made  the  fortune  of  almost  every  one  of  his 
intimate  friends,  as  "so  obliging  that  he  ne'ei 
obliged." 

That  Addison  felt  the  sting  of  Pope's  satir* 
keenly,  we  cannot  doubt.  That  he  was  con 
scious  of  one  of  the  weaknesses  with  which 
he  was  rl|>roached,  is  highly  probable.  But 
his  heart,  we  firmly  believe,  acquitted  him  of 
the  gravest  part  of  the  accusation.  He  acted 
like  himself.  As  a  satirist  he  was,  at  his  own 
weapons,  more  than  Pope's  match ;  and  he 
would  have  been  at  no  loss  for  topics.  A  dis 
torted  and  diseased  body,  tenanted  by  a  yet 
more  distorted  and  diseased  mind — spite  and 
envy  thinly  disguised  by  sentiments  as  benevo 
lent  and  noble  as  those  which  Sir  Peter  Teazle 
admired  in  Mr.  Joseph  Surface — a  feeble,  sickly 
licentiousness — an  odious  love  of  fihhy  and 
noisome  images — these  were  things  which  a 
genius  less  powerful  than  that  to  which  we 
owe  the  Spectator  could  easily  have  held  up  to 
the  mirth  and  hatred  of  mankind.  Addison 
had,  moreover,  at  his  command  other  means 
of  vengeance  which  a  bad  man  would  not  have 
scrupled  to  use.  He  was  powerful  in  the  state. 
Pope  was  a  Catholic;  and,  in  those  times,  a 
minister  would  have  found  it  easy  to  harass 
the  most  innocent  Catholic  by  innumerable 
petty  vexations.  Pope,  near  twenty  years  later, 
said,  that  "through  the  lenity  of  the  govern 
ment  alone  he  could  live  with  comfort."  "  Con 
sider,"  he  exclaimed,  "  the  injury  that  a  man 
of  high  rank  and  credit  may  do  to  a  private 
person,  under  penal  laws  and  many  other  dis 
advantages."  It  is  pleasing  to  reflect  that  the 
only  revenge  which  Addison  took  was  to  insert 
in  the  Freeholder  a  warm  encomium  on  the 
translation  of  the  Iliad;  and  to  exhort  all 
lovers  of  learning  to  put  down  their  names  as 
subscribers.  There  could  be  no  doubt,  he 
said,  from  the  specimens  already  published, 
thai  the  masterly  hand  of  Pope  would  do  aa 
much  for  Homer  as  Dryden  had  dene  for  Vir 
gil.  From  that  time  to  the  end  of  his  life,  he 
always  treated  Pope,  by  Pope's  own  acknow 
ledgment,  with  justice.  Friendship,  was,  of 
course,  at  an  end. 

One  reason  which  induced  the  Earl  of  War 
wick  to  play  the  ignominious  part  of  the  tale 
bearer  on  this  occasion,  may  have  been  his 
dislike  of  the  marriage  which  was  about  to 
take  place  between  his  mother  and  Addison. 
The  countess-dowager,  a  daughter  of  the  old 
and  honourable  family  of  the  Myddletons  of 
Chirk,  a  family  which,  in  any  country  but  ours, 
would  be  called  noble,  resided  at  Holland 


6*0 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


House.  Addison  hid,  during  some  years,  oc 
cupied  at  Chelsea  a  small  dwelling,  once  the 
abode  of  Nell  Gwyn.  Chelsea  is  now  a  dis 
trict  of  London,  and  Holland  House  may  be 
called  a  town  residence.  But,  in  the  days  of 
Anne  and  George  I.,  milkmaids  and  sportsmen 
wandered,  between  green  hedges  and  over 
fields  bright  with  daisies,  from  Kensington 
almost  to  the  shore  of  the  Thames.  Addison 
and  Lady  Warwick  were  country  neighbours, 
and  became  intimate  friends.  The  great  wit 
and  scholar  tried  to  allure  the  young  lord  from 
the  fashionable  amusements  of  beating  watch 
men,  breaking  windows,  and  rolling  women  in 
hogsheads  down  Holborn  Hill,  to  the  study  of 
letters  and  the  practice  of  virtue.  These  well 
meant  exertions  did  little  good,  however,  either 
to  the  disciple  or  to  the  master.  Lord  War 
wick  grew  up  a  rake,  and  Addison  fell  in  love. 
The  mature  beauty  of  the  countess  has  been 
celebrated  by  poets  in  language  wrnch,  after  a 
very  large  allowance  has  been  made  for  flat 
tery,  would  lead  us  to  believe  t-hat  she  was  a 
fine  woman  ;  and  her  rank  doubtless  heighten 
ed  her  attractions.  The  courtship  was  long. 
The  hopes  of  the  lover  appear  to  have  risen 
and  fallen  with  the  fortunes  of  his  party.  His 
attachment  was  at  length  matter  of  such  noto 
riety  that,  when  he  visited  Ireland  for  the  last 
time,  Rowe  addressed  some  consolatory  verses 
to  the  Chloe  of  Holland  House.  It  strikes  us 
as  a  little  strange  that,  in  these  verses,  Addi 
son  should  be  called  Lycidas  ;  a  name  of  sin 
gularly  evil  omen  for  a  swain  just  about  to 
cross  St.  George's  Channel. 

At  length  Chloe  capitulated.  Addison  was 
indeed  able  to  treat  with  her  on  equal  terms. 
He  had  reason  to  expect  preferment  even 
higher  than  that  which  he  had  attained.  He 
had  inherited  the  fortune  of  a  brother  who  died 
governor  of  Madras.  He  had  purchased  an 
estate  in  Warwickshire,  and  had  been  wel 
comed  to  his  domain  in  very  tolerable  verse 
by  one  of  the  neighbouring  squires,  the  poeti 
cal  fox-hunter,  William  Somervile.  In  August, 
1716,  the  newspapers  announced  that  Joseph 
Addison,  Esquire,  famous  for  many  excellent 
works  both  in  verse  and  prose,  had  espoused 
the  countess-dowager  of  Warwick. 

He  now  fixed  his  abode  at  Holland  House — 
a  house  which  can  boast  of  a  greater  number 
of  inmates  distinguished  in  political  and  literary 
history  than  any  other  private  dwelling  in 
England.  His  portrait  now  hangs  there.  The 
features  are  pleasing;  the  complexion  is  re 
markably  fair;  but,  in  the  expression,  we  trace 
rather  the  gentleness  of  his  disposition  than 
the  force  and  keenness  of  his  intellect. 

Not  long  after  his  marriage  he  reached  the 
height  of  civil  greatness.  The  whig  govern 
ment  had,  during  some  time,  been  torn  by  in 
ternal  dissensions.  Lord  Townshend  led  one 
section  of  the  cabinet;  Lord  Sunderland  the 
other.  At  length,  in  the  spring  of  1717,  Sun- 
ilerland  triumphed.  Townshend  retired  from 
office,  and  was  accompanied  by  Walpole  and 
Cowper.  Sunderland  proceeded  to  reconstruct 
the  ministry;  and  Addison  was  appointed  se 
cretary  of  state.  It  is  certain  that  the  seals 
were  pressed  upon  him,  and  were  at  first  de 


clined  by  him.  Men  equally  versed  in  official 
business  might  easily  have  been  found;  and 
his  collegues  knew  that  they  could  not  expect 
assistance  from  him  in  debate.  He  owed  his 
elevation  to  his  popularity ;  to  his  stainless 
probity,  and  to  his  literary  fame. 

But  scarcely  had  Addison  entered  the  cabi 
net  when  his  health  began  to  fail.  From  one 
serious  attack  he  recovered  in  the  autumn; 
and  his  recovery  was  celebrated  in  Latin  verses, 
worthy  of  his  own  pen,  by  Vincent  Bourne, 
who  was  then  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge. 
A  relapse  soon  took  place;  and,  in  the  follow 
ing  spring,  Addison  was  prevented  by  a  severe 
asthma  from  discharging  the  duties  of  his  post. 
He  resigned  it,  and  was  succeeded  by  his 
friend  Craggs ;  a  young  man  whose  natural 
parts,  though  little  improved  by  cultivation, 
were  quick  and  showy,  whose  graceful  person, 
and  winning  manners  had  made  him  generally 
acceptable  in  society,  and  who,  if  he  had  lived, 
would  probably  have  been  the  most  formidable 
of  all  the  rivals  of  Walpole. 

As  yet  there  was  no  Joseph  Hume.  The 
ministers  therefore,  were  able  to  bestow  oa 
Addison  a  retiring  pension  of  £1500  a  year. 
In  what  form  this  pension  was  given  we  are 
not  told  by  his  biographers,  and  have  not  time 
to  inquire.  But  it  is  certain  that  Addison  did 
not  vacate  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons. 

Rest  of  mind  and  body  seemed  to  have  re 
established  his  health  ;  and  he  thanked  God, 
with  cheerful  piety,  for  having  set  him  free 
both  from  his  office  and  from  his  asthma. 
Many  years  seemed  to  be  before  him,  anct  he 
meditated  many  works — a  tragedy  on  the  death 
of  Socrates,  a  translation  of  the  Psalms,  a 
treatise  on  the  evidences  of  Christianity.  Of 
this  last  performance  a  part,  which  we  could 
well  spare,  has  come  down  to  us. 

But  the  fatal  complaint  soon  returned,  and 
gradually  prevailed  against  all  the  resources 
of  medicine.  It  is  melancholy  that  the  last 
months  of  such  a  life  should  have  been  over 
clouded  both  by  domestic  and  by  political 
vexations.  A  tradition  which  began  early, 
which  has  been  generally  received,  and  tc 
which  we  have  nothing  to  oppose,  has  repre 
sented  his  wife  as  an  arrogant  and  imperious 
woman.  It  is  said  that  till  his  health  failed 
him  he  was  glad  to  escape  from  the  countess- 
dowager  and  her  magnificent  dining-room,, 
blazing  with  the  gilded  devices  of  the  house  of 
Rich,  to  some  tavern  where  he  could  enjoy  a 
laugh,  to  talk  about  Virgil  and  Boileau,  and  a 
bottle  of  claret,  with  the  friends  of  his  happier 
days.  All  those  friends,  however,  were  not  left 
to  him.  Sir  Richard  Steele  had  been  gradually 
estranged  by  various  causes.  He  considered 
himself  as  one  who,  in  evil  times,  had  braved 
martyrdom  for  his  political  principles,  and  de 
manded,  when  the  whig  party  was  triumphant, 
a  large  compensation  for  what  he  had  suffered 
when  it  was  militant.  The  whig  leaders  took 
a  very  different  view  of  his  claims.  They 
thought  that  he  had,  by  his  own  petulance  and 
folly,  brought  them  as  well  as  himself  into 
trouble;  and  though  they  did  not  absolutely 
neglect  him,  doled  out  favours  to  him  with  a 


LIFE    AND   WRITINGS   OF  ADDTSON. 


62. 


sparing  hand  It  was  natural  lhat  he  should 
be  angry  with  them,  and  especially  angry  with 
Addison.  But  what  above  all  seems  to  have 
disturbed  Sir  Richard  was  the  elevation  of 
Tickell,  who,  at  thirty,  was  made  by  Addison 
under-secretary  of  state;  while  the  editor  of 
the  Tatler  and  Spectator,  the  author  of  the 
Crisis,  the  member  for  Stock-bridge  who  had 
been  persecuted  for  firm  adherence  to  the 
house  of  Hanover,  was,  at  near  fifty,  forced, 
after  many  solicitations  and  complaints,  to 
content  himself  with  a  share  in  the  patent  of 
Drury-lane  theatre.  Steele  himself  says,  in 
his  celebrated  letter  to  Congreve,  that  Addison, 
by  his  preference  of  Tickell,  "incurred  the 
warmest  resentment  of  oiher  gentlemen  ;"  and 
every  thing  seems  to  indicate  that,  of  those  re 
sentful  gentlemen  Steele  was  himself  one. 

While  poor  Sir  Richard  was  brooding  over 
whar  he  considered  as  Addison's  unkindness,  a 
new  cause  of  quarrel  arose.  The  whig  party, 
already  divided  against  itself,  was  rent  by  a 
new  schism.  The  celebrated  bill  for  limiting 
the  number  of  peers  had  been  brought  in.  The 
proud  Duke  of  Somerset,  first  in  rank  of  all 
nobles  whose  religion  permitted  them  to  sit  in 
Parliament,  was  the  ostensible  author  of  the 
measure.  But  it  was  supported,  and,  in  truth, 
devised  by  the  prime  minister. 

We  are  satisfied  that  the  bill  was  most  per 
nicious;  and  we  fear  that  the  motives  which 
induced  Sunderland  to  frame  it  were  not  ho 
nourable  to  him.  But  we  cannot  deny  that 
it  was  supported  by  many  of  the  best  and 
wisest  men  of  that  age.  Nor  was  this  strange. 
The  royal  prerogative  had,  within  the  me 
mory  of  the  generation  then  in  the  vigour 
of  life,  been  so  grossly  abused,  that  it  was 
still  regarded  with  a  jealousy  which,  v.rhen 
the  peculiar  situation  of  the  house  of  Bruns 
wick  is  considered,  may  perhaps  be  called  im 
moderate.  The  prerogative  of  creating  peers 
had,  in  the  opinion  of  the  whigs,  been  grossly 
abused  by  Queen  Anne's  last  ministry  ;  and 
even  the  lories  admitted  that  her  majesty,  in 
swamping,  as  it  has  since  been  called,  the  Up 
per  House,  had  done  what  only  an  extreme 
case  could  justify.  The  theory  of  the  English 
constitution,  according  to  many  high  authori 
ties,  was,  that  three  independent  powers,  the 
monarchy,  the  nobility,  and  the  commons, 
ought  constantly  to  act  as  checks  on  each  other. 
If  this  theory  were  sound,  it  seemed  to  follow 
that  to  put  one  of  these  powers  under  the  ab 
solute  control  of  the  other  two,  was  absurd. 
But  if  the  number  of  peers  were  unlimited,  it 
could  not  be  denied  that  the  Upper  House  was 
under  the  absolute  control  of  the  crown  and 
the  commons,  and  was  indebted  only  to  their 
moderation  for  any  power  which  it  might  be 
suffered  to  retain. 

Steele  took  part  with  the  opposition  ;  Addi 
son   with   the   ministers.      Steele,  in   a   paper 
called  the  "Plebeian,"  vehemently  attacked  the 
bill.     Sunderland  called  for  help  on  Addison,  I 
and   Addison    obeyed    the    call.     Jn    a   paper  I 
called  the  "Old  Whig,"  he  answered,  and  in 
deed  refuted,  Steele's  arguments.     It  seems  to 
us,  that  the  premises  of  both  the  controversial 
ists  were   unsound;   that,  on  those  premises, 


Addison  reasoned  well  and  Steele  ill;  and  that 
consequently  Addison  brought  out  a  false  con 
clusion,  while  Steele  blundered  upon  the  truth. 
In  style,  in  wit,  and  in  politeness,  Addison 
maintained  his  superiority,  though  the  Old 
Whig  is  by  no  means  one  of  his  happiest  per 
formances.* 

At  first,  both  the  anonymous  opponents  ob 
served  the  laws  of  propriety.  Butat  length  Steele 
so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  throw  an  odious  impu 
tation  on  the  morals  of  the  chiefs  of  the  adminis 
tration.  Addison  replied  with  severity;  but,  in. 
our  opinion,  with  less  severity  than  was  due  to 
so  grave  an  offence  against  morality  and  deco 
rum;  nor  did  he,  in  his  just  anger,  forget  for  a 
moment  the  laws  of  good  taste  and  good  breed 
ing.  One  calumny  which  has  been  often  re 
peated,  and  never  yet  contradicted,  it  is  our 
duty  to  expose.  It  is  asserted  in  the  Biogra- 
phia  Britannica,  that  Addison  designated  Steele 
as  "  little  Dicky."  This  assertion  was  repeated 
by  Johnson,  who  had  never  seen  the  Old  Whig, 
and  was  therefore  excusable.  It  has  also  been 
repeated  by  Miss  Aikin,  who  has  seen  the  Old 
Whig,  and  for  whom,  therefore,  there  is  less 
excuse.  Now,  it  is  true  that  the  words  "little 
Dicky"  occur  in  the  Old  Whig,  and  that  Steele's 
name  was  Richard.  It  is  equally  true  that  the 
words  "  little  Isaac"  occur  in  the  Duenna,  and 
that  Newton's  name  was  Isaac.  But  we  confi 
dently  affirm  that  Addison's  little  Dicky  had 
no  more  to  do  with  Steele,  than  Sheridan's 
little  Isaac  with  Newton.  If  we  apply  the 
words  "iittle  Dicky"  to  Steele,  we  deprive  a 
very  lively  and  ingenious  passage,  not  only 
of  all  its  wit,  but  of  all  its  meaning.  Little 
Dicky  was  evidently  the  nickname  of  some 
comic  actot4  who  played  the  usurer  Gomez, 
then  a  most  popular  part,  in  Dryden's  Spauisu 
Friar.f 

The  merited  reproof  which  Steelt  had  re 
ceived,  though  softened  by  some  kind  and 
courteous  expressions,  galled  him  bitterly.  He 
replied  with  little  force  and  great  acrimony; 
but  no  rejoinder  appeared.  Addison  was  fast 
hastening  to  his  grave  ;  and  had,  as  we  may 
we'l  suppose,  little  disposition  to  prosecute  a 
quarrel  with  an  old  friend.  His  complaint  had 
terminated  in  dropsy.  He  bore  up  long  and 
manfully.  Butat  length  he  abandoned  all  hope, 


*  Miss  Aikin  says  that  these  pieces,  never  having  been 
reprinted,  are  now  of  extreme  rnrity.  This  is  a  mistake. 
They  Inve  been  reprinted,  and  may  he  obtained  with  >ut 
the  smallest  difficulty.  The  copy  now  lying  before  ua 
bears  the  date  of  17S9. 

t  We  will  transcribe  the  whole  paragraph  How  it 
can  ever  have  been  misunderstood  is  unintelligible 
to  ns. 

"  But  our  author's  chief  concern  is  for  the  poor  Hous<j 
of  Commons,  whom  he  represents  as  nuked  and  defence 
less,  when  the  crown,  by  losing  this  prerogative,  would 
be  less  able  to  protect  them  aeainst  the  power  of  a  House 
of  Lords.  Who  forbears  laughing  when  the  Spanish  Fria* 
represents  little  Dicky,  under  the  person  of  Gome/,  insult 
ing  the  Colonel  that  was  able  to  fright  him  out  of  his  vita 
with  a  single  frown  1  This  dorm  7.,  savs  he,  flew  upon 
him  like  a  dragon,  got  him  down,  the  Devil  being  strong 
in  him.  and  gave  him  bastinado  on  bastinado,  and  buffet 
on  buffet,  which  the  poor  Colonel,  beinir  prostrate, 
suffered  with  a  most  Christian  patience.  The  improba 
bility  of  the  fact  never  fails  to  raise  mirth  in  the  audi 
ence  ;  and  one  may  venture  to  answer  for  a  Uritish  Hoii«« 
of  Commons,  if  we  may  jrm-ss  from  its  conduct  hitherto, 
that  it  will  scarce  lc  either  so  tame  or  so  weak  a*  ou» 
author  supposes." 


622 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


dismissed  his  physicians,  and  calmly  prepared 
himself  to  die. 

His  \vcrks  he  intrusted  to  the  care  of  Tickell ; 
and  dedicated  them  a  very  few  days  before  his 
death  to  Craggs,  in  a  letter  written  with  the 
sweet  and  graceful  eloquence  of  a  Saturday's 
Spectator.  In  this,  his  last  composition,  he 
alluded  to  his  approaching  end  in  words  so 
manly,  so  cheerful,  and  so  tender,  that  it  is  dif 
ficult  to  read  them  without  tears.  At  the  same 
time  he  earnestly  recommended  the  interests 
of  Tickell  to  the  care  of  Craggs. 

Within  a  few  hours  of  the  time  at  which  this 
dedication  was  written,  Addison  sent  to  beg 
Gay,  who  was  then  living  by  his  wits  about 
town,  to  come  to  Holland  House.  Gay  went 
and  was  received  with  great  kindness.  To  his 
amazement  his  forgiveness  was  implored  by 
the  dying  man.  Poor  Gay,  the  most  good- 
natured  and  simple  of  mankind,  could  not 
imagine  what  he  had  to  forgive.  There  was, 
however,  some  wrong,  the  remembrance  of 
which  weighed  on  Addison's  mind,  and  which 
he  declared  himself  anxious  to  repair.  He 
was  in  a  state  of  extreme  exhaustion  ;  and  the 
parting  was  doubtless  a  friendly  one  on  both 
sides.  Gay  supposed  that  some  plan  to  serve 
him  had  been  in  agitation  at  court,  and  had 
been  frustrated  by  Addison's  influence.  Nor 
is  this  improbable.  Gay  had  paid  assiduous 
court  to  the  royal  family.  But  in  the  queen's 
days  he  had  been  the  eulogist  of  Bolingbroke, 
and  was  still  connected  with  many  lories.  It 
is  not  strange  that  Addison,  while  heated  by 
conflict,  should  have  thought  himself  justified 
in  obstructing  the  preferment  of  one  whom  he 
might  regard  as  a  political  enemy.  Neither  is 
it  strange  that,  when  reviewing  his  whole  life, 
and  earnestly  scrutinizing  all  his  motives,  he 
should  think  that  he  had  acted  an  unkind  and 
ungenerous  part,  in  using  his  power  against  a 
distressed  man  of  letters,  who  was  as  harmless 
and  as  helpless  as  a  child. 

One  inference  maybe  drawn  from  this  anec 
dote.  It  appears  that  Addison,  on  his  death 
bed,  called  himself  to  a  strict  account;  and  was 
not  at  ease  till  he  had  asked  pardon  for  an  in 
jury  which  it  was  not  even  suspected  that  he 
had  committed — for  an  injury  which  would 
have  caused  disquiet  only  to  a  very  tender 
conscience.  Is  it  not  then  reasonable  to  infer 
that,  if  he  had  really  been  guilty  of  forming  a 
base  conspiracy  against  the  fame  and  fortunes 
of  a  rival,  he  would  have  expressed  some  re 
morse  for  so  serious  a  crime  1  But  it  is  unne 
cessary  to  multiply  arguments  and  evidence 
for  the  defence,  when  there  is  neither  argument 
nor  evidence  for  the  accusation. 

The  last  moments  of  Addison  were  perfectly 
serene.  His  interview  with  his  son-in-law  is 
universally  known.  "See,"  he  said,  "how  a 
Christian  can  die!"  The  piety  of  Addison 
was,  in  truth,  of  a  singularly  cheerful  charac 
ter.  The  feeling  which  predominates  in  all 
his  devotional  writings,  is  gratitude.  God  was 
to  him  the  all-wise  and  all-powerful  friend, 
who  had  watched  over  his  cradle  with  more 
than  maternal  tenderness;  who  had  listened  to 
his  cries  before  they  could  form  themselves  in 
prayer;  who  had  preserved  his  youth  from  the 


snares  of  vice;  who  had  made  his  cup  run 
over  with  worldly  blessings  ;  who  hail  doubled 
the  value  of  those  blessings,  by  bestowing  a 
thankful  heart  to  enjoy  them,  and  clear  friends 
to  partake  them  ;  who  had  rebuked  the  waves 
of  the  Ligurian  gulf,  had  purified  the  autumnal 
air  of  the  Campagna,  and  had  restrained  the 
avalanches  of  Mont  Cenis.  Of  the  Psalms,  his 
favourite  was  that  which  represents  the  Ruler 
of  all  things  under  the  endearing  image  of  a 
shepherd,  whose  crook  guides  the  flock  safe, 
through  gloomy  and  desolate  glens,  to  mea 
dows  well  watered  and  rich  with  herbage.  On, 
that  goodness  to  which  he  ascribed  all  the  hap 
piness  of  his  life,  he  relied  in  the  hour  of  death 
with  the  love  which  casteth  out  fear.  He  died 
on  the  17th  of  June,  1719.  He  had  just  entered 
on  his  forty-eighth  year. 

His  body  lay  in  state  in  the  Jerusalem  Cham 
ber,  and  was  borne  thence  to  the  Abbey  at  dead 
of  night.  The  choir  sang  a  funeral  hymn. 
Bishop  Atterbury,  one  of  those  lories  who  had 
loved  and  honoured  the  most  accomplished  of 
the  whigs,  met  the  corpse,  and  led  the  proces 
sion  by  torch-light,  round  the  shrine  of  Saint 
Edward  and  the  graves  of  the  Plantagenets,  to 
the  chapel  of  Henry  the  Seventh.  On  the  north 
side  of  that  chapel,  in  the  vault  of  the  house  of 
Albemarle,  the  coffin  of  Addison  lies  next  to  the 
coffin  of  Montagu.  Yet  a  few  months — and  the 
same  mourners  passed  again  along  the  same 
aisle.  The  same  sad  anthem  was  again  chant 
ed.  The  same  vault  was  again  opened ;  and 
the  coffin  of  Craggs  was  placed  close  to  the 
coffin  of  Addison. 

Many  tributes  were  paid  to  the  memory  of 
Addison.  But  one  alone  is  now  remembered. 
Tickell  bewailed  his  friend  in  an  elegy  which 
would  do  honour  to  the  greatest  name  in  our 
literature;  and  which  unites  the  energy  and 
magnificence  of  Dryden  to  the  tenderness  and 
purity  of  Cowper.  This  fine  poem  was  pre 
fixed  to  a  superb  edition  of  Addison's  works, 
which  was  published  in  1721,  by  subscription. 
The  names  of  the  subscribers  proved  how 
widely  his  fame  had  been  spread.  That  his 
countrymen  should  be  eager  to  possess  his 
writings,  even  in  a  costly  form,  is  not  wonder 
ful.  But  it  is  wonderful  that,  though  English 
literature  was  then  little  studied  on  the  Conti 
nent,  Spanish  grandees,  Italian  prelates,  mar 
shals  of  France,  should  be  found  in  the  list. 
Among  the  most  remarkable  names  are  those 
of  the  Queen  of  Sweden,  of  Prince  Eugene,  of 
the  Grand  Duke  of  Tuscany,  of  the  Dukes  of 
Parma,  Modena,  and  Guastalla,  of  the  Doge  of 
Genoa,  of  the  Regent  Orleans,  and  of  Cardinal 
Dubois.  We  ought  to  add,  that  this  edition, 
though  eminently  beautiful,  is  in  some  impor 
tant  points  defective:  nor,  indeed,  do  we  yet 
possess  a  complete  collection  of  Addison's 
writings. 

It  is  strange  that  neither  his  opulent  and 
noble  widow,  nor  any  of  his  powerful  and  at 
tached  friends,  should  have  thought  of  placing 
even  a  simple  tablet,  inscribed  with  his  name, 
on  the  walls  of  the  Abbey.  It  was  not  till' 
three  generations  had  laughed  and  wept  over 
his  pages  that  the  omission  was  supplied  by 
the  public  veneration.  At  length,  in  our  own 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  ADDISON. 


623 


time,  his  image,  skilfully  graven,  appeared  in 
Poet's  Corner.  It  represents  him,  as  we  can 
conceive  him,  clad  in  his  dressing-gown,  and 
freed  from  his  wig,  stepping  from  his  parlour 
at  Chelsea  into  his  trim  little  garden,  with  the 
account  of  the  Everlasting  Club,  or  the  Loves 
of  Hilpa  and  Shalum,  just  finished  for  the  next 
day's  Spectator,  in  his  hand.  Such  a  mark 
of  national  respect  was  due  to  the  unsullied 
«tate«manj  to  the  accomplished  scholar,  to  the 


master  of  pure  English  eloquence,  to  the  con 
summate  painter  of  life  and  manners.  It  was 
due,  above  all,  to  the  great  satirist,  who  alone 
knew  how  to  use  ridicule  without  abusing  it, 
who,  without  inflicting  a  wound,  effected  a 
great  social  reform,  and  who  reconciled  wit 
and  virtue,  after  a  long  and  disastrous  separa 
tion,  during  which  wit  had  been  led  astray  bf 
profligacy,  and  virtue  by  fanaticism. 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


BARERE'S    MEMOIRS.' 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  APRIL,  1844.] 


THIS  book  has  more  than  one  title  to  our 
rerious  attention.  It  is  an  appeal,  solemnly 
made  to  posterity  by  a  man  who  played  a  con- 
spicuous  part  in  great  events,  and  who  repre 
sents  himself  as  deeply  aggrieved  by  the  rash 
and  malevolent  censure  of  his  contemporaries. 
To  such  an  appeal  we  shall  always  give  ready 
audience.  We  can  perform  no  duty  more  use 
ful  to  society,  or  more  agreeable  to  our  own 
feelings,  than  that  of  making,  as  far  as  our 
power  extends,  reparation  to  the  slandered  and 
persecuted  benefactors  to  mankind.  We  there 
fore  promptly  took  into  our  consideration  this 
copious  apology  for  the  life  of  Bertrand  Barere. 
We  have  made  up  our  minds;  and  we  now 
propose  to  do  him,  by  the  blessing  of  God,  full 
and  signal  justice. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  appellant  in  this 
case  does  not  come  into  court  alone.  He  is 
attended  to  the  bar  of  public  opinion  by  two 
compurgators  who  occupy  highly  honourable 
stations.  One  of  these  is  M.  David  of  Angers, 
member  of  the  Institute,  an  eminent  sculptor, 
and,  if  we  have  been  rightly  informed,  a  favour 
ite  pupil,  though  not  kinsman,  of  the  painter 
who  bore  the  same  name.  The  other,  to  whom 
we  owe  the  biographical  preface,  is  M.  Hippo- 
*yte  Carnot,  member  of  the  Chamber  of  Depu 
ties,  and  son  of  the  celebrated  Director.  In  the 
judgment  of  M.  David,  and  of  M,  Hippolyte 
Carnot,  Barere  was  adeservingand  an  ill-used 
man,  a  man  who,  though  by  no  means  faultless, 
must  yet,  when  due  allowance  is  made  for  the 
force  of  circumstances  and  the  infirmity  of 
human  nature,  he  considered  as  on  the  whole 
entitled  to  our  esteem.  It.  will  be  for  the  public 
to  determine,  after  a  full  hearing,  whether  the 
editors  have,  by  thus  connecting  their  names 
with  that  of  Barere,  raised  his  character  or 
lowered  their  own. 

We  are  not  conscious  that,  when  we  opened 
this  book,  we  were  under  the  influence  of  any 
feeling  likely  to  pervert  our  judgment.  Un 
doubtedly  we  had  long  entertained  a  most 
unfavourable  opinion  of  Barpre ;  but  to  this 
opinion  we  were  not  tied  by  any  passion  or  by 
any  interest.  Our  dislike  was  a  reasonable 
dislike,  and  might  have  been  removed  by  reason. 
Indeed,  our  expectation  was,  that  these  Me 
moirs  would  in  some  measure  clear  Barere's 
fame.  That  he  could  vindicate  himself  from 
all  the  charges  which  had  been  brought  against 
him,  we  knew  to  be  impossible :  and  his  editors 
admit  that  he  has  not  done  so.  But  we  thought 
it  highly  probable  that  some  grave  accusations 
would  be  refuted,  and  that  many  offences  to 
which  he  would  have  been  forced  to  plead 
guilty  would  be  greatly  extenuated.  We  were 
not  disposed  to  be  severe.  We  were  fully 

*  Mtiiujire*  de  Hertratid  Bertre ;  publics  par  MM. 
HIPPOLYTE  CARNOT,  Membre  de  la  Chanthre  des  De- 
putt's,  et  DAVID  d'Anirers,  Menibre  de  1'Instit.ut:  pre- 
«td's  d'une  Notice  llistorique  par  H.  CARNOT.  4 
Tomes.  Paris:  1813. 


aware  that  temptations  such  as  those  to  which 
the  members  of  the  Convention  and  of  the 
committee  of  public  safety  were  exposed,  musl 
try  severely  the  strength  of  the  firmest  virtue. 
Indeed,  our  inclination  has  always  been  to 
regard  with  an  indulgence,  which  to  some  rigid 
moralists  appears  excessive,  those  faults  inhi 
which  gentle  and  noble  spirits  are  sometimes 
hurried  by  the  excitement  of  conflict,  by  the 
maddening  influence  of  sympathy,  and  by  ill- 
regulated  zeal  for  a  public  cause. 

With  such  feelings  we  read  this  book,  and 
compared  it  with  other  accounts  of  the  events 
in  which  Barere  bore  a  part.  It  is  now  our 
duty  to  express  the  opinion  to  which  this  in 
vestigation  has  led  us. 

Our  opinion  then  is  this,  that  Barere  ap 
proached  nearer  than  any  person  mentioned 
in  history  or  fiction,  whether  man  or  devil,  to 
the  idea  of  consummate  and  universal  deprav 
ity.  In  him  the  qualities  which  are  the  proper 
objects  of  hatred,  and  the  qualities  which  are  the 
proper  objects  of  contempt,  preserve  an  exqui 
site  and  absolute  harmony.  In  almost  every 
particular  sort  of  wickedness  he  has  had  rivals. 
His  sensuality  was  immoderate ;  but  this  was  a 
failing  common  to  him  with  many  great  and 
amiable  men.  There  have  been  many  men  as 
cowardly  as  he,  some  as  cruel,  a  few  as  mean, 
a  few  as  impudent.  There  may  also  have  been 
a?  great  liars,  though  we  never  met  with  them 
or  read  of  them.  But  when  we  put  every 
thing  together,  sensuality,  poltroonery,  baseness, 
effrontery,  mendacity,  barbarity,  the  result  is 
something  which  in  a  novel  we  should  con 
demn  as  caricature,  and  to  which  we  ventur* 
to  say,  no  parallel  can  be  found  in  history. 

It  would  be  grossly  unjust,  we  acknowledge, 
to  try  a  man  situated  as  Barere  was  by  a  severe 
standard.  Nor  have  we  done  so.  We  have 
formed  our  opinion  of  him  by  comparing  him, 
not  with  politicians  of  stainless  character,  not 
with  Chancellor  D'Aguesseau,  or  General  Wash 
ington,  or  Mr.  Wilberforce,  or  Earl  Gray,  but 
with  his  own  colleagues  of  the  Mountain.  That 
party  included  a  considerable  number  of  the 
worst  men  that  ever  lived ;  but  we  see  in  it 
nothing  like  Barere.  Compared  with  him, 
Fouche  seems  honest ;  Billaud  seems  humane  ; 
Hebert  seems  to  rise  into  dignity.  Every  other 
chief  of  a  party,  says  M.  Hippolyte  Carnot, 
has  found  apologists ;  one  set  of  men  exalts 
the  Girondists  ;  another  set  justifies  Danton;  a 
third  deifies  Robespierre;  but  Barere  remains 
without  a  defender.  We  venture  to  suggest  a 
very  simple  solution  of  this  phenomenon.  All 
the  other  chiefs  of  parties  had  some  good 
qualities,  and  Barere  had  none.  The  genius, 
courage,  patriotism,  and  humanity  of  the  Giron 
dist  statesmen,  more  than  atoned  for  what  was 
culpable  in  their  conduct,  and  should  have 
protected  them  from  the  insult  of  being  com 
pared  with  such  a  thing  as  Barere.  Danton 


BARERE'S   MEMOIRS. 


625 


and  Robesp;erre  were,  indeed,  bad  men;  but  in 
both  of  them  some  important  parts  of  the  mind 
remained  sound.  Danlon  was  brave  and  re- 
sclute,  fond  of  pleasure,  of  power,  and  of  dis 
tinction,  with  vehement  passions,  with  lax 
principles,  but  with  some  kind  and  manly 
feelings,  capable  of  great  crimes,  but  capable 
also  of  friendship  and  of  compassion.  He, 
therefore,  naturally  finds  admirers  among  per 
sons  of  bold  and  sanguine  dispositions.  Robes 
pierre  was  a  vain,  envious,  and  suspicious 
man,  with  a  hard  heart,  weak  nerves,  and  a 
gloomy  temper.  But  we  cannot  with  truth 
deny  that  he  was,  in  the  vulgar  sense  of  the 
word,  disinterested,  that  his  private  life  was 
correct,  or  that  he  was  sincerely  zealous  for 
his  own  system  of  politics  and  morals.  He 
therefore  naturally  finds  admirers  among  honest 
but  moody  and  bitter  democrats.  If  no  class 
has  taken  the  reputation  of  Barere  under  its 
patronage,  the  reason  is  plain :  Barere  had 
not  a  single  virtue,  nor  even  the  semblance 
of  one. 

It  is  true  that  he  was  not,  as  far  as  we  are 
able  to  judge,  originally  of  a  savage  disposi 
tion ;  but  this  circumstance  seems  to  us  only 
to  aggravate  his  guilt.  There  are  some  un 
happy  men  constitutionally  prone  to  the  darker 
passions,  men  all  whose  blood  is  gall,  and  to 
whom  bitter  words  and  harsh  actions  are  as 
natural  as  snarling  and  biting  to  a  ferocious 
dog.  To  come  into  the  world  with  this  wretched 
mental  disease  is  a  greater  calamity  than  to  be 
born  blind  or  deaf.  A  man  who,  having  such 
a  temper,  keeps  it  in  subjection,  and  constrains 
himself  to  behave  habitually  with  justice  and 
humanity  towards  those  who  are  in  his  power, 
seems  to  us  worthy  of  the  highest  admiration. 
There  have  been  instances  of  this  self-com 
mand  ;  and  they  are  among  the  most  signal 
triumphs  of  philosophy  and  religion.  On  the 
other  hand,  a  man  who,  having  been  blessed 
by  nature  with  a  bland  disposition,  gradually 
brings  himself  to  inflict  misery  on  his  fellow- 
creatures  with  indifference,  with  satisfaction, 
and  at  length  with  a  hideous  rapture,  deserves 
to  be  regarded  as  a  portent  of  wickedness ;  and 
such  a  man  was  Barere.  The  history  of  his 
downward  progress  is  full  of  instruction.  Weak 
ness,  cowardice,  and  fickleness  were  born  with 
him ;  the  best  quality  which  he  received  from 
nature  was  a  good  temper.  These,  it  is  true, 
are  not  very  promising  materials;  yet  out  of 
materials  as  unpromising,  high  sentiments  of 
piety  and  of  honour  have  sometimes  made 
martyrs  and  heroes.  Rigid  principles  often  do 
for  feeble  minds  what  stays  do  for  feeble  bodies. 
But  Barere  had  no  principles  at  ail.  His  cha 
racter  was  equally  destitute  of  natural  and  of 
acquired  strength.  Neither  in  the  commerce 
of  life,  nor  in  books,  did  we  ever  become  ac 
quainted  with  any  mind  so  unstable,  so  utterly 
destitute  of  tone,  so  incapable  of  independent 
thought  and  earnest  preference,  so  ready  to  take 
impressions  and  so  ready  to  lose  them.  He 
resembled  those  creepers  which  must  lean  on 
something,  and  which  as  soon  as  their  prop  is 
removed,  fall  down  in  utter  helplessness.  He 
could  no  more  stand  up,  erect  andself-supporl- 
ed,  in  any  cause,  than  the  ivy  can  rear  itself 
like  the  oak,  or  the  wild  vine  shoot  to  heaven 

VOL.  V,— 79 


ike  the  cedar  of  Lebanon.  It  is  barely  possible 
that,  under  good  guidance  and  in  favourable 
circumstances,  such  a  man  might  have  slipped 
through  life  without  discredit.  But  the  unsea- 
worthy  craft,  which  even  in  still  water  would 
have  been  in  danger  of  going  down  from  ita 
own  rottenness,  was  launched  on  a  raging 
oce in,  amidst  a  storm  in  which  a  whole  armada 
of  gallant  ships  were  cast  away.  The  weakest 
and  most  servile  of  human  beings  found  himself 
on  a  sudden  an  actor  in  a  Revolution  which 
convulsed  the  whole  civilized  world.  At  first 
he  fell  under  the  influence  of  humane  and 
moderate  men,  and  talked  the  language  of 
humanity  and  moderation.  But  he  soon  found 
himself  surrounded  by  fierce  and  resolute 
spirits,  scared  by  no  danger  and  restrained  by 
no  scruple.  He  had  to  choose  whether  he  would 
be  their  victim  or  their  accomplice.  His  choice 
was  soon  made.  He  tasted  blood,  and  felt  no 
loathing:  he  tasted  it  again,  and  liked  it  well 
Cruelly  became  with  him,  first  a  habit,  then  a 
passion,  at  last  a  madness.  So  complete  and 
rapid  was  the  degeneracy  of  his  nature,  that 
within  a  very  few  months  after  the  time  when 
he  passed  for  a  good-natured  man,  he  had 
brought  himself  to  look  on  the  despair  and 
misery  of  his  fellow-creatures  with  a  glee 
resembling  that  of  the  fiends  whom  Datae  saw 
watching  the  pool  of  seething  pitch  in  Male- 
bolge.  He  had  many  associates  in  guilt;  but 
he  distinguished  himself  from  them  all  by  the 
Bacchanalian  exultation  which  he  seemed  to 
feel  in  the  work  of  death.  He  was  drunk  with 
innocent  and  noble  blood,  laughed  and  shouted 
as  he  butchered,  and  howled  strange  songs  and 
reeled  in  strange  dances  amidst  the  carnage. 
Then  came  a  sudden  and  violent  turn  of  fortune. 
The  miserable  man  was  hurled  down  from  the 
height  of  power  to  hopeless  ruin  and  infamy. 
The  shock  sobered  him  at  once.  The  fumes 
of  his  horrible  intoxication  passed  away.  But 
he  was  now  so  irrecoverably  depraved,  that  the 
discipline  of  adversity  only  drove  him  further 
i  into  wickedness.  Ferocious  vices,  of  which  he. 
had  never  been  suspected,  had  been  developed 
in  him  by  power.  Another  class  of  vices,  less 
hateful,  perhaps,  but  more  despicable,  was  now 
developed  in  him  by  poverty  and  disgrace. 
Having  appalled  the  whole  world  by  great 
crimes  perpetrated  under  tho  pretence  of  zeal 
for  liberty,  he  became  the  meanest  of  all  the 
tools  of  despotism.  It  is  not  easy  to  settle  thv 
order  of  precedence  among  his  vices ;  but  we 
are  inclined  to  think  that  his  baseness  was,  oa 
the  whole,  a  rarer  and  more  marvellous  thing 
than  his  cruelty. 

This  is  the  view  which  we  have  long  taken 
of  Barere's  character ;  but,  till  we  read  these 
Memoirs,  we  held  our  opinion  with  the  diffi 
dence  which  becomes  a  judge  who  has  heant 
only  one  side.  The  case  seemed  strong,  and  in 
parts  unanswerable  ;  yet  we  did  not  know  what 
the  accused  party  might  have  to  say  i'or  him 
self;  and,  not  being  much  inclined  to  take  our 
fellow-creatures  either  for  angels  of  tight  or 
for  angels  of  darkness,  we  could  not  but  feet 
some  suspicion  that  his  offences  had  fi^en  <?\- 
aggerated.  That  suspicion  is  now  at  an  end. 
The  vindication  is  before  us.  It  occupies  iour 
volumes.  It  was  :he  work  of  iony  years.  4' 
3G 


626 


MAOAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


<vould  be  absurd  to  suppose  that  it  does  not 
refute  every  serious  charge  which  admitted  of  : 
refutation.  How  many  serious  charges,  then, ! 
are  here  refuted  1  Not  a  single  one.  Most  of  ; 
.the  imputations  which  have  been  thrown  on  j 
Barere  he  does  not  even  notice.  In  such  cases, 
of  course,  judgment  must  go  against  him  by 
default.  The  fact  is,  that  nothing  can  be  more 
meagre  and  uninteresting  than  his  account  of 
the  great  public  transactions  in  which  he  was 
engaged.  He  gives  us  hardly  a  word  of  new 
information  respecting  the  proceedings  of  the 
Committee  of  Public  Safety;  and,  by  way  of 
compensation,  tells  us  long  stories  about  things 
which  happened  before  he  emerged  from  ob 
scurity,  and  after  he  had  again  sunk  into  it. 
Nor  is  this  the  worst.  As  soon  as  he  ceases 
to  write  trifles,  he  begins  to  write  lies;  and 
such  lies  !  A  man  who  has  never  been  within 
the  tropics  does  not  know  what  a  thunder-storm 
means;  a  man  who  has  never  looked  on  Nia 
gara  has  but  a  faint  idea  of  a  cataract ;  and  he 
who  has  not  read  Barere's  Memoirs  may  be 
said  not  to  know  what  it  is  to  lie.  Among  the 
numerous  classes  which  make  up  the  great 
genus  Mendarium,  the  Mendacium  Vasronicum,  or 
Gascon  lie,  has,  during  some  centuries,  been 
highly  esteemed  as  peculiarly  circumstantial 
and  peculiarly  impudent;  and  among  the  Men- 
duciu  V(isi:oni<:a,  the  Mendadum  Barerianum  is, 
without  doubt,  the  finest  species.  It  is,  indeed, 
a  superb  variety,  and  quite  throws  into  the 
shade  some  Mendada  which  we  were  used  to 
regard  with  admiration.  The  Mendndum  Wrar- 
allwmtnt,  for  example,  though  by  no  means  to 
be  despised,  will  not  sustain  the  comparison 
for  a  moment.  Seriously,  we  think  that  M. 
Hippolyte  Carnot  is  much  to  blame  in  this 
matter.  We  can  hardly  suppose  him  to  be 
worse  read  than  ourselves  in  the  history  of  the 
Convention,  a  history  which  must  interest  him 
deeply,  not  only  as  a  Frenchman,  but  also  as  a 
son.  He  must,  therefore,  be  perfectly  aware  that 
many  of  the  most  important  statements  which 
these  volumes  contain  are  falsehoods,  such 
as  Corneille's  Dorante,  or  Moliere's  Scapin, 
or  Colin  d'Harleville's  Monsieur  de  Crac  would 
have  been  ashamed  to  utter.  We  are  far,  in 
deed,  from  holding  M.  Hippolyte  Carnot  an 
swerable  for  Barere's  want  of  veracity.  But 
M.  Hippolyte  Carnot  has  arranged  "these  Me 
moirs,  has  introduced  them  to  the  world  by  a 
laudatory  preface,  has  described  them  as  docu 
ments  of  great  historical  value,  and  has  illus 
trated  them  by  notes.  We  cannot  but  think 
that,  by  acting  thus,  he  contracted  some  obli 
gations  of  which  he  does  not  seem  to  have 
been  at  all  aware ;  and  that  he  ought  not  to 
have  suffered  any  monstrous  fiction  to  go  forth 
under  the  sanction  of  his  name,  without  adding 
a  line  at  the  foot  of  the  page  for  the  purpose  of 
cautioning  the  reader. 

We  will  content  ourselves  at  present  with 
pointing  out  two  instances  of  Barere's  wilful 
and  deliberate  mendacity ;  namely,  his  account 
of  the  death  of  Marie  Antoinette,  and  his  ac 
count  of  the  death  of  the  Girondists.  His  ac 
count  of  the  death  of  Marie  Antoinette  is  as 
follows: — "Robespierre  in  his  turn  proposed 
that  the  members  of  the  Capet  family  should 
Ue  banished,  and  that  Marie  Antoinette  should 


be  brought  to  trial  before  the  Revolutionary 
Tribunal.  He  would  have  been  better  em 
ployed  in  concerting  military  measures  which 
might  have  repaired  our  disasters  in  Belgium, 
and  might  have  arrested  the  progress  of  the 
enemies  of  the  Revolution  in  the  west." — (VoL 
ii.  p.  312.) 

Now  it  is  notorious  that  Marie  Antoinette 
was  sent  before  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal, 
not  at  Robespierre's  instance,  but  in  direct  op 
position  to  Robespierre's  wishes.  We  will 
cite  a  single  authority,  which  is  quite  decisive, 
Buonaparte,  who  had  no  conceivable  motive 
to  disguise  the  truth,  who  had  the  best  oppor 
tunities  of  knowing  the  truth,  and  who,  after 
his  marriage  with  the  Archduchess,  naturally 
felt  an  interest  in  the  fate  of  his  wife's  kins 
woman,  distinctly  affirmed  that  Robespierre 
opposed  the  trying  of  the  queen.*  Who,  then, 
was  the  person  who  really  did  propose  that  the 
Capet  family  should  be  banished,  and  that 
Marie  Antoinette  should  be  tried?  Full  infor 
mation  will  be  found  in  the  Mon;feur.^  From 
that  valuable  record  it  appears  that, on  the  first 
of  August  1793,  an  orator  deputed  by  the  Com 
mittee  of  Public  Safety  addressed  the  Conven 
tion  in  a  long  and  elaborate  discourse.  He 
asked,  in  passionate  language,  how  it  happened 
that  the  enemies  of  the  Republic  still  continued 
to  hope  for  success.  "  Is  it,"  he  cried,  •«  be 
cause  we  have  too  long  forgotten  the  crimes 
of  the  Austrian  woman  1  Is  it  because  we 
have  shown  so  strange  an  indulgence  to  the 
race,  of  our  ancient  tyrants  1  It  is  time  that 
this  unwise  apathy  should  cease;  it  is  time  to 
extirpate  from  the  soil  of  the  Republic  the  last 
roots  of  royalty.  As  for  the  children  of  Louis 
the  conspirator,  they  are  hostages  for  the  Re 
public.  The  charge  of  their  maintenance  shall 
be  reduced  to  what  is  necessary  for  the  food 
and  keep  of  two  individuals.  The  public 
treasure  shall  no  longer  be  lavished  on  crea 
tures  who  have  too  long  been  considered  as 
privileged.  But  behind  them  lurks  a  woman 
who  has  been  the  cause  of  all  the  disasters  of 
France,  and  whose  share  in  eve: y  project  ad 
verse  to  the  Revolution  haa  k.ng  been  kiiown. 
National  justice  claims  iisiighl over  her.  It  is 
to  the  tribunal  appointed  for  the  trial  of  con 
spirators  that  she  ougnt  to  be  sent.  It  is  only 
by  striking  the  Austrian  woman  that  you  can 
make  Francis  and  George,  Charles  and  Wil 
liam,  sensible  of  the  crimes  which  their  minis 
ters  and  their  armies  have  committed."  The 
speaker  concluded  by  moving  that  Marie  An 
toinette  should  be  brought  to  judgment,  and 
should,  for  that  end,  be  forthwith  transferred 
to  the  Conciergerie  ;  and  that  all  the  members 
of  the  house  of  Capet,  with  the  exception  of 
those  who  were  under  the  sword  of  the  law, 
and  of  the  two  children  of  Louis,  should  be 
banished  from  the  French  territory.  The  mo 
tion  was  carried  without  debate. 

Now,  who  was  the  person  who  made  this 
speech  and  this  motion?  It  was  Barere  him- 
self.  It  is  clear,  then,  that  Barere  attributed  his 
own  mean  insolence  and  barbarity  to  one  who. 
whatever  his  crimes  may  have  been,  was  in 


*  O'Menra's  Vnire  from  St.  Helena,  ii  170. 
\  Moniteur,  2<1,  7th,  and  9th,  of  August,  1783. 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


627 


this  matter  innocent.  The  only  question  re 
maining  is,  whether  Bare  re  was  misled  by  his 
memory,  or  wrote  a  deliberate  falsehood. 

We  are  convinced  that  he  wrote  a  deliberate 
falsehood.  His  memory  is  described  by  editors 
as  remarkably  good,  and  must  have  been  bad 
indeed  if  he  could  not  remember  such  a  fact 
as  this.  It  is  true  that  the  number  of  murders 
in  which  he  subsequently  bore  a  part  was  so 
great,  that  he  might  well  confound  one  with 
another,  that  he  might  well  forget  what  part  of 
the  daily  hecatomb  was  consigned  to  death  by 
himself,  and  what  part  by  his  colleagues.  But 
two  circumstances  make  it  quite  incredible 
that  the  share  which  lie  took  in  the  death  of 
Marie  Antoinette  should  have  escaped  his  re 
collection.  She  was  one  of  his  earliest  vic 
tims.  She  was  one  of  his  most  illustrious 
victims.  The  most  hardened  assassin  remem 
bers  the  first  time  that  he  shed  blood;  and  the 
widow  of  Louis  was  no  ordinary  sufferer.  If 
the  question  had  been  about  some  milliner 
butchered  for  hiding  in  her  garret  her  brother 
who  had  let  drop  a  word  against  the  Jacobin 
club — if  the  question  had  been  about  some  old 
nun,  dragged  to  death  for  having  mumbled 
what  were  called  fanatical  words  over  her 
beads — Barere's  memory  might  well  have  de 
ceived  him.  It  would  be  as  unreasonable  to 
expect  him  to  remember  all  the  wretches  whom 
he  slew,  as  all  the  pinches  of  snuff  that  he 
took.  But  though  Barere  murdered  many 
hundreds  of  human  beings,  he  murdered  only 
one  queen.  That  he,  a  small  country  lawyer, 
who,  a  few  years  before,  would  have  thought 
himself  honoured  by  a  glance  or  a  word  from 
the  daughter  of  so  many  Coesars,  should  call 
her  the  Austrian  woman,  should  send  her  from 
jail  to  jail,  should  deliver  her  over  to  the  exe 
cutioner,  was  surely  a  great  event  in  his  life. 
Whether  he  had  reason  to  be  proud  of  it  or 
ashamed  of  it,  is  a  question  on  which  we  may 
perhaps  differ  from  his  editors;  but  they  will 
admit,  we  think,  that  he  could  not  have  forgot 
ten  it. 

We,  therefore,  confidently  charge  Barere 
with  having  written  a  deliberate  falsehood; 
and  we  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  we 
never,  in  the  course  of  any  historical  re 
searches  that  we  have  happened  to  make,  fell 
in  with  a  falsehood  so  audacious,  except  only 
the  falsehood  which  we  are  about  to  expose. 

Of  the  proceeding  against  the  Girondists, 
Barere  speaks  with  just  severity.  He  calls  it 
an  atrocious  injustice  perpetrated  against  the 
legislators  of  the  Republic.  He  complains 
that  distinguished  deputies,  who  ought  to  have 
been  re  admitted  to  their  seats  in  the  Conven 
tion,  were  sent  to  the  scaffold  as  conspirators. 
The  day,  he  exclaims,  was  a  day  of  mourning 
for  France.  It  mutilated  the  national  repre- 
sentation  ;  it  weakened  the  sacred  principle, 
that  the  delegates  of  the  people  were  inviola 
ble.  He  protests  that  he  had  no  share  in  the 
guilt.  "I  have  had,"  he  says,  "the  patience 
to  go  through  the  Monileur,  extracting  all  the 
charges  brought  against  deputies,  and  all  the 
decrees  for  arresting  and  impeaching  deputies. 
Nowhere  will  you  find  my  name.  I  never 
hi  ought  a  charge  against  any  of  my  colleagues, 


]  or  made  a  report  against  any,  or  drew  up  an 
impeachment  against  any."* 

Now,  we  affirm  that  this  is  a  lie.  We  affirm 
that  Barere  himself  took  the  lead  in  the  pro 
ceedings  of  the  convention  against  the  Giron 
dists.  We  affirm  that  he,  on  the  twenty  -eighth 
of  July,  1793,  proposed  a  decree  for  bringing 
nine  Girondist  deputies  to  trial,  and  for  putting 
to  death  sixteen  other  Girondist  deputies  with 
out  any  trial  at  all.  We  affirm  that,  when  the 
accused  deputies  had  been  brought  to  trial,  and 
when  some  apprehension  arose  that  their  elo 
quence  might  produce  an  effect  even  on  the  re- 
voluntary  tribunal,  Barere  did,  on  the  8th  of 
Brumaire,  second  a  motion  for  a  decree  au 
thorizing  the  tribunal  to  decide  without  hearing 
out  the  defence;  and,  for  the  truth  of  every  one 
of  these  things  so  affirmed  by  us,  we  appeal  to 
that  very  Moniteur  to  which  Barere  has  dared 
to  appeal.f 

What  M.  Hyppolyte  Carnot,  knowing,  as  he 
must  know,  that  this  book  contains  such  false 
hoods  as  those  which  we  have  exposed,  can 
have  meant,  when  he  described  it  as  a  valuable 
addition  to  our  stock  of  historical  information, 
passes  our  comprehension.  When  a  man  is 
not  ashamed  to  tell  lies  about  events  which 
took  place  before  hundreds  of  witnesses,  and 
which  are  recorded  in  well-known  and  acces 
sible  books,  what  credit  can  we  give  to  his  ac 
count  of  things  done  in  corners  ?  No  historian 
who  does  not  wish  to  be  laughed  at  will  ever 
cite  the  unsupported  authority  of  Barere  as 
sufficient  to  prove  any  fact  whatever.  The  only 
thing,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  on  which  these 
volumes  throw  any  light,  is  the  exceeding  base 
ness  of  the  author. 

So  much  for  the  veracity  of  the  Memoirs.  In 
a  literary  point  of  view,  they  are  beneath  criti 
cism.  They  are  as  shallow,  flippant  and  af 
fected  as  Barere's  oratory  in  the  convention. 
They  are  also,  what  his  oratory  in  the  conven 
tion  was  not,  utterly  insipid.  In  fact,  they  are 
the  mere  dregs  and  rinsings  of  a  bottle,  of  which 
even  the  first  froth  was  but  of  very  question 
able  flavour. 

We  will  now  try  to  present  our  readers  with 
a  sketch  of  this  man's  life.  We  shall,  of  course, 
make  very  sparing  use,  indeed,  of  his  own 
memoirs;  and  never  without  distrust,  except 
where  they  are  confirmed  by  other  evidence. 

Bertrand  Barere  was  born  in  the  year  1755, 
at  Tarbes  in  Gascony.  His  father  was  the 
proprietor  of  a  small  estate  at  Vieuzac,  in  the 
beautiful  vale  of  Argeles.  Bertrand  always 
loved  to  be  called  Barere  de  Vieuzac,  and  flat 
tered  himself  with  the  hope  that,  by  the  help  of 
this  feudal  addition  to  his  name,  he  might  pass 
for  a  gentleman.  He  was  educated  for  the  bar 
at  Toulouse,  the  seat  of  one  of  the  most  cele 
brated  parliaments  of  the  kingdom,  practised 
as  an  advocate  with  considerable  success,  and 
wrote  some  small  pieces,  whi'ch  he  sent  to  the 
principal  literary  societies  in  the  south  of 
France.  Among  provincial  towns,  Toulouse 
seems  to  have  been  remarkably  rich  in  indiffe 
rent  versifiers  and  critics.  It  gloried  especially 

*  Vol.  ii.  407. 

t  Mvniteur,  31st  of  July,  1793,  and  Nonidi,  first  Decad* 
of  Brumaire,  in  the  year  2. 


628 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS* 


in  one  venerable  institution,  called  the  Acade 
my  of  ihe  Floral  Games.  This  body  held  every 
year  a  grand  meeting,  which  was  a  subject  of 
intense  interest  to  the  whole  city, and  at  which 
flowers  of  gold  and  silver  were  given  as  prizes 
for  odes,  for  idyls,  and  for  something  that  was 
called  eloquence.  These  bounties  produced  of 
course  the  ordinary  effect  of  bounties,  and  turn 
ed  people  who  might  have  been  thriving  attor 
neys  and  useful  apothecaries  into  small  wits 
and  bad  poets.  Barere  does  not  appear  to  have 
been  so  lucky  as  to  obtain  any  of  these  preci 
ous  flowers ;  but  one  of  his  performances  was 
mentioned  with  honour.  At  Montauban  he 
was  more  fortunate.  The  academy  of  that 
town  bestowed  on  him  several  prizes,  one  for 
a  panegyric  on  Louis  the  Twelfth,  in  which  the 
blessings  of  monarchy  and  the  loyalty  of  the 
French  nation  were  set  forth ;  and  another  for 
a  panegyric  on  poor  Franc  de  Pompignan,  in 
which,  as  may  easily  be  supposed,  the  philo 
sophy  of  the  eighteenth  century  was  sharply 
assailed.  Then  Barere  found  an  old  stone  in 
scribed  with  three  Latin  words,  and  wrote  a 
dissertation  upon  it,  which  procured  him  a  seat 
in  a  learned  assembly,  called  the  Toulouse 
Academy  of  Sciences,  Inscriptions,  and  Polite 
Literature.  At  length  the  doors  of  the  Acade 
my  of  the  Floral  Games  were  opened  to  so 
much  merit.  Barere,  in  his  thirty-third  year, 
took  his  seat  as  one  of  that  illustrious  brother 
hood,  and  made  an  inaugural  oration  which 
was  greatly  admired.  He  apologizes  for  re 
counting  these  triumphs  of  his  youthful  genius. 
We  own  that  we  cannot  blame  him  for  dwell 
ing  long  on  the  least  disgraceful  portion  of  his 
existence.  To  send  in  declamations  for  prizes 
offered  by  provincial  academies,  is  indeed  no 
very  useful  or  dignified  employment  for  a 
bearded  man  ;  but  it  would  have  been  well  if 
Barere  had  always  been  so  employed. 

In  1785  he  married  a  young  lady  of  conside 
rable  fortune.  Whether  she  was  in  other  re 
spects  qualified  to  make  a  home  happy,  is  a 
point  respecting  which  we  are  imperfectly  in 
formed.  In  a  little  work,  entitled  Melancholy 
Pages,  which  was  written  in  1797,  Barere  avers 
that  his  marriage  was  one  of  mere  conveni 
ence,  that  at  the  altar  his  heart  was  heavy  with 
sorrowful  forebodings,  that  he  turned  pale  as 
he  pronounced  the  solemn  "  Yes,"  that  unbid 
den  tears  rolled  down  his  cheeks,  that  his  mo 
ther  shared  his  presentiment,  and  that  the  evil 
omen  was  accomplished.  "  My  marriage,"  he 
says,  "was  one  of  the  most  unhappy  of  mar 
riages."  So  romantic  a  tale,  told  by  so  noted  a 
liar,  did  not  command  our  belief.  We  were, 
therefore,  not  much  surprised  to  discover  that, 
in  his  Memoirs,  he  calls  his  wife  a  most  amia 
ble  woman,  and  declares  that,  after  he  had  been 
united  to  her  six  years,  he  found  her  as  amiable 
as  ever.  He  complains,  indeed,  that  she  was 
too  much  attached  to  royalty  and  to  the  old  su 
perstition  ;  but  he  assures  us  that  his  respect 
lor  her  virtues  induced  him  to  tolerate  her  pre 
judices.  Now  Barere,  at  the  time  of  his  mar 
riage,  was  himself  a  royalist  and  a  Catholic- 
He  had  gained  one  prize  by  flattering  the 
throne,  and  another  by  defending  the  church. 
It  is  hardly  possible,  therefore,  that  disputes 
»hout  politics  or  religion  should  have  embitter 


ed  his  domestic  life  till  some  time  after  he  be. 
came  a  husband.  Our  own  guess  is,  that  his 
wife  was,  as  he  says,  a  virtuous  and  amiable 
woman,  and  that  she  did  her  best  to  make  him 
happy  during  some  years.  It  seems  clear  that; 
when  circumstances  developed  the  latent  atro* 
city  of  his  character,  she  could  no  longer  en, 
dure  him,  refused  to  see  him,  and  sent  back  his 
letters  unopened.  Then  it  was,  we  imagine, 
that  he  invented  the  fable  about  his  distress  on 
his  wedding-day. 

In  1788,  Barere  paid  his  first  visit  to  Paris, 
attended  reviews,  heard  Laharpe  at  the  Lycse- 
um,  and  Condorcet  at  the  Academy  of  Sciences, 
stared  at  the  envoys  of  Tippoo  Saih,  saw  the 
royal  family  dine  at  Versailles,  and  kept  a  jour 
nal  in  which  he  noted  down  adventures  and 
speculations.  Some  parts  of  this  journal  are 
printed  in  the  first  volume  of  the  work  before 
us,  and  are  certainly  most  characteristic.  The 
worst  vices  cf  the  writer  had  not  yet  shown 
themselves  ;  but  the  weakness  which  was  the 
parent  of  those  vices  appears  in  every  line. 
His  levity,  his  inconsistency,  his  servility,  were 
already  what  they  weie  to  the  last.  AI!  his 
opinions,  all  his  feelings,  spin  round  and  round 
like  a  weathercock  in  a  whirlwind.  Nay,  the 
very  impressions  which  he  receives  through 
his  senses  are  not  the  same  two  days  together. 
He  sees  Louis  the  Sixteenth,  and  is  so  much 
blinded  by  loyalty  as  to  find  his  majesty  hand 
some.  "I  fixed  my  eyes,"  he  says,  ''with  a 
lively  curiosity  on  his  fine  countenance,  which 
I  thought  open  and  noble."  The  next  time  thai 
the  king  appears,  all  is  altered.  His  majesty's 
eyes  are  without  the  smallest  expression  ;  he 
has  a  vulgar  laugh  which  seems  like  idiocy, 
an  ignoble  figure,  an  awkward  gait,  and  the 
look  of  a  big  boy  ill  brought  up.  It  is  the  same 
with  more  important  questions.  Barere  is  for 
the  parliaments  on  the  Monday  and  against  the 
parliaments  on  the  Tuesday,  for  feudality  in 
the  morning  and  against  feudality  in  the  after 
noon.  One  day  he  admires  the  English  consti 
tution  :  then  he  shudders  to  think  that,  in  the 
struggles  by  which  that  constitution  had  been 
obtained,  the  barbarous  islanders  had  murder 
ed  a  king,  and  gives  the  preference  to  the  con 
stitution  of  Beam.  Beam,  he  says,  has  a  sub 
lime  constitution,  a  beautiful  constitution. 
There  the  nobility  and  clergy  meet  in  one  house 
and  the  commons  in  another.  If  the  houses 
differ,  the  king  has  the  casting  vote.  A  few 
weeks  later  we  find  him  raving  against  the 
principles  of  this  sublime  and  beautiful  consti 
tution.  To  admit  deputies  of  the  nobility  and 
clergy  into  the  legislature  is,  he  says,  neither 
more  or  less  than  to  admit  enemies  of  the  na 
tion  into  the  legislature. 

In  this  state  of  mind,  without  one  settled  pur 
pose  or  opinion,  the  slave  of  the  last  word, 
royalist,  aristocrat,  democrat,  according  to  the 
prevailing  sentiment  of  the  coffee-house  or 
drawing-room  into  which  he  had  just  looked, 
did  Barere  enter  into  public  life.  The  states- 
general  had  been  summoned.  Barere  went 
down  to  his  own  province,  was  there  elected 
one  of  the  representatives  of  the  Third  Estate, 
and  returned  to  Paris  in  May  1 789. 

A  great  crisis,  often  predicted,  had  at  last 
arrived.  In  no  country,  we  conceive,  hare  ift- 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


629 


lellectnal  freedom  and  political  servitude  ex 
isted  together  so  long  as  in  France,  during;  the 
seventy  or  eighty  years  which  preceded  the 
last  convocation  of  the  orders.  Ancient  abuses 
and  new  theories  flourished  in  equal  vigour 
side  hy  side.  The  people,  having  no  constitu 
tional  means  of  checking  even  the  most  flagi 
tious  misgovernment,  were  indemnified  for  op 
pression  by  being  suffered  to  luxuriate  in 
anarchical  speculation,  and  to  deny  or  ridicule 
every  principle  on  which  the  institutions  of  the 
stale  reposed.  Neither  those  who  attribute  the 
downfall  of  the  old  French  institutions  to  the 
public  grievances,  nor  those  who  attribute  it  to 
the  doctrines  of  the  philosophers,  appear  to  us 
to  have  taken  into  their  view  more  than  one- 
half  of  the  subject.  Grievances  as  heavy 
have  often  been  endured  without  producing  a 
revolution  ;  doctrines  as  bold  have  often  been 
propounded  without  producing  a  revolution. 
The  question,  whether  the  French  nation 
was  alienated  from  its  okl  polity  by  the  fol 
lies  and  vices  of  the  viziers  and  sultanas 
who  pillaged  and  disgraced  it,  or  by  the  writ 
ings  of  Voltaire  and  Rousseau,  seems  to  us  as 
idle  as  the  question  whether  it  was  fire  or  gun 
powder  that  blew  up  the  mills  at  Hounslow. 
Neither  cause  would  have  sufficed  alone.  Ty 
ranny  may  last  through  ages  where  discussion 
is  suppressed.  Discussion  may  safely  be  left 
free  by  rulers  who  act  on  popular  principles. 
But  combine  a  press  like  that  of  London  with 
a  government  like  that  of  St.  Petersburg,  and 
the  inevitable  effect  will  be  an  explosion  that 
will  shake  the  world.  So  it  was  in  France. 
Despotism  and  license,  mingling  in  unblessed 
union,  engendered  that  mighty  Revolution  in 
which  ihe  lineaments  of  both  parents  were 
strangely  blended.  The  long  gestation  was  ac 
complished  ;  and  Europe  saw,  with  mixed  hope 
and  terror,  that  agonizing  travail  and  that  por 
tentous  birth. 

Among  the  crowd  of  legislators  which  at  this 
conjuncture  poured  from  all  the  provinces  of 
France  into  Paris,  Bardre  made  no  contempti 
ble  figure.  The  opinions  which  he  for  the  mo 
ment  professed  were  popular,  yet  not  extreme. 
His  character  was  fair;  his  personal  advan 
tages  are  said  to  have  been  considerable;  and, 
from  the  portrait  which  is  prefixed  to  these 
Memoirs,  and  which  represents  him  as  he  ap 
peared  in  the  Convention,  we  should  judge  that 
his  features  must  have  been  strikingly  hand 
some,  though  we  think  that  we  can  read  in  them 
cowardice  and  meanness  very  legibly  written 
by  the  hand  of  God.  His  conversation  was 
lively  and  easy  ;  his  manners  remarkably  good 
for  a  country  lawyer.  Women  of  rank  and 
wit  said  that  he  was  the  only  man  who,  on  his 
first  arrival  from  a  remote  province,  had  that 
indescribable  air  which  it  was  supposed  that 
Paris  alone  could  give.  His  eloquence,  in- 
ieed,  was  by  no  means  so  much  admired  in 
Ihe  capital  as  it  had  been  by  the  ingenious 
academicians  of  Montauban  and  Toulouse. 
His  style  was  thought  very  bad;  and  very  bad, 
if  a  foreigner  may  venture  to  judge,  it  con 
tinued  to  the  last.  It  would,  however,  be  un 
just  to  deny  that  he  had  some  talents  for 
speaking  an  I  writing.  His  rhetoric,  though 
deformed  by  every  imaginable  fault  of  taste, 


from  bombast  down  to  buffoon ry,  was  not 
wholly  without  force  and  vivacity.  He  ha<* 
also  one  quality  which,  in  active  life,  often 
gives  fourth-rate  men  an  advantage  over  first- 
rate  men.  Whatever  he  could  do,  he  could  do 
without  effort,  at  any  moment,  in  any  abun 
dance,  and  on  any  side  of  any  question.  There 
was,  indeed,  a  perfect  harmony  between  his 
moral  character  and  his  intellectual  character. 
His  temper  was  that  of  a  slave;  his  abilities 
were  exactly  those  which  qualified  him  to  be  a 
useful  slave.  Of  thinking  to  purpose,  he  was 
utterly  incapable;  but  he  had  wonderful  readi 
ness  in  arranging  and  expressing  thoughts  fur 
nished  by  others. 

In  thK  National  Assembly  he  had  no  oppor 
tunity  ol'  displaying  the  full  extent  either  of  his 
talents  or  of  his  vices.  He  was  indeed  eclipsed 
by  much  abler  men.  He  went,  as  was  his 
habit,  with  the  stream,  spoke  occasionally 
with  some  success,  and  edited  a  journal  called 
the  Point  du  Jour,  in  which  the  debates  of  the 
Assembly  were  reported. 

He  at  first  ranked  by  no  means  among  th« 
violent  reformers.  He  was  not  friendly  to 
that  new  division  of  the  French  territory 
which  was  among  the  most  important  changes 
introduced  by  the  Revolution,  and  was  espe 
cially  unwilling  to  see  his  native  province  dis 
membered.  He  was  entrusted  with  the  task 
of  framing  reports  on  the  woods  and  forests. 
Louis  was  exceedingly  anxious  about  this 
matter;  for  his  majesty  was  a  keen  sports 
man,  and  would  much  rather  have  gone  with 
out  the  veto,  or  the  prerogative  of  making 
peace  and  war,  than  without  his  hunting  and 
shooting.  Gentlemen  of  the  royal  household 
were  sent  to  Barere,  in  order  to  intercede  for 
the  deer  and  pheasants.  Nor  was  this  inter 
cession  unsuccessful.  The  reports  were  so 
drawn,  that  Barere  was  afterwards  accused  of 
having  dishonestly  sacrificed  the  interests  «f 
the  public  to  the  tastes  of  the  court.  To  one 
of  these  reports  he  had  the  inconceivable  folly 
and  bad  taste  to  prefix  a  punning  motto  from  Vir 
gil,  fit  only  for  such  essays  as  he  had  been  in 
the  habit  of  composing  for  the  Floral  Games— 

"  Si  canimus  sylvas,  sylvae  sint  Consulc  dignse." 

This  literary  foppery  was  one  of  the  few  things 
in  which  he  was  consistent.  Royalist  or  Gi 
rondist,  Jacobin  or  Imperialist,  he  was  always 
a  Trissotin. 

As  the  monarchical  party  becamo  weaker 
and  weaker,  Barere  gradually  estranged  him 
self  more  and  more  from  it,  and  drew  closer 
and  closer  to  the  republicans.  It  would  seem 
that,  during  this  transition,  he  was  for  a  time 
closely  connected  with  the  family  of  Orleans 
It  is  certain  that  he  was  entrusted  with  the 
guardianship  of  the  celebrated  Pamela,  after 
wards  Lady  Edward  Fitzgerald;  and  it  was 
asserted  that  he  received  during  some  years  a 
pension  of  twelve  thousand  franca  from  the 
Palais  Royal. 

At  the  end  of  September  1791,  the  laboms 
of  the  National  Assembly  terminated,  and 
those  of  the  first  and  last  Legislative  Assem 
bly  commenced. 

It  had  been  enacted  that  no  member  o*"  the 
National  Assembly  should  sit  in  the  Ieg;» 
3G* 


630 


MACAULAY'iS  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


lative  Assembly;  a  preposterous  and  mis 
chievous  regulation,  to  which  the  disasters 
which  followed  must  in  part  be  ascribed.  In 
England,  what  would  be  thought  of  a  parlia 
ment  which  did  not  contain  one  single  person 
who  had  ever  sat  in  parliament  before!  Yet 
it  may  safely  be  affirmed,  that  the  number  of 
Englishmen  who,  never  having  taken  any 
share  in  public  affairs,  are  yet  well  qualified, 
by  knowledge  and  observation,  to  be  members 
©f  the  legislature,  is  at  least  a  hundred  times  as 
great  a<?  the  number  of  Frenchmen  who  were 
so  qualified  in  1791.  How,  indeed,  should  it 
have  been  otherwise!  In  England,  centuries 
of  representative  government  have  made  all 
educated  people  in  some  measure  statesmen. 
In  France,  the  National  Assembly  had  pro 
bably  been  composed  of  as  good  materials  as 
were  then  to  be  found.  It  had  undoubtedly 
removed  a  vast  mass  of  abuses ;  some  of  its 
members  had  read  and  thought  much  about 
theories  of  government;  and  others  had  shown 
great  oratorical  talents.  But  that  kind  of  skill 
which  is  required  for  the  constructing,  launch 
ing,  and  steering  of  a  polity  was  lamentably 
wanting;  for  it  is  a  kind  of  skill  to  which 
practice  contributes  more  than  books.  Books 
are  indeed  useful  to  the  politician,  as  they  are 
useful  to  the  navigator  and  to  the  surgeon. 
But  the  real  navigator  is  formed  by  the 
waves;  the  real  surgeon  is  formed  at  bedsides; 
and  the  conflicts  of  free  states  are  the  real 
school  of  constitutional  statesmen.  The  Na 
tional  Assembly  had,  however,  now  served  an 
apprenticeship  of  two  laborious  and  eventful 
years.  It  had,  indeed,  by  no  means  finished 
its  education;  but  it  was  no  longer,  as  on  the 
day  when  it  met,  altogether  rude  to  political 
functions.  Its  later  proceedings  contain  abun 
dant  proof  that  the  members  had  profited  by 
their  experience.  Beyond  all  doubt,  there  was 
not  in  France  any  equal  number  of  persons 
possessing  in  an  equal  degree  the  qualities  ne 
cessary  for  the  judicious  direction  of  public 
affairs ;  and,  just  at  this  moment,  these  legisla 
tors,  misled  by  a  childish  wish  to  display  their 
own  disinterestedness,  deserted  the  duties  which 
they  had  half  learned,  and  which  nobody  else 
bad  learned  at  all,  and  left  their  hall  to  a  se 
cond  crowd  of  novices,  who  had  still  to  master 
the  first  rudiments  of  political  business.  When 
Barere  wrote  his  Memoirs,  the  absurdity  of 
this  self-denying  ordinance  had  been  proved 
by  events,  and  was,  we  believe,  acknowledged 
by  all  parties.  He  accordingly,  with  his  usual 
mendacity,  speaks  of  it  in  terms  implying  that 
he  had  opposed  it.  There  was,  he  tells  us,  no 
£ood  citizen  who  did  not  regret  this  fatal  vote. 
Nay,  all  wise  men,  he  says,  wished  the  Na 
tional  Assembly  to  continue  its  sittings  as  the 
first  Legislative  Assembly.  But  no  attention 
was  paid  to  the  wishes  of  the  enlightened  friends 
•f  liberty;  and  the  generous  but  fatal  suicide 
was  perpetrated.  Now  the  fact  is,  that  Barrre, 
far  from  opposing  this  ill-advised  measure, 
was  one  of  those  who  most  eagerly  supported 
it;  that  he  described  it  from  the  tribune  as  wise 
and  magnanimous;  and  that  he  assigned,  as 
liis  reasons  for  takinsj  this  vi^w,  some  of  those 
phrase*  in  which  orators  of  his  clnss  delight, 
and  which,  on  all  men  who  have  the  smallest 


insight  into  politics,  produce  an  effect  very 
similar  to  that  of  ipecacuanha.  "Those,"  he 
said,  "  who  have  framed  a  constitution  for  their 
country,  are,  so  to  speak,  out  of  the  pale  of 
that  social  state  of  which  they  are  the  authors; 
for  creative  power  is  not  in  the  same  sphere 
with  that  which  it  has  created." 

M.  Hippolyte  Carnot  has  noticed  this  untruth, 
and  attributes  it  to  mere  forgetfulness.  We 
leave  it  to  him  to  reconcile  his  very  charitable 
supposition  with  what  he  elsewhere  says  of  the 
remarkable  excellence  of  Barere's  memory. 

Many  members  of  the  National  Assembly 
were  indemnified  for  the  sacrifice  of  legislative 
power,  by  appointments  in  various  departments 
of  the  public  service.  Of  these  fortunate  per 
sons  Barere  was  one.  A  high  Court  of  Appeal 
had  just  been  instituted.  The  court  was  to  sit 
at  Paris  ;  but  its  jurisdiction  was  to  extend  over 
the  whole  realm,  and  the  departments  were  to 
choose  the  judges.  Barere  was  nominated  by 
the  department  of  the  Upper  Pyrenees,  and 
took  his  seat  in  the  Palace  of  Justice.  He 
asserts,  and  our  readers  may,  if  they  choose, 
believe,  that  it  was  about  this  time  in  contem 
plation  to  make  him  minister  of  the  interior, 
and  that,  in  order  to  avoid  so  grave  a  responsi 
bility,  he  obtained  permission  to  pay  a  visit  to 
his  native  place.  It  is  certain  that  he  left  Paris 
early  in  the  year  1792,  and  passed  some  months 
in  the  south  of  France. 

In  the  mean  time,  it  became  clear  that  the 
constitution  of  1791  would  not  work.  It  was, 
indeed,  not  to  be  expected  that  a  constitution, 
new  both  in  its  principles  and  its  details  would 
at  first  work  easily.  Had  the  chief  magistrate 
enjoyed  the  entire  confidence  of  the  people, 
had  he  performed  his  part  with  the  utmost 
zeal,  fidelity  and  ability,  had  the  representative 
body  included  all  the  wisest  statesmen  of 
France,  the  difficulties  might  still  have  been 
found  insuperable.  But,  in  fact,  the  experi 
ment  was  made  under  every  disadvantage. 
The  king,  very  naturally,  hated  the  constitu 
tion.  In  the  Legislative  Assembly  were  men 
of  genius  and  men  of  good  intentions,  but  not 
a  single  man  of  experience.  Nevertheless,  if 
France  had  been  suffered  to  settle  her  own 
affairs  without  foreign  interference,  it  is  possi 
ble  that  the  calamities  which  followed  might 
have  been  averted.  The  king  who,  with  many 
good  qualities,  was  sluggish  and  sensual,  might 
have  found  compensation  for  his  lost  preroga 
tives  in  his  immense  civil  list,  in  his  palaces 
and  hunting-grounds,  in  soups,  Perigrord  pies, 
and  Champagne.  The  people,  finding  them 
selves  secure  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  valuable 
reforms  which  the  National  Assembly  had,  in 
the  midst  of  all  its  errors,  effected,  would  not 
have  been  easily  excited  by  demagogues  to 
acts  of  atrocity;  or,  if  acts  of  atrocity  had 
been  committed,  those  acts  would  probably 
have  produced  a  speedy  and  violent  reaction. 
Had  tolerable  quiet  been  preserved  during  a 
few  years,  the  constitution  of  1791  might,  per 
haps,  have  taken  root,  mi«ht  have  gradually 
acquired  the  strength  which  time  alone  can 
give,  and  might,  with  some  modifications 
which  were  undoubtedly  needed,  have  lasted 
down  to  the  present  time.  The  European 
coalition  against  the  Revolution  extinguished 


BARERE'3  MEMOIRS. 


631 


all  hope  of  such  a  result.  The  deposition  of  | 
Louis  was,  in  our  opinion,  the  necessary  con-  ' 
sequence  of  that  coalition.  The  question  was 
now  no  longer,  whether  the  king  should  have 
an  absolute  veto  or  a  suspensive  veto,  whether 
there  should  be  one  chamber  or  two  chambers, 
whether  the  members  of  the  representative 
body  should  be  re-eligible  or  not;  but  whether 
France  should  belong  to  the  French.  The  in 
dependence  of  the  nation,  the  integrity  of  the 
territory,  were  at  stake;  and  we  must  say 
plainly,  that  we  cordially  approve  of  the  con- 
Suet  of  those  Frenchmen  who,  at  that  conjunc 
ture,  resolved,  like  our  own  Blake,  to  play  the 
men  for  their  country,  under  whatever  form  of 
government  their  country  might  fall. 

It  seems  to  us  clear  that  the  war  with  the  con 
tinental  coalition  was,  on  the  side  of  France,  at 
first  a  defensive  war,  and  therefore  a  just  war. 
It  was  not  a  war  for  small  objects,  or  against 
despicable  enemies.  On  the  event  were  staked 
all  the  dearest  interests  of  the  French  people. 
Foremost  among  the  threatening  powers  ap 
peared  IAVO  great  and  martial  monarchies, 
either  of  \vhich,  situated  as  France  then  was, 
might  be  regarded  as  a  formidable  assailant. 
It  is  evident  that,  under  such  circumstances, 
the  French  could  not,  without  extreme  impru 
dence,  entrust  the  supreme  administration  of 
their  affairs  to  any  person  whose  attachment 
to  the  national  cause  admitted  of  doubt.  Now, 
it  is  no  reproach  to  the  memory  of  Louis  to 
say,  that  he  was  not  attached  to  the  national 
cause.  Had  he  been  so,  he  Avould  have  been 
something  more  than  man.  He  had  held  abso 
lute  power,  not  by  usurpation,  but  by  the  acci 
dent  of  birth  and  by  the  ancient  polity  of  the 
kingdom.  That  power  he  had,  on  the  Avhole, 
used  with  lenity.  He  had  meant  well  by  his 
people.  He  had  been  willing  to  make  to  them, 
of  his  own  mere  motion,  concessions  such  as 
scarcely  any  other  sovereign  has  ever  made 
except  under  duress.  He  had  paid  the  penalty 
of  faults  not  his  own,  of  the  haughtiness  and 
ambition  of  some  of  his  predecessors,  of  the 
dissoluteness  and  baseness  of  others.  He  had 
been  vanquished,  taken  captive,  led  in  triumph, 
put  in  ward.  He  had  escaped ;  he  had  been 
caught;  he  had  been  dragged  back  like  a  run 
away  galley-slave  to  the  oar.  He  was  still  a 
state  prisoner.  His  quiet  was  broken  by  daily 
affronts  and  lampoons.  Accustomed  from  the 
cradle  to  be  treated  with  profound  reverence, 
he  was  now  forced  to  command  his  feelings, 
while  men,  who,  a  few  months  before,  had  been 
hackney  writers  or  country  attorneys,  sat  in 
his  presence  with  covered  heads,  and  addressed 
him  in  the  easy  tone  of  equality.  Conscious 
of  fair  intentions,  sensible  of  hard  usage,  he 
doubtless  detested  the  Revolution  ;  and,  while 
charged  with  the  conduct  of  the  war  against 
the  confederates,  pined  in  secret  for  the  sight 
of  the  German  eagles  and  the  sound  of  the 
German  drums.  We  do  not  blame  him  for 
this.  But  can  we  blame  those  who,  being  re 
solved  to  defend  the  Avork  of  the  National 
Assembly  against  the  interference  of  strangers, 
were  not  disposed  to  have  him  at  their  head  in 
the  fearful  struggle  which  Avas  approaching? 
We  have  nothing  to  say  in  defence  or  extenua 
tion  of  the  insolence,  injustice,  and  cruelty, 


with  which,  after  the  victory  of  the  republi 
cans,  he  and  his  family  were  treated.  But  this 
we  say,  that  the  French  had  only  one  alterna 
tive,  to  deprive  him  of  the  powers  of  first 
magistrate,  or  to  ground  their  arms  and  sub 
mit  patiently  to  foreign  dictation.  The  events 
of  the  tenth  of  August  sprang  inevitably  from 
the  league  of  Pilnitz.  The  king's  palace  was 
stormed;  his  guards  were  slaughtered.  He 
was  suspended  from  his  regal  functions  ;  and 
the  Legislative  Assembly  invited  the  nation  to 
elect  an  extraordinary  Convention,  \vith  full 
powers  which  the  conjuncture  required.  To 
this  Convention  the  members  of  the  National 
Assembly  were  eligible;  and  Barere  was 
chosen  by  his  own  department. 

The  Convention  met  on  the  twenty-first  of 
September,  1792.  The  first  proceedings  were 
unanimous.  Royalty  Avas  abolished  by  accla 
mation.  No  objections  were  made  to  this 
great  change,  and  no  reasons  Avere  assigned 
for  it.  For  certainly  we  cannot  honour  Avith 
the  name  of  reasons  such  apophthegms,  as 
that  kings  are  in  the  moral  Avorld  what  mon 
sters  are  in  the  physical  world;  and  that  the 
history  of  kings  is  the  rnartyrology  of  nations. 
But  though  the  discussion  was  worthy  only  of 
a  debating-club  of  school-boys,  the  resolution 
to  which  the  Convention  came  seems  to  have 
been  that  which  sound  policy  dictated.  Ir 
saying  this  we  do  not  mean  to  express  an 
opinion  that  a  republic  is,  either  in  the  abstract 
the  best  form  of  government,  or  is,  under  ordi 
nary  circumstances,  the  form  of  government 
best  suited  to  the  French  people.  Our  own, 
opinion  is,  that  the  best  governments  which 
have  ever  existed  in  the  world  have  been 
limited  monarchies;  and  that  France,  in  par 
ticular,  has  never  enjoyed  so  much  prosperity 
and  freedom  as  under  a  limited  monarchy. 
Nevertheless,  \ve  approve  of  the  vote  of  the 
Convention  Avhich  abolished  kingly  govern 
ment.  The  interference  of  foreign  powers  had 
brought  on  a  crisis  which  made  extraordinary 
measures  necessary.  Hereditary  monarchy 
may  be,  and  we  believe  that  it  is,  a  very  use 
ful  institution  in  a  country  like  France.  And 
masts  are  very  useful  parts  of  a  ship.  But,  if 
the  ship  is  on  her  beam-ends,  it  may  be  neces 
sary  to  cut  the  masts  a\vay.  When  once  she 
has  righted,  she  may  come  safe  into  port  under 
jury  rigging,  and  there  be  completely  repaired. 
But,  in  the  mean  time,  she  must  be  hacked 
with  unsparing  hand,  lest  that  which,  under 
ordinary  circumstances,  is  an  essential  part  of 
her  fabric.,  should,  in  her  extreme  distress,  sink 
her  to  the  bottom.  Even  so  there  are  politica* 
emergencies  in  which  it  is  necessary  that 
governments  should  be  mutilated  of  their  fair 
proportions  for  a  time,  lest  they  be  cast  aAvay 
for  ever;  and  with  such  an  emergency  the 
Convention  had  to  deal.  The  first  object  of  a 
srood  Frenchman  should  have  been  to  save 
France  from  the  fate  of  Poland.  The  first 
requisite  of  a  government  was  entire  devotion 
to  the  national  cause.  That  requisite  was 
wan-ting  in  Louis ;  and  such  a  Avant,  at  such  a 
moment,  could  nut  be  supplied  by  any  public 
or  private  virtues.  ,  If  the  king  were  set  aside, 
the  abolition  of  kingship  necessarily  followed. 
In  the  state  in  Avhich  the  public  mind  ther,  was 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


it  would  have  been  idle  to  think  of  doing  what 
our  ancestors  did  in  1688,  and  what  the  French 
Chamber  of  Deputies  did  in  1830.  Such  an 
ittempt  would  have  failed  amidst  universal 
derision  and  execration.  It  would  have  dis 
gusted  all  zealous  men  of  all  opinions;  and 
there  were  then  few  men  who  were  not  zeal 
ous.  Parties  fatigued  by  long  conflict,  and 
instructed  by  the  severe  discipline  of  that 
school  in  which  alone  mankind  will  learn, 
are  disposed  to  listen  to  the  voice  of  a  me 
diator.  But  when  they  are  in  their  first  heady 
youth,  devoid  of  experience,  fresh  for  exertion, 
flushed  with  hope,  burning  with  animosity,  they 
agree  only  in  spurning  out  of  their  way  the 
daysman  who  strives  to  take  his  stand  between 
them  and  to  lay  his  hand  upon  them  both. 
Such  was  in  1792  the  state  of  France.  On 
one  side  was  the  great  name  of  the  heir  of 
Hugh  Capet,  the  thirty-third  king  of  the  third 
race ;  on  the  other  side  was  the  great  name  of 
the  Republic.  There  was  no  rally  ing-point 
save  these  two.  It  was  necessary  to  make  a 
choice  ;  and  those,  in  our  opinion,  judged  well 
who,  waiving  for  the  moment  all  subordinate 
puestions,  preferred  independence  to  subjuga 
tion,  the  natal  soil  to  the  emigrant  camp. 

As  to  the  abolition  of  royalty,  and  as  to  the 
vigorous  prosecution  of  the  war,  the  whole 
Convention  seemed  to  be  united  as  one  man. 
But  a  deep  and  broad  gulf  separated  the  repre 
sentative  body  into  two  great  parties. 

On  one  side  were  those  statesmen  who  are 
called,  from  the  name  of  the  department  which 
some  of  them  represented,  the  Girondists,  and, 
from  the  name  of  one  of  their  most  conspicuous 
leaders,  the  Brissotines.  In  activity  and  prac 
tical  ability,  Brissot  and  Gensonne  were  the 
most  conspicuous  among  them.  In  parliamen 
tary  eloquence,  no  Frenchman  of  that  time  can 
be  considered  as  equal  to  Vergniaud.  In  a 
foreign  country,  and  after  the  lapse  of  half  a 
century,  some  parts  of  his  speeches  are  still 
read  with  mournful  admiration.  No  man,  we 
are  inclined  to  believe,  ever  rose  so  rapidly  to 
such  a  height  of  oratorical  excellence.  His 
whole  public  life  lasted  barely  i  wo  years.  This 
is  a  circumstance  which  distinguishes  him 
from  our  own  greatest  speakers,  Fox,  Burke, 
Pitt,  Sheridan,  Windham,  Canning.  Which 
of  these  celebrated  men  would  now  be  remem 
bered  as  an  orator,  if  he  had  died  two  years 
after  he  first  took  his  seat  in  the  house  of  Com 
mons  1  Condorcet  brought  to  the  Girondist 
party  a  different  kind  of  strength.  The  public 
regarded  him  with  justice  as  an  eminent  mathe 
matician,  and,  with  less  reason,  as  a  great 
master  of  ethical  and  political  science;  the 
philosophers  considered  him  as  their  chief,  as 
the  rightful  heir,  by  intellectual  descent,  and  by 
solemn  adoption,  of  their  deceased  sovereign 
D'Alembert.  In  the  same  ranks  were  found 
Unadet,  Isnard,  Barbaroux,  Buzot,  Louvet,  too 
•well  known  as  the  author  of  a  very  ingenuous 
and  very  licentious  romance,  and  more  honour- 
aoly  distinguished  by  the  generosity  with  which 
he  pleaded  for  the  unfortunate,  and  by  the  in 
trepidity  with  which  he  defied  the  wicked  and 
powerful.  Two  persons  whose  talents  were 
not  brilliant,  but  who  enjoyed  a  high  reputation 
ior  probity  and  public  spirit,  Petion  and  Roland, 


lent  the  whole  weight  of  their  names  to  the 
Girondist  connection.  The  wife  of  Roland 
brought  to  the  deliberations  of  htr  husband's 
friends  masculine  courage  and  force  of  thought, 
tempered  by  womanly  grace  and  vivacity.  Nor 
was  the  splendour  of  a  great  military  reputa 
tion  wanting  to  this  celebrated  party.  Dumou- 
rier,  then  victorious  over  the  foreign  invaders, 
and  at  the  height  of  popular  favour,  must  be 
reckoned  among  the  allies  of  the  Gironde. 

The  errors  of  the  Brissotines  were  undoubt 
edly  neither  few  nor  small ;  but  when  we 
fairly  corn  pare  their  conduct  with  the  conduct  of 
any  other  party  which  acted  or  suffered  during 
the  French  Revolution,  we  are  forced  to  admit 
their  superiority  in  every  quality  except  that 
single  quality  which,  in  such  times,  prevails 
over  every  other — decision.  They  were  zeal 
ous  for  the  great  social  reform  which  had  been 
effected  by  the  National  Assembly;  and  they 
were  right.  For  though  that  reform  was,  in 
some  respects,  carried  too  far,  it  was  a  blessing 
well  worth  even  the  fearful  price  which  has  been 
paid  for  it.  They  were  resolved  to  maintain 
the  independence  of  their  country  against  for 
eign  invaders  ;  and  they  were  right.  For  the 
heaviest  of  all  yokes  is  the  yoke  of  the  stranger. 
They  thought  that,  if  Louis  remained  at  their 
head  they  could  not  carry  on  with  the  requisite 
energy  the  conflict  against  the  European  coali 
tion.  They  therefore  concurred  in  establishing 
a  republican  government;  and  here,  again, 
they  were  right.  For  in  that  struggle  for  life 
and  death,  it  would  have  been  madness  to  trust 
a  hostile  or  even  a  half-hearted  leader. 

Thus  far  they  went  along  with  the  revolu 
tionary  movement.  At  this  point  they  stopped; 
and,  in  our  judgment,  they  were  right  in  stop 
ping,  as  they  had  been  right  in  moving.  For 
great  ends,  and  under  extraordinary  circum 
stances,  they  had  concurred  in  measures  which, 
together  with  much  good,  had  necessarily  pro 
duced  much  evil;  which  had  unsettled  the 
public  mind ;  which  had  taken  axvay  from 
government  the  sanction  of  prescription  ;  which 
had  loosened  the  very  foundations  of  property 
and  law.  They  thought  that  it  was  now  their 
duty  to  prop  what  it  had  recently  been  their  duty 
to  batter.  They  loved  liberty,  but  liberty  associ 
ated  with  order,  with  justice,  with  mercy,  and 
with  civilization.  They  were  republicans;  but 
they  were  desirous  to  adorn  their  Republic  with 
all  that  had  given  grace  and  dignity  to  the  fallen 
monarchy.  They  hoped  that  the  humanity,  the 
courtesy,  the  taste,  which  had  done  much  in, 
old  times  to  mitigate  the  slavery  of  France, 
would  now  lend  additional  charms  to  her  free, 
dom.  They  saw  with  horror  crimes  exceeding 
in  atrocity  those  which  had  disgraced  the 
infuriated  religious  factions  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  perpetrated  in  the  name  of  reason 
and  philanthropy.  They  demanded,  with  elo 
quent  vehemence,  that  the  authors  of  the  lawless 
massacre  which,  just  before  the  meeting  of  the 
Convention,  had  been  committed  in  the  prisons 
of  Paris,  should  be  brought  to  condign  punish 
ment.  They  treated  with  just  contempt  the 
pleas  which  have  been  set  up  for  that  great 
crime.  They  admitted  that  the  public  danger 
was  pressing;  but  they  denied  that  it  justified 
a  violation  of  those  principles  of  morality  on 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


633 


which  ail  society  rests.  The  independence  and 
honour  of  France  were  indeed  to  be  vindicated, 
but  to  be  vindicated  by  triumphs  and  not  by 
murders. 

Opposed  to  the  Girondists  was  a  party  which, 
having  been  long  execrated  throughout  the 
civilized  world,  has  of  late — such  is  the  ebb  and 
flow  of  opinion — found  not  only  apologists,  but 
even  eulogists.  We  are  not  disposed  to  deny 
that  some  members  of  the  Mountain  were  sin 
cere  and  public-spirited  men.  But  even  the 
best  of  them,  Carnot,  for  example,  and  Cambon, 
were  far  too  unscrupulous  as  to  the  means 
which  they  employed  for  the  purpose  of  attain 
ing  great  ends.  In  the  train  of  these  enthusiasts 
followed  a  crowd,  composed  of  all  who,  from 
sensual,  sordid  or  malignant  motives,  wished 
for  a  period  of  boundless  license. 

When  the  Convention  met,  the  majority  was 
with  the  Girondists,  and  Barere  was  with  the 
majority.  On  the  king's  trial,  indeed,  he  quit 
ted  the  party  with  which  he  ordinarily  acted, 
voted  with  the  Mountain,  and  spoke  against 
the  prisoner  with  a  violence  such  as  few  mem- 
bers  even  of  Ihe  Mountain  showed. 

The  conduct  of  the  leading  Girondists  on 
that  occasion  was  little  to  their  honour.  Of 
cruelty,  indeed,  we  fully  acquit  them  ;  but  it  is 
impossible  to  acquit  them  of  criminal  irreso 
lution  and  disingenuousness.  They  were  far, 
indeed,  f;«r  from,  thirsting  for  the  blood  of  Louis; 
on  the  contrarv,  they  were  most  desirous  to 
protect  him.  But  they  were  afraid  that,  if  they 
went  straight  forward  to  their  object,  the  sin 
cerity  of  their  attachment  to  republican  insti 
tutions  would  be  suspected.  They  wished  to 
save  the  kind's  life,  and  yet  to  obtain  all  the 
credit  of  having  been  regicides.  Accordinsly, 
they  traced  out  for  themselves  a  crooked 
course,  by  which  they  hoped  to  attain  both 
their  objects.  They  first  voted  the  king  guilty. 
They  then  voted  for  referring  the  question  re 
specting:  his  fate  to  the  whole  body  of  the  people. 
Defeated  in  this  attempt  to  rescue  him,  they 
reluctantly,  ard  with  ill-suppressed  shame  and 
concern,  voted  for  the  capital  sentence.  Then 
they  made  a  last  attempt  in  his  favour,  and 
voted  for  respiting  the  execution.  These  zig 
zag  politics  produced  the  effect  which  any  man 
conversant  with  public  affairs  might  have  fore 
seen.  The  Girondists,  instead  of  attaining 
both  their  ends  failed  of  both.  The  Mountain 
justly  charged  them  with  having  attempted  to 
save  the  king  by  underhand  means.  Their 
own  consciences  told  them,  with  equal  justice, 
that  '.heir  hands  had  been  dipped  in  the  blood 
of  the  most  inoffensive  and  most  unfortunate 
of  men.  The  direct  path  was  here,  as  usual, 
the  path  riot  only  of  honour  but  of  safety.  The 
principle  on  which  the  Girondists  stood  as  a 
party  was,  that  the  season  for  revolutionary 
violence  was  over,  and  that  the  reign  of  law 
and  order  ought  now  to  commence.  But  the 
proceeding  against  the  king  was  clearly  revo 
lutionary  in  its  nature.  It  was  not  in  confor 
mity  with  the  laws.  The  only  plea  for  it  was, 
that  all  ordinary  rules  of  jurisprudence  and  | 
morality  were  suspended  by  the  extreme  public 
danger.  This  was  the  very  plea  which  the  j 
Mountain  urged  in  defence  of  the  massacre  of  I 
September,  nnd  to  which,  when  so  urged,  the  j 
V«t  V.— 80 


j  Girondists  refused  to  "listen.  They  therefore, 
i  by  voting  for  the  death  of  the  king,  conceded 
!  to  the  Mountain  the  chief  point  at  Kssue  be 
tween  the  two  parties.  Had  they  given  a 
manful  vote  against  the  capital  sentence,  the 
regicides  would  have  been  in  a  minority,  it 
is  probable  that  there  would  have  been  an  im 
mediate  appeal  to  force.  The  Girondists  might 
have  been  victorious.  In  the  worst  event, 
they  would  have  fallen  with  unblemished 
honour.  Thus  much  is  certain,  that  their 
boldness  and  honesty  could  not  possibly  have 
produced  a  worse  effect  than  was  actually  pro 
duced  by  their  timidity  and  their  stratagems. 

Barere,  as  we  have  said,  sided  with  the 
Mountain  on  this  occasion.  He  voted  against 
the  appeal  to  the  people,  and  against  the  re 
spite.  His  demeanour  and  his  language  also 
were  widely  different  from  those  of  the  Giron 
dists.  Their  hearts  were  heavy,  and  their  de 
portment  was  that  of  men  oppressed  by  sorrow. 
It  was  Vergniaud's  duty  to  proclaim  the  result 
of  the  roll-call.  His  face  was  pale,  and  he 
trembled  with  emotion,  as  in  a  low  and  broken 
voice  he  announced  that  Louis  was  condemned 
to  death.  Barere  had  not,  it  is  true,  yet  at 
tained  to  full  perfection  in  the  art  of  mingling 
jests  and  conceits  with  words  of  death  ;  but 
he  already  gave  promise  of  his- future  excel 
lence  in  this  high  department  of  Jacobin  ora 
tory.  He  concluded  his  speech  with  a  sentence 
worthy  of  his  head  and  heart.  "The  tree  of 
liberty,"  he  said,  "as  an  ancient  author  re 
marks,  flourishes  when  it  is  watered  with  the 
blood  of  all  classes  of  tyrants."  M.  Hippolyte 
Carnot  has  quoted  this  passage,  in  order,  as 
we  suppose,  to  do  honour  to  his  hero.  We 
wish  that  a  note  had  been  added  to  inform  us 
from  what  ancient  author  Barere  quoted.  In 
the  course  of  our  own  small  reading  among 
the  Greek  and  Latin  writers,  we  have  not  hap 
pened  to  fall  in  with  trees  of  liberty  and  wa 
tering-pots  full  of  b'ood;  nor  can  we,  such  is 
ur  ignorance  of  classical  antiquity,  even 
imagine  an  Attic  or  Roman  orator  employing 
imagery  of  that  sort.  In  plain  words,  when 
Barere  talked  about  an  ancient  author,  he  was 
lying,  as  he  generally  was  when  he  asserted 
any  fact,  great  or  small.  Why  he  lied  on  this 
occasion  we  cannot  guess,  unless,  indeed,  it 
was  to  keep  his  hand  in. 

It  is  not  improbable  that,  but  for  one  circum 
stance,  Barere  would,  like  most  of  those  with 
whom  he  ordinarily  acted,  have  voted  for  the 
appeal  to  the  people  and  for  the  respite.  But, 
just  before  the  commencement  of  the  trial, 
papers  had  been  discovered  which  proved  that, 
while  a  member  of  the  National  Assembly,  he 
had  been  in  communication  with  the  court  re 
specting  his  reports  on  the  woods  and  forests. 
He  was  acquitted  of  all  criminality  by  the 
Convention;  but  the  fiercer  republicans  con 
sidered  him  as  a  tool  of  the  fallen  monarch; 
and  this  reproach  was  long  repeated  in  the 
journal  of  Marat,  and  in  the  speeches  at  the 
Jacobin  club.  It  was  natural  that  a  man  like 
Barere  should,  under  such  circumstances,  try 
to  distinguish  himself  among  the  crowd  of  re 
gicides  by  peculiar  ferocity.  It  was  because 
he  had  been  a  royalist  that  he  was  one  of  the 
foremost  in  shedding  blood. 


634 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  king  was  no  more.  The  leading  Giron 
dists  had,  by  their  conduct  towards  him,  lowered 
their  character  in  the  eyes  both  of  friends  and 
foes.  They  still,  however,  maintained  the  con 
test  against  the  Mountain,  called  for  vengeance 
on  the  assassins  of  September,  and  protested 
against  the  anarchical  and  sanguinary  doc 
trines  of  Marat.  For  a  time  they  seemed  likely 
to  prevail.  As  publicists  and  orators  they  had 
no  rivals  in  the  Convention.  They  had  with 
them,  beyond  all  doubt,  the  great  majority  both 
of  the  deputies  and  of  the  French  nation. 
These  advantages,  it  should  seem,  ought  to 
have  decided  the  event  of  the  struggle.  But 
the  opposite  party  had  compensating  advanta 
ges  of  a  different  kind.  The  chiefs  of  the 
Mountain,  though  not  eminently  distinguished 
by  eloquence  or  knowledge,  had  great  audacity, 
activity,  and  determination.  The  Convention 
and  France  were  against  them ;  but  the  mob 
of  Paris,  the  clubs  of  Paris,  and  the  municipal 
government  of  Paris,  were  on  their  side. 

The  policy  of  the  Jacobins,  in  this  situation, 
was  to  subject  France  to  an  aristocracy  in 
finitely  worse  than  that  aristocracy  which 
had  emigrated  with  the  Count  of  Artois — 
to  an  aristocracy  not  of  birth,  not  of  wealth, 

not    of   education,    but    of   mere    locality 

They  would  not  hear  of  privileged  orders;  but 
they  wished  to  have  a  privileged  city.  That 
twenty-five  millions  of  Frenchmen  should 
be  ruled  by  a  hundred  thousand  gentlemen 
and  clergymen  was  insufferable ;  but  that 
twenty-five  millions  of  Frenchmen  should  be 
ruled  by  a  hundred  thousand  Parisians,  was  as 
it  should  be.  The  qualification  of  a  member 
of  the  new  oligarchy  was  simplv  that  he  should 
live  near  the  hall  where  the  Convention  met, 
and  should  be  able  to  squeeze  himself  daily 
into  the  gallery  during  a  debate,  and  now  and 
then  to  attend  with  a  pike  for  the  purpose  of 
blockading  the  doors.  It  was  quite  agreeable 
to  the  maxims  of  the  Mountain,  that  a  score 
of  draymen  from  Santerre's  brewery,  or  of 
devils  from  Hubert's  printing-house,  should  be 
permitted  to  drown  the  voices  of  men  commis 
sioned  to  speak  the  sense  of  such  cities  as 
Marseilles,  Bordeaux,  and  Lyons  ;  and  that  a 
rabble  of  half-naked  porters  from  the  Faubourg 
St.  Antoine,  should  have  power  to  annul  de 
crees  for  which  the  representatives  of  fifty  or 
sixty  departments  had  voted.  It  was  necessary 
to  find  some  pretext  for  so  odious  and  absurd 
a  tyranny.  Such  a  pretext  was  found.  To  the 
old  phrases  of  liberty  and  equality  were  added 
the  sonorous  watchwords,  unity  and  indivisi 
bility.  A  new  crime  was  inven  ed,  and  called 
by  the  name  of  federalism.  The  object  of  the 
Girondists,  it  was  asserted,  was  to  break  up 
the  great  nation  into  little  independent  com 
monwealths,  bound  together  only  by  a  league 
like  that  which  connects  the  Swiss  cantons  or 
the  United  States  of  America.  The  great  ob 
stacle  in  the  way  of  this  pernicious  design 
was  the  influence  cf  Paris.  To  strengthen  the 
influence  of  Paris  ought,  therefore,  to  be  the 
chief  object  of  every  patriot. 

The  accusation  brought  against  the  leaders 
of  the  Girondist  part;r  was  a  mere  calumny. 
They  were  undoubtedly  desirous  to  prevent  the 
capital  from  domineering  over  the  Republic, 


|  and  would  gladly  have  seen  the  Convention 
removed  for  a  time  to  some  provincial  town,  or 
placed  under  the  protection  of  a  trusty  guard, 
which  might  have  overawed  the  Parisian 
mob;  but  there  is  not  the  slightest  reason  to 
suspect  them  of  any  design  against  the  unity 
of  the  state.  Barere,  however,  really  was  a 
federalist,  and,  we  are  inclined  to  believe,  the 
only  federalist  in  the  Convention.  As  far  as  a 
man  so  unstable  and  servile  can  be  said  to  have 
felt  any  preference  for  any  form  of  government, 
he  felt  a  preference  for  federal  government. 
He  was  born  under  the  Pyrenees;  he  was  a 
Gascon  of  the  Gascons,  one  of  a  people  strong, 
ly  distinguished  by  intellectual  and  moral  cha 
racter,  by  manners,  by  modes  of  speech,  by 
accent,  and  by  physiognomy,  from  the  French 
of  the  Seine  and  of  the  Loire;  and  he  had  many 
of  the  peculiarities  of  the  race  to  which  he  be 
longed.  When  he  first  left  his  own  province 
he  had  attained  his  thirty-fourth  year,  and  had 
acquired  a  high  local  reputation  for  eloquence 
and  literature.  He  had  then  visited  Paris  for 
the  first  time.  He  had  found  himself  in  a  new 
world.  His  feelings  were  those  of  a  banished 
man.  It  is  clear  also  that  he  had  been  by  no 
means  without  his  share  of  the  small  disap 
pointments  and  humiliations  so  often  experi 
enced  by  men  of  letters  who,  elated  by  provin 
cial  applause,  venture  to  display  their  powers 
before  the  fastidious  critics  of  a  capital.  On 
the  other  hand,  whenever  he  revisited  the 
mountains  among  which  he  had  been  born,  he 
found  himself  an  object  of  general  admiration. 
His  dislike  of  Paris,  and  his  partiality  to  his 
native  district,  were  therefore  as  strong  and 
durable  as  any  sentiments  of  a  mind  like  his 
could  be.  He  long  continued  to  maintain  that 
the  ascendency  of  one  great  city  was  the  bane 
of  France;  that  the  superiority  of  taste  and  in 
telligence  which  it  was  the  fashion  to  ascribe 
to  the  inhabitants  of  that  city  were  wholly  ima 
ginary;  and  that  the  nation  would  never  enjoy 
a  really  good  government  till  the  Alsatian  peo 
ple,  the  Breton  people,  the  people  of  Beam,  the 
people  of  Provence,  should  have  each  an  inde 
pendent  existence,  and  laws  suited  to  its  own 
tastes  and  habits.  These  communities  he  pro 
posed  to  unite  by  a  tie  similar  to  that  which 
binds  together  the  grave  Puritans  of  Connec 
ticut,  and  the  dissolute  slave-drivers  of  New 
Orleans.  To  Paris  he  was  unwilling  to  grant 
even  the  rank  which  Washington  holds  in  the 
United  States.  He  thought  it  desirable  that 
the  congress  of  the  French  federation  should 
have  no  fixed  place  of  meeting,  but  should  sit 
sometimes  at  Rouen,  sometimes  at  Bordeaux, 
sometimes  at  his  own  Toulouse. 

Animated  by  such  feelings,  he  was,  till  the 
close  of  May.  1793,  a  Girondist,  if  not  an  ultra- 
Girondist.  He  exclaimed  against  those  impure 
and  blood-thirsty  men  who  wished  to  make  the 
public  danger  a  pretext  for  cruelty  and  rapine, 
"Peril,"  he  said,  "could  be  no  excuse  for 
crime.  It  is  when  the  wind  blows  hard,  and 
the  waves  run  high,  that  the  anchor  is  most 
needed;  it  is  when  a  revolution  is  raging,  that 
the  srreat  laws  of  morality  are  most  necessary 
to  the  safety  of  a  state."  Of  Marnt  he  spoke 
with  abhorrence  and  contempt;  of  the  munici 
pal  authorities  of  Paris  with  just  severity.  Hr 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


635 


.c-idly  complained  that  there  were  Frenchmen 
Who  paid  to  the  Mountain  that  homage  which 
was  due  to  the  Convention  alone.  When  the 
establishment  of  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal 
was  first  proposed,  he  joined  himself  to  Verg- 
niaud  and  Buzot,  who  strongly  objected  to  that 
odious  measure.  "It  cannot  be,"  exclaimed 
Barere,  "  that  men  really  attached  to  liberty  will 
imitate  the  most  frightful  excesses  of  despo 
tism  !"  He  proved  to  the  Convention,  after  his 
fashion,  out  of  Sallust,  that  such  arbitrary 
courts  may  indeed,  for  a  time,  be  severe  only 
on  real  criminals,  but  must  inevitably  degene 
rate  into  instruments  of  private  cupidity  and 
revenge.  When,  on  the  tenth  of  March,  the 
worst  part  of  the  population  of  Paris  made  the 
first  unsuccessful  attempt  to  destroy  the  Giron 
dists,  Barere  eagerly  called  for  vigorous  mea 
sures  of  repression  and  punishment.  On  the 
second  of  April,  another  attempt  of  the  Jaco 
bins  of  Paris  to  usurp  supreme  dominion  over 
the  Republic,  was  brought  to  the  knowledge  of 
the  Convention  ;  and  again  Barere  spoke  with 
warmth  against  the  new  tyranny  which  afflict 
ed  France,  and  declared  that  the  people  of  the 
departments  would  never  crouch  beneath  the 
tyranny  of  one  ambitious  city.  He  even  pro 
posed  a  resolution  to  the  effect,  that  the  Con 
vention  would  exert  against  the  demagogues 
of  the  capital  the  same  energy  which  had  been 
exerted  against  the  tyrant  Louis.  We  are  as 
sured  that,  in  private  as  in  public,  he  at  this 
time  uniformly  spoke  with  strong  aversion  of 
the  Mountain. 

His  apparent  zeal  for  the  cause  of  humanity 
and  order  had  its  reward.  Early  in  April, 
came  the  tidings  of  Dumourier's  defection. 
This  was  a  heavy  blow  to  the  Girondists.  Du- 
mourier  was  their  general.  His  victories  had 
thrown  a  lustre  on  the  whole  party;  his  army, 
it  had  been  hoped,  would,  in  the  worst  event, 
protect  the  deputies  of  the  nation  against  the 
ragged  pikemen  of  the  garrets  of  Paris.  He 
was  now  a  deserter  and  an  exile ;  and  those 
who  had  lately  placed  their  chief  reliance  on 
his  support,  were  compelled  to  join  with  their 
deadliest  enemies  in  execrating  his  treason. 
At  this  perilous  Conjuncture,  it  was  resolved  to 
appoint  a  committee  of  public  safety,  and  to 
arm  that  committee  with  powers,  small  indeed 
when  compared  with  those  which  it  afterwards 
drew  to  itself,  but  still  great  and  formidable. 
The  moderate  party,  regarding  Barere  as  a 
representative  of  their  feelings  and  opinions, 
elected  him  a  member.  In  his  new  situation 
he  soon  began  to  make  himsdf  useful.  He 
brought  to  the  deliberations  of  the  committee, 
not  indeed  the  knowledge  or  the  ability  of  a 
great  statesman,  but  a  tongue  and  a  pen  which, 
if  others  would  only  supply  ideas,  never  paused 
/or  want  of  words.  His  mind  was  a  mere 
organ  of  communication  between  other  minds. 
It  originated  nothing;  it  retained  nothing;  but 
it  transmitted  every  thing.  The  post  assigned 
Vo  him  by  his  colleagues  was  not  really  of  the 
highest  importance  ;  but  it  was  prominent,  and 
drew  the  attention  of  all  Europe.  When  a 
great  measure  was  to  be  brought  forward,  when 
an  account  was  to  be  rendered  of  an  important 
event,  he  was  generally  the  mouthpiece  of  the 
administration.  He  was  therefore  not  unna- 


|  turally  considered,  by  persons  who  lived  at  a 

distance   from   the   seat   of  government,   and 

above  all  by  foreigners  who,  while  the  war 

I  raged,  knew  France  only  from  journals,  as  (he 

head  of  that  administration  of  which,  in  truth, 

j  he  was  only  the  secretary  and  the  spokesman, 

j  The  author  of  the  History  of  Europe,  in  our 

I  own  Annual  Registers,  appears  to  have  been 

completely  under  this  delusion. 

The  conflict  between  the  hostile  parties  was 
!  meanwhile  fast  approaching  to  a  crisis.     The 
temper  of  Paris  grew  daily  fiercer  and  fiercer. 
Delegates  appointed  by  thirty-five  of  the  forty- 
j  eight  wards  of  the  city  appeared  at  the  bar  of 
j  the  Convention,  and  demanded  that  Vergniaud, 
j  Brissot,  Gaudet,  Gensonne,  Barbaroux,  Buzot, 
!  Potion,  Louvet,  and  many  other  deputies,  should 
be  expelled.     This  demand  was  disapproved  by 
I  at   least  three-fourths   of  the  Assembly,  and, 
I  when  known  in  the  departments,  called  forth  a 
j  general  cry  of  indignation.     Bordeaux  declared 
|  that  it  would  stand  by  its  representatives,  and 
would,  if  necessary,  defend  them  by  the  sword 
against  the  tyranny  of  Paris.     Lyons  and  Mar 
seilles  were  animated  by  a  similar  spirit.  These 
[manifestations  of  public  opinion  gave  courage 
to    the   majority  of  the   Convention.     Thanks 
were  voted  to  the  people  of  Bordeaux  for  their 
patriotic  declaration,  and  a  commission  con 
sisting  of  twelve  members  was  appointed  for 
the  purpose  of  investigating  the  conduct  of  the 
municipal  authorities  of  Paris  ;  and  was  em 
powered  to  place  under  arrest  such  persons  as 
should  appear  to  have  been  concerned  in  any 
plot  against  the  authority  of  the  Convention. 
This  measure  was  adopted  on  the  motion  of 
Barere. 

A  few  days  of  stormy  excitement  and  pro 
found  anxiety  followed ;  and  then  came  the 
crash.  On  the  thirty-first  of  May,  the  mob  of 
Paris  rose;  the  Palace  of  the  Tmleries  was 
besieged  by  a  vast  array  of  pikes  ;  the  majority 
of  the  deputies,  after  vain  strugg.es  and  re 
monstrances,  yielded  to  violence,  and  suffered 
the  Mountain  to  carry  a  decree  for  the  suspen 
sion  and  arrest  of  the  deputies  whom  the  wards 
of  the  capital  had  accused. 

During  this  contest,  Barere  had  been  tos.-,ed 
backwards  and  forwards  between  the  two  rag 
ing  factions.  His  feelings,  languid  and  un. 
steady  as  they  always  were,  drew  him  to  the 
Girondists;  but  he  was  awed  by  the  vigour 
and  determination  of  the  Mountain.  At  one 
moment  he  held  high  and  firm  language,  com 
plained  that  the  Convention  was  not  free,  and 
protested  against  the  validity  of  any  vote  pass 
ed  under  coercion.  At  another  moment  he 
proposed  to  conciliate  the  Parisians  by  abo« 
lishing  that  commission  of  twelve  which  he 
had  himself  proposed  only  a  few  days  before; 
and  himself  drew  up  a  paper  condemning  the 
very  measures  which  had  been  adopted  at  his 
own  instance,  and  eulogizing  the  public  spirit 
of  the  insurgents.  To  do  him  justice,  it  was 
not  without  some  symptoms  of  shame  that  he 
read  this  document  from  the  tribune,  where  he 
had  so  often  expressed  very  different  senti 
ments.  It  is  said  that,  at  some  passages,  he 
was  even  seen  to  blush.  It  may  have  been  so ; 
he  was  still  in  his  noviciate  of  infamy. 
Some  days  later  he  proposed  that  hostag.it 


630 


MACULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


for  the  personal  safety  of  the  accused  deputies 
should  be  sent  to  the  departments,  and  offered 
to  he  himself  one  of  those  hostages.  Nor  do 
we  in  the  least  doubt  that  the  offer  was  sincere. 
He  would,  we  firmly  believe,  have  thought  him 
self  far  safer  at  Bordeaux  or  Marseilles  than  at 
Paris.  His  proposition,  however,  was  not  car 
ried  into  effect;  and  he  remained  in  the  hands 
of  the  victorious  Mountain. 

This  was  the  great  crisis  of  his  life.  Hitherto 
he  had  done  nothing  inexpiable,  nothing  which 
marked  him  out  as  a  much  worse  man  than 
that  of  his  colleagues  in  the  Convention.  His 
voice  had  generally  been  on  the  side  of  mode 
rate  measures.  Had  he  bravely  cast  in  his 
lot  with  the  Girondists,  and  suffered  with  them, 
he  would,  like  them,  have  had  a  not  dishonour 
able  place  in  history.  Had  he,  like  the  great 
body  of  deputies  who  meant  well,  but  who 
had  not  the  courage  to  expose  themselves  to 
martyrdom,  crouched  quietly  under  the  domi 
nion  of  the  triumphant  minority,  and  suffered 
every  motion  of  Robespierre  and  Billaud  to 
pass  unopposed,  he  would  have  incurred  no 
peculiar  ignominy.  But  it  is  probable  that  this 
course  was  not  open  to  him.  He  had  been  too 
prominent  among  the  adversaries  of  the  Moun 
tain  to  be  admitted  to  quarter  without  making 
some  atonement.  It  was  necessary  that,  if  he 
hoped  to  find  pardon  from  his  new  lords,  he 
should  not  be  merely  a  silent  and  passive 
slave.  What  passed  in  private  between  him 
and  them  cannot  be  accurately  related;  but 
the  result  was  soon  apparent.  The  committee 
of  public  safety  was  renewed.  Several  of  the 
fiercest  of  the  dominant  faction,  Couthon  for 
example,  and  St.  Just,  were  substituted  for 
more  moderate  politicians ;  but  Barere  was 
suffered  to  retain  his  seat  at  the  board. 

The  indulgence  with  which  he  was  treated 
excited  the  murmurs  of  some  stern  and  ardent 
zealots.  Marat,  in  the  very  last  words  that  he 
wrote,  words  not  published  till  the  dagger  of 
CharloUe  Corday  had  avenged  France  and 
mankind,  complained  that  a  man  who  had  no 
principles,  who  was  always  on  the  side  of  the 
strongest,  who  had  been  a  royalist,  and  who 
was  ready,  in  case  of  a  turn  of  fortune,  to  be 
a  royalist  again,  should  be  entrusted  with  an 
important  share  in  the  administration.*  But 
the  chiefs  of  the  Mountain  judged  more  cor 
rectly.  They  knew  indeed,  as  well  as  Marat, 
chat  Barere  was  a  man  utterly  without  faith  or 
steadiness ;  that,  if  he  could  be  said  to  have 
any  political  leaning,  his  leaning  was  not 
towards  them;  that  he  felt  for  the  Girondist 
party  that  faint  and  wavering  sort  of  prefer 
ence  of  which  alone  his  nature  was  suscepti 
ble  ;  and  that,  if  he  had  been  at  liberty  to  make 
his  choice,  he  would  rather  have  murdered 
Robespierre  and  Danton,  than  Vergniaud  and 
Gensonne.  But  they  justly  appreciated  that 
levity  which  made  him  incapable  alike  of 
earnest  love  and  of  earnest  hatred,  and  that 
meanness  which  made  it  necessary  to  him  to 
have  a  master.  In  truth,  what  the  planters  of 
Carolina  and  Louisiana  say  of  black  men  with 
flat  noses  and  woolly  hair,  was  strictly  true  of 


*  S«e  the  Fitbliriste  of  the  14th  of  July,  1793.    Marat 
was  slabbed  on  the  evening  of  the  13ih. 


Barere.  The  curse  of  Canaan  was  upoh  nim. 
He  was  born  a  slave.  Baseness  was  an  in 
stinct  in  him.  The  impulse  which  drove  him 
from  a  party  in  adversity  to  a  party  in  pros 
perity,  was  as  irresistible  as  that  which  drives 
the  cuckoo  and  the  swallow  towards  the  sun 
when  the  dark  and  cold  months  are  approach 
ing.  The  law  which  doomed  him  to  be  the 
humble  attendant  of  stronger  spirits  resembled 
the  law  which  binds  the  pilot-fish  to  the  shark. 
"  Ken  ye,"  said  a  shrewd  Scotch  lord,  who  was 
asked  his  opinion  of  James  the  First;  "Ken 
ye  a  John  Ape  ?  If  I  have  Jacko  by  the  collar, 
I  can  make  him  bite  you  ;  but  if  you  have 
Jacko,  you  can  make  him  bite  me.'*  Just  such 
a  creature  was  Barere.  In  the  hands  of  the 
Girondists  he  would  have  been  eager  to  pro 
scribe  the  Jacobins ;  he  was  just  as  ready,  in 
the  gripe  of  the  Jacobins,  to  proscribe  th«» 
Girondists.  On  the  fidelity  of  such  a  man,  the 
heads  of  the  Mountain  could  not,  of  course, 
reckon  ;  but  they  valued  their  conquest  as  the 
very  easy  and  not  very  delicate  lover  in  Con- 
greve's  lively  song  valued  the  conquest  of  a 
prostitute  of  a  different  kind.  Bart-re  was, 
|  like  Chloe,  false  and  common;  but  he  was, 
like  Chloe,  constant  while  possessed  ;  and  they 
asked  no  more.  They  needed  a  service  which 
he  was  perfectly  competent  to  perform.  Des 
titute  as  he  was  of  all  the  talents  both  of  an 
active  and  of  a  speculative  statesman,  he 
could  with  great  facility  draw  up  a  report,  or 
make  a  speech  on  any  subject  and  on  any 
side.  If  other  people  would  furnish  facts  and 
thoughts,  he  could  always  furnish  phrases; 
and  this  talent  was  absolutely  at  the  command 
of  his  owners  for  the  time  being.  Nor  had 
he  excited  any  angry  passion  among  those  to 
whom  he  had  hitherto  been  opposed.  They 
felt  no  more  hatred  to  him  than  they  felt  to  the 
horses  which  dragged  the  cannon  of  the  Duke 
of  Brunswick  and  of  the  Prince  of  Saxe-Co- 
burg.  The  horses  had  only  done  according  to 
their  kind,  and  would,  if  they  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  French,  drag  with  equal  vigour 
and  equal  docility  the  guns  of  the  Republic, 
and  therefore  ought  not  merely  to  be  spared, 
but  to  be  well  fed  and  curried.  So  was  it  \vith 
Barere.  He  was  of  a  nature  so  low,  that  it 
might  be  doubted  whether  he  could  properly 
be  an  object  of  the  hostility  of  reasonable 
beings.  He  had  not  been  an  enemy;  he  WHS 
not  now  a  friend.  But  he  had  been  an  annoy 
ance;  and  he  would  now  be  a  help. 

BiH  though  the  heads  of  the  Mountain  par 
doned  this  man,  and  admitted  him  into  part 
nership  with  themselves,  it  was  not  without 
exacting  pledges  such  as  made  it  impossible 
for  him,  false  and  fickle  as  he  was.  ever  again 
to  find  admission  into  the  ranks  which  he  had 
deserted.  That  was  truly  a  terrible  sacrament 
by  which  they  admitted  the  apostate  into  their 
communion.  They  demanded  of  him  that  he 
should  himself  take  the  most  prominent  part 
in  murdering  his  old  friends.  To  refuse  was 
as  much  as  his  life  was  worth.  But  what  is 
life  worth  when  it  is  only  one  long  agony  of 
remorse  and  shame?  These,  however,  are 
feelings  of  which  it  is  idle  to  talk,  when  we 
considering  the  conduct  of  such  a  man 
Barere.  He  undertook  th«:  task,  mounted 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


637 


triDiine,  and  fold  the  Convention  that  the  time 
was  come  for  taking  the  stern  atlitude  of  jus 
tice,  and  for  striking  at  all  conspirators  without 
distinction.  He  then  moved  that  Buzot,  Bar- 
baroux,  Petion,  and  thirteen  other  deputies, 
should  be  placed  out  of  the  pale  of  the  law,  or, 
in  other  words,  beheaded  without  a  trial;  and 
that  Vergniaud,  Guadet,  Gensonne,  and  six 
others,  should  be  impeached.  The  motion  was 
carried  without  debate. 

We  have  already  seen  with  what  effrontery 
Barere  has  denied,  in  these  Memoirs,  that  he 
took  any  part  against  the  Girondists.  Thi.< 
denial,  we  think,  was  the  only  thing  wanting 
to  make  his  infamy  complete.  The  most  im 
pudent  of  all  lies  was  a  fit  companion  for  the 
foulest  of  all  murders. 

Barere,  however,  had  not  yet  earned  his  par 
don.  The  Jacobin  party  contained  one  gang 
which,  even  in  that  party,  was  pre-eminent  in 
every  mean  and  every  savage  vies,  a  gang  so 
low-minded  and  so  inhuman,  that,  compared 
with  them,  Robespierre  might  be  called  mag 
nanimous  and  merciful.  Of  these  wretches 
Hubert  was  perhaps  the  best  representative. 
His  favourite  amusement  was  to  torment  and 
insult  the  miserable  remains  of  that  great 
family  which,  having  ruled  France  during 
eight  hundred  years,  had  now  become  an  ob 
ject  of  pity  to  the  humblest  artisan  or  peasant. 
The  influence  of  this  man,  and  of  men  like 
him,  induced  the  committee  of  public  safety  to 
determine  that  Marie  Antoinette  should  be 
sent  to  the  scaffold.  Barere  was  again  sum 
moned  to  his  duty.  Only  four  days  after  he 
had  proposed  the  decrees  against  the  Girondist 
deputies,  he  again  mounted  the  tribune,  in 
order  to  move  that  the  queen  should  be  brought 
before  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal.  He  was 
improving  fast  in  the  society  of  his  new  allies. 
When  he  asked  for  the  heads  of  Vergniaud 
and  Petion,  he  had  spoken  like  a  man  who  had 
Some  slight  sense  of  his  own  guilt  and  degra 
dation;  he  had  said  little,  and  that  littie  had 
not  been  violent.  The  office  of  expatiating  on 
the  guilt  of  his  old  friends  he  had  left  to  St. 
Just.  Very  different  was  Barore's  second  ap 
pearance  in  the  character  of  an  accuser.  He 
now  cried  out  for  blood  in  the  eager  tones  of 
the  true  and  burning  thirst,  and  raved  against 
the  Austrian  woman  with  the  virulence  natural 
to  a  coward  who  finds  himself  at  liberty  to 
outrage  that  which  he  has  feared  and  envied. 
We  have  already  exposed  the  shameless  men 
dacity  with  which,  in  these  Memoirs,  he  at 
tempts  to  throw  the  blame  of  his  own  guilt  on 
the  guiltless. 

On  the  day  on  which  the  fallen  queen  was 
dragged,  already  more  than  half  dead,  to  her 
doom,  Barere  regaled  Robespierre  and  some 
other  Jacobins  at  a  tavern.  Robespierre's  ac 
ceptance  of  the  invitation  caused  some  sur 
prise  to  those  who  knew  how  long  and  how 
bitterly  it  was  his  nature  to  hate.  «  Robespierre 
of  the  party!"  muttered  St.  Just.  "Barere  is 
the  only  man  whom  Robespierre  has  forgiven." 
We  have  an  account  of  this  singular  repast 
from  one  of  the  guests.  Robespierre  condemned 
the  senseless  brutality  with  which  Hubert  had 
Conducted  the  proceedings  against  the  Austrian 
woman,  and-  in.  talking  on  that  subject,  became 


so  much  excited  that  he  broke  his  plate  in  the 
violence  of  his  gesticulation.  Barere  exclaimed 
that  the  gullotine  had  cut  a  diplomatic  knot 
which  it  might  have  been  difficult  to  untie.  IK 
the  intervals  between  the  Beaune  and  the 
Champagne,  between  the  ragout  of  thrushes 
and  the  partridge  with  trufles,  he  fervently 
preached  his  new  political  creed.  "The  ves 
sel  of  fhe  revolution,"  he  said,  "can  float  into 
port  only  on  waves  of  blood.  We  must  begin 
v/ith  the  members  of  the  National  Assembly 
and  of  the  Legislative  Assembly.  That  rub 
bish  must  be  swept  away." 

As  he  talked  at  table  he  talked  in  the  Con 
vention.  His  peculiar  style  of  oratory  was  now 
formed.  It  was  not  altogether  without  inge 
nuity  and  liveliness.  But,  in  any  other  age  or 
country,  it  would  have  been  thought  unfit  for 
the  deliberations  of  a  grave  assembly,  and  still 
more  unfit  for  state  papers.  It  might,  perhaps, 
succeed  at  a  meeting  of  a  Protestant  associa 
tion  in  Exeter  Hall,  at  a  repeal  dinner  in  Ire 
land,  after  men  had  well  drunk,  or  in  an  Ameri 
can  oration  on  the  fourth  of  July.  No  legislative 
body  would  now  endure  it.  But  in  France,  du 
ring  the  reign  of  the  Convention,  the  old  laws 
of  composition  were  held  in  as  much  contempt 
as  the  old  government  or  the  old  creed.  Cor 
rect  and  noble  diction  belonged,  like  the  eti 
quette  of  Versailles  and  the  solemnities  of  Notre 
Dame,  to  an  age  which  had  passed  away.  Just 
as  a  swarm  of  ephemeral  constitutions,  demo 
cratic,  directorial,  and  consular,  sprang  from 
the  decay  of  the  ancient  monarchy;  just  as  a 
swarm  of  new  superstitions,  the  worship  of  the 
Goddess  of  Reason,  and  the  fooleries  of  the 
Theophilanthropists,  sprang  from  the  decay  of 
the  ancient  church;  even  so,  out  of  the  decay 
of  the  ancient  French  eloquence,  sprang  new 
fashions  of  eloquence,  for  the  understanding  of 
which  new  grammars  and  dictionaries  were 
necessary.  The  same  innovating  spirit  which 
altered  the  common  phrases  of  salutation,  which 
turned  hundreds  of  Johns  and  Peters  into  Scce- 
volas  and  Aristogitons,  and  which  expelled 
Sunday  and  Monday,  January  and  February, 
Lady-day  arid  Christmas,  from  the  calendar, in 
order  to  substitute  Decadi  and  Primidi,  Nivose 
and  Pluviose,  Feasts  of  Opinion  and  Feasts  of 
the  Supreme  Being,  changed  all  the  forms  of 
fficial  correspondence.  For  the  calm,  guarded, 
and  sternly  courteous  language  which  govern 
ments  had  long  been  accustomed  to  employ, 
were  substituted  puns,  interjections,  Ossianic 
rants,  rhetoric  worthy  only  of  a  schoolboy,  scur 
rility  worthy  only  of  a  fishwife.  Of  the  phrase 
ology  which  was  now  thought  to  be  peculiarly 
well  suited  to  a  report  or  a  manifesto,  Barere 
had  a  greater  command  than  any  man  of  his 
time ;  and,  during  the  short  and  sharp  parox 
ysm  of  the  revolutionary  delirium,  passed  for 
a  great  orator.  When  the  fit  was  over,  he  was 
considered  as  what  he  really  was,  a  man  of 
quick  apprehension  and  fluent  elocution,  with 
no  originality,  with  little  information,  arid  with 
a  taste  as  bad  as  his  heart.  His  reports  were 
jopularly  called  Carmagnoles.  A  few  months 
ago,  we  should  have  had  si  me  difficulty  in  con 
veying  to  an  English  reader  an  exact  notion  of 
he  state  papers  to  which  this  appellation  was 
given.  Fortunately  a  noble  and  distinguished 
3H 


MAUAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


porson,  whom  her  majesty's  ministers  have 
thought  qualified  to  fill  the  most  important  post 
in  the  empire,  has  made  our  task  easy.  Who 
ever  has  read  Lord  Ellenborough's  proclama 
tions  is  able  to  form  a  complete  idea  of  a  Car 
magnole. 

The  effect  which  Barere's  discourses  at  one 
time  produced  is  not  to  be  wholly  attributed  to 
the  perversion  of  the  national  taste.  The  occa 
sions  on  which  he  rose  were  frequently  such 
as  would  have  secured  to  the  worst  speaker  a 
favourable  hearing.  When  military  advan 
tage  had  been  gained,  he  was  generally  de 
puted  by  the  committee  of  public  safety  to  an 
nounce  the  good  news.  The  hall  resounded 
with  applause  as  he  mounted  the  tribune,  hold 
ing  the  despatches  in  his  hand.  Deputies  and 
strangers  listened  with  delight  while  he  told 
them  that  victory  was  the  order  of  the  day; 
that  the  guineas  of  Pitt  had  been  vainly  la 
vished  to  hire  machines  six  feet  high,  carry 
ing  guns ;  that  the  flight  of  the  English  leopard 
deserved  to  be  celebrated  by  Tyrtoeus ;  and  that 
the  saltpetre  dug  out  of  the  cellars  of  Paris  had 
been  turned  into  thunder,  which  would  crush 
the  Titan  brethren,  George  and  Francis. 

Meanwhile  the  trial  of  the  accused  Girond 
ists,  who  were  under  arrest  at  Paris,  came  on. 
They  flattered  themselves  with  a  vain  hope  of 
escape.  They  placed  some  reliance  on  their 
innocence,  and  some  reliance  on  their  elo 
quence.  They  thought  that  shame  would  suf 
fice  to  restrain  any  man,  however  violent  and 
cruel,  from  publicly  committing  the  flagrant 
iniquity  of  condemning  them  to  death.  The 
Revolutionary  Tribunal  was  new  to  its  func 
tions.  No  member  of  the  Convention  had  yet 
been  executed;  and  it  was  probable  that  the 
boldest  Jacobin  would  shrink  from  being  the 
first  to  violate  the  sanctity  which  was  sup 
posed  to  belong  to  the  representatives  of  the 
people. 

The  proceedings  lasted  some  days.  Gen- 
sonne  and  Brissot  defended  themselves  with 
great  ability  and  presence  of  mind  against  the 
vile  Hcbert  and  Chaumette,  who  appeared  as 
accusers.  The  eloquent  voice  of  Vergniaud 
was  heard  for  the  last  time.  He  pleaded  his 
own  cause,  and  that  of  his  friends,  with  such 
force  of  reason  and  elevation  of  sentiment,  that 
a  murmur  of  pity  and  admiration  rose  from  the 
audience.  Nay,  the  court  itself,  not  yet  accus 
tomed  to  riot  in  daily  carnage,  showed  signs  of 
emotion.  The  sitting  was  adjourned,  and  a 
rumour  went  forth  that  there  would  be  an  ac 
quittal.  The  Jacobins  met,  breathing  ven 
geance.  Robespierre  undertook  to  be  their 
organ.  He  rose  on  the  following  day  in  the 
Convention,  and  propose!  a  decree  of  such 
atrocity,  that  even  among  the  acts  of  that  year 
it  can  hardly  be  paralleled.  By  this  decree 
the  tribunal  was  empowered  to  cut  short  the 
defence  of  the  prisoners,  o  pronounce  the  case 
clear,  and  to  pass  immediate  judgment.  One 
deputy  made  a  faint  opposition.  Barere  in 
stantly  sprang  up  to  support  Robespierre— 
Barere  the  federalist;  Barere,  the  author  of 
that  commission  of  twelve  which  was  among 
the  chief  causes  of  the  hatred  borne  by  Paris 
to  the  Girondists ;  Barere,  who  in  these  Me 
moirs  denies  that  he  ever  took  any  part  against 


the  Girondists;  Barere,  who  has  the  effrontery 
to  declare  that  he  greatly  loved  and  highly  es 
teemed  Vergniaud.  The  decree  was  passed; 
and  the  tribunal,  without  suffering  the  pri 
soners  to  conclude  what  they  had  to  say,  pro 
nounced  them  guilty. 

The  following  day  was  the  saddest  in  the  sad 
history  of  the  Revolution.  The  sufferers  were 
so  innocent,  so  brave,  so  eloquent,  so  accom 
plished,  so  young.  Some  of  them  were  grace 
ful  and  handsome  youths  of  six  or  seven  and 
twenty.  Vergniaud  and  Gensonne  were  little 
more  than  thirty.  They  had  been  only  a  few 
months  engaged  in  public  affairs.  In  a  few 
months  the  fame  of  their  genius  had  filled 
Europe;  and  they  were  to  die  for  no  crime  but 
this,  that  they  had  wished  to  combine  order, 
justice  and  mercy  with  freedom.  Their  great 
fault  was  want  of  courage.  We  mean  want 
of  political  courage — of  that  courage  which  is 
proof  to  clamour  and  obloquy,  and  which 
meets  great  emergencies  by  daring  and  deci 
sive  measures.  Alas!  they  had  but  too  good 
an  opportunity  of  proving,  that  they  did  not 
want  courage  to  endure  with  manly  cheerful 
ness  the  worst  that  could  be  inflicted  by  such 
tyrants  as  St.  Just,  and  such  slaves  as  Barere. 

They  were  not  the  only  victims  of  the  noble 
cause.  Madame  Roland  followed  them  to  the 
scaffold  with  a  spirit  as  heroic  as  their  own. 
Her  husband  was  in  a  safe  hiding-place,  but 
could  not  bear  to  survive  her.  His  body  was 
found  on  the  high  road,  near  Rouen.  He  had 
fallen  on  his  sword.  Condorcet  swallowed 
opium.  At  Bordeaux,  the  steel  fell  on  the 
necks  of  the  bold  and  quick-witted  Gaudet,  and 
of  Barbaroux,  the  chief  of  those  enthusiasts 
from  the  Rhone  whose  valour,  in  the  great 
crisis  of  the  tenth  of  August,  had  turned  back 
the  tide  of  battle  from  the  Louvre  to  the  Tuile- 
ries.  In  a  field  near  the  Garonne  was  found 
all  that  the  wolves  had  left  of  Petion,  once 
honoured,  greatly  indeed  beyond  his  deserts, 
as  the  model  of  republican  virtue.  We  are 
far  from  regarding  even  the  best  of  the  Gi 
rondists  with  unmixed  admiration  ;  but  history 
owes  to  them  this  honourable  testimony,  that, 
being  free  to  choose  whether  they  would  be 
oppressors  or  victims,  they  deliberately  and 
firmly  resolved  rather  to  suffer  injustice  than 
to  inflict  it. 

And  now  began  that  strange  period  known 
by  the  name  of  the  Reign  of  Terror.  The 
Jacobins  had  prevailed.  This  was  their  hour, 
and  the  power  of  darkness.  The  Convention 
was  subjugated,  and  reduced  to  profound 
silence  on  the  highest  questions  of  state.  The 
sovereignty  passed  to  the  committee  of  public 
safety.  To  the  edicts  framed  by  that  com 
mittee,  the  representative  assembly  did  not 
venture  to  offer  even  the  species  of  opposition 
which  the  ancient  Parliament  had  frequently 
offered  to  the  mandates  of  the  ancient  kings. 
Six  persons  held  the  chief  power  in  the  small 
cabinet  which  now  domineered  over  France — 
Robespierre,  St.  Just,  Couthon,  Collot,  Billaud, 
and  Barere. 

To  some  of  these  men,  and  of  those  who 
adhered  to  them,  it  is  due  to  say,  that  the  fana 
ticism  which  had  emancipated  them  trom  the 
restraints  of  justice  and  compassion,  had  eman- 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


639 


eipated  them  also  from  the  dominion  of  vulgar 
cupidity  and  of  vulgar  fear;  that,  while  hardly 
knowing  where  to  find  an  assignat  of  a  few 
francs  to  pay  for  a  dinner,  they  expended  with 
strict  integrity  the  immense  revenue  which 
they  collected  by  every  art  of  rapine;  and 
that  they  were  ready,  in  support  of  their  cause, 
to  mount  the  scaffold  with  as  much  indifference 
as  they  showed  when  they  signed  the  death- 
warrants  of  aristocrats  and  priests.  But  no 
great  party  can  be  composed  of  such  materials 
as  these.  It  is  the  inevitable  law,  that  such 
zealots  as  we  have  described  shall  collect 
around  them  a  multitude  of  slaves,  of  cowards, 
and  of  libertines,  whose  savage  tempers  and 
licentious  appetites,  withheld  only  by  the 
dread  of  law  and  magistracy  from  the  worst 
excesses,  are  called  into  full  activity  by  the 
hope  of  impunity.  A  faction  which,  from 
whatever  motive,  relaxes  the  great  laws  of 
morality,  is  certain,  to  be  joined  by  the  most 
immoral  part  of  the  community.  This  has 
been  repeatedly  proved  in  religious  wars.  The 
war  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  the  Albigensian 
war,  the  Huguenot  war,  the  Thirty  Years'  war, 
all  originated  in  pious  zeal.  That  zeal  inflamed 
the  champions  of  the  church  to  such  a  point, 
that  they  regarded  all  generosity  to  the  van 
quished  as  a  sinful  weakness.  The  infidel,  the 
heretic,  v/as  to  be  run  down  like  a  mad  dog. 
No  outrage  committed  by  the  Catholic  warrior 
on  the  miscreant  enemy  could  deserve  punish 
ment.  As  soon  as  it  was  known  that  bound 
less  license  was  thus  given  to  barbarity  and 
dissoluteness,  thousands  of  wretches  who 
cared  nothing  for  the  sacred  cause,  but  who 
were  eager  to  be  exempted  from  the  police  of 
peaceful  cities,  and  the  discipline  of  well-go 
verned  camps,  flocked  to  the  standard  of  the 
faith.  The  men  who  had  set  up  that  standard 
were  sincere,  chaste,  regardless  of  lucre,  and 
perhaps,  where  only  themselves  were  con 
cerned,  not  unforgiving  ;  but  round  that  stand 
ard  were  assembled  such  gangs  of  rogues, 
ravishers,  plunderers,  and  ferocious  bravoes, 
as  were  scarcely  ever  found  under  the  flag  of 
any  state  engaged  in  a  mere  temporal  quarrel. 
In  a  very  similar  way  was  the  Jacobin  party 
composed.  There  was  a  small  nucleus  of 
enthusiasts;  round  that  nucleus  was  gathered 
avast  mass  of  ignoble  depravity;  and  in  all 
that  mass,  there  was  nothing  so  depraved  and 
so  ignoble  as  Barere. 

Then  came  those  days  when  the  most  bar 
barous  of  all  codes  was  administered  by  the 
most  barbarous  of  all  tribunals;  when  no  man 
could  greet  his  neighbours,  or  say  his  prayers, 
or  dress  his  hair,  without  danger  of  committing 
a  capital  crime;  when  spies  lurked  in  every 
corner;  when  the  guillotine  was  long  and  hard 
at  work  every  morning;  when  the  jails  were 
fiJled  as  close  as  the  hold  of  a  slave-ship  ; 
when  the  gutters  ran  foaming  with  blood  into 
the  Seine  ;  when  it  was  death  to  be  great-niece 
of  a  captain  of  the  royal  guards,  or  half-bro 
ther  of  a  doctor  of  the  Sarbonne,  to  express  a 
doubt  whether  assignats  would  not  fall,  to  hint 
that  the  English  had  been  victorious  in  the 
action  of  the  first  of  June,  to  have  a  copy  of 
one  of  Burke's  pamphlets  locked  up  in  a  desk, 
to  laugh  at  a  Jacobin  for  taking  the  name  of 


Cassias  or  Timoleon,  or  to  call  the  Fifth  Sans- 
culottide  by  its  old  superstitious  name  of  St. 
Matthew's  Day.  While  the  daily  wagon-loads 
of  victims  were  carried  to  their  doom  through 
the  streets  of  Paris,  the  proconsuls  whom  the 
sovereign  committee  had  sent  forth  to  the 
departments,  revelled  in  an  extravagance  of 
cruelty  unknown  even  in  the  capital.  The 
knife  of  the  deadly  machine  rose  and  fell  too 
slow  for  their  work  of  slaughter.  Long  rows 
of  captives  were  mowed  down  with  grape- 
shot.  Holes  were  made  in  the  bottom  of 
crowded  barges.  Lyons  was  turned  into  a 
desert.  At  Arras  even  the  cruel  mercy  of  a 
speedy  death  was  denied  to  the  prisoners.  All 
down  the  Loire,  from  Samur  to  the  sea,  great 
flocks  of  crows  and  kites  feasted  on  naked 
corpses,  twined  together  in  hideous  embraces. 
No  mercy  was  shown  to  sex  or  age.  The 
number  of  young  lads  and  of  girls  of  seven 
teen  who  were  murdered  by  that  execrable 
government,  is  to  be  reckoned  by  hundreds. 
Babies  torn  from  the  breast  were  tossed  from 
pike  to  pike  along  the  Jacobin  ranks.  One 
champion  of  liberty  had  his  pockets  well  stuffed 
with  ears.  Another  swaggered  about  with  the 
finger  of  a  little  child  in  his  hat.  A  few  months 
had  sufficed  to  degrade  France  below  the  level 
of  New  Zealand. 

It  is  absurd  to  say,  that  any  amount  of  pub 
lic  danger  can  justify  a  system  like  this,  we 
do  not  say  on  Christian  principles,  we  do  not 
say  on  the  principles  of  a  high  morality,  but 
even  on  principles  of  Machiavelian  policy.  It 
is  true  that  great  emergencies  call  for  activity 
and  vigilance;  it  is  true  that  they  justify 
severity  which,  in  ordinary  times,  would  de 
serve  the  name  of  cruelty.  But  indiscriminate 
severity  can  never,  under  any  circumstances, 
be  useful.  It  is  plain  that  the  whole  efficacy 
of  punishment  depends  on  the  care  with  which 
the  guilty  are  distinguished.  Punishment  which 
strikes  the  guilty  and  the  innocent  promiscu 
ously,  operates  merely  like  a  pestilence  or  a 
great  convulsion  of  nature,  and  has  no  more 
tendency  to  prevent  offences,  than  the  cholera, 
or'  an  earthquake  like  that  of  Lisbon,  would 
have.  The  energy  for  which  the  Jacobin 
administration  is  praised  was  merely  the  en 
ergy  of  the  Malay  who  maddens  himself  with 
opium,  draws  his  knife,  and  runs  a-muck 
through  the  streets,  slashing  right  and  left  at 
friends  and  foes.  Such  has  never  been  the 
energy  of  truly  great  rulers;  of  Elizabeth,  for 
example,  of  Oliver,  or  of  Frederick.  They 
were  not,  indeed,  scrupulous.  But,  had  they 
been  less  scrupulous  than  they  were,  ihe 
strength  and  amplitude  of  their  minds  would 
have  preserved  them  from  crimes,  such  as 
those  which  the  small  men  of  the  commute.* 
of  public  safety  took  for  daring  strokes  of  po 
licy.  The  great  queen  who  so  long  held  her 
own  against  foreign  and  domes-tic  enemies, 
against  temporal  and  spiritual  arms;  the  great 
protector  who  governed  with  more  than  regal 
power,  in  despite  both  of  royalists  and  repub 
licans  ;  the  great  king  who,  with  a  beaten  army 
and  an  exhausted  treasury,  defended  his  little 
dominions  to  the  last  against  the  united  efforts 
of  Russia,  Austria,  and  France;  with  whal 
scorn  would  they  have  heard  that  it  was  an 


640 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


possible  for  them  to  strike  a  salutary  terror [ 
into  the  disaffected,  without  sending  school- 
bcys  and  school-girls  to  death  by  cart-loads 
aud  boat-loads! 

The  popular  notion  is,  we  believe,  that  the 
leading  Terrorists  were  wicked  men,  but,  at 
the  same  time,  great  men.  We  can  see  no 
thing  great  about  them  but  their  wickedness. 
That  their  policy  was  daringly  original  is  a 
vulgar  error.  Their  policy  is  as  old  as  the 
oldest  accounts  which  we  have  of  human  mis- 
government.  It  seemed  new  in  France,  and  in 
the  eiglueenth  century,  only  because  it  had 
been  long  disused,  for  excellent  reasons,  by 
the  enlightened  part  of  mankind.  But  it  has 
always  prevailed,  and  still  prevails,  in  savage 
and  half  savage  nations,  and  is  the  chief  cause 
which  prevents  such  nations  from  making 
advances  towards  civilization.  Thousands  of 
deys,  of  beys,  of  pachas,  of  rajahs,  of  nabobs, 
have  shovv.i  themselves  as  great  masters  of 
statecraft  as  the  members  of  the  committee  of 
public  safety.  Djezzar,  we  imagine,  was  supe 
rior  to  any  of  them  in  their  own  line.  In  fact. 
there  is  not  a  petty  tyrant  in  Asia  or  Africa  so 
dull  or  so  unlearned  as  not  to  be  fully  qualified 
for  the  business  of  Jacobin  police  and  Jacobin 
finance.  To  behead  people  by  scores  without 
caring  whether  they  are  guilty  or  innocent;  to 
wring  money  out  of  the  rich  by  the  help  of 
jailers  and  executioners;  to  rob  the  public 
creditor,  and  put  him  to  death  if  he  remon 
strates  ;  to  take  loaves  by  force  out  of  the 
bakers'  shops;  to  clothe  and  mount  soldiers 
by  seizing  on  one  man's  wool  and  linen,  and 
on  another  man's  horses  and  saddles,  without 
compensation,  is  of  all  modes  of  governing  the 
simplest  and  most  obvious.  Of  its  morality 
we  at  present  say  nothing.  But  surely  it  re 
quires  no  capacity  beyond  that  of  a  barbarian 
or  a  child.  By  means  like  those  which  we 
have  described,  the  committee  of  public  safety 
undoubtedly  succeeded,  for  a  short  time,  in 
enforcing  profound  submission,  and  in  raising 
immense  funds.  But  to  enforce  submission  by 
butchery,  and  to  raise  funds  by  spoliation,  is 
not  statesmanship.  The  real  statesman  is  he 
who,  in  troubled  times,  keeps  down  the  turbu 
lent  without  unnecessarily  harassing  the  well- 
affected;  and  who,  when  great  pecuniary  re 
sources  are  needed,  provides  for  the  public 
exigencies  without  violating  the  security  of 
property,  and  drying  up  the  sources  of  future 
prosperity.  Such  a  statesman,  we  are  confi 
dent,  might,  in  1793,  have  preserved  the  inde 
pendence  of  France  without  shedding  a  drop 
of  innocent  blood,  without  plundering  a  single 
warehouse.  Unhappily,  the  Republic  was  sub> 
ject  to  men  who  were  mere  demagogues,  and 
in  no  sense  statesmen.  They  could  declaim  at 
a  ciub.  They  could  lead  a  rabble  to  mischief. 
Bui  they  had  no  skill  to  conduct  the  affairs  of 
an  empire.  The  want  of  skill  they  supplied 
for  a  time  by  atrocicv  and  blind  violence.  For 
legislative  ability,  fiscal  ability,  military  ability, 
diplomatic  ability,  they  had  one  substitute,  the 
guillotine.  Indeed  their  exceeding  ignorance, 
and  the  barrenness  of  their  invention,  are  the 
best  excuse  for  their  murders  and  robberies. 
We  really  believe  that  thpy  would  not  have 
cai  so  man"  throats,  and  picked  so  many! 


pockets,  if  they  had  known  how  to  govern  in 
any  other  way. 

That,  under  their  administration,  the  wat 
against  the  European  coalition  was  successful 
ly  conducted,  is  true.  But  that  war  had  been 
successfully  conducted  before  their  elevation, 
and  continued  to  be  successfully  conducted 
after  their  fall.  Terror  was  not  the  order  cf 
the  day  when  Brussels  opened  its  gates  to  Du- 
mourier.  Terror  had  ceased  to  be  the  order  of 
the  Jay  when  Piedmont  and  Lombardy  were 
conquered  by  Bonaparte.  The  truth  is,  that 
France  was  saved,  not  by  the  committee  of 
public  safety,  but  by  the  energy,  patriotism,  and 
valour  of  the  French  people.  Those  high  quali 
ties  were  victorious  in  spite  of  the  incapacity 
of  rulers  whose  administration  was  a  tissue, 
not  merely  of  crimes,  but  of  blunders. 

WTe  have  not  time  to  tell  how  the  leaders  of 
the  savage  faction  at  length  began  to  avenge 
mankind  on  each  other;  how  the  craven 
Hebert  was  dragged  wailing  and  trembling  to 
his  doom  ;  how  the  nobler  Danton,  moved  by  a 
late  repentance,  strove  in  vain  to  repair  th«» 
evil  which  he  had  wrought,  and  half  redeemed 
the  great  crime  of  September,  by  manfully  en 
countering  death  in  the  cause  of  mercy. 

Our  business  is  with  Barere.  In  all  those 
things  he  was  not  only  consenting,  but  eagerly 
and  joyously  forward.  Not  merely  was  he  one 
of  the  guilty  administration.  He  was  the  man 
to  whom  was  especially  assigned  the  office  of 
proposing  and  defending  outrages  on  justice 
and  humanity,  and  of  furnisning  to  atrocious 
schemes  an  appropriate  garb  of  atrocious  rho- 
domontade.  Barere  first  proclaimed  fro.n  the 
tribune  of  the  Convention,  that  terror  must  be 
the  order  of  the  day.  It  was  by  Barere  that  the 
Revolutionary  Tribunal  of  Paris  was  provided 
with  the  aid  of  a  public  accuser  worthy  of  such 
a  court,  the  infamous  Fouquier  Tinville.  It 
was  Barere  who,  when  one  of  the  old  members 
of  the  National  Assembly  had  been  absolved 
by  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal,  gave  orders 
that  a  fresh  jury  should  be  summoned.  "Ac 
quit  one  of  the  National  Assembly!"  he  cried. 
"  The  tribunal  is  turning  against  the  Revolu 
tion."  It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  the  pri 
soner's  head  was  soon  in  the  basket.  It  was 
Barere  who  moved  that  the  city  of  Lyons  should 
be  destroyed.  "  Let  the  plough,"  he  cried  from 
the  tribune,  "pass  over  her.  Lei  her  name 
cease  to  exist.  The  rebels  are  conquered;  but 
are  they  all  exterminated  1  No  weakness.  No 
mercy.  Let  every  one  be  smitten.  Two  words 
will  suffice  to  tell  the  whole.  Lyons  made  war 
on  liberty;  Lyons  is  no  more."  When  Toulon 
was  taken,  Barere  came  forward  to  announce 
the  event.  "The  conquest,"  said  the  apostate 
Brissotine,  "  won  by  the  Mountain  ovrr  the 
Brissotines,  must  be  commemorated  by  a  mark 
set  on  the  place  where  Toulon  once  stood.  The 
national  thunder  must  crush  the  house  of  every 
trader  in  the  town."  When  Camille  Desmou- 
lins,  long  distinguished  among  the  republicans 
by  zeal  and  ability,  dared  to  raise  his  eloquent 
voice  against  the  Reign  of  Terror,  and  to  point 
out  the  close  analogy  between  the  government 
which  then  oppressed  France  and  the  govern 
ment  of  the  worst  of  the  Caesars,  Barere  rose 
to  complain  of  the  weak  compassion  which 


BARERE'3  MEMOIRS. 


641 


tried  to  revive  the  hopes  of  the  aristocracy. 
«  Whoever,"  he  said,  "  is  nobly  born,  is  a  man 
to  be  suspected.  Every  priest,  every  frequenter 
of  the  old  court,  every  lawyer,  every  banker,  is 
a  man  to  be  suspected.  Every  person  who 
grumbles  at  the  course  which  the  Revolution 
takes,  is  a  man  to  be  suspected.  There  are 
whole  castes  already  tried  and  Condemned. 
There  are  callings  which  carry  theirdoom  with 
them.  There  are  relations  of  blood  which  the 
law  regards  with  an  evil  eye.  Republicans  of 
France !"  yelled  the  renegade  Girondist,  the  old 
enemy  of  the  Mountain — "Republicans  of 
France!  the  Brissotines  led  you  by  gentle 
means  to  slavery.  The  Mountain  leads  you  by 
strong  measures  to  freedom.  Oh  !  who  can 
count  the  evils  which  a  false  compassion  may 
produce!"  When  the  friends  of  Dan  ton  mus 
tered  courage  to  express  a  wish  that  the  Con 
vention  would  at  least  hear  him,  in  his  own 
defence,  before  it  sent  him  to  certain  death,  the 
voice  of  Barere  was  the  loudest  in  opposition 
to  their  prayer.  When  the  crimes  of  Lebon, 
one  of  the  worst,  if  not  the  very  worst,  of  the 
vicegerents  of  the  committee  of  public  safety, 
had  so  maddened  the  people  of  the  Departments 
of  the  North,  that  they  resorted  to  the  desperate 
expedient  of  imploring  the  protection  of  the 
Convention,  Barere  pleaded  the  cause  of  the 
accused  tyrant,  and  threatened  the  petitioners 
with  the  utmost  vengeance  of  the  government. 
"  These  charges,"  he  said,  "  have  been  sug 
gested  by  wily  aristocrats.  The  man  who 
crushes  the  enemies  of  the  people,  though  he 
may  be  hurried  by  his  zeal  into  some  excesses, 
can  never  be  a  proper  object  of  censure.  The 
proceedings  of  Lebon  may  have  been  a  little 
harsh  as  to  form."  One  of  the  small  irregu 
larities  thus  gently  censured  was  this :  Lebon 
kept  a  wretched  man  a  quarter  of  an  hour  un 
der  the  knife  of  the  guillotine,  in  order  to  tor 
ment  him,  by  reading  to  him,  before  he  was 
despatched,  a  letter,  the  contents  of  which  were 
supposed  to  be  such  as  would  aggravate  even 
the  bitterness  of  death.  "  But  what,"  proceed 
ed  Barere,  "is  not  permitted  to  the  hatred  of  a 
republioan  against  aristocracy  ?  How  many 
generous  sentiments  atone  for  what  may  per 
haps  seem  acrimonious  in  the  prosecution  of 
public  enemies  ?  Revolutionary  measures  are 
always  to  be  spoken  of  with  respect.  Liberty 
is  a  virgin  whose  veil  it  is  not  lawful  to  lift." 

After  this,  it  would  be  idle  to  dwell  on  facts 
which  would  indeed,  of  themselves,  suffice  to 
render  a  name  infamous,  but  which  makes  no 
perceptible  addition  to  the  great  infamy  of 
Barere.  It  would  be  idle,  for  example,  to  relate 
how  he,  a  man  of  letters,  a  member  of  an  aca 
demy  of  inscriptions,  was  foremost  in  that  war 
against  learning,  art,  and  history  which  dis 
graced  the  Jacobin  government;  how  he  re 
commended  a  general  conflagration  of  libraries ; 
how  he  proclaimed  that  all  records  of  events 
anterior  to  the  Revolution  ought  to  be  destroy 
ed  ;  how  he  laid  waste  the  abbey  of  St.  Denis, 
.pulled  down  monuments  consecrated  by  the 
veneration  of  ages,  and  scattered  on  the  wind 
the  dust  of  ancient  kings.  He  was,  in  truth, 
seldom  so  well  employed  as  when  he  turned 
for  a  moment  from  making  war  on  the  living 
to  make  war  on  fhe  dead. 
VOL.  V._8i 


Equally  idle  would  it  be  to  dilate  on  his  sen 
sual  excesses.  That  in  Barere,  as  in  the  whole 
breed  of  Neros,  Caligulas,  and  Domitians  whom 
he  resembled,  voluptuousness  was  mingled 
with  cruelty;  that  he  withdrew,  twice  in  every 
decade,  from  the  work  of  blood  to  the  smiling 
gardens  of  Clichy,  and  there  forgot  public  cares 
in  the  madness  of  wine,  and  in  the  arms  of 
courtesans,  has  often  been  repeated.  M.  Hip- 
polyte  Carnot  does  not  altogether  deny  the 
truth  of  these  stories,  but  justly  observes  that 
Barere's  dissipation  was  not  carried  to  such  a 
point  as  to  interfere  with  his  industry.  Nothing 
can  be  more  true.  Barere  was  by  no  means  so 
much  addicted  to  debauchery  as  to  neglect  the 
work  of  murder.  It  was  his  boast  that,  even 
during  his  hours  of  recreation,  he  cut  out  work 
for  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal.  To  those  who 
expressed  a  fear  that  his  exertions  would  hurt 
his  health,  he  gaily  answered  that  he  was  less 
busy  than  they  thought.  "  The  guillotine,"  he 
said,  "  does  all ;"  the  "  guillotine  governs." 
For  ourselves,  we  are  much  more  disposed  to 
look  indulgently  on  the  pleasures  which  he 
allowed  to  himself,  than  on  the  pain  which  he 
inflicted  on  his  neighbours. 

"  Atque  utinam  his  pntins  nngie  tola  ilia  dedisset 
Tenipora  smvitirs,  claras  quibus  abatulit  urhi 
Illustresque  animus,  impune  ac  vindice  nullo." 

An  immoderate  appetite  for  sensual  gratifica 
tion  is  undoubtedly  a  blemish  on  the  fame  of 
Henry  the  Fourth,  of  Lord  Somers,  of  Mr. 
Fox.  But  the  vices  of  honest  men  are  the 
virtues  of  Barere. 

And  now  Barere  had  become  a  really  cruel 
man.     It  was  from  mere  pusillanimity  that  he 
had  perpetrated  his  first  great  crimes.     But  the 
whole  history  of  our  race  proves  that  the  taste 
for  the  misery  of  others  is  a  taste  which  minds 
not  naturally  ferocious  may  too  easily  acquire, 
and  which,  when  once  acquired,  is  as  strong 
as  any  of  the  propensities  with  which  we  are 
born.    A  very  few  months  had  sufficed  to  bring 
this  man  into  a  state  of  mind  in  which  images 
of  despair,  wailing,  and  death,  had  an  exhila 
rating  effect  on  him  ;  and  inspired  him  as  wine 
and  love  inspire  men  of  free  and  joyous  na 
tures.     The    cart    creaking   under   its   daily 
freight  of  victims,  ancient  men,  and  lads,  and 
fair  young  girls,  the  binding  of  the  hands,  the 
thrusting  of  the  head  out  of  the  little  national 
sash-window,  the  crash  of  the  axe,  the  pool  of 
blood  beneath  the  scaffold,  the  heads  rolling  by 
scores  in  the  panier — these  things  were  to  him 
what  Lalage  and  a  cask  of  Falernian  were  to 
Horace,  what   Rosette   and  a  bottle   of  iced 
champagne  are  to  De  Beranger.    As  soon  as 
he   began   to   speak  of   slaughter,  his   heart 
seemed  to  be  enlarged,  and  his  fancy  to  be 
come  unusually  fertile  of  conceits  and  gasco 
nades.      Robespierre,  St.  Just,   and   Billaud, 
whose  barbarity  was  the  effect  of  earnest  and 
gloomy  hatred,  were,  in   his  view,  men  who 
made  a  toil  of  pleasure.     Cruelty  was  no  such 
melancholy  business,  to  be  gone  about  with  ai* 
austere  brow  and  a  whining  ton«;  it  was  a  re 
creation,   fitly   accompanied   by   singing    an4 
'aughing.     In  truth,  Robespierre  and  Barer* 
might  be  well  compared   to  the  two  renowneu 
langmen  of  Louis  the  Eleventh.    They  were 
3H* 


642 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


alike  insensible  of  pity,  alike  bent  on  havoc. 
But,  while  they  murdered,  one  of  them  frowned 
and  canted,  the  other  grinned  and  joked.  For 
our  own  part,  we  prefer  Jean  qui  pleure  to  Jean 
qui  rit. 

In  the  midst  of  the  funereal  gloom  which 
overhung  Paris,  a  gaiety  stranger  and  more 
ghastly  than  the  horrors  of  the  prison  and  the 
scaffold  distinguished  the  dwelling  of  Barere. 
Every  morning  a  crowd  of  suitors  assembled 
to  implore  his  protection.  He  came  forth  in 
his  rich  dressing-gown,  went  round  the  ante 
chamber,  dispensed  smiles  and  promises 
among  the  obsequious  crowd,  addressed  him 
self  with  peculiar  animation  to  every  hand 
some  woman  who  appeared  in  the  circle,  and 
complimented  her  in  the  florid  style  of  Gascony 
on  the  bloom  of  her  cheeks  and  the  lustre  of 
her  eyes.  When  he  had  enjoyed  the  fear  and 
anxiety  of  his  suppliants,  he  dismissed  them, 
and  flung  all  their  memorials  unread  into  the 
fire.  This  was  the  best  way,  he  conceived,  to 
prevent  arrears  of  business  from  accumulating. 
Here  he  was  only  an  imitator.  Cardinal  Du- 
bois  had  been  in  the  habit  of  clearing  his  table 
of  papers  in  the  same  way.  Nor  was  this  the 
only  point  in  which  we  could  point  out  a  re 
semblance  between  the  worst  statesman  of  the 
monarchy  and  the  worst  statesman  of  the  Re 
public. 

Of  Barpre's  peculiar  vein  of  pleasantry  a 
notion  may  be  formed  from  an  anecdote  which 
one  of  his  intimate  associates,  a  juror  of  the 
Revolutionary  Tribunal,  has  related.  A  cour 
tesan  who  bore  a  conspicuous  part  in  the 
orgies  of  Clichy,  implored  Barere  to  use  his 
power  against  a  head-dress  which  did  not  suit 
her  stvle  of  face,  and  which  a  rival  beauty  was 
trying  to  bring  into  fashion.  One  of  the  ma 
gistrates  of  the  capital  was  summoned,  and 
received  the  necessary  orders.  Aristocracy, 
Barere  said,  was  again  rearing  its  front.  These 
new  wigs  were  counter-revolutionary.  He  had 
reason  to  know  that  they  were  made  out  of  the 
long  fair  hair  of  handsome  aristocrats  who 
had  died  by  the  national  chopper.  Every  lady 
who  adorned  herself  with  the  relics  of  crimi 
nals  might  justly  be  suspected  of  incivism. 
This  ridiculous  lie  imposed  on  the  authorities 
of  Paris.  Female  citizens  were  solemnly 
warned  against  the  obnoxious  ringlets,  and 
were  left  to  choose  between  their  head-dresses 
and  their  heads.  Barere's  delight  at  the  suc 
cess  of  this  facetious  fiction  was  quite  extrava 
gant  ;  he  could  not  tell  the  story  without  going 
into  such  convulsions  of  laughter  as  made  his 
hearers  hope  that  he  was  about  to  choke. 
There  was  something  peculiarly  tickling  and 
exhilarating  to  his  mind  in  this  grotesque  com 
bination  of  the  frivolous  with  the  horrible,  of 
false  locks  and  curling-irons  with  spouting  ar 
teries  and  reeking  hatchets. 

But  though  Barere  succeeded  in  earning  the 
honourable^nicknames  of  the  Witling  of  Terror, 
and  the  Anacreon  of  the  Guillotine,  there  was 
one  place  where  it  was  long  remembered  to 
his  disadvantage,  that  he  "had,  for  a  time,  talked 
the  language  of  humanity  and  moderation. 
That  place  was  the  Jacobin  Club.  Even  after 
hfc  had  borne  the  chief  part  in  the  massacre 


of  the  Girondists,  in  the  murder  of  the  Queen, 
in  the  destruction  of  Lyons,  he  durst  not  show 
himself  within  that  sacred  precinct.  At  one 
meeting  of  the  society,  a  member  complained 
that  the  committee  to  which  the  supreme  di 
rection  of  affairs  was  intrusted,  after  all  the 
changes  which  had  been  made,  still  contained 
one  man  ^10  was  not  trustworthy.  Robes 
pierre,  whose  influence  over  the  Jacobins  was 
boundless,  undertook  the  defence  of  his  col- 
league,  owned  there  was  some  ground  for 
what  had  been  said,  but  spoke  highly  of  Ba 
rere's  industry  and  aptitude  for  business.  This 
seasonable  interposition  silenced  the  accuser, 
but  it  was  long  before  the  neophyte  could  ven 
ture  to  appear  at  the  club. 

At  length  a  masterpiece  of  wickedness, 
unique,  we  think,  even  among  Barcre's  great 
achievements,  obtained  his  full  pardon  even 
from  that  rigid  conclave.  The  insupportable 
tyranny  of  the  committee  of  public  salety  had 
at  length  brought  the  minds  of  men,  and  even 
of  women,  into  a  fierce  and  hard  temper,  which 
defied  or  welcomed  death.  The  life  which 
might  be  any  morning  taken  away,  in  conse 
quence  of  the  whisper  of  a  private  enemy, 
seemed  of  little  value.  It  was  something  to 
die  after  smiting  one  of  the  oppressors  ;  it  was 
something  to  bequeath  to  the  surviving  tyrants 
a  terror  not  inferior  to  that  which  they  had 
themselves  inspired.  Human  nature,  hunted 
and  worried  to  the  utmost,  now  turned  furious 
ly  to  bay.  Fouquier  Tinville  was  afraid  to 
walk  the  streets;  a  pistol  was  snapped  at 
Collot  D'Herbois;  a  young  girl,  animated  ap 
parently  by  the  spirit  of  Charlotte  Corday, 
attempted  to  obtain  an  interview  with  Robes 
pierre.  Suspicions  arose;  she  was  searched; 
and  two  knives  were  found  about  her.  She 
was  questioned,  and  spoke  of  the  Jacobin 
domination  with  resolute  scorn  and  aversion. 
It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  she  was  sent  to 
the  guillotine.  Barere  declared  from  the  tri 
bune  that  the  cause  of  these  attempts  was 
evident.  Pitt  and  his  guineas  had  done  the 
whole.  The  English  government  ha^l  organ 
ized  a  vast  system  of  murder,  had  armed  the 
hand  of  Charlotte  Corday,  and  had  now,  by 
similar  means,  attacked  two  of  the  most  emi 
nent  friends  of  liberty  in  France.  It  is  need 
less  to  say,  that  these  imputations  were  not 
only  false,  but  destitute  of  all  shoAv  of  truth, 
Nay,  they  were  demonstrably  absurd;  for  the 
assassins  to  whom  Barere  referred  rushed  on 
certain  death,  a  sure  proof  that  they  were 
not  hirelings.  The  whole  wealth  of  England 
would  not  have  bribed  any  sane  person  to  do 
what  Charlotte  Corday  did.  But  when  we 
consider  her  as  an  enthusiast,  her  conduct  is 
perfectly  natural.  Even  those  French  writers 
who  are  childish  enough  to  believe  that  the 
English  government  contrived  the  infernal 
machine,  and  strangled  the  Emperor  Paul, 
have  fully  acquitted  Mr.  Pitt  of  all  share  m 
the  death  of  Marat  and  in  the  attempt  on  Ro 
bespierre.  Yet  on  calumnies  so  futile  as  those 
which  we  have  mentioned,  did  Barere  ground 
a  motion  at  which  all  Christendom  stood 
aghast.  He  proposed  a  decree  that  no  quarter 
should  be  given  to  any  English  or  Hanoverian 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


G43 


oldier.*  ^lis  Carmagnole  was  worthy  of  the 
reposition  with  which  it  concluded.  "That 
e  Englishman  should  be  spared,  that  for  the 
ives  of  George,  for  the  human  machines  of 
3  >rk,  the  vocabulary  of  our  armies  should 
contain  such  a  word  as  generosity,  this  is  what 
the  National  Convention  cannot  endure.  War 
to  the  death  against  every  English  soldier.  If 
last  year,  at  Dunkirk,  quarter  had  been  refused 
to  them  when  they  asked  it  on  their  knees,  if 
our  troops  had  exterminated  them  all,  instead 
of  suffering  them  to  infest  our  fortresses  by 
their  presence,  the  English  government  would 
not  have  renewed  its  attack  on  our  frontiers 
this  year.  It  is  only  the  dead  man  who  never 
comes  back.  What  is  this  moral  pestilence 
which  h?s  introduced  into  our  armies  false 
ideas  of  humanity  1  That  the  English  were 
to  be  treated  with  indulgence  was  the  philan 
thropic  notion  of  the  Brissotines ;  it  was  the 
patriotic  practice  of  Dumourier.  But  hu 
manity  consists  in  exterminating  our  enemies. 
No  mercy  to  the  execrable  Englishman.  Such 
are  the  sentiments  of  the  true  Frenchman  ;  for 
he  knows  that  he  belongs  to  a  nation  revolu 
tionary  as  nature,  powerful  as  freedom,  ardent 
as  the  saltpetre  which  she  has  just  torn  from 
(he  entrails  of  the  earth.  Soldiers  of  liberty, 
when  victory  places  Englishmen  at  your  mer 
cy,  strike  !  None  of  them  must  return  to  the 
servile  soil  of  Great  Britain;  none  must  pol 
lute  the  free  soil  of  France." 

The  Convention,  thoroughly  tamed  and  si 
lenced,  acquiesced  in  Barere's  motion  without 
debate.  And  now  at  last  the  doors  of  the  Jaco 
bin  Club  were  thrown  open  to  the  disciple  who 
had  surpassed  his  masters.  He  was  admitted 
a  member  by  acclamation,  and  was  soon  se 
lected  to  preside. 

For  a  time  he  was  not  without  hope  that  his 
decree  would  be  carried  into  full  effect.  Intel 
ligence  arrived  from  the  seat  of  war  of  a  sharp 
contest  between  some  French  and  English 
troops,  in  which  the  republicans  had  the  ad 
vantage,  and  in  which  no  prisoners  had  been 
made.  Such  things  happen  occasionally  in 
all  wars.  Barere,  however,  attributed  the  fe 
rocity  of  this  combat  to  his  darling  decree,  and 
entertained  the  Convention  with  another  Car 
magnole. 

"  The  republicans,"  he  said,  "  saw  a  division 
in  red  uniform  at  a  distance.  The  red-coats 
are  attacked  with  the  bayonet.  Not  one  of 
them  escapes  the  blows  of  the  republicans.  All 
the  red-coats  have  been  killed.  No  mercy,  no 
indulgence,  has  been  shown  towards  the  vil- 


*  M.  Hippnlyte  C.irnot  does  his  best  to  excuse  this 
decree.  His  abuse  of  England  is  merely  laughable. 
England  has  managed  to  deal  with  enemies  of  a  very 
different  sort  from  either  himself  or  his  hero.  One 
disgraceful  blunder,  however,  we  think  it  right  to 


M  Hippoljte  Carnot  asserts  that  a  motion  similar  to 
that  of  Barete  was  made  in  the  English  Parliament  by 
the  late  Lord  Fitzwilliam.  This  assertion  is  false.  We 
defy  M.  Hippolyte  Carnot  to  state  the  date  and  terms 
«!'  the  motion  of  which  he  speaks.  We  do  not  accuse 
him  of  intentional  misrepresentation  ;  but  we  confi 
dently  accuse  him  of  extreme  ignorance  and  temerity. 
Our  renders  will  be  amused  to  learn  on  what  authority 
he  lias  ventured  to  publish  such  a  fable.  He  quotes,  not 
the  .loflrnals  of  the  Lords,  not  the  Parliamentary  De- 
bntes  ;  J,ut  a  ratitin?  message  of  the  Executive  Direc 
tory  to  the  Five  Hundred,  a  message,  too,  the  whole 
meaning  of  v'wh  he  has  utterly  misunderstood. 


lains.  Not  an  Englishman  whom  the  republi 
cans  could  reach  is  now  living.  How  many 
prisoners  should  you  guess  that  we  have 
made?  One  single  prisoner  is  the  result  of 
this  great  day." 

And  now  this  bad  man's  craving  for  blood 
had  become  insatiable.  The  more  he  quaffed, 
the  more  he  thirsted.  He  had  begun  with  the 
English;  but  soon  he  came  down  with  a  pro 
position  for  new  massacres.  "All  the  troops," 
he  said,  "of  the  coalesced  tyrants  in  garrison 
at  Conde,  Valenciennes,  Le  Quesnoy,  and  Lan- 
drecies,  ought  to  be  put  to  the  sword  unless 
they  surrender  at  discretion  in  twenty-four 
hours.  The  English,  of  course,  will  be  admit 
ted  to  no  capitulation  whatever.  With  the 
English  we  have  no  treaty  but  death.  As  to 
the  rest,  surrender  at  discretion  in  twenty-four 
hours,  or  death,  these  are  our  conditions.  If 
the  slaves  resist,  let  them  feel  the  edge  of  the 
sword."  And  then  he  waxed  facetious.  "On 
these  terms  the  Republic  is  willing  to  give 
a  lesson  in  the  art  of  war."  At  that  jest,  some 
hearers  worthy  of  such  a  speaker,  set  up  a 
laugh.  Then  he  became  serious  again.  "Let 
the  enemy  perish,"  he  cried;  "I  have  already 
said  it  from  this  tribune.  It  is  only  the  dead 
man  who  never  comes  back.  Kings  will  not 
conspire  against  us  in  the  grave.  Armies  will 
not  fight  against  us  when  they  are  annihilated. 
Let  our  war  with  them  be  a  war  of  extermina 
tion.  What  pity  is  due  to  slaves  whom  the 
emperor  leads  to  war  under  the  cane;  whom 
the  King  of  Prussia  beats  to  the  shambles  with 
the  flat  of  the  sword;  and  whom  the  Duke  of 
York  makes  drunk  with  rum  and  gin  1"  And 
at  the  rum  and  gin  the  Mountain  and  the  gal- 
leries  laughed  again. 

If  Barere  had  been  able  to  effect  his  pur- 
I  pose,  it  is  difficult  to  estimate  the  extent  of  the 
calamity  which  he  would  have  brought  on  the 
human  race.  No  government,  however  averse 
to  cruelty,  could,  in  justice  to  its  own  subjects, 
have  given  quarter  to  enemies  who  gave  none. 
Retaliation  would  have  been,  not  merely  justi 
fiable,  but  a  sacred  duty.  It  would  have  been 
necessary  for  Howe  and  Nelson  to  make  every 
French  sailor  whom  they  took  walk  the  plank. 
England  has  no  peculiar  reason  to  dread  the 
introduction  of  such  a  system.  On  the  con 
trary,  the  operation  of  Barere's  new  law  of  war 
would  have  been  more  unfavourable  to  his 
countrymen  than  to  ours;  for  we  believe  that, 
from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  the  war,  there 
never  was  a  time  at  which  the  number  of  French 
prisoners  in  England  was  not  greater  than  the 
number  of  English  prisoners  in  France;  and 
so,  we  apprehend,  it  will  be  in  all  wars  while 
England  retains  her  maritime  superiority.  Had 
the  murderous  decree  of  the  Convention  been  in 
force  from  1794  to  1815,  we  are  satisfied  that, 
for  every  Englishman  slain  by  the  French,  at 
least  three  Frenchmen  would  have  been  put  to 
the  sword  by  the  English.  It  is  therefore,  not 
as  Englishmen,  but  as  mft.nbfrs  of  the  great 
society  of  mankind,  that  we  speak  with  indig 
nation  and  horror  of  the  change  which  Barere 
attempted  to  introduce.  The  mere  slaughter 
would  have  been  the  smallest  part  of  the  evil. 
The  butchering  of  a  single  unarmed  man  in 
cold  blood,  under  an  act  of  the  legislature, 


644 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


would  have  produced  more  evil  than  the  car- ' 
nage  of  ten  such  fields  as  Albuera.  Public 
law  would  have  been  subverted  from  the  foun-  j 
dations ;  national  enmities  would  have  been 
inflamed  to  a  degree  of  rage  which,  happily,  it 
is  not  easy  for  us  to  conceive;  cordial  peace 
would  have  been  impossible.  The  moral  cha 
racter  of  the  European  nations  would  have 
been  rapidly  and  deeply  corrupted;  for  in  all 
countries  those  men  whose  calling  is  to  put 
their  lives  in  jeopardy  for  the  defence  of  the 
public  weal  enjoy  high  consideration,  and  are 
considered  as  the  best  arbitrators  on  points  of 
honour  and  manly  bearing.  With  the  standard 
of  morality  established  in  the  military  profes 
sion,  the  general  standard  of  morality  must,  to 
a  great  extent,  sink  or  rise.  It  is,  therefore, 
a  fortunate  circumstance,  that  during  a  long 
course  of  years,  respect  for  the  weak,  and 
clemency  towards  the  vanquished,  have  been 
considered  as  qualities  not  less  essential  to  the 
accomplished  soldier  than  personal  courage. 
How  long  would  this  continue  to  be  the  case, 
i'  the  slaying  of  prisoners  were  a  part  of  the 
daily  duty  of  the  warrior?  What  man  of  kind 
and  generous  nature  would,  under  such  a  sys 
tem,  willingly  bear  arms!  Who,  that  was 
compelled  to  bear  arms,  would  long  continue 
kind  and  generous  ?  And  is  it  not  certain  that, 
if  barbarity  towards  the  helpless  became  the 
characteristic  of  military  men,  the  taint  must 
rapidly  spread  to  civil  and  to  domestic  life,  and 
must  show  itself  in  all  the  dealings  of  the  strong 
with  the  weak,  of  husbands  with  wives,  of 
employers  with  workmen,  of  creditors  with 
debtors  ] 

But,  thank  God,  Barcre's  decree  was  a  mere 
dead  letter.  It  was  to  be  executed  by  men  very 
different  from  those  whc,  in  the  interior  of 
France,  were  the  instruments  of  the  committee 
of  public  safety,  who  prated  at  Jacobin  Clubs, 
and  ran  to  Fouquier  Tinville  with  charges  of 
incivism  against  women  whom  they  could  not 
seduce,  and  bankers  from  whom  they  could 
not  extort  money.  The  warriors  who,  under 
Hoche,  had  guarded  the  walls  of  Dunkirk,  and 
who,  under  Kleber,  had  made  good  the  defence 
of  the  wood  of  Monceaux,  shrank  with  horror 
from  an  office  more  degrading  than  that  of  the 
hangman.  "The  Convention,"  said  an  officer 
to  his  men,  "  has  sent  orders  that  all  the  English 
prisoners  shall  be  ,shot."  "  We  will  not  shoot 
them,"  answered  a  stout-hearted  sergeant. 
"Send  them  to  the  Convention.  If  the  depu 
ties  take  pleasure  in  killing  a  prisoner,  they 
may  kill  him  themselves,  and  eat  him  too,  like 
savages  as  they  are."  This  was  the  sentiment 
of  the  whole  army.  Buonaparte,  who  tho 
roughly  understood  war,  who  at  Jaffa  and  else 
where  gave  ample  proof  that  he  was  not  un 
willing  to  strain  the  laws  of  war  to  their  utmost 
rigour,  and  whose  hatred  of  England  amounted 
to  a  folly,  always  spoke  of  Barere's  decree  with 
loathing,  and  boasted  that  the  army  had  re 
fused  to  obey  the  Convention. 

Such  disobedience  on  the  part  of  any  other 
class  of  citizens  would  have  been  instantly 
punished  by  wholesale  massacre  ;  but  the  com 
mittee  of  public  safety  was  aware  that  the  dis 
cipline  which  had  tamed  the  unwarlike  popu 
lation  of  the  fields  and  cities  might  not  answer 


in  the  camps.  To  fling  people  'oy  score?,  out 
of  a  boat,  and,  when  they  catch  hold  of  it,  to 
chop  off  their  fingers  with  a  hatchet,  is  un 
doubtedly  a  very  agreeable  pastime  for  a  tho 
rough-bred  Jacobin,  when  the  sufferers  are,  as 
at  Nantes,  old  confessors,  young  girls,  or  wo 
men  with  child.  But  such  sport  might  prove 
a  little  dangerous  if  tried  upon  grim  ranks  of 
grenadiers,  marked  with  the  scars  of  Hond- 
schoote,  and  singed  by  the  smoke  of  Fleurus. 

Barere,  however,  found  some  consolation. 
If  he  could  not  succeed  in  murdering  the 
English  and  the  Hanoverians,  he  was  amply 
indemnified  by  a  new  and  vast  slaughter  of 
his  own  countrymen  and  countrywomen.  If 
the  defence  which  has  been  set  up  for  the 
members  of  the  committee  of  public  safety 
had  been  well  founded,  if  it  had  been  true  that 
they  governed  with  extreme  seventy  only  be 
cause  the  Republic  was  i^  extreme  peril,  it  is 
clear  that  the  severity  v/cuM  have  diminished 
as  the  peril  diminished.  But  the  fact  is,  that 
those  cruelties  for  which  the  public  danger  is 
made  a  plea,  became  more  and  more  enor 
mous  as  the  danger  became  less  and  less,  and 
reached  the  full  height  when  there  was  no 
longer  any  danger  at  all.  In  the  autumn  of 
1793,  there  was  undoubtedly  reason  to  appre 
hend  that  France  might  be  unable  to  maintain 
the  struggle  against  the  European  coalition. 
The  enemy  was  triumphant  on  the  frontiers. 
More  than  half  the  departments  disowned  the 
authority  of  the  Convention.  But  at  that  time 
eight  or  ten  necks  a  day  were  thought  an  am 
ple  allowance  for  the  guillotine  of  the  capital. 
In  the  summer  of  1794,  Bordeaux,  Toulon, 
Caen,  Lyons,  Marseilles,  had  submitted  to  the 
ascendency  of  Paris.  The  French  arms  were 
victorious  under  the  Pyrenees  and  on  the 
Sambre.  Brussels  had  fallen.  Prussia  had 
announced  her  intention  of  withdrawing  from 
the  contest.  The  Republic,  no  longer  content 
with  defending  her  own  independence,  was 
beginning  to  meditate  conquest  beyond  the 
Alps  and  the  Rhine.  She  was  now  more  for 
midable  to  her  neighbours  than  ever  Louis  the 
Fourteenth  had  been.  And  now  the  Revolu 
tionary  Tribunal  of  Paris  was  not  content  with 
forty,  fifty,  sixty  heads  in  a  morning.  It  was 
just  after  a  series  of  victories  which  destroyed 
the  whole  force  of  the  single  argument  which 
has  been  urged  in  defence  of  the  system  of 
terror,  that  the  committee  of  public  safety  re 
solved  to  infuse  into  that  system  an  energy 
hitherto  unknown.  It  was  proposed  to  recon 
struct  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal,  and  to  col 
lect  in  the  space  of  two  pages  the  whole  revolu 
tionary  jurisprudence.  Lists  of  twelve  judges 
and  fifty  jurors  were  made  out  from  among  the 
fiercest  Jacobins.  The  substantive  law  was 
simply  this,  that  whatever  the  tribunal  should 
think  pernicious  to  the  Republic  was  a  capital 
crime.  The  law  of  evidence  was  simply  this, 
that  whatever  satisfied  the  jurors  was  sufficient 
proof.  The  law  of  procedure  was  of  a  piece 
with  every  thing  else.  There  was  to  be  an  ad 
vocate  against  the  prisoner,  and  no  advocate 
for  him.  It  was  expressly  declared  that,  if  the 
jurors  were  in  any  manner  convinced  of  the 
guilt  of  the  prisoner,  they  might  convict  him 
without  hearing  a  single  witness.  The  only 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


345 


punishment  which  the  court  could  inflict  was 
death. 

Robespierre  proposed  this  decree.  When  he 
had  read  it,  a  murmur  rose  from  the  Conven 
tion.  The  fear  which  had  long  restrained  the 
deputies  from  opposing  the  committee  was 
overcome  by  a  stronger  fear.  Every  man  felt 
the  knife  at  his  throat.  "The  decree,"  said 
one,  "  is  of  grave  importance.  I  move  that  it 
be  printed,  and  that  the  debate  be  adjourned. 
If  such  a  measure  were  adopted  without  time 
for  consideration,  I  would  blow  my  brains  out 
at  once."  The  motion  for  adjournment  was 
seconded.  Then  Barere  sprang  up.  "It  is 
impossible,"  he  said,  "that  there  can  be  any 
difference  of  opinion  among  us  as  to  a  law  like 
this,  a  law  so  favourable  in  all  respects  to  pa 
triots  ;  a  law  which  insures  the  speedy  punish 
ment  of  conspirators.  If  there  is  to  be  an  ad 
journ  mem,  I  must  insist  that  it  shall  not  be  for 
more  than  three  days."  The  opposition  was 
overawed  ;  the  decree  was  passed  ;  and,  during 
the  six  weeks  which  followed,  the  havoc  was 
such  as  had  never  been  known  before. 

And  now  the  evil  was  beyond  endurance. 
That  timid  majority  which  had  for  a  time  sup 
ported  the  Girondists,  and  which  had,  after 
their  fall,  con'enled  itself  with  registering  in 
silence  the  decrees  of  the  committee  of  public 
safety,  at  length  drew  courage  from  despair. 
Leaders  of  bold  and  firm  character  were  not 
wanting;  men  such  asFouche  andTallien,who, 
having  been  long  conspicuous  among  the  chiefs 
of  the  Mountain,  now  found  that  their  own 
lives,  or  lives  still  dearer  to  them  than  their 
own,  were  in  extreme  peril.  Nor  could  it  be 
longer  kept  secret  that  there  was  a  schism  in 
the  despotic  committee.  On  one  side  were  Ro 
bespierre,  St.  Just,  and  Couthon  ;  on  the  other, 
Collot  and  Billaud.  Barere  leaned  towards 
Ihese  last,  but  only  leaned  towards  them.  As 
was  ever  his  fashion  when  a  great  crisis  was 
at  hand,  he  fawned  alternately  on  both  parties, 
struck  alternately  at  both,  and  held  himself  in 
readiness  to  chant  the  praises  or  to  sign  the 
death-warrant  of  either.  In  any  event  his  Car 
magnole  was  ready.  The  tree  of  liberty,  the 
blood  of  traitors,  the  dagger  of  Brutus,  the 
guineas  of  perfidious  Albion,  would  do  equally 
well  for  Billaud  and  for  Robespierre. 

The  first  attack  which  was  made  on  Robes 
pierre  was  indirect.  An  old  woman  named 
Catharine  Theot,  half  maniac,  half  impostor, 
was  protected  by  him,  and  exercised  a  strange 
influence  over  his  mind;  for  he  was  natrrally 
prone  to  superstition,  and,  having  abjured  the 
ifaith  in  which  he  had  been  brought  up,  was 
looking  about  for  something  to  believe.  Ba- 
rere  drew  up  a  report  against  Catharine,  which 
contained  many  facetious  conceits,  and  ended, 
IAS  might  be  expected,  with  a  motion  for  send 
ing  her  and  some  other  wretched  creatures  of 
both  sexes  to  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal,  or, 
in  other  words,  to  death.  This  report,  how 
ever,  he  did  not  dare  to  read  to  the  Convention 
himself.  Another  member,  less  timid,  was  in 
duced  to  father  the  cruel  buffoonery;  and  the 
real  author  enjoyed  in  security  the  dismay  and 
vexation  of  Robespierre. 

Barere  now  thought  that  he  had  done  enough 
on  one  side,  and  that  it  was  lime  to  make  his 


peace  with  the  other.  On  the  seventh  of  Ther- 
midor,  he  pronounced  in  the  Convention  a  pane 
gyric  on  Robespierre.  "That  representative 
of  the  people,"  he  said,  "enjoys  a  reputation 
for  patriotism,  earned  by  five  years  of  exer 
tion,  and  by  unalterable  fidelity  to  the  prin 
ciples  of  independence  and  1  berty."  On  the 
eighth  of  Thermidor,  it  became  clear  that  a 
decisive  struggle  was  at  hand.  Robespierre 
struck  the  first  blow.  He  mounted  the  tribune 
and  uttered  a  long  invective  on  his  opponents. 
It  was  moved  that  his  discourse  should  be 
printed;  and  Barere  spoke  for  the  printing. 
The  sense  of  the  Convention  soon  appeared  to 
be  the  other  way ;  and  Barere  apologized  for 
his  former  speech,  and  implored  his  colleagues 
to  abstain  from  disputes,  which  would  be  agree 
able  only  to  Pitt  and  York.  On  the  next  day, 
the  ever-memorable  ninth  of  Thermidor,  came 
the  real  tug  of  war.  Tallien,  bravely  taking 
his  life  in  his  hand,  led  the  onset,  Billaud  fol 
lowed  ;  and  then  all  that  infinite  hatred  which 
had  long  been  kept  down  by  terror  burst  forth, 
and  swept  every  barrier  before  it.  When  at 
length  the  voice  of  Robespierre,  drowned  by 
the  president's  bell,  and  by  shouts  of  "Down 
with  the  tyrant!"  had  died  away  in  hoarse 
gasping,  Barere  arose.  He  began  with  timid 
and  doubtful  phrases,  watched  the  effect  of 
every  word  he  uttered,  and,  when  the  feeling 
of  the  Assembly  had  been  unequivocally  mani 
fested,  declared  against  Robespierre.  But  it 
was  not  till  the  people  out  of  doors,  and  espe 
cially  the  gunners  of  Paris,  had  espoused  the 
cause  of  the  Convention,  that  Barere  felt 
quite  at  ease.  Then  he  sprang  to  the  tribune, 
poured  forth  a  Carmagnole  about  Pisistratus 
and  Catiline,  and  concluded  by  moving  that  the 
heads  of  Robespierre  and  Robespierre's  accom 
plices  should  be  cut  off  without  a  trial.  The 
motion  was  carried.  On  the  following  morn, 
ing  the  vanquished  members  of  the  committee 
of  public  safety  and  their  principal  adherents 
suffered  death.  It  was  exactly  one  year  since 
Barere  had  commenced  his  career  of  slaughter, 
by  moving  the  proscription,  of  his  old  allies,  the 
Girondists.  We  greatly  doubt  whether  any 
human  being  has  ever  succeeded  in  packing 
more  wickedness  into  the  space  of  three  hun 
dred  and  sixty-five  days. 

The  ninth  of  Thermidor  is  one  of  the  great 
epochs  in  the  history  of  Europe.  It  is  true 
that  the  three  members  of  the  committee  of 
public  safety  who  triumphed  were  by  no  means 
better  men  than  the  three  who  fell.  Indeed, 
we  are  inclined  to  think  that  of  these  six  states 
men  the  least  bad  were  Robespierre  and  St. 
Just,  whose  cruelty  was  the  effect  of  sincere 
fanaticism  operating  on  narrow  understandings 
and  acrimonious  tempers.  The  worst  of  the 
six  was,  beyond  all  doubt,  Barere,  who  had  no 
faith  in  any  part  of  the  system  which  he  up 
held  by  persecution  ;  who,  while  he  sent  nis 
fellow-creatures  to  death  for  being  the  third 
cousins  of  royalists,  had  not  in  the  least  made 
up  his  mind  that  a  republic  was  better  than  a 
monarchy  ;  who,  while  he  slew  his  old  friends 
for  federalism,  was  himself  far  more  a  federal 
ist  than  any  of  them  ;  who  had  become  a  mur 
derer  merely  for  his  safety,  and  who  continued 
to  be  a  murderer  merely  for  his  pleasure 


616 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


The  tendency  of  the  vulgar  is  to  embody 
every  thing.  S'ome  individual  is  selected,  and 
often  selected  very  injudiciously,  as  the  repre-  i 
sentative  of  every  great  movement  of  the  pub 
lic  mind,  of  every  great  revolution  in  human 
affairs  ;  and  on  this  individual  are  concentrated 
all  the  love  and  all  the  hatred,  all  the  admira 
tion  and  all  the  contempt,  which  he  ought  right 
fully  to  share  with  a  whole  party,  a  whole  sect, 
a  whole  nation,  a  whole  generation.  Perhaps 
no  human  being  has  suffered  so  much  from 
this  propensity  of  the  multitude  as  Robespierre. 
He  is  regarded  not  merely  as  what  he  was,  an 
envious,  malevolent  zealot;  but  as  the  incar 
nation  of  Terror,  as  Jacobinism  personified. 
The  truth  is,  that  it  was  not  by  him  that  the 
system  of  terror  was  carried  to  the  last  extreme. 
The  most  horrible  days  in  the  history  of  the 
Revolutionary  Tribunal  of  Paris,  were  those 
which  immediately  preceded  the  ninth  of  Ther- 
midor.  Robespierre  had  then  ceased  to  attend 
the  meetings  of  the  sovereign  committee  ;  and 
the  direction  of  affairs  was  really  in  the  hands 
of  Billand,  of  Collot,  and  of  Barere. 

It  had  never  occurred  to  those  three  tyrants, 
that  in  overthrowing  Robespierre,  they  were 
overthrowing  that  system  of  terror  to  which 
they  were  more  attached  than  he  had  ever 
been.  Their  object  was  to  go  on  slaying  even 
more  mercilessly  than  before.  But  they  had 
misunderstood  the  nature  of  the  great  crisis 
•which  had  at  last  arrived.  The  yoke  of  the 
committee  was  broken  for  ever.  The  Conven 
tion  had  regained  its  liberty,  had  tried  its 
strength,  had  vanquished  and  punished  its 
enemies.  A  great  reaction  had  commenced. 
Twenty-four  hours  after  Robespierre  had  ceased 
to  live,  it  was  moved  and  carried,  amidst  loud 
bursts  of  applause,  that  the  sittings  of  the  Re 
volutionary  Tribunal  should  be  suspended.  Bil- 
laud  was  not  at  that  moment  present.  He  en 
tered  the  hall  soon  after,  learned  with  indigna 
tion  what  had  passed,  and  moved  that  the  vote 
should  be  rescinded.  But  loud  cries  of  "No, 
no!"  rose  from  those  benches  which  had  lately 
paid  mute  obedience  to  his  commands.  Barere 
came  forward  on  the  same  day,  and  adjured 
the  Convention  not  to  relax  the  system  of  ter 
ror.  "Beware,  above  all  things,"  he  cried, 
"of  that  fatal  moderation  which  talks  of  peace 
and  of  clemency.  Let  aristocracy  know  that 
here  she  will  find  only  enemies  sternly  bent  on 
vengeance,  and  judges  who  have  no  pity."  But 
the  "day  of  the  Carmagnoles  was  over:  the 
restraint  of  fear  had  been  relaxed;  and  the 
hatred  with  which  the  nation  regarded  the 
Jacobin  dominion  broke  forth  with  ungovern 
able  violence.  Not  more  strongly  did  the  tide 
of  public  opinion  run  against  the  old  monarchy 
and  aristocracy,  at  the  time  of  the  taking  of  the 
Bastile,  than  it  now  ran  against  the  tyranny  of 
the  Mountain.  From  every  dungeon  the  prison 
ers  came  forth,  as  they  had  gone  in,  by  hundreds. 
The  decree  which  forbade  the  soldiers  of  the 
Republic  to  give  quarter  to  the  English,  was 
repealed  by  an  unanimous  vote,  amidst  loud 
acclamations  ;  nor,  passed  as  it  was,  disobeyed 
as  it  was,  and  rescinded  as  it  was,  can  it  be 
with  justice  considered  as  a  blemish  on  the 
(ame  of  the  French  nation.  The  Jacobin  Club 
was  refractory.  It  was  suppressed  without 


resistance.  The  surviving  Girondist  deputies 
who  had  concealed  themselves  from  the  ven 
geance  of  their  enemies  in  caverns  and  garrets, 
were  re-admitted  to  their  seats  in  the  Conven 
tion.  No  day  passed  without  some  signal 
reparation  of  injustice;  no  street  in  Paris  was 
without  some  trace  of  the  recent  change.  la 
the  theatre,  the  bust  of  Marat  was  pulled  down, 
from  its  pedestal  and  broken  in  pieces,  amidst 
the  applause  of  the  audience.  His  carcass 
was  ejected  from  the  Pantheon.  The  celebrated 
picture  of  his  death,  which  had  hung  in  the 
hall  of  the  Convention,  was  removed.  The 
savage  inscriptions  with  which  the  walls  of  the 
city  had  been  covered  disappeared;  and  in. 
place  of  death  and  terror,  humanity,  the  watch 
word  of  the  new  rulers,  was  everywhere  to  be 
seen.  In  the  mean  time,  the  gay  spirit  of 
France,  recently  subdued  by  oppression,  and 
now  elated  by  the  joy  of  ,a  great  deliverance, 
wantoned  in  a  thousand  forms.  Art,  taste, 
luxury,  revived.  Female  beauty  regained  its 
empire — an  empire  strengthened  by  the  remem 
brance  of  all  the  tender  and  all  the  sublime 
virtues  which  women,  delicately  bred  and  re 
puted  frivolous,  had  displayed  during  the  evil 
days.  Refined  manners,  chivalrous  sentiments, 
followed  in  the  train  of  love.  The  dawn  of  the 
Arctic  summer  day  after  the  Arctic  winter 
night,  the  great  unsealing  of  the  waters,  the 
awakening  of  animal  and  vegetable  life,  the 
sudden  softening  of  the  air,  the  sudden  bloom 
ing  of  the  flowers,  the  sudden  bursting  of  whole 
forests  into  verdure,  is  but  a  feeble  type  of  that 
happiest  and  most  genial  of  revolutions,  the 
revolution  of  the  ninth  of  Thermidor. 

But,  in  the  midst  of  the  revival  of  all  kind 
and  generous  sentiments,  there  was  one  por 
tion  of  the  community  against  which  mercy 
itself  seemed  to  cry  out  for  vengeance.  The 
chiefs  of  the  late  government  and  their  tools 
were  now  never  named  but  as  the  men  of  blood, 
the  drinkers  of  blood,  the  cannibals.  In  some 
parts  of  France,  where  the  creatures  of  the 
Mountain  had  acted  with  peculiar  barbarity, 
the  populace  took  the  law  into  its  own  hands, 
and  meted  out  justice  to  the  Jacobins  with  the 
true  Jacobin  measure ;  but  at  Paris  the  punish 
ments  were  inflicted  with  order  and  decency; 
and  were  few  when  compared  with  the  num 
ber,  and  lenient  when  compared  with  the  enor 
mity,  of  the  crimes.  Soon  after  the  ninth  of 
Thermidor,  two  of  the  vilest  of  mankind,  Fou- 
quier  Tinville,  whom  Barere  had  placed  at  the 
Revolutionary  Tribunal,  and  Lebon,  whom 
Barere  had  defended  in  the  Convention,  were 
placed  under  arrest.  A  third  miscreant  soon 
shared  their  fate,  Carrier,  the  tyrant  of  Nantes. 
The  trials  of  these  men  brought  to  light  horrors 
surpassing  any  thing  that  Sueton.us  and  Lam- 
|  pridius  have  related  of  the  worst  Cxsars.  But 
it  was  impossible  to  punish  subordinate  agents 
j  who,  bart  as  they  were,  had  only  acted  in  ac- 
cordance  with  tne  spirit  of  the  government 
|  which  they  served,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to 
grant  impunity  to  the  heads  of  the  wicked  ad 
ministration.  A  cry  was  raised,  both  within 
and  without  the  Convention,  for  justice  on 
Collot,  Billaud,  and  Barore. 

Collot  and  Billaud,  with  all  th?i- "nces,  ap 
pear  to  have  been  men  of  resolu'o  natures. 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


647 


They  made  no  submission ;  but  opposed  to  the 
hatred  of  mankind,  at  first  a  fierce  resistance, 
and  afterwards  a  dogged  and  sullen  endurance. 
Barere,  on  the  other  hand,  as  soon  as  he  began 
to  understand  the  real  nature  of  the  revolution 
of  Thermidor,  attempted  to  abandon  the  Moun 
tain,  and  to  obtain  admission  among  his  old 
friends  of  the  moderate  party.  He  declared 
everywhere  that  he  had  never  been  in  favour 
of  severe  measures;  that  he  was  a  Girondist; 
that  he  had  always  condemned  and  lamented 
the  manner  in  which  the  Brissotine  deputies 
had  been  treated.  He  now  preached  mercy 
from  that  tribune  from  which  he  had  recently 
preached  extermination.  "  The  time,"  he  said, 
"  has  come  at  which  our  clemency  may  be  in 
dulged  without  danger.  We  may  now  safely 
consider  temporary  imprisonment  as  an  ade 
quate  punishment  for  political  misdemeanors." 
It  was  only  a  fortnight  since,  from  the  same 
place,  he  had  declaimed  against  the  moderation 
which  dared  even  to  talk  "of  clemency;  it  was 
only  a  fortnight  since  he  had  ceased  to  send 
men  and  women  to  the  guillotine  of  Paris,  at 
the  rate  of  three  hundred  a  week.  He  now 
wished  to  make  his  peace  with  the  moderate 
party  at  the  expense  of  the  Terrorists,  as  he 
had,  a  year  before,  made  his  peace  with  the 
Terrorists  at  the  expense  of  the  moderate  party. 
But  he  was  disappointed.  He  had  left  himself 
no  retreat.  His  face,  his  voice,  his  rants,  his 
jokes,  had  become  hateful  to  the  Convention. 
When  he  spoke,  he  was  interrupted  by  mur 
murs.  Bitter  reflections  were  daily  cast  on  his 
cowardice  and  perfidy.  On  one  occasion  Car- 
not  rose  to  give  an  account  of  a  victory,  and 
so  far  forgot  the  gravity  of  his  character  as  to 
indulge  in  the  sort  of  oratory  which  Barere  had 
affected  on  similar  occasions.  He  was  inter 
rupted  by  cries  of  "No  more  Carmagnoles!" 
"No  more  of  Barere's  puns  !" 

At  length,  five  months  after  the  revolution  of 
1  hermidor,  the  Convention  resolved  that  a 
committee  of  twenty-one  members  should  be 
appointed  to  examine  into  the  conduct  of  Bil- 
laud,  Col  lot,  and  Barere.  In  some  weeks  the 
report  was  made.  From  that  report  we  learn 
that  a  paper  had  been  discovered,  signed  by 
Barere,  and  containing  a  proposition  for  adding 
the  last  improvement  to  the  system  of  terror. 
France  was  to  be  divided  into  circuits;  itine 
rant  revolutionary  tribunals,  composed  of  trusty 
Jacobins,  were  to  move  from  department  to 
department ;  and  the  guillotine  was  to  travel  in 
their  train. 

Barere,  in  his  defence,  insisted  that  no  speech 
or  motion  which  he  had  made  in  the  Conven 
tion  could,  without  a  violation  of  the  freedom 
of  debate,  be  treated  as  a  crime.  He  was  asked 
how  he  could  resort  to  such  a  mode  of  defence, 
after  putting  to  death  so  many  deputies  on  ac 
count  of  opinions  expressed  in  the  Convention. 
He  hard  nothing  to  say,  but  that  it  was  much 
to  be  regretted  that  the  sound  principle  had 
ever  been  violated. 

He  arrogated  to  himself  a  large  share  of  the 
merir.  of  the  revolution  of  Thermidor.  The  men 
who  had  mlced  their  lives  to  effect  that  revo- 
l.ttion,  and  \vho  knew  that,  if  they  had  failed, 
Barere  would,  in  all  probability,  have  moved 
the  decree  for  beheading  them  without  a  trial, 


1  and  have  drawn  up  a  proclamation  announcing 
'  their  guilt  and  their  punishment  to  all  France, 
were  by  no  means  disposed  to  acquiesce  in  his 
claims.  He  was  reminded  that,  only  forty-eight 
hours  before  the  decisive  conflict,  he  had,  in  the 
tribune,  been  profuse  of  adulation  to  Robes 
pierre.  His  answer  to  this  reproach  is  worthy 
of  himself.  "  It  was  necessary,"  he  said,  "  to 
dissemble.  It  was  necessary  to  flatter  Robes 
pierre's  vanity,  and,  by  panegyric,  to  impel  him 
to  the  attack.  This  was  the  motive  which  in- 
duced  me  to  load  him  with  those  praises  of 
which  you  complain.  Who  ever  blamed  Bru 
tus  for  dissembling  with  Tarquinl" 

The  accused  triumvirs  had  only  one  chance 
of  escaping  punishment.  There  was  severe 
distress  at  that  moment  among  the  working 
people  of  the  capital.  This  distress  the  Jaco 
bins  attributed  to  the  reaction  of  Thermidcr, 
to  the  lenity  with  which  the  aristocrats  were 
now  treated,  and  to  the  measures  which  had 
been  adopted  against  the  chiefs  of  the  late 
administration.  Nothing  is  too  absurd  to  be 
believed  by  a  populace  which  has  not  break 
fasted,  and  which  does  not  know  how  it  is  to 
dine.  The  rabble  of  the  Faubourg  St.  An- 
toine  rose,  menaced  the  deputies,  and  de 
manded  with  loud  cries  the  liberation  of  the 
persecuted  patriots.  But  the  Convention  was 
no  longer  such  as  it  had  been',  whin  similar 
means  were  employed  too  successfully  against 
the  Girondists.  Its  spirit  was  roused.  Its 
strength  had  been  proved.  Military  means 
were  at  its  command.  The  tumult  was  sup 
pressed,  and  it  was  decreed  that  same  evening 
that  Collot,  Billaud,  and  Barere  should  instantly 
be  removed  to  a  distant  place  of  confinement 
The  next  day  the  order  of  the  Convention 
was  executed.  The  account  which  Barere  has 
given  of  his  journey  is  the  most  interesting 
and  the  most  trustworthy  part  of  these  memoirs. 
There  is  no  witness  so  infamous  that  a  court 
of  justice  will  not  take  his  word  against  him 
self;  and  even  Barere  may  be  believed  when 
he  tells  us  how  much  he  was  hated  and  de 
spised. 

The  carriage  in  which  he  was  to  travel 
passed,  surrounded  by  armed  men,  along  the 
street  of  St.  Honore.  A  crowd  soon  gathered 
round  it,  and  increased  every  moment.  On 
the  long  flight  of  steps  before  the  church  of 
St.  Roch  stood  rows  of  eager  spectators.  It 
was  with  difficulty  that  the  coach  could  maka 
its  way  through  those  who  hung  upon  it,  hoot 
ing,  cursing,  and  striving  to  burst  the  doors, 
Barere  thought  his  life  in  danger,  and  was  con 
ducted  at  his  own  request  to  a  public  office, 
where  he  hoped  that  he  might  find  shelter  till 
the  crowd  should  disperse.  In  the  mean  time, 
another  discussion  on  his  fate  took  place  in  the 
Convention.  It  was  proposed  to  deal  with  him 
as  he  had  dealt  with  better  men,  to  pur  him  out 
of  the  pale  of  the  law,  and  to  deliver  him  at 
once  without  any  trial  to  the  headsman.  But 
the  humanity  which,  since  the  ninth  Thermi 
dor,  had  generally  directed  the  public  counsels, 
restrained  the  deputies  from  taking  this  course 
It  was  now  nisrht;  and  the  streets  gradually 
became  quiet.  The  clock  struck  tweive  ;  arii. 
Barere,  under  a  strong  guard,  again  set  forth 
I  on  his  journey.  He  was  conducted  over  th^ 


648 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


river  to  the  place  where  the  Orleans  road 
branches  off  from  the  southern  boulevard. 
Two  travelling  carriages  stood  there.  In  one 
of  them  was  Billaud,  attended  by  two  officers; 
in  the  other,  two  more  officers  were  waiting  to 
receive  Barere.  Collot  was  already  on  the  road. 
At  Orleans,  a  city  which  had  suffered  cruelly 
from  the  Jacobin  tyranny,  the  three  deputies 
were  surrounded  by  a  mob  bent  on  tearing 
them  to  pieces.  All  the  national  guards  of  the 
neighbourhood  were  assembled ;  and  this  force 
was  not  greater  than  the  emergency  required  ; 
'or  the  multitude  pursued  the  carriages  far  on 
the  road  to  Blois. 

At  Amboise  the  prisoners  learned  that  Tours 
was  ready  to  receive  them.  The  stately  bridge 
was  occupied  by  a  throng  of  people,  who  swore 
that  the  men  under  whose  rule  the  Loire  had 
been  choked  with  corpses,  should  have  full 
personal  experience  of  the  nature  of  a  noyade. 
In  consequence  of  this  news,  the  officers  who 
had  charge  of  the  criminals  made  such  arrange 
ments  that  the  carriages  reached  Tours  at  two 
in  the  morning,  and  drove  straight  to  the  post- 
house.  Fresh  horses  were  instantly  ordered, 
and  the  travellers  started  again  at  full  gallop. 
They  had  in  truth  not  a  moment  to  lose ;  for 
the  alarm  had  been  given :  lights  were  seen  in 
motion  ;  and  the  yells  of  a  great  multitude, 
disappointed  of  its  revenge,  mingled  with  the 
sound  of  the  departing  wheels. 

At  Poitiers  there  was  another  narrow  escape. 
As  the  prisoners  quitted  the  post-house,  they  saw 
the  whole  population  pouring  in  fury  down  the 
steep  declivity  on  which  the  city  is  built.  They 
passed  near  Niort,  but  could  not  venture  to 
enter  it.  The  inhabitants  came  forth  with 
threatening  aspect,  and  vehemently  cried  to 
the  postilions  to  stop  ;  but  the  postilions  urged 
the  horses  to  full  speed,  and  soon  left  the  town 
behind.  Through  such  dangers  the  men  of 
blood  were  brought  in  safety  to  Rochelle. 

Oleron  was  the  place  of  their  destination,  a 
dreary  island  beaten  by  the  raging  waves  of 
the  Bay  of  Biscay.  The  prisoners  were  con 
fined  in  the  castle  ;  each  had  a  single  chamber, 
at  the  door  of  which  a  guard  was  placed  ;  and 
each  was  allowed  the  ration  of  a  single  soldier. 
They  were  not  allowed  to  communicate  either 
with  the  garrison  or  with  the  population  of  the 
island:  and  soon  after  their  arrival  they  were 
denied  the  indulgence  of  walking  on  the  ram 
parts.  The  only  place  where  they  were  suf 
fered  to  take  exercise  was  the  esplanade  where 
the  troops  were  drilled. 

They  had  not  been  long  in  this  situation 
when  news  came  that  the  Jacobins  of  Paris 
had  made  a  last  attempt  to  regain  ascendency 
in  the  state,  that  the  hall  of  the  Convention  had 
bei-n  forced  by  a  furious  crowd,  that  one  of  the 
deputies  had  been  murdered  and  his  head  fixed 
on  a  pike,  that  the  life  of  the  President  had 
been  for  a  time  in  imminent  danger,  and  that 
some  members  of  the  legislature  had  not  been 
ashamed  to  join  the  rioters.  But  troops  had 
arrived  in  time  to  prevent  a  m'assacre.  The 
insurgents  had  been  put  to  flight ;  the  inhabit 
ants  of  the  disaffected  quarters  of  the  capital 
had  been  disarmed;  the  guilty  deputies  had 
suffered  the  just  punishment  of  their  treason; 
%nd  the  power  of  the  Mountain  was  broken  for  j 


ever.  These  events  strengthened  the  aversion 
with  which  the  system  of  Terror  and  the 
authors  of  that  system  were  regarded.  One 
member  of  the  Convention  had  moved,  that 
the  three  prisoners  of  Oleron  should  be  put  to 
death ;  another,  that  they  should  be  brought 
back  to  Paris,  and  tried  by  a  council  of  war. 
These  propositions  were  rejected.  But  some 
thing  was  conceded  to  the  party  which  called 
for  severity.  A  vessel  which  had  been  fitted 
out  with  great  expedition  at  Rochefort  touched 
at  Oleron,  and  it  was  announced  to  Collot  and 
Billaud  that  they  must  instantly  go  on  board. 
They  were  forthwith  conveyed  to  Guiana, 
where  Collot  soon  drank  himself  to  death  with 
brandy.  Billaud  lived  many  years,  shunning 
his  fellow  creatures  and  shunned  by  them; 
and  diverted  his  lonely  hours  by  teaching  par 
rots  to  talk.  Why  a  distinction  was  made 
between  Barere  and  his  companions  in  guilt, 
neither  he  nor  any  other  writer,  as  far  as  we 
know,  has  explained.  It  does  not  appear  that 
the  distinction  was  meant  to  be  at  all  in  his 
favour ;  for  orders  soon  arrived  from  Paris, 
that  he  should  be  brought  to  trial  for  his  crimes 
before  the  criminal  court  of  the  department 
of  the  Upper  Charente.  He  was  accordingly 
brought  back  to  the  Continent,  and  confined 
during  some  months  at  Saintes,  in  an  old  con 
vent  which  had  lately  been  turned  into  the  jail. 
While  he  lingered  here,  the  reaction  which 
had  followed  the  great  crisis  of  Thermidor  met 
with  a  temporary  check.  The  friends  of  the 
house  of  Bourbon,  presuming  on  the  indul 
gence  with  which  they  had  been  treated  after 
the  fall  of  Robespierre,  not  only  ventured  to 
avow  their  opinions  with  little  disguise,  but  at 
length  took  arms  against  the  Convention,  and 
were  not  put  down  till  much  blood  had  been 
shed  in  the  streets  of  Paris.  The  vigilance  of 
the  public  authorities  was  therefore  now  di 
rected  chiefly  against  the  royalists,  and  the 
rigour  with  which  the  Jacobins  had  lately  been 
treated  was  somewhat  relaxed.  The  Conven 
tion,  indeed,  again  resolved  that  Barere  should 
be  sent  to  Guiana.  But  this  decree  was  not 
arried  into  effect.  The  prisoner,  probably 
with  the  connivance  of  some  powerful  per 
sons,  made  his  escape  from  Saintes  and  fled  to 
Bordeaux,  where  he  remained  in  concealment 
during  some  years.  There  seems  to  have  been 
a  kind  of  understanding  between  him  and  the 
government,  that,  as  long  as  he  hid  himself,  he 
should  not  be  found,  but  that,  if  he  obtruded 
himself  on  the  public  eye,  he  must  take  the 
consequences  of  his  rashness. 

While  the  constitution  of  1795,  with  its  Ex 
ecutive  Directory,  its  Council  of  Elders,  and 
its  Council  of  Five  Hundred,  was  in  operation, 
he  continued  to  live  under  the  ban  of  the  law. 
It  was  in  vain  that  he  solicited,  even  at  mo 
ments  when  the  politics  of  the  Mountain 
seemed  to  be  again  in  the  ascendant,  a  remis 
sion  of  the  sentence  pronounced  by  the  Con 
vention.  Even  his  fellow  regicides,  even  the 
authors  of  the  slaughter  of  Vendemiaire  and 
of  the  arrests  of  Fructidor,  were  ashamed  of 
him. 

About  eighteen  months  after  his  escape  from 
prison,  his  name  was  again  brought  before  (he 
world.  In  his  own  province  he  still  retaiop-1 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


649 


some  of  his  M-fly  popularity.  He  had,  indeed,  | 
never  been  in&hat  province'since  the  downfall  j 
of  the  monarchy.  The  mountaineers  of  Gas-j 
cony  were  far  removed  from  the  seat  of  govern- j 
ment,  and  were  but  imperfectly  informed  of 
what  passed  there.  They  knew  that  their  coun 
tryman  had  played  an  important  part,  and  that 
he  had  on  some  occasions  promoted  their  local 
interests ;  and  they  stood  by  him  in  his  adver 
sity  and  in  his  disgrace,  with  a  constancy 
which  presents  a  singular  contrast  to  his  own 
abject  fickleness.  All  France  was  amazed  to 
learn,  that  the  department  of  the  Upper  Pyre 
nees  had  chosen  the  proscribed  tyrant  a  mem 
ber  of  the  Council  of  Five  Hundred.  The 
council  which,  like  our  House  of  Commons, 
was  the  judge  of  the  election  of  its  own  mem 
bers,  refused  to  admit  him.  When  his  name 
was  read  from  the  roll,  a  cry  of  indignation 
rose  from  the  benches.  "Which  of  you,"  ex 
claimed  one  of  the  members,  "would  sit  by 
the  side  of  such  a  monster]'' — "Not  I,  not  I!" 
answered  a  crowd  of  voices.  One  deputy 
declared  that  he  would  vacate  his  seat  if  the 
hall  were  polluted  by  the  presence  of  such  a 
wretch.  The  election  was  declared  null,  on 
the  ground  that  the  person  elected  was  a  crimi 
nal  Bulking  from  justice;  and  many  severe 
reflections  were  thrown  on  the  lenity  which 
suffered  him  to  be  still  at  large. 

He  tried  to  make  his  peace  with  the  Direc 
tory  by  writing  a  bulky  libel  on  England,  enti 
tled,  The  Liberty  of  the  Seas.  He  seems  to 
have  confidently  expected  that  this  work  would 
produce  a  great  effect.  He  printed  three  thou 
sand  copies,  and,  in  order  to  defray  the  expense 
of  publication,  sold  one  of  his  farms  for  the 
sum  of  ten  thousand  francs.  The  book  came 
out;  but  nobody  bought  it,  in  consequence,  if 
Barere  is  to  be  believed,  of  the  villainy  of  Mr. 
Pitt,  who  bribed  the  Directory  to  order  the 
reviewers  not  to  notice  so  formidable  an 
attack  on  the  maritime  greatness  of  perfidious 
Albion. 

Barere  had  been  about  three  years  at  Bor 
deaux  when  he  received  intelligence  that  the 
mob  of  the  town  designed  him  the  honour  of 
a  visit  on  the  ninth  of  Thermidor,  and 
would  probably  administer  to  him  what  he 
had,  in  his  defence  of  his  friend  Lebon,  de 
scribed  as  substantial  justice  under  forms  a 
little  harsh.  It  was  necessary  for  him  to  dis 
guise  himself  in  clothes  such  as  were  worn  by 
the  carpenters  of  the  dock.  In  this  garb,  with 
a  bundle  of  wood  shavings  under  his  arm,  he 
made  his  escape  into  the  vineyards  which  sur 
round  the  city,  lurked  during  some  days  in  a 
peasant's  hut,  and,  when  the  dreaded  anniver 
sary  was  over,  stole  back  into  the  city.  A  few 
months  later  he  was  again  in  danger.  He 
now  thought  that  he  should  be  nowhere  so  safe 
as  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Paris.  He  quitted 
Bordeaux,  hastened  undetected  through  those 
towns  where  four  years  before  his  life  had  been 
in  extreme  danger,  passed  through  the  capital 
in  the  morning  twilight,  when  none  were  in  the 
streets  except  shopboys  taking  down  the  shut-; 
ters,  and  arrived  safe  at  the  pleasant  village  of 
St.  Ouen  on  the  Seine.  Here  he  remained  in  | 
seclusion  during  some  months.  In  the  moan  j 
time  Bonaparte  returned  from  Egypt,  placed; 
Vox,.  V.— 82 


himself  at  the  head  of  a  coalition  of  discon 
tented  parties,  covered  his  designs  with  the 
authority  of  the  Elders,  drove  the  Five  Hundred 
out  of  their  hall  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet, 
and  became  absolute  monarch  of  France  un 
der  the  name  of  First  Consul. 

Barere  assures  us  that  these  events  almost 
broke  his  heart;  that  he  could  not  bear  to  see 
France  again  subject  to  a  master;  and  that,  if 
the  representatives  had  been  worthy  of  that 
honourable  name,  they  would  have  arrested 
the  ambitious  general  who  insulted  them. 
These  feelings,  however,  did  not  prevent  him 
from  soliciting  the  protection  of  the  new  go 
vernment,  and  from  sending  to  the  First  Con 
sul  a  handsome  copy  of  the  Essay  on  the 
Liberty  of  the  Seas. 

The  policy  of  Bonaparte  was  to  cover  a.l 
the  past  with  a  general  oblivion.  He  belonged 
half  to  the  Revolution  and  half  to  the  reaction. 
He  was  an  upstart,  and  a  sovereign ;  and  had, 
therefore,  something  in  common  with  the  Jaco 
bin,  and  something  in  common  with  the  royal 
ist.  All,  whether  Jacobins  or  royalists,  who 
were  disposed  to  support  his  government,  were 
readily  received — all,  whether  Jacobins  or 
royalists,  who  showed  hostility  to  his  govern 
ment,  were  put  down  and  punished.  Men 
who  had  borne  a  part  in  the  worst  crimes  of 
the  Reign  of  Terror,  and  men  who  had  fought 
in  the  army  of  Conde,  were  to  be  found  close 
together,  both  in  his  antechambers  and  in  his 
dungeons.  He  decorated  Fouchu  and  Maury 
with  the  same  cross.  He  sent  Arena  and 
Georges  Cadoudal  to  the  same  scaffold.  From 
a  government  acting  on  such  principles  Barere 
easily  obtained  the  indulgence  which  the  Di 
rectory  had  constantly  refused  to  grant.  The 
sentence  passed  by  the  Convention  was  remit 
ted,  and  he  was  allowed  to  reside  at  Paris. 
His  pardon,  it  is  true,  was  not  granted  in  the 
most  honourable  form  ;  and  he  remained,  dur 
ing  some  time,  under  the  special  supervision 
of  the  police.  He  hastened,  however,  to  pay 
his  court  at  the  Luxembourg  palace,  where 
Bonaparte  then  resided,  and  was  honoured 
with  a  few  dry  and  careless  words  by  the  mas 
ter  of  France. 

Here  begins  a  new  chapter  of  Barere's  his 
tory.  What  passed  between  him  and  the  con 
sular  government  cannot,  of  course,  be  so 
accurately  known  to  us  as  the  speeches  and 
reports  which  he  made  in  the  Convention.  It 
is,  however,  not  difficult,  from  notorious  facts, 
and  from  the  admissions  scattered  ever  these 
lying  Memoirs,  to  form  a  tolerably  accurate 
notion  of  what  took  place.  Bor.aparte  want 
ed  to  buy  Barere:  Barere  wanted  to  sell  him 
self  to  Bonaparte.  The  only  question  was 
one  of  price;  and  there  was  an  immense  in 
terval  between  what  was  offered  and  what  was 
demanded. 

Bonaparte,  whose  vehemence  of  will,  fix 
edness  of  purpose,  and  reliance  on  his  own 
genius,  were  not  only  great,  but  extravagant, 
looked  with  scorn  on  the  most  effeminate  and 
dependent  of  human  minds.  He  was  quite 
capable  of  perpetrating  crimes  under  the  influ 
ence  either  of  ambition  or  of  revenge ;  but  h« 
had  no  touch  of  that  accursed  monomania, 
that  craving  for  blood  and  tears,  which  raged 
31 


650 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


in  some  of  the  Jacobin  chiefs.  To  proscribe 
the  Terrorists  would  have  been  wholly  incon 
sistent  with  his  policy;  but  of  all  the  classes 
of  men  whom  his  comprehensive  system  in 
cluded,  he  liked  them  the  least;  and  Barere 
was  the  worst  of  them.  This  wretch  had  been 
branded  with  infamy,  first  by  the  Convention, 
and  then  by  the  Council  of  Five  Hundred. 
The  inhabitants  of  four  or  five  great  cities  had 
attempted  to  tear  him  limb  from  limb.  Nor 
were  his  vices  redeemed  by  eminent  talents  for 
administration  or  legislation.  It  would  be  un 
wise  to  place  in  any  honourable  or  important 
post  a  man  so  wicked,  so  odious,  and  so  little 
qualified  to  discharge  high  political  duties.  At 
the  same  time,  there  was  a  way  in  which  it 
seemed  likely  t*hat  he  might  be  of  use  to  the 
government.  The  First  Consul,  as  he  after 
wards  acknowledged,  greatly  overrated  Ba 
rere's  powers  as  a  writer.  The  effect  which 
the  reports  of  the  committee  of  public  safety 
had  produced  by  the  camp-fires  of  the  republi 
can  armies  had  been  great.  Napoleon  himself, 
when  a  young  soldier,  had  been  delighted  by 
those  compositions,  which  had  much  in  com 
mon  with  the  rhapsodies  of  his  favourite  poet, 
Macpherson.  The  taste,  indeed,  of  the  gt;eat 
warrior  and  j  talesman  was  never  very  pure. 
His  bulletins,  his  general  orders,  and  his  pro 
clamations,  are  sometimes,  it  is  true,  master 
pieces  in  their  kind;  but  we  too  often  detect, 
even  in  his  best  writing*  traces  of  Fingal,  and 
of  the  Carmagnoles.  It  is  not  strange,  there 
fore,  that  he  should  have  been  desirous  to  se 
cure  the  aid  of  Barere's  pen.  Nor  was  this 
the  only  kind  of  assistance  which  the  old 
member  of  the  committee  of  public  «afety 
might  render  to  the  consular  government.  He 
was  likely  to  find  admission  into  the  gloomy 
dens  in  which  those  Jacobins  whose  constancy 
was  to  be  overcome  by  no  reverse,  or  whose 
crimes  admitted  of  no  expiation,  hid  them 
selves  from  the  curses  of  mankind.  No  en 
terprise  wat;  too  bold  or  too  atrocious  for  minds 
crazed  by  fanaticism,  and  familiar  with  misery 
and  death.  The  government  was  anxious  to 
have  information  of  what  passed  in  their  se 
cret  councils;  and  no  man  was  better  qualified 
to  furnish  such  information  than  Barere. 

For  these  reasons  the  First  Consul  was  dis 
posed  to  employ  Barere  as  a  writer  and  as  a 
spy.  But  Barere — was  it  possible  that  he 
would  submit  to  such  a  degradation  ]  Bad  as 
ne  was,  he  had  played  a  great  part.  He  had 
belonged  to  that  class  of  criminals  who  fill  the 
world  with  the  renown  of  their  crimes;  he  had 
been  one  of  a  cabinet  which  had  ruled  France 
with  absolute  power,  and  made  war  on  all  Eu 
rope  with  signal  success.  Nav.  he  had  b^en. 
though  no*  the  most  powerful,  yet,  with  the 
single  exception  of  Robespierre,  the  most  con- 
upicuous  member  of  that  cabinet.  His  name 
had  been  a  household  word  at  Moscow  and  at 
Philadelphia,  at  Edinburgh  and  at  Cadiz.  The 
blood  of  the  Queen  of  France,  the  blood  of 
the  greatest  orators  and  philosophers  of  France, 
war.  on  his  hands.  He  had  spoken;  and  it 
had  been  decreed,  that  the  plousrh  should  pass 
over  the  great  city  of  Lyons.  He  had  spoken 
again  ,  and  it  had  been  decreed,  that  the  streets 
of  Toulon  should  be  razed  to  the  ground. 


1  When  depravity  is  placed  so  high  as  his,  the 

hatred  which  it  inspires  is  raft^ed  with  awe. 

His  place  was  with  great  tyrants,  with  Cntias 

and  Sylla,  with  Eccelino  and  Borgia;  not  will* 

hireling  scribblers  and  police  runners. 

"Virtue,  I  grant  you,  is  an  empty  boast ; 

But  shall  the  dignity  of  vice  he  lost?" 

So  sang  Pope;  and  so  felt  Barere.  When  il 
was  proposed  to  him  to  publish  a  journal  in 
defence  of  the  consular  government,  rage  and 
shame  inspired  him  for  the  first  and  last  time 
with  something  like  courage.  He  had  filled  as 
large  a  space  in  the  eyes  of  mankind  as  Mr. 
Pitt  or  General  Washington  ;  and  he  was  coolly- 
invited  to  descend  at  once  to  the  level  of  Mr. 
Lewis  Goldsmith.  He  saw,  too,  with  agonies 
of  envy,  that  a  wide  distinction  was  made  be 
tween  himself  and  the  other  statesmen  of  the 
Revolution  who  were  summoned  to  the  aid  of 
the  government.  Those  statesmen  were  re 
quired,  indeed,  to  make  large  sacrifices  of  prin 
ciple;  but  they  were  not  called  on  to  sacrifice 
what,  in  the  opinion  of  the  vulgar,  constitutes 
personal  dignity.  They  were  made  tribunes 
and  legislators,  ambassadors  and  counsellors 
of  state,  ministers,  senators,  and  consuls.  They 
might  reasonably  expect  to  rise  with  the  rising 
fortunes  of  their  master;  and,  in  iruth^nany 
of  them  were  destined  to  wear  the  baUjfe  of 
his  Legion  of  Honour  and  of  his  orJer  of  the 
Iron  Crown;  to  be  arch-chancellors  and  arch- 
treasurers,  counts,  dukes,  and  princes.  Ba 
rere,  only  six  years  before,  had  been  far  more 
powerful,  far  more  widely  renowned,  than  any 
of  them;  and  now,  while  they  were  thought 
worthy  to  represent  the  majesty  of  France  at 
foreign  courts,  while  they  received  ciowds  of 
suitors  in  gilded  ante-chambers,  he  was  to  pass 
his  life  in  measuring  paragraphs,  and  scolding 
correctors  of  the  press.  It  was  too  much'. 
Those  lips  which  had  never  before  been  able 
to  fashion  themselves  to  a  No,  now  murmured 
expostulation  and  refusal.  "I  could  not" — 
these  are  his  own  words — "abase  myself  to 
such  a  point  as  to  serve  the  First  Consul 
merely  in  the  capacity  of  a  journalist,  while  so, 
many  insignificant,  low,  and  servile  people, 
such  as  the  Treilhards.  the  Rrcderers,  ihe  Le- 
bruns,  the  Marets,  and  others  whom  it  is  super 
fluous  to  name,  held  the  fust  place  in  this 
government  of  upstarts." 

This  outbreak  of  spirit  was  of  short  duration. 
Napoleon  was  inexorable.  It  is  said  indeed 
that  he  was.  for  a  moment,  half  inclined  10  ad 
mit  Barere  into  the  Council  of  State;  but  the 
members  of  that  body  remonstrated  in  the 
strongest  terms,  and  declared  that  such  a  nomi 
nation  would  be  a  disgrace  to  th^m  all.  This 
plan  was  therefore  relinquished.  Thenceforth 
Barere's  only  chance  of  obtaining  the  patron 
age  of  the  government  wa.s  to  subdue  his  pride, 
to  forget  that  there  had  been  a  time  when,  with 
three  words,  he  might  have  had  the  heads  of 
the  three  consuls,  and  to  betake  himself,  hum 
bly  and  industriously,  to  the  task  of  compos 
ing  lampoons  on  England  and  panegj'rics  ou 
Bonaparte. 

It  has  often  been  asserted,  we  know  not  on 

what  grounds,  that  Barere  was  employed  bjr 

the  government,  not  only  as  a  writer,  but  as  a 

!  censor  of  the  writings  of  other  men.    This  im- 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


651 


putation  he  vehemently  denies  in  his  Memoirs ; 
but  our  readers  will  probably  agree  with  us  in 
thinking,  that  his  denial  leaves  the  question 
Exactly  where  it  was. 

Thus  much  is  certain,  that  he  was  not  re 
strained  from  exercising  the  office  of  censor  by 
any  scruple  of  conscience  or  honour;  for  he 
did  accept  an  office,  compared  with  which  that 
of  censor,  odious  as  it  is,  may  be  called  an 
august  and  beneficent  magistracy.  He  began 
to  have  what  are  delicately  called  relations 
with  the  police.  We  are  not  sure  that  we 
have  formed,  or  that  we  can  convey,  an  exact 
notion  of  the  nature  of  Barere's  new  calling. 
It  is  a  calling  unknown  in  our  country.  It 
has,  indeed,  often  happened  in  England,  that  a 
plot  has  been  revealed  to  the  government  by 
one  of  the  conspirators.  The  informer  has 
sometimes  been  directed  to  carry  it  fair  to 
wards  his  accomplices,  and  to  let  the  evil  de 
sign  come  to  full  maturity.  As  soon  as  his 
work  is  done,  he  is  generally  snatched  from  the 
public  gaze,  and  sent  to  some  obscure  village, 
or  to  some  remote  colony.  The  use  of  spies, 
even  to  this  extent,  is  in  the  highest  degree 
unpopular  in  England;  but  a  political  spy  by 
profession,  is  a  creature  from  which  our  island 
is  as  free  as  it  is  from,  wolves.  In  France  the 
race  is  well  known,  and  was  never  more  nume 
rous,  more  greedy,  more  cunning,  or  more  sav 
age,  than  under  the  government  of  Bonaparte. 

Our  idea  of  a  gentleman  in  relations  with 
the  consular  and  imperial  police  may  perhaps 
be  incorrect.  Such  as  it  is,  we  will  try  to  con 
vey  it  to  our  readers.  We  image  to  ourselves 
a  well  dressed  person,  with  a  soft  voice  and 
affable  manners.  His  opinions  are  those  of 
the  society  in  which  he  finds  himself,  but  a  lit 
tle  stronger.  He  often  complains,  in  the  lan 
guage  of  honest  indignation,  that  what  passes 
in  private  conversation  finds  its  way  strangely 
to  the  government,  and  cautions  his  associates 
to  take  care  what  they  say  when  they  are  not 
sure  of  their  company.  As  for  himself,  he 
owns  that  he  is  indiscreet.  He  can  never  re 
frain  from  speaking  his  mind  ;  and  that  is  the 
reason  that  he  is  not  prefect  of  a  department. 

In  a  gallery  of  che  Palais  Royal  he  overhears 
two  friends  talking  earnestly  about  the  king 
and  the  Count  of  Artois.  He  follows  them  into 
a  coffee-house,  sits  at  the  table  next  to  them, 
calls  for  his  half-dish  and  his  small  glass  of 
cognac,  takes  up  a  journal,  and  seems  occupied 
with  the  news.  His  neighbours  go  on  talking 
without  restraint,  and  in  the  style  of  persons 
warmly  attached  to  the  exiled  family.  They 
depart,  and  he  follows  them  half  round  the 
boulevards  till  he  fairly  tracks  them  to  their 
apartments,  arid  learns  their  names  from  the 
porters.  From  that  day  everv  letter  addressed 
tt»  either  of  them  is  sent  from  the  post-office  to 
the  police,  and  opened.  Their  correspondents 
become  known  to  the  government,  and  are 
carefully  watched.  Six  or  eight  honest  fami 
lies,  in  different  parts  of  France,  find  them 
selves  at  once  under  the  frown  of  power,  with- 
ou»  being  able  to  guess  what  offence  they  have 
given.  One  person  is  dismissed  from  a  public 
office;  another  learns  with  dismay  that  his 
promising  son  has  been  turned  out  of  the  Po 
lytechnic  school. 


N"ext,  the  indefatigable  servant  of  the  staff 
falls  in  with  an  old  republican,  who  has  nut 
changed  with  the  times,  who  regrets  the  red 
cap  and  the  tree  of  liberty,  who  has  not  un 
learned  the  Thee  and  Thou,  and  who  still  sub 
scribes  his  letters  with  "Health  and  Frater 
nity."  Into  the  ears  of  this  sturdy  politician 
our  friend  pours  forth  a  long  series  of  com 
plaints.  What  evil  times!  What  a  change 
since  the  days  when  the  Mountain  governed 
France !  What  is  the  First  Consul  but  a  king 
under  a  new  name?  What  is  this  Legion  of 
Honour  but  a  new  aristocracy  1  The  old  su 
perstition  is  reviving  with  the  old  tyranny. 
There  is  a  treaty  with  the  Pope,  and  a  provi 
sion  for  the  clergy.  Emigrant  nobles  are  re 
turning  in  crowds,  and  are  better  received  at 
the  Tuiieries  than  the  men  of  the  tenth  of  Au 
gust.  This  cannot  last.  What  is  life  without 
liberty!  What  terrors  has  death  to  the  true 
patriot?  The  old  Jacobin  catches  fire,  be 
stows  and  receives  the  fraternal  hug,  and  hints 
that  there  will  soon  be  great  news,  and  that 
the  breed  of  Harmodius  and  Brutus  is  not 
quite  extinct.  The  next  day  he  is  close  pri 
soner,  and  all  his  papers  are  in  the  hands  of 
the  government. 

To  this  vocation,  a  vocation  compared  with 
which  the  life  of  a  beggar,  of  a  pickpocket,  of 
a  pimp,  is  honourable,  did  Barore  now  descend. 
It  was  his  constant  practice,  as  often  as  he  en 
rolled  himself  in  a  new  party,  to  pay  his  foot 
ing  with  the  heads  of  old  friends.  Ht  was  at 
first  a  royalist;  and  he  made  atonement  by 
watering  the  tree  of  liberty  with  the  blood  of 
Louis.  He  was  then  a  Girondist;  and  he 
made  atonement  by  murdering  Vergniaud  and 
Gensonne.  He  fawned  on  Robespierre  up  to 
the  eighth  of  Thermidor;  and  he  made  atone- 
men,:  by  moving,  on  the  ninth,  that  Robespierre 
should  be  beheaded  without  a  trial.  He  was 
now  enlisted  in  the  service  of  the  new  mo 
narchy;  and  he  proceeded  to  atone  for  viis 
republican  heresies  by  sending  republican 
throats  to  the  guillotine. 

Among  his  most  intimate  associates  was  a 
Gascon  named  Demerville,  who  had  been 
employed  in  an  office  of  high  trust  under  the 
committee  of  public  safety.  This  man  was 
fanatically  attached  to  the  Jacobin  system  of 
politics,  and,  in  conjunction  with  other  enthu 
siasts  of  the  same  class,  formed  a  design 
against  the  First  Consul.  A  hint  of  this  de 
sign  escaped  him  in  conversation  with  Barere. 
Barere  carried  the  intelligence  to  Lannes,  who 
commanded  the  Consular  Guards.  Demerville 
was  arrested,  tried,  and  beheaded;  and  among 
the  witnesses  who  appeared  against  him  was 
his  friend  Barere. 

The   account  which  Barere  has  given  of 

these  transactions  is  studiously  confused  and 

grossly  dishonest.      We  think,  however,  that 

we  can  discern,  through  much  falsehood  and 

much  artful  obscurity,  some  truths  uhich  he 

I  labours  to  conceal.    It  is  clear  to  us  that  the 

!  government  suspected  him  of  what  the  Italians 

call  a  double  treason.  It  was  natural  that  such 

a  suspicion  should  attach  to  him.     He  h?tu,  In 

times  not  very  remote,  zealously  preached  the 

Jacobin  doctrine,  that  he  who  smites  a  tyrant 

:  deserves  higher  praise  than  he  vcho  saves  a 


653 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


citizen.  Was  it  possible  that  the  memher  of 
the  committee  of  public  safety,  the  king-killer, 
the  queen-killer,  could  in  earnest  mean  to  de 
liver  his  old  confederates,  his  bosom  friends, 
to  the  executioner,  solely  because  they  had 
planned  an  act  which,  if  there  were  any  truth 
in.  his  own  Carmagnoles,  was  in  the  highest 
degree  virtuous  and  glorious?  Was  it  not 
more  probable  that  he  was  really  concerned  in 
the  plot,  and  that  the  information  which  he 
gave  was  merely  intended  to  lull  or  to  mislead 
the  police'?  Accordingly  spies  were  set  on  the 
spy.  He  was  ordered  to  quit  Paris,  and  not  to 
come  within  twenty  leagues  till  he  received 
further  orders.  Nay,  he  ran  no  small  risk  of 
being  sent,  with  some  of  his  old  friends,  to 
Madagascar. 

He  made  his  peace,  however,  with  the  go 
vernment  so  far,  that  he  was  not  only  permitted, 
during  some  years,  to  live  unmolested,  but 
was  employed  in  the  lowest  sort  of  political 
drudgery.  In  the  summer  of  1803,  while  he 
was  preparing  to  visit  the  south  of  France,  he 
received  a  letter  which  deserves  to  be  inserted. 
It  was  from  Duroc,  who  is  well  known  to  have 
enjoyed  a  large  share  of  Napoleon's  confidence 
and  favour. 

"The  First  Consul,  having  been  informed 
thai  Citizen  Barere  is  about  to  set  out  for  the 
country,  desires  that  he  will  stay  at  Paris. 

"Citizen  Barere  will  every  week  draw  up  a 
Deport  of  the  state  of  public  opinion  on  the 
proceedings  of  the  government,  and  generally 
on  every  thing  which,  in  his  judgment,  it  will 
be  interesting  to  the  First  Consulto  learn. 

"He  may  write  with  perfect  freedom. 

"  He  Avill  deliver  his  reports  under  seal  into 
General  Duroc's  own  hand,  and  General  Duroc 
will  deliver  them  to  the  First  Consul.  But  it 
is  absolutely  necessary  that  nobody  should  sus 
pect  that  this  species  of  communication  takes 
place;  and,  should  any  such  suspicion  get 
abroad,  the  First  Consul  will  cease  to  receive 
the  reports  of  Citizen  Barere. 

"  It  will  also  be  proper  that  Citizen  Barere 
should  frequently  insert  in  the  journals  articles 
tending  to  animate  the  public  mind,  particu 
larly  against  the  English." 

During  some  years  Barere  continued  to  dis 
charge  the  functions  assigned  to  him  by  his 
master.  Secret  reports,  filled  with  the  talk  of 
colTee-houses,  were  carried  by  him  every  week 
to  the  Tuileries.  His  friends  assure  us  that  he 
took  especial  pains  to  do  all  the  harm  in  his 
power  to  the  returned  emigrants.  It  was  not 
his  fault  if  Napoleon  was  not  apprised  of  every 
murmur  and  every  sarcasm  which  old  mar 
quesses  who  had  lost  their  estates,  and  old  cler 
gymen  who  had  lost  their  benefices,  uttered 
against  the  imperial  system.  M.  Hippolyte 
Carnot,  we  grieve  to  say,  is  so  much  blinded 
by  party  spirit,  that  he  seems  to  reckon  this 
dirty  wickedness  among  his  hero's  titles  to 
public  esteem. 

Barere  was,  at  the  same  time,  an  indefati 
gable  journalist  and  pamphleteer.  He  set  up  a 
paper  directed  against  England,  and  called  the 
Memorial  Jlntibritannique.  He  planned  a  work 
entitled,  "France  made  great  and  illustrious 
by  Napoleon."  When  the  imperial  govern 
ment  was  established,  the  old  regicide  made 


himself  conspicuous  even  among  the  crowd 
of  ilatterers  by  the  peculiar  fulsoTneness  of  his 
adulation.  He  translated  into  French  a  con 
temptible  volume  of  Italian  verses,  entitled, 
"  The  Poetic  Crown,  composed  on  the  elorious 
accession  of  Napoleon  the  First,  by  the  Shep 
herds  of  Arcadia."  He  commenced  a  new 
series  of  Carmagnoles  vtry  different  from 
those  which  had  charmed  the  Mountain.  The 
title  of  Emperor  of  the  French,  he  said,  was 
mean;  Napoleon  ought  to  be  Emperor  of  Eu 
rope.  King  of  Italy  was  too  humble  an  appel 
lation  ;  Napoleon's  style  ought  to  be  King  of 
Kings. 

But  Barere  laboured  to  small  purpose  in 
both  his  vocations.  Neither  as  a  writer  nor  as 
a  spy  was  he  of  much  use.  He  complains 
bitterly  that  his  paper  did  not  sell.  While  the 
Journal  des  Debuts,  then  flourishing  under  the 
able  management  of  GeoffVoy,  had  a  circula 
tion  of  at  least  twenty  thousand  copies,  the 
Memorial  JJnlibriUinnique  never,  in  its  most  pros 
perous  times,  had  more  than  fifteen  hundred 
subscribers ;  and  these  subscribers  were,  with 
scarcely  an  exception,  persons  residing  far  from 
Paris,  probably  Gascons,  among  whom  the 
name  of  Barere  had  not  yet  lost  its  influence. 

A  writer  who  cannot  find  readers,  generally 
attributes  the  public  neglect  to  any  cause 
rather  than  to  the  true  one;  and  Barere  was 
no  exception  to  the  general  rule.  His  old 
hatred  to  Paris  revived  in  all  its  fury.  That 
city,  he  says,  has  no  sympathy  with  France. 
No  Parisian  cares  to  subscribe  to  a  journal 
which  dwells  on  the  real  wants  and  interests 
of  the  country.  To  a  Parisian  nothing  is  so 
ridiculous  as  patriotism.  The  higher  classes 
of  the  capital  have  always  been  devoted  to 
England.  A  corporal  from  London  is  better 
received  among  them  than  a  French  general. 
A  journal,  therefore,  which  attacks  England 
has  no  chance  of  their  support. 

A  much  better  explanation  of  the  failure  of 
the  Memorial,  was  given  by  Bonaparte  at  St. 
Helena.  "  Barere,"  said  he  to  Barry  O'Meara, 
"had  the  reputation  of  being  a  man  of  talent; 
but  I  did  not  find  him  so.  I  employed  him  to 
write;  but  he  did  not  display  ability.  He  used 
many  flowers  of  rhetoric,  but  no  solid  argu 
ment;  nothing  but  coglionerie  wrapped  up  in 
high-scunding  language." 

The  truth  is,  that  though  Barere  was  a  man 
of  quick  parts,  and  could  do  with  ease  what 
he  could  do  at  all,  he  had  never  been  a  good 
writer.  In  the  day  of  his  power,  he  had  been 
in  the  habit  of  haranguing  an  excitable  audi 
ence  on  exciting  topics.  The  faults  of  his 
style  passed  uncensured;  for  it  was  a  time  of 
literary  as  well  as  of  civil  lawlessness,  and  a 
patriot  was  licensed  to  violate  the  ordinary 
rules  of  composition  as  well  as  the  ordinary 
rules  of  jurisprudence  and  of  social  morality. 
But  there  had  now  been  a  literary  as  well  as  a 
civil  reaction.  As  there  was  again  a  throne 
and  a  court,  a  magistracy,  a  chivalry,  and  a 
hierarchy,  so  was  there  a  revival  of  classical 
taste.  Honor  was  again  paid  to  the  prose  of 
Pascal  and  Masillon,  and  to  the  verse  of  Racine 
and  La  Fontaine.  The  oratory  which  had  de 
lighted  the  galleries  of  the  Convention,  was  not 
onlv  as  much  out  of  date  as  the  language  of 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


653 


Villehardouin  and  Joinville,  but  was  associated 
in  the  public  mind  with  images  of  horror.  All 
the  peculiarities  of  the  Anacreon  of  the  guillo 
tine,  his  words  unknown  to  the  Dictionary  of 
the  Academy,  his  conceits  and  his  jokes,  his 
Gascon  idioms  and  his  Gascon  hyperboles,  had 
become  as  odious  as  the  cant  of  the  Puritans 
was  in  England  after  the  Restoration. 

Bonaparte,  who  had  never  loved  the  men  of 
the  Reign  of  Terror,  had  now  ceased  to  fear 
them.  He  was  all-powerful  and  at  the  height 
of  glory ;  they  were  weak  and  universally  ab 
horred.  He  was  a  sovereign,  and  it  is  probable 
that  he  already  meditated  a  matrimonial  alli 
ance  with  sovereigns.  He  was  naturally  un 
willing,  in  his  new  position,  to  hold  any  inter 
course  with  the  worst  class  of  Jacobins.  Had 
Barere's  literary  assistance  been  important  to 
the  government,  personal  aversion  might  have 
yielded  to  considerations  of  policy ;  but  there 
was  no  motive  for  keeping  terms  with  a  worth 
less  man  who  had  also  proved  a  worthless 
writer.  Bonaparte,  therefore,  gave  loose  to 
his  feelings.  Barere  was  not  gently  dropped, 
not  sent  into  an  honourable  retirement,  but 
spurned  and  scourged  away  like  a  troublesome 
dog.  He  had  been  in  the  habit  of  sending  six 
copies  of  his  journal  on  fine  paper  daily  to  the 
Tuileries.  Instead  of  receiving  the  thanks  and 
praises  which  he  expected,  he  was  dryly  told 
that  the  great  man  had  ordered  five  copies  to 
be  sent  back.  Still  he  toiled  on  ;  still  he  che 
rished  a  hope  that  at  last  Napoleon  would 
relent,  and  that  at  last  some  share  in  the 
honours  of  the  state  would  reward  so  much 
assiduity  and  so  much  obsequiousness.  He 
was  bitterly  undeceived.  Under  the  imperial 
constitution  the  electoral  college  of  the  depart 
ments  did  not  possess  the  right  of  choosing 
senators  or  deputies,  but  merely  that  of  pre 
senting  candidates.  From  among  these  can 
didates  the  emperor  named  members  of  the 
senate,  and  the  senate  named  members  of  the 
legislative  bodies.  The  inhabitants  of  the 
Upper  Pyrenees  were  still  strangely  partial  to 
Barere.  In  the  year  1805,  they  were  disposed 
to  present  him  as  a  candidate  for  the  senate. 
On  this  Napoleon  expressed  the  highest  dis 
pleasure  ;  and  the  president  of  the  electoral 
college  was  directed  to  tell  the  voters,  in  plain 
terms,  that  such  a  choice  would  be  disgraceful 
to  the  department.  All  thought  of  naming 
Barere  a  candidate  for  the  senate  was  conse 
quently  dropped.  But  the  people  of  Argeles 
ventured  to  name  him  a  candidate  for  the 
legislative  body.  That  body  was  altogether 
destitute  of  weight  and  dignity;  it  was  not 
permitted  to  debate ;  its  only  function  was  to 
vote  in  silence  for  whatever  the  government 
proposed.  It  is  not  easy  to  understand  how 
any  man,  who  had  sat  in  free  and  powerful 
deliberative  assemblies,  could  condescend  to 
bear  a  part  in  such  a  mummery.  Barere,  how 
ever,  was  desirous  of  a  place  even  in  this  mock 
legislature;  and  a  place  even  in  this  mock 
legislature  was  refused  to  him.  In  the  whole 
senate  he  had  not  a  single  vote. 

Such  treatment  was  sufficient,  it  might  have 
been  thought,  to  move  the  most  abject  of 
mankind  to  resentment.  Still,  however,  Ba 
rere  cringed  and  fawned  on.  His  letters  came  j 


weekly  to  the  Tuileries  till  the  year  1807.  At 
length,  while  he  was  actually  writing  the  two 
hundred  and  twenty-third  of  the  series,  a  note 
was  put  into  his  hands.  It  was  from  Duroc, 
and  was  much  more  perspicuous  than  polite. 
Barere  was  requested  to  send  no  more  of  his 
reports  to  the  palace,  as  the  emperor  was  too 
busy  to  read  them. 

Contempt,  says  the  Indian  proverb,  pierces 
even  the  shell  of  the  tortoise  ;  and  the  contempt 
of  the  court  was  felt  to  the  quick  even  by  the 
callous  heart  of  Barere.  He  had  humbled 
himself  to  the  dust ;  and  he  had  humbled  him 
self  in  vain.  Having  been  eminent  among  the 
rulers  of  a  great  and  victorious  state,  he  had 
stooped  to  serve  a  master  in  the  vilest  capaci 
ties  ;  and  he  had  been  told  that,  even  in  those 
capacities,  he  was  not  worthy  of  the  pittance 
which  had  been  disdainfully  flung  to  him.  He 
was  now  degraded  below  the  level  even  of  the 
hirelings  whom  the  government  employed  in 
the  most  infamous  offices.  He  stood  idle  in 
the  market-place,  not  because  he  thought  any 
office  too  infamous ;  but  because  none  would 
hire  him. 

Yet  he  had  reason  to  think  himself  fortu 
nate;  for,  had  all  that  is  avowed  in  these  Me- 
moirs  been  then  known,  he  would  have  received 
very  different  tokens  of  the  imperial  displea 
sure.  We  learn  from  himself,  that  while  pub 
lishing  daily  columns  of  flattery  on  Bonaparte, 
and  while  carrying  weekly  budgets  of  calumny 
to  the  Tuileries,  he  was  in  close  connection 
with  the  agents  whom  the  Emperor  Alexander, 
then  by  no  means  favourably  disposed  towards 
France,  employed  to  watch  all  that  passed  at 
Paris;  was  permitted  to  read  all  their  secre* 
despatches  ;  was  consulted  by  them  as  to  the 
temper  of  the  public  mind  and  the  character 
of  Napoleon ;  and  did  his  best  to  persuade 
them  that  the  government  was  in  a  tottering 
condition,  and  that  the  new  sovereign  was  not, 
as  the  world  supposed,  a  great  statesman  and 
soldier.  Next,  Barere,  still  the  flatterer  and 
talebearer  of  the  imperial  court,  connected 
himself  in  the  same  manner  with  the  Spanish 
envoy.  He  owns  that  with  that  envoy  he  had 
relations  which  he  took  the  greatest  pains  to 
conceal  from  his  own  government;  that  they 
met  twice  a  day,  and  that  their  conversation 
chiefly  turned  on  the  vices  of  Napoleon,  on 
his  designs  against  Spain,  and  on  the  best 
mode  of  rendering  those  designs  abortive.  In 
truth,  Barere's  baseness  was  unfathomable. 
In  the  lowest  deeps  of  sharne  he  found  out 
lower  deeps.  It  is  bad  to  be  a  sycophant ;  it 
is  bad  to  be  a  spy.  But  even  among  syco 
phants  and  spies  there  are  degrees  of  mean 
ness.  The  vilest  sycophant  is  he  who  privily 
slanders  the  master  on  whom  he  fawns;  the 
vilest  spy  is  he  who  serves  foreigners  against 
the  government  of  his  native  land. 

From  1807  to  1814  Barere  lived  in  obscurity, 
railing  as  bitterly  as  his  craven  cowardice 
would  permit  against  the  imperial  administra 
tion,  and  coming  sometimes  unpleasantly 
across  the  police.  When  the  Bourbons  re 
turned,  he,  as  might  be  expected,  became  a 
royalist,  and  wrote  a  pamphlet  setting  forth  the 
horrors  of  the  system  from  which  the  Restora 
tion  had  delivered  France,  and  magnifying  thr 
3i  2 


654 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


wisdom  and  goodness  which  had  dictated  the 
charter.  He  who  had  voted  for  the  death  of 
Louts,  he  who  had  moved  the  decree  for  the 
trial  of  Marie  Antoinette,  he  whose  hatred  of 
monarchy  had  led  him  to  make  war  even  upon 
the  sepulchres  of  ancient  monarchs,  assures 
us  with  great  complacency,  that  "  in  this  work 
monarchical  principles  and  attachment  to  the 
House  of  Bourbon  are  nobly  expressed."  By 
thi?  apostacy  he  got  nothing,  not  even  any 
additional  infamy;  for  his  character  was  al 
ready  too  black  to  be  blackened. 

During  the  hundred  days  he  again  emerged 
for  a  very  short  time  into  public  life  ;  he  was 
chosen  by  his  native  district  a  member  of  the 
Chamber  of  Representatives.  But  though  that 
assembly  was  composed  in  a  great  measure  of 
men  who  regarded  the  excesses  of  the  Jaco 
bins  with  indulgence,  he  found  himself  an  ob 
ject  of  general  aversion.  When  the  President 
first  informed  the  Chamber  that  M.  Barere  re 
quested  a  hearing,  a  deep  and  indignant  mur 
mur  ran  round  the  benches.  After  the  battle 
of  Waterloo,  Barere  proposed  that  the  Cham 
ber  should  save  France  from  the  victorious 
enemy,  by  putting  forth  a  proclamation  about 
the  pass  of  Thermopylae,  and  the  Lacedaemo 
nian  custom  of  wearing  flowers  in  times  of 
extreme  danger.  Whether  this  composition, 
if  it  had  then  appeared,  would  have  stopped 
the  English  and  Prussian  armies,  is  a  question 
respecting  which  we  are  left  to  conjecture. 
The  Chamber  refused  to  adopt  this  last  of  the 
Carmagnoles. 

The  Emperor  had  abdicated.  The  Bourbons 
returned.  The  Chamber  of  Representatives, 
af.;r  burlesquing  during  a  few  weeks  the  pro- 
ceadings  of  the  National  Convention,  retired 
with  the  well-earned  character  of  having  been 
the  silliest  political  assembly  that  had  mot  in 
France.  Those  dreaming  pedants  and  praters 
never  for  a  moment  comprehended  their  posi 
tion.  They  could  never  understand  that  Eu 
rope  must  be  either  conciliated  or  vanquished  ; 
that  Europe  could  be  conciliated  only  by  the 
restoration  of  Louis,  and  vanquished  only  by 
means  of  a  dictatorial  power  entrusted  to  Na 
poleon.  They  would  not  hear  of  Louis  ;  yet 
they  would  not  hear  of  the  only  measures 
which  could  keep  him  out.  They  incurred  the 
enmity  of  all  foreign  powers  by  putting  Napo 
leon  at  their  head;  yet  they  shackled  him, 
thwarted  him,  quarrelled  with  him  about  every 
trifle,  abandoned  him  on  the  first  reverse. 
They  then  opposed  declamations  and  disquisi 
tions  to  eight  hundred  thousand  bayonets ; 
played  at  making  a  constitution  for  their  coun- 
Iry,  when  it  depended  on  the  indulgence  of  the 
victor  whether  they  should  have  a  country; 
and  were  at  last  interrupted  in  the  midst  of 
Iheir  babble  about  the  rights  of  man  and  the 
sovereignty  of  the  people,  by  the  soldiers  of 
Wellington  and  Blucher. 

A  new  Chamber  of  Deputies  was  elected, 
no  bitterly  hostile  to  the  Revolution,  that  there 
was  no  small  risk  of  a  new  reign  of  terror. 
It  is  just,  however,  to  say  that  the  king,  his 
ministers,  and  his  allies,  exerted  themselves  to 
restrain  the  violence  of  the  fanatical  royalists,  i 
and  that  the  punishments  inflicted,  though  in 
cmr  opinion  unjustifiable,  were  few  and  lenient 


;  when  compared  with  those  which  were  de- 
j  manded  by  M.  de  Labourdonnaye  and  M.  Hyde 
i  de  Neuville.  We  have  always  heard,  and  are 
inclined  to  believe,  that  the  government  was 
not  disposed  to  treat  even  the  regicides  with 
severity.  But  on  this  point  the  feeling  of  the 
Chamber  of  Deputies  was  so  strong,  that  it 
was  thought  necessary  to  make  some  conces 
sion.  It  was  enacted,  therefore,  that  whoever, 
having  voted  in  January  1793  for  the  death  of 
Louis  the  Sixteenth,  had  in  any  manner  given 
in  an  adhesion  to  the  government  of  Buona 
parte  during  the  hundred  days,  should  be  ban 
ished  for  life  from  France.  Barere  fell  within 
this  description.  He  had  voted  for  the  death 
of  Louis;  and  he  had  sat  in  the  Chamber  of 
Representatives  during  the  hundred  days. 

He  accordingly  retired  to  Belgium,  and  re 
sided  there,  forgotten  by  all  mankind,  till  the 
year  1830.  After  the  Revolution  of  July  he 
was  at  liberty  to  return  to  France,  and  he  fixed 
his  residence  in  his  native  province.  But  he 
was  soon  involved  in  a  succession  of  lawsuits 
with  his  nearest  relations — "  three  fatal  sisters 
and  an  ungrateful  brother,"  to  use  his  own 
words.  Who  was  in  the  right  is  a  question 
about  which  we  have  no  means  of  judging, 
and  certainly  shall  not  take  Barere's  word. 
The  courts  appear  to  have  decided  some  points 
in  his  favour  and  some  against  him.  The 
natural  inference  is,  that  there  were  faults  on 
all  sides.  The  result  of  this  litigation  was, 
that  the  old  man  was  reduced  to  extreme 
poverty,  and  was  forced  to  sell  his  paternal 
house. 

As  far  as  we  can  judge  from  the  few  facts 
which  remain  to  be  mentioned,  Barere  con 
tinued  Barere  to  the  last.  After  his  exile  he 
turned  Jacobin  again,  and,  when  he  came  back 
to  France,  joined  the  party  of  the  extreme  left 
in  railing  at  Louis  Philippe,  and  at  all  Louis 
Philippe's  ministers.  M.  Casimir  Perier,  M. 
de  Broglie,  M.  Guizot,  and  M.  Thiers,  in  par 
ticular,  are  honoured  with  his  abuse ;  and  the 
king  himself  is  held  up  to  execration  as  a  hy 
pocritical  tyrant.  Nevertheless,  Barere  had 
no  scruple  about  accepting  a  charitable  dona 
tion  of  a  thousand  francs  a  year  from  the  privy 
purse  of  the  sovereign  whom  he  hated  and  re 
viled.  This  pension,  together  with  some  small 
sums  occasionally  doled  out  to  him  by  the  de 
partment  of  the  Interior,  on  the  ground  that  he 
was  a  distressed  man  of  letters,  and  by  the 
department  of  Justice,  on  the  ground  that  he 
formerly  held  a  high  judicial  office,  saved 
:iim  from  the  necessity  of  begging  his  bread. 
Having  survived  all  his  colleagues  of  the  re 
nowned  committee  of  public  safety,  and  almost 
all  his  colleagues  of  the  Convention,  he  died 
n  January  1841.  He  had  attained  his  eighty- 
sixth  year. 

We  have  now  laid  before  our  readers  what 
we  believe  to  be  a  just  account  of  this  man's 
ife.  Can  it  be  necessary  for  us  to  add  any 
hing  for  the  purpose  of  assisting  their  judg- 
nent  of  his  character!  If  we  were  writing 
about  any  of  his  colleagues  in  the  committee 
of  public  safety,  about  Carnot,  about  Robes 
pierre,  or  St.  Just,  nay,  even  about  Couthon, 
Collot,  or  Billaud,  we  might  fee!  it  necessary 
to  go  into  a  full  examination  of  the  arguments 


BARERE'S  MEMOIRS. 


655 


which  have  been  employed  to  vindicate  or  to 
excuse  the  system  of  Terror.  We  could,  we 
think,  show  that  France  was  saved  from  her 
foreign  enemies,  not  by  the  system  of  Terror, 
but  in  spite  of  it ;  and  that  the  perils  which 
were  made  the  plea  for  the  violent  policy  of  the 
Mountain,  were,  to  a  great  extent,  created  by 
that  very  policy.  We  could,  we  think,  also 
show  that  the  evils  produced  by  the  Jacobin 
administration  did  not  terminate  when  it  fell; 
that  it  bequeathed  a  long  series  of  calamities 
to  France  and  to  Europe;  that  public  opinion, 
which  had  during  two  generations  been  con 
stantly  becoming  more  and  more  favourable 
to  civil  and  religious  freedom,  underwent,  dur 
ing  the  days  of  Terror,  a  change  of  which  the 
traces  are  still  to  be  distinctly  perceived.  It 
was  natural  that  there  should  be  such  a  change, 
when  men  saw  that  those  who  called  them 
selves  the  champions  of  popular  rights  had 
compressed  into  the  space  of  twelve  months 
more  crimes  than  the  kings  of  France,  Mero 
vingian,  Carlovingian,  and  Capetian,  had  per 
petrated  in  twelve  centuries.  Freedom  was 
regarded  as  a  great  delusion.  Men  were  will 
ing  to  submit  to  the  government  of  hereditary 
princes,  of  fortunate  soldiers,  of  nobles,  of 
priests;  to  any  government  but  that  of  philo 
sophers  and  philanthropists.  Hence  the  im 
perial  despotism,  with  its  enslaved  press  and 
its  silent  tribune,  its  dungeons  stronger  than 
the  old  Bastile,  and  its  tribunals  more  obse 
quious  than  the  old  parliaments.  Hence  the 
restoration  of  the  Bourbons  and  of  the  Jesuits, 
the  Chamber  of  1815,  with  its  categories  of 
proscription,  the  revival  of  the  feudal  spirit, 
the  encroachments  of  the  clergy,  the  persecu 
tion  of  the  Protestants,  the  appearance  of  a  new 
breed  of  De  Montforts  and  Dominies  in  the  full 
light  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Hence  the 
admission  of  France  into  the  Holy  Alliance, 
and  the  war  waged  by  the  old  soldiers  of  the 
tri-colour  against  the  liberties  of  Spain.  Hence, 
too,  the  apprehensions  with  which,  even  at  the 
present  day,  the  most  temperate  plans  for  widen 
ing  the  narrow  basis  of  the  French  represen 
tation  are  regarded  by  those  who  are  especially 
interested  in  the  security  of  property  and  the 
maintenance  of  order.  Haifa  century  has  not 
sufficed  to  obliterate  the  stain  which  one  year 
of  depravity  and  madness  has  left  on  the 
noblest  of  causes. 

Nothing  is  more  ridiculous  than  the  manner 
in  which  writers  like  M.  Hippolyte  Carnot 
defend  or  excuse  the  Jacobin  administration, 
while  they  declaim  against  the  reaction  which 
followed.  That  the  reaction  has  produced  and 
is  still  producing  much  evil,  is  perfectly  true. 
But  what  produced  the  reaction?  The  spring 
flies  up  with  a  force  proportioned  to  that  with 
which  it  has  been  pressed  down.  The  pendu 
lum  which  is  drawn  far  in  one  direction  swings 
as  far  in  the  other.  The  joyous  madness  of 
intoxication  in  the  evening  is  followed  by  lan 
guor  and  nausea  on  the  morrow.  And  so,  in 
politics,  it  is  the  sure  law  that  every  excess 
shall  generate  its  opposite ;  nor  does  he  deserve 
the  name  of  a  statesman  who  strikes  a  great 
blow  without  fully  calculating  the  effect  of  the 
rebound.  But  such  calculation  was  infinitely 
beyond  the  reach  of  the  authors  of  the  Reign  of 


Terror.  Violence,  and  more  violence,  blocd, 
and  more  blood,  made  up  their  whole  policy. 
In  a  few  months  these  poor  creatures  succeeded 
in  bringing  about  a  reaction,  of  which  none  of 
them  saw,  and  of  which  none  of  us  may  see, 
the  close;  and,  having  brought  it  about,  they 
marvelled  at  it;  the}'  bewailed  it;  they  exe 
crated  it;  they  ascribed  it  to  every  thing  but 
the  real  cause — their  own  immorality  and  their 
own  profound  incapacity  for  the  conduct  of 
great  affairs. 

These,  however,  are  considerations  to  which, 
on  the  present  occasion,  it  is  hardly  necessary 
for  us  to  advert;  for,  the  defence  which  has 
been  set  up  for  the  Jacobin  policy,  good  or  bad, 
it  is  a  defence  which  cannot  avail  Barere. 
From  his  own  life,  from  his  own  pen,  from  his 
own  mouth,  we  can  prove  that  the  part  which 
he  took  in  the  work  of  blood  is  to  be  attributed, 
not  even  to  sincere  fanaticism,  not  even  to 
misdirected  and  ill-regulated  patriotism,  but 
either  to  cowardice,  or  to  delight  in  human 
misery.  Will  it  be  pretended  that  it  was  from 
public  spirit  that  he  murdered  the  Girondists'? 
In  these  very  Memoirs  he  tells  us  that  he  al 
ways  regarded  their  death  as  the  greatest 
calamity  that  could  befall  France.  Will  it  be 
pretended  that  it  was  from  public  spirit  that  he 
raved  for  the  head  of  the  Austrian  woman1? 
In  these  very  Memoirs  he  tells  us  that  the  time 
spent  in  attacking  her  was  ill-spent,  and  ought 
to  have  been  employed  in  concerting  measures 
of  national  defence.  Will  it  be  pretended  that 
he  was  induced  by  sincere  and  earnest  abhor 
rence  of  king!}'  government  to  butcher  the  living 
and  to  outrage  the  dead;  he  who  invited  Na 
poleon  to  take  the  title  of  King  of  Kings,  he 
who  assures  us,  that  after  the  Restoration  he 
expressed  in  noble  language  his  attachment  to 
monarchy,  and  to  the  house  of  Bourbon  1  Had 
he  been  less  mean,  something  might  have  been 
said  in  extenuation  of  his  cruelty.  Had  he 
been  less  cruel,  something  might  have  been 
said  in  extenuation  of  his  meanness.  But  for 
him,  regicide  and  court-spy,  for  him  who  pa 
tronized  Lebon  and  betrayed  Demerville,  for 
him  who  wantoned  alternately  in  gasconades 
of  Jacobinism,  and  gasconades  of  servility, 
what  excuse  has  the  largest  charity  to  offer] 

We  cannot  conclude  without  saying  some 
thing  about  two  parts  of  his  character,  which 
his  biographer  appears  to  consider  as  deserving 
of  high  admiration.  Barere,  it  is  admitted,  was 
somewhat  fickle;  but  in  two  things  he  was 
consistent,  in  his  love  of  Christianity,  and  hi 
his  hatred  to  England.  If  this  were  so,  we 
must  say  that  England  is  much  more  beholden 
to  him  than  Christianity. 

It  is  possible  that  our  inclinations  may  bias 
our  judgment ;  but  we  think  that  we  do  not 
flatter  ourselves  when  we  say,  that  Barere's 
aversion  to  our  country  was  a  sentiment  as 
deep  and  constant  as  his  mind  was  capable  of 
entertaining.  The  value  of  this  compliment 
is,  indeed,  somewhat  diminished  by  the  cir 
cumstance,  that  he  knew  very  little  about  us. 
His  ignorance  of  our  institutions,  manners,  and 
history,  is  the  less  excusable,  because,  accord 
ing  to  his  own  account,  he  consorted  much, 
during  the  peace  of  Amiens,  with  Englishmen 
of  note,  such  as  that  eminent  nobleman  Lord 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Greaten,  and  that  not  less  eminent  philosopher 
Mr  Mackenzie  Ccefhis.  In  spite,  however,  of 
his  connection  with  these  well-known  orna 
ments  of  our  country,  he  was  so  ill  informed 
about  us  as  to  fancy  that  our  government  was 
always  laying  plans  to  torment  him.  If  he 
was  hooted  at  Saintes,  probably  by  people 
whose  relations  he  had  murdered,  it  was  be 
cause  the  cabinet  of  St.  James  had  hired  the 
mob.  If  nobody  would  read  his  bad  books,  it 
was  because  the  cabinet  of  St.  James  had 
secured  the  reviewers.  His  accounts  of  Mr. 
Fox,  of  Mr.  Pitt,  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  of 
Mr.  Canning,  swarm  with  blunders,  surpassing 
even  the  ordinary  blunders  committed  by 
Frenchmen  who  write  about  England.  Mr. 
Fox  and  Mr.  Pitt,  he  tells  us,  were  ministers  in 
two  different  reigns.  Mr.  Pitt's  sinking  fund 
was  instituted  in  order  to  enable  England  to 
pay  subsidies  to  the  powers  allied  against  the 
French  Republic.  The  Duke  of  Wellington's 
house  in  Hyde  Park  was  built  by  the  nation, 
which  twice  voted  the  sum  of  £200,000  for  the 
purpose.  This,  however,  is  exclusive  of  the 
cost  of  the  frescoes,  which  were  also  paid  for 
out  of  the  public  purse.  Mr.  Canning  was  the 
first  En°lishman  whose  death  Europe  had  rea 
son  to  lament;  for  the  death  of  Lord  Ward,  a 
relation,  we  presume,  of  Lord  Greaten  and  Mr. 
Ccefhis,  had  been  an  immense  benefit  to  man 
kind. 

Ignorant,  however,  as  Barere  was,  he  knew 
enough  of  us  to  hate  us;  and  we  persuade  our 
selves  that,  had  he  known  us  better,  he  would 
have  hated  us  more.  The  nation  which  has 
combined,  beyond  all  example  and  all  hope, 
the  blessings  of  liberty  with  those  of  order, 
might  well  be  an  object  of  aversion  to  one  who 
had  been  false  alike  to  the  cause  of  order  and 
to  the  cause  of  liberty.  -We  have  had  amongst 
us  intemperate  zeal  for  popular  rights ;  we 
have  had  amongst  us  also  the  intemperance  of 
loyalty.  But  we  have  never  been  shocked  by 
such  a  spectacle  as  the  Barere  of  1794,  or  as 
the  Barere  of  1804.  Compared  with  him,  our 
fiercest  demagogues  have  been  gentle ;  com 
pared  with  him,  our  meanest  courtiers  have 
been  manly.  Mix  together  Thistlewood  and 
Bubb  Dodington,  and  you  are  still  far  from 
having  Barere.  The  antipathy  between  him 
and  us  is  such,  that  neither  for  the  crimes  of 
his  earlier,  nor  for  those  of  his  later  life,  does 
our  language,  rich  as  it  is,  furnish  us  with  ade 
quate  names.  We  have  found  it  difficult  to 
relate  his  history  without  having  perpetual 
recourse  to  the  French  vocabulary  of  base 
ness.  It  is  not  easy  to  give  a  notion  of  his 
conduct  in  the  Convention,  without  using  those 
emphatic  terms,  guillotinadf,  noyade,  fusillade, 
nitraUlude.  It  is  not  easy  to  give  a  notion  of 
his  conduct  under  the  consulate  and  the  em 
pire,  without  borrowing  such  words  as  mouchard 
and  mouton. 

We,  therefore,  like  his  invectives  against  us 
much  better  than  any  thing  else  that  he  has 
written;  and  dwell  on  them,  not  merely  with 
complacency,  but  with  a  feeling  akin  to  grati- 
lude.  It  wa?  but  little  that  he  could  do  to  pro 


mote  the  honour  of  our  courify ;  but  that  little 
he  did  strenuously  and  constantly.  Renegade, 
traitor,  slave,  coward,  liar,  slanderer,  murderer, 
hack-writer,  police-spy — the  one  small  service 
which  he  could  render  to  England,  was  to  hate 
her:  and  such  as  he  was  may  all  who  hate 
her  be. 

We  cannot  say  that  we  contemplate  with 
equal  satisfaction  that  fervent  and  constant 
zeal  for  religion,  which,  according  to  M.  Hip- 
polyte  Carnot,  distinguished  Barere;  for,  as  we 
think  that  whatever  brings  dishonour  on  reli 
gion  is  a  serious  evil,  we  had,  we  own,  indulged 
a  hope  that  Barere  was  an  atheist.  We  now 
learn,  however,  that  he  was  at  no  time  even  a 
sceptic,  that  he  adhered  to  his  faith  through  the 
whole  Revolution,  and  that  he  has  left  several 
manuscript  works  on  divinity.  One  of  these 
is  a  pious  treatise,  entitled,  "Of  Christianity 
and  of  its  Influence."  Another  consists  of 
meditations  on  the  Psalms,  which  will  doubt 
less  greatly  console  and  edify  the  church. 

This  makes  the  character  complete.  What 
soever  things  are  false,  whatsoever  things  are 
dishonest,  whatsoever  things  are  unjust,  what 
soever  things  are  impure,  whatsoever  things 
are  hateful,  whatsoever  things  are  of  evil  re 
port,  if  there  be  any  vice,  and  if  there  be  any 
infamy,  all  these  things,  we  knew,  were  blended 
in  Barere.  But  one  thing  was  still  wanting, 
and  that  M.  Hyppolyte  Carnot  has  supplied. 
When  to  such  an  assemblage  of  qualities  a 
high  profession  of  piety  is  added,  the  effect 
becomes  overpowering.  We  sink  under  the 
contemplation  of  such  exquisite  and  mani 
fold  perfection;  and  feel,  with  deep  humility, 
how  presumptuous  it  was  in  us  to  think  of 
composing  the  legend  of  this  beatified  athlete 
of  the  faith,  Saint  Bertrancl  of  the  Carmag-4 
noles. 

Something  more  we  had  to  say  about  him. 
But  let  him  go.  We  did  not  seek  him  out,  and 
will  not  keep  him  longer.  If  those  who  call 
themselves  his  friends  had  not  forced  him  on 
our  notice,  we  should  never  have  vouchsafed 
to  him  more  than  a  passing  word  of  scorn  and 
abhorrence,  such  as  we  might  fling  at  his 
brethren,  Hebert  and  Fouquier  Tinville,  and 
Carrier  and  Lebon.  We  have  no  pleasure  in 
seeing  human  nature  thus  degraded.  We  turn 
with  disgust  from  the  filthy  and  spiteful  Yahoos 
of  the  fiction;  and  the  filthiest  and  most  spite 
ful  Yahoo  of  the  fiction  was  a  noble  creature 
when  compared  with  the  Barere  of  history. 
But  what  is  no  pleasure,  M.  Hyppolyte  Carnot 
has  made  a  duty.  It  is  no  light  thing,  that  a 
man  in  high  and  honourable  public  trust,  a 
man  who,  from  his  connections  and  position, 
may  not  unnaturally  be  supposed  to  speak  the 
sentiments  of  a  large  class  of  his  countrymen, 
should  come  forward  to  demand  approbation 
for  a  life,  black  with  every  sort  of  wickedness, 
and  unredeemed  by  a  single  virtue.  This  M. 
Hippolite  Carnot  has  done.  By  attempting  to 
enshrine  this  Jacobin  carrion,  he  has  forced 
us  to  gibbet  it;  and  we  venture  to  say  that, 
from  the  eminence  of  infamy  on  which  we 
have  placed  it,  he  will  not  easily  take  it  down. 


MR.  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS. 


56T 


ME.  EGBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS/ 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  APRIL,  1830.] 


THE  wise  men  of  antiquity  loved  to  convey 
Instruction  under  the  covering  of  apologue; 
and,  though  this  practice  of  theirs  is  generally 
thought  childish,  we  shall  make  no  apology  for 
adopting  it  on  the  present  occasion.  A  gene 
ration  which  has  bought  eleven  editions  of  a 
poem  by  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery,  may  well 
condescend  to  listen  to  a  fable  of  Pilpay. 

A  pious  Brahmin,  it  is  written,  made  a  vow 
that  on  a  certain  day  he  would  sacrifice  a 
sheep,  and  on  the  appointed  morning  he  went 
forth  to  buy  one.  There  lived  in  his  neighbour 
hood  three  rogues  who  knew  of  his  vow,  and 
laid  a  scheme  for  profiting  by  it.  The  first  met 
him  and  said,  "Oh,  Brahmin,  wilt  thou  buy  a 
sheep?  I  have  one  fit  for  sacrifice." — "It  is 
for  that  very  purpose,"  said  the  holy  man, 
«  that  I  came  forth  this  day."  Then  the  im 
postor  opened  a  bag,  and  brought  out  of  it  an 
unclean  beast,  an  ugly  dog,  lame  and  blind. 
Thereon  the  Brahmin  cried  out,  "  Wretch,  who 
touchest  things  impure,  and  utterest  things  un 
true,  callest  thou  that  cur  a  sheep  ?"— "  Truly," 
answered  the  other,  "  it  is  a  sheep  of  the  finest 
fleece,  and  of  the  sweetest  flesh.  Oh,  Brahmin, 
it  will  be  an  offering  most  acceptable  to  the 
gods." — "Friend,"  said  the  Brahmin,  "either 
thou  or  I  must  be  blind." 

Just  then  one  of  the  accomplices  came  up. 
"Praised  be  the  gods,"  said  this  second  rogue, 
•*  that  I  have  been  saved  the  trouble  of  going 
to  the  market  for  a  sheep!  This  is  such  a 
sheep  as  I  wanted.  For  how  much  wilt  thou 
sell  it  1"  When  the  Brahmin  heard  this,  his 
mind  waved  to  and  fro,  like  one  swinging  in 
the  air  at  a  holy  festival.  "  Sir,"  said  he  to  the 
new  comer,  "  take  heed  what  thou  dost ;  this  is 
no  sheep,  but  an  unclean  cur." — "Oh,  Brah 
min,"  said  the  new  comer,  "  thou  art  drunk  or 
mad !" 

At  this  time  the  third  confederate  drew  near. 
"Let.  us  ask  this  man,"  said  the  Brahmin, 
"  what  the  creature  is,  and  I  will  stand  by  what 
he  shall  say."  To  this  the  others  agreed ;  and 
the  Brahmin  called  out,  "Oh,  stranger,  what 
dost  thou  call  this  beast  1" — "  Surely,  oh,  Brah 
min,"  said  the  knave,  "it  is  a  fine  shrep." 
Then  the  Brahmin  said,  "Surely  the  gods  have 
taken  away  my  senses," — and  he  asked  pardon 
of  him  who  carried  the  dog,  and  bought  it  for 
a  measure  of  rice  and  a  pot  of  ghee,  and  offered 
it  up  to  the  gods,  who,  being  wroth  at  this  un 
clean  sacrifice,  smote  him  with  a  sore  disease 
in  all  his  joints. 

Thus,  or  nearly  thu.»,  if  we  remember  rightly, 
runs  the  story  of  the  Sanscrit  JGsop.  The 
moral,  like  the  moral  of  every  fable  that  is 

*  The  Omnipresence  of  the  Deity,  a  Poem.  By  ROBKRT 
MONTGOMERY.  Eleventh  Edition.  London.  1830. 

2.  Satan,  a  Pf>em.  By  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY.  Second 
Edition.    London.    1830. 
VOL.  V.— 83 


|  worth  the  telling,  lies  on  the  surface.  The 
'  writer  evidently  means  to  caution  us  against 
the  practices  of  puffers,~a  class  of  people 
who  have  more  than  once  talked  the  public 
into  the  most  absurd  errors,  but  who  surely 
never  played  a  more  curious,  or  a  more  diffi 
cult  trick,  than  when  they  passed  Mr.  Robert 
Montgomery  off  upon  the  world  as  a  great  poet. 

In  an  age  in  which  there  are  so  few  readers 
that  a  writer  cannot  subsist  on  the  sum  arising 
from  the  sale  of  his  works,  no  man  who  has 
not  an  independent  fortune  can  devote  himself 
to  literary  pursuits,  unless  he  is  assisted  by 
patronage.  In  such  an  age,  accordingly,  men 
of  letters  too  often  pass  their  lives  in  dangling 
at  the  heels  of  the  wealthy  and  powerful ;  and 
all  the  faults  which  dependence  tends  to  pro 
duce,  pass  into  their  character.  They  become 
the  parasites  and  slaves  of  the  great.  It  is 
melancholy  to  think  how  many  of  the  highest 
and  most  exquisitely  formed  of  human  intel 
lects  have  been  condemned  to  the  ignominious 
labor  of  disposing  the  commonplaces  of  adu 
lation  in  new  forms,  and  brightening  them  into 
new  splendour.  Horace  invoking  Augustus 
in  the  most  enthusiastic  language  of  religious 
veneration, — Statius  flattering  a  tyrant,  and  the 
minion  of  a  tyrant,  for  a  morsel  of  bread, — 
Ariosto  versifying  the  whole  genealogy  of  a 
niggardly  patron, — Tasso  extolling  the  heroic 
virtues  of  the  wretched  creature  who  locked 
him  up  in  a  mad-house, — these  are  but  a  few 
of  the  instances  which  might  easily  be  given 
of  the  degradation  to  which  those  must  sub 
mit,  who,  not  possessing  a  competent  fortune, 
are  resolved  to  write  when  there  are  scarcely 
any  who  read. 

This  evil  the  progress  of  the  human  mind 
tends  to  remove.  As  a  taste  for  books  becomes 
more  and  more  common,  the  patronage  of  indi 
viduals  becomes  less  and  less  necessary.  In 
the  earlier  part  of  ihe  last  century  a  marked 
change  took  place.  The  tone  of  literary  men, 
both  in  this  country  and  in  France,  became 
higher  and  more  independent.  Pope  boasted 
that  he  was  the  "one  poet"  who  had  "pleased 
by  manly  ways ;"  he  derided  the  soft  dedica 
tions  with  which  Halifax  had  been  fed,- 
asserted  his  own  superiority  over  the  pen 
sioned  Boileau, — and  glorified  in  being  not  the 
follower,  but  the  friend,  of  nobles  and  princes. 
The  explanation  of  all  this  is  very  simple. 
Pope  was  the  first  Englishman  who,  by  the 
mere  sale  of  his  writings,  realized  a  sum 
which  enabled  him  to  live  in  comfort  and  ia 
perfect  independence.  Johnson  extols  him  for 
the  magnanimity  which  he  showed  in  inscrib 
ing  his  Iliad,  not  to  a  minister  or  a  peer,  but  to 
Congreve.  In  our  time,  this  would  scarcely 
be  a  subject  for  praise.  Nobody  is  astonished 
when  Mr.  Moore  pays  a  compliment  of  ihw 


658 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


to  Sir  Walter  Scott,  or  Sir  Walter  Scott 
to  Mr.  Moore.  The  idea  of  either  of  those 
gentlemen  looking  out  for  some  lord  who 
would  be  likely  to  give  him  a  few  guineas  in 
return  for  a  fulsome  dedication,  seems  laugh 
ably  incongruous.  Yet  this  is  exactly  what 
Dryden  or  Otway  would  have  done ;  and  it 
would  be  hard  to  blame  them  for  it.  Otway  is 
said  to  have  been  choked  with  a  piece  of  bread 
which  he  devoured  in  the  rage  of  hunger;  and, 
whether  this  story  be  true  or  false,  he  was,  be 
yond  all  question,  miserably  poor.  Dryden,  at 
near  seventy,  when  at  the  head  of  the  literary 
men  of  England,  without  equal  or  second, 
received  three  hundred  pounds  for  his  Fables 
— a  collection  of  ten  thousand  verses, — and 
such  verses  as  no  man  then  living,  except 
himself,  could  have  produced.  Pope,  at  thirty, 
had  laid  up  between  six  and  seven  thousand 
pounds, — the  fruits  of  his  poetry.  It  was  not, 
we  suspect,  because  he  had  a  higher  spirit,  or 
a  more  scrupulous  conscience,  than  his  pre 
decessors,  but  because  he  had  a  larger  income, 
that  he  kept  up  the  dignity  of  the  literary  cha 
racter  so  much  better  than  they  had  done. 

From  the  time  of  Pope  to  the  present  day, 
the  readers  have  been  constantly  becoming 
more  and  more  numerous:  and  the  writers, 
consequently,  more  and  more  independent. 
It  is  assuredly  a  great  evil,  that  men  fitted  by 
their  talents  and  acquirements  to  enlighten 
and  charm  the  world,  should  be  reduced  to 
the  necessity  of  flattering  wicked  and  foolish 
patrons  in  return  for  the  very  sustenance  of 
life.  But  though  we  heartily  rejoice  that  this 
evil  is  removed,  we  cannot  but  see  with  con 
cern  that  another  evil  has  succeeded  to  it. 
The  public  is  now  the  patron,  and  a  most  libe 
ral  patron.  All  that  the  rich  and  powerful 
bestowed  on  authors  from  the  time  of  Maecenas 
to  that  of  Harley  would  not,  we  apprehend, 
make  up  a  sum  equal  to  that  which  has  been 
paid  by  English  booksellers  to  authors  during 
the  last  thirty  years.  Men  of  letters  have 
accordingly  ceased  to  court  individuals,  and 
have  begun  to  court  the  public.  They  for 
merly  used  flattery.  They  now  use  puffing. 

Whether  the  old  or  the  new  vice  be  the 
worse, — whether  those  who  formerly  lavished 
insincere  praise  on  others,  or  those  who  now 
contrive  by  every  art  of  beggary  and  bribery 
to  stun  the  public  with  praises  of  themselves, 
disgrace  their  vocation  the  more  deeply, — we 
shall  not  attempt  to  decide.  But  of  this  we 
are  sure, — that  it  is  high  time  to  make  a  stand 
against  the  new  trickery.  The  puffing  of 
books  is  now  so  shamefully  and  so  success 
fully  practised,  that  it  is  the  duty  of  all  who 
are  anxious  for  the  purity  of  the  national  taste, 
or  for  the  honour  of  the  literary  character,  to 
join  in  discountenancing  it.  All  the  pens  that 
ever  were  employed  in  magnifying  Bish's 
lucky  office,  Romanis's  fleecy  hosiery,  Pack- 
wood's  razor  strops,  and  Rowland's  Kalydor, 

all  the  placard-bearers  of  Dr.  Eady,— all  the 
wall-chalkers  of  Day  and  Martin— seem  to 
have  taken  service  with  the  poets  and  novel 
ists  of  this  generation.  Devices  which  in  the 
lowest  trades  are  considered  as  disreputable,  j 
are  adopted  without  scruple,  and  improved  ' 


upon  with  a  despicable  ingenuity  by  people 
engaged  in  a  pursuit  which  never  was,  and 
never  will  be,  considered  as  a  mere  trade  by 
any  man  of  honour  and  virtue.  A  butcher  of 
the  higher  class  disdains  to  ticket  his  meat.  A 
mercer  of  the  higher  class  would  be  ashamed 
to  hang  up  papers  in  his  window  inviting  the 
passers-by  to  look  at  the  stock  of  a  bankrupt, 
all  of  the  first  quality,  and  going  for  half  the 
value.  We  expect  some  reserve,  some  decent 
pride,  in  our  hatter  and  our  bootmaker.  But 
no  artifice  by  which  notoriety  can  be  obtained 
is  thought  too  abject  for  a  man  of  letters. 

It  is  amusing  to  think  over  the  history  of 
most  of  the  publications  which  have  had  a  run 
during  the  last  few  years.  The  publisher  is 
often  the  publisher  of  some  periodical  work. 
In  this  periodical  work  the  first  flourish  of 
trumpets  is  sounded.  The  peal  is  then  echoed 
and  re-echoed  by  all  the  other  periodical  works 
over  which  the  publisher  or  the  author,  or  the 
author's  coterie,  may  have  any  influence.  The 
newspapers  are  for  a  fortnight  filled  with  puffs  of 
all  the  various  kinds  which  Sheridan  recounted, 
— direct,  oblique,  and  collusive.  Sometimes 
the  praise  is  laid  on  thick  for  simple-minded 
people.  "  Pathetic,"  "  sublime,"  "  splendid," 
"graceful,  brilliant  wit,"  "exquisite  humour," 
and  other  phrases  equally  flattering,  fall  in  a 
shower  as  thick  and  as  sweet  as  the  sugar 
plums  at  a  Roman  carnival.  Sometimes  great 
er  art  is  used.  A  sinecure  has  been  offered  to 
the  writer  if  he  would  suppress  his  work,  or  if 
he  would  even  soften  down  a  few  of  his  incom 
parable  portraits.  A  distinguished  military  and 
political  character  has  challenged  the  inimita 
ble  satiiist  of  the  vices  of  the  great;  and  the 
puffer  is  glad  to  learn  that  the  parties  have 
been  bound  over  to  keep  the  peace.  Some 
times  it  is  thought  expedient  that  the  pufFer 
should  put  on  a  grave  face,  and  utter  his  pane 
gyric  in  the  form  of  admonition!  "Such  at 
tacks  on  private  character  cannot  be  too  much 
condemned.  Even  the  exuberant  wit  of  our 
author,  and  the  irresistible  power  of  his  with 
ering  sarcasm,  are  no  excuses  for  that  utter 
disregard  which  he  manifests  for  the  feelings 
of  others.  We  cannot  but  wonder  that  the 
writer  of  such  transcendent  talents, — a  writer 
who  is  evidently  no  stranger  to  the  kindly 
charities  and  sensibilities  of  our  nature,  should 
show  so  little  tenderness  to  the  foibles  of  noble 
and  distinguished  individuals,  with  whom,  it  is 
clear,  from  every  page  of  his  work,  that  he 
must  have  been  constantly  mingling  in  socie 
ty."  These  are  but  tame  and  feeble  imitations 
of  the  paragraphs  with  which  the  daily  papers 
are  filled  whenever  an  attorney's  clerk  or  an 
apothecary's  assistant  undertakes  to  tell  the 
public,  in  bad  English  and  worse  French,  how 
people  tie  their  neckcloths  and  eat  their  die. 
ners  in  Grosvenor  Square.  The  editors  of  the 
higher  and  more  respectable  newspapers 
usually  prefix  the  words  "Advertisement,"  or 
"From  a  Correspondent,"  to  such  paragraphs, 
But  this  makes  little  difference.  The  panegy 
ric  is  extracted,  and  the  significant  heading 
omitted.  The  fulsome  eulogy  makes  its  ap 
pearance  on  the  covers  of  all  the  Reviews  and 
Magazines,  with  "  Times"  or  "  Globe"  affixed, 


MR.  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS. 


653 


though  the  editors  of  the  Times  and  the  Globe 
have  no  more  to  do  with  it  than  with  Mr.  Goss's 
way  of  making  old  rakes  young  again. 

That  people  who  live  by  personal  slander 
should  practise  these  arts  is  not  surprising. 
Those  who  stoop  to  write  calumnious  books 
may  well  stoop  to  puff  them; — and  that  the 
basest  of  all  trades  should  be  carried  on  in  the 
basest  of  all  manners,  is  quite  proper,  and  as 
it  should  be.  But  how  any  man,  who  has  the 
least  self-respect,  the  least  regard  for  his  own 
personal  dignity,  can  condescend  to  persecute 
the  public  with  this  rag-fair  importunity,  we 
do  not  understand.  Extreme  poverty  may, 
indeed,  in  some  degree,  be  an  excuse  for  em 
ploying  these  shifts,  as  it  may  be  an  excuse 
for  stealing  a  leg  of  mutton.  But  we  really 
think  that  a  man  of  spirit  and  delicacy  would 
quite  as  soon  satisfy  his  wants  in  the  one  way 
as  in  the  other. 

It  is  no  excuse  for  an  author,  that  the  praises 
of  journalists  are  procured  by  the  money  or  in 
fluence  of  the  publisher,  and  not  by  his  own. 
It  is  his  business  to  take  such  precautions  as 
may  prevent  others  from  doing  what  must  de 
grade  them.  It  is  for  his  honour  as  a  gentle 
man,  and,  if  he  is  really  a  man  of  talents,  it 
will  eventually  be  for  his  honour  and  interest 
as  a  writer,  that  his  works  should  come  before 
the  public,  recommended  by  their  own  merits 
alone,  and  should  be  discussed  with  perfect 
freedom.  If  his  objects  be  really  such  as  he 
may  own  without  shame,  he  will  find  that  they 
will,  in  the  long  run,  be  better  attained  by  suf 
fering  the  voice  of  criticism  to  be  fairly  heard. 
At  present,  we  too  often  see  a  writer  attempt 
ing  to  obtain  literary  fame  as  Shakspeare's 
usurper  obtains  sovereignty.  The  publisher 
plays  Buckingham  to  the  author's  Richard. 
Some  few  creatures  of  the  conspiracy  are  dex 
terously  disposed  here  and  there  in  a  crowd. 
It  is  the  business  of  these  hirelings  to  throw  up 
their  caps,  and  clap  their  hands,  and  utter  their 
rivets.  The  rabble  at  first  stare  and  wonder, 
and  at  last  join  in  shouting  for  shouting's  sake; 
and  thus  a  crown  is  placed  on  the  head  which 
has  no  right  to  it,  by  the  huzzas  of  a  few  ser 
vile  dependants. 

The  opinion  of  the  great  body  of  the  reading 
public  is  very  materially  influenced  even  by 
the  unsupported  assertions  of  those  who  as 
sume  a  right  to  criticise.  Nor  is  the  public 
altogether  to  blame  on  this  account.  Most, 
even  of  those  who  have  really  a  great  enjoy 
ment  in  reading,  are  in  the  same  state,  with 
respect  to  a  book,  in  which  a  man,  who  has 
never  given  particular  attention  to  the  art  of 
painting,  is  with  respect  to  a  picture.  Every 
man  who  has  the  least  sensibility  or  imagina 
tion,  derives  a  certain  pleasure  from  pictures. 
Yet  a  man  of  the  highest  and  finest  intellect 
might,  unless  he  had  formed  his  taste  by  con 
templating  the  best  pictures,  be  easily  per 
suaded  by  a  knot  of  connoisseurs  that  the  worst 
daub  in  Somerset-house  was  a  miracle  of  art. 
If  he  deserves  to  be  laughed  at,  it  is  not  for  his 
ignorance  of  pictures,  but  for  his  ignorance  of 
men.  He  knows  that  there  is  a  delicacy  of 
taste  in  painting  which  he  docs  not  possess; 
*hat  he  cannot  discriminate  hands,  as  prac 


tised  judges  can  ;  that  he  is  not  familliar  witb 
the  finest  models ;  that  he  has  never  looked  at 
them  with  close  attention ;  and  that,  when  the 
general  effect  of  a  piece  has  pleased  him,  or 
displeased  him,  he  has  never  troubled  himself 
to  ascertain  why.  When,  therefore,  people 
whom  he  thinks  more  competent  to  judge  than 
himself,  and  of  whose  sincerity  he  entertains 
no  doubt,  assure  him  that  a  particular  work  is 
exquisitely  beautiful,  he  takes  it  for  granted 
that  they  must  be  in  the  right.  He  returns  to 
the  examination,  resolved  to  find  or  imagine 
beauties;  and  if  he  can  work  himself  up  into 
something  like  admiration,  he  exults  in  his 
own  proficiency. 

Just  such  is  the  manner  in  which  nine 
readers  out  of  ten  judge  of  a  book.  They  are 
ashamed  to  dislike  what  men,  who  speak  as 
having  authority,  declare  to  be  good.  At  pre 
sent,  however  contemptible  a  poem  or  a  novel 
may  be,  there  is  not  the  least  difficulty  in  pro 
curing  favourable  notices  of  it  from  all  sorts 
of  publications,  daily,  weekly,  and  monthly. 
In  the  mean  time,  little  or  nothing  is  said  on 
the  other  side.  The  author  and  the  publisher 
are  interested  in  crying  up  the  book.  Nobody 
has  any  very  strong  interest  in  crying  it  down. 
Those  who  are  best  fitted  to  guide  the  public 
opinion,  think  it  beneath  them  to  expose  mere 
nonsense,  and  comfort  themselves  by  reflecting 
that  such  popularity  cannot  last.  This  con 
temptuous  lenity  has  been  carried  too  far.  It 
is  perfectly  true,  that  reputations  which  have 
been  forced  into  an  unnatural  bloom,  fade  al 
most  as  soon  as  they  have  expanded  ;  nor  have 
we  any  apprehensions  that  puffing  will  ever 
raise  any  scribbler  to  the  rank  of  a  classic.  It 
is.  indeed,  amusing  to  turn  over  some  late  vol 
umes  of  periodical  works,  and  to  see  how 
many  immortal  productions  have,  within  a  few 
months,  been  gathered  to  the  poems  of  Black- 
more  and  the  novels  of  Mrs.  Behn  ;  how  many 
"  profound  views  of  human  nature,"  and  "  exqui 
site  delineations  of  fashionable  manners,"  and 
"vernal,  and  sunny,  and  refreshing  thoughts," 
and  "high  imaginings,"  and  "young  breath 
ings,"  and  "embodyings,"  and  "pinings,"  and 
"  minglings  with  the  beauty  of  the  universe," 
and  "harmonies  which  dissolve  the  soul  in  a 
passionate  sense  of  loveliness  and  divinity,"  the 
world  has  contrived  to  forget.  The  names  of 
the  books  and  the  writers  are  buried  in  as  deep 
an  oblivion  as  the  name  of  the  builder  of  Stone- 
hedge.  Some  of  the  well-puffed  "  fashionable 
novels"  of  the  last,  hold  the  pastry  of  the  pre 
sent  year;  and  others  of  the  class,  which  are 
now  extolled  in  language  almost  too  high-flown 
for  the  merits  of  Don  Quixote,  will,  we  have  no 
doubt,  line  the  trunks  of  eighteen  hundred  and 
thirty-one.  But  though  we  have  no  apprehen 
sions  that  puffing  will  ever  confer  permanent 
reputation  on  the  undeserving,  we  still  think 
its  influence  most  pernicious.  Men  of  leai 
merit  will,  if  they  persevere,  at  last  reach  the 
station  to  which  they  are  entitled,  and  intruders 
will  be  ejected  with  contempt  and  derision. 
But  it  is  no  small  evil  that  the  avenues  to  fame 
should  be  blocked  up  by  a  swarm  of  noisy, 
pushing,  elbowing  pretenders,  who,  though 
they  will  not  ultimately  be  able  to  make  goo«l 


660 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


their  own  entrance,  hinder,  in  the  mean  time, 
those  who  have  a  right  to  enter.  All  who  will 
not  disgrace  themselves  by  joining  in  the  un 
seemly  scuffle,  must  expect  to  be  at  first  hustled 
and  shouldered  back.  Some  men  of  talents, 
accordingly,  turn  away  in  dejection  from  pur 
suits  in  which  success  appears  to  bear  no 
proportion  to  desert.  Others  employ  in  self- 
defence  the  means  by  which  competitors,  far 
inferior  to  themselves,  appear  for  a  time  to  ob 
tain  a  decided  advantage.  There  are  few  who 
have  sufficient  confidence  in  their  own  powers, 
and  sufficient  elevation  of  mind,  to  wait  with 
secure  and  contemptuous  patience,  while  dunce 
after  dunce  presses  before  them.  Those  who 
will  not  stoop  to  the  baseness  of  the  modern 
fashion  are  too  often  discouraged.  Those  who 
stoop  to  it  are  always  degraded. 

We  have  of  late  observed  with  great  plea 
sure  some  symptoms  which  lead  us  to  hope, 
that  respectable  literary  men  of  all  parties  are 
begin ii ing  to  be  impatient  of  this  insufferable 
nuisance.  And  we  purpose  to  do  what  in  us 
lies  for  the  abating  of  it.  We  do  not  think 
that  we  can  more  usefully  assist  in  this  good 
work,  than  by  showing  our  honest  countrymen 
what  that  sort  of  poetry  is  which  puffing  can 
drive  through,  eleven  editions ;  and  how  easy 
any  bellman  might,  if  a  bellman  would  stoop 
to  the  necessary  degree  of  meanness,  become 
"  a  master-spirit  of  the  age."  We  have  no  en 
mity  to  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery.  We  know 
nothing  whatever  about  him,  except  what  we 
have  learned  from  his  books,  and  from  the 
portrait  prefixed  to  one  of  them,  in  which  he 
appears  to  be  doing  his  very  best  to  look  like  a 
man  of  genius  and  sensibility,  though  with  less 
success  than  his  strenuous  exertions  deserve. 
We  select  him,  because  his  works  have  re 
ceived  more  enthusiastic  praise,  and  have  de 
served  more  unmixed  contempt,  than  any 
which,  as  far  as  our  knowledge  extends,  have 
appeared  within  the  last  three  or  four  years. 
His  writing  bears  the  same  relation  to  poetry 
which  a  Turkey  carpet  bears  to  a  picture 
There  are  colours  in  the  Turkey  carpet,  out  of 
which  a  picture  might  be  made.  There  are 
words  in  Mr.  Montgomery's  verses,  which  when 
disposed  in  certain  orders  and  combinations, 
have  made,  and  will  again  make,  good  poetry. 
But,  as  they  now  stand,  they  seem  to  be  put 
together  on  principle,  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
give  no  image  of  any  thing  in  the  "heavens 
above,  or  in  the  earth  beneath,  or  in  the  waters 
under  the  earth." 

The  poem  on  the  Omnipresence  of  the  Deity 
commences  with  a  description  of  the  creation, 
in  which  we  can  find  only  one  thought  which 
has  the  least  pretension  to  ingenuity,  and  that 
one  thought  is  stolen  from  Dryden,  and  marred 
in  the  stealing — 


"Last,  softly  beautiful  as  music's  close, 
Angelic  woman  into  being  rose." 

fhe  all-pervading  influence  of  the  Supreme 
Being  is  then  described  in  a  few  tolerable  lines 
Borrowed  from  Pope,  and  a  great  many  intoler 
able  lines  of  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's  own. 
The  jbLowir.g  may  stand  as  a  specimen— 


"  But  who  could  trace  Thine  unrestricted  conne. 
Though  Fancy  follow'd  with  immortal  force  1 
There's  not  a  blossom  fondled  by  the  breeze, 
There's  not  a  fruit  that  beautifies  the  trees, 
There's  not  a  particle  in  sea  or  air, 
But  nature  owns  thy  plastic  influence  there  1 
With  fearful  gaze,  still  be  it  mine  to  see 
How  all  is  filled  and  vivified  by  Thee ; 
Upon  thy  mirror,  earth's  majectic  view, 
To  paint  Thy  Presence,  and  to  feel  it  too." 

The  last  two  lines  contain  an  excellent  spe 
cimen  of  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's  Turkey 
carpet  style  of  writing.  The  majertic  view  of 
earth  is  the  mirror  of  God's  presence;  and  on 
this  mirror  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  paints 
God's  presence.  The  use  of  a  mirror,  we 
submit,  is  not  to  be  painted  upon. 

A  few  more  lines,  as  bad  as  those  which  we 
have  quoted,  bring  us  to  one  of  the  most  amus 
ing  instances  of  literary  pilfering  which  we 
remember.  It  might  be  of  use  to  plagiarists  to 
know  as  a  general  rule,  that  what  they  steal  is, 
to  employ  a  phrase  common  in  advertisements, 
of  no  use  to  any  but  the  right  owner.  W<? 
never  fell  in,  however,  with  any  plunderer  who 
so  little  understood  how  to  turn  his  booty  to 
good  account  as  Mr.  Montgomery.  Lord  By 
ron,  in  a  passage  which  every  body  knows  by 
heart,  has  said,  addressing  the  sea, 

"Time  writes  no  wrinkle  on  thine  azure  brow." 

Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  very  cooly  appro 
priates  the  image,  and  reproduces  the  stolen 
goods  in  the  following  form: 

"And  thou,  vast  Ocean,  on  whose  awful  face 
Time's  iron  feet  can  print  no  ruin  trace." 

So  may  such  ill-got  gains  ever  prosper! 

The  effect  which  the  Ocean  produces  on 
Atheists  is  then  described  in  the  following 
lofty  lines : 

"  Oh  !  never  did  the  dark-soul'd  ATHEIST  stand, 
And  watch  the  breakers  boiling  on  the  strand, 
And,  while  creation  staggered  at  his  nod, 
Mock  the  dread  presence  of  the  mighty  fJod  ! 
We  hear  Him  in  the  wind -heaved  ocean's  roar, 
Hurling  her  billowy  crags  upon  the  shore; 
Wre  hear  him  in  the  riot  of  the  blast, 
And  shake,  w  bile  rush  the  raving  whirlwinds  past !" 

If  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's  genius  were  not 
far  too  free  and  aspiring  to  be  shackled  by  the 
rules  of  syntax,  we  should  suppose  that  it  is 
at  the  nod  of  the  Atheist  that  creation  shud 
ders,  and  that  it  is  this  same  dark-souled  Athe 
ist  who  hurls  billowy  crags  upon  the  shore. 

A  few  more  linrs  bring  us  to  another  in 
stance  of  unprofitable  theft.  Sir  Walter  Scott 
has  these  lines  in  the  Lord  of  the  Isles, 

"The  dew  that  on  the  violet  lies, 
Mocks  the  dark  lustre  of  thine  eyes." 

This  is  pretty,  taken  separately,  and,  as  is 
almost  always  the  case  with  good  things  of 
good  writers,  much  prettier  in  its  place  than 
can  even  be  conceived  by  those  who  see  it  only 
detached  from  the  context.  Now  for  Mr.  Mont- 
goraery— 

"And  the  bright  dew-bead  on  the  bramble  lies. 
Like  liquid  rapture  upon  beauty's  eyes." 

The  comparison  of  a  violet,  bright  with  the 
dew,  to  a  woman's  eyes,  is  as  perfect  as  a 
comparison  can  be.  "Sir  Walter's  lines  are 
part  of  a  song  addressed  to  a  woman,  and  thf 


MR.  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS. 


661 


comparison  is  therefore  peculiarly  natural  and 
graceful.  Dew  on  a  bramble  is  no  more  like 
a  woman's  eyes  than  dew  anywhere  else. 
There  is  a  very  pretty  Eastern  tale,  of  which 
the  fate  of  plagiarists  often  reminds  us.  The 
slave  of  a  magician  saw  his  master  wave  his 
wand,  and  heard  him  give  orders  to  the  spirits 
who  arose  at  the  summons.  He  accordingly 
stole  the  wand,  and  waved  it  himself  in  the 
air;  but  he  had  not  observed  that  his  master 
used  the  left  hand  for  that  purpose.  The  spirits 
thus  irregularly  summoned,  tore  him  to  pieces, 
instead  of  obeying  his  orders.  There  are  very 
few  who  can  safely  venture  to  conjure  with 
the  rod  of  Sir  Walter,  and  we  are  sure  that 
Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  is  not  one  of  them. 

Mr.  Campbell,  in  one  of  his  most  pleasant 
pieces,  has  this  line — 

"  The  sentinel  stars  set  their  watch  in  the  sky." 

The  thought  is  good — and  has  a  very  striking 
propriety  where  Mr.  Campbell  placed  it — in 
the  mouth  of  a  soldier  telling  his  dream.  But, 
though  Shakspeare  assures  us  that  "every 
true  man's  apparel  fits  your  thief,"  it  is  by  no 
means  the  case,  as  we  have  already  seen,  that 
every  true  poet's  similitude  fits  your  plagiarist. 
Let  us  see  how  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  uses 
the  image — 

"Ye  quenchless  stars  !  so  eloquently  bright, 
tJ  lit  rod  bled  sentries  of  the  shadowy  night, 
While  half  the  world  is  lapped  in  downy  dreams, 
And  round  the  lattice  creep  your  midnight  beams, 
How  sweet  to  gaze  upon  your  placid  eyes, 
In  lambent  beauty  looking  from  the  skies." 

Certainly  the  ideas  of  eloquence — of  un 
troubled  repose — of  placid  eyes,  on  the  lambent 
beauty  of  which  it  is  sweet  to  gaze,  harmonize 
admirably  with  the  idea  of  a  sentry! 

We  would  not  be  understood,  however,  to 
say,  that  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  cannot  make 
similitudes  for  himself.  A  very  few  lines  far 
ther  on,  we  find  one  which  has  every  mark  of 
originality,  and  on  which,  we  will  be  bound, 
none  of  the  poets  whom  he  has  plundered  will 
ever  think  of  making  reprisals : 

"The  soul,  aspiring,  pants  its  source  to  mount, 
As  streams  meander  level  with  their  fount." 

We  take  this  to  be,  on  the  whole,  the  worst 
similitude  in  the  world.  In  the  first  place,  no 
stream  meanders,  or  can  possibly  meander, 
level  with  its  fount.  In  the  next  place,  if 
streams  did  meander  level  with  their  founts,  no 
two  motions  can  be  less  alike  than  that  of 
meandering  level,  and  that  of  mounting  up 
wards. 

We  have  then  an  apostrophe  to  the  Deity, 
couched  in  terms  which,  in  any  writer  who 
dealt  in  meanings,  we  should  call  profane,  but 
to  which,  we  suppose,  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery 
attaches  no  idea  whatever. 

"Yes!  pause  and  think,  within  one  fleeting  hour, 
How  vast  a  universe  obeys  Thy  power; 
Unseen,  but  felt,  Thine  interfused  control 
Works  in  each  atom,  and  pervades  the  whole; 
Expands  the  blossom,  and  erects  the  tree, 
Conducts  each  vapour,  and  commands  each  sea, 
Beams  in  each  ray,  bids  whirlwinds  be  unfurl'd, 
Unrolls  the  thunder,  and  upheaves  a  world!" 

No  field-preacher  ever  carried  his  irreverent 


familiarity  so  far  as  to  bid  the  Supreme  Being 
stop  and  meditate  on  the  importance  of  the 
interests  which  are  under  his  care.  The  gro 
tesque  indecency  of  such  an  address  throws 
into  shade  the  subordinate  absurdities  of  the 
passage,  the  unfurling  of  whirlwinds,  the  un 
rolling  of  thunder,  and  the  upheaving  of 
worlds. 

Then  comes  a  curious  specimen  of  our 
poet's  English — 

"Yet  not  alone  created  realms  engage 
Thy  faultless  wisdom,  grand,  primeval  sage ! 
For  all  the  thronging  woes  to  life  allied 
Thy  mercy  tempers,  and  Thy  cares  provide." 

We  should  be  glad  to  know  what  the  word 
"For"  means  here.  If  it  is  a  preposition,  it 
makes  nonsense  of  the  words,  "Thy  mercy 
tempers."  If  it  is  an  adverb,  it  mattes  non 
sense  of  the  words,  "Thy  cares  provide." 

These  beauties  we  have  taken,  almost  at 
random,  from  the  first  part  of  the  poem.  The 
second  part  is  a  series  of  descriptions  of  va 
rious  events, — a  battle — a  murder — an  execu 
tion—a  marriage — a  funeral — and  so  forth.  Mr. 
Robert  Montgomery  terminates  each  of  these 
descriptions,  by  assuring  us  that  the  Deity  was 
present  at  the  battle,  murder,  execution,  mar 
riage,  or  funeral,  in  question.  And  this  propo 
sition,  which  might  be  safely  predicated  of 
every  event  that  ever  happened,  or  ever  will 
happen,  forms  the  only  link  which  connects 
these  descriptions  with  the  subject,  or  with 
each  other. 

How  the  descriptions  are  executed,  our  rea 
ders  are  probably  by  this  time  able  to  conjec 
ture.  The  battle  is  made  up  of  the  battles  of 
all  ages  and  nations;  "red-mouthed  cannons, 
uproaring  \o  the  clouds,"  and  "hands  grasping 
firm  the  glittering  shield."  The  only  military 
operations  of  which  this  part  of  the  poem  re 
minds  us  are  those  which  reduced  the  Abbey 
of  Quedtinburgh  to  submission — the  Templar 
with  his  cross — the  Austrian  and  Prussian 
grenadiers  in  full  uniform — and  Curtius  and 
Dentatus  with  their  battering-ram.  We  ought 
not  to  pass  by  unnoticed  the  slain  war-horse, 
who  will  no  more 

"  Roll  his  red  eye,  and  rally  for  the  fight ;" 

or  the  slain  warrior,  who,  while  "  lying  on  his 
bleeding  breast,"  contrives  to  "stare  ghastly 
and  grimly  on  the  skies."  As  to  this  last  ex 
ploit,  we  can  only  say,  as  Dante  did  on  a  simi 
lar  occasion, 

"Forse  per  forza  gia  di  parlasia 
Si  stravolse  cosi  alcun  del  tutto: 
Ma  io  nol  vidi,  ne  credo  che  sia." 

The  tempest  is  thus  described — 

"  But  lo !  around  the  marsh'lling  clouds  unite, 
Like  thick  battalions  halting  for  the  fight ; 
The  sun  sinks  back,  the  tempest-spirits  sweep] 
Fierce  through  the  air,  and  flutter  on  the  deep. 
Till  from  their  caverns  ru.*h  the  maniac  blasts, 
Tear  the  loose  sails,  and  split  The  creaking  masts, 
And  the  lash'd  billows,  rolling  in  a  train. 
Rear  their  white  heads,  and  race  along  the  main !  " 

What,  we  should  like  to  know,  is  the  differ 
ence  between  the  two  operations  which  Mr. 
Robert  Montgomery  so  accurately  distinguishes 
from  each  ether,— the  fierce  sweeping  of  the 
tempest-spirits  through  the  air,  and  the  rash'ng 
3  K 


t>62 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  the  maniac  blasts  from  their  caverns  1  And  I 
why  does  the  former  operation  end  exactly 
when  the  latter  commences  7 

We  cannot  stop  over  each  of  Mr.  Robert 
Montgomery's  descriptions.  We  have  a  ship 
wrecked  sailor,  who  "  visions  a  viewless  temple 
in  the  air;" — a  murderer,  who  stands  on  a 
heath,  "  with  ashy  lips,  in  cold  convulsion 
spread;" — a  pious  man,  to  whom,  as  he  lies  in 
bed  at  night, 

"The  panorama  of  past  life  appears, 
Warms  his  pure  mind  and  melts  it  into  tears  ;"-r- 

a  traveller,  who  lose;,  his  way,  owing  to  the 
thickness  of  the  "cloud-battalion,"  and  the 
want  of  "heaven-lamps,  to  beam  their  holy 
light."  We  have  a  description  of  a  convicted 
felon,  stolen  from  thai  incomparable  passage  in 
Crabbe's  Borough,  which  has  made  many  a 
rough  and  cynical  reader  cry  like  a  child.  We 
can,  however,  conscientiously  declare,  that 
persons  of  the  most  excitable  sensibility  may 
safely  venture  upon  it  in  Mr.  Robert  Montgo 
mery's  alteration.  Then  w«  have  the  "  poor, 
mindless,  pale-faced,  maniac  boy,v'  who 

"Rolls  his  vacant  eye, 
To  greet  the  glowing  fancies  of  the  sky." 

What  are  the  glowing  fancies  of  the  sky? 
And  what  is  the  meaning  of  the  two  lines  which 
almost  immediately  follow  1 

"A  soulless  thing,  a  spirit  of  the  woods, 
He  loves  to  commune  with  the  fields  and  floods." 

How  can  a  soulless  thing  be  a  spirit  ?  Then 
comes  a  panegyric  on  the  Sunday.  A  baptism 
follows  : — after  that  a  marriage  ;  and  we  then 
proceed,  in  due  course,  to  the  visitation  of  the 
sick,  and  the  burial  of  the  dead. 

Often  as  death  has  been  personified,  Mr. 
Montgomery  has  found  something  new  to  say 
about  him. 

"O  Death!  thou  dreadless  vanquisher  of  earth, 
The  Elements  shrank  blasted  at  thy  birth! 
Careering  round  the  world  like  tempest  wind, 
Martyrs  before,  and  victims  strew'd  behind; 
Ages  on  ages  cannot  grapple  thee, 
Dragging  the  world  into  eternity!" 

If  there  be  any  one  line  in  this  passage  about 
which  we  are  more  in  the  dark  than  about  the 
rest,  it  is  the  fourth.  What  the  difference  may 
be  between  the  victims  and  the  martyrs,  and 
why  the  martyrs  are  to  lie  before  Death,  and 
the  victims  behind  him,  are  to  us  great  myste 
ries. 

We  now  come  to  the  third  part,  of  which  we 
may  say  with  honest  Cassio,  "Why,  this  is  a 
more  excellent  song  than  the  other."  Mr.  Ro 
bert  Montgomery  is  very  severe  on  the  infidels, 
and  undertakes  to  prove  that,  as  he  elegantly 
expresses  it, 

"One  great  Enchanter  helm'd  the  harmonious  whole." 

What  an  enchanter  has  to  do  with  helming,  or 
what  a  helm  has  to  do  with  harmony,  we  do 
not  quite  understand.  He  proceeds  with  his 
argument  thus: 

"And  dare  men  dream  that  dismal  Chance  has  framed 
All  that  the  eye  perceives,  or  tongue  has  named; 
The  spacious  world,  and  all  its  wonders,  born 
Designless,  self-rrented.  and  forlorn  ; 
Like  To  the  flashing  bubbles  on  a  stream, 
Fire  from  the  cloud,  or  phantom  in  a  dream  1" 


We  should  be  sorry  to  stake  our  faith  in  a 
higher  Power  on  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's 
logic.  Does  he  believe  that  lightning,  and  bub 
bles,  and  the  phenomena  of  dreams,  are  design 
less  and  self-createdl  If  he  does,  we  cannot 
conceive  why  he  may  not  believe  that  the  whole 
universe  is  designless  and  self-created.  A  few 
lines  before,  he  tells  us  that  it  is  the  Deity  who 
bids  "thunder  rattle  from  the  skiey  deep." 
His  theory  is  therefore  this,  that  God  made  the 
thunder,  but  that  the  lightning  made  itself. 

But  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's  metaphysics 
are  not  at  present  our  game.  He  proceeds  to 
set  forth  the  fearful  effects  of  atheism. 

"Then,  blood-stain'd  Murder,  bare  thy  hideous  arm, 
And  thou,  Rebellion,  welter  in  thy  storm: 
Awake,  ye  spirits  of  avenging  crime; 
Burst  from  your  bonds,  and  battle  with  the  time!" 

Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  is  fond  of  personi 
fication,  and  belongs,  we  need  not  say,  to  that 
school  of  poets  who  hold  that  nothing  more  is 
necessary  to  a  personification  in  poetry  than  to 
begin  a  word  with  a  capital  letter.  Murder 
may,  without  impropriety,  bare  her  arm, — as 
she  did  long  ago,  in  Mr.  Campbell's  Pleasures 
of  Hope.  But  what  possible  motive  Rebellion 
can  have  for  weltering  in  her  storm, — what 
avenging  crime  may  be, — who  its  spirits  may 
be, — why  they  should  burst  from  their  bonds, 
— what  their  bonds  may  be, — why  they  should 
battle  with  the  time, — what  the  time  may  be, 
— and  what  a  battle  between  the  time  and  the 
spirits  of  avenging  crime  would  resemble,  we 
must  confess  ourselves  quite  unable  to  under 
stand. 

"And  here  let  Memory  turn  her  tearful  glance 
On  the  dark  horrors  of  tumultuous  France, 
When  blood  and  blasphemy  defiled  her  land, 
And  fierce  Rebellion  shook  her  savage  hand." 

Whether  Rebellion  shakes  her  own  hand, 
shakes  the  hand  of  Memory,  or  shakes  the 
hand  of  France,  or  what  any  one  of  the  meta 
phors  would  mean,  we  know  no  more  than  we 
know  what  is  the  sense  of  the  following  pass 
age: 

"  Let  the  foul  orgies  of  infuriate  crime 
Pic'ure  the  raging  havoc  of  that  time, 
When  leagued  Rebellion  march'd  to  kindle  man, 
Fright  in  her  rear,  and  Murder  in  her  van. 
And    thou,    sweet   flower  of  Austria,    slaughtered 

Queen, 

Who  dropped  no  tear  upon  the  dreadful  scene, 
When  gushed  the  life-blood  from  thine  angel  form, 
And  martyr'd  beamy  perish'd  in  the  storm, 
Once  worshipp'd  paragon  of  all  who  saw, 
Thy  look  obedience,  and  thy  smile  a  law,"  &c. 

What  is  the  distinction  between  the  foul  orgies 
and  the  raging  havoc  which  the  foul  orgies  are 
to  picture?  Why  does  Fright  go  behind  Re 
bellion,  and  Murder  before  ?  Why  should  not 
Murder  fall  behind  Fright?  Or  why  should 
not  all  the  three  walk  abreast  ?  We  have  read 
of  a  hero  who  had 

"Amazement  in  his  van,  with  Flight  combined, 
And  Sorrow's  faded  form,  and  Solitude  behind." 

Gray,  we  suspect,  could  have  given  a  reason 
for  disposing  the  allegorical  attendants  of  Ed 
ward  thus.  But  to  proceed. — "  Flower  of  A  us* 
tria"  is  stolen  from  Byron.  "Dropped"  is 
false  English.  "Perish'd  in  the  storm"  means 
nothing  at  all ;  and  "  thy  look  obedience"  means 


MR.  ROBERT  MONTGOMERY'S  POEMS. 


665* 


the  very  reverse  of  what  Mr.  Robert  Montgo 
mery  intends  to  say. 

Our  poet  then  proceeds  to  demonstrate  the 
immortality  of  the  soul : — 

I"  And  shall  the  soul,  the  fount  of  reason,  die, 
•When  dust  and  darkness  round  its  temple  lie? 
Did  God  breathe  in  it  no  ethereal  fire, 
Dimless  and  quenchless,  though  the  breath  expire." 

The  soul  is  a  fountain ;  and  therefore  it  is  not 
to  die,  though  dust  and  darknes*  lie  round  its 
cemple,  because  an  ethereal  fire  has  been 
oreathed  into  it,  which  cannot  be  quenched 
though  its  breath  expire.  Is  it  the  fountain, 
or  the  temple,  that  breathes,  and  has  fire 
breathed  into  it  ? 

Mr.  Montgomery  apostrophizes  the 

"Immortal  beacons,— spirits  of  the  just." 

and  describes  their  employments  in  another 
world,  which  are  to  be,  it  seems,  bathing  in 
light,  hearing  fiery  streams  flow,  and  riding  on 
living  cars  of  lightning.  The  deathbed  of  the 
sceptic  is  described  with  what  we  suppose  is 
meant  for  energy. 

"  See  how  he  shudders  at  the  thought  of  death ! 
What  doubt  and  horror  hang  upon  his  breath, 
The  gibbering  teeth,  glazed  eye,  and  marble  limb. 
Shades  from  the  tornb  stalk  out  and  stare  at  him." 

'  A  man  as  stiff  as  marble,  shuddering  and 
gibbering  violently,  would  certainly  present  so 
curious  a  spectacle,  that  the  shades,  if  they 
came  in  his  way,  might  well  stare. 

We  then  have  the  deathbed  of  a  Christian 
made  as  ridiculous  as  false  imagery  and  false 
English  can  make  it.  But  this  is  not  enough : 
— The  Day  of  Judgment  is  to  be  described, — 
and  a  roaring  cataract  of  nonsense  is  poured 
forth  upon  this  tremendous  subject.  Earth,  we 
are  told,  is  dashed  into  Eternity.  Furnace 
blazes  wheel  round  the  horizon,  and  burst  into 
bright  wizard  phantoms.  Racing  hurricanes 
unroll  and  whirl  quivering  fire-clouds.  The 
white  waves  gallop.  Shadowy  worlds  career 
around.  The  red  and  raging  eye  of  Imagina 
tion  is  then  forbidden  to  pry  further.  But  fur 
ther  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  persists  in  pry 
ing.  The  stars  bound  through  the  airy  roar. 
The  unbosomed  deep  yawns  on  the  ruin.  The 
billows  of  Eternity  then  begin  to  advance. 
The  world  glares  in  fiery  slumber.  A  car 
comes  forward  driven  by  living  thunder. 

"Creation  shudders  with  sublime  dismay, 
And  in  a  blazing  tempest  whirls  away." 

And  this  is  fine  poetry !  This  is  what  ranks 
its  writer  with  the  master-spirits  of  the  age ! 
This  is  what  has  been  described  over  and  over 
again,  in  terms  which  would  require  some 
qualification  if  used  respecting  Paradise  Lost! 
It  is  too  much  that  this  patchwork,  made  by 
stitching  together  old  odds  and  ends  of  what, 
when  new,  was,  for  the  most  part,  but  tawdry 
frippery,  is  to  be  picked  off  the  dunghill  on 
which  it  ought  to  rot,  and  to  be  held  up  to  ad 
miration  as  an  inestimable  specimen  of  art. 
And  what  must  we  think  of  a  system,  by 
means  of  which  verses  like  those  which  we 
have  quoted — verses  fit  only  for  the  poet's  cor 


ner  of  the  Morning  Post — can  produce  emolu 
ment  and  fame1?  The  circulation  of  this 
writer's  poetry  has  been  greater  than  that  of 
Southey's  Roderic,  and  beyond  all  comparison 
greater  than  that  of  Carey's  Dante,  or  of  the 
best  works  of  Coleridge.  Thus  encouraged, 
Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  has  favoured  the  pub 
lic  with  volume  after  volume.  We  have  given 
so  much  space  to  the  examination  of  his  first 
and  most  popular  performance,  that  we  have 
none  to  spare  for  his  Universal  Prayer,  and  his 
smaller  poems,  which,  as  the  puffing  journals 
tell  us,  would  alone  constitute  a  sufficient  title 
to  literary  immortality.  We  shall  pass  at  once 
to  his  last  publication,  entitled  Satan. 

This  poem  was  ushered  into  the  world  with 
the  usual  roar  of  acclamation.  But  the  thing 
was  now  past  a  joke.  Pretensions  so  un 
founded,  so  impudent,  and  so  successful,  had 
aroused  a  spirit  of  resistance.  In  several 
magazines  and  reviews,  according)}'  Satan 
has  been  handled  somewhat  roughly,  and  the 
arts  of  the  puffers  have  been  exposed  with 
good  sense  and  spirit.  We  shall,  therefore,  be 
very  concise. 

Of  the  two  poems,  we  rather  prefer  that  on 
the  Omnipresence  of  the  Deity,  for  the  same 
reason  which  induced  Sir  Thomas  Moore  to 
rank  one  bad  book  above  another.  "  Marry, 
this  is  somewhat.  This  is  rhyme.  But  the 
other  is  neither  rhyme  nor  reason."  Satan  is 
a  long  soliloquy,  which  the  Devil  pronounces 
in  five  or  six  thousand  lines  of  blank  verse, 
concerning  geography,  politics,  newspapers, 
fashionable  society,  theatrical  amusements, 
Sir  Walter  Scott's  novels,  Lord  Byron's  poetry, 
and  Mr.  Martin's  pictures.  The  new  designs 
for  Milton  have,  as  was  natural,  particularly 
attracted  the  attention  of  a  personage  who 
occupies  so  conspicuous  a  place  in  them.  Mr. 
Martin  must  be  pleased  to  learn,  that,  whatever 
may  be  thought  of  those  performances  on 
earth,  they  give  full  satisfaction  in  Pandemo 
nium,  and  that  he  is  there  thought  to  have  hit 
off  the  likenesses  of  the  various  thrones  and 
dominations  very  happily. 

The  motto  to  the  poem  of  Satan  is  taken 
from  the  Book  of  Job : — "  Whence  comest 
thou  1  From  going  to  and  fro  in  the  earth,  and 
walking  up  and  down  in  it."  And  certainly, 
Mr.  Robert  Montgomery  has  not  failed  to  make 
his  hero  go  to  and  fro,  and  walk  up  and  down. 
With  the  exception,  however,  of  this  propen 
sity  to  locomotion,  Satan  has  not  one  Satanic 
quality.  Mad  Tom  had  told  us,  that  "the 
prince  of  darkness  is  a  gentleman ;"  but  we 
had  yet  to  learn  that  he  is  a  respectable  and 
pious  gentleman,  whose  principal  fault  is,  that 
he  is  something  of  a  twaddle,  and  far  too  liberal 
of  his  good  advice.  That  happy  change  in  his 
character  which  Origen  anticipated,  and  of 
which  Tillotson  did  not  despair,  seems  to  be 
rapidly  taking  place.  Bad  habits  are  not  eradi 
cated  in  a  moment.  It  is  not  strange,  therefore, 
that  so  old  an  offender  should  now  and  then 
relapse  for  a  short  time  into  wrong  disposi 
tions.  But  to  give  him  his  due,  as  the  proverb 
recommends,  we  must  say,  that  he  always  re 
turns,  after  two  or  three  lines  of  impiety,  to  his 
preaching  tone.  We  would  seriously  advise 


664 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


Mr.  Montgomery  to  omit,  or  alter,  about  a  hun 
dred  lines  in  different  parts  of  this  large  volume, 
and  to  republish  it  under  the  name  of  "  Ga 
briel."  The  reflections  of  which  it  consists 
would  come  less  absurdly,  as  far  as  there  is  a 
more  and  a  less  in  extreme  absurdity,  from  a 
good  than  from  a  bad  angel. 

We  can  afford  room  only  for  a  single  quota 
tion.  We  give  one  taken  at  random — neither 
worse  nor  better,  as  far  as  we  can  perceive, 
than  any  other  equal  number  of  lines  in  the 
book.  The  Devil  goes  to  the  play,  and  moral 
izes  thereon  as  follows  : — 

*•  Music  and  pomp  their  mingling  spirit  shed 
Around  me  ;  beauties  in  their  cloud-like  robes 
Shine  forth,— a  scanic  paradise,  it  glares 
Intoxication  through  the  reeling  sense 
Of  flushed  enjoyment.    In  the  motley  host 
Three  prime  gradations  may  be  ranked  :  the  first, 
To  mount  upon  the  wings  of  Shakspeare's  mind, 
And  win  a  flash  of  his  Promethean  thought, — 
To  smile  and  weep,  to  shudder  and  achieve 
A  round  of  passionate  omnipotence, 


Attend  :  the  second,  arc  a  sensual  t/ibe, 
Convened  to  hear  romuriir  l.drlois  si.ig. 
On  forms  to  banquet  a  lascivious  ga/.e, 
While  the  bright  perfidy  of  wanton  eyes 
Through  brain  and  spirit  darts  delicious  fire : 
The  last,  a  throng  most  pitiful !  who  seen., 
With  their  corroded  figures,  rayless  glance 
And  death-like  struggle  of  decaying  age, 
Like  painted  skeletons  in  enamel  pomp 
Set  forth  to  satirize  the  human  kind  ! — 
How  fine  a  prospect  for  demoniac  view ! 
'Creatures  whose  souls  outbalance  worlds  awake!* 
Methinks  I  hear  a  pitying  angel  cry." 

Here  we  conclude.  If  our  remarks  give 
pain  to  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery,  w«  are  scrry 
for  it.  But,  at  whatever  cost  of  pain  to  indi 
viduals,  literature  must  be  purified  of  this 
taint.  And,  to  show  that  we  are  not  actuated 
by  any  feelings  of  personal  enmity  towards 
him,  we  hereby  give  notice,  that,  as  soon  as 
any  book  shall,  by  means  of  putting,  reach  a 
second  edition,  our  intention  is,  to  do  unto  the 
writer  of  it  as  we  have  done  unto  M*.  Robert 
Montgomery. 


CIVIL  DISABILITIES  OF  THE  JEWS. 


665 


CIVIL  DISABILITIES  OF  THE  JEWS: 


THE  distinguished  member  of  the  House  of 
Commons  who,  towards  the  close  of  the  late 
Parliament,  brought  forward  a  proposition  for 
the  relief  of  the  Jews,  has  given  notice  of  his 
intention  to  renew  it.  The  force  of  reason,  in 
the  last  session,  carried  the  measure  through 
one  stage,  in  spite  of  the  opposition  of  power. 
Reason  and  power  are  now  on  the  same  side ; 
and  we  have  little  doubt  that  they  will  con 
jointly  achieve  a  decisive  victory.  In  order 
to  contribute  our  share  to  the  success  of  just 
principles,  we  propose  to  pass  in  review,  as 
rapidly  as  possible,  some  of  the  arguments, 
or  phrases  claiming  to  be  arguments,  which 
have  been  employed  to  vindicate  a  system  full 
of  absurdity  and  injustice. 

The  constitution,  it  is  said,  is  essentially 
Christian  ;  and  therefore  to  admit  Jews  to  office 
is  to  destroy  the  constitution.  Nor  is  the  Jew 
injured  by  being  excluded  from  political  power. 
For  no  man  has  any  right  to  his  property  ;  a  man 
has  a  right  to  be  protected  from  personal  injury. 
These  rights  the  law  allows  to  the  Jew;  and 
with  these  rights  it  would  be  atrocious  to  inter 
fere.  But  it  is  a  mere  matter  of  favour  to  ad 
mit  any  man  to  political  power;  and  no  man 
can  justly  complain  that  he  is  shut  out  from  it. 

We  cannot  but  admire  the  ingenuity  of  this 
contrivance  for  shifting  the  burden  of  the  proof 
from  those  to  whom  it  properly  belongs,  and 
who  would,  we  suspect,  find  it  rather  cumber 
some.  Surely  no  Christian  can  deny  that  every 
numan  being  has  a  right  to  be  allowed  every 
gratification  which  produces  no  harm  to  others, 
and  to  be  spared  every  mortification  which 
produces  no  good  to  others.  Is  it  not  a  source 
of  mortification  to  a  class  of  men  that  they  are 
excluded  from  political  power  1  If  it  be,  they 
have,  on  Christian  principles,  a  right  to  be 
freed  from  that  mortification,  unless  it  can  be 
shown  that  their  exclusion  is  necessary  for  the 
averting  of  some  greater  evil.  The  presump 
tion  is  evidently  in  favour  of  toleration.  It  is 
for  the  persecutor  to  make  out  his  case. 

The  strange  argument  which  we  are  con 
sidering  would  prove  too  much  even  for  those 
who  advance  it.  If  no  man  has  a  right  to  po 
litical  power,  then  neither  Jew  nor  Gentile  has 
such  a  right.  The  whole  foundation  of  go 
vernment  is  taken  away.  But  if  government 
be  taken  away,  the  property  and  the  persons 
of  men  are  insecure;  and  it  is  acknowledged 
that  men  have  a  right  to  their  property  and  to 
personal  security.  If  it  be  right  that  the  pro 
perty  of  men  should  be  protected,  and  if  this 
can  only  be  done  by  means  of  government, 
then  it  must  be  right  that  government  should 
exist.  Now  there  cannot  be  government  unless 
some  person  or  persons  possess  political  power. 
Therefore  it  is  right  that  some  person  or  per 
sons  should  possess  political  power.  That  is 


Statement  af  the  Civil  Disabilities  and  Privations  af- 
Jeirts  in  Rutland.    8vo.     London  :  1829. 
VOL.  V.— 84 


to  say,  some  person  or  persons  must  have  a 
right  to  political  power. 

It  is  because  men  are  not  in  the  habit  of 
considering  what  the  end  of  government  is, 
that  Catholic  disabilities  and  Jewish  disabili 
ties  have  been  suffered  to  exist  so  long.  We 
hear  of  essentially  Protestant  governments 
and  essentially  Christian  governments,  words 
which  mean  just  as  much  as  essentially  Pro 
testant  cookery,  or  essentially  Christian  horse 
manship.  Government  exists  for  the  purpose 
of  keeping  the  peace,  for  the  purpose  of  com 
pelling  us  to  settle  our  disputes  by  arbitration 
instead  of  settling  them  by  blows,  for  the  pur 
pose  of  compelling  us  to  supply  our  wants  by- 
industry  instead  of  supplying  them  by  rapine. 
This  is  the  only  operation  for  which  the  ma 
chinery  of  government  is  peculiarly  adapted, 
the  only  operation  which  wise  governments 
ever  propose  to  themselves  as  their  chief  ob 
ject.  If  there  is  any  class  of  people  who  are 
not  interested,  or  who  do  not  think  themselves 
interested,  in  the  security  of  property  and  the 
maintenance  of  order,  that  class  ought  to  have 
no  share  of  the  powers  which  exist  for  the 
purpose  of  securing  property  and  maintaining 
order.  But  why  a  man  should  be  less  fit  to 
exercise  those  powers  because  he  wears  a 
beard,  because  he  does  not  eat  ham,  because 
he  goes  to  the  synagogue  on  Saturdays  instead 
of  going  to  the  church  on  Sundays,  we  cannot 
conceive. 

The  points  of  difference  between  Christianity 
and  Judaism  have  very  much  to  do  with  a 
man's  fitness  to  be  a  bishop  or  a  rabbi.  But 
they  have  no  more  to  do  with  his  fitness  to  be 
a  magistrate,  a  legislator,  or  a  minister  of 
finance,  than  with  his  fitness  to  be  a  cobbler. 
Nobody  has  ever  thought  of  compelling  cob 
blers  to  make  any  declaration  on  the  true  faith 
of  a  Christian.  Any  man  would  rather  have 
his  shoes  mended  by  a  heretical  cobbler  than 
by  a  person  who  had  subscribed  all  the  thirty- 
nine  articles,  but  had  never  handled  an  awl. 
Men  act  thus,  not  because  they  are  indifferent 
to  religion,  but  because  they  do  not  see  what 
religion  has  to  do  with  the  mending  of  their 
shoes.  Yet  religion  has  as  much  to  do  with  the 
mending  of  shoes  as  with  the  budget  and  the 
army  estimates.  We  have  surely  had  several 
signal  proofs  within  the  last  twenty  years  that 
a  very  good  Christian  may  be  a  very  bad 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer. 

But  it  would  be  monstrous,  say  the  persecu 
tors,  that  Jews  should  legislate  for  a  Christian 
community.  This  Is  a  palpable  misrepresen- 
tation.  What  is  proposed  is,  not  that  the  Jews 
should  legislate  fora  Christian  community, but 
that  a  legislature  composed  of  Christians  and 
Jews  should  legislate  for  a  community  com 
posed  of  Christians  and  Jews.  On  nine  hundred 
and  ninety-nine  questions  out  of  a  thousand, 
on  all  questions  of  police,  of  finance,  of  civil 
and  criminal  law,  of  foreign  policy,  the  Jew 
3*2 


666 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


as  a  Jew,  has  no  interest  hostile  to  that  of  the 
Christian,  or  even  to  that  of  the  Churchman. 
On  question?;  relating  to  the  ecclesiastical 
establishment,  the  Jew  and  the  Churchman 
may  differ.  But  they  cannot  differ  more  widely 
than  the  Catholic  and  the  Churchman,  or  the 
Independent  and  the  Churchman.  The  princi 
ple  that  Churchmen  ought  to  monopolize  the 
whole  power  of  the  state  would  at  least  have 
an  intelligible  meaning.  The  principle  that 
Christians  ought  to  monopolize  it  has  no  mean 
ing  at  all.  For  no  question  connected  with 
the  ecclesiastical  institutions  of  the  country 
can  possibly  come  before  Parliament,  with  re 
spect  to  which  there  will  not  be  as  wide  a  dif 
ference  between  Christians  as  there  can  be 
between  any  Christian  and  any  Jew. 

In  fact,  the  Jews  are  not  now  excluded  from 
any  political  power.  They  possess  it;  and  as 
long  as  they  are  allowed  to  accumulate  large 
fortunes,  they  mu^t  possess  it.  The  distinction 
which  is  sometimes  made  between  civil  privi 
leges  and  political  powers  is  a  distinction  with 
out  a  difference.  Privileges  are  power.  Civil 
and  political  are  synonymous  words,  the  one 
derived  from  the  Latin,  the  other  from  the 
Greek.  Nor  is  this  mere  verbal  quibbling. 
If  we  look  for  a  moment  at  the  facts  of  the 
case,  we  shall  see  that  the  things  are  insepara 
ble,  or  rather  identical. 

That  a  Jew  should  be  a  judge  in  a  Christian 
country  would  be  most  shocking.  But  he  may 
be  a  juryman.  He  may  try  issues  of  fact ; 
and  no  harm  is  done.  But  if  he  should  be 
suffered  to  try  issues  of  law,  there  is  an  end 
of  the  constitution.  He  may  sit  in  a  box 
plainly  dressed,  and  return  verdicts.  But  that 
he  should  sit  on  the  bench  in  a  black  gown  and 
white  wig,  and  grant  new  trials,  would  be  an 
abomination  not  to  be  thought  of  among  bap 
tized  people.  The  distinction  is  certainly  most 
philosophical. 

What  power  in  civilized  society  is  so  great 
as  that  of  the  creditor  over  the  debtor?  If  we 
take  this  away  from  the  Jew,  we  take  away 
from  him  the  security  of  his  property.  If  we 
leave  it  to  him,  we  leave  to  him  a  power  more 
despotic  by  far  than  that  of  the  king  and  all 
his  cabinet. 

It  would  be  impious  to  let  a  Jew  sit  in  Par 
liament.  But  a  Jew  may  make  money;  and 
money  may  make  members  of  Parliament. 
Gallon  and  Old  Sarum  maybe  the  property  of 
a  Hebrew.  An  elector  of  Penryn  will  take 
ten  pounds  from  Shylock  rather  than  nine 
pounds  nineteen  shillings  and  eleven  pence 
three  farthings  from  Antonio.  To  this  no  ob 
jection  is  made.  That  a  Jew  should  possess 
the  substance  of  legislative  power,  that  he 
should  command  eight  votes  on  every  division 
as  if  he  were  the  great  Duke  of  Newcastle 
himself,  is  exactly  as  it  should  be.  But  that 
he  should  pass  the  bar  and  sit  down  on  those 
mysterious  cushions  of  green  leather,  that  he 
should  cry  «  hear"  and  "  order,"  and  talk  about 
being  on  his  legs,  and  being,  for  one,  free  to 
gay  this  and  to  say  that,  would  be  a  profana- 
t'on  sufficient  to  bring  ruin  on  the  country. 

That  a  Jew  should  be  privy-councillor  to  a 
Christian  king  would  be  an  eternal  disgrace  to 
the  nation.  But  the  Jew  may  govern  the 


money-market,  and  the  money-market  maj 
govern  the  world.  The  minister  may  be  in 
douK  as  to  his  scheme  of  finance  till  he  has 
been,  closeted  with  the  Jew.  A  congress  of 
sovereigns  may  be  forced  to  summon  the  Jew 
to  their  assistance.  The  scrawl  of  the  Jew  on 
the  back  of  a  piece  of  paper  may  be  worth 
more  than  the  royal  word  of  three  kings,  or 
the  national  faith  of  three  new  American  re 
publics.  But  that  he  should  put  Right  Honour 
able  before  his  name  would  be  the  most  fright 
ful  of  national  calamities. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  some  of  our  politi 
cians  reasoned  about  the  Irish  Catholics.  The 
Catholics  ought  to  have  no  political  power. 
The  sun  of  England  is  set  for  ever  if  the 
Catholics  exercise  political  power.  Give  the 
Catholics  every  thing  else;  but  keep  political 
power  from  them.  These  wise  men  did  not 
see  that,  when  every  thing  else  had  been  given, 
political  power  had  been  given.  They  con 
tinued  to  repeat  their  cuckoo  song,  when  it 
was  no  longer  a  question  whether  Catholics 
should  have  political  power  or  not,  Avhen  a 
Catholic  Association  bearded  the  Parliament, 
when  a  Catholic  agitator  exercised  infinitely 
more  authority  than  the  lord-lieutenant. 

If  it  is  our  duty  as  Christians  to  exclude  the 
Jews  from  political  power,  it  must  be  our  duty 
to  treat  them  as  our  ancestors  treated  them,  to 
murder  them,  and  banish  them,  and  rob  them. 
For  in  that  way,  and  in  that  way  alone,  can  we 
really  deprive  them  of  political  power.  If  we 
do  not  adopt  this  course,  we  may  take  away  the 
shadow,  but  we  must  leave  them  the  sub 
stance.  We  may  do  enough  to  pain  and  irri 
tate  them ;  but  we  shall  not  dc  enough  to 
secure  ourselves  from  danger,  if  danger  really 
exists.  Where  wealth  is,  there  power  must 
inevitably  be. 

The  English  Jews,  we  are  told,  are  not  Eng 
lishmen.  They  are  a  separate  people,  living 
locally  in  this  island,  but  living  morally  and 
politically  in  communion  with  their  brethren 
who  are  scattered  over  all  the  world.  An 
English  Jew  looks  on  a  Dutch  or  a  Portuguese 
Jew  as  his  countryman,  and  on  an  English 
Christian  as  a  stranger.  This  want  of  patrio 
tic  feelin-g,  it  is  said,  renders  a  Jew  unfit  to 
exercise  political  functions. 

The  argument  has  in  it  something  plausible : 
but  a  close  examination  shows  it  to  be  quite 
unsound.  Even  if  the  alleged  facts  are  admit 
ted,  still  the  Je\vs  are  not  the  only  people  who 
have  preferred  their  sect  to  their  country.  The 
feeling  of  patriotism,  when  society  is  in  a 
healthful  state,  springs  up,  by  a  natural  and 
inevitable  association,  in  the  minds  of  citizens 
who  know  that  they  owe  all  their  comforts  arid 
pleasures  to  the  bond  which  unites  them  in 
one  community.  But,  under  a  partial  and  op 
pressive  government,  these  associations  cannot 
acquire  that  strength  which  they  have  in  a 
better  state  of  things.  Men  are  compelled  to 
seek  from  their  party  that  protection  which 
they  ought  to  receive  from  their  country,  and 
they,  by  a  natural  consequence,  transfer  to  their 
party  that  affection  which  they  would  other 
wise  have  felt  for  their  country.  The  Hugue 
nots  of  France  called  in  the  help  of  England 
against  their  Catholic  kings.  The  Catholics 


CIVIL  DISABILITIES  OF  THE  JEWS. 


6GV 


of  France  called  in  the  help  of  Spain  against  a  j  their  countrymen.     It  will  not  be  denied  that 
Huguenot  king.     Would  it  be  fair  to  infer,  that  j  they  are  far  better  affected  to  the  state  than  the 


at  present  the  French  Protestants  would  wish 
to  see  their  religion  made  dominant  by  the  help 
of  a  Prussian  or  English  army?  Surely  not. 
And  why  is  it  that  they  are  not  willing,  as  they 
formerly  were  willing,  to  sacrifice  the  interests 
of  their  country  to  the  interests  of  their  reli 
gious  persuasion  1  The  reason  is  obvious :  they 
were  persecuted  then,  and  are  not  persecuted 
now.  The  English  Puritans,  under  Charles 
the  First,  prevailed  on  the  Scotch  to  invade 
England.  Do  the  Protestant  Dissenters  of  our 
time  wish  to  see  the  church  put  down  by  an 
invasion  of  foreign  Calvinists  1  If  not,  to  what 
cause  are  we  to  attribute  the  change  ]  Surely 
to  this,  that  the  Protestant  Dissenters  are  far  bet 
ter  treated  now  than  in  the  seventeenth  century. 
Some  of  the  most  illustrious  public  men  that 
England  ever  produced  were  inclined  to  take 
refuge  from  the  tyranny  of  Laud  in  North 
America.  Was  this  because  Presbyterians  and 
Independents  are  incapable  of  loving  their 
country]  But  it  is  idle  to  multiply  instances. 
Nothing  is  so  offensive  to  a  man  who  knows 
any  thing  of  history  or  uf  human  nature  as  to 
hear  those  who  exercise  the  powers  of  govern 
ment  accuse  any  sect  of  foreign  attachments. 
If  there  be  any  proposition  universally  true  in 
politics  it  is  this,  that  foreign  attachments  are 
the  fruit  of  domestic  misrule.  It  has  always 
been  the  trick  of  bigots  to  make  their  subjects 
miserable  at  home,  and  then  to  complain  that 
they  look  for  relief  abroad;  to  divide  society, 
and  to  wonder  that  it  is  not  united;  to  govern 
as  if  a  section  of  the  state  were  the  whole,  and 
to  censure  the  other  sections  of  the  state  for 
their  want  of  patriotic  spirit.  If  the  Jews  have 
not  felt  towards  England  like  children,  it  is 
because  she  has  treated  them  like  a  step 
mother.  There  is  no  feeling  which  more  cer 
tainly  developes  itself  in  the  minds  of  men 
Jmng  under  tolerably  good  government  than 
the  feeling  of  patriotism.  Since  the  beginning 
of  the  world,  there  never  was  any  nation,  or 
any  large  portion  of  any  nation,  not  cruelly 
oppressed,  which  was  wholly  destitute  of  that 
feeling.  To  make  it  therefore  ground  of  ac 
cusation  against  a  class  of  men,  that  they  are 
not  patriotic,  is  the  most  vulgar  legerdemain 
of  sophistry.  It  is  the  logic  which  the  wolf 
employs  against  the  lamb.  It  is  to  accuse  the 
mouth  of  the  stream  of  poisoning  the  source. 

If  the  English  Jews  really  felt  a  deadly  hatred 
to  England,  if  the  weekly  prayer  of  their  syna 
gogues  were  that  all  the  curses  denounced  by 
Ezekiel  on  Tyre  and  Egypt  might  fall  on  Lon< 


followers  of  Coligni  or  Vane.  But  they  are 
not  so  well  treated  as  the  dissenting  sects  of 
Christians  are  now  treated  in  England;  and 
on  this  account,  and,  we  firmly  believe,  on  this 
account  alone,  they  have  a  more  exclusive 
spirit.  Till  we  have  carried  the  experiment 
farther,  we  are  not  entitled  to  conclude  that 
they  cannot  be  made  Englishmen  altogether. 
The  statesman  who  treats  them  as  aliens,  and 
then  abuses  them  for  not  entertaining  all  the 
feelings  of  natives,  is  as  unreasonable  as  the 
tyrant  who  punished  their  fathers  for  not  mak 
ing  bricks  without  straw. 

Rulers  must  not  be  suffered  thus  to  absolve 
themselves  of  their  solemn  responsibility.  It 
does  not  lie  in  their  mouths  to  say  that  a  sect 
is  not  patriotic.  It  is  their  business  to  make 
it  patriotic.  History  and  reason  clearly  indi 
cate  the  means.  The  English  Jews  are,  as  far 
as  we  can  see,  precisely  what  our  government 
'has  made  them.  They'are  precisely  what  any 
sect,  what  any  class  of  men,  treated  as  they 
have  been  treated,  would  have  been.  If  all  the 
red-haired  people  in  Europe  had,  during  cen 
turies,  been  outraged  and  oppressed,  banished 
from  this  place,  imprisoned  in  that,  deprived 
of  their  money,  deprived  of  their  teeth,  con 
victed  of  the  most  improbable  crimes  on  the 
feeblest  evidence,  dragged  at  horses'  tails, 
hanged,  tortured,  burned  alive,  if,  when  man 
ners  became  milder,  they  had  still  been  subject 
to  debasing  restrictions  and  exposed  to  vulgar 
insults,  locked  up  in  particular  streets  in  some 
countries,  pelted  and  ducked  by  the  rabble  in 
others,  excluded  everywhere  from  magistracies 
and  honours,  what  would  be  the  patriotism  of 
gentlemen  with  red  hair  1  And  if,  under  such 
circumstances,  a  proposition  were  made  for 
admitting  red-haired  men  to  office,  how  striking 
a  speech  might  an  eloquent  admirer  of  our 
old  institutions  deliver  against  so  revolutionary 
a  measure!  "These  men,"  he  might  say, 
"  scarcely  consider  themselves  as  Englishmen. 
They  think  a  red-haired  Frenchman  or  a  red- 
haired  German  more  closely  connected  with 
them  than  a  man  with  brown  hair  born  in  their 
own  parish.  If  a  foreign  sovereign  patronizes 
red  hair,  they  love  him  better  than  their  own, 
native  king.  They  are  not  Englishmen  :  they 
cannot  be  Englishmen:  nature  has  forbidden 
it:  experience  proves  it  to  be  impossible. 
Right  to  political  power  they  have  none;;  for 
no  man  has  a  right  to  political  power.  Let 
them  enjoy  personal  security;  let  their  pro 
perty  be  under  the  protection  of  the  law.  But 


don,  if,  in  their  solemn  feasts,  they  called  down    if  they  ask  for  leave  to  exercise  power  over  a 


blessings  on  those  who  should  dash  our  chil 
dren  to  pieces  on  the  stones,  still,  we  say,  their 
hatred  to  their  countrymen  would  not  be  more 
intense  than  that  which  sects  of  Christians 
have  often  borne  to  each  other.  But  in  fact 
the  feeling  of  the  Jews  is  not  such.  It  is  pre 
cisely  what,  in  the  situation  in  which  they  are 
placed,  we  should  expect  it  to  be.  They  are 
treated  far  better  than  the  French  Protestants 
were  treated  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth 
centuries,  or  than  our  Puritans  were  treated  in 
the  time  of  Laud.  They,  therefore,  have  no 


community  of  which  they  are  only  half  mem 
bers,  a  community  the  constitution  of  which  is 
essentially  dark-haired,  let  us  answer  them  in 
the  words  of  our  wise-ancestors,  Nolumus  leges 
AtiglicK  mutari" 

But,  it  is  said,  the  Scriptures  declare  that 
the  Jews  are  to  be  restored  to  their  own  coun 
try;  and  the  whole  nation  looks  forward  to 
that  restoration.  They  are,  therefore,  not  so 
deeply  interested  as  others  in  the  prosperity  ot 
England.  It  is  not  their  home,  but  merelv  the 
place  of  their  sojourn,  the  house  of  their  bon- 


rancour   against   the   government  or  against ;  dage.     This  argument,  which  first  appeared  in 


668 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  Times  newspaper,  and  which  has  attracted 
a  degree  of  attention  proportioned  not  so  much 
to  its  own  intrinsic  force  as  to  the  general 
talent  with  which  that  journal  is  conducted, 
belongs  to  a  class  of  sophisms  by  which  the 
most  hateful  persecutions  may  easily  be  jus- 
tied.  To  charge  men  with  practical  conse 
quences  which  they  themselves  deny,  is  disin 
genuous  in  controversy;  it  is  atrocious  in 
government.  The  doctrine  of  predestination, 
in  the  opinion  of  many  people,  lends  to  make 
those  who  hold  it  utterly  immoral.  And  cer 
tainly  it  would  seem  that  a  man  who  believes 
his  eternal  destiny  to  be  already  irrevocably 
fixed  is  likely  to  indulge  his  passions  without 
restraint  and  to  neglect  his  religious  duties. 
If  he  is  an  heir  of  wrath,  his  exertions  must  be 
unavailing.  If  he  is  preordained  to  life,  they 
must  be  superfluous.  But  would  it  be  wise  to 
punish  every  man  who  holds  the  higher  doc 
trines  of  Calvinism,  as  if  he  had  actually  com 
mitted  all  those  crimes  which  we  know  some 
Antinomians  to  have  committed  ?  Assuredly 
not.  The  fact  notoriously  is  that  there  are 
many  Caivinists  as  moral  in  their  conduct  as 
any  Anninian,  and  many  Arminians  as  loose 
as  any  Calvinist. 

It  is  altogether  impossible  to  reason  from 
the  opinions  which  a  man  professes  to  his  feel 
ings  and  his  actions  ;  and  in  fact  no  person  is 
ever  such  a  fool  as  to  reason  thus,  except  when 
he  wants  a  pretext  for  persecuting-  his  neigh 
bours.  A  Christian  is  commanded,  under  the 
strongest  sanctions,  to  be  just  in  all  his  deal 
ings.  Yet  to  how  many  of  the  twenty-four 
millions  of  professing  Christians  in  these  isl 
ands  would  any  man  in  his  senses  lend  a  thou 
sand  pounds  without  security?  A  man  who 
should  act,  for  one  day,  on  the  supposition  that 
ail  the  people  about  him  -were  influenced  by 
the  religion  which  they  professed,  would  find 
himself  ruined  before  night;  and  no  man  ever 
does  act  on  that  supposition  in  any  of  the  ordi 
nary  concerns  of  life,  in  borrowing,  in  lend 
ing,  in  buying,  or  in  selling.  But  when  any  of 
our  feiiow-creatures  are  to  be  oppressed,  the 
case  is  different.  Then  we  represent  those 
motives  which  we  know  to  be  so  feeble  for 
good  as  omnipotent  for  evil.  Then  we  lay  to 
tne  charge  of  our  victims  aH  the  vices  and 
follies  to  which  their  doctrines,  however  re 
motely,  seem  to  tend.  We  forget  that  the  same 
weakness,  the  same  laxity,  the  same  disposi 
tion  to  prefer  the  present  to  the  future,  which 
make  men  worse  than  a  good  religion,  make 
them  better  than  a  bad  one. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  our  ancestors  rea 
soned,  and  that  some  people  in  our  own  time 
still  reason,  about  the  Catholics.  A  Papist 
believes  himself  bound  to  obey  the  pope.  The 
pope  has  issued  a  bull  deposing  Queen  Eli 
zabeth.  Therefore  every  Papist  will  treat 
her  grace  as  an  usurper.  Therefore  every 
Papist  is  a  traitor.  Therefore  every  Papist 
ought  to  be  hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered.  To 
this  logic  we  owe  some  of  the  most  hateful 
laws  that  ever  disgraced  our  history.  Surely 
the  answer  lies  on  the  surface.  The  church 
of  Rome  may  have  commanded  these  men  to 
treat  the  queen  as  an  usurper.  But  she  has 
ix,mmanded  them  to  io  many  other  things 


]  which  they  have  never  done.  She  enjoins  he? 
I  priests  to  observe  strict  purity.  You  are 
always  taunting  them  with  their  licentious 
ness.  She  commands  al'  her  followers  to  fast 
often,  to  be  charitable  to  the  poor,  to  take  no 
interest  for  money,  to  fight  no  duels,  to  see  no 
plays.  Do  they  obey  these  injunctions  1  If  it 
be  the  fact  that  very  few  of  them  strictly  ob 
serve  her  precepts,  when  her  precepts  are 
opposed  to  their  passions  and  interests,  may 
not  loyalty,  may  uot  humanity,  may  not  the 
love  of  ease,  may  not  the  fear  of  death,  be 
sufficient  to  prevent  them  from  executing 
those  wicked  orders  which  she  has  issued 
against  the  sovereign  of  England?  When 
we  know  that  many  of  these  people  do  not 
care  enough  for  their  religion  tc  go  without 
beef  on  a  Friday  for  it,  why  should  we  think 
that  they  will  run  the  risk  of  being  racked  and 
hanged  "for  it? 

People  are  now  reasoning  about  the  Jews  as 
our  fathers  reasoned  about  the  Papists.  The 
law  which  is  inscribed  on  the  walls  of  the  sy 
nagogues  prohibits  covetousness.  But  if  we 
were  to  say  that  a  Jew  mortgagee  would  not 
foreclose,  because  God  had  commanded  him 
not  to  covet  his  neighbour's  house,  every  body 
would  think  us  out  of  our  wits.  Yet  it  passes 
for  an  argument  to  say  that  a  Jew  will  take  no 
interest  in  the  prosperity  of  the  country  in 
which  he  lives,  that  he  will  not  care  how  bad 
its  laws  and  police  may  be,  how  heavily  it 
may  be  taxed,  how  often  it  may  be  conquered 
and  given  up  to  spoil,  because  God  has  pro 
mised  that,  by  some  unknown  means,  and  at 
some  undetermined  time,  perhaps  ten  thousand 
years  hence,  the  Jews  shall  migrate  to  Pales 
tine.  Is  not  this  the  most  profound  ignorance 
of  human  nature  ?  Do  we  not  know  that  what 
is  remote  and  indefinite  affects  men  far  less 
than  what  is  near  and  certain?  The  argu 
ment  too  applies  to  Christians  as  strongly  as 
to  Jews.  The  Christian  believes,  as  well  as 
the  Jew,  that  at  some  future  period  the  pres 
ent  order  of  things  will  come  to  an  end.  Nay, 
many  Christians  believe  that  the  Messiah  will 
shortly  establish  a  kingdom  on  the  sarth,  and 
reign  visibly  over  all  its  inhabitants.  Whether 
this  doctrine  be  orthodox  or  not  we  shall  not 
here  inquire.  The  number  of  people  who  hold 
it  is  very  much  greater  than  the  number  of 
Jews  residing  in  England.  Many  of  those  who 
hold  it  are  distinguished  by  rank,  wealth,  and 
ability.  It  is  preached  from  pulpits,  both  of 
the  Scottish  and  of  the  English  church.  No 
blemen  and  members  of  parliament  have  writ 
ten  in  defence  of  it.  Now  wherein  does  this 
!  doctrine  differ,  as  far  as  its  political  tendency 
I  is  concerned,  from  the  doctrine  of  the  Jews  T 
|  If  a  Jew  is  unfit  to  legislate  for  us  because  he 
|  believes  that  he  or  his  remote  descendants  will 
be  removed  to  Palestine,  can  we  safely  open 
the  House  of  Commons  to  a  fifth  monarchy 
man  who  expects  that,  before  this  generation 
shall  pass  away,  all  the  kingdoms  of  the  earth 
will  be  swallowed  up  in  one  divine  empire? 

Does  a  Jew  engage  less  eagerly  than  a  Chris- 

;  tian  in  any  competition  which  the  law  leaves 

•  open  to  him  ?     Is  he  less  active  and  regular  in 

his  business  than  his  neighbours?     Does  he 

i  furnish  his  house  meanly,  because  he  is  a  pil- 


CIVIL  DISABILITIES  OF  THE  JEWS. 


669 


grim  and  sojourner  in  the  land]  Does  the  ex 
pectation  of  being  restored  to  the  country  of 
his  fathers  make  him  insensible  to  the  fluctua 
tions  of  the  stock-exchange]  Docs  he,  in  ar 
ranging  his  private  affairs,  ever  take  into  the 
account  the  chance  of  his  migrating  to  Pales 
tine  ]  If  not,  why  are  we  to  suppose  that  feel 
ings  which  never  influence  his  dealings  as  a 
merchant,  or  his  dispositions  as  a  testator,  will 
acquire  a  boundless  influence  over  him  as  soon 
as  he  becomes  a  magistrate  or  a  legislator] 

There  is  another  argument  which  we  would 
not  willingly  treat  with  levity,  and  which  yet  we 
scarcely  know  how  to  treat  seriously.  Scrip 
ture,  it  is  said,  is  full  of  terrible  denunciations 
against  the  Jews.  It  is  foretold  that  they 
are  to  be  wanderers.  Is  it  then  right  to  give 
them  a  home]  It  is  foretold  that  they  are  to 
be  oppressed.  Can  we  with  propriety  suffer 
them  to  be  rulers]  Tc  admit  them  to  the 
rights  of  citizens  is  manifestly  to  insult  the 
Divine  oracles. 

We  allow  that  to  falsify  a  prophecy  inspired 
by  Divine  Wisdom  would  be  a  most  atrocious 
crime.  It  is,  therefore,  a  happy  circumstance 
for  our  frail  species,  that  it  is  a  crime  which 
no  man  can  possibly  comm.'t  If  we  admit  the 
Jews  to  seats  in  Parliament,  we  shall,  by  so 
doing,  prove  that  the  prophecies  in  question, 
whatever  they  may  mean,  do  not  mean  that  the 
Jews  shall  be  excluded  from  Parliament. 

In  fact  it  is  already  clear  that  the  prophecies 
do  not  bear  the  meaning  put  upon  them  by  the 
respectable  persons  whom  we  are  now  answer 
ing.  In  France  and  in  the  United  States  the 
Jews  are  already  admitted  to  all  the  rights  of 
citizens.  A  prophecy,  therefore,  which  should 
mean  that  the  Jews  would  never,  during  the 
course  of  their  wanderings,  be  admitted  to  all 
the  rights  of  citizens  in  the  places  of  their  so 
journ,  would  be  a  false  prophecy.  This,  there 
fore,  is  not  the  meaning  of  the  prophecies  of 
Scripture. 

But  we  protest  altogether  against  the  prac 
tice  of  confounding  prophecy  with  precept,  of 
setting  up  predictions  which  are  often  obscure 
ogainst  a  morality  which  is  always  clear.  If 
actions  are  to  be  considered  as  just  and  good 
merely  because  they  have  been  predicted,  what, 
action  was  ever  more  laudable  than  that  crime 
which  our  bigots  are  now,  at  the  end  of  eighteen 
centuries,  urging  us  to  avenge  on  the  Jews, 


that  crime  which  made  the  earth  shake  ana 
blotted  out  the  sun  from  heaven  ]  The  same 
reasoning  which  is  now  employed  to  vindicate 
the  disa.bilit.ies  imposed  on  our  Hebrew  coun 
trymen  will  equally  vindicate  the  kiss  of  Judas 
and  the  judgment  of  Pilate.  "  The  Son  of  man 
goeth,  as  it  is  written  of  him ;  but  woe  to  thai 
man  by  whom  the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed/ 
And  woe  to  those  who,  in  any  age  or  in  any 
country,  disobey  his  benevolent  commands  un 
der  pretence  of  accomplishing  his  predictions. 
If  this  argument  justifies  the  laws  now  existing 
against  the  Jews,  it  justifies  equally  all  the 
cruelties  which  have  ever  been  committee' 
against  them,  the  sweeping  edicts  of  banish 
ment  and  confiscation,  the  dungeon,  the  rack, 
and  the  slow  fire.  How  can  we  excuse  our 
selves  for  leaving  property  to  people  who  are 
"to  serve  their  enemies  in  hunger,  and  in  thirsr, 
and  in  nakedness,  and  in  want  of  all  things ;" 
for  giving  protection  to  the  persons  of  those 
who  are  to  "fear  day  and  night,  and  to  have 
none  assurance  of  their  life;"  for  not  seizing 
on  the  children  of  a  race  whose  "  sons  and 
daughters  are  to  be  given  unto  another  people." 
We  have  not  so  learned  the  doctrines  of 
Him  who  commanded  us  to  love  our  neigh 
bour  as  ourselves,  and  who,  when  he  was 
called  upon  to  explain  what  He  meant  by  a 
neighbour,  se-lecied  as  an  example  a  heretic 
and  an  alien.  Last  year,  we  remember,  it  was 
represented  by  a  pious  writer  in  the  John  Bull 
newspaper,  and  by  some  other  equally  fervid 
Christians,  as  a  monstrous  indecency,  that  the 
measure  for  the  relief  of  the  Jews  should  be 
brought  forward  in  Passion  week.  One  of 
these  humourists  ironically  recommended  thai 
it  should  be  read  a  second  time  on  Good  Fri 
day.  We  should  have  had  no  objection ;  nor 
do  we  believe  that  the  day  could  be  commemo 
rated  in  a  more  worthy  manner.  We  know  ol 
no  day  fitter  for  terminating  long  hostilities 
and  repairing  cruel  wrongs,  than  the  day  on 
which  the  religion  of  mercy  was  founded.  We 
know  of  no  day  fitter  for  blotting  out  from  the 
statute  book  the  last  traces  of  intolerance  than 
the  day  on  which  the  spirit  of  intolerance  pro 
duced  the  foulest  of  all  judicial  murders,  the 
day  on  which  the  list  of  the  victims  of  intcler- 
ance,  that  noble  list  wherein  Socrates  and  MOP? 
are  enrolled,  was  glorified  by  a  yet  greater  ami 
holier  name. 


670 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  MARCH,  1829.] 


OF  those  philosophers  who  call  themselves 
Utilitarians,  and  whom  others  generally  call 
Benthamites,  Mr.  Mill  is,  with  the  exception  of 
the  illustrious  founder  of  the  sect,  by  far  the 
most  distinguished.  The  little  work  now  before 
us  contains  a  summary  of  the  opinions  held  by 
this  gentleman  and  his  brethren,  on  several 
subjects  most  important  to  society.  All  the 
seven  Essays  of  which  it  consists,  abound  in 
curious  matter.  But  at  present  we  intend  to 
confine  our  remarks  to  the  Treatise  on  Govern 
ment,  which  stands  first  in  the  volume.  On 
some  future  occasion  we  may  perhaps  attempt 
to  do  justice  to  the  rest. 

It  must  be  owned,  that,  to  do  justice  to  any 
composition  of  Mr.  Mill  is  not,  in  the  opinion 
of  his  admirers,  a  very  easy  task.  They  do 
not,  indeed,  place  nim  in  the  same  rank  with 
Mr.  Bentham  ;  but  the  terms  in  which  they 
extol  thf  disciple,  though  feeble  when  com 
pared  with  the  hyperboles  of  admiration  em 
ployed  by  them  in  speaking  of  the  master,  are 
as  strong  as  any  sober  rnan  would  allow  him 
self  to  use  concerning  Locke  or  Bacon.  The 
Essay  before  us  is  perhaps  the  most  remarka 
ble  of  the  works  to  which  Mr.  Mill  owes  his 
fame.  By  the  members  of  his  sect,  it  is  con 
sidered  as  perfect  and  unanswerable.  Every 
part  of  it  is  an  article  of  their  faith ;  and  the 
damnatory  clauses, in  which  theircreed  abounds 
far  beyond  any  theological  symbol  with  which 
we  are  acquainted,  are  strong  and  full  against 
all  who  reject  any  portion  of  what  is  so  irre- 
fragably  established.  No  man,  they  maintain, 
who  has  understanding  sufficient  to  carry  him 
through  the  first  proposition  of  Euclid,  can 
read  this  master-piece  of  demonstration,  and 
honestly  declare  that  he  remains  unconvinced. 

We  have  formed  a  very  different  opinion  of 
this  work.  We  think  that  the  theory  of  Mr. 
Mill  rests  altogether  on  false  principles,  and 
that  even  on  those  false  principles  he  does  not 
reason  logically.  Nevertheless,  we  do  not 
think  it  strange  that  his  speculations  should 
have  filled  the  Utilitarians  with  admiration. 
We  have  been  for  some  time  past  inclined  to 
suspect  that  these  people,  whom  some  regard 
as  the  lights  of  the  world,  and  others  as  incar 
nate  demons,  are  in  general  ordinary  men,  with 
narrow  understandings,  and  little  information. 
The  contempt  which  they  express  for  elegant 
literature  is  evidently  the  contempt  of  igno 
rance.  We  apprehend  that  many  of  them  are 
persons  who,  having  read  little  or  nothing,  are 
delighted  to  be  rescued  from  the  sense  of  their 
cwn  inferiority,  by  some  teacher  who  assures 


*  Exsays  on  Government,  Jurisprudence,  the  Liberty  of 
the  Press,  Prisons  and  Prison  Discipline,  Colonies,  the  Law 
of  Nations  and  Education.  By  JAMES  MILL,  Esq.,  author 
of  the  History  of  British  India.  Reprinted  hy  permission 
from  the  Supplement  to  the  Encyclopaedia  Britannica. 
(Not  for  sale.)  London.  1828 


them  that  the  studies  which  they  have  neglected 
are  of  no  value,  puts  five  or  six  phrases  intc 
their  mouths,  lends  them  an  odd  number  of  the 
Westminster  Review,  and  in  a  month  trans 
forms  them  into  philosophers.  Mingled  with 
these  smatterers,  whose  attainments  just  suffice 
to  elevate  them  from  the  insignificance  of 
dunces  to  the  dignity  of  bores,  and  to  spread 
dismay  among  their  pious  aunts  and  grand 
mothers,  there  are,  we  well  know,  many  well- 
meaning  men,  who  have  really  read  and 
thought  much ;  but  whose  reading  and  medi 
tation  have  been  almost  exclusively  confined 
to  one  class  of  subjects ;  and  who,  consequently, 
though  they  possess  much  valuable  knowledge 
respecting  those  subjects,  are  by  no  means  so 
well  qualified  to  judge  of  a  great  system  as  if 
they  had  taken  a  more  enlarged  view  of  litera 
ture  and  society. 

Nothing  is  more  amusing  or  instructive  than 
to  observe  the  manner  in  which  people,  who 
think  themselves  wiser  than  all  the  rest  of  the 
world,  fall  into  snares  which  the  simple  good 
sense  of  their  neighbours  detects  and  avoids. 
It  is  one  of  the  principal  tenets  of  the  Utilita 
rians,  that  sentiment  and  eloquence  serve  only 
to  impede  the  pursuit  of  truth.  They  there 
fore  affect  a  quakerly  plainness,  or  rather  a 
cynical  negligence  and  impurity  of  style.  The 
strongest  arguments,  when  clothed  in  brilliant 
language,  seem  to  them  so  much  wordy  non 
sense.  In  the  meantime  they  surrender  their 
understandings,  with  a  facility  found  in  no 
other  party,  to  the  meanest  and  most  abject 
sophisms,  provided  those  sophisms  come  before 
them  disguised  with  the  externals  of  demonstra 
tion.  They  do  not  seem  to  know  that  logic  has 
its  illusions  as  well  as  rhetoric, — that  a  fallacy 
may  lurk  in  a  syllogism  as  well  as  in  a 
metaphor. 

Mr.  Mill  is  exactly  the  writer  to  please  people 
of  this  description.  His  arguments  are  stated 
with  the  utmost  affectation  of  precision:  his 
divisions  are  awfully  formal;  and  his  style  is 
generally  as  dry  as  that  of  Euclid's  Elements. 
Whether  this  be  a  merit,  we  must  be  permitted 
to  doubt.  Thus  much  is  certain,  that  the  ages 
in  which  the  true  principles  of  philosophy 
were  least  understood,  were  those  iu  nrhich  the 
ceremonial  of  logic  was  most  strictly  observed, 
and  that  the  time  from  which  we  date  the  rapid 
progress  of  the  experimental  sciences  was  also 
the  time  at  which  a  less  exact  and  formal  way 
of  writing  came  into  use. 

The  style  which  the  Utilitarians  admire,  suits 
only  those  subjects  on  which  it  is  possible  to 
reason  a  priori.  It  grew  up  with  the  verbal 
sophistry  which  flourished  during  the  dark 
ages.  With  that  sophistry  it  fell  before  the 
Baconian  philosophy,  in  the  day  of  the  great 
deliverance  of  th.«  human  mind.  Th-  induc 
tive  method  not  cnly  endured,  but  required, 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT. 


G71 


greater  freedom  of  diction.  It  was  impossible 
to  reason  from  phenomena  up  to  principles,  to 
mark  slight  shades  of  difference  in  quality,  or 
to  estimate  the  comparative  effect  of  Uvo  oppo 
site  considerations,  between  which  there  was 
no  common  measure,  by  means  of  the  naked 
and  meager  jargon  of  the  schoolmen.  Of  those 
schoolmen,  Mr.  Mill  has  inherted  both  the  spirit 
and  the  style.  He  is  an  Aristotelian  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  born  out  of  due  season.  We 
have  here  an  elaborate  treatise  on  government, 
from  which,  but  for  two  or  three  passing  allu 
sions,  it  would  not  appear  that  the  author  was 
aware  that  any  governments  actually  existed 
among  men.  Certain  propensities  of  human 
nature  are  assumed;  and  from  these  premises 
the  whole  science  of  politics  is  synthetically 
deduced  !  We  can  scarcely  persuade  ourselves 
that  we  are  not  reading  a  book  written  before 
the  time  of  Bacon  and  Galileo, — a  book  written 
in  those  days  in  which  physicians  reasoned 
from  the  nature  of  heat  to  the  treatment  of 
fever,  and  astronomers  proved  syllogistically 
that  the  planets  could  have  no  independent 
motion, — because  the  heavens  were  incorrupti 
ble,  and  nature  abhorred  a  vacuum! 

The  reason,  too,  which  Mr.  Mill  has  assigned 
for  taking  this  course  strikes  us  as  most  extra 
ordinary. 

"Experience,"  says  he,  "if  we  look  only  at 
the  outside  of  the  facts,  appears  to  be  divided  on 
this  subject.  Absolute  monarchy,  under  Neros 
and  Caligulas,  under  such  men  as  the  emperors 
of  Morocco  and  sultans  of  Turkey,  is  the 
scourge  of  human  nature.  On  the  other  side, 
the  people  of  Denmark,  tired  out  with  the  op 
pression  of  an  aristocracy,  resolved  that  their 
king  should  be  absolute ;  and,  under  their  abso 
lute  monarch,  are  as  well  governed  as  any 
people  in  Europe." 

This  Mr.  Mill  actually  gives  as  a  reason  for 
pursuing  the  a  priori  method.  But,  in  our 
judgment,  the  very  circumstances  which  he 
mentions,  irresistibly  prove  that  the  a  priori 
method  is  altogether  unfit  for  investigations  of 
this  kind,  and  that  the  only  way  to  arrive  at  the 
truth  is  hy  induction.  Experience  can  never  be 
divided,  or  even  appear  to  be  divided,  except 
with  reference  to  some  hypothesis.  When  we 
say  that  one  fact  is  inconsistent  with  another 
fact,  we  mean  only  that  it  is  inconsistent  with 
the  theory  which  we  have  founded  on  that  other 
fact.  But,  if  the  fact  be  certain,  the  unavoid 
able  conclusion  is,  that  our  theory  is  false :  and 
in  order  to  correct  it,  we  must  reason  back  from 
an  enlarged  collection  of  facts  to  principles. 

Now,  here  we  have  two  governments  which, 
by  Mr.  Mill's  own  account,  come  under  the 
same  head  in  his  theoretical  classification.  It 
is  evident,  therefore,  that,  by  reasoning  on  that 
theoretical  classification,  we  shall  be  brought 
to  the  conclusion  that  these  two  forms  of  go 
vernment  must  produce  the  same  effects.  But 
Mr.  Mill  himself  tells  us,  that  they  do  not  pro 
duce  the  same  effects.  Hence  he  infers,  that 
the  only  way  to  get  at  truth  is  to  place  implicit 
confidence  in  that  chain  of  proof  a  priori,  from 
which  it  appears  that  they  must  produce  the 
same  effects !  To  believe  at  once  in  a  theory, 
and  in  a  fact  which  contradicts  it,  is  an  exer 
cise  of  faith  sufficiently  hard:  But,  to  believe 


in  a  theory  because  a  fact  contradicts  it,  is  what 
neither  philosopher  nor  pope  ever  before  re 
quired.  This,  however,  is  what  Mr.  Mill  de 
mands  of  us.  He  seems  to  think  that  if  all 
despots,  without  exception,  governed  ill,  it 
would  be  unnecessary  to  prove,  by  a  synthetical 
argument,  what  would  then  be  sufficiently  clear 
from  experience.  But  as  some  despots  will  be 
so  perverse  as  to  govern  M'ell.he  finds  himself 
compelled  to  prove  the  impossibility  of  their 
governing  well,  by  that  synthetical  argument, 
which  would  have  been  superfluous  had  not 
the  facts  contradicted  it.  He  reasons  a  priori, 
because  the  phenomena  are  not  what,  by  rea 
soning  a  priori,  he  will  prove  them  to  be.  la 
other  words,  he  reasons  a  priori,  because,  by  so 
reasoning,  he  is  certain  to  arrive  at  a  false 
conclusion! 

In  the  course  of  the  examination  to  which 
we  propose  to  subject  the  speculations  of  Mr. 
Mill,  we  shall  have  to  notice  many  other  curious 
instances  of  that  turn  of  mind  which  the  pas 
sage  above  quoted  indicates. 

The  first  chapter  of  his  Essay  relates  to  the 
ends  of  government.  The  conception  on  this 
subject,  he  tells  us,  which  exists  in  the  minds 
of  most  men,  is  vague  arid  undistinguishing. 
He  first  assumes,  justly  enough,  that  the  end 
of  government  is  "to  increase  to  the  utmost 
the  pleasures,  and  diminish  to  the  utmost  the 
pains,  which  men  derive  from  each  other."  He 
then  proceeds  to  show,  with  great  form,  that 
"  the  greatest  possible  happiness  of  society  is 
attained  by  insuring  to  every  man  the  greatest 
possible  quantity  of  the  produce  of  his  labour." 
To  effect  this  is,  in  his  opinion,  the  end  of  go 
vernment.  It  is  remarkable  that  Mr.  Mill,  with 
all  his  affected  display  of  precision,  has  here 
given  a  description  of  the  ends  of  government 
far  less  precise  than  that  which  is  in  the 
mouths  of  the  vulgar.  The  first  man  with 
whom  Mr.  Mill  may  travel  in  a  stage-coach 
will  tell  him  that  government  exists  lor  the 
protection  of  the  persons  and  property  of  men. 
But  Mr.  Mill  seems  to  think  that  the  preserva 
tion  of  property  is  the  first  and  only  object.  It 
is  true,  doubtless,  that  many  of  the  injuries 
which  are  offered  to  the  persons  of  men  pro 
ceed  from  a  desire  to  possess  their  property. 
But  the  practice  of  vindictive  assassination, 
as  it  has  existed  in  some  parts  of  Europe — the 
practice  of  fighting  wanton  and  sanguinary 
duels,  like  those  of  the  sixteenth  and  seven 
teenth  centuries,  in  which  bands  of  seconds 
risked  their  lives  as  well  as  the  principals; — 
these  practices,  and  many  others  which  might 
be  named,  are  evidently  injurious  to  society; 
and  we  do  not  see  how  a  government  which 
tolerated  them  could  be  said  "  to  diminish  to 
the  utmost  the  pains  which  men  derive  from 
each  other."  Therefore,  according  to  Mr. 
Mill's  very  correct  assumption,  such  a  govern 
ment  would  not  perfectly  accomplish  the  end 
of  its  institution.  Yet  such  a  government 
might,  as  far  as  we  can  perceive,  "insure  to 
every  man  the  greatest  possible  quantity  of  the 
produce  of  his  labour."  Therefore,  such  a 
government  might,  according  to  Mr.  Mill's 
subsequent  doctrine,  perfectly  accomplish  the 
end  of  its  institution.  The  matter  is  not  of 
much  consequence,  except  as  an  instance  cf 


672 


MACAULATS  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


that  slovenliness  of  thinking  which  is  often 
concealed  beneath  a  peculiar  ostentation  of 
logical  neatness. 

Having  determined  the  ends,  Mr.  Mill  pro 
ceeds  to  consider  the  means.  For  the  pre 
servation  of  property,  some  portion  of  the 
community  must  be  intrusted  with  power. 
This  is  government;  and  the  question  is,  how 
are  those  to  whom  the  necessary  power  is  in 
trusted  to  be  prevented  from  abusing  it? 

Mr.  Mill  first  passes  in  review  the  simple 
forms  of  government.  He  allows  that  it  would 
be  inconvenient,  if  not  physically  impossible, 
that  the  whole  community  should  meet  in  a 
mass  ;  it  follows,  therefore,  that  the  powers  of 
government  cannot  be  directly  exercised  by 
the  people.  But  he  sees  no  objection  to  pure 
and  direct  democracy,  except  the  difficulty 
which  we  have  mentioned. 

"The  community,"  says  he,  "cannot  have 
an  interest  opposite  to  its  interest.  To  affirm 
this  would  be  a  contradiction  in  terms.  The 
community  within  itself,  and  with  respect  to 
itself,  can  have  no  sinister  interest.  One  com 
munity  may  intend  the  evil  of  another;  never 
its  own.  This  is  an  indubitable  proposition, 
and  one  of  great  importance." 

Mr.  Mill  then  proceeds  to  demonstrate  that 
a  purely  aristocratical  form  of  government  is 
necessarily  bad. 

"The  reason  for  which  government  exists 
is,  that  one  man,  if  stronger  than  another,  will 
take  from  him  whatever  that  other  possesses 
and  he  desires.  But  if  one  man  will  do  this, 
so  will  several.  And  if  powers  are  put  into 
the  hands  of  a  comparatively  small  number, 
called  an  aristocracy, — powers  which  make 
them  stronger  than  the  rest  of  the  community, 
they  will  take  from  the  rest  of  the  community 
as  much  as  they  please  of  the  objects  of  desire. 
They  will  thus  defeat  Ihe  very  end  for  which 
government  was  instituted.  The  unfitness, 
therefore,  of  an  aristocracy  to  be  intrusted 
with  the  powers  of  government,  rests  on  de 
monstration." 

In  exactly  the  same  manner  Mr.  Mill  proves 
absolute  monarch'/  to  be  a  bad  form  of  govern 
ment. 

"If  government  is  founded  upon  this  as  a  law 
of  human  nature,  that  a  man,  if  able,  will  take 
from  others  any  thing  which  they  have  and  he 
desires,  it  is  sufficiently  evident  that  when  a 
man  is  called  a  king  he  does  not  change  his 
nature;  so  that  when  he  has  got  power  to  en 
able  him  to  take  from  every  man  what  he 
pleases,  he  will  take  whatever  he  pleases. 
To  suppose  that  he  will  not,  is  to  affirm  that 
government  is  unnecessary,  and  that  human 
beings  will  abstain  from  injuring  one  another 
of  their  own  accord. 

"It  is  very  evident  that  this  reasoning  ex 
tends  to  every  modification  of  the  smaller 
number.  Whenever  the  powers  of  govern 
ment  are  placed  in  any  hands  other  than  those 
of  the  community,  whether  those  of  one  man, 
of  a  few,  or  of  several,  those  principles  of  hu 
man  nature  which  imply  that  government  is  at 
all  necessary,  imply  that  those  persons  will 
make  use  of  them  to  defeat  the  very  end  for 
which  government  exists." 

Bat  is  it  not  possible  that  a  king  or  an  aris 


tocracy  may  soon  oe  saturated  with  the  objects 
of  their  desires,  and  may  then  protect  the  com- 
munity  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  rest!  Mr. 
Mill  answers  in  the  negative.  He  proves,  with 
great  pomp,  that  every  man  desires  to  have 
the  actions  of  every  other  correspondent  to 
bis  will.  Others  can  be  induced  to  conform 
to  our  will  only  by  motives  derived  from  plea 
sure  or  from  pain.  The  infliction  of  pain  is 
of  course  direct  injury;  and  even  if  it  take  the 
milder  course,  in  order  to  produce  obedience 
by  motives  derived  from  pleasure,  the  govern 
ment  must  confer  favours.  But,  as  there  is  no 
limit  to  its  desire  of  obedience,  there  will  be  no 
limit  to  its  disposition  to  confer  favours  ;  and, 
as  it  can  confer  favours  only  by  plundering 
the  people,  there  will  be  no  limit  to  its  disposi 
tion  to  plunder  the  people.  "It  is  therefore 
not  true,  that  there  is  in  the  mind  of  a  king,  or 
in  the  minds  of  an  aristocracy,  any  point  of 
saturation  with  the  objects  of  desire." 

Mr.  Mill  then  proceeds  to  show  that,  as  mo 
narchical  and  oligarchical  governments  can 
influence  men  by  motives  drawn  from  pain  as 
well  as  by  motives  drawn  from  pleasure,  they 
will  carry  their  cruelty,  as  well  as  their  rapa 
city,  to  a  frightful  extent.  As  he  seems  greatly 
to  admire  his  own  reasonings  on  this  subject, 
we  think  it  but  fair  to  let  him  speak  for  him 
self. 

"The  chain  of  inference  in  this  case  is  close 
and  strong  to  a  most  unusual  degree.  A  man 
desires  that  the  actions  of  other  men  shall  be 
instantly  and  accurately  correspondent  to  his 
will.  He  desires  that  the  actions  of  the  great 
est  possible  number  shall  be  so.  Terror  is  the 
grand  instrument.  Terror  can  work  only 
through  assurance  that  evil  will  follow  any 
failure  of  conformity  between  the  will  and  the 
actions  willed.  Every  failure  must  therefore 
be  punished.  As  there  are  no  bounds  to  the 
mind's  desire  of  its  pleasure,  there  are,  of 
course,  no  bounds  to  its  desire  of  perfection 
in  the  instruments  of  that  pleasure.  There 
are,  therefore,  no  bounds  to  its  desire  of  exact 
ness  in  the  conformity  between  its  will  and  the 
actions  willed;  and,  by  consequence,  to  the 
strength  of  that  terror  which  is  its  procuring 
cause.  Even  the  most  minute  failure  must  be 
visited  with  the  heaviest  infliction ;  and  as 
failure  in  extreme  exactness  must  frequently 
happen,  the  occasions  of  cruelty  must  be  in 
cessant. 

"  We  have  thus  arrived  at  several  conclu 
sions  of  the  highest  possible  importance.  We 
have  seen  that  the  principle  of  human  nature 
upon  which  the  necessity  of  government  is 
founded,  the  propensity  of  ono  man  to  possess 
himself  of  the  objects  of  desire  at  the  cost  of 
another,  leads  on,  by  infallible  sequence,  where 
power  over  a  community  is  attained,  and  no 
thing  checks,  not  only  to  that  degree  of  plun 
der  which  leaves  the  members,  (excepting  al 
ways  the  recipients  and  instruments  of  the 
plunder,)  the  bare  means  of  subsistence,  but 
to  that  degree  of  cruelty  which  is  necessary  to 
keep  in  existence  the  most  intense  terrors." 

Now,  no  man  who  has  the  least  knowledge 
of  the  real  state  of  the  world,  either  in  former 
ages  or  at  the  present  moment,  can  possibly 
be  convinced,  though  he  may  perhaps  be  ho 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT. 


673 


rildered,  by  arguments  like  these.  During 
the  last  two  centuries,  some  hundreds  of  ab 
solute  princes  have  reigned  in  Europe.  Is 
it  true  that  their  cruelty  has  kept  in  'exist 
ence  the  most  intense  degree  of  terror,  that 
their  rapacity  has  left  no  more  than  the  bare 
means  of  subsistence  to  any  of  their  subjects, 
their  ministers  and  soldiers  excepted?  Is  this 
true  of  all  of  them  1  Of  one-half  of  them  1 
Of  one-tenth  part  of  them?  Of  a  single  one  1 
Is  it  true,  in  the  full  extent,  even  of  Philip  the 
Second,  of  Lewis  the  Fifteenth,  or  of  the  Em 
peror  Paul?  But  it  is  scarcely  necessary  to 
quote  history.  No  man  of  common  sense, 
however  ignorant  he  may  be  of  books,  can  be 
imposed  on  by  Mr.  Mill's  argument;  because 
no  man  of  comm  n  sense  can  live  among  his 
fellow-creatures  for  a  day  without  seeing  in 
numerable  facts  which  contradict  it.  It  is  our 
business,  however,  to  point  out  its  fallacy;  and, 
happily,  the  fallacy  is  not  very  recondite. 

We  grant  that  rulers  will  take  as  much  as 
they  can  of  the  objects  of  their  desires ;  and 
that  when  the  agency  of  other  men  is  neces 
sary  to  that  end.  they  will  attempt  by  all  means 
in  their  power  to  enforce  the  prompt  obedience 
of  such  men.  But  what  are  the  objects  of  hu 
man  desire  1  Physical  pleasure,  no  doubt,  in 
part.  But  the  mere  appetites  which  we  have 
in  common  with  the  animals,  would  be  gratified 
almost  as  cheaply  and  easily  as  those  of  the 
animals  are  gratified,  if  nothing  were  given  to 
taste,  to  ostentation,  or  to  the  affections.  How 
small  a  portion  of  the  income  of  a  gentleman 
in  easy  circumstances  is  laid  out  merely  in 
giving  pleasurable  sensations  to  the  body  of 
the  possessor  ?  The  greater  part  even  of  what 
is  spent  on  his  kitchen  and  his  cellar,  goes  not 
to  titillate  his  palate,  but  to  keep  up  his  charac 
ter  for  hospitality,  to  save  him  from  the  re 
proach  of  meanness  in  house-keeping,  and  to 
cement  the  ties  of  good  neighbourhood.  It  is 
clear,  that  a  king  or  an  aristocracy  may  be 
supplied  to  satiety  with  mere  corporeal  plea 
sures,  at  an  expense  which  the  rudest  and 
poorest  community  would  scarcely  feel. 

Those  tastes  and  propensities  which  belong 
to  us  as  reasoning  and  imaginative  beings,  are 
not,  indeed,  so  easily  gratified.  There  is,  we 
admit,  no  point  of  saturation  with  objects  of 
desire  which  come  under  this  head.  And 
therefore  the  argument  of  Mr.  Mill  will  be  just, 
unless  there  be  something  in  the  nature  of  the 
objects  of  desire  themselves  which  is  incon 
sistent  with  it.  Now,  of  these  objects  there  is 
none  which  men  in  general  seem  to  desire 
more  than  the  good  opinion  of  others.  The 
hatred  and  contempt  of  the  public  are  gene 
rally  felt  to  be  intolerable.  It  is  probable,  that 
cur  regard  for  the  sentiments  of  our  fellow- 
creatures  springs  by  association  from  a  sense 
of  their  ability  to  hurt  or  to  serve  us.  But  be 
this  as  it  may,  it  is  notorious,  that  when  the 
habit  of  mind  of  which  we  speak  has  once  been 
formed,  men  feel  extremely  solicitous  about 
the  opinions  of  those  by  whom  it  is  most  im 
probable,  nay,  absolutely  impossible,  that  they 
should  ever  be  in  the  slightest  degree  injured 
or  benefited.  The  desire  of  posthumous  fame 
and  the  dread  of  posthumous  reproach  and 

Voi.  V.— 85 


xecration,  are  feelings  from  the  influence  of 

hich  scarcely  any  man  is  perfectly  free,  and 

hich  in  many  men  are  powerful  and  constant 

motives  of  action.     As  we  are  afraid  that,  if 

we  handle  this  part  of  the  argument  after  our 

wn  manner,  we  shall  incur  the  reproach  of 

entimentality,  a  word  which,  in   the   sacred 

anguage  of  the  Benthamites,  is  synonymous 

with  idiocy,  we  will  quote  what  Mr.  Mill  him- 

elf  says  on  the  subject,  in  his  Treatise  on 

urisprudence. 

"  Pains  from  the  moral  source  are  the  pains 
lerived  from  the  unfavourable  sentiments  of 

nankind These  pains  are  capable 

f  rising  to  a  height  with  which  hardly  any 
ther  pains  incident  to  our  nature  can  be 
ompared.  There  is  a  certain  degree  of  un- 
avourableness  in  the  sentiments  of  his  fellow- 
reatures,  under  which  hardly  any  man,  not 
>elow  the  standard  of  humanity,  can  endure 
o  live. 

"  The  importance  of  this  powerful  agency, 
or  the  prevention  of  injurious  acts,  is  too  ob 
vious  to  need  to  be  illustrated.  If  sufficiently 
at  command,  it  would  almost  supersede  the 
ise  of  other  means.  .  .  . 

"To  know  how  to  direct  the  unfavourable 

ientiments  of  mankind,  it  is  necessary  to  know 

n  as  complete,  that  is,  in  as  comprehensive,  a 

way  as  possible,  what  it  is  which  gives  them 

irth.     Without  entering  into  the  metaphysics 

f  the  question,  it  is  a  sufficient  practical  an- 

wer,  for  the  present  purpose,  to  say  that  the 

anfavourable  sentiments  of  man  are  excited 

by  every  thing  which  hurts  them." 

It  is  strange  that  a  writer  who  considers  the 
pain  derived  from  the  unfavourable  sentiments 
if  others  as  so  acute,  that,  if  sufficiently  at 
command,  it  would  supersede  the  use  of  the 
fallows  and  the  treadmill,  should  take  no  no- 
ice  of  this  most  important  restraint,  when 
discussing  the  question  of  government.  We 
will  attempt  to  deduce  a  theory  of  politics  in 
the  mathematical  form,  in  which  Mr.  Mill  do 
ights,  from  the  premises  with  which  he  naa 
limself  furnished  us. 

PROPOSITION  I.       THEOREM. 

No  rulers  will  do  any  thing  which  may  hurt 
the  people. 

This  is  the  thesis  to  be  maintained ;  and  the 
following  we  humbly  offer  to  Mr.  Mill  as  its 
syllogistic  demonstration. 

No  rulers  will  do  that  which  produces  pain 
to  themselves. 

But  the  unfavourable  sentiments  of  the  peo 
pie  will  give  pain  to  them. 

Therefore  no  rulers  will  do  any  thing  which 
may  excite  the  unfavourable  sentiments  of  the 
people. 

But  the  unfavourable  sentiments  of  the  peo 
pie  are  excited  by  every  thing  \vhich  hurts 
them. 

Therefore  no  rulers  will  do  any  thing  which 
may  hurt  the  people,  which  was  the  thing  to 
be  proved. 

Having  thus,  as  we  think,  not  unsuccessfully 
imitated  Mr.  Mill's  logic,  we  do  not  see  why 
we  should  not  imitate  what  is  at  least  equally 
perfect  in  its  kind,  his  self-complacency,  auif 
3L 


674 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


proclaim  our  Ewgxjt*  in  his  own  words  :  "  The 
chain  of  inference,  in  this  case,  is  close  and 
strong  to  a  most  unusual  degree." 

The  fact  is,  that  when  men,  in  treating  of 
things  which  cannot  be  circumscribed  by  pre 
cise  definitions,  adopt  this  mode  of  reasoning, 
when  once  they  begin  to  talk  of  power,  happi 
ness,  misery,  pain,  pleasure,  motives,  objects 
of  desire,  as  they  talk  of  lines  and  numbers, 
there  is  no  end  to  the  contradictions  and  absur 
dities  into  which  they  fall.  There  is  no  pro 
position  so  monstrously  untrue  in  morals  or 
politics  that  we  will  not  undertake  to  prove  it, 
by  something  which  shall  sound  like  a  logical 
demonstration,  from  admitted  principles. 

Mr.  Mill  argues,  that  if  men  are  not  inclined 
to  plunder  each  other,  government  is  unneces 
sary;  and  that,  if  they  are  so  inclined,  the 
powers  of  government,  when  intrusted  to  a 
small  number  of  them,  will  necessarily  be 
abused.  Surely  it  is  not  by  propounding  di 
lemmas  of  this  sort  that  we  are  likely  to  arrive 
at  sound  conclusions  in  any  moral  science. 
The  whole  question  is  a  question  of  degree. 
If  all  men  preferred  the  moderate  approbation 
of  their  neighbours  to  any  degree  of  wealth,  or 
grandeur,  or  sensual  pleasure,  government 
would  be  unnecessary.  If  all  men  desired 
wealth  so  intensely  as  to  be  willing  to  brave 
the  hatred  of  their  fellow-creatures  for  six 
pence,  Mr.  Mill's  argument  against  monarchies 
and  aristocracies  would  be  true  to  the  full  ex 
tent.  But  the  fact  is,  that  all  men  have  some 
desires  which  impel  them  to  injure  their  neigh 
bours,  and  some  desires  which  impel  them  to 
benefit  their  neighbours.  Now,  if  there  were 
a  community  consisting  of  two  classes  of  men, 
one  of  which  should  be  principally  influenced 
by  the  one  set  of  motives,  and  the  other  by  the 
other,  government  would  clearly  be  necessary 
to  restrain  the  class  which  was  eager  of  plun 
der,  and  careless  of  reputation  :  and  yet  the 
powers  of  government  might  be  safely  intrust 
ed  to  the  class  \vnich  was  chiefly  actuated  by 
the  love  of  approbation.  Now,  it  might,  with 
no  small  plausibility,  be  maintained,  that,  in 
many  countries,  there  are  two  classes  which,  in 
some  degree,  answer  to  this  description ;  that 
the  poor  compose  the  class  which  government 
is  established  to  lestrain:  and  the  people  of 
some  property  the  class  to  which  the  powers 
of  government  may  without  danger  be  con 
fided.  It  might  be  said,  that  a  man  who  can 
barely  earn  a  livelihood  by  severe  labour,  is 
under  stronger  temptations  to  pillage  others 
than  a  man  who  enjoys  many  luxuries.  It 
might  be  said,  that  a  man  who  is  lost  in  the 
crowd  is  less  likely  to  have  the  fear  of  public 
opinion  before  his  eyes,  than  a  man  whose 
station  and  mode  of  living  rendered  him  con 
spicuous.  We  do  not  assert  all  this.  We  only 
say,  that  it  was  Mr.  Mill's  business  to  prove 
the  contrary;  and  that,  not  having  proved  the 
contrary,  he  is  not  entitled  to  say,  "that  those 
principles  which  imply  that  government  is  at 
all  necessary,  imply  that  an  aristocracy  will 
make  use  of  its  power  to  defeat  the  end  for 
which  governments  exist."  This  is  not  true, 
rmless  it  be  true  that  a  rich  man  is  as  likely  to 

vet  »V  goods  of  his  neighbours  as  a  poor 
n ;   -ul  that  a  poor  man  is  as  likely  to  be 


solicitous  about  the  opinion  of  his  neighbours 
as  a  rich  man. 

But  we  do  not  see  that,  by  reasoning  a  priori 
on  such  subjects  as  these,  it  is  possible  to 
advance  one  single  step.  We  know  that  every 
man  has  some  desires  which  he  can  gratify 
only  by  hurting  his  neighbours,  and  some 
which  he  can  gratify  only  by  pleasing  them. 
Mr.  Mill  has  chosen  only  to  look  at  one-half  of 
human  nature,  and  to  reason  on  the  motives 
which  impel  men  to  oppress  and  despoil  others, 
as  if  they  were  the  only  motives  by  which  men 
could  possibly  be  influenced.  We  have  already 
shown  that,  by  taking  the  other  half  of  the 
human  character,  and  reasoning  on  it  as  if  it 
were  the  whole,  we  can  bring  out  a  result  dia 
metrically  opposite  to  that  at  which  Mr.  Mill 
has  arrived.  We  can,  by  such  a  process,  easily 
prove  that  any  form  of  government  is  good,  or 
that  all  government  is  superfluous. 

We  must  now  accompany  Mr.  Mill  on  the 
next  stage  of  his  argument.  Does  any  combi 
nation  of  the  three  simple  forms  of  government 
afford  the  requisite  securities  against  the  abuse 
of  power  1  Mr.  Mill  complains  that  those  who 
maintain  the  affirmative  generally  beg  the 
question,  and  proceeds  to  settle  the  point  by 
proving,  after  his  fashion,  that  no  combination 
of  the  three  simple  forms,  or  of  any  two  of  them, 
can  possibly  exist. 

"  From  the  principles  which  we  have  already 
laid  down,  it  follows  that,  of  the  objects  of  hu 
man  desire,  and  speaking  more  definitely,  of 
the  means  to  the  ends  of  human  desire,  namely, 
wealth  and  power,  each  party  will  endeavour  to 
obtain  as  much  as  possible. 

"If  any  expedient  presents  itself  to  any  of 
the  supposed  parties  effectual  to  this  end,  and 
not  opposed  to  any  preferred  object  of  pursuit, 
we  may  infer,  with  certainty,  that  it  will  be 
adopted.  One  effectual  expedient  is  not  more 
effectual  than  obvious.  Any  two  of  the  par 
ties,  by  combining  may  swallow  up  the  third. 
That  such  combinations  will  take  place,  ap 
pears  to  be  as  certain  as  any  thing  which  de 
pends  upon  human  will:  because  there  are 
strong  motives  in  favour  of  it,  and  none  that 

can  be  conceived  in  opposition  to  it 

The  mixture  of  three  of  the  kinds  of  govern 
ment,  it  is  thus  evident,  cannot  possibly  exist. 

It  may  be  proper  to  inquire,  whether 

a  union  may  not  be  possible  of  two  of  them. 

"  Let  us  first  suppose,  that  monarchy  is  united 
with  aristocracy.  Their  power  is  equal  or  not 
equal.  If  it  is  not  equal,  it  follows,  as  a  neces 
sary  consequence,  from  the  principles  which 
we  have  already  established,  that  the  stronger 
will  take  from  the  weaker  till  it  engrosses  the 
whole.  The  only  question,  therefore,  is,  What 
will  happen  when  the  power  is  equal  1 

"In  the  first  place,  it  seems  impossible  that 
such  equality  should  ever  exist.  How  is  it  to 
be  established]  or,  by  what  criterion  is  it  to  be 
ascertained]  If  there  is  no  such  criterion,  it 
must,  in  all  cases,  be  the  result  of  chance.  If 
so,  the  chances  against  it  are  as  infinity  to  one. 
The  idea,  therefore,  is  wholly  chimerical  and 
absurd.  .  .  . 

"In  this  doctrine  of  the  mixture  of  the  sim 
ple  forms  of  government  is  included  the  cele 
brated  theory  of  the  balance  among  the  con- 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT. 


675 


ponent  parts  of  a  government.  By  this  it  is 
supposed  that,  when  a  government  is  composed 
of  monarchy,  aristocracy,  and  democracy,  they 
balance  one  another,  and  by  mutual  checks 
produce  good  government.  A  few  words  will 
suffice  to  show  that,  if  any  theory  deserves  the 
epithet  of  '  wild,  visionary,  and  chimerical,'  it 
is  that  of  the  balance.  If  there  are  three 
powers,  How  is  it  possible  to  prevent  two  of 
them  from  combining  to  swallow  up  the  third  1 

"The  analysis  which  we  have  already  per 
formed  will  enable  us  to  trace  rapidly  the  con 
catenation  of  causes  and  effects  in  this  ima 
gined  case.  . 

"  We  have  already  seen  that  the  interest  of 
the  community,  considered  in  the  aggregate,  or 
in  the  democratical  point  c1'  view,  is,  that  each 
individual  should  receive  protection;  and  that 
the  powers  which  are  constituted  for  that  pur 
pose  should  be  employed  exclusively  for  that 

purpose We  have  also  seen  that  the 

interest  of  the  king  and  of  the  governing  aris 
tocracy  is  directly  the  reverse.  It  is  to  have 
unlimited  power  over  the  rest  of  the  commu 
nity,  and  to  use  it  for  their  own  advantage.  In 
the  supposed  case  of  the  balance  of  the 
monarchical,  aristocratical,  and  democratical 
powers,  it  cannot  be  for  the  interest  either  of 
the  monarchy  or  the  aristocracy  to  combine 
with  the  democracy;  because  it  is  the  interest 
of  the  democracy,  or  community  at  large, 
that  neither  the  king  nor  the  aristocracy  should 
have  one  particle  of  power,  or  one  particle  of 
me  wealth  of  the  community,  for  their  own 
advantage 

"The  democracy  or  community  have  all 
possible  motives  to  endeavour  to  prevent  the 
monarchy  and  aristocracy  from  exercising 
power,  or  obtaining  the  wealth  of  the  commu 
nity  for  their  own  advantage.  The  monarchy 
and  aristocracy  have  all  possible  motives  for 
endeavouring  to  obtain  unlimited  power  over 
the  persons  and  property  of  the  community. 
The  consequence  is  inevitable ;  they  have  all 
possible  motives  for  combining  to  obtain  that 
power." 

If  any  part  of  this  passage  *e  more  emi 
nently  absurd  than  another,  it  is,  we  think,  the 
argument  by  which  Mr.  Mill  proves  that  there 
cannot  be  a  union  of  monarchy  and  aristo 
cracy.  Their  power,  he  says,  must  be  equal  or 
not  equal.  But  of  equality  there  is  no  crite 
rion.  Therefore  the  chances  against  its  exist 
ence  are  as  infinity  to  one.  If  the  power  be 
not  equal,  then  it  follows,  from  the  principles 
of  human  nature,  that  the  stronger  will  take 
from  the  weaker,  till  it  has  engrossed  the 
whole. 

Now,  if  there  be  no  criterion  of  equality  be 
tween  two  portions  of  power,  there  can  be  no 
common  measure  of  portions  of  power.  There 
fore  it  is  utterly  impossible  to  compare  them 
together.  But  where  two  portions  of  power 
are  of  the  same  kind,  there  is  no  difficulty  in 
ascertaining,  sufficiently  for  all  practical  pur 
poses,  whether  they  are  equal  or  unequal.  It 
is  easy  to  judge  whether  two  men  run  equally 
fast,  or  can  lift  equal  weights.  Two  arbitrators, 
whos^  joint  decision  is  to  be  final,  and  neither 
of  whom  can  do  any  thing  without  the  assent 
of  the  other,  possess  equal  power.  Two  elec 


tors,  each  of  whom  has  a  vote  for  a  borough, 
possess,  in  that  respect,  equal  power.  If  not, 
all  Mr.  Mill's  political  theories  fall  to  the  ground 
at  once.  For  if  it  be  impossible  to  ascertain 
whether  two  portions  of  power  are  equal,  he 
never  can  show  that,  even  under  a  system  of 
universal  suffrage,  a  minority  might  not  carry 
every  thing  their  own  way,  against  the  wishes 
and  interests  of  the  majority. 

Where  there  are  two  portions  of  power  dif 
fering  in  kind,  there  is,  we  admit,  no  criterion 
of  equality.  But  then,  in  such  a  case,  it  is  ab 
surd  to  talk,  as  Mr.  Mill  does,  about  the  stronger 
and  the  weaker.  Popularly,  indeed,  and  with 
reference  to  some  particular  objects,  these 
words  may  very  fairly  be  used.  But  to  use 
them  mathematically  is  altogether  improper. 
If  we  are  speaking  of  a  boxing-match,  we  may 
say  that  some  famous  bruiser  has  greater  bo 
dily  power  than  any  man  in  England.  If  we 
are  speaking  of  a  pantomime,  we  may  say  the 
same  of  some  very  agile  harlequin.  Bui  it 
would  be  talking  nonsense  to  say,  in  general, 
that  the  power  of  the  harlequin  either  exceeded 
that  of  the  pugilist,  or  fell  short  of  it. 

If  Mr.  Mill's  argument  be  good  as  between 
different  branches  of  a  legislature,  it  is  equally 
good  as  between  sovereign  powers.  Every 
government,  it  may  be  said,  will,  if  it  can,  take 
the  objects  of  its  desires  from  every  other.  If 
the  French  government  can  subdue  England, 
it  will  do  so.  If  the  English  government  can 
subdue  France,  it  will  do  so.  But  the  power  of 
England  and  France  is  either  equal  or  not  equal. 
The  chance  that  it  is  not  exactly  equal  is  as 
infinity  to  one,  and  may  safely  be  left  out  of  the 
account ;  and  then  the  stronger  will  infallibly 
take  from  the  weaker,  till  the  weaker  is  altoge 
ther  enslaved. 

Surely  the  answer  to  all  this  hubbub  of  un 
meaning  words  is  the  plainest  possible.  For 
some  purposes  France  is  stronger  than 
England.  For  some  purposes  England  is 
stronger  than  France.  For  some,  neither  has 
any  power  at  all.  France  has  the  greater 
population,  England  the  greater  capital; 
France  has  the  greater  army,  England  the 
greater  fleet.  For  an  expedition  to  Rio  Janeiro 
or  the  Philippines,  England  has  the  greater 
power.  For  a  war  on  the  Po  or  on  the  Danube, 
France  has  the  greater  power.  But  neither  has 
power  sufficient  to  keep  the  other  in  quiet  sub 
jection  for  a  month.  Invasion  would  be  very 
perilous ;  the  idea  of  complete  conquest  on 
either  side  utterly  ridiculous.  This  is  the 
manly  and  sensible  way  of  discussing  such 
questions.  The  ergo,  or  rather  the  argal,  of  Mr. 
Mill,  cannot  impose  on  a  child.  Yet  we  ought 
scarcely  to  say  this ;  for  we  remember  to  have 
heard  a  child  ask  whether  Bonaparte  was 
stronger  than  an  elephant  ? 

Mr.  Mill  reminds  us  of  those  philosophers 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  who,  having  satisfied 
themselves  a  priori  that  the  rapidity  with  which 
bodies  descended  to  the  earth  varied  exacMy  as 
their  weights,  refused  to  believe  the  contrary 
on  the  evidence  of  their  own  eyes  ami  ears 
The  British  constitution,  according  to  Mr. 
Mill's  classification,  is  a  mixture  of  monarchy 
and  aristocracy;  one  house  of  Parliameti 
being  composed  of  hereditary  nobles,  an-i  the 


«76 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


other  almost  entirely  chosen  by  a  privileged 
class,  who  possess  the  elective  franchise  on 
account  of  their  property,  or  their  connection 
with  certain  corporations.  Mr.  Mill's  argu 
ment  proves  that,  from  the  time  that  these  two 
powers  were  mingled  in  our  government,  that 
is,  from  the  very  first  dawn  of  our  history,  one 
or  the  other  must  have  been  constantly  en 
croaching.  According  to  him,  moreover,  all 
the  encroachments  must  have  been  on  one 
side.  For  the  first  encroachment  could  only 
have  been  made  by  the  stronger,  and  that 
first  encroachment  would  have  made  the 
stronger  stronger  still.  It  is,  therefore,  mat 
ter  of  absolute  demonstration,  that  either  the 
Parliament  was  stronger  than  the  crown  in 
the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.,  or  that  the  crown 
was  stronger  than  the  Parliament  in  1641. 
"Hippocrate  dira  ce  que  lui  plaira,"  says  the 
girl  in  Moliere ;  "  mais  le  cocher  est  mort." 
Mr.  Mill  may  say  what  he  pleases;  but  the 
English  constitution  is  still  alive.  That,  since 
the  Revolution,  the  Parliament  has  possessed 
great  power  in  the  state,  is  what  nobody  will 
dispute.  The  king,  on  the  other  hand,  can  cre 
ate  new  peers,  and  can  dissolve  Parliaments. 
William  sustained  severe  mortifications  from 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  was,  indeed,  un 
justifiably  oppressed.  Anne  was  desirous  to 
change  a  ministry  which  had  a  majority  in 
both  houses.  She  watched  her  moment  for  a 
dissolution,  created  twelve  tory  peers,  and  suc 
ceeded.  Thirty  years  later,  the  House  of  Com 
mons  drove  Walpole  from  his  seat.  In  1784, 
George  III.  was  able  to  keep  Mr.  Pitt  in  office, 
in  the  face  of  a  majority  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  In  1804,  the  apprehension  of  a  defeat 
in  Parliament,  compelled  the  same  king  to  part 
from  his  most  favoured  minister.  But  in  1807, 
he  was  able  to  do  exactly  what  Anne  had  done 
nearly  a  hundred  years  before.  Now,  had  the 
power  of  the  king  increased  during  the  inter 
vening  century,  or  had  it  remained  stationary! 
Is  it  possible  that  the  one  lot  among  the  infinite 
number  should  have  fallen  to  us  1  If  not,  Mr. 
Mill  has  proved  that  one  of  the  two  parties  must 
have  been  constantly  taking  from  the  other. 
Many  of  the  ablest  men  in  England  think  that 
the  influence  of  the  crown  has,  on  the  whole, 
increased  since  the  reign  of  Anne.  Others 
think  that  the  Parliament  has  been  growing  in 
strength.  But  of  this  there  is  no  doubt,  that 
both  sides  possessed  great  power  then,  and 
possess  great  power  now.  Surely,  if  there  were 
the  least  truth  in  the  argument  of  Mr.  Mill,  it 
could  not  possibly  be  a  matter  of  doubt,  at  the 
end  of  a  hundred  and  twenty  years,  whether 
the  one  side  or  the  other  had  been  the  gainer. 

But  we  ask  pardon.  We  lorgot  that  a  fact, 
irreconcilable  with  Mr.  Mill's  theory,  furnishes, 
in  his  opinion,  the  strongest  reason  for  adher 
ing  to  the  theory.  To  take  up  the  question  in 
another  manner,  is  it  not  plain  that  there  may 
be  two  bodies,  each  possessing  a  perfect  and 
entire  power,  which  cannot  be  taken  from  it 
•without  its  own  concurrence?  What  is  the 
meaning  of  tne  words  stronger  and  weaker, 
when  applied  to  such  bodies  as  these?  The 
one  may,  indeed,  by  physical  force  altogether 
destroy  the  other.  But  this  is  not  the  question. 
A  third  party,  a  general  of  their  own.  for  ex 


ample,  may,  by  physical  force,  subjugate  th?m 
both:  nor  is  there  any  form  of  government, 
Mr.  Mill's  Utopian  democracy  not  excepted, 
secure  from  such  an  occurrence.  We  are 
speaking  of  the  powers  with  which  the  const! 
tution  invests  the  two  branches  of  the  legisla 
ture;  and  we  ask  Mr.  Mill  how,  on  his  own 
principles,  he  can  maintain  that  one  of  them 
will  be  able  to  encroach  on  the  other,  if  the 
consent  of  the  other  be  necessary  to  such  en 
croachment? 

Mr.  Mill  tells  us,  that  if  a  government  be 
composed  of  the  three  simple  forms,  which  he 
will  not  admit  the  British  constitution  to  be, 
two  of  the  component  parts  will  inevitably  join 
against  the  third.  Now,  if  two  of  them  com 
bine  and  act  as  one,  this  case  evidently  resolves 
itself  into  the  last ;  and  all  the  observations 
which  we  have  just  made  will  fully  apply  to 
it.  Mr.  Mill  says,  that  "  any  two  of  the  par 
ties,  by  combining,  may  swallow  up  the  third;" 
and  afterwards  asks,  "How  is  it  possible  to 
prevent  two  of  them  from  combining  to  swal 
low  up  the  third!"  Surely  Mr.  Mill  must  be 
aware,  that  in  politics  two  is  not  always  the 
double  of  one.  If  the  concurrence  of  all  the 
three  branches  of  the  legislature  be  necessary 
to  every  law,  each  branch  will  possess  consti 
tutional  power  sufficient  to  protect  it  against 
any  thing  but  that  physical  force,  from  which 
no  form  of  government  is  secure.  Mr.  Mill 
reminds  us  of  the  Irishman,  who  could  not  be 
brought  to  understand  how  one  juryman  could 
possibly  starve  out  eleven  others. 

But  is  it  certain  that  two  of  the  branches  of 
the  legislature  will  combine  against  the  third? 
"  It  appears  to  be  as  certain,"  says  Mr.  Mill, 
"as  any  thing  which  depends  upon  human 
will ;  because  there  are  strong  motives  in  fa 
vour  of  it,  and  none  that  can  be  conceived  in 
opposition  to  it."  He  subsequently  sets  forth 
what  these  motives  are.  .  The  interest  of  the 
democracy  is,  that  each  individual  should  re 
ceive  protection.  The  interest  of  the  king 
and  the  aristocracy  is,  to  have  all  the  power 
that  they  can  obtain,  and  to  use  it  for  their  own 
ends.  There%re  the  king  and  the  aristocracy 
have  all  possible  motives  for  combining  against 
the  people.  If  our  readers  will  look  back  to  the 
passage  quoted  above,  they  will  see  that  we  re 
present  Mr.  Mill's  argument  quite  fairly. 

Now  we  should  have  thought  that,  without 
the  help  of  either  history  or  experience,  Mr. 
Mill  would  have  discovered,  by  the  light  of  his 
own  logic,  the  fallacy  which  lurks,  and  indeed 
scarcely  lurks,  under  this  pretended  demon 
stration.  The  interest  of  the  king  may  be  op 
posed  to  that  of  the  people.  But  is  it  identical 
with  that  of  the  aristocracy  ?  In  the  very  page 
which  contains  this  argument,  intended  to  prove 
that  the  king  and  the  aristocracy  will  coalesce 
against  the  people,  Mr.  Mill  attempts  to  show 
that  there  is  so  strong  an  opposition  of  interest 
between  the  king  and  the  aristocracy,  that  if 
the  powers  of  government  are  divided  between 
them,  the  one  will  inevitably  usurp  the  power 
of  the  other.  If  so,  he  is  not  entitled  to  con 
clude  that  they  will  combine  to  destroy  the 
power  of  the  people,  merely  because  their  in 
terests  may  be  at  variance  with  those  of  the 
people.  He  is  bound  to  show,  not  merely  thai 


MILL'S  ESSAY   ON  GOVERNMENT. 


677 


In  all  communities  the  interest  of  a  king  must 
be  opposed  to  that  of  the  people,  but  also  that, 
in  all  communities,  it  must  be  more  directly 
opposed  to  the  interest  of  the  people  than  to 
the  interest  of  the  aristocracy.  But  he  has  not 
shown  this.  Therefore  he  has  not  proved  his 
proposition  on  his  own  principles.  To  quote 
history  would  be  a  mere  waste  of  time.  Every 
school-boy,  whose  studies  have  gone  so  far  as 
the  abridgments  of  Goldsmith,  can  mention  in 
stances  in  which  sovereigns  have  allied  them 
selves  with  the  people  against  the  aristocracy, 
and  in  which  nobles  have  allied  themselves 
with  the  people  against  the  sovereign.  In  ge 
neral,  when  there  are  three  parties,  every  one 
of  which  has  much  to  fear  from  the  others,  it 
is  not  found  that  two  of  them  combine  to  plun 
der  the  third.  If  such  a  combination  be  formed, 
it  scarcely  ever  effects  its  purpose.  It  soon  be 
comes  evident  which  member  of  the  coalition 
is  likely  to  be  the  greater  gainer  by  the  trans 
action.  He  becomes  an  object  of  jealousy  to 
his  ally,  who,  in  all  probability,  changes  sides, 
and  compels  him  to  restore  what  he  has  taken. 
Everybody  knows  how  Henry  VIII.  trimmed 
between  Francis  and  the  Emperor  Charles. 
But  it  is  idle  to  cite  examples  of  the  operation 
of  a  principle  which  is  illustrated  in  almost 
every  page  of  history,  ancient  or  modern,  and 
to  which  almost  every  state  in  Europe  has,  at 
one  time  or  another,  been  indebted  for  its  in 
dependence. 

Mr.  Mill  has  now,  as  he  conceives,  demon 
strated  that  the  simple  forms  of  government 
are  bad,  and  that  the  mixed  forms  cannot  pos 
sibly  exist.  There  is  still,  however,  it  seems, 
a  hope  for  mankind. 

"In  the  grand  discovery  of  modern  times, 
the  system  of  representation,  the  solution  of  all 
the  difficulties,  both  speculative  and  practical, 
will  perhaps  be  found.  If  it  cannot,  we  seem 
to  be  forced  upon  the  extraordinary  conclusion, 
that  good  government  is  impossible.  For  as 
there  is  no  individual  or  combination  of  indi 
viduals,  except  the  community  itself,  who  would 
not  have  an  interest  in  bad  government,  if  in 
trusted  with  its  powers,  and  as  the  community 
itself  is  incapable  of  exercising  those  powers, 
and  must  intrust  them  to  certain  individuals, 
the  conclusion  is  obvious  :  the  community  it 
self  must  check  those  individuals,  else  they 
will  follow  their  interest,  and  produce  bad 
government.  But  how  is  it  the  community 
can  check?  The  community  can  act  only 
when  assembled;  and  when  assembled,  it  is 
incapable  of  acting.  The  community,  how 
ever,  can  choose  representatives." 

The  next  question  is — How  must  the  repre 
sentative  body  be  constituted  7  Mr.  Mill  lays 
down  two  principles,  about  which,  he  says,  "it 
is  unlikely  that  there  will  be  any  dispute." 

"  First,  The  checking  body  must  have  a  de 
gree  of  power  sufficient  for  the  business  of 
checking. 

"Secondly,  It  must  have  an  identity  of  inte 
rest  with  the  community.  Otherwise,  it  will 
make  a  mischievous  use  of  its  power." 

The  first  of  these  propositions  certainly 
admits  of  no  dispute.  As  to  the  second,  we 
shall  hereafter  take  occasion  to  make  some 
remarks  on  the  sense  in  which  Mr.  Mill  un 


derstands  the  words,  "interest  of  the  com 
munity." 

It  does  not  appear  very  easy,  on  Mr.  Mill's 
principles,  to  find  out  any  mode  of  making  the 
interest  of  the  representative  body  identical 
with  that  of  the  constituent  body.  The  plan 
proposed  by  Mr.  Mill  is  simply  that  of  very 
frequent  election.  "As  it  appears,"  says  he, 
"  that  limiting  the  duration  of  their  power  is  a 
security  against  the  sinister  interest  of  the 
people's  representatives,  so  it  appears  that  it 
is  the  only  security  of  which  the  nature  of  the 
case  admits."  But  all  the  arguments  by  which 
Mr.  Mill  has  proved  monarchy  and  aristocracy 
to  be  pernicious,  will,  as  it  appears  to  us, 
equally  prove  this  security  to  be  no  security 
at  all.  Is  it  not  clear  that  the  representatives, 
as  soon  as  they  are  elected,  are  an  aristocracy 
with  an  interest  opposed  to  the  interest  of  the 
community  1  Why  should  they  not  pass  a  law 
for  extending  the  term  of  their  power  from  one 
year  to  ten  years,  or  declare  themselves  sena 
tors  for  life?  If  the  whole  legislative  power 
is  given  to  them,  they  will  be  constitutionally 
competent  to  do  this.  If  part  of  the  legislative 
power  is  withheld  from  them,  to  whom  is  that 
part  given  ]  Is  the  people  to  retain  it,  and  to 
express  its  assent  or  dissent  in  primary  assem 
blies  1  Mr.  Mill  himself  tells  us  that  the  com 
munity  can  only  act  when  assembled,  and  that, 
when  assembled,  it  is  incapable  of  acting.  Or 
is  it  to  be  provided,  as  in  some  of  the  Ameri 
can  republics,  that  no  change  in  the  funda- 
•mental  laws  shall  be  made  without  the  consent 
of  a  convention,  specially  elected  for  the  pur 
pose]  Still  the  difficulty  recurs :  Why  may 
not  the  members  of  the  convention  betray  their 
trust,  as  well  as  the  members  of  the  ordinary 
legislature]  When  private  men,  they  may 
have  been  zealous  for  the  interests  of  the  com 
munity.  When  candidates,  they  may  have 
pledged  themselves  to  the  cause  of  the  consti 
tution.  But  as  soon  as  they  are  a  convention, 
as  soon  as  they  are  separated  from  the  people, 
as  soon  as  the  supreme  power  is  put  into  their 
hands,  commences  that  interest,  opposite  to  the 
interest  of  the  community,  which  must,  accord 
ing  to  Mr.  Mill,  produce  measures  opposite  to 
the  interests  of  the  community.  We  must  find 
some  other  means,  therefore,  of  checking  this 
check  upon  a  check  ;  some  other  prop  to  carry 
the  tortoise,  that  carries  the  elephant,  that  car 
ries  the  world. 

We  know  well  that  there  is  no  real  danger 
in  such  a  case.  But  there  is  no  danger,  only 
because  there  is  no  truth  in  Mr.  Mill's  princi 
ples.  If  men  were  what  he  represents  them 
to  be,  the  letter  of  the  very  constitution  which 
he  recommends  would  afford  no  safeguard 
against  bad  government.  The  real  security  is 
this,  that  legislators  will  be  deterred  by  the 
fear  of  resistance  and  of  infamy  from  acting 
in  the  manner  which  we  have  described.  But 
restraints,  exactly  the  same  in  kind,  and  differ 
ing  only  in  degree,  exist  in  all  forms  of  go 
vernment.  That  broad  line  of  distinction 
which  Mr.  Mill  tries  to  point  out  between 
monarchies  and  aristocracies  on  the  one  side, 
and  democracies  on  the  other,  has  in  fact  no 
existence.  In  no  form  of  government  is  there 
i  an  absolute  identity  of  interest  between  the 
3i.2 


678 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


people  and  their  rulers.  In  every  form  of  go 
vernment  the  rulers  stand  in  some  awe  of  the 
people.  The  fear  of  resistance  and  the  sense 
of  shame  operate,  in  a  certain  degree,  on  the 
most  absolute  kings  and  the  most  illiberal  oli 
garchies.  And  nothing  but  the  fear  of  resist 
ance  and  the  sense  of  shame  preserves  the 
freedom  of  the  most  democratic  communities 
from  the  encroachments  of  their  annual  and 
biennial  delegates. 

We  have  seen  how  Mr.  Mill  proposes  to 
render  the  interest  of  the  representative  body 
identical  with  that  of  the  constituent  body. 
The  next  question  is,  in  what  manner  the  in 
terest  of  the  constituent  body  is  to  be  rendered 
identical  with  that  of  the  community.  Mr. 
Mill  shows  that  a  minority  of  the  community, 
consisting  even  of  many  thousands,  would  be 
a  bad  constituent  body,  and,  indeed,  merely  a 
numerous  aristocracy. 

"  The  benefits  of  the  representative  system," 
says  he,  "  are  lost  in  all  cases  in  which  the  in 
terests  of  the  choosing  body  are  not  the  same 
with  those  of  the  community.  It  is  very  evi 
dent  that,  if  the  community  itself  were  the 
choosing  body,  the  interest  of  the  community 
and  that  of  the  choosing  body  would  be  the 
same." 

On  these  grounds  Mr.  Mill  recommends  that 
all  males  of  mature  age,  rich  and  poor,  edu 
cated  and  ignorant,  shall  have  votes.  But 
why  not  the  women  tool  This  question  has 
often  been  asked  in  parliamentary  debate,  and 
has  never,  to  our  knowledge,  received  a  plau-* 
sible  answer.  Mr.  Mill  escapes  from  it  as  fast 
as  he  can.  But  we  shall  take  the  liberty  to 
dwell  a  little  on  the  words  of  the  oracle.  "One 
thing./'  says  he,  "is  pretty  clear,  that  all  those 
individuals  whose  interests  are  involved  in 
those  of  other  individuals  may  be  struck  off 

without  inconvenience In 

this  light  women  may  be  regarded,  the  interest 
of  almost  all  of  whom  is  involved  either  in 
that  of  their  fathers,  or  in  that  of  their  hus 
bands." 

If  we  were  to  content  ourselves  with  saying, 
in  answer  to  all  the  arguments  in  Mr.  Mill's 
Essay,  that  the  interest  of  a  king  is  involved 
in  that  of  the  community,  we  should  be  ac 
cused,  and  justly,  of  talking  nonsense.  Yet 
such  an  assertion  would  not,  as  far  as  we  can 
perceive,  be  more  unreasonable  than  that 
which  Mr.  Mill  has  here  ventured  to  make. 
Without  adducing  one  fact,  without  taking  the 
trouble  to  perplex  the  question  by  one  sophism, 
he  placidly  dogmatizes  away  the  interests  of 
one-half  of  the  human  race.  If  there  be  a 
word  of  truth  in  history,  women  have  always 
been,  and  still  are,  over  the  greater  part  of  the 
globe,  humble  companions,  playthings,  cap 
tives,  menials,  beasts  of  burden.  Except  in  a 
few  happy  and  highly  civilized  communities, 
they  are  strictly  in  a  state  of  personal  slavery. 
Even  in  those  countries  where  they  are  best 
treated,  the  laws  are  generally  unfavourable 
to  them,  with  respect  to  almost  all  the  points 
in  which  they  are  most  deeply  interested. 

Mr.  Mill  is  not  legislating  for  England  or 
the  United  States;  but  for  mankind.  Is  then 
the  interest  of  a  Turk  the  same  with  that  of 
the  girls  who  compose  his  haram1?  Is  the  in 


terest  of  a  Chinese  the  same  with  that  of  the 
woman  whom  he  harnesses  to  his  plough? 
Is  the  interest  of  an  Italian  the  same  with  that 
of  the  daughter  whom  he  devotes  to  God1? 
The  interest  of  a  respectable  Englishman  may 
be  said,  without  any  impropriety,  to  be  identi 
cal  with  that  of  his  wife.  But  why  is  it  so? 
Because  human  nature  is  not  what  Mr.  MiJl 
conceives  it  to  be ;  because  civilized  men, 
pursuing  their  own  happiness  in  a  social  state, 
are  not  Yahoos  fighting  for  carrion ;  because 
there  is  a  pleasure  in  being  loved  and  es 
teemed,  as  well  as  in  being  feared  and  ser 
vilely  obeyed.  Why  does  not  a  gentleman  re 
strict  his  wife  to  the  bare  maintenance  which 
the  law  would  compel  him  to  allow  her,  that 
he  may  have  more  to  spend  on  his  personal 
pleasures  1  Because,  if  he  loves  her,  he  has 
pleasure  in  seeing  her  pleased ;  and  because, 
even  if  he  dislikes  her,  he  is  unwilling  that 
the  whole  neighbourhood  should  cry  shame  on 
his  meanness  and  ill-nature.  Why  does  not 
the  legislature,  altogether  composed  of  males, 
pass  a  law  to  deprive  women  of  all  civil  pri 
vileges  whatever,  and  reduce  them  to  the  state 
of  slaves'!  By  passing  such  a  law.  they  would 
gratify  what  Mr.  Mill  tells  us  is  an  inseparable 
part  of  human  nature,  the  desire  to  possess 
unlimited  power  of  inflicting  pain  upon  others. 
That  they  do  not  pass  such  a  law,  though  they 
have  the  power  to  pass  it,  and  that  no  man  in. 
England  wishes  to  see  such  a  law  passed, 
proves  that  the  desire  to  possess  unlimited 
power  of  inflicting  pain  is  not  inseparable 
from  human  natur*e. 

If  there  be  in  this  country  an  identity  of  in 
terest  between  the  two  sexes,  it  cannot  possi 
bly  arise  from  any  thing  but  the  pleasure  of 
being  loved,  and  of  communicating  happiness. 
For  that  it  does  not  spring  from  the  mere  in 
stinct  of  sex,  the  treatment  which  women  ex 
perience  over  the  greater  part  of  the  world 
abundantly  proves.  And  if  it  be  said  that  our 
laws  of  marriage  have  produced  it,  this  only 
removes  the  argument  a  step  further;  for 
those  laws  have  been  made  by  males.  Now, 
if  the  kind  feelings  of  one-half  of  the  species 
be  a  sufficient  security  for  the  happiness  of  the 
other,  why  may  not  the  kind  feelings  of  a  mo 
narch  or  an  aristocracy  be  sufficient  at  least 
to  prevent  them  from  grinding  the  people  to 
the  very  utmost  of  their  power? 

If  Mr.  Mill  will  examine  why  it  is  that  wo 
men  are  better  treated  in  England  than  in 
Persia,  he  may  perhaps  find  out,  in  the  course 
of  his  inquiries,  why  it  is  that  the  Danes  are 
better  governed  than  the  subjects  of  Caligula. 

We  now  come  to  the  most  important  practi 
cal  question  in  the  whole  Essay.  Is  it  desira 
ble  that  all  males  arrived  at  years  of  discre 
tion  should  vote  for  representatives,  or  should 
a  pecuniary  qualification  be  required1?  Mr. 
Mill's  opinion  is,  that  the  lower  the  qualifica 
tion  the  better;  and  that  the  best  system  is 
that  in  which  there  is  none  at  all. 

"The  qualification,"  says  he,  "must  either 
be  such  as  to  embrace  the  majority  of  the 
population,  or  something  less  than  the  ma 
jority.  Suppose,  in  the  first  place,  that  it  em 
braces  the  majority,  the  question  is,  whether 
the  majority  would  ha^e  an  interest  in  op« 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT. 


679 


pressing  those  who,  upon  this  supposition, 
would  be  deprived  of  political  power?  If  we 
reduce  the  calculation  to  its  elements,  we  shall 
see  that  the  interest  which  they  would  have 
of  this  deplorable  kind,  though  it  would  be 
something,  would  not  be  very  great.  Each 
man  of  the  majority,  if  the  majority  were  con 
stituted  the  governing  body,  would  have  some 
thing  less  than  the  benefit  of  oppressing  a 
single  man.  If  the  majority  were  twice  as 
great  as  the  minority,  each  man  of  the  ma 
jority  would  only  have  one-half  the  benefit  of 

oppressing  a  single   man 

Suppose,  in  the  second  place,  that  the  qualifi 
cation  did  not  admit  a  body  of  electors  so 
large  as  the  majority,  in  that  case,  taking 
again  the  calculation  in  its  elements,  we  shall 
see  that  each  man  would  have  a  benefit  equal 
to  that  derived  from  the  oppression  of  more 
than  one  man ;  and  that,  in  proportion  as  the 
elective  body  constituted  a  smaller  and  smaller 
minority,  the  benefit  of  misrule  to  the  elective 
body  would  be  increased,  and  bad  government 
would  be  insured." 

The  first  remark  which  we  have  to  make  on 
this  argument  is,  that,  by  Mr.  Mill's  own  ac 
count,  even  a  government  in  which  every 
human  being  should  vote  would  still  be  defec 
tive.  For,  under  a  system  of  universal  suffrage, 
the  majority  of  the  electors  return  the  repre 
sentative,  and  the  majority  of  the  representa 
tives  make  the  law.  The  whole  people  may 
vote,  therefore,  but  only  the  majority  govern. 
So  that,  by  Mr.  Mill's  own  confession,  the  most 
perfect  system  of  government  conceivable  is 
one  in  which  the  interest  of  the  ruling  body  to 
oppress,  though  not  great,  is  something. 

But  is  Mr.  Mill  in  the  right,  when  he  says 
that  such  an  interest  could  not  be  very  great  ? 
We  think  not.  If,  indeed,  every  man  in  the 
community  possessed  an  equal  share  of  what 
Mr.  Mill  calls  the  objects  of  desire,  the  majority 
would  probably  abstain  from  plundering  the 
minority.  A  large  minority  would  offer  a 
vigorous  resistance ;  and  the  property  of  a 
small  minority  would  not  repay  the  other 
members  of  the  community  for  the  trouble  of 
dividing  it.  But  it  happens  that  in  all  civilized 
communities  there  is  a  small  minority  of  rich 
men,  and  a  great  majority  of  poor  men.  If 
there  were  a  thousand  men  with  ten  pounds 
apiece,  it  would  not  be  worth  while  for  nine 
hundred  and  ninety  of  them  to  rob  ten,  and  it 
would  be  a  bold  attempt  for  six  hundred  of  them 
to  rob  four  hundred.  But  if  ten  of  them  had  a 
hundred  thousand  pounds  apiece,  the  case 
would  be  very  different.  There  would  then  be 
much  to  be  got,  and  nothing  to  be  feared. 

"That  one  human  being  will  desire  to  render 
the  person  and  property  of  another  subservient 
to  his  pleasures,  notwithstanding  the  pain  or 
loss  of  pleasure  which  it  may  occasion  to  that 
other  individual,  is,"  according  to  Mr.  Mill, 
"the  foundation  of  government."  That  the 
property  of  the  rich  minority  can  be  made  sub 
servient  to  the  pleasures  of  the  poor  majority, 
will  scarcely  be  denied.  But  Mr.  Mill  proposes 
to  give  the  poor  majority  power  over  the  rich 
minority.  Is  it  possible  to  doubt  to  what,  on 
his  own  principles,  such  an  arrangement  must 


It  may,  perhaps,  be  said  that,  in  the  iong  run. 
it  is  for  the  interest  of  the  people  that  property 
should  be  secure,  and  that,  therefore,  they  will 
respect  it.  We  answer  thus: — It  cannot  be 
pretended  that  it  is  not  for  the  immediate  in 
terest  of  the  people  to  plunder  the  rich.  There 
fore,  even  if  it  were  quite  certain  that,  in  the 
long  run,  the  people  would,  as  a  body,  lose  by 
doing  so,  it  would  not  necessarily  follow  that 
the  fear  of  remote  ill  consequences  would  over 
come  the  desire  of  immediate  acquisitions. 
Every  individual  might  flatter  himself  that  the 
punishment  would  not  fall  on  him.  Mr.  Mill 
himself  tells  us,  in  his  Essay  on  Jurisprudence, 
that  no  quantity  of  evil  which  is  remote  and 
uncertain  will  suffice  to  prevent  crime. 

But  we  are  rather  inclined  to  think  that  it 
would,  on  the  whole,  be  for  the  interest  of  the 
majority  to  plunder  the  rich.  If  so,  the  Utilita 
rians  will  say,  that  the  rich  ought  to  be  plun 
dered.  We  deny  the.  inference.  For,  in  the 
first  place,  if  the  object  of  government  be  the 
greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest  number,  the 
intensity  of  the  suffering  which  a  measure 
inflicts  must  be  taken  into  consideration,  as 
well  as  the  number  of  the  sufferers.  In  the  next 
place,  we  have  to  notice  one  most  important 
distinction  which  Mr.  Mill  has  altogether  over 
looked.  Throughout  his  Essay,  he  confounds 
the  community  with  the  species.  He  talks  of 
the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greater  number: 
but  when  we  examine  his  reasonings,  we  find 
that  he  thinks  only  of  the  greatest  number  of  a 
single  generation. 

Therefore,  even  if  we  were  to  concede,  that 
all  those  arguments  of  which  we  have  exposed 
the  fallacy,  are  unanswerable,  we  might  still 
deny  the  conclusion  at  which  the  essayist 
arrives.  Even  if  we  were  to  grant  that  he  had 
found  out  the  form  of  government  which  is 
best  for  the  majority  of  the  people  now  living 
on  the  face  of  the  earth,  we  might  still,  without 
inconsistency,  maintain  that  form  of  govern 
ment  to  be  pernicious  to  mankind.  It  would 
still  be  incumbent  on  Mr.  Mill  to  prove  that  the 
interest  of  every  generation  is  identical  with 
the  interest  of  all  succeeding  generations.  And 
how,  on  his  own  principles,  he  could  do  this 
we  are  at  a  loss  to  conceive. 

The  case,  indeed,  is  strictly  analogous  to  that 
of  an  aristocratical  government.  In  an  aris 
tocracy,  says  Mr.  Mill,  the  few,  being  invested 
with  the  powers  of  government,  can  take  the 
objects  of  their  desires  from  the  people.  In  the 
same  manner,  every  generation,  in  turn,  can 
gratify  itself  at  the  expense  of  posterity, — pri 
ority  of  time,  in  the  latter  case,  giving  an  ad 
vantage  exactly  corresponding  to  that  which 
superiority  of  station  gives  in  the  former. 
That  an  aristocracy  will  abuse  its  advantage, 
is,  according  to  Mr.  Mill,  matter  of  demonstra 
tion.  Is  it  not  equally  certain  that  the  whole 
people  will  do  the  same;  that,  if  they  have  the 
power,  they  will  commit  waste  of  every  sort  on 
the  estate  of  mankind,  and  transmit  it  to  pos- 
j  terity  impoverished  and  desolated? 

How  is  it  possible  for  any  person  who  holds 
'  the  doctrines  of  Mr.  Mill  to  doubt,  that  the  rich, 
in  a  democracy  such  as  that  which  he  recom 
mends,  would  be  pillaged  as  unmercilully  as 
;  under  a  Turkish  pacha?    It  is  no  doubt  f«r  thc» 


680 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


interest  of  the  next  generation,  and  it  may  be 
for  the  remote  interest  of  the  present  genera 
tion,  that  property  should  be  held  sacred.  And 
so  no  doubt  it  will  be  for  the  interest  of  the  next 
pacha,  and  even  for  that  of  the  present  pacha, 
if  he  should  hold  office  long,  that  the  inhabitants 
of  his  pachalic  should  be  encouraged  to  accu 
mulate  wealth.  Scarcely  any  despotic  sove 
reign  has  plundered  his  subjects  to  a  large 
extent,  without  having  reason,  before  the  end 
of  his  reign,  to  regret  it.  Everybody  knows 
how  bitterly  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  towards  the 
close  of  his  life,  lamented  his  former  extrava 
gance.  If  that  magnificent  prince  had  not 
expended  millions  on  Marli  and  Versailles,  and 
tens  of  millions  on  the  aggrandizement  of  his 
grandson,  he  would  not  have  been  compelled 
at  last  to  pay  servile  court  to  low-born  money 
lenders,  to  humble  himself  before  men,  on 
whom,  in  the  days  of  his  pride,  he  would  not 
have  vouchsafed  to  look,  for  the  means  of  sup 
porting  even  his  own  household.  Examples 
to  the  same  effect  might  easily  be  multiplied. 
But  despots,  we  see,  do  plunder  their  subjects, 
though  history  and  experience  tell  them,  that 
by  prematurely  exacting  the  means  of  profu 
sion,  they  are  in  fact  devouring  the  seed-corn, 
from  which  the  future  harvest  of  revenue  is  to 
spring.  Why  then  should  we  suppose  that  the 
people  will  be  deterred  from  procuring  imme 
diate  relief  and  enjoyment  by  the  fear  of  distant 
calamities,  of  calamities  which,  perhaps,  may 
not  be  fully  felt  till  the  times  of  their  grand 
children  1 

These  conclusions  are  strictly  drawn  from 
Mr.  Mill's  own  principles  :  and,  unlike  most  of 
the  conclusions  which  he  has  himself  drawn 
from  those  principles,  they  are  not,  as  far  as 
we  know,  contradicted  by  facts.  The  case  of 
the  United  States  is  not  in  point.  In  a  country 
where  the  necessaries  of  life  are  cheap  and  the 
wages  of  labour  high,  where  a  man  who  has 
no  capital  but  his  legs  and  arms  may  expect 
to  become  rich  by  industry  and  frugality,  it  is 
not  very  decidedly  even  for  the  immediate 
advantage  of  the  poor  to  plunder  the  rich;  and 
the  punishment  of  doing  so  would  very  speedily 
follow  the  offence.  But  in  countries  in  which 
the  great  majorities  live  from  hand  to  mouth, 
and  in  which  vast  masses  of  wealth  have  been 
accumulated  by  a  comparatively  small  number, 
the  case  is  widely  different.  The  immediate 
want  is,  at  particular  seasons,  craving,  impe 
rious,  irresistible.  In  our  own  time,  it  has 
steeled  men  to  the  fear  of  the  gallows,  and 
urged  them  on  the  point  of  the  bayonet.  And 
if  these  men  had  at  their  command  that  gallows, 
and  those  bayonets,  which  now  scarcely  restrain 
them,  what  is  to  be  expected  ?  Nor  is  this  state 
of  things  one  which  can  exist  only  under  a  bad 
government.  If  there  be  the  least  truth  in  the 
doctrines  of  the  school  to  which  Mr.  Mill  be 
longs,  the  increase  of  population  will  necessa 
rily  produce  it  everywhere.  The  increase  of 
population  is  accelerated  by  good  and  cheap 
government.  Therefore,  the  better  the  govern 
ment,  the  greater  is  the  inequality  of  condi 
tions  ;  and  the  greater  the  inequality  of  con 
ditions,  the  stronger  are  the  motives  which 
impel  the  populace  to  spoliation.  As  for 
America,  we  appeal  to  the  twentieth  century. 


It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  discuss  the  effects 
which  a  general  spoliation  of  the  rich  would 
produce.  It  may  indeed  happen,  that  where  a 
legal  and  political  system  full  of  abuses  is 
inseparably  bound  up  with  the  institution  of 
property,  a  nation  may  gain  by  a  single  con 
vulsion,  in  which  both  perish  together.  The 
price  is  fearful :  but  if,  when  the  shock  is  over, 
a  new  order  of  things  should  arise,  under 
which  property  may  enjoy  security,  the  indus 
try  of  individuals  will  soon  repair  the  devasta 
tion.  Thus  we  entertain  no  doubt  that  the 
Revolution  was,  on  the  whole,  a  most  salutary 
event  for  France.  But  would  France  have 
gained,  if,  ever  since  the  year  1793,  she  had 
been  governed  by  a  democratic  convention? 
If  Mr.  Mill's  principles  be  sound,  we  say  that 
almost  her  whole  capital  would  by  this  time 
have  been  annihilated.  As  soon  as  the  first 
explosion  was  beginning  to  be  forgotten,  as 
soon  as  wealth  again  began  to  germinate,  as 
soon  as  the  poor  again  began  to  compare  their 
cottages  and  salads  with  the  hotels  and  ban 
quets  of  the  rich,  there  would  have  been  an 
other  scramble  for  property,  another  maximum, 
another  general  confiscation,  another  reign  of 
terror.  Four  or  five  such  convulsions  follow 
ing  each  other,  at  intervals  of  ten  or  twelve 
years,  would  reduce  the  most  flourishing  coun 
tries  of  Europe  to  the  state  of  Barbary  or  the 
Morea. 

The  civilized  part  of  the  world  has  now 
nothing  to  fear  from  the  hostility  of  savage 
nations.  Once  the  deluge  of  barbarism  has 
passed  over  it,  to  destroy  and  to  fertilize ;  and 
in  the  present  state  of  mankind  we  enjoy  a  full 
security  against  that  calamity.  That  flood  will 
no  more  return  to  cover  the  earth.  But  is  it 
possible  that,  in  the  bosom  of  civilization  it 
self,  may  be  engendered  the  malady  which  shall 
destroy  if?  Is  it  possible  that  institutions  may 
be  established  which,  without  the  help  of  earth 
quake,  of  famine,  of  pestilence,  or  of  the  foreign 
sword,  may  undo  the  work  of  so  many  ages 
of  wisdom  and  glory,  and  gradually  sweep 
away  taste,  literature,  science,  commerce,  ma 
nufactures,  every  thing  but  the  rude  arts  ne 
cessary  to  the  support  of  animal  life?  Is  it 
possible,  that  in  two  or  three  hundred  years,  a 
few  lean  and  half-naked  fishermen  may  divide 
with  owls  and  foxes  the  ruins  of  the  greatest 
of  European  cities — may  wash  their  nets 
amidst  the  relics  of  her  gigantic  docks,  and 
build  their  huts  out  of  the  capitals  of  her 
stately  cathedrals?  If  the  principles  of  Mr. 
Mill  be  sound,  we  say,  without  hesitation,  that 
the  form  of  government  which  he  recommends 
will  assuredly  produce  all  this.  But  if  these 
principles  be  unsound,  if  the  reasonings  by 
which  we  have  opposed  them  be  just,  the  higher 
and  middling  orders  are  the  natural  representa 
tives  of  the  human  race.  Their  interest  may 
be  opposed,  in  some  things,  to  that  of  their 
poorer  contemporaries,  but  it  is  identical  with 
that  of  the  innumerable  generations  which  are 
to  follow. 

Mr.  Mill  concludes  his  essay,  by  answering 
an  objection  often  made  to  the  project  of  uni 
versal  suffrage— that  the  people  do  not  under 
stand  their  own  interests.  We  shall  not  go 
through  his  arguments  on  this  subject,  because, 


MILL'S  ESSAi"  ON   GOVERNMENT. 


681 


till  he  has  proved,  that  it  is  for  the  interest  of  | 
the  people  to  respect  property,  he  only  makes 
matters  worse,  by  proving  that  they  understand 
their  interests.  But  we  cannot  refrain  from 
treating  our  readers  with  a  delicious  bonne 
bouche  of  wisdom,  which  he  has  kept  for  the 
last  moment. 

"The  opinions  of  that  class  of  the  people 
who  are  below  the  middle  rank  are  formed,  and 
their  minds  are  directed,  by  that  intelligent,  that 
virtuous  rank,  who  come  the  most  immediately 
in  contact  with  them,  who  are  in  the  constant 
habit  of  intimate  communication  with  them,  to 
whom  they  tiy  for  advice  and  assistance  in  all 
their  numerous  difficulties,  upon  whom  they 
feel  an  immediate  and  daily  dependence  in 
health  and  in  sickness,  in  infancy  and  in  old 
age,  to  whom  their  children  look  up  as  models 
for  their  imitation,  whose  opinions  they  hear 
daily  repeated,  and  account  it  their  honour  to 
adopt.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  middle 
rank,  which  gives  to  science,  to  art,  and  to 
legislation  itself,  their  most  distinguished  orna 
ments,  and  is  the  chief  source  of  all  that  has 
exalted  and  refined  human  natnre,  is  that  por 
tion  of  the  community,  of  which,  if  the  basis 
of  representation  were  ever  so  far  extended, 
the  opinion  would  ultimately  decide.  Of  the 
people  beneath  them,  a  vast  majority  would  be 
sure  to  be  guided  by  their  advice  and  ex 
ample." 

This  single  paragraph  is  sufficient  to  upset 
Mr.  Mill's  theory.  Will  the  people  act  against 
their  own  interest1?  Or  will  the  middle  rank 
net  against  its  own  interest  1  Or  is  the  inte 
rest  of  the  middle  rank  identical  with  the  inte 
rest  of  the  people]  If  the  people  act  accord 
ing  to  the  directions  of  the  middle  rank,  as  Mr. 
Mill  says  that  they  assuredly  will,  one  of  these 
three  questions  must  be  answered  in  the  affir 
mative.  But  if  any  one  of  the  three  be  answer 
ed  in  the  affirmative,  his  whole  system  falls  to 
the  ground.  If  the  interest  of  the  middle  rank 
be  identical  with  that  of  the  people,  why  should 
not  the  powers  of  government  be  intrusted  to 
that  rank  1  If  the  powers  of  government  were 
intrusted  to  that  rank,  there  would  evidently 
be  an  aristocracy  of  wealth ;  and  "  to  constitute 
an  aristocracy  of  wealth,  though  it  were  a  very 
numerous  one,  would,"  according  to  Mr.  Mill, 
leave  the  community  without  protection,  and 
exposed  to  all  the  "evils  of  unbridled  power." 
"Will  not  the  same  motives  which  induce  the 
middle  classes  to  abuse  one  of  kind  of  power, 
induce  them  to  abuse  another]  If  their  interest 
be  the  same  with  that  of  the  people,  they  will 
govern  the  people  well.  If  it  be  opposite  to 
that  of  the  people,  they  will  advise  the  people 
ill.  The  system  of  universal  suffrage,  there 
fore,  according  to  Mr.  Mill's  own  account,  is 
only  a  device  for  doing  circuitously  what  a 
representative  system,  with  a  pretty  high  qua 
lification,  would  do  directly. 

So  ends  the  celebrated  essay.  And  such  is 
this  philosophy,  for  which  the  experience  of 
three  thousand  years  is  to  be  discarded ;  this 
philosophy,  the  professors  of  which  speak  as 
if  it  had  guided  the  world  to  the  knowledge  of 
navigation  and  alphabetical  writing;  as  if,  be 
fore  its  dawn,  the  inhabitants  of  Europe  had 
lived  in  caverns  and  eaten  each  other!  We 
VOL.  V.— 86 


are  sick,  it  seems,  like  the  children  of  Israel, 
of  the  objects  of  our  old  and  legitimate  wor 
ship.  We  pine  for  a  new  idolatry.  All  that 
is  costly  and  all  that  is  ornamental  in  our  in 
tellectual  treasures  must  be  delivered  up,  and 
cast  into  the  furnace — and  there  comes  out 
this  calf! 

Our  readers  can  scarcely  mistake  our  object 
in  writing  this  article.  They  will  not  suspect 
us  of  any  disposition  to  advocate  the  cause  of 
absolute  monarchy,  or  of  any  narrow  form 
of  oligarchy,  or  to  exaggerate  the  evils  of  po 
pular  government.  Our  object  at  present  is, 
not  so  much  to  attack  or  defend  any  particular 
system  of  polity,  as  to  expose  the  vices  of  a 
kind  of  reasoning  utterly  unfit  for  moral  and 
political  discussions ;  of  a  kind  of  reasoning 
which  may  so  readily  be  turned  to  purposes 
of  falsehood,  that  it  ought  to  receive  no  quarter, 
even  when  by  accident  it  may  be  employed  on 
the  side  of  truth. 

Our  objection  to  the  essay  of  Mr.  Mill  is 
fundamental.  We  believe  that  it  is  utterly 
impossible  to  deduce  the  science  of  govern 
ment  from  the  principles  of  human  nature. 

What  proposition  is  there  respecting  human 
nature  which  is  absolutely  and  universally 
true]  We  know  of  only  one;  and  that  is  no! 
only  true,  but  identical ;  that  men  always  acl 
from  self-interest.  This  truism  the  Utilitarians 
proclaim  with  as  much  pride  as  if  it  were  rew. 
and  as  much  zeal  as  if  it  were  important.  But 
in  fact,  when  explained,  it  means  only  that 
men,  if  they  can,  will  do  as  they  cheese 
When  we  see  the  actions  of  a  man,  we  know 
with  certainty  what  he  thinks  his  interest  to  be 
But  it  is  impossible  to  reason  with  certainty 
from  what  we  take  to  be  his  interest  to  his  ac 
tions.  One  man  goes  without  a  dinner,  that 
he  may  add  a  shilling  to  a  hundred  thousand 
pounds  :  another  runs  in  debt  to  give  balls  and 
masquerades.  One  man  cuts  his  father's  throat 
to  get  possession  of  his  old  clothes  :  another 
hazards  his  own  life  to  save  that  of  an  enemy. 
One  man  volunteers  on  a  forlorn  hope :  an 
other  is  drummed  out  of  a  regiment  for  cow 
ardice.  Each  of  these  men  has,  no  doubt, 
acted  from  self-interest.  But  *ve  gain  nothing 
by  knowing  this,  except  the  pleasure,  if  it  be 
one,  of  multiplying  useless  words.  In  fact, 
this  principle  is  just  as  recondite,  and  just  as 
important,  as  the  great  truth,  that  whatever  is, 
is.  If  a  philosopher  were  always  to  state  facts 
in  the  following  form — "There  is  a  shower: 
but  whatever  is,  is ;  therefore,  there  is  a  shower," 
his  reasoning  would  be  perfectly  sound ;  but 
we  do  not  apprehend  that  it  would  materially 
enlarge  the  circle  of  human  knowledge.  And 
it  is  equally  idle  to  attribute  any  importance  to 
a  proposition,  which,  when  interpreted,  means 
only  that  a  man  had  rather  do  what  he  had 
rather  do. 

If  the  doctrine  that  men  always  act  from 
self-interest  be  laid  down  in  any  other  sense 
than  this — if  the  meaning  of  the  word  self- 
interest  be  narrowed  so  as  to  exclude  any  one 
of  the  motives  which  may  by  possibility  act 
on  any  human  being, — the  proposition  ceases 
to  be  identical ;  but  at  the  same  time  it  ceases 
to  be  true. 

What  we  have  said  of  the  word  "self-inte 


683 


MACAUL^Y'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


rest"  applies  to  all  the  synonymes  and  circum 
locutions  which  are  employed  to  convey  the 
same  meaning;  pain  and  pleasure,  happiness 
and  misery,  objects  of  desire,  and  so  forth. 

The  whole  art  of  Mr.  Mill's  essay  consists 
in  one  simple  trick  of  legerdemain.  It  con 
sists  in  using  words  of  the  sort  which  we  have 
been  describing,  first  in  one  sense  and  then  in 
another.  Men  will  take  the  objects  of  their 
desire  if  they  can.  Unquestionably  : — but  this 
is  an  identical  proposition :  for  an  object  of 
desire  means  merely  a  thing  which  a  man  will 
procure  if  he  can.  Nothing  can  possibly  be 
inferred  from  a  maxim  of  this  kind.  When 
we  see  a  man  take  something,  we  shall  know 
that  it  was  an  object  of  his  desire.  But  till 
then,  we  have  no  means  of  judging  with  cer 
tainty  what  he  desires,  or  what  he  will  take. 
The  general  proposition,  however,  having  been 
admitted,  Mr.  Mill  proceeds  to  reason  as  if 
men  had  no  desires  but  those  which  can  be 
gratified  only  by  spoliation  and  oppression.  It 
then  becomes  easy  to  deduce  doctrines  of  vast 
importance  from  the  original  axiom.  The 
only  misfortune  is,  that  by  thus  narrowing  the 
meaning  of  the  word  desire,  the  axiom  be 
comes  false,  and  all  the  doctrines  consequent 
upon  it  are  false  likewise. 

When  we  pass  beyond  those  maxims  which 
it  is  impossible  to  deny  without  a  contradiction 
in  terms,  and  which,  therefore,  do  not  enable 
us  to  advance  a  single  step  in  practical  know 
ledge,  we  do  not  believe  that  it  is  possible  to 
lay  down  a  single  general  rule  respecting  the 
motives  which  influence  human  actions.  There 
is  nothing  which  may  not,  by  association  or  by 
comparison,  become  an  object  either  of  desire 
or  of  aversion.  The  fear  of  death  is  generally 
considered  as  one  of  the  strongest  of  our  feel 
ings.  It  is  the  most  formidable  sanction  which 
legislators  have  been  able  to  devise.  Yet 
it  is  notorious  that,  as  Lord  Bacon  has  ob 
served,  there  is  no  passion  by  which  that  fear 
has  not  been  often  overcome.  Physical  pain 
is  indisputably  an  evil ;  yet  it  has  been  often 
endured,  and  even  welcomed.  Innumerable 
martyrs  have  exulted  in  torments  which  made 
the  spectators  shudder;  and,  to  use  a  more 
homely  illustration,  there  are  few  wives  who 
do  not  long  to  be  mothers. 

Is  the  love  of  approbation  a  stronger  motive 
than  the  love  of  wealth  ?  It  is  impossible  to 
answer  this  question  generally,  even  in  the 
case  of  an  individual  with  whom  we  are  very 
intimate.  We  often  say,  indeed,  that  a  man 
loves  fame  more  than  money,  or  money  more 
than  fame.  But  this  is  said  in  a  loose  and 
popular  sense ;  for  there  is  scarcely  a  man 
who  would  not  endure  a  few  sneers  for  a  great 
sum  of  money,  if  he  were  in  pecuniary  dis 
tress;  and  scarcely  a  man,  on  the  other  hand, 
who,  if  he  were  in  flourishing  circumstances, 
would  expose  himself  to  the  hatred  and  con 
tempt  of  the  public  for  a  trifle.  In  order,  there 
fore,  to  return  a  precise  answer,  even  about  a 
single  human  being,  we  must  know  what  is  the 
amount  of  the  sacrifice  of  reputation  demand 
ed,  and  of  the  pecuniary  advantage  offered, 
and  in  what  situation  the  person  to  whom  the 
temptation  is  proposed  stands  at  the  time.  But 
when  the  imestion  is  propounded  generally 


about  the  whole  species,  the  impossibility  of 
answering  is  still  more  evident.  Man  differs 
from  man ;  generation  from  generation ;  na 
tion  from  nation.  Education,  station,  sex,  age, 
accidental  associations,  produce  infinite  shades 
of  variety. 

Now,  the  only  mode  in  which  we  can  con 
ceive  it  possible  to  deduce  a  theory  of  govern 
ment  from  the  principles  of  human  nature,  is 
this.  We  must  find  out  what  are  the  motives 
which,  in  a  particular  form  of  government, 
impel  rulers  to  bad  measures,  and  what  are 
those  which  impel  them  to  good  measures. 
We  must  then  compare  the  effect  of  the  two 
classes  of  motives;  and  according  as  we  find 
the  one  or  the  other  to  prevail,  we  must  pro 
nounce  the  form  of  government  in  question 
good  or  bad. 

Now  let  it  be  supposed  that,  in  aristocratical 
and  monarchical  states,  the  desire  of  wealth, 
and  other  desires  of  the  same  class,  always 
tend  to  produce  misgovernment,  and  that  the 
love  of  approbation,  and  other  kindred  feelings, 
always  tend  to  produce  good  government. 
Then,  if  it  be  impossible,  as  we  have  shown 
that  it  is,  to  pronounce  generally  which  of  the 
two  classes  of  motives  is  the  more  influential, 
it  is  impossible  to  find  out,  a  priori,  whether  a 
monarchical  or  aristocratical  form  of  govern 
ment  be  good  or  bad. 

Mr.  Mill  has  avoided  the  difficulty  of  making 
the  comparison,  by  very  coolly  putting  all  the 
weights  into  one  of  the  scales, — by  reasoning 
as  if  no  human  being  had  ever  sympathized 
with  the  feelings,  been  gratified  by  the  thanks, 
or  been  galled  by  the  execrations,  of  another. 

The  case,  as  we  have  put  it,  is  decisive 
against  Mr.  Mill ;  and  yet  we  have  put  it  in  a 
manner  far  too  favourable  to  him.  For  in 
fact,  it  is  impossible  to  lay  it  down  as  a  general 
rule,  that  the  love  of  wealth  in  a  sovereign 
always  produces  misgovernment,  or  the  love 
of  approbation  good  government.  A  patient 
and  far-sighted  ruler,  for  example,  who  is  less 
desirous  of  raising  a  great  sum  immediately, 
than  of  securing  an  unencumbered  and  pro 
gressive  revenue,  will,  by  taking  off  restraints 
from  trade,  and  giving  perfect  security  to  pro 
perty,  encourage  accumulation,  and  entice 
capital  from  foreign  countries.  The  com 
mercial  policy  of  Prussia,  which  is  perhaps 
superior  to  that  of  any  government  in  the 
world,  and  which  puts  to  shame  the  absurdi 
ties  of  our  republican  brethren  on  the  other 
side  of  the  Atlantic,  has  probably  sprung  from 
the  desire  of  an  absolute  ruler  to  enrich  him 
self.  On  the  other  hand,  when  the  popular 
estimate  of  virtues  and  vices  is  erroneous, 
which  is  too  often  the  case,  the  love  of  appro 
bation  leads  sovereigns  to  spend  the  wealth  of 
the  nation  on  useless  shows,  or  to  engage  in 
wanton  and  destructive  wars.  If,  then,  we  can 
neither  compare  the  strength  of  two  motive?, 
nor  determine  with  certainty  to  what  descrip 
tion  of  actions  either  motive  will  lead,  how  can 
ive  possibly  deduce  a  theory  of  government 
from  the  nature  of  man? 

How,  then,  are  we  to  arrive  at  just  conclu 
sions  on  a  subject  so  important  to  the  happi 
ness  of  mankind  1  Surely  by  that  method 
which,  in  every  experimental  science,  to  which 


MILL'S  ESSAY  ON  GOVERNMENT. 


683 


it  has  been  applied,  has  signally  increased  the 
power  and  knowledge  of  our  species, — by  that 
method  for  which  our  new  philosophers  would 
substitute  quibbles  scarcely  worthy  of  barba 
rous  respondents  and  opponents  of  the  middle 
ages, — by  the  method  of  induction ; — by  observ 
ing  the  present  state  of  the  world, — by  as 
siduously  studying  the  history  of  past  ages, — 
by  sifting  the  evidence  of  facts, — by  carefully 
combining  and  contrasting  those  which  are 
authentic, — by  generalizing  with  judgment  and 
diffidence, — by  perpetually  bringing  the  theory 
which  we  have  constructed  to  the  test  of  new 
facts, — by  correcting,  or  altogether  abandoning 
it,  according  as  those  new  facts  prove  it  to  be 
partially  or  fundamentally  unsound.  Proceed 
ing  thus, — patiently,  diligently,  candidly, — we 
may  hope  to  form  a  system  as  far  inferior  in 
pretensions  to  that  which  we  have  been  ex 
amining,  and  as  far  superior  to  it  in  real  utility, 
as  the  prescriptions  of  a  great  physician,  vary 
ing  with  every  stage  of  every  malady,  and 
with  the  constitution  of  every  patient,  to  the 
pill  of  the  advertising  quack,  which  is  to 
cure  all  human  beings,  in  all  climates,  of  all 
diseases. 

This  is  that  noble  science  of  politics,  which 
is  equally  removed  from  the  barren  theories  of 
the  Utilitarian  sophists,  and  from  the  petty 
craft,  so  often  mistaken  for  statesmanship  by 
minds  grown  narrow  in  habits  of  intrigue,  job 
bing,  and  official  etiquette ; — which,  of  all 
sciences,  is  the  most  important  to  the  welfare 


of  nations, — which,  of  all  sciences,  most  tends 
to  expand  and  invigorate  the  mind, — which 
draws  nutriment  and  ornament  from  every  part 
of  philosophy  and  literature,  and  dispenses,  in. 
return,  nutriment  and  ornament  to  all.  We  are 
sorry  and  surprised  when  we  see  men  of  good 
intentions  and  good  natural  abilities  abandon 
this  healthful  and  generous  study,  to  pore  over 
speculations  like  those  which  we  have  been 
examining.  And  we  should  heartily  rejoice  to 
find  that  our  remarks  had  induced  any  person 
of  this  description,  to  employ,  in  researches  of 
real  utility,  the  talents  and  industry  which  are 
now  wasted  on  verbal  sophisms,  wretched  of 
their  wretched  kind. 

As  to  the  greater  part  of  the  sect,  it  is,  we 
apprehend,  of  little  consequence,  what  they 
study,  or  under  whom.  It  would  be  more 
amusing,  to  be  sure,  and  more  reputable,  if  they 
would  take  up  the  old  republican  cant,  and 
declaim  about  Brutus  and  Timoleon,  the  duty 
of  killing  tyrants,  and  the  blessedness  of  dying 
for  liberty.  But,  on  the  whole,  they  might  have 
chosen  worse.  They  may  as  well  be  Utilita 
rians  as  jockeys  or  dandies.  And  though 
quibbling  about  self-interest  and  motives,  and 
objects  of  desire,  and  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  greatest  number,  is  but  a  poor  employ 
ment  for  a  grown  man,  it  certainly  hurts  the 
health  less  than  hard  drinking,  and  the  fortune 
less  than  high  play:  it  is  not  much  more 
laughable  than  phrenology,  and  is  immeasu 
rably  more  humane  than  cock-fighting. 


MACAULAl'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


BERTRAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL.* 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  JUNE,  1829.] 


WE  have  had  great  reason,  we  think,  to  be 
gratified  by  the  success  of  our  late  attack  on 
Ihe  Utilitarians.  We  could  publish  a  long  list 
of  the  cures  which  it  has  wrought,  in  cases 
previously  considered  as  hopeless.  Delicacy 
forbids  us  to  divulge  names;  but  we  cannot 
refrain  from  alluding  to  two  remarkable  in 
stances. — A  respectable  lady  writes  to  inform 
us,  that  her  son,  who  was  plucked  at  Cam 
bridge  last  January,  has  not  been  heard  to  caH 
Sir  James  Mackintosh  a  poor  ignorant  fool 
more  than  twice  since  the  appearance  of  our 
article.  A  distinguished  political  writer  in  the 
Westminster  and  Parliamentary  Reviews  has 
borrowed  Hume's  History,  and  has  actually  got 
as  far  as  the  battle  of  Agincourt.  He  assures 
us  that  he  takes  great  pleasure  in  his  new 
study,  and  that  he  is  very  impatient  to  learn 
how  Scotland  and  England  became  one  king 
dom.  But  the  greatest  compliment  that  we 
have  received  is,  that  Mr.  Beritham  himself 
should  have  condescended  to  take  the  field  in 
defence  of  Mr.  Mill.  We  have  not  been  in  the 
habit  of  re  vie  wing  reviews;  but  asMr.Bentham 
is  a  truly  great  man,  and  as  his  party  have 
thought  fit  to  announce  in  puffs  and  placards 
that  this  article  is  written  by  him,  and  contains 
not  only  an  answer  to  our  attacks,  but  a  develop 
ment  of  the  "greatest  happiness  principle," 
with  the  latest  improvements  of  the  author,  we 
shall  for  once  depart  from  our  general  rule. 
However  the  conflict  may  terminate,  we  shall 
at  least  not  have  been  vanquished  by  an  igno 
ble  hand. 

Of  Mr.  Bentham  himself,  we  shall  endea 
vour,  even  while  defending  ourselves  against 
his  reproaches,  Ao  speak  with  the  respect  to 
which  his  venerable  age,  his  genius,  and  his 
public  services  entitle  him.  If  any  harsh  ex 
pression  should  escape  us,  we  trust  that  he 
will  attribute  it  to  inadvertence,  to  the  momen 
tary  warmth  of  controversy, — to  any  thing,  in 
short,  rather  than  to  a  design  of  affronting  him. 
Though  we  have  nothing  in  common  with  the 
crew  of  Hurds  and  Boswells,  who,  either  from 
interested  motives,  or  from  the  habit  of  intel 
lectual  servility  and  dependence,  pamper  and 
vitiate  his  appetite  with  the  noxious  sweetness 
of  their  undiscerning  praise,  we  are  not  per 
haps  less  competent  than  they  to  appreciate 
his  merit, or  less  sincerely  disposed  to  acknow 
ledge  it.  Though  we  may  sometimes  think  his 
reasonings  on  moral  and  political  questions 
(eeble  and  sophistical — though  we  may  some 
times  smile  at  his  extraordinary  language — we 
can  never  be  weary  of  admiring  the  amplitude 
«f  his  comprehension, the  keenness  of  his  pene- 
Vratior,  the  exuberant  fertility  with  which  his 
mind  pours  forth  arguments  and  illustrations. 

*llie  Westminster  Review,  No.  XX!.,  Article  XVI. 
Edinburgh  Review,  No.  YCVJI.,  Article  on  Mill's  Essays 
or  Government,  &c. 


However  sharply  he  may  speak  of  us,  we  can 
never  cease  to  revere  in  him  tne  father  of  the 
philosophy  of  Jurisprudence.  He  has  a  full 
right  to  all  the  privileges  of  a  great  inventor; 
and,  in  our  court  of  criticism,  those  privileges 
will  never  be  pleaded  in  vain.  But  they  are 
limited  in  the  same  manner  in  which,  fortu 
nately  for  the  ends  of  justice,  the  privileges  of 
the  peerage  are  now  limited.  The  advantage 
is  personal  and  incommunicable.  A  nobleman 
can  now  no  longer  cover  with  his  protection 
every  lackey  who  follows  his  heels,  or  every 
bully  who  draws  in  his  quarrel;  and,  highly 
as  we  respect  the  exalted  rank  which  Mr.  Ben 
tham  holds  among  the  writers  of  our  time,  yet 
when,  for  the  due  maintenance  of  literary  po 
lice,  we  shall  think  it  necessary  to  confute  so 
phists,  or  to  bring  pretenders  lo  shame,  we  shall 
not  depart  from  the  ordinary  course  of  our  pro 
ceedings  because  the  offenders  call  themselves 
Benthamites. 

Whether  Mr.  Mill  has  much  reason  to  thank 
Mr.  Bentham  for  undertaking  his  defence,  our 
readers,  when  they  have  finished  this  article, 
will  perhaps  be  inclined  to  doubt.  Great  as 
Mr.  Bentham's  talents  are,  he  has,  we  think, 
shown  an  undue  confidence  in  them.  He 
should  have  considered  how  dangerous  it  is 
for  any  man,  however  eloquent  and  ingenious 
he  may  be,  to  attack  or  to  defend  a  book  with 
out  reading  it.  And  we  feel  quite  convinced 
that  Mr.  Bentham  would  never  have  written 
the  article  before  us,  if  he  had,  before  he  be 
gan,  perused  our  review  with  attention,  and 
compared  it  with  Mr.  Mill's  Essay. 

He  has  utterly  mistaken  our  object  and 
meaning.  He  seems  to  think  that  we  have 
undertaken  to  set  up  some  theory  of  govern 
ment  in  opposition  to  that  of  Mr.  Mill.  But  we 
distinctly  disclaimed  any  such  design.  From 
the  beginning  to  the  end  of  our  article,  there  is 
not,  as  far  as  we  remember,  a  single  sentence 
which,  when  fairly  construed,  can  be  considered 
as  indicating  any  such  design.  If  such  an  ex 
pression  can  be  found,  it  has  been  dropped  by 
inadvertence.  Our  object  was  to  prove,  not 
that  monarchy  and  aristocracy  are  good,  but 
that  Mr.  Mill  had  not  proved  them  to  be  bad; 
not  that  democracy  is  bad,  but  that  Mr.  Mill 
had  not  proved  it  to  be  good.  The  points  in 
issue  are  these,  Whether  the  famous  Essay  on 
Government  be,  as  it  has  been  called,  a  perfect 
solution  of  the  great  political  problem,  or  a  se 
ries  of  sophisms  and  blunders;  and  whether 
the  sect  which,  while  it  glories  in  the  precision 
of  its  logic,  extols  this  Essay  as  a  masterpiece 
of  demonstration,  be  a  sect  deserving  of  the 
respect  or  of  the  derision  of  mankind.  These, 
we  say,  are  the  issues ;  and  on  these  we  with 
full  confidence  put  ourselves  on  the  country. 

It  is  not  necessary,  for  the  purposes  of  this 
investigation,  that  we  should  stale  what  our 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL. 


685  ' 


political  creed  is,  or  whether  we  have  any  po 
litical  creed  at  all.  A  man  who  cannot  act  the 
most  trivial  part  in  a  farce  has  a  right  to  his 
Komeo  Coates — a  man  who  does  not  know  a 
vein  from  an  artery  may  caution  a  simple 
neighbour  against  the  advertisements  of  Doc 
tor  Eady.  A  complete  theory  of  government 
would,  indeed,  be  a  noble  present  to  mankind ; 
but  it  is  a  present  which  we  do  not  hope,  and 
do  not  pretend,  that  we  can  offer.  If,  however, 
we  cannot  lay  the  foundation,  it  is  something 
to  clear  away  the  rubbish — if  we  cannot  set  up 
truth.it  is  something  to  pull  down  error.  Even 
if  the  subjects  of  which  the  Utilitarians  treat 
were  subjects  of  less  fearful  importance,  we 
should  think  it  no  small  service  to  the  cause 
of  good  sense  and  good  taste,  to  point  out  the 
contrast  between  their  magnificent  pretensions 
and  their  miserable  performances.  Some  of 
them  have,  however,  thought  fit  to  display  their 
ingenuity  on  questions  of  the  most  momentous 
kind,  and  on  questions  concerning  which  men 
cannot  reason  ill  with  impunity.  We  think  it, 
under  these  circumstances,  an  absolute  duty 
to  expose  the  fallacy  of  their  arguments.  It 
is  no  matter  of  pride  or  of  pleasure.  To  read 
their  works  is  the  most  soporific  employment 
that  we  know ;  and  a  man  ought  no  more  to 
be  proud  of  refuting  them  than  of  having  two 
legs.  We  must  now  come  to  close  quarters 
with  Mr.  Bentham,  whom,  we  need  not  say, 
we  do  not  mean  to  include  in  this  observation. 
He  charges  us  with  maintaining, — 

"  First,  « that  it  is  not  true  that  all  despots 
govern  ill :' — whereon  the  world  is  in  a  mis 
take,  and  the  whigs  have  the  true  light.  And 
for  proof,  principally, — that  the  king  of  Den 
mark  is  not  Caligula.  To  which  the  answer 
is,  that  the  king  of  Denmark  is  not  a  despot. 
He  was  put  in  his  present  situation,  by  the 
people  turning  the  scale  in  his  favour,  in  a 
balanced  contest  between  himself  and  the  no 
bility.  And  it  is  quite  clear  that  the  same 
power  would  turn  the  scale  the  other  way,  the 
moment  a  king  of  Denmark  should  take  into 
his  head  to  be  Caligula.  It  is  of  little  conse 
quence  by  what  congeries  of  letters  the  ma 
jesty  of  Denmark  is  typified  in  the  royal  press 
of  Copenhagen,  while  the  real  fact  is,  that  the 
sword  of  the  people  is  suspended  over  his  head 
in  case  of  ill-behaviour,  as  effectually  as  in 
other  countries  where  more  noise  is  made 
upon  the  subject.  Everybody  believes  the 
sovereign  of  Denmark  to  be  a  good  and  virtu 
ous  gentleman  ;  but  there  is  no  more  superhu 
man  merit  in  his  being  so,  than  in  the  case  of 
a  rural  squire  who  does  not  shoot  his  land- 
steward,  or  quarter  his  wife  with  his  yeomanry 
sabre. 

"It  is  true  that  there  are  partial  exceptions 
to  the  rule,  that  all  men  use  power  as  badly  as 
they  dare  There  may  have  been  such  things 
as  amiable  negro-drivers  and  sentimental  mas 
ters  of  press-gangs  ;  and  here  and  there,  among 
the  odd  freaks  of  human  nature,  there  may  have 
been  specimens  of  men  who  were  '  No  tyrants, 
though  bred  up  to  tyranny.'  But  it  would  be 
as  wise  to  recommend  wolves  for  nurses  at 
the  Foundling,  on  the  credit  of  Romulus  and 
Remus,  as  to  substitute  the  exception  for  the 
general  fact,  and  advise  mankind  to  take  to 


trusting  to  arbitrary  power  on  the  credit  of 
these  specimens." 

Now,  in  the  first  place,  we  never  cited  the 
case  of  Denmark  to  prove  that  all  despots  do 
not  govern  ill.  We  cited  it  to  prove  that  Mr. 
Mill  did  not  know  how  to  reason.  Mr.  Mill 
gave  it  as  a  reason  for  deducing  the  theory  of 
government  from  the  general  laws  of  human 
nature,  that  the  king  of  Denmark  was  not 
Caligula.  This  we  said,  and  we  still  say,  was 
absurd. 

In  the  second  place,  it  was  not  we,  but  Mr. 
Mill,  who  said  that  the  king  of  Denmark  was 
a  despot.  His  words  are  these  : — "The  people 
of  Denmark,  tired  out  with  the  oppression  of 
an  aristocracy,  resolved  that  their  king  should 
be  absolute ;  and  under  their  absolute  monarch 
are  as  well  governed  as  any  people  in  Europe." 
We  leave  Mr.  Bentham  to  settle  with  Mr.  Mill 
the  distinction  between  a  despot  and  an  abso 
lute  king. 

In  the  third  place,  Mr.  Bentham  says,  that 
there  was  in  Denmark  a  balanced  contest  be 
tween  the  king  and  the  nobility.  We  find 
some  difficulty  in  believing  that  Mr.  Bentham 
seriously  means  to  say  this,  when  we  considei 
that  Mr.  Mill  has  demonstrated  the  chance  to 
be  as  infinity  to  one  against  the  existence  of 
such  a  balanced  contest. 

Fourthly,  Mr.  Bentham  says,  that  in  this 
balanced  contest  the  people  turned  the  scale 
in  favour  of  the  king  against  the  aristocracy. 
But  Mr.  Mill  has  demonstrated,  that  it  cannot 
possibly  be  for  the  interest  of  the  monarchy 
and  democracy  to  join  against  the  aristocracy; 
and  that  wherever  the  three  parties  exist,  the 
king  and  the  aristocracy  will  combine  against 
the  people.  This,  Mr.  Mill  assures  us,  is  as 
certain  as  any  thing  which  depends  upon 
human  will. 

Fifthly,  Mr.  Bentham  says,  that  if  the  king 
of  Denmark  were  to  oppress  his  people,  the 
people  and  nobles  would  combine  against  the 
king.  But  Mr.  Mill  has  proved  that  it  can 
never  be  for  the  interest  of  the  aristocracy  to 
combine  with  the  democracy  against  the  king. 
It  is  evidently  Mr.  Bentham's  opinion,  that 
"  monarchy,  aristocracy,  and  democracy,  may 
balance  each  other,  and  by  mutual  checks  pro 
duce  good  government."  But  this  is  the  very 
theory  which  Mr.  Mill  pronounces  to  be  the 
wildest,  the  most  visionary,  the  most  chimeri 
cal,  ever  broached  on  the  subject  of  govern 
ment. 

We  have  no  dispute  on  these  heads  with  Mr 
Bentham.  On  the  contrary,  we  think  his  ex 
planation  true — or,  at  least,  true  in  part;  and 
we  heartily  thank  him  for  lending  us  his  as 
sistance  to  demolish  the  essay  of  his  follower. 
His  wit  and  his  sarcasm  are  sport  to  us;  but 
they  are  death  to  his  unhappy  disciple. 

Mr.  Bentham  seems  to  imagine  that  we  have 
said  something  implying  an  opinion  favourable 
to  despotism.  We  can  scarcely  suppose  that, 
as  he  has  not  condescended  to  read  that  portion 
of  our  work  which  he  undertook  to  answer,  he 
can  have  bestowed  much  attention  on  its  general 
character.  Had  he  done  so,  he  would,  we  think, 
scarcely  have  entertained  such  a  suspicion. 
Mr.  Mill  asserts,  and  pretends  to  prove,  that 
under  no  despotic  government  does  any  human 
3M 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


being,  except  the  tools  of  the  sovereign,  possess  I 
more  than  the  necessaries  of  life,  and  that  the  j 
most  intense  degree  of  terror  is  kept  up  by 
constant  cruelty.  This,  we  say,  is  untrue.  It 
is  not  merely  a  rule  to  which  there  are  excep 
tions :  but  it  is  not  the  rule.  Despotism  is  bad; 
but  it  is  scarcely  anywhere  so  bad  as  Mr.  Mill 
says  that  it  is  everywhere.  This,  we  are  sure, 
Mr.  Bentham  will  allow.  If  a  man  were  to  say 
that  five  hundred  thousand  people  die  every 
year  in  London  of  dram-drinking,  he  would 
not  assert  a  proposition  more  monstrously  false 
than  Mr.  Mill's.  Would  it  be  just  to  charge  us 
with  defending  intoxication  because  we  might 
say  that  such  a  man  was  grossly  in  the  wrong! 

We  say  with  Mr.  Bentham  that  despotism  is 
a  bad  thing.  We  say  with  Mr.  Bentham  that 
the  exceptions  do  not  destroy  the  authority  of 
the  rule.  But  this  we  say — that  a  single  ex 
ception  overthrows  an  argument,  which  either 
does  not  prove  the  rule  at  all,  or  else  proves 
the  rule  to  be  true  without,  exceptions ;  and  such 
an  argument  is  Mr.  Mill's  argument  against 
despotism.  In  this  respect,  there  is  a  great 
difference  between  rules  drawn  from  expe 
rience,  and  rules  deduced  a  priori.  We  might 
believe  that  there  had  been  a  fall  of  snow  last 
August,  and  yet  not  think  it  likely  that  there 
would  be  snow  next  August.  A  single  oc 
currence  opposed  to  our  general  experience 
would  tell  for  very  little  in  our  calculation  of 
the  chances.  But  if  we  could  once  satisfy 
ourselves  that,  in  any  single  right-angled  tri 
angle,  the  square  of  the  hypothenuse  might  be 
less  than  the  squares  of  the  sides,  we  must  re 
ject  the  forty-seventh  proposition  of  Euclid 
altogether.  We  willingly  adopt  Mr.  Bentham's 
lively  illustration  about  the  wolf;  and  we  will 
say,  in  passing,  that  it  gives  us  real  pleasure 
to  see  how  little  old  age  has  diminished  the 
gayety  of  this  eminent  man.  We  can  assure 
him  that  his  merriment  gives  us  far  more  plea 
sure  on  his  account,  than  pain  in  our  own. 
We  say  with  him,  keep  the  wolf  out  of  the 
nursery,  in  spite  of  the  story  of  Romulus  and 
Remus.  But  if  the  shepherd  who  saw  the  wolf 
licking  and  suckling  those  famous  twins,  were, 
after  telling  this  story  to  his  companions,  to 
assert  that  it  was  an  infallible  rule  that  no 
wolf  ever  had  spared,  or  ever  would  spare, 
any  living  thing  which  might  fall  in  its  way — 
that  its  nature  was  carnivorous — and  that  it 
could  not  possibly  disobey  its  nature,  we  think 
that  the  hearers  might  have  been  excused  for 
starting.  It  may  be  strange,  but  is  not  incon 
sistent,  that  a  wolf  which  has  eaten  ninety-nine 
children  should  spare  the  hundredth.  But  the 
fact  that  a  wolf  has  once  spared  a  child  is 
sufficient  to  show  that  there  must  be  some  flaw 
in  the  chain  of  reasoning,  purporting  to  prove 
that  wolves  cannot  possibly  spare  children. 

Mr.  Bentham  proceeds  to  attack  another  po 
sition  which  he  conceives  us  to  maintain  : — 

"  Secondly,  That  a  government  not  under  the 
control  of  the  community  (for  there  is  no  ques 
tion  upon  any  other)  'may  soon  be  saturated.' 
Tell  it  not  in  Bow  Street,  whisper  it  not  in 
Hatton  Garden — that  there  is  a  plan  for  pre 
venting  injustice  by  'saturation.'  With  what 
peals  of  unearthly  merriment  would  Minos,  | 
<fJacus,  and  Radamanthus,  be  aroused  upon  i 


their  benches,  if  the  'light  wings  of  saffron 
and  of  blue'  should  bear  this  theory  into  their 
grim  domains  !  Why  do  not  the  owners  of 
pocket-handkerchiefs  try  to  '  saturate  V  Why 
does  not  the  cheated  publican  beg  leave  to 
check  the  gulosity  of  his  defrauder  with  a  re- 
petatur  haustus,  and  the  pummelled  plaintiff 
neutralize  the  malice  of  his  adversary,  by  re 
questing  to  have  the  rest  of  the  beating  in  pre 
sence  of  the  court, — if  it  is  not  that  such  con 
duct  would  run  counter  to  all  the  conclusions 
of  experience,  and  be  the  procreation  of  the 
mischief  it  affected  to  destroy  1  Woful  is  the 
man  whose  wealth  depends  on  his  having  more 
than  somebody  else  can  be  persuaded  to  take 
from  him  ;  and  woful  also  is  the  people  that  is 
in  such  a  case  !" 

Now,  this  is  certainly  very  pleasant  writing . 
but  there  is  no  great  difficulty  in  answering 
the  argument.  The  real  reason  which  makes 
it  absurd  to  think  of  preventing  theft  by  pen 
sioning  off  thieves  is  this,  that  there  is  no  limit 
to  the  number  of  thieves.  If  there  were  only 
a  hundred  thieves  in  a  place,  and  we  were 
quite  sure  that  no  person  not  already  addicted 
to  theft  would  take  to  it,  it  might  become  a 
question,  whether  to  keep  the  thieves  frcm 
dishonesty  by  raising  them  above  distress, 
would  not  be  a  better  course  than  to  employ 
officers  against  them.  But  the  actual  cases  are 
not  parallel.  Every  man  who  chooses  can  be 
come  a  thief;  but  a  man  cannot  become  a  king 
or  a  member  of  the  aristocracy  whenever  he 
chooses.  The  number  of  the  depredators  is 
limited  ;  and  therefore  the  amount  of  depreda 
tion,  so  far  as  physical  pleasures  are  concern 
ed,  must  be  limited  also.  Now,  we  make  the 
remark  which  Mr.  Bentham  censures  with  re 
ference  to  physical  pleasures  only.  The  plea 
sures  of  ostentation,  of  taste,  of  revenge,  and 
other  pleasures  of  the  same  description,  have, 
we  distinctly  allowed,  no  limit.  Our  words  are 
these : — "  A  king  or  an  aristocracy  may  be 
supplied  to  satiety  with  corporal  pleasures,  at  an 
expense  which  the  rudest  and  poorest  commu 
nity  would  scarcely  feel."  Does  Mr.  Bentham 
deny  this  ?  If  he  does,  we  leave  him  to  Mr. 
Mill.  "  What,"  says  that  philosopher,  in  his 
Essay  on  Education,  "what  are  the  ordinary 
pursuits  of  wealth  and  power,  which  kindle  to 
such  a  height  the  ardour  of  mankind  1  Not  to 
mere  love  of  eating  and  of  drinking,  or  all  the 
physical  objects  together  which  wealth  can 
purchase  or  power  command.  With  these 
every  man  is  in  the  long  run  speedily  satis 
fied."  What  the  difference  is  between  being 
speedily  satisfied  and  being  soon  saturated,  we 
leave  Mr.  Bentham  and  Mr.  Mill  to  settle  to 
gether. 

The  word  "  saturation,"  however,  seems  to 
provoke  Mr.  Bentham's  mirth.  It  certainly  did 
not  strike  us  as  very  pure  English  ;  but,  as  Mr. 
Mill  used  it,  we  supposed  it  to  be  good  Ben- 
thamese.  With  the  latter  language  we  are  not 
critically  acquainted,  though,  as  it  has  many 
roots  in  commv  n  with  our  mother  tongue,  w« 
can  contrive,  by  the  help  of  a  converted  Utili 
tarian,  who  atti  lids  us  in  the  capacity  of  Moon- 
shee,  to  make  out  a  little.  But  Mr.  Bentham's 
authority  is  of  course  decisive,  and  we  bow 
to  iU 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE   OF  MILL 


687 


Mr.  Bentham  next  represents  us  as  main 
taining, — 

"  Thirdly,  That  '  though  there  may  be  some 
tastes  and  propensities  that  have  no  point  of 
saturation,  there  exists  a  sufficient  check  in 
the  desire  of  the  good  opinion  of  others.'  The 
misfortune  of  this  argument  is,  that  no  man 
cares  for  the  good  opinion  of  those  he  has  been 
accustomed  to  wrong.  If  oysters  have  opi 
nions,  it  is  probable  they  think  very  ill  of  those 
who  eat  them  in  August;  but  small  is  the 
effect  upon  the  autumnal  glutton  that  engulfs 
their  gentle  substances  within  his  own.  The 
planter  and  the  slave-driver  care  just  as  much 
about  negro  opinion  as  the  epicure  about  the 
sentiments  of  oysters.  M.  Ude  throwing  live 
eels  into  the  fire  as  a  kindly  method  of  divest 
ing  them  of  the  unsavoury  oil  that  lodges  be 
neath  their  skins,  is  not  more  convinced  of  the 
immense  aggregate  of  good  which  arises  to  the 
lordlier  parts  of  the  creation,  than  is  the  gentle 
peer  who  strips  his  fellow-man  of  country  and 
of  family  for  a  wild  fowl  slain.  The  goodly 
landowner,  who  lives  by  morsels  squeezed  in 
discriminately  from  the  waxy  hands  of  the 
cobbler  and  the  polluted  ones  of  the  nightman, 
is  in  no  small  degree  the  object  of  both  hatred 
and  contempt ;  but  it  is  to  be  feared  that  he  is 
a  long  way  from  feeling  them  to  be  intolerable. 
The  principle  of  '  At  mihi  plaudo  ipse  domi,  simul 
ac  nummosconiemplorin  area,'  is  sufficient  to  make 
a  wide  interval  between  the  opinions  of  the 
plaintiff  and  defendant  in  such  cases.  In  short, 
to  banish  law  and  leave  all  plaintiffs  to  trust  to 
the  desire  of  reputation  on  the  opposite  side, 
would  only  be  transporting  the  theory  of  the 
whigs  from  the  House  of  Commons  to  West 
minster  Hall." 

Now,  in  the  first  place,  we  never  maintained 
the  proposition  which  Mr.  Bentham  puts  into 
our  mouths.  We  said,  and  say,  that  there  is  a 
certain  check  to  the  rapacity  and  cruelty  of 
men,  in  their  desire  of  the  good  opinion  of 
others.  We  never  said  that  it  was  sufficient. 
Let  Mr.  Mill  show  it  to  be  insufficient.  It  is 
enough  for  us  to  prove  that  there  is  a  set-off 
against  the  principle  from  which  Mr.  Mill  de 
duces  the  whole  theory  of  government.  The 
balance  may  be,  and,  we  believe,  will  be,  against 
despotism  and  the  narrow  forms  of  aristocracy. 
But  what  is  this  to  the  correctness  or  incor 
rectness  of  Mr.  Mill's  accounts  ?  The  question 
is  not,  whether  the  motives  which  lead  rulers 
to  behave  ill,  are  stronger  than  those  which 
lead  them  to  behave  well ; — but  whether  we 
ought  to  form  a  theory  of  government  by  look 
ing  only  at  the  motives  which  lead  rulers  to  be 
have  ill,  and  never  noticing  those  which  lead 
them  to  behave  well. 

Absolute  rulers,  says  Mr.  Bentham,  do  not 
care  for  the  good  opinion  of  their  subjects  ;  for 
no  man  cares  for  the  good  opinion  of  those 
whom  he  has  been  accustomed  to  wrong.  By 
Mr.  Beritham's  leave,  this  is  a  plain  begging  of 
the  question.  The  point  ai  issue  is  this  : — Will 
Kings  and  nobles  wrong  the  people  1  The  ar 
gument  in  favour  of  kings  and  nobles  is  this : 
— they  will  not  wrong  the  people,  because  they 
care  for  the  good  opinion  of  the  people.  But 
this  argument  Mr.  Bentham  meets  thus: — they 
will  not  care  for  the  good  opinion  of  the  peo 


ple,  because  they  are  accustomed  to  wrong  the 
people. 

Here  Mr.  Mill  differs,  as  usual,  from  Mr.  Ben 
tham.  "  The  greatest  princes,"  says  he,  in  his 
Essay  on  Education,  "  the  most  despotical  mas 
ters  of  human  destiny,  when  asked  what  they 
aim  at  by  their  wars  and  conquests,  would  an 
swer,  if  sincere,  as  Frederic  of  Prussia  an 
swered,  pour  fair  parler  de  soi; — to  occupy  a 
large  space  in  the  admiration  of  mankind." 
Putting  Mr.  Mill's  and  Mr.  Bentham's  princi 
ples  together,  we  might  make  out  very  easily 
that  "  the  greatest  princes,  the  most  despotical 
masters  of  human  destiny,"  would  never  abuse 
their  power. 

A  man  who  has  been  long  accustomed  to  in 
jure  people,  must  also  have  been  long  accus 
tomed  to  do  without  their  love,  and  to  endure 
their  aversion.  Such  a  man  may  not  miss  the 
pleasure  of  popularity ;  for  men  seldom  miss  a 
pleasure  which  they  have  long  denied  them 
selves.  An  old  tyrant  does  without  popularity, 
just  as  an  old  water-drinker  dues  without  wine. 
But  though  it  is  perfectly  true  that  men  who, 
for  the  good  of  their  health,  have  long  ab 
stained  from  wine,  feel  the  want  of  it  very  lit 
tle,  it  would  be  absurd  to  infer  that  men  will 
always  abstain  from  wine,  when  their  health 
requires  that  they  should  do  so.  And  it  would 
be  equally  absurd  to  say,  because  men  who 
have  been  accustomed  to  oppress  care  little  for 
popularity,  that  men  will  therefore  necessarily 
prefer  the  pleasures  of  oppression  to  those  of 
popularity. 

Then,  again,  a  man  may  be  accustomed  to 
wrong  people  in  one  point,  and  not  in  another. 
He  may  care  for,  their  good  opinion  with  re 
gard  to  one  point,  and  not  with  regard  to  an 
other.  The  Regent  Orleans  laughed  at  charges 
of  impiety,  libertinism,  extravagance,  idleness, 
disgraceful  promotions.  But  the  slightest  al 
lusion  to  the  charge  of  poisoning  threw  him 
into  convulsions.  Louis  the  Fifteenth  braved 
the  hatred  and  contempt  of  his  subjects  during 
many  years  of  the  most  odious  and  imbecile 
misgovernment.  But  when  a  report  was 
spread  that  he  used  human  blood  for  his  baths, 
he  was  almost  driven  mad  by  it.  Surely  Mr. 
Bentham's  position,  "  that  no  man  cares  for  the 
good  opinion  of  those  whom  he  has  been  ac 
customed  to  wrong,"  would  be  objectionable,  as 
far  too  sweeping  and  indiscriminate,  even  if  it 
did  not  involve,  as  in  the  present  case  we  have 
shown  that  it  does,  a  direct  begging  of  the 
question  at  issue. 

Mr.  Bentham  proceeds: — 

"Fourthly,  The  Edinburgh  Reviewers  are  ( 
of  opinion,  that  '  it  might,  with  no  small 
plausibility,  be  maintained,  that,  in  many  coun 
tries,  there  are  two  classes  which,  in  some  de 
gree,  answer  to  this  description ;'  [viz.]  '  that 
the  poor  compose  the  class  which  government 
is  established  to  restrain,  and  the  people  of 
some  property,  the  class  to  which  the  powers 
of  government  may  without  danger  be  con 
fided.' 

"They  take  great  pains,  it  is  true,  to  saj 
this,  and  not  to  say  it.  They  shuffle  and  creep 
about,  to  secure  a  hole  to  escape  at,  if  '  what 
they  do  not  assert'  should  Ije  found  in  any  de 
gree  inconvenient.  A  man  might  waste  hw 


ess 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


life  in  trying  to  find  out  whether  the  Misses  of 
Ihe  Edinburgh  mean  to  say  Yes  or  No  in  their 
political  coquetry.  But  whichever  way  the 
lovely  spinsters  may  decide,  it  is  diametrically 
opposed  to  history  and  the  evidence  of  facts, 
that  the  poor  are  the  class  whom  there  is  any 
difficulty  in  restraining.  It  is  not  the  poor  but 
the  rich  that  have  a  propensity  to  take  the 
property  of  other  people.  There  is  no  instance 
upon  earth  of  the  poor  having  combined  to 
take  away  the  property  of  the  rich ;  and  all  the 
instances  habitually  brought  forward  in  sup 
port  of  it,  are  gross  misrepresentations,  found 
ed  upon  the  most  necessary  acts  of  self-defence 
on  the  part  of  the  most  numerous  classes. 
Such  a  misrepresentation  is  the  common  one 
of  the  Agrarian  law ;  which  was  nothing  but 
an  attempt,  on  the  part  of  the  Roman  people, 
to  get  back  some  part  of  what  had  been  taken 
from  them  by  undisguised  robbery.  Such  an 
other  is  the  stock  example  of  the  French  Revo 
lution,  appealed  to  by  the  Edinburgh  Review  in 
the  actual  case.  It  is  utterly  untrue  that  the 
French  Revolution  took  place  because  'the 
poor  began  to  compare  their  cottages  and  sa 
lads  with  the  hotels  and  banquets  of  the  rich;' 
it  took  place  because  they  were  robbed  of  their 
cottages  and  salads  to  support  the  hotels  and 
banquets  of  their  oppressors.  It  is  utterly  un 
true  that  there  was  either  a  scramble  for  pro 
perty  or  a  general  confiscation  ;  the  classes 
who  took  part  with  the  foreign  invaders  lost 
their  property,  as  they  would  have  done  here, 
and  ought  to  do  everywhere.  All  these  are  the 
vulgar  errors  of  the  man  on  the  lion's  back, — 
which  the  lion  will  set  to  rights  when  he  can 
tell  his  own  story.  History  is  nothing  but  the 
relation  of  the  sufferings  of  the  poor  from  the 
rich ;  except  precisely  so  far  as  the  numerous 
classes  of  the  community  have  contrived  to 
keep  the  virtual  power  in  their  hands,  or  in 
other  words,  to  establish  free  governments. 
If  a  poor  man  injures  the  rich,  the  law  is  in 
stantly  at  his  heels;  the  injuries  of  the  rich 
fowards  the  poor  are  always  inflicted  by  the 
law.  \nd  to  enable  the  rich  to  do  this  to  any 
extent  that  may  be  practicable  or  prudent,  there 
is  clearly  one  postulate  required,  which  is,  that 
the  rich  shall  make  the  law." 

This  passage  is  alone  sufficient  to  prove  thai 
Mr.  Bemham  has  not  taken  the  trouble  to  read 
uur  article  from  beginning  to  end.  We  are 
quite  sure  that  he  would  not  stoop  to  misrepre 
sent  it.  And  if  he  had  read  it  with  any  atten 
tion,  he  would  have  perceived  that  all  this  co 
quetry,  this  hesitation,  this  Yes  and  No,  this 
oaying  and  not  saying,  is  simply  an  exercise 
of  the  undeniable  right  which  in  controversy 
belongs  to  the  defensive  side — to  the  side  which 
proposes  to  establish  nothing.  The  affirmative 
of  the  issue  and  the  burden  of  the  proof  are 
with  Mr.  Mill,  not  with  us.  We  are  not  bound, 
perhaps  we  are  not  able,  to  show  that  the  form 
of  government  which  he  recommends  is  bad. 
It  is  quite  enough  if  we  can  show  that  he  does 
not  prove  it  to  be  good.  In  his  proof,  among 
many  other  flaws,  is  this — he  says,  that  if  men 
are  not  inclined  to  plunder  each  other,  govern 
ment  is  unnecessary,  and  that,  if  men  are  so 
inclined,  kings  and  aristocracies  will  plunder 
t  people.  Now  Ihis.  wo  say,  is  a  fallacy. 


That  some  men  will  plunder  their  neighbours 
if  they  can,  is  a  sufficient  reason  for  the  exist 
ence  of  governments.  But  it  is  not  demon 
strated  that  kings  and  aristocracies  will  plun 
der  the  people,  unless  it  be  true  that  all  men 
will  plunder  their  neighbours  if  they  can.  Men 
are  placed  in  very  different  situations.  Some 
have  all  the  bodily  pleasures  that  they  desire, 
and  many  other  pleasures  besides,  without 
plundering  anybody.  Others  can  scarcely  ob 
tain  their  daily  bread  without  plundering.  It 
may  be  true,  but  surely  it  is  not  self-evident, 
that  the  former  class  is  under  as  strong  temp 
tations  to  plunder  as  the  latter.  Mr.  Mill  was 
therefore  bound  to  prove  it.  That  he  has  not 
proved  it,  is  one  of  thirty  or  forty  fatal  errors 
in  his  argument.  It  is  not  necessary  that  we 
should  express  an  opinion,  or  even  have  au 
opinion  on  the  subject.  Perhaps  we  are  in  a 
state  of  perfect  skepticism;  but  what  then] 
Are  we  the  theory-makers  1  When  we  bring 
before  the  world  a  theory  of  government,  it 
will  be  time  to  call  upon  us  to  offer  proof  at 
every  step.  At  present  we  stand  on  our  un 
doubted  logical  right.  We  concede  nothing, 
and  we  deny  nothing.  We  say  to  the  Utilita 
rian  theorists — When  you  prove  your  doctrine, 
we  will  believe  it,  and  till  you  prove  it,  we  will 
not  believe  it. 

Mr.  Bentham  has  quite  misunderstood  what 
we  said  about  the  French  Revolution.  We 
never  alluded  to  that  event  for  the  purpose  of 
proving  that  the  poor  were  inclined  to  rob  the 
rich.  Mr.  Mill's  principles  of  human  nature 
furnished  us  with  that  part  of  our  argument 
ready-made.  We  alluded  to  the  French  Revo 
lution  for  the  purpose  of  illustrating  the  effects 
which  general  spoliation  produces  on  society, 
not  for  the  purpose  of  showing  that  general 
spoliation  will  take  place  under  a  democracy. 
We  allowed  distinctly  that,  in  the  peculiar  cir 
cumstances  of  the  French  monarchy,  the  Re 
volution,  though  accompanied  by  a  great 
shock  to  the  institution  of  property,  was  a 
blessing.  Surely  Mr.  Bentham  will  not  main 
tain  that  the  injury  produced  by  the  deluge  of 
assignats  and  by  the  maximum  fell  only  on 
the  emigrants, — or  that  there  were  not  many 
emigrants  who  would  have  stayed  and  lived 
peaceably  under  any  government,  if  their  per 
sons  and  property  had  been  secure. 

We  never  said  that  the  French  Revolution 
took  place  because  the  poor  began  to  compare 
their  cottages  and  salads  with  the  hotels  and 
banquets  of  the  rich.  We  were  not  speaking 
about  the  causes  of  the  Revolution,  or  thinking 
about  them.  This  we  said,  and  say,  that  if  a 
democratic  government  had  been  established 
in  France,  the  poor,  when  they  began  to  com 
pare  their  cottages  and  salads  with  the  hotels 
and  banquets  of  the  rich,  would,  on  the  sup 
position  that  Mr.  Mill's  principles  are  sound, 
have  plundered  the  rich,  and  repeated,  without 
provocation,  all  the  severities  and  confisca 
tions  which,  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution, 
were  committed  with  provocation.  We  say 
that  Mr.  Mill's  favourite  form  of  government 
would,  if  his  own  views  of  human  nature  be 
just,  make  those  violent  convulsions  and  trans 
fers  of  property  which  now  rarely  happen,  ex 
cept,  as  in  the  cas«  of  the  French  Revolution. 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL. 


•when  the  people  are  maddened  by  oppression, 
events  of  annual  or  biennial  occurrence.  We 
gave  no  opinion  of  our  own.  We  give  none 
now.  We  say  that  this  proposition  may  be 
proved  from  Mr.  Mill's  own  premises,  by  steps 
strictly  analogous  to  those  by  which  he  proves 
monarchy  and  aristocracy  to  be  bad  forms  of 
government.  To  say  this  is  not  to  say  that  the 
proposition  is  true.  For  we  hold  both  Mr. 
Mill's  premises  and  his  deductions  to  be  un 
sound  throughout. 

Mr,  Bentham  challenges  us  to  prove  from 
history  that  the  people  will  plunder  the  rich. 
What  does  history  say  to  Mr.  Mill's  doctrine, 
that  absolute  kings  will  always  plunder  their 
subjects  so  unmercifully  as  to  leave  nothing 
but  a  bare  subsistence  to  any  except  their  own 
creatures  ?  If  experience  is  to  be  the  test,  Mr. 
Mill's  theory  is  unsound.  If  Mr.  Mill's  reason 
ing  a  priori  be  sound,  the  people  in  a  demo 
cracy  will  plunder  the  rich.  Let  us  use  one 
weight  and  one  measure.  Let  us  not  throw 
history  aside  when  we  are  proving  a  theory, 
and  take  it  up  again  when  we  have  to  refute 
an  objection  founded  on  the  principles  of  that 
theory. 

\Ve  have  not  done,  however,  with  Mr.  Ben- 
Iham's  charges  against  us. 

"Among  other  specimens  of  their  ingenuity, 
they  think  they  embarrass  the  subject  by  ask 
ing  why,  on  the  principles  in  question,  women 
should  not  have  votes  as  well  as  men.  And 
why  not? 

'Gentle  shepherd,  tell  me  why. — ' 
If  the  mode  of  election  was  what  it  ought  to 
be,  there  would  be  no  more  difficulty  in  wo 
men  voting  for  a  representative  in  Parliament 
than  for  a  director  at  the  India  House.  The 
world  will  find  out  at  some  time,  that  the  readi 
est  way  to  secure  justice  on  some  points  is  to 
be  just  on  all ; — that  the  whole  is  easier  to  ac 
complish  than  the  part;  and  that,  whenever 
the  camel  is  driven  through  the  eye  of  the 
needle,  it  would  be  simple  folly  and  debility 
that  would  leave  a  hoof  behind." 

Why,  says  or  sings  Mr.  Bentham,  should 
not  women  vote  1  It  may  seem  uncivil  in  us 
to  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  his  Arcadian  warblings. 
But  we  submit,  with  great  deference,  that  it  is 
not  our  business  to  tell  him.  why.  We  fully 
agree  with  him  that  the  principle  of  female 
suffrage  is  not  so  palpably  absurd  that  a  chain 
of  reasoning  ought  to  be  pronounced  unsound, 
merely  because  it  leads  to  female  suffrage. 
We  say  that  every  argument  which  tells  in 
favour  of  the  universal  suffrage  of  the  males, 
tells  equally  in  favour  of  female  suffrage.  Mr. 
Mill,  however,  wishes  to  see  all  men  vote,  but 
says  that  is  unnecessary  that  women  should 
vote  ;  and  for  making  this  distinction,  he  gives 
as  a  reason  an  assertion  which,  in  the  first 
place,  is  not  true,  and  which,  in  the  next  place, 
would,  if  true,  overset  his  whole  theory  of 
human  nature;  namely,  that  the  interest  of  the 
women  is  identical  with  that  of  the  men.  We 
side  with  Mr.  Bentham,  so  far  at  least  as  this, 
that  when  we  join  to  drive  the  camel  through 
the  needle,  he  shall  go  through  hoof  and  all. 
We  at  present  desire  to  be  excused  from  driv 
ing  the  camel.  It  is  Mr.  Mill  who  leaves  the 
hoof  behind.  But  we  should  think  it  uncourte- 
VOL.  V.— 87 


ous  to  reproach  him  in  the  language  which 
Mr.  Bentham,  in  the  exercise  of  his  paternal 
authority  over  the  sect,  thinks  himself  entitled 
to  employ. 

"  Another  of  their  perverted  ingenuities  is, 
that  'they  are  rather  inclined  to  think'  that  it 
would,  on  the  whole,  be  for  the  interest  of  the 
majority  to  plunder  the  rich;  and  if  so,  the 
Utilitarians  will  say,  that  the  rich  ought  to  be 
plundered.  On  which  it  is  sufficient  to  reply, 
that  for  the  majority  to  plunder  the  rich,  would 
amount  to  a  declaration  that  nobody  should  be 
rich ;  which,  as  all  men  wish  to  be  rich,  would 
involve  a  suicide  of  hope.  And.  as  nobody  has 
shown  a  fragment  of  reason  why  such  a  pro 
ceeding  should  be  for  the  general  happiness, 
it  does  not  follow  that  the  '  Utilitarians'  would 
recommend  it.  The  Edinburgh  Reviewers  have 
a  waiting  gentlewoman's  ideas  of 'Utilitarian 
ism.'  .  It  is  unsupported  by  any  thing  but  the 
pitiable  'We  are  rather  inclined  to  think,'— 
and  is  utterly  contradicted  by  the  whole  course 
of  history  and  human  experience  besides, — 
that  there  is  either  danger  or  possibility  of 
such  a  consummation  as  the  majority  agree 
ing  on  the  plunder  of  the  rich.  There  have 
been  instances  in  human  memory  of  their 
agreeing  to  plunder  rich  oppressors,  rich  trai 
tors,  rich  enemies, — but  the  rich  simpliciter, 
never.  It  is  as  true  now  as  in  the  days  of 
Harrington,  that  'a  people  never  will,  nor  ever 
can,  never  did,  nor  ever  shall,  take  up  arms 
for  levelling.'  All  the  commotions  in  the 
world  have  been  for  something  else ;  and 
'levelling'  is  brought  forward  as  the  blind,  to 
conceal  what  the  other  was." 

WTe  say,  again  and  again,  that  we  are  on  the 
defensive.  We  do  not  think  it  necessary  to 
prove  that  a  quack  medicine  is  poison.  Let 
the  vender  prove  it  to  be  sanative.  We  do  not 
pretend  to  show  that  universal  suffrage  is  an 
evil.  Let  its  advocates  show  it  to  be  a  good. 
Mr.  Mill  tells  us,  that  if  power  be  given  for 
short  terms  to  representatives  elected  by  all 
the  males  of  mature  age,  it  will  then  be  for 
the  interest  of  those  representatives  to  promote 
the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest  number. 
To  prove  this,  it  is  necessary  that  he  should 
prove  three  propositions;  first,  that  the  inte 
rest  of  such  a  representative  body  will  be 
identical  with  the  interest  of  the  constituent 
body;  secondly,  that  the  interest  of  the  consti 
tuent  body  will  be  identical  with  that  of  the 
community;  thirdly,  that  the  interest  of  one 
generation  of  a  community  is  identical  with 
that  of  all  succeeding  generations.  The  two 
first  propositions  Mr.  Mill  attempts  to  prove, 
and  fails.  The  last  he  does  not  even  attempt 
to  prove.  We  therefore  refuse  our  assent  ;o 
his  conclusions.  Is  this  unreasonable1? 

We  never  even  dreamed,  what  Mr.  BenthaT, 
conceives  us  to  have  maintained,  that  it  co 
be  for  the  greatest  happiness  of  mankind 
plunder  the  rich.  But  we  are  "  rather  inclined 
to  think,"  though  doubtingly,  and  with  a  dispo 
sition  to  yield  to  conviction,  that  it  may  be  for 
the  pecuniary  interest  of  the  majority  of  a  sin 
gle  generation  in  a  thickly-peopled  country  to 
plunder  the  rich.  Why  we  are  inclined  to 
think  so  we  will  explain,  whenever  we  send  a 
theory  of  government  to  an  encyclopedia.  At 
3*? 


MACAULAY'S   MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


present  we  are  bound  to  say  only  that  we  think  I 
so,  till  somebody  shows  us  a  reason  for  think 
ing  otherwise. 

Mr.  Bentham's  answer  to  us  is  simple  asser 
tion.  He  must  not  think  that  we  mean  any 
discourtesy  by  meeting  it  with  a  simple  denial. 
The  fact  is,  that  almost  all  the  governments 
that  have  ever  existed  in  the  civilized  world, 
have  been,  in  part  at  least,  monarchical  and 
aristocratical.  The  first  government  consti 
tuted  on  principles  approaching  to  those  which 
the  Utilitarians  hold,  was,  we  think,  that  of  the 
United  States.  That  the  poor  have  never  com 
bined  to  plunder  the  rich  in  the  governments 
of  the  old  world,  no  more  proves  that  they 
might  plunder  the  rich  under  a  system  of  uni 
versal  suffrage,  than  the  fact,  that  the  English 
kings  of  the  House  of  Brunswick  have  been 
Neros  and  Domitians,  proves  that  sovereigns 
may  safely  be  intrusted  with  absolute  power. 
Of  what  the  people  would  do  in  a  state  of  per 
fect  sovereignty,  we  can  judge  only  by  indica 
tions,  which,  though  rarely  of  much  moment 
in  themselves,  and  though  always  suppressed 
with  little  difficulty,  are  yet  of  great  signifi 
cance,  and  resemble  those  by  which  our  do 
mestic  animals  sometimes  remind  us  that  they 
are  of  kin  with  the  fiercest  monsters  of  the 
forest.  It  would  not  be  wise  to  reason  from 
the  behaviour  of  a  dog  crouching  under  the 
Jash,  which  is  the  case  of  the  Italian  people, 
or  from  the  behaviour  of  a  dog  pampered  with 
the  best  morsels  of  a  plentiful  kitchen,  which 
is  the  case  of  the  people  of  America,  to  the 
behaviour  of  a  wolf,  which  is  nothing  but  a 
dog  run  wild,  after  a  week's  fast  among  the 
snows  of  the  Pyrenees.  No  commotion,  says 
Mr.  Beniham,  was  ever  really  produced  by  the 
wish  of  levelling:  the  wish  has  been  put  for 
ward  as  a  blind  ;  but  something  else  has  been 
the  real  object.  Grant  all  this.  But  why  has 
levelling  been  put  forward  as  a  blind  in  times 
of  commotion,  to  conceal  the  real  objects  of 
the  agitators  1  Is  it  with  declarations  which 
involve  "a  suicide  of  hope,"  that  men  attempt 
to  allure  others  1  Was  famine,  pestilence, 
slavery,  ever  held  out  to  attract  the  people  ] 
If  levelling  has  been  made  a  pretence  for  dis 
turbances,  the  argument  against  Mr.  Bentham's 
doctrine  is  as  strong  as  if  it  had  been  the  real 
object  of  the  disturbances. 

But  the  great  objection  which  Mr.  Bentham 
makes  to  our  review,  still  remains  to  be  noticed. 

"  The  pith  of  the  charge  against  the  author 
of  the  Essays  is.  that  he  has  written  '  an  ela- 
horate  Treatise  on  Government,'  and  'deduced 
ihe  whole  science  from  the  assumption  of  cer 
tain  propensities  of  human  nature.'  Now,  in 
Cne  name  of  Sir  Richard  Birnie,  and  all  saints, 
from  what  else  should  it  be  deduced?  What 
iid  ever  anybody  imagine  to  be  the  end,  object, 
and  design  of  government  as  it  ought  to  be,  but 
the  same  operation,  on  an  extended  scale,  which 
that  meritorious  chief  magistrate  conducts  on 
a  limited  one  at  Bow  Street;  to  wit,  the  pre 
venting  one  man  from  injuring  another  ]  Ima 
gine,  then,  that  ihe  whiggery  of  Bow  Street  were 
»'  rise  up  against  the  proposition  that  their  sci 
ence  was  to  be  deduced  from  'certain  propen 
sities  of  human  nature,'  and  thereon  were  to 
ratiocinate  as  follows  ; — 


"'How then  are  we  to  arrive  at  just  conclu 
sions  on  a  subject  so  important  to  the  happi 
ness  of  mankind!  Surely  by  that  method, 
which,  in  every  experimental  science  to  which 
it  has  been  applied,  has  signally  increased  the 
power  and  knowledge  of  our  species, — by  that 
method  for  which  our  new  philosophers  would 
substitute  quibbles  scarcely  worthy  of  the  bar 
barous  respondents  and  opponents  of  the  middle 
ages, — by  the  method  of  induction, — by  observ 
ing  the  present  state  of  the  world,  by  assidu 
ously  studying  the  history  of  past  ages, — by 
sifting  the  evidence  of  facts, — by  carefully 
combining  and  contrasting  those  which  are 
authentic, — by  generalizing  with  judgment  and 
diffidence, — by  perpetually  bringing  the  theory 
which  we  have  constructed  to  the  test  of  new 
facts, — by  correcting,  or  altogether  abandoning 
it,  according  as  those  new  facts  prove  it  to  be 
partially  or  fundamentally  unsound.  Proceed 
ing  thus, — patiently,  diligently,  candidly, — we 
may  hope  to  form  a  system  as  far  inferior  in 
pretension  to  that  which  we  have  been  examin 
ing,  and  as  far  superior  to  it  in  real  utility,  as 
the  prescriptions  of  a  great  physician,  varying 
with  every  stage  of  every  malady,  and  with  the 
constitution  of  every  patient,  to  the  pill  of  ihe 
advertising  quack,  which  is  to  cure  all  human 
beings,  in  all  climates,  of  all  diseases.' 

"Fancy  now, — only  fancy, — the  delivery  of 
these  wise  words  at  Bow  Street;  and  think 
how  speedily  the  practical  catchpolls  would 
reply  that  all  this  might  be  very  fine,  but  as  far 
as  they  had  studied  history,  the  naked  story 
was,  after  all,  that  numbers  of  men  had  a  pro 
pensity  to  thieving,  and  their  business  was  to 
catch  them  ;  that  they,  too,  had  been  sifters  of 
facts  ;  and,  to  say  the  truth,  their  simple  opi 
nion  was,  that  their  brethren  of  the  red  waist 
coat — though  they  should  be  sorry  to  think  ill 
of  any  man — had  somehow  contracted  a  lean 
ing  to  the  other  side,  and  were  more  bent  on 
puzzling  the  case  for  the  benefit  of  the  defend 
ants,  than  on  doing  the  duty  of  good  officers 
and  true.  Such  would,  beyond  all  doubt,  be 
the  sentence  passed  on  such  trimmers  in  the 
microcosm  of  Bow  Street.  It  might  not  abso 
lutely  follow  that  they  were  in  a  plot  to  rob  the 
goldsmiths'  shops,  or  to  set  fire  to  the  House 
of  Commons  ;  but  it  would  be  quite  clear  that 
they  had  got  a  feeling, — that  they  were  in  pro 
cess  of  siding  with  the  thieves, — and  that  it 
was  not  to  them  that  any  man  must  look,  who 
was  anxious  that  pantries  should  be  safe." 

This  is  all  very  witty ;  but  it  does  not  touch 
us.  On  the  present  occasion,  we  cannot  but 
flatter  ourselves  that  we  bear  a  much  greater 
resemblance  to  a  practical  catchpoll  than  either 
Mr.  Mill  or  Mr.  Bentham.  It  would,  to  oe  sure, 
be  very  absurd  in  a  magistrate,  discussing  the 
arrangements  of  a  police-office,  to  spout  in  the 
style  either  of  our  article  or  Mr.  Beritham's ; 
but,  in  substance,  he  would  proceed,  if  he  were 
a  man  of  sense,  exactly  as  we  recommend.  He 
would,  on  being  appointed  to  provide  for  the 
security  of  property  in  a  town,  study  attentively 
the  state  of  the  town.  He  would  learn  at  what 
places,  at  what  times,  and  under  what  circum 
stances,  theft  and  outrage  were  most  frequent. 
Are  the  streets,  he  would  ask,  most  infested 
with  thieves  at  sunset,  or  at  midnight  I  Are 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL. 


691 


there  any  public  places  of  resort  which  give 
peculiar  facilities  to  pickpockets?  Are  there 
any  districts  completely  inhabited  by  a  lawless 
population]  Which  are  the  flash-houses,  and 
which  the  shops  of  receivers  1  Having  made 
himself  master  of  the  facts,  he  would  act  ac 
cordingly.  A  strong  detachment  of  officers 
might  be  necessary  for  Petticoat-Lane;  another 
for  the  pit  entrance  of  Covent-Garden  Theatre. 
Grosvenor  Square  and  Hamilton  Place  would 
require  little  or  no  protection.  Exactly  thus 
shouH  we  reason  about  government.  Lom- 
bardy  is  oppressed  by  tyrants;  and  constitu 
tional  checks,  such  as  may  produce  security 
to  the  people,  are  required.  It  is,  so  to  speak, 
one  of  the  resorts  of  thieves,  and  there  is  great 
need  of  police-officers.  Denmark  resembles 
one  of  those  respectable  streets,  in  which  it  is 
scarcely  necessary  to  station  a  catchpoll,  be 
cause  the  inhabitants  would  at  once  join  to 
seize  a  thief.  Yet  even  in  such  a  street,  we 
should  wish  to  see  an  officer  appear  now  and 
then,  as  his  occasional  superintendence  would 
render  the  security  more  complete.  And  even 
Denmark,  we  think,  would  be  better  off  under 
a  constitutional  form  of  government. 

Mr.  Mill  proceeds  like  a  director  of  police, 
who,  without  asking  a  single  question  about  the 
state  of  his  district,  should  give  his  orders 
thus: — "My  maxim  is,  that  every  man  will 
take  what  he  can.  Every  man  in  London 
would  be  a  thief,  but  for  the  thief-takers.  This 
is  an  undeniable  principle  of  human  nature. 
Some  of  my  predecessors  have  wasted  their 
time  in  inquiring  about  particular  pawnbro 
kers,  and  particular  alehouses.  Experience  is 
altogether  divided.  Of  people  placed  in  ex 
actly  the  same  situation,  I  see  that  one  steals, 
and  that  another  would  sooner  burn  his  hand 
off.  Therefore  I  trust  to  the  laws  of  human 
nature  alone,  and  pronounce  all  men  thieves 
alike.  Let  everybody,  high  and  low,  be  watch 
ed.  Let  Townsend  take  particular  care  that 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  does  not  steal  the  silk 
handkerchief  of  the  lord  in  waiting  at  the 
levee.  A  person  has  lost  a  watch.  Go  to  Lord 
Fitzwilliam  and  search  him  for  it:  he  is  as 
great  a  receiver  of  stolen  goods  as  Ikey  Solo- 
mans  himself.  Don't  tell  me  about  his  rank, 
and  character,  and  fortune.  He  is  a  man  ;  and 
a  man  does  not  change  his  nature  when  he  is 
called  a  lord.*  Either  men  will  steal  or  they 
will  not  steal.  If  they  will  not,  why  do  I  sit 
here  ?  If  they  will,  his  lordship  must  be  a 
thief."  The  whiggery  of  Bow  Street  would 
perhaps  rise  up  against  this  wisdom.  Would 
Mr.  Bentham  think  that  the  whiggery  of  Bow 
was  in  the  wrong? 

We  blamed  Mr.  Mill  for  deducing  his  theory 
of  government  from  the  principles  of  human 
nature.  "In  the  name  of  Sir  Richard  Birnie, 
and  all  saints,"  cries  Mr.  Bentham,  "  from  what 


*  If  government  is  founded  upon  this,  as  a  law  of  hu 
man  nature,  that  a  man,  if  able,  will  take  from  others 
nrty  thing  which  they  have  and  he  desires,  it  is  suffi 
ciently  evident  that  when  a  man  is  called  a  king,  he  does 
rot  change  his  nature ;  so  that,  when  he  has  power  to 
take  what  he  pleases,  he  will  take  what  he  pleases.  To 
suppose  that  he  will  not,  is  to  affirm  that  government  is 
unnecessary,  and  that  human  beings  will  abstain  from 
injuring  one  another  of  their  own  accord."— MILL  on 
Government 


else  should  it  be  deduced!"  In  spite  of  this 
solemn  adjuration,  we  shall  venture  to  answer 
Mr.  Bentham's  question  by  another.  How  does 
he  arrive  at  those  principles  of  human  nature 
from  which  he  proposes  to  deduce  the  science 
of  government?  We  think  that  we  may  ven 
ture  to  put  an  answer  into  his  mouth;  for  in 
truth  there  is  but  one  possible  answer.  He 
will  say — By  experience.  But  what  is  the 
extent  of  this  experience  ?  Is  it  an  experience 
which  includes  experience  of  the  conduct  of 
men  intrusted  with  the  powers  of  government ; 
or  is  it  exclusive  of  that  experience?  If  it 
includes  experience  of  the  manner  in  which 
men  act  when  intrusted  with  the  powers  of 
government,  then  those  principles  of  human 
nature  from  which  the  science  of  govern 
ment  is  to  be  deduced,  can  only  be  known  after 
going  through  that  inductive  process  by  which 
we  propose  to  arrive  at  the  science  of  govern 
ment.  Our  knowledge  of  human  nature,  in 
stead  of  being  prior  in  order  to  our  knowledge 
of  the  science  of  government,  will  be  posterior 
to  it.  And  it  would  be  correct  to  say,  that  by 
means  of  the  science  of  government,  and  of 
other  kindred  sciences — the  science  of  educa 
tion,  for  example,  which  falls  under  exactly  the 
same  principle — we  arrive  at  the  science  of 
human  nature. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  are  to  deduce  the 
theory  of  government  from  principles  of  hu 
man  nature,  in  arriving  at  which  principles  we 
have  not  taken  into  the  account  the  manner 
in  which  men  act  when  invested  with  the 
powers  of  government,  then  those  principles 
must  be  defective.  They  have  not  been  formed 
by  a  sufficiently  copious  induction.  We  are 
reasoning  from  what  a  man  does  in  one  situa 
tion,  to  what  he  will  do  in  another.  Sometimes 
we  may  be  quite  justified  in  reasoning  thus. 
When  we  have  no  means  of  acquiring  infor 
mation  about  the  particular  case  before  us,  we 
are  compelled  to  resort  to  cases  which  bear  some 
resemblance  to  it.  But  the  most  satisfactory- 
course  is  to  obtain  information  about  the  par 
ticular  case  ;  and  whenever  this  can  be  ob 
tained,  it  ought  to  be  obtained.  When  first  the 
yellow  fever  broke  out,  a  physician  might  be 
justified  in  treating  it  as  he  had  been  accus 
tomed  to  treat  those  complaints  which,  on  the 
whole,  had  the  most  symptoms  in  common  with 
it.  But  what  should  we  think  of  a  physician 
who  should  now  tell  us  that  he  deduced  his 
treatment  of  yellow  fever  from  the  general 
theory  of  pathology  ?  Surely  we  should  ask 
him,  Whether,  in  constructing  his  theory  of 
pathology,  he  had,  or  had  not,  taken  into  the 
account  the  facts  which  had  been  ascertained 
respecting  the  yellow  fever?  If  he  had,  then, 
it  would  be  more  correct  to  say,  that  he  had 
arrived  at  the  principles  of  pathology  partly 
by  his  experience  of  cases  of  yellow  fever, 
than  that  he  had  deduced  his  treatment  of  yel 
low  fever  from  the  principles  of  pathology. 
If  he  had  not,  he  should  not  prescribe  for  us. 
If  we  had  the  yellow  fever,  we  should  prefer  a 
man  who  had  never  treated  any  cases  of  yellow 
fever,  to  a  man  who  had  walked  the  hospitals 
of  London  and  Paris  for  years,  but  who  knew 
nothing  of  our  particular  disease. 

Let  Lord  Bacon  sneak  for  us:  "Tndueticnon 


692 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ceusemus  earn  esse  demonstrandi  formam,quae  j 
sensum,  tuetur,  et  naturam  premit,  et  operibus 
imminet,  ac  fere  immiscetur.  Itaque  ordo 
quoque  demonstrandi  plane  invertitur.  Adhuc 
enim  res  ita  geri  consuevit,  ut  a  sensu  et  par- 
ticularibus  primo  loco  ad  maxime  generalia 
advoietur,  tanquam  ad  polos  fixes,  circa  quos 
disputationes  vertantur ;  ab  illis  caetera,  per 
media,  deriventur ;  via  certe  compendiaria,  sed 
proecepiti,  et  ad  naturam  impervia,  ad  disputa 
tiones  proclivi  et  accommodata.  At,  securidum 
HOS,  axiomata  continenter  et  gradatim  excitan- 
tur,  ut  non,  nisi  postremo  loco,  ad  maxime 
generalia  veriiatur."  Can  any  words  more 
exactly  describe  the  political  reasonings  of  Mr. 
Mill  than  those  in  which  Lord  Bacon  thus  de 
scribes  the  logomachies  of  the  schoolmen] 
Mr.  Mill  springs  at  once  to  a  general  principle 
of  the  widest  extent,  and  from  that  general 
principle  deduces  syllogistically  every  thing 
which  is  included  in  it.  We  say  with  Bacon — 
"non,  nisi  postremo  loco,  ad  maxime  generalia 
veniatur."  In  the  present  inquiry,  the  science 
of  human  nature  is  the  "maxime  generale." 
To  this  the  Utilitarian  rushes  at  once,  and  from 
this  he  deduces  a  hundred  sciences.  But  the 
true  philosopher,  the  inductive  reasoner,  travels 
up  to  it  slowly,  through  those  hundred  sciences, 
of  which  the  science  of  government  is  one. 

As  we  have  lying  before  us  that  incompar 
able  volume,  the  noblest  and  most  useful  of  all 
the  works  of  the  human  reason,  the  Novum 
Organum,  we  will  transcribe  a  few  lines,  in 
which  the  Utilitarian  philosophy  is  portrayed 
to  the  life. 

"  Syllogismus  ad  principia  scientiarum  non 
adhibetur,  ad  media  axiomata  frustra  adhibetur, 
cum  sit  subtilitati  naturae  longe  impar.  As- 
sensum  itaque  constringit,  non  res.  Syllogis 
mus  ex  propositionibus  constat,  propositiones 
ex  verbis,  verba  notionum  tesserae  sunt.  Itaque 
si  notiones  ipsae,  id  quod  basis  rei  est,  confusse 
sint,  et  temere  a  rebus  abstraclse,  nihil  in  iis 
quoe  superstruuntur  est  firmitudinis.  Itaque 
spes  est  una  in  Inductione  vera.  In  notionibus 
nil  sani  est,  nee  in  Logicis  nee  in  physicis. 
Non  substantia,  non  qualitas,  agere,  pati,  ipsum 
csse,  bonse  notiones  sunt:  multo  minus  grave, 
leve,  densum,  tenue,  humidum,  siccum,  gene- 
ratio,  corruptio,  attrahere,  fugare,  elementum, 
materia,  forma,  et  id  genus,  sed  omnes  phan- 
tasticae  et  male  terminatae." 

Substitute  for  the  "  substantia,"  the  "gene- 
ratio,"  the  "corruptio,"  the  "elementum,"  the 
"  materia"  of  the  old  schoolmen,  Mr.  Mill's 
pain,  pleasure,  interest,  power,  objects  of 
desire, — and  the  words  of  Bacon  will  seem  to 
suit  the  current  year  as  well  as  the  beginning 
of  the  seventeenth  century. 

We  have  now  gone  through  the  objections 
that  Mr.  Bentham  makes  to  our  article ;  and 
we  submit  ourselves  on  all  the  charges  to  the 
judgment  of  the  public.  . 

The  rest  of  Mr.  Bentham's  article  consists 
of  an  exposition  of  the  Utilitarian  principle, 
or,  as  he  decrees  that  it  shall  be  called,  the 
"greatest  happiness  principle."  He  seems  to 
think  that  we  have  been  assailing  it.  We 
never  said  a  syllable  against  it.  We  spoke 
slightingly  of  the  Utilitarian  sect,  as  we  though 
cf  them,  and  think  of  them  ;  but  it  was  not  for 


holding  this  doctrine  that  we  blamed  them.  In 
attacking  them  we  no  more  meant  to  attack 
he  "  greatest  happiness  principle,"  than  whea 
we  say  that  Mohammedanism  is  a  false  religion, 
we  mean  to  deny  the  unity  of  God,  which  is  the 
first  article  of  the  Mohammedan  creed; — no 
more  than  Mr.  Bentham,  when  he  sneers  at  the 
whigs,  means  to  blame  them  for  denying  the 
divine  right  of  kings.  We  reasoned  throughout 
our  article  on  the  supposition  that  the  end  of 
government  was  to  produce  the  greatest  happi 
ness  to  mankind. 

Mr.  Bentham  gives  an  account  of  the  manner 
n  which  he  arrived  at  the  discovery  of  the 
'greatest  happiness  principle."  He  then  pro 
ceeds  to  describe  the  effects  which,  as  he  con 
ceives,  that  discovery  is  producing,  in  language 
so  rhetorical  and  ardent,  that,  if  it  had  been 
written  by  any  other  person,  a  genuine  Utilita 
rian  would  certainly  have  thrown  down  the 
book  in  disgust. 

"The  only  rivals  of  any  note  to  the  new 
principles  which  were  brought  forward,  were 
those  known  by  the  names  of  the  '  moral  sense,' 
and  the  'original  contract.'  The  new  principle 
superseded  the  first  of  these,  by  presenting  it 
with  a  guide  for  its  decisions ;  and  the  other, 
by  making  it  unnecessary  to  resort  to  a  remote 
and  imaginary  contract,  for  what  was  clearly 
the  business  of  every  man  and  every  hour. 
Throughout  the  whole  horizon  of  morals  and 
of  politics,  the  consequences  were  glorious 
and  vast.  It  might  be  said,  without  danger  of 
exaggeration,  that  they  who  sat  in  darkness 
had  seen  a  great  light.  The  mists  in  which 
mankind  had  jousted  against  each  other  were 
swept  away,  as  when  the  sun  of  astronomical 
science  arose  in  the  full  development  of  the 
principle  of  gravitation.  If  the  object  of  legis 
lation  was  the  greatest  happiness,  morality  was 
the  promotion  of  the  same  end  by  the  conduct 
of  the  individual ;  and  by  analogy,  the  happi 
ness  of  the  world  was  the  morality  of  nations. 

" All  the  sublime  obscurities,  which  had 

haunted  the  mind  of  man  from  the  first  forma 
tion  of  society, — the  phantoms  whose  steps  had 
been  oji  earth,  and  their  heads  among  the 
clouds, — marshalled  themselves  at  the  sound 
of  this  new  principle  of  connection  and  of 
union,  and  stood  a  regulated  band,  where  all 
was  order,  symmetry,  and  force.  What  men 
had  struggled  for  and  bled,  while  they  saw  it  bu 
as  through  a  glass  darkly,  was  made  the  object 
of  substantial  knowledge  and  lively  appre 
hension.  The  bones  of  sages  and  of  patriots 
stirred  within  their  tombs,  that  what  they  dimly 
saw  and  followed  had  become  the  world's 
common  heritage.  And  the  great  result  wa» 
wrought  by  no  supernatural  means,  nor  pro 
duced  by  any  unparallelable  concatenation  of 
events.  It  was  foretold  by  no  oracles,  and 
ushered  by  no  portents ;  but  was  brought  about 
by  the  quiet  and  reiterated  exercise  of  God's 
first  gift  of  common  sense." 

Mr.  Bentham's  discovery  does  not,  as  we 
think  we  shall  be  able  to  show,  approach  in 
importance  to  that  of  gravitation,  to  which  he 
compares  it.  At  all  events,  Mr.  Bentham  seems 
to  us  to  act  much  as  Sir  Isaac  Newton  would 
have  done,  if  he  had  gone  about  boasting 
that  he  was  the  first  person  who  taught  brick 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE   OF  MILL. 


693 


layers  not  to  jump  off  scaffolds  and  break 
their  legs. 

Does  Mr.  Bentham  profess  to  hold  out  any 
new  motive  which  may  induce  men  to  promote 
the  happiness  of  the  species  to  which  they 
belong  1  Not  at  all.  He  distinctly  admits  that, 
if  he  is  asked  why  governments  should  attempt 
to  produce  the  greatest  possible  happiness,  he 
can  give  no  answer. 

"The  real  answer,"  says  he,  "appeared  to 
be,  that  men  at  large  ought  not  to  allow  a  go 
vernment  to  afflict  them  with  more  evil  or  less 
good  than  they  can  help.  What  a  government 
ought  to  do,  is  a  mysterious  and  searching 
question,  which  those  may  answer  who  know 
what  it  means ;  but  what  other  men  ought  to 
do,  is  a  question  of  no  mystery  at  all.  The 
word  ought,  if  it  means  any  thing,  must  have 
reference  to  some  kind  of  interest  or  motives: 
and  what  interest  a  government  has  in  doing 
right,  when  it  happens  to  be  interested  in  doing 
wrong,  is  a  question  for  the  schoolmen.  The 
fact  appears  to  be,  that  ought  is  not  predicable 
of  governments.  The  question  is  not  why 
governments  are  bound  not  to  do  this  or  that, 
but  why  other  men  should  let  them  if  they  can 
help  it.  The  point  is  not  to  determine  why 
the  lion  should  not  eat  sheep,  but  why  men 
should  eat  their  own  mutton  if  they  can." 

The  principle  of  Mr.  Bentharn,  if  we  under 
stand  it,  is  this,  that  mankind  ought  to  act  so  a 
to  produce  their  greatest  happiness.  The  word 
ought,  he  tells  us,  has  no  meaning,  unless  it  be 
used  with  reference  to  some  interest.  But  the 
interest  of  a  man  is  synonymous  with  his 
greatest  happiness  : — and  therefore  to  say  that 
a  man  ought  to  do  a  thing,  is  to  say  that  it  is 
for  his  greatest  happiness  to  do  it.  And  to  say 
that  mankind  ought  to  act  so  as  to  produce  their 
greatest  happiness,  is  to  say  that  the  greatest 
happiness  is  the  greatest  happiness — and  thi 
is  all ! 

Does  Mr.  Bentham's  principle  tend  to  make 
any  man  wish  for  any  thing  for  which  he  would 
not  have  wished,  or  do  any  thing  which  he 
would   not  have   done,   if  the  principle   had 
never  been  heard  of  1     If  not,  it  is  an  utterly 
useless  principle.    Now,  every  man  pursues 
his  own  happiness  or  interest — call  it  which 
you  will.     If  his  happiness  coincides  with  the 
happiness  of  the  species,  then,  whether  he  ever 
heard  of  the  "greatest  happiness  principle"  or 
not,  he  will,  to  the  best  of  his  knowledge  and 
ability,  attempt  to  produce  the  greatest  happi 
ness  of  the  species.     But,  if  what  he  thinks 
his  happiness  be  inconsistent  with  the  greates 
happiness  of  mankind,  will  this  new  principle 
convert  him  to  another  frame  of  mind  1     Mr 
Bentham  himself  allows,  as  we  have  seen,  tha 
he  can  give  no  reason  why  a  man  should  pro 
mote  the  greatest  happiness  of  others,  if  their 
greatest  happiness  be  inconsistent  with  wha 
he  thinks  his  own.    We  should  very  much  like 
to  know  how  the  Utilitarian  principle  woul 
run,  when  reduced  to  one  plain  imperative 
proposition.     Will  it  run   thus — pursue  you 
own  happiness  1    This  is  superfluous.     Ever) 
inan  pursues   it,  according  to   his  light,  and 
always  has  pursued  it,  and  always  must  pursue 
it.     To  say  that  a  man  has  done  any  thing,  is 
to  say  that  he  thought  it  for  his  happiness  to 


o  it.  Will  the  principle  run  thus — pursue  the 
reatest  happiness  of  mankind,  whether  it  be 
our  own  greatest  happiness  or  not '.'  This  is 
bsurd  and  impossible,  and  Mr.  Bentham  him- 
elf  allows  it  to  be  so.  But  if  the  principle 
ie  not  stated  in  one  of  these  two  ways,  we  can- 
lot  imagine  how  it  is  to  be  stated  at  all.  Stated 
n  one  of  these  ways,  it  is  an  identical  proposi- 
ion, — true,  but  utterly  barren  of  consequences. 
Stated  in  the  other  way,  it  is  a  contradiction  in 
erms.  Mr.  Bentham  has  distinctly  declined 
he  absurdity.  Are  we  then  to  suppose  that  he 
adopts  the  truism  1 

There  are  thus,  it  seems,  two  great  truths 
which  the  Utilitarian  philosophy  is  to  commu 
nicate  to  mankind — two  truths  which  are  to 
>roduce  a  revolution  in  morals,  in  laws,  in 
governments,  in  literature,  in  the  whole  system 
of  life.  The  first  of  these  is  speculative ;  the 
second  is  practical.  The  speculative  truth  is, 
hat  the  greatest  happiness  is  the  greatest  hap 
piness.  The  practical  rule  is  very  simple,  for 
t  imports  merely  that  men  should  never  omit, 
when  they  wish  for  any  thing,  to  wish  for  it,  or 
when  they  do  any  thing,  to  do  it !  It  is  a  great 
comfort  for  us  to  think,  that  we  readily  assent 
ed  to  the  former  of  these  great  doctrines  as 
soon  as  it  was  stated  to  us ;  and  that  we  have 
ong  endeavoured,  as  far  as  human  frailty  would 
permit,  to  conform  to  the  latter  in  our  practice. 
We  are,  however,  inclined  to  suspect,  that  the 
alamities  of  the  human  race  have  been  owing 
less  to  their  not  knowing  that  happiness  was 
happiness,  than  to  their  not  knowing  how  to 
obtain  it — less  to  their  neglecting  to  do  what 
they  did,  than  to  their  not  being  able  to  do  what 
they  wished,  or  not  wishing  to  do  what  they 
ought. 

Thus  frivolous,  thus  useless  is  this  philoso 
phy, — "controversiarum  ferax,  operum  effceta, 
ad  garriendum  prompta,  ad  generandum  in- 
valida."*  The  humble  mechanic  who  disco 
vers  some  slight  improvement  in  the  construc 
tion  of  safety  lamps  or  steam  vessels,  does 
more  for  the  happiness  of  mankind  than  the 
"magnificent  principle,"  as  Mr.  Bentham  calls 
it,  will  do  in  ten  thousand  years.  The  mechanic 
teaches  us  how  we  may,  in  a  small  degree,  be 
better  off  than  we  were.  The  Utilitarian  ad 
vises  us,  with  great  pomp,  to  be  as  well  off  as 
we  can. 

The  doctrine  of  a  moral  sense  may  be  very 
unphilosophical,  but  we  do  not  think  that  it  can. 
be  proved  to  te  pernicious.  Men  did  not  enter 
tain  certain  desires  and  aversions  because  they 
believed  in  a  moral  sense,  but  they  gave  the 
name  of  moral  sense  to  a  feeling  which  they 
found  in  their  minds,  however  it  came  there. 
If  they  had  given  it  no  name  at  all,  it  would 
still  have  influenced  their  actions :  and  it  will 
not  be  very  easy  to  demonstrate  that  it  has  in 
fluenced  their  actions  the  more,  because  they 
have  called  it  the  moral  sense.  The  theory  of 
the  original  contract  is  a  fiction,  and  a  very- 
absurd  fiction  ;  but  in  practice  it  meant,  what 
the  "greatest  happiness  principle,"  if  ever 
it  becomes  a  watchword  of  political  warfare 
will  mean — that  is  to  say,  whatever  served  the 
turn  of  those  who  used  it.  Both  the  on 3  ex- 

*  Bacon,  Novurn  Organum. 


694 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


pression  and  the  other  sound  very  well  in  de 
bating  clubs  ;  but  in  the  real  conflicts  of  life, 
our  passions  and  interests  bid  them  stand  aside 
and  know  their  place.  The  "greatest  happi 
ness  principle"  has  always  been  latent  under 
the  words,  social  contract,  justice,  benevo 
lence,  patriotism,  liberty,  and  so  forth,  just 
as  far  as  it  was  for  the  happiness,  real  or  ima 
gined,  of  those  who  used  these  words  to  pro 
mote  the  greatest  happiness  of  mankind.  And 
of  this  we  may  be  sure,  that  the  words  "  the 
greatest  happiness"  will  never,  in  any  man's 
mouth,  mean  more  than  the  greatest  happiness 
of  others  which  is  consistent  with  what  he 
thinks  his  own.  The  project  of  mending  a  bad 
•world,  by  teaching  people  to  give  new  names 
to  old  things,  reminds  us  of  Walter  Shandy's 
scheme,  for  compensating  the  loss  of  his  son's 
nose  by  christening  him  Trismegistus.  What 
society  wants  is  a  new  motive — not  a  new  cant. 
If  Mr.  Bentham  can  find  out  any  argument  yet 
undiscovered  which  may  induce  men  to  pursue 
the  general  happiness,  he  will  indeed  be  a  great 
benefactor  to  our  species.  But  those  whose 
happiness  is  identical  with  the  general  happi 
ness,  are  even  now  promoting  the  general  hap 
piness  to  the  very  best  of  their  power  and  know 
ledge  ;  and  Mr.  Bentham  himself  confesses 
that  he  has  no  means  of  persuading  those 
whose  happiness  is  not  identical  with  the  gene 
ral  happiness,  to  act  upon  his  principle.  la 
not  this,  then,  darkening  counsel  by  words 
without  knowledge?  If  the  only  fruit  of  the 
"  magnificent  principle"  is  to  be,  that  the  op 
pressors  and  pilferers  of  the  next  generation 
are  to  talk  of  seeking  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  greatest  number,  just  as  the  same  class 
of  men  have  talked  in  our  time  of  seeking  to 
uphold  the  Protestant  Constitution — just  as 
they  talked  under  Anne  of  seeking  the  good 
of  the  Church,  and  under  Cromwell,  of  seek 
ing  the  Lord — where  is  the  gain  ?  Is  not  every 
great  question  already  enveloped  in  a  suffi 
ciently  dark  cloud  of  unmeaning  words  ?  Is  it 
so  difficult  for  a  man  to  cant  some  one  or  more 
of  the  good  old  English  cants  which  his  father 
and  grandfather  canted  before  him,  that  he 
must  learn,  in  the  school  of  the  Utilitarians,  a 
new  sleight  of  tongue,  to  make  fools  clap  and 
wise  men  sneer?  Let  our  countrymen  keep 
their  eyes  on  the  neophytes  of  this  sect,  and  see 
whether  we  turn  out  to  be  mistaken  in  the  pre 
diction  which  we  now  hazard.  It  will  before 
long  be  found,  we  prophesy,  that,  as  the  cor 
ruption  of  a  dunce  is  the  generation  of  an 
Utilitarian,  so  is  the  corruption  of  an  Utilita 
rian  the  generation  of  a  jobber. 

The  most  elevated  station  that  the  "  greatest 
happine:,o  principle"  is  ever  likely  to  attain  is 
this,  that  it  may  be  a  fashionable  phrase  among 
newspaper  writers  and  members  of  Parliament 
— that  it  may  succeed  to  the  dignity  which  has 
been  enjoyed  by  the  "  original  contract,"  by  the 
*' constitution  of  1688,"  and  other  expressions 
<of  the  same  kind.  We  do  not  apprehend  that 
it  is  a  less  flexible  cant  than  those  which  have 
preceded  it,  or  that  it  will  less  easily  furnish  a 
pretext  for  any  design  for  which  a  pretext  may 
be  required.  Trie  "  original  contract"  meant, 
in  the  Convention  Parliament,  the  co-ordi- 
rate  authority  of  the  Three  Estates.  If  there 


were  to  be  a  radical  insurrection  to-morrow, 
the  "  original  contract"  would  stand  just  as  well 
for  annual  parliaments  and  universal  suffrage. 
The  "Glorious  Constitution"  again,  has  meant 
every  thing  in  turn :  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act 
the  Suspension  of  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act,  the 
Test  Act,  the  Repeal  of  the  Test  Act.  There 
has  not  been  for  many  years  a  single  important 
measure  which  has  not  been  unconstitutional 
with  its  opponents,  and  which  its  supporters 
have  not  maintained  to  be  agreeable  to  the  true 
spirit  of  the  constitution.  Is  it  easier  to  ascer 
tain  what  is  for  the  greatest  happiness  of  the 
human  race  than  what  is  the  constitution  of 
England?  If  not,  the  "greatest  happiness 
principle"  will  be  what  the  "principles  of  the 
constitution"  are,  a  thing  to  be  appealed  to  by 
everybody,  and  understood  by  everybody  in 
the  sense  which  suits  him  best.  It  will  mean 
cheap  bread,  dear  bread,  free  trade,  protecting 
duties,  annual  parliaments,  septennial  parlia 
ments,  universal  suffrage,  Old  Sarum,  trial  by 
jury, martial  law,  every  thing,  in  short,  good, bad, 
or  indifferent,  of  which  any  person,  from  ra 
pacity  or  from  benevolence,  chooses  to  under 
take  the  defence.  It  will  mean  six  and  eight- 
pence  with  the  attorney,  tithes  at  the  rectory, 
and  game-laws  at  the  manor-house.  The  sta 
tute  of  uses,  in  appearance  the  most  sweeping 
legislative  reform  in  our  history,  was  said  to 
have  produced  no  other  effect  than  that  of  add 
ing  three  words  to  a  conveyance.  The  uni 
versal  admission  of  Mr.  Bentham's  great  prin 
ciple  would,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  produce  no 
other  effect  than  that  those  orators  who,  while 
waiting  for  a  meaning,  gain  time  (like  bankers 
paying  in  sixpences  during  a  run)  by  uttering 
wo'rds  that  mean  nothing,  would  substitute 
"  the  greatest  happiness,"  or  rather,  as  the 
longer  phrase,  "  the  greatest  happiness  of  the 
greatest  number,"  for,  "  under  existing  circum 
stances," — "  now  that  I  am  on  my  legs," — arid, 
"  Mr.  Speaker,  I,  for  one,  am  free  to  say."  In 
fact,  principles  of  this  sort  resemble  those 
forms  which  are  sold  by  law-stationers,  with 
blanks  for  the  names  of  parties,  and  for  the 
special  circumstances  of  every  case — mere 
customary  headings  and  conclusions,  which 
are  equally  at  the  command  of  the  most  honest 
and  of  the  most  unrighteous  claimant.  It  is  on 
the  filling  up  that  every  thing  depends. 

The  "greatest  happiness  principle"  of  Mr. 
Bentham  is  included  in  the  Christian  morality; 
and,  to  our  thinking,  it  is  there  exhibited  in  an 
infinitely  more  sound  and  philosophical  form 
than  in  the  Utilitarian  speculations.  For  in 
the  New  Testament  it  is  neither  an  identical 
proposition,  nor  a  contradiction  in  terms  ;  and, 
as  laid  down  by  Mr.  Bentham,  it  must  be  either 
the  one  or  the  other.  "  Do  as  you  would  be 
done  by:  Love  your  neighbour  as  yourself;" 
these  are  the  precepts  of  Jesus  Christ.  Under 
stood  in  an  enlarged  sense,  these  precepts  are, 
in  fact,  a  direction  to  every  man  to  promote 
the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest  number 
But  this  direction  would  be  utterly  unmean 
ing,  as  it  actually  is  in  Mr.  Bentham's  philoso 
phy,  unless  it  were  accompanied  by  a  sanction. 
In  the  Christian  scheme,  accordingly,  it  is  ac 
companied  by  a  sanction  of  immense  force. 
To  a  man  whose  greatest  happiness  in  this 


BENTHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  MILL. 


695 


world  is  inconsistent  with  the  greatest  happi 
ness  of  the  greatest  number,  is  held  out  the 
prospect  of  an  infinite  happiness  hereafter, 
from  which  he  excludes  himself  by  wronging 
his  fellow-creatures  here. 

This  is  practical  philosophy,  as  practical  as 
that  on  which  penal  legislation  is  founded.  A 
man  is  told  to  do  something  which  otherwise 
he  would  not  do,  and  is  furnished  with  a  new 
motive  for  doing  it.  Mr.  Bentham  has  no  new 
motive  to  furnish  his  disciples  with.  He  has 
talents  sufficient  to  effect  any  thing  that  can  be 
effected.  But  to  induce  men  to  act  without  an 
inducement  is  too  much  even  for  him.  He 
should  reflect  that  the  whole  vast  world  of 
morals  cannot  be  moved,  unless  the  mover 
can  obtain  some  stand  for  his  engines  beyond 
it.  He  acts  as  Archimedes  would  have  done, 
if  he  had  attempted  to  move  the  earth  by  a 
ever  fixed  on  the  earth.  The  action  and  re 
action  neutralize  each  other.  The  artist  la 
bours,  and  the  world  remains  at  rest.  Mr. 
Bentham  can  only  tell  us  to  do  something 
which  we  have  always  been  doing,  and  should 
still  have  continued  to  do,  if  we  had  never 
heard  of  the  "greatest  happiness  principle," — 
or  else  to  do  something  which  we  have  no  con 
ceivable  motive  for  doing,  and  therefore  shall 
not  do.  Mr.  Bentham's  principle  is  at  best 
no  more  than  the  golden  rule  of  the  Gospel 
without  its  sanction.  Whatever  evils,  there 
fore,  have  existed  in  societies  in  which  the  au 
thority  of  the  Gospel  is  recognised,  may,  d  for 
tiori,  as  it  appears  to  us,  exist  in  societies  in 
which  the  Utilitarian  principle  is  recognised. 
We  do  not  apprehend  that  it  is  more  difficult 
for  a  tyrant  or  a  persecutor  to  persuade  him 
self  and  others  that,  in  putting  to  death  those 
who  oppose  his  power  or  differ  from  his  opi 
nions,  he  is  pursuing  "the  greatest  happiness," 
than  that  he  is  doing  as  he  would  be  done  by. 
But  religion  gives  him  a  motive  for  doing  as 
be  would  be  done  by:  and  Mr.  Bentham  fur 
nishes  him  with  no  motive  to  induce  him  to 
promote  the  general  happiness.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  Mr.  Bentham's  principle  mean  only 
that  every  man  should  pursue  his  own  great 
est  happiness,  he  merely  asserts  what  every 
body  knows,  and  recommends  what  everybody 
does. 

It  is  not  upon  this  "  greatest  happiness  prin 
ciple"  that  the  fame  of  Mr.  Bentham  will  rest. 
He  has  not  taught  people  to  pursue  their  own 
happiness  ;  for  that  they  always  did.  He  has 
not  taught  them  to  promote  the  happiness  of 
others  at  the  expense  of  their  own;  for  that  they 
will  not  and  cannot  do.  But  he  has  taught 
them  how,  in  some  most  important  points,  to 
promote  their  own  happiness;  and  if  his  school 
had  emulated  him  as  successfully  in  this  re 
spect  as  in  the  trick  of  passing  off  truisms  for 
discoveries,  the  name  of  Benthamite  would 
have  been  no  word  for  the  scoffer.  But  few 
of  those  who  consider  themselves  as  in  a  more 
especial  manner  his  followers,  have  any  thing 
in  common  with  him  but  his  faults.  The 
whole  science  of  jurisprudence  is  his.  He  has 
done  much  for  political  economy;  but  we  are 
not  aware  that  in  either  department  any  im 
provement  has  been  made  by  members  of  his 


[  sect.  He  discovered  truths;  all  that  they  have 
done  has  been  to  make  those  truths  unpopular. 
He  investigated  the  philosophy  of  law;  he 
could  teach  them  only  to  snarl  at  lawyers. 

We  entertain  no  apprehensions  of  danger  to 
the  institutions  of  this  country  from  the  Utili 
tarians.  Our  fears  are  of  a  different  kind.  We 
dread  the  odium  and  discredit  of  their  alliance. 
We  wish  to  see  a  broad  and  clear  line  drawn  be 
tween  the  judicious  friends  of  practical  reform 
and  a  sect  which,  having  derived  all  its  influence 
from  the  countenance  which  they  have  impru 
dently  bestowed  upon  it,  hates  them  with  the 
deadly  hatred  of  ingratitude.  There  is  not, 
and  we  firmly  believe  that  there  never  was,  in 
this  country,  a  party  so  unpopular.  They 
have  already  made  the  science  of  political 
economy — a  science  of  vast  importance  to  the 
welfare  of  nations — an  object  rf  disgust  to  the 
majority  of  the  community.  The  question  of 
parliamentary  reform  will  share  the  same  fate, 
if  once  an  association  be  formed  in  the  public 
mind  between  Reform  an  Utilitarianism. 

We  bear  no  enmity  to  any  member  of  the 
sect:  and  for  Mr.  Bentham  we  entertain  very 
high  admiration.  We  know  that  among  his 
followers  there  are  some  well-intentioned  men, 
and  some  men  of  talents  :  but  we  cannot  say 
that  we  think  the  logic  on  which  they  pride 
themselves  likely  to  improve  their  heads,  or 
the  scheme  of  morality  which  they  have  adopt 
ed  likely  to  improve  their  hearts.  Their  theory 
of  morals,  however,  well  deserves  an  article  to 
itself;  and  perhaps,  on  some  future  occasion, 
we  may  discuss  it  more  fully  than  time  and 
space  at  present  allow. 


The  preceding  article  was  written,  and  was 
actually  in  types,  when  a  letter  from  Mr.  Ben 
tham  appeared  in  the  newspapers,  importing, 
that  "though  he  had  furnished  the  Westminster 
Review  with  some  memoranda  respecting  '  the 
greatest  happiness  principle,'  he  had  nothing 
to  do  with  the  remarks  on  our  former  article. 
We  are  truly  happy  to  find  that  this  illustrious 
man  had  so  small  a  share  in  a  performance 
which,  for  his  sake,  we  have  treated  with  far 
greater  lenity  than  it  deserved.  The  mistake, 
however,  does  not  in  the  least  affect  any  part 
of  our  arguments;  and  we  have  therefore 
thought  it  unnecessary  to  cancel  or  cast  anew 
any  of  the  foregoing  pages.  Indeed,  we  are 
not  sorry  that  the  world  should  see  how  re 
spectfully  we  were  disposed  to  treat  a  great 
man,  even  when  we  considered  him  as  the  au 
thor  of  a  very  weak  and  very  unfair  attack  on 
ourselves.  We  wish,  however,  to  intimate  to 
the  actual  writer  of  that  attack,  that  our  civili 
ties  were  intended  for  the  author  of  the 
"  Preuves  Judiciaires,"  and  the  "  Defence  of 
Usury," — and  not  for  him.  We  cannot  con 
clude,  indeed,  without  expressing  a  wish,— 
though  we  fear  it  has  but  little  chance  of 
reaching  Mr.  Bentham, — that  he  would  endea 
vour  to  find  better  editors  for  his  compositions 
If  M.  Dumont  had  not  been  a  redact eur  of  a  dif 
ferent  description  from  some  of  his  successors, 
Mr.  Bentham  would  never  have  attained  th« 
distinction  of  even  giving  his  name  to  a  sect 


696 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT/ 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  OCTOBER,  1829.] 


WE  have  long  been  of  opinion  that  the  Uti 
litarians  have  owed  all  their  influence  to  a 
mere  delusion — that,  while  professing  to  have 
submitted  their  minds  to  an  intellectual  disci 
pline  of  peculiar  severity,  to  have  discarded  all 
sentimentality,  and  to  have  acquired  consum 
mate  skill  in  the  art  of  reasoning,  they  are  de 
cidedly  inferior  to  the  mass  of  educated  men 
in  the  very  qualities  in  which  they  conceive 
themselves  to  excel.  They  have  undoubtedly 
freed  themselves  from  the  dominion  of  some 
absurd  notions.  But  their  struggle  for  intel 
lectual  emancipation  has  ended,  as  injudicious 
and  violent  struggles  for  political  emancipation 
too  often  end,  in  a  mere  change  of  tyrants. 
Indeed,  we  are  not  sure  that  we  do  not  prefer 
the  venerable  nonsense  which  holds  prescrip 
tive  sway  over  the  ultra-tory,  to  the  upstart 
dynasty  of  prejudices  and  sophisms,  by  which 
the  revolutionists  of  the  moral  world  have 
suffered  themselves  to  be  enslaved. 

The  Utilitarians  have  sometimes  been  abused 
as  intolerant,  arrogant,  irreligious, — as  enemies 
of  literature,  of  the  fine  arts,  and  of  the  domes 
tic  charities.  They  have  been  reviled  for  some 
things  of  which  they  were  guilty,  and  for  some 
of  which  they  were  innocent.  But  scarcely 
anybody  seems  to  have  perceived,  that  almost 
all  their  peculiar  faults  arise  from  the  utter  want 
both  of  comprehensiveness  and  of  precision  in 
their  mode  of  reasoning.  We  have,  for  some 
time  past,  been  convinced  that  this  was  really 
the  case  ;  and  that,  whenever  their  philosophy 
should  be  boldly  and  unsparingly  scrutinized, 
the  world  would  see  that  it  had  been  under  a 
mistake  respecting  them. 

W7e  have  made  the  experiment,  and  it  has 
succeeded  far  beyond  our  most  sanguine  ex 
pectations.  A  chosen  champion  of  the  school 
has  come  forth  against  us.  A  specimen  of  his 
logical  abilities  now  lies  before  us ;  and  we 
pledge  ourselves  to  show,  that  no  prebendary 
at  an  Anti-Catholic  meeting,  no  true-blue  baro 
net  after  the  third  bottle  at  a  Pitt  Club,  ever 
displayed  such  utter  incapacity  of  comprehend 
ing  or  answering  an  argument,  as  appears  in 
the  speculations  of  this  Utilitarian  apostle; 
that  he  does  not  understand  our  meaning,  or 
Mr.  Mill's  meaning,  or  Mr.  Bentham's  meaning, 
or  his  own  meaning ;  and  that  the  various  parts 
of  his  system — if  the  name  of  system  can  be 
so  misapplied — directly  contradict  each  other. 

Having  shown  this,  we  intend  to  leave  him  in 
undisputed  possession  of  whatever  advantage 
he  may  derive  from  the  last  word.  We  pro 
pose  only  to  convince  the  public  that  there  is 
nothing  in  the  far-famed  logic  of  the  Utilita 
rians,  of  which  any  plain  man  has  reason  to 


*  Westminster  Review,  (XXII.  Art.  16,)  on  the  Stric 
tures  of  the  Edinburgh  Review  (XCV1II.  Art.  1,)  on  the 
U.ilitarian  Theory  of  Government,  and  the  "Greatest 
Uappiuess  Principle." 


be  afraid ; — that  this  logic  will  impose  on  no 
man  who  dares  to  look  it  in  the  face. 

The  Westminster  Reviewer  begins  by  charg 
ing  us  with  having  misrepresented  an  import 
ant  part  of  Mr.  Mill's  argument. 

"The  first  extract  given  by  the  Edinburgh 
Reviewers  from  the  essay  was  an  insulated 
passage,  purposely  despoiled  of  what  had  pre 
ceded  and  what  followed.  The  author  had 
been  observing,  that  some  profound  and  bene 
volent  investigators  of  human  affairs  had 
adopted  the  conclusion,  that  ot'  all  the  possible 
forms  of  government,  absolute  monarchy  is 
the  best.  This  is  what  the  reviewers  have 
omitted  at  the  beginning.  He  then  adds,  as  in 
the  extract,  that  'Experience,  if  we  look  only  at 
the  outside  of  the  facts,  appears  to  be  divided  on 
this  subject ;'  there  are  Caligulas  in  one  place, 
and  kings  of  Denmark  in  another.  'As  the 
surface  of  history  affords,  therefore,  no  certain, 
principle  of  decision,  ive  must  go  beyond  the  sur 
face,  and  penetrate  to  the  springs  within.'  This 
is  what  the  reviewers  have  omitted  at  the 
end." 

It  is  perfectly  true,  that  our  quotation  from 
Mr. Mill's  Essay  was,  like  most  other  quotations, 
preceded  and  followed  by  something  which 
we  did  not  quote.  But  if  the  Westminster  Re 
viewer  means  to  say,  that  either  what  preceded, 
or  what  followed,  would,  if  quoted,  have  shown 
that  we  put  a  wrong  interpretation  on  the  pas 
sage  which  was  extracted,  he  does  not  under 
stand  Mr.  Mill  rightly. 

Mr.  Mill  undoubtedly  says  that,  "  as  the  sur 
face  of  history  affords  no  certain  principle  of 
decision,  we  must  go  beyond  the  surface,  and 
penetrate  to  the  springs  within."  But  these 
expressions  will  admit  of  several  interpreta 
tions.  In  what  sense,  then,  does  Mr.  Mill  use 
them  ?  If  he  means  that  we  ought  to  inspect 
the  facts  with  close  attention,  he  means  what 
is  rational.  But  if  he  means  that  we  ought  to 
leave  the  facts,  with  all  their  apparent  incon 
sistencies,  unexplained — to  lay  down  a  general 
principle  of  the  widest  extent,  and  to  deduce 
doctrines  from  that  principle  by  syllogistic  ar 
gument,  without  pausing  to  consider  whether 
those  doctrines  be,  or  be  not,  consistent  with 
the  facts, — then  he  means  what  is  irrational; 
and  this  is  clearly  what  he  does  mean  :  for  he 
immediately  begins,  without  offering  the  least 
explanation  of  the  contradictory  appearances 
which  he  has  himself  described,  to  go  beyond 
the  surface  in  the  following  manner: — "That 
one  human  being  will  desire  to  render  the  per 
son  and  property  of  another  subservient  to  his 
pleasures,  notwithstanding  the  pain  or  loss  of 
pleasure  which  it  may  occasion,  to  that  other 
individual,  is  the  foundation  of  government. 
The  desire  of  the  object  implies  the  desire  of 
the  power  necessary  to  accomplish  the  object." 
And  thus  he  proceeds  to  deduce  consequences 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


697 


directly  inconsistent  with  what  he  has  himself  conclusion,  that  good  government  is  impossi 
stated  respecting  the  situation  of  the  Danish  !  Die."  That  the  Danes  are  well  governed  with- 
people.  i  out  a  representation,  is  a  reason  for  deducing 

If  we  assume  that  the  object  of  government  |  the  theory  of  government  from  a  general  prin- 
is  the  preservation  of  the  persons  and  property  |  ciple,  from  which  it  necessarily  follows,  that 
of  men,  then  we  must  hold  that,  wherever  that  i  good  government  is  impossible  without  a  re- 
object  is  attained,  there  the  principle  of  good  | 
government  exists.  If  that  object  be  attained 
both  in  Denmark  and  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  then  that  which  makes  government 
good  must  exist,  under  whatever  disguise  of 
title  or  name,  both  in  Denmark  and  in  the 
United  States.  If  men  lived  in  fear  for  their 
lives  and  their  possessions  under  Nero  and 
under  the  National  Convention,  it  follows  that 
the  causes  from  which  misgovernment  pro 
ceeds,  existed  both  in  the  despotism  of  Rome, 
and  in  the  democracy  of  France.  What,  then, 
is  that  which,  being  found  in  Denmark  and  in 
the  United  States,  and  not  being  found  in  the 
Roman  empire,  or  under  the  administration  of 
Robespierre,  renders  governments,  widely  dif 
fering  in  their  external  form,  practically  good  1 
Be  it  what  it  may,  it  certainly  is  not  that  which 
Mr.  Mill  proves  a  priori  that  it  must  be. — a  de 
mocratic  representative  assembly.  For  the 
Danes  have  no  such  assembly. 

The   latent  principle  of  good  government 
ought  to  be  tracked,  as  it  appears  to  us,  in  the 
same  manner  in  which  Lord  Bacon  proposed 
to  track  the  principle  of  heat.     Make  as  large 
a  list  as  possible,  said  that  great  man,  of  those 
bodies   in  which,  however  widely  they  differ 
from  *ach  other  in  appearance,  we  perceive 
heat;  and  as  large  a  list  as  possible  of  those 
which,  while  they  bear  a  general  resemblance 
to  hot  bodies,  are,  nevertheless,  not  hot.     Ob 
serve  the  different  degrees  of  heat  in  different 
hot  bodies,  and  then,  if  there  be  something 
which  is  found  in  all  hot  bodies,  and  of  which 
the  increase  or  diminution  is  always  accom 
panied  by  an  increase  or  diminution  of  heat, 
we  may  hope  that  we  have  really  discovered 
the  object  of  our  search.     In  the  same  manner, 
we  ought  to  examine  the  constitution  of  all 
those  communities  in  which,  under  whatever 
form,  the  blessings  of  good  government  are  en 
joyed;  and  to  discover,  if  possible,  in  what 
they  resemble  each  other,  and  in  what  they  all 
differ  from  those  societies  in  which  the  object 
of  government  is  not  attained.     By  proceeding 
thus  we  shall  arrive,  not  indeed  at  a  perfect 
theory  of  government,  but  at  a  theory  which 
will  be  of  great  practical  use,  and  which  the 
experience  of  every  successive  generation  will 
probably  bring  nearer  and  nearer  to  perfection. 
The  inconsistencies  into  which  Mr.  Mill  has 
been   betrayed,  by  taking  a  different   course, 
ought  to  serve  as  a  warning  to  all  speculators. 
Because  Denmark  is  well  governed  by  a  mo 
narch,  who,  in  appearance  at  least,  is  absolute 
Mr.  Mill  thinks,  that  the  only  mode  of  arriving 
at  the  true  principles  of  government,  is  to  de 
duce  them  a  priori  from  the  laws  of  human  na 
ture.     And  what  conclusion  does  he  bring  out 
by  this  deduction  1     We  will  give  it  in  his  own 
words  : — "  In  the  grand  discovery  of  modern 
times,  the  system  of  representation,  the  solu 
tifii  of  all  the  difficulties,  both  speculative  and 
practical,  wiil  perhaps  be  found.     If  it  cannot, 
we  seem  to  be  forced  upon  the  extraordinary 
VOL.  V.-88 


presentation  !  We  have  done  our  best  to  put 
this  question  plainly  ;  and  we  think,  that  if  the 
Westminster  Reviewer  will  read  over  what  we 
ave  written,  twice  or  thrice  wilh  patience  and 
attention,  some  glimpse  of  our  meaning  will 
>reak  in,  even  on  his  mind. 

Seme  objections  follow,  so  frivolous  and  un- 
air,  that  we  are  almost  ashamed  to  notice  them. 

"  When  it  was  said  that  there  was  in  Den- 
nark  a  balanced  contest  between  the  king  and 
he  nobility,  what  was  said  was,  that  there  was 
a  balanced  contest,  but  it  did  not  last.  It  was 
Balanced  till  something  put  an  end  to  the  ba- 
ance  ;  and  so  is  every  thing  else.  That  such 
a  balance  will  not  last,  is  precisely  what  Mr, 
Mill  had  demonstrated." 

Mr.  Mill,  we  positively  affirm,  pretends  to 
demonstrate,  not  merely  that  a  balanced  con 
test  between  the  king  and  the  aristocracy  will 
not  last,  but  that  the  chances  are  as  infinity  to 
one  against  the  existence  of  such  a  balanced 
contest.  This  is  a  mere  question  of  fact:  We 
quote  the  words  of  the  Essay,  and  defy  the 
Westminster  Reviewer  to  impeach  our  accu 
racy  : — 

It  seems  impossible  that  such  equality 
should  ever  exist.  How  is  it  to  be  esta 
blished1?  Or  by  what  criterion  is  it  to  be  as- 
ertainedl  If  there  is  no  such  criterion,  it 
must,  in  all  cases,  be  the  result  of  chance. 
If  so,  the  chances  against  it  are  as  infinity  to 
one." 

The  Reviewer  has  confounded  the  division 
of  power  with  the  balance  or  equal  division 
of  power.  Mr.  Mill  says,  that  the  division  of 
power  can  never  exist  long,  because  it  is  next 
to  impossible  that  the  equal  division  of  power 
should  ever  exist  at  all. 

"  When  Mr.  Mill  asserted  that  it  cannot  be 
for  the  interest  of  either  the  monarchy  or  the 
aristocracy  to  combine  with  the  democracy,  it 
is  plain  he  did  not  assert  that  if  the  monarchy 
and  aristocracy  were  in  doubtful  contest  with 
each  other,  they  would  not,  either  of  them,  ac 
cept  of  the  assistance  of  the  democracy.  He 
spoke  of  their  taking  the  side  of  the  democra 
cy;  not  of  their  allowing  the  democracy  to  take 
side  with  themselves." 

If  Mr.  Mill  meant  any  thing,  he  must  have 
meant  this — that  the  monarchy  and  the  aristo 
cracy  will  never  forget  their  enmiiy  to  the  de 
mocracy,  in  their  enmity  to  each  other. 

"The  monarchy  and  aristocracy,"  says  he, 
"have  all  possible  motives  for  endeavouring 
to  obtain  unlimited  power  over  the  persons  and 
property  of  the  community.  The  consequence 
is  inevitable.  They  have  all  possible  motives 
for  combining  to  obtain  that  power,  and  unless 
the  people  have  power  enough  to  be  a  match 
for  both,  they  have  no  protection.  The  ba 
lance,  therefore,  is  a  thing,  the  existence  of 
which,  upon  the  best  possible  evidence,  is  U» 
be  regarded  as  impossible." 

If  Mr.  Mill  meant  only  what  the  Westminster 
Reviewer  conceives  him  to  have  meant,  hw 
3N 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


argument  would  leave  the  popular  theory  of 
the  balance  quite  untouched.  For  it  is  the 
very  theory  of  the  balance,  that  the  help  of  the 
people  will  be  solicited  by  the  nobles  when 
hard  pressed  by  the  king,  and  by  the  king 
when  hard  pressed  by  the  nobles ;  and  that, 
as  the  price  of  giving  alternate  support  to  the 
crown  and  the  aristocracy,  they  will  obtain 
something  for  themselves,  as  the  reviewer  ad 
mits  that  they  have  done  in  Denmark.  If  Mr. 
Mill  admits  this,  he  admits  the  only  theory  of 
the  balance  of  which  we  never  heard — that 
very  theory  which  he  has  declared  to  be  wild 
and  chimerical.  If  he  denies  it,  he  is  at  issue 
with  the  Westminster  Reviewer  as  to  the  phe 
nomena  of  the  Danish  government. 

We  now  come  to  a  more  important  passage. 
Our  opponent  has  discovered,  as  he  conceives, 
a  radical  error  which  runs  through  our  whole 
argument,  and  vitiates  every  part  of.it.  We 
suspect  that  we  shall  spoil  his  triumph. 

"Mr.  Mill  never  asserted  ' that  under  no  des 
potic  government  does  any  human  being,  except  the 
tools  of  the  sovereign,  possess  more  than  the  necessa 
ries  of  life,  and  that  the  most  intense  degree  of  terror 
is  kept  up  by  constant  cruelty.'  He  said  that  ab 
solute  power  leads  to  such  results,  '  by  infalli 
ble  sequence,  where  power  over  a  community 
is  attained,  and  nothing  checks.1  The  critic  on 
the  Mount  never  made  a  more  palpable  mis 
quotation. 

"  The  spirit  of  this  misquotation  runs  through 
*;very  part  of  the  reply  of  the  Edinburgh  Re 
view  that  relates  to  the  Essay  on  Government ; 
and  is  repeated  in  as  many  shapes  as  the  Ro 
man  Pork.  The  whole  description  of  'Mr. 
Mill's  argument  against  despotism,' — including 
the  illustration  from  right-angled  triangles  and 
the  square  of  the  hypothenuse, — is  founded  on 
this  invention  of  saying  what  an  author  has 
not  said,  and  leaving  unsaid  what  he  has." 

We  thought,  and  still  think,  for  reasons 
vhich  our  readers  will  soon  understand,  that 
we  represented  Mr.  Mill's  principle  quite  fairly, 
and  according  to  the  rule  and  law  of  common 
sense,  ut  res  magis  valeat  quam  pereat.  Let  us, 
however,  give  him  all  the  advantage  of  the 
explanation  tendered  by  his  advocate,  and  see 
what  he  will  gain  by  it. 

The  Utilitarian  doctrine  then  is,  not  that 
despots  and  aristocracies  will  always  oppress 
and  plunder  the  people  to  the  last  point,  but 
that  they  will  do  so  if  nothing  checks  them. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  quite  clear  that  the 
doctrine  thus  stated,  is  of  no  use  at  all,  unless 
the  force  of  the  checks  be  estimated.  The 
first  law  oi'  motion  is,  that  a  ball  once  pro 
jected  will  fly  on  to  all  eternity  with  undimi- 
nished  velocity,  unless  something  checks.  The 
fact  is,  that  a  ball  stops  in  a  few  seconds  after 
proceeding  a  few  yards  with  very  variable 
motion.  Every  man  would  wring  his  child's 
ueck,  and  pick  his  friend's  pocket,  if  nothing 
checked  him.  In  fact,  the  principle  thus  stated, 
means  only  that  government  will  oppress,  un 
less  they  abstain  from  oppressing.  This  is 
quite  true,  we  own.  But  we  might  with  equal 
propriety  turn  the  maxim  round,  and  lay  it 
down  as  the  fundamental  principle  of  govern- 
men,  that  all  rulers  will  govern  well,  unless 


some  motive  interferes  to  keep  them  from  do 
ing  so. 

If  there  be,  as  the  Westminster  Reviewer 
acknowledges,  certain  checks  which,  under 
political  institutions  the  most  arbitrary  in  seem 
ing,  sometimes  produce  good  government,  and 
almost  always  place  some  restraint  on  the  ra 
pacity  and  cruelty  of  the  powerful ;  surely  the 
knowledge  of  those  checks,  of  their  nature, 
and  of  their  effect,  must  be  a  most  important 
part  of  the  science  of  government.  Does  Mr. 
Mill  say  any  thing  upon  this  part  of  the  sub 
ject?  Not  one  word. 

The  line  of  defence  now  taken  by  the  Utili 
tarians  evid3ntly  degrades  Mr.  Mill's  theory 
of  government  from  the  rank  which,  till  within 
the  last  few  months,  was  claimed  for  it  by  the 
whole  sect.  It  is  no  longer  a  practical  system, 
fit  to  guide  statesmen,  but  merely  a  barren  ex 
ercise  of  the  intellect,  like  those  propositions 
in  mechanics  in  which  the  effect  of  friction  and 
of  the  resistance  of  the  air  is  left  out  of  the 
question  ;  and  which,  therefore,  though  cor 
rectly  deduced  from  the  premises,  are  in  prac 
tice  utterly  false.  For  if  Mr.  Mill  professes  to 
prove  only  that  absolute  monarchy  and  aristo 
cracy  are  pernicious  without  checks, — if  he 
allows  that  there  are  checks  which  produce 
good  government,  even  under  absolute  mo- 
narchs  and  aristocracies, — and  if  he  omits  to 
tell  us  what  those  checks  are,  and  what  effects 
they  produce  under  different  circumstances,  he 
surely  gives  us  no  information  which  can  be 
of  real  utility. 

But  the  fact  is, — and  it  is  most  extraordinary 
that  the  Westminster  Reviewer  should  not 
have  perceived  it, — that  if  once  the  existence 
of  checks  on  the  abuse  of  power  in  monarchies 
and  aristocracies  be  admitted,  the  whole  of  Mr. 
Mill's  theory  falls  to  the  ground  at  once.  This 
is  so  palpable,  that  in  spite  of  the  opinion  of 
the  Westminster  Reviewer,  we  must  acquit  Mr. 
Mill  of  having  intended  to  make  such  an  ad 
mission.  We  still  think  that  the  words,  "where 
power  over  a  community  is  attained,  and  no 
thing  checks,"  must  not  be  understood  to  mean, 
that  under  a  monarchical  or  aristocratical  form 
of  government  there  can  really  be  any  check 
which  can  in  any  degree  mitigate  the  wretch 
edness  of  the  people. 

For,  ail  possible  checks  may  be  classed  un 
der  two  general  heads, — want  of  will,  and  want 
of  power.  Now,  if  a  king  or  an  aristocracy} 
having  the  power  to  plunder  and  oppress  the 
people,  can  want  the  will,  all  Mr.  Mill's  prin 
ciples  of  human  nature  must  be  pronounced 
unsound.  He  tells  us,  "that  the  desire  to  pos 
sess  unlimited  power  of  inflicting  pain  upon 
others,  is  an  inseparable  part  of  human  nature;" 
and  that  "  a  chain  of  inference,  close  and  strong 
to  a  most  unusual  degree,"  leads  to  the  conclu 
sion  that  those  who  possess  this  power  will 
always  desire  to  use  it.  It  is  plain,  therefore, 
that,  if  Mr.  Mill's  principles  be  sound,  the  check 
on  a  monarchical  or  an  aristocratical  govern 
ment  will  not  be  the  want  of  will  to  oppress. 

If  a  king  or  an  aristocracy,  having,  as  Mr. 
1  Mill  tells  us  that  they  always  must  have,  the  will 
j  to  oppress  the  people  with  the  utmost,  severity 
want  the  power,  then  the  government,  by  what 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


699 


ever  name  it  may  be  called,  must  be  virtually 
a  mixed  government,  or  a  pure  democracy :  for 
it  is  quite  clear  that  the  people  possess  some 
power  in  the  state — some  means  of  influencing 
the  nominal  rulers.  But  Mr.  Mill  has  demon 
strated  that  no  mixed  government  can  possibly 
exist,  or  at  least  that  such  a  government  must 
come  to  a  very  speedy  end  :  therefore,  every 
country  in  which  people  not  in  the  service  of 
the  government  have,  for  any  length  of  time, 
been  permitted  to  accumulate  more  than  the 
bare  means  of  subsistence,  must  be  a  pure  de 
mocracy.  That  is  to  say,  France  before  the 
revolution,  and  Ireland  during  the  last  century, 
were  pure  democracies.  Prussia,  Austria, 
Russia,  all  the  governments  of  the  civilized 
world,  were  pure  democracies.  If  this  be  not 
a  reductio  ad  absurdum,  we  do  not  know  what  is. 

The  errors  of  Mr.  Mill  proceed  principally 
from  that  radical  vice  in  his  reasoning,  which, 
in  our  last  number,  we  described  in  the  words 
of  Lord  Bacon.  The  Westminster  Reviewer 
is  unable  to  discover  the  meaning  of  our  ex 
tracts  from  the  Novum  Organum,  and  expresses 
himself  as  follows : 

"  The  quotations  from  Lord  Bacon  are  mis 
applications,  such  as  anybody  may  make  to 
any  thing  he  dislikes.  There  is  no  more  re 
semblance  between  pain,  pleasure,  motives, 
&c.,  and  substantia,  generatio,  corruptio,  elemen- 
tum,  materiel, — than  between  lines,  angles,  mag 
nitudes,  &c.,  and  the  same." 

It  would  perhaps  be  unreasonable  to  expect 
that  a  writer  who  cannot  understand  his  own 
English,  should  understand  Lord  Bacon's  La 
tin.  We  will,  therefore,  attempt  to  make  our 
meaning  clearer. 

What  Lord  Bacon  blames  in  the  schoolmen 
of  his  time,  is  this, — that  they  reasoned  syllo- 
gistically  on  words  which  had  not  been  defined 
with  precision  ;  such  as  moist,  dry,  generation, 
corruption,  and  so  forth.  Mr.  Mill's  error  is 
exactly  of  the  same  kind.  He  reasons  syllo- 
gistically  about  power,  pleasure,  and  pain, 
without  attaching  any  definite  notion  to  any 
one  of  those  words.  There  is  no  more  resem 
blance,  says  the  Westminster  Reviewer,  be 
tween  pain  and  substantia,  than  between  pain 
and  a  line  or  an  angle.  By  his  permission,  in 
the  very  point  to  which  Lord  Bacon's  observa 
tion  applies,  Mr.  Mill's  subjects  do  resemble 
the  substantia  and  elementum  of  the  schoolmen, 
and  differ  from  the  lines  and  magnitudes  of 
Euclid.  We  can  reason  a  priori  en  mathema 
tics,  because  we  can  define  with  an  exactitude 
which  precludes  all  possibility  of  confusion. 
If  a  mathematician  were  to  admit  the  least 
laxity  into  his  notions;  if  he  were  to  allow 
himself  to  be  deluded  by  the  vague  sense 
which  words  bear  in  a  popular  use,  or  by  the 
aspect  of  an  ill-drawn  diagram  ;  if  he  were  to 
forget  in  his  reasonings  that  a  point  was  indi 
visible,  or  that  the  definition  of  a  line  excluded 
breadth,  there  would  be  no  end  to  his  blunders. 
The  schoolmen  tried  to  reason  mathematically 
about  things  which  had  not  been,  and  perhaps 
could  not  be,  defined  with  mathematical  accu 
racy.  We  know  the  result.  Mr.  Mill  has  in 
our  time  attempted  to  do  the  same.  He  talks 
of  power,  for  example,  as  if  the  meaning  of  the 
word  power  were  as  determinate  as  the  mean 


ing  of  the  word  circle.  But  when  we  analyze 
his  speculations,  we  find  that  his  notion  of 
power  is,  in  the  words  of  Bacon,  "phantastica 
et  male  terminuta" 

There  are  two  senses  in  which  we  may  use 
the  word  power,  arid  those  words  which  denote 
the  various  distributions  of  power,  as  for  ex 
ample,  monarchy  ; — the  one  sense  popular  anU 
superficial, — the  other  more  scientific  and  ac 
curate.  Mr.  Mill,  since  he  chose  to  reason  a 
priori,  ought  to  have  clearly  pointed  out  in 
which  sense  he  intended  to  use  words  of  this 
kind,  and  to  have  adhered  inflexibly  to  the  sense 
on  which  he  fixed.  Instead  of  doing  this,  he 
flies  backwards  and  forwards  from  the  one  sense 
to  the  other,  and  brings  out  conclusions  at  last 
which  suit  neither. 

The  state  of  these  two  communities  to  which 
he  has  himself  referred — the  kingdom  of  Den 
mark  and  the  empire  of  Rome — may  serve  to 
illustrate  our  meaning.  Looking  merely  at  the 
surface  of  things,  we  should  call  Denmark  a 
despotic  monarchy,  and  the  Roman  world,  in 
the  fiist  century  after  Christ,  an  aristocratical 
republic.  Caligula  was,  in  theory,  nothing 
more  than  a  magistrate  elected  by  the  senate, 
and  subject  to  the  senate.  That  irresponsible 
dignity  which,  in  the  most  limited  monarchies 
of  our  time,  is  ascribed  to  the  person  of  the 
sovereign,  never  belonged  to  the  earlier  Caesars. 
The  sentence  of  death  which  the  great  council 
of  the  commonwealth  passed  on  Nero,  was 
strictly  according  to  the  theory  of  the  constitu 
tion.  Yet,  in  fact,  the  power  of  the  Roman 
emperors  approached  nearer  to  absolute  domi 
nion  than  that  of  any  prince  in  modern  Europe. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  king  of  Denmark,  in 
theory  the  most  despotic  of  princes,  would,  in 
practice,  find  it  most  perilous  to  indulge  in  cru 
elty  and  licentiousness.  Nor  is  there,  we  be 
lieve,  at  the  present  moment,  a  single  sovereign 
in  our  part  of  the  world,  who  has  so  much  real 
power  over  the  lives  of  his  subjects  as  Robes 
pierre,  while  he  lodged  at  a  chandler's  and 
dined  at  a  restaurateur's,  exercised  over  the 
lives  of  those  whom  he  called  his  fellow-citi 
zens. 

Mr.  Mill  and  the  Westminster  Reviewer  seem 
to  agree,  that  there  cannot  long  exist,  in  any 
society,  a  division  of  power  between  a  monarch, 
an  aristocracy, and  the  people;  or  between  any 
two  of  them.  However  the  power  be  distri 
buted,  one  of  the  three  parties  will,  according  to 
them,  inevitably  monopolize  the  whole.  Now, 
what  is  here  meant  by  power  ]  If  Mr.  Mill 
speaks  of  the  external  semblance  of  power, — 
of  power  recognised  by  the  theory  of  the  con 
stitution, — he  is  palpably  wrong.  In  England, 
for  example,  we  have  had  for  ages  the  name 
and  form  of  a  mixed  government,  if  nothing 
more.  Indeed,  Mr.  Mill  himself  owns,  that 
there  are  appearances  which  have  given  colour 
to  the  theory  of  the  balance,  though  he  main 
tains  that  these  appearances  are  delusive.  But 
if  he  uses  the  word  power  in  a  deeper  and  phi 
losophical  sense,  he  is,  if  possible,  still  more  in 
the  wrong  than  on  the  former  supposition. 
For  if  he  had  considered  in  what  the  power  of 
one  human  being  over  other  human  beings  must 
ultimately  consist,  he  "vould  have  perceived, 
not  only  that  there  are  mixed  government! 


700 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS   WRITINGS. 


in  the  world,  but  that  all  the  governments  in 
the  world,  and  all  the  governments  which  can 
even  be  conceived  as  existing  in  the  world, 
are  virtually  mixed. 

If  a  king  possessed  the  lamp  of  Aladdin, — 
if  he  governed  by  the  help  of  a  genius,  who 
carried  away  the  daughters  and  wives  of  his 
subjects  through  the  air  to  the  royal  Parc-aux- 
cerfs,  and  turned  into  stone  every  man  who 
wagged  a  linger  against  his  majesty's  govern 
ment,  there  would,  indeed,  be  an  unmixed  des 
potism.  But,  fortunately,  a  ruler  can  be  grati 
fied  only  by  means  of  his  subjects.  His  power 
depends  on  their  obedience ;  and,  as  any  three 
or  four  of  them  are  more  than  a  match  for 
him  by  himself,  he  can  only  enforce  the  un- 
.  willing  obedience  of  some,  by  means  of  the 
willing  obedience  of  others.  Take  any  of 
those  who  are  popularly  called  absolute 
princes — Napoleon  for  example.  Could  Napo 
leon  have  walked  through  Paris,  cutting  off  the 
head  of  one  person  in  every  house  which  he 
passed"?  Certainly  riot  without  the  assistance 
of  an  army.  If  not,  why  not?  Because  the 
people  had  sufficient  physical  power  to  resist 
him,  and  would  have  put  forth  that  power  in 
defence  of  their  lives  and  of  the  lives  of  their 
children.  In  other  words,  there  was  a  portion 
of  power  in  the  democracy  under  Napoleon. 
Napoleon  might  probably  have  indulged  him 
self  in  such  an  atrocious  freak  of  power  if  his 
army  would  have  seconded  him.  But  if  his 
army  had  taken  part  with  the  people,  he  would 
have  found  himself  utterly  helpless  ;  and  even 
if  they  had  obeyed  his  orders  against  the  peo 
ple,  they  would  not  have  suffered  him  to  deci 
mate  their  own  body.  In  other  words,  there 
was  a  portion  of  power  in  the  hands  of  a  mi 
nority  of  the  people,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  hands 
of  an  aristocracy,  under  the  reign  of  Napoleon. 
To  come  nearer  home, — Mr.  Mill  tells  us  that 
it  is  a  mistake  to  imagine  that  the  English  go 
vernment  is  mixed.  He  holds,  we  suppose, 
with  all  the  politicians  of  the  Utilitarian  school, 
that  it  is  purely  aristocratical.  There  certainly 
is  an  aristocracy  in  England,  and  we  are  afraid 
that  their  power  is  greater  than  it  ought  to  be. 
They  have  power  enough  to  keep  up  the  game- 
laws  and  corn-laws;  but  they  ha\e  not  power 
enough  to  subject  the  bodies  of  men  of  the 
lowest  class  to  wanton  outrage  at  their  plea 
sure.  Suppose  that  they  were  to  make  a  law, 
that  any  gentleman  of  two  thousand  a  year 
might  have  a  day-labourer  or  a  pauper  flogged 
with  a  cat-of-nine-tails  whenever  the  whim 
might  take  him.  It  is  quite  clear,  that  the  first 
day  on  which  such  flagellation  shovjld  be  ad 
ministered,  would  be  the  last  day  of  the  English 
aristocracy.  In  this  point,  and  in  many  other 
points  which  might  be  named,  the  commonalty 
in  our  island  enjoy  a  security  quite  as  com 
plete  as  if  they  exercised  the  right  of  univer 
sal  suffrage.  We  say,  therefore,  that  the  Eng 
lish  people  have,  in  their  own  hands,  a  suffi 
cient  guarantee  that  in  some  points  the  aristo 
cracy  will  conform  to  their  wishes; — in  other 
words,  they  have  a  certain  portion  of  power 
over  the  aristocracy.  Therefore  the  English 
government  is  mixed. 

Wherever  a  king  or  an  oligarchy  refrains 
from  the  last  extremity  of  rapacity  and  tyranny. 


through  fear  of  the  resistance  of  the  people, 
there  the  constitution,  whatever  it  may  be 
called,  is  in  some  measure  democratical.  The 
admixture  of  democratic  power  may  be  slight. 
It  may  be  much  slighter  than  it  ought  to  be; 
but  some  admixture  there  is.  Wherever  a  nu 
merical  minority,  by  means  of  superior  wealth 
or  intelligence,  of  political  concert,  or  of  mili 
tary  discipline,  exercises  a  greater  influence  on 
the  society  than  any  other  equal  number  of 
persons, — there,  whatever  the  form  of  govern- 
may  be  called,  a  mixture  of  aristocracy  does 
in  fact  exist.  And  wherever  a  single  man, 
from  whatever  cause,  is  so  necessary  to  the 
community,  or  to  any  portion  of  it,  that  he 
possesses  more  power  than  any  other  man, 
there  is  a  mixture  of  monarch)'.  This  is  the 
philosophical  classification  of  governments; 
and  if  we  use  this  classification  we  shall  find, 
not  only  that  there  are  mixed  governments,  but 
that  all  governments  are,  and  must  always  be, 
mixed.  But  we  may  safely  challenge  Mr.  Mill 
to  give  any  definition  of  power,  or  to  make  any 
classification  of  governments,  which  shall  bear 
him  out  in  his  assertion,  that  a  lasting  division 
of  authority  is  impracticable. 

It  is  evidently  on  the  real  distribution  of 
power,  and  not  on  names  and  badges,  that  the 
happiness  of  nations  must  depend.  The  repre 
sentative  system,  though,  doubtless  a  great  and 
precious  discovery  in  politics,  is  only  one  of 
the  many  modes  in  which  the  democratic  part 
of  the  community  can  effectually  check  the 
governing  few.  That  certain  men  have  been 
chosen  as  deputies  of  the  people, — that  there 
is  a  piece  of  paper  stating  such  deputies  to 
possess  certain  powers, — these  circumstances 
in  themselves  constitute  no  security  for  good 
government.  Such  a  constitution  nominally 
existed  in  France  ;  while,  in  fact,  an  oligarchy 
of  committees  and  clubs  trampled  at  once  on 
the  electors  and  the  elected.  Representation  ia 
a  very  happy  contrivance  for  enabling  large 
bodies  of  men  to  exert  their  power,  with  les> 
risk  of  disorder  than  there  would  otherwise  be, 
But  assuredly  it  does  not  of  itself  give  power 
Unless  a  representative  assembly  is  sure  of 
being  supported,  in  the  last  resort,  by  th« 
physical  strength  of  large  masses,  who  have 
spirit  to  defend  the  constitution,  and  sense  to 
defend  it  in  concert,  the  mob  of  the  town  in 
which  it  meets  may  overawe  it ; — the  howls  of 
the  listeners  in  its  gallery  may  silence  its  de 
liberations ;— an  able  and  daring  individual 
may  dissolve  it.  And  if  that  sense  and  thai 
spirit  of  which  we  speak  be  diffused  through  a 
society,  then,  even  without  a  representative  as 
sembly,  that  society  will  enjoy  many  of  the 
blessings  of  good  government. 

Which  is  the  better  able  to  defend  himself, 
— a  strong  man  with  nothing  but  his  fists,  or  a 
paralytic  cripple  encumbered  with  a  sword 
which  he  cannot  lift  ?  Such,  we  believe,  is  the 
difference  between  Denmark  and  some  new  re 
publics  in  which  the  constitutional  forms  of  the 
United  States  have  been  most  sedulously  imi 
tated. 

Look  on  the  Long  Parliament,  on  the  day  on 
which  Charles  came  to  seize  the  five  members, 
and  look  at  it  again  on  the  day  when  Cromwell 
stamped  with  his  foot  on  its  floor.  On  which 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


701 


day  was  its  apparent  power  the  greater?  On 
which  day  was  its  real  power  the  less? 
Nominally  subject,  it  was  able  to  defy  the 
sovereign.  Nominally  sovereign,  it  was  turned 
out  of  doors  by  its  servant. 

Constitutions  are  in  politics  what  paper- 
money  is  in  commerce.  They  afford  great 
facilities  and  conveniences.  But  we  must  not 
attribute  to  them  that  value  which  really  be 
longs  to  what  they  represent.  They  are  not 
power,  but  symbols  of  power,  and  will,  in  an 
emergency,  prove  altogether  useless,  unless  the 
power  for  which  they  stand  be  forthcoming. 
The  real  power  by  which  the  community  is 
governed,  is  made  up  of  all  the  means  which 
all  its  members  possess  of  giving  pleasure  or 
pain  to  each  other. 

Great  light  may  be  thrown  on  the  nature  of 
a  circulating  medium  by  the  phenomena  of  a 
state  of  barter.  And  in  the  same  manner  it 
may  be  useful  to  those  who  wish  to  compre 
hend  the  nature  and  operation  of  the  outward 
signs  of  power,  to  look  at  communities  in 
which  no  such  signs  exist:  for  example,  at  the 
great  community  of  nations.  There  we  find 
nothing  analogous  to  a  constitution :  But  do  we 
not  find  a  government  ?  We  do  in  fact  find 
government  in  its  purest,  and  simplest,  and 
most  intelligible  form.  We  see  one  portion 
of  power  acting  directly  on  another  portion  of 
power.  We  see  a  certain  police  kept  up ;  the 
weak  to  a  certain  degree  protected;  the  strong 
to  a  certain  degree  restrained.  We  see  the 
principle  of  the  balance  in  constant  operation. 
We  see  the  whole  system  sometimes  undis 
turbed  by  any  attempt  at  encroachment  for 
twenty  or  thirty  years  at  a  time ;  and  all  this  is 
produced  without  a  legislative  assembly,  or  an 
executive  magistracy  —  without  tribunals, — 
without  any  code  which  deserves  the  name ; 
solely  by  the  mutual  hopes  and  fears  of  the 
various  members  of  the  federation.  In  the 
community  of  nations,  the  first  appeal  is  to 
physical  force.  In  communities  of  men,  forms 
of  government  serve  to  put  off  that  appeal, 
and  often  render  it  unnecessary.  But  it 
is  still  open  to  the  oppressed  or  the  am 
bitious. 

Of  course,  we  do  not  mean  to  deny  that  a 
form  of  government  will,  after  it  has  existed 
for  a  long  time,  materially  affect  the  real  dis 
tribution  of  power  throughout  the  community. 
This  is  because  those  who  administer  a  govern 
ment,  with  their  dependents,  form  a  compact 
and  disciplined  body,  which,  acting  methodi 
cally  and  in  concert,  is  more  powerful  than 
any  other  equally  numerous  body  which  is 
inferior  in  organization.  The  power  of  rulers 
is  not,  as  superficial  observers  sometimes  seem 
to  think,  a  thing  sui  generis.  It  is  exactly- 
similar  in  kind,  though  generally  superior  in 
amount,  to  that  of  any  set  of  conspirators  who 
plot  to  overthrow  it.  We  have  seen  in  our 
time  the  most  extensive  and  the  best  organized 
conspiracy  that  ever  existed — a  conspiracy 
which  possessed  all  the  elements  of  real  power 
in  so  great  a  degree,  that  it  was  able  to  cope 
with  a  strong  government,  and  to  triumph 
over  it — the  Catholic  Association.  A  Utilita 
rian  would  tell  us,  we  suppose,  that  the  Irish 
Catholics  had  no  portion  of  political  power 


whatever  on  the  first  day  of  the  late  sessior* 
of  Parliament. 

Let  us  really  go  beyond  the  surface  of  facts 
let  us,  in  the  sound  sense  of  the  words,  pene 
trate  to  the  springs  within ;  and  the  deeper  we 
go,  the  more  reason  shall  we  find  to  smile  at 
those  theorists  who  hold  that  the  sole  hope  of 
the  human  race  is  in  a  rule-of-lhree  sum  and  a 
ballot-box. 

We  must  ROW  return  to  the  Westminster 
Reviewer.  '  The  following  paragraph  is  an 
excellent  specimen  of  his  peculiar  mode  of 
understanding  and  answering  arguments. 

"  The  reply  to  the  argument  against  'satura 
tion,'  supplies  its  own  answer.  The  reason 
why  it  is  of  no  use  to  try  to  'saturate,'  is  pre 
cisely  what  the  Edinburgh  Reviewers  have 
suggested — 'that  there  is  no  limit  to  the  number  of 
thieves'  There  are  the  thieves, and  the  thieves' 
cousins, — with  their  men-servants,  their  maid 
servants,  and  their  little  ones,  to  the  fortieth 
generation.  It  is  true,  that  'a  man  cannot 
become  a  king  or  a  member  of  the  aristocracy 
whenever  he  chooses ;'  but  if  there  is  to  be  no 
limit  to  the  depredators  except  their  own  incli 
nation  to  increase  and  multiply,  the  situation 
of  those  who  are  to  suffer  is  as  wretched  as 
it  needs  be.  It  is  impossible  to  define  what  art 
'  corporal  pleasures.'  A  Duchess  of  Cleveland 
was  a  '  corporal  pleasure.'  The  most  disgrace* 
ful  period  in  the  history  of  any  nation, — that 
of  the  Restoration, — presents  an  instance  of 
the  length  to  which  it  is  possible  to  go  in  an 
attempt  to  '  saturate'  with  pleasures  of  this 
kind." 

To  reason  with  such  a  writer  is  like  talking 
to  a  deaf  man,  who  catches  at  a  stray  word, 
makes  answer  beside  the  mark,  and  is  led 
further  and  further  into  error  by  every  attempt 
to  explain.  Yet,  that  our  readers  may  fully 
appreciate  the  abilities  of  the  new  philoso 
phers,  we  shall  take  the  trouble  to  go  over 
some  of  our  ground  again. 

Mr.  Mill  attempts  to  prove,  that  there  is  no 
point  of  saturation  with  the  objects  of  human 
desire.  He  then  takes  it  for  granted  that  men 
have  no  objects  of  desire  but  those  which  can 
be  obtained  only  at  the  expense  of  the  happi 
ness  of  others.  Hence  he  infers  that  absolute 
monarchs  and  aristocracies  will  necessarily 
oppress  and  pillage  the  people  to  a  frightful 
extent. 

We  answered  in  substance  thus:  there  are 
two  kinds  of  objects  of  desire ;  those  which 
give  mere  bodily  pleasure,  and  those  which 
please  through  the  medium  of  associations. 
Objects  of  the  former  class,  it  is  true,  a  man 
cannot  obtain  without  depriving  somebody  eise 
of  a  share :  but  then  with  these  every  man  is 
soon  satisfied.  A  king  or  an  aristocracy  can 
not  spend  any  very  large  portion  of  the  national 
wealth  on  the  mere  pleasures  of  sense.  With 
the  pleasures  which  belong  to  us  as  reason- 
ing  and  imaginative  beings  we  are  never 
satiated,  it  is  true :  but  then,  on  the  other 
hand,  many  of  those  pleasures  can  be  ob 
tained  without  injury  to  any  person,  and  suma 
of  them  can  be  obtained  only  by  doing  good  to 
others. 

The  Westminster  Reviewer,  in  nis  former 
attack  on  us,  laughed  at  us  fcr  saying,  that  a 
3*3 


702 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


king  or  an  aristocracy  could  not  be  easily 
satiated  with  the  pleasures  of  sense,  and  asked 
why  the  same  course  was  not  tried  with  thieves. 
We  were  not  a  little  surprised  at  so  silly  an 
objection  from  the  pen,  as  we  imagined,  of 
Mr.  Bentham.  We  returned,  however,  a  very 
simple  answer.  There  is  no  limit  to  the 
number  of  thieves.  Any  man  who  chooses 
can  steal :  but  a  man  cannot  become  a  member 
of  the  aristocracy,  or  a  king,  whenever  he 
chooses.  To  satiate  one  thief,  is  to  tempt 
twenty  other  people  to  steal.  But  by  satiating 
one  king  or  five  hundred  nobles  with  bodily 
pleasures,  we  do  not  produce  more  kings  or 
more  nobles.  The  answer  of  the  Westminster 
Reviewer  we  have  quoted  above ;  and  it  will 
amply  repay  our  readers  for  the  trouble  of 
examining  it.  We  never  read  any  passage 
which  indicated  notions  so  vague  and  confused. 
The  number  of  the  thieves,  says  our  Utilitarian, 
is  not  limited.  For  there  are  the  dependents 
and  friends  of  the  king,  and  of  the  nobles.  Is 
it  possible  that  he  should  not  perceive  that  this 
comes  under  a  different  head?  The  bodily 
pleasures  which  a  man  in  power  dispenses 
among  his  creatures,  are  bodily  pleasures  as 
respects  his  creatures,  no  doubt.  But  the 
pleasure  which  he  derives  from  bestowing 
them  is  not  a  bodily  pleasure.  It  is  one  of 
those  pleasures  which  belong  to  him  as  a 
reasoning  and  imaginative  being.  No  man  of 
common  understanding  can  have  failed  to  per 
ceive,  that  when  we  said  that  a  king  or  an  aris 
tocracy  might  easily  be  supplied  to  satiety  with 
sensual  pleasures,  we  were  speaking  of  sensual 
pleasures  directly  enjoyed  by  themselves.  But 
"it  is  impossible,"  says  the  Reviewer,  "to  define 
what  are  corporal  pleasures."  Our  brother 
would  indeed,  we  suspect,  find  it  a  difficult 
task;  nor,  if  we  are  to  judge  of  his  genius  for 
classification  from  the  specimen  which  imme 
diately  follows,  would  we  advise  him  to  make 
the  attempt.  "A  Duchess  of  Cleveland  was  a 
corporal  pleasure."  And  to  this  wise  remark 
is  appended  a  note,  setting  forth  that  Charles 
the  Second  gave  to  the  Duchess  of  Cleveland 
the  money  which  he  ought  to  have  spent  on 
the  war  with  Holland.  We  scarcely  know  how 
to  answer  a  man  who  unites  so  much  preten 
sion  to  so  much  ignorance.  There  are,  among 
the  many  Utilitarians  who  talk  about  Hume, 
Condillac,  and  Hartley,  a  few  who  have  read 
those  writers.  Let  the  Reviewer  ask  one  of 
these  what  he  thinks  on  the  subject.  We  shall 
not  undertake  to  whip  a  pupil  of  so  little 
promise  through  his  first  course  of  meta 
physics.  We  shall,  therefore,  only  say — leav 
ing  him  to  guess  and  wonder  what  we  can 
mean — that  in  our  opinion,  the  Duchess  of 
Cleveland  was  not  a  merely  corporal  plea 
sure, — that  the  feeling  which  leads  a  prince  to 
prefer  one  woman  to  all  others,  and  to  lavish 
the  wealth  of  kingdoms  on  her,  is  a  feeling 
which  can  only  be  explained  by  the  law  of  as 
sociation. 

But  we  are  tired,  and  even  more  ashamed 
.nan  tired,  of  exposing  these  b.anders.  The 
•whole  article  is  of  «i  piece.  One  passage, how 
ever,  we  must  select,  because  it  contains  a 
wery  gross  misrepresentation. 

•' '  They  never  alluaed  to  the  French  Revolution 


for  the  purpose  of  proving  that  Ihe  poor  were  inclined 
to  rob  the  rich.' — They  only  said, '  as  soon  as  the 
poor  again  began  to  compare  their  cottages 
and  salads  with  the  hotels  and  banquets  of  the 
rich,  there  would  have  been  another  scramble 
for  property,  another  general  confiscation,' "  &c. 

We  said,  that,  if  Mr.  Mill's  principles  of  human 
nature  were  correct,  there  would  have  been  an 
other  scramble  for  property,  and  another  con 
fiscation.  We  particularly  pointed  this  out  in 
our  last  article.  We  showed  the  Westminster 
Reviewer  that  he  had  misunderstood  us.  We 
dwelt  particularly  on  the  condition  which  was 
introduced  into  our  statement.  We  said  that 
we  had  not  given,  and  did  not  mean  to  give, 
any  opinion  of  our  own.  And  after  this,  the 
Westminster  Reviewer  thinks  proper  to  repeat 
his  former  misrepresentation,  without  taking 
the  least  notice  of  that  qualification  to  which 
we,  in  the  most  marked  manner,  called  his  at 
tention. 

We  hasten  on  to  the  most  curious  part  of  the 
article  under  our  consideration — the  defence 
of  the  "greatest  happiness  principle."  The 
Reviewer  charges  us  with  having  quite  mis 
taken  its  nature. 

"All  that  they  have  established  is,  that  they 
do  not  understand  it.  Instead  of  the  truism  of 
the  whigs,  'that  the  greatest  happiness  is  the 
greatest  happiness,'  what  Mr.  Bentham  had  de 
monstrated,  or,  at  all  events,  had  laid  such 
foundations  that  there  was  no  trouble  in  de 
monstrating,  was,  that  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  individual  was,  in  the  long  run,  to  be 
obtained  by  pursuing  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  aggregate." 

It  was  distinctly  admitted  by  the  Westminster 
Reviewer,  as  we  remarked  in  our  last  article, 
that  he  could  give  no  answer  to  the  question, — 
why  governments  should  attempt  to  produce  the 
greatest  possible  happiness'!  The  Reviewer 
replies  tkus  : — 

"Nothing  of  the  kind  will  be  admitted  at  all 
In  the  passage  thus  selected  to  be  tacked  to  the 
other,  the  question  started  was,  concerning  'the 
object  of  government;' in  which  government 
was  spoken  of  as  an  operation,  not  as  any  thing 
that  is  capable  of  feeling  pleasure  or  pain.  In 
this  sense  it  is  true  enough,  that  ought  is  not 
predicable  of  governments." 

We  will  quote,  once  again,  the  passage  which 
we  quoted  in  our  last  number,  and  we  really 
hope  that  our  brother  critic  will  feel  something 
like  shame  while  he  peruses  it. 

"The  real  answer  appeared  to  be,  that  men 
at  large  ought  not  to  allow  a  government  to 
afflict  them  with  more  evil  or  less  good,  than 
they  can  help.  What  a  government,  ought  to 
do,  is  a  mysterious  and  searching  question, 
which  those  may  answer  who  know  what  it 
means ;  but  what  other  men  ought  to  do,  is  a 
question  of  no  mystery  at  all.  The  word  ought, 
if  it  means  any  thing,  must  have  reference  to 
some  kind  of  interest  or  motives;  and  what 
interest  a  government  has  in  doing  right,  when 
it  happens  to  be  interested  in  doing  wrong,  is 
a  question  for  the  schoolmen.  The  fact  ap 
pears  to  be,  'that  ought  is  not  predicable  of 
governments.  The  question  is  not,  why  go 
vernments  are  bound  not  to  do  this  or  that, 
but  why  other  men  should  let  them  if  they  cao 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


703 


help  it.  The  point  is  not  to  determine  why 
the  lioL  should  not  eat  sheep,  but  why  men 
should  not  eat  their  own  mutton  if  they  can." 

We  defy  ihe  Westminster  Reviewer  to  re 
concile  this  passage  with  the  "  general  happi 
ness  principle,"  as  he  now  states  it.  He  tells 
us,  that  he  meant  by  government,  not  the  peo 
ple  invested  with  the  powers  of  government, 
but  a  mere  operation  incapable  of  feeling  plea 
sure  or  pain.  We  say,  that  he  meant  the  peo 
ple  invested  with  the  powers  of  government, 
and  nothing  else.  It  is  true,  that  ought  is  not 
predicable  of  an  operation.  But  who  would 
ever  dream  of  raising  any  question  about  the 
duties  of  an  operation  ?  What  did  the  Re 
viewer  mean  by  saying,  that  a  government 
could  not  be  interested  in  doing  right  because 
it  was  interested  in  doing  wrong]  Can  an 
operation  be  interested  in  either  1  And  what 
did  he  mean  by  his  comparison  about  the 
lion  1  Is  a  lion  an  operation  incapable  of  pain 
or  pleasure  1  And  what  did  he  mean  by  the 
expression,  "  other  men,"  so  obviously  opposed 
to  the  word  u  government  ?"  But  let  the  public 
judge  between  us.  It  is  superfluous  to  argue 
a  point  so  clear. 

The  Reviewer  does  indeed  seem  to  feel  that 
his  expressions  cannot  be  explained  away,  and 
attempts  to  shuffle  out  of  the  difficulty  by  own 
ing,  that  "the  double  meaning  of  the  word 
government  was  not  got  clear  of  without  con 
fusion."  He  has  now,  at  all  events,  he  assures 
us,  made  himself  master  of  Mr.  Bentham's 
philosophy.  The  real  and  genuine  "greatest 
happiness  principle"  is,  that  the  greatest  hap 
piness  of  every  individual  is  identical  with  the 
greatest  happiness  of  society;  and  all  other 
"greatest  happiness  principles"  whatever,  are 
counterfeits.  "This,"  says  he,  "is  the  spirit 
of  Mr.  Bentham's  principle;  and  if  there  is 
any  thing  opposed  to  it  in  any  former  state 
ment,  it  may  be  corrected  by  the  present." 

Assuredly  if  a  fair  and  honourable  opponent 
had,  in  discussing  a  question  so  abstruse  as 
that  concerning  the  origin  of  moral  obligation, 
made  some  unguarded  admission  inconsistent 
with  the  spirit,  of  his  doctrines,  we  should  not 
be  inclined  to  triumph  over  him.  But  no  ten 
derness  is  due  to  a  writer  who,  in  the  very  act 
of  confessing  his  blunders,  insults  those  by 
whom  his  blunders  have  been  detected,  and 
accuses  them  of  misunderstanding  what,  in 
fact,  he  has  himself  misstated. 

The  whole  of  this  transaction  illustrates  ex 
cellently  the  real  character  of  this  sect.  A 
paper  comes  forth,  professing  to  contain  a  full 
development  of  the  "greatest  happiness  prin 
ciple,"  with  the  latest  improvements  of  Mr. 
Bentham.  The  writer  boasts  that  his  article 
has  the  honour  of  being  the  announcement 
and  the  organ  of  this  wonderful  discovery, 
which  is  to  make  "the  bones  of  sages  and  pa 
triots  stir  within  their  tombs."  This  "  magni 
ficent  principle"  is  then  stated  thus:  Mankind 
ought  to  pursue  their  greatest  happiness.  But 
there  are  persons  whose  interest  is  opposed  to 
the  greatest  happiness  of  mankind.  Ought  is 
not  predicable  of  such  persons.  For  the  word 
aught  has  no  meaning,  unless  it  be  used  with 
reference  to  some  interest. 

We  answered,  with  much  more  lenity  than 


we  should  have  shown  to  such  nonsense  had 
it  not  proceeded,  as  we  supposed,  from  Mr. 
Bentham,  that  interest  was  synonymous  with 
greatest  happiness ;  and  that,  therefore,  if  tho 
word  ought  has  no  meaning,  unless  used  with 
reference  to  interest,  then,  to  say  that  mankind 
ought  to  pursue  their  greatest  happiness,  is 
simply  to  say,  that  the  greatest  happiness  is 
the  greatest  happiness;  that  every  individual 
pursues  his  own  happiness;  that  either  what 
he  thinks  his  happiness  must  coincide  with 
the  greatest  happiness  of  society  or  not;  thai 
if  what  he  thinks  his  happiness  coincides  with 
the  greatest  happiness  of  society,  he  will  at 
tempt  to  promote  the  greatest  happiness  of 
society,  whether  he  ever  heard  of  the  "  great 
est  happiness  principle"  or  not;  and  that,  by 
the  admission  of  the  Westminster  Reviewer, 
if  his  happiness  is  inconsistent  with  the  great 
est  happiness  of  society,  there  is  no  reason 
why  he  should  promote  the  greatest  happiness 
of  society.  Now,  that  there  are  individuals 
who  think  that  for  their  happiness  which  is 
not  for  the  greatest  happiness  of  society  is 
evident.  The  Westminster  Reviewer  allowed 
that  some  of  these  individuals  were  in  the 
right;  and  did  not  pretend  to  give  any  reason 
which  could  induce  any  one  of  them  to  think 
himself  in  the  wrong.  So  that  the  "magnifi 
cent  principle"  turned  out  to  be  either  a  truism 
or  a  contradiction  in  terms;  either  this  maxim. 
"  Do  what  you  do ;"  or  this  maxim,  "  Do  what 
you  cannot  do." 

The  Westminster  Reviewer  had  the  wit  to 
see  that  he  could  not  defend  this  palpable  non 
sense;  but,  instead  of  manfully  owning  that  he 
had  misunderstood  the  whole  nature  of  the 
"greatest  happiness  principle"  in  the  summer, 
and  had  obtained  new  light  during  the  autumn, 
he  attempts  to  withdraw  the  former  principle 
unobserved,  and  to  substitute  another,  directly 
opposed  to  it,  in  its  place  ;  clamouring  all  the 
time  against  our  unfairness,  like  one  who, 
while  changing  the  cards,  diverts  the  attention 
of  the  table  from  his  sleight-of-hand  by  voci 
ferating  charges  of  foul  play  against  other 
people. 

The  "greatest  happiness  principle"  for  the 
present  quarter  is  then  this, — that  every  indi 
vidual  will  best  promote  his  own  happiness  in 
this  world,  religious  consichrations  being  left 
out  of  the  question,  by  promoting  the  greatest 
happiness  of  the  whole  species.  And  this 
principle,  we  are  told,  holds  good  with  respect 
to  kings  and  aristocracies,  as  well  as  with 
other  people. 

"  It  is  certain  that  the  individual  operators 
in  any  government,  if  they  were  thoroughly  in 
telligent  and  entered  into  a  perfect  calculation 
of  all  existing  chances,  would  seek  for  their 
own  happiness  in  the  promotion  of  the  general ; 
which  brings  them,  if  they  knew  it,  under  Mr. 
Bentham's  rule.  The  mistake  of  supposing  the 
contrary,  lies  in  confounding  criminals  who 
have  had  the  luck  to  escape  punishment  with 
those  who  have  the  risk  still  before  them.  Sup 
pose,  for  instance,  a  member  of  the  House  of 
Commons  were  at  this  moment  to  debate  with 
in  himself  whether  it  would  be  for  his  ultimate 
happiness  to  begin,  according  to  his  ability,  to 
misgovern.  If  he  could  be  sure  of  being  as 


704 


MAC AUL AY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


lucky  as  some  that  are  dead  and  gone,  there 
might  be  difficulty  in  finding  him  an  answer. 
But  he  is  not  sure;  and  never  can  be  till  he  is 
dead.  He  does  not  know  that  he  is  not  close 
upon  the  moment  when  misgovernment,  such 
as  he  is  tempted  to  contemplate,  will  be  made 
a  terrible  example  of.  It  is  not  fair  to  pick 
out  the  instance  of  the  thief  that  has  died  un 
hanged.  The  question  is,  whether  thieving  is 
at  this  moment  an  advisable  trade  to  begin, 
with  all  the  possibilities  of  hanging  not  got 
over]  This  is  the  spirit  of  Mr.  Bentham's 
principle ;  and  if  there  is  any  thing  opposed 
to  it  in  any  former  statement,  it  may  be  cor 
rected  by  the  present." 

We  hope  that  we  have  now  at  last  got  to 
the  real  "magnificent  principle," — to  the  prin 
ciple  which  is  really  to  make  "the  bones  of 
the  sages  and  patriots  stir."  What  effect  it 
may  produce  on  the  bones  of  the  dead  we  shall 
not  pretend  to  decide ;  but  we  are  sure  that 
it  will  do  very  little  for  the  happiness  of  the 
living. 

In  the  first  place,  nothing  is  more  certain 
than  this,  that  the  Utilitarian  theory  of  govern 
ment,  as  developed  in  Mr.  Mill's  Essay,  and  in 
all  the  other  works  on  the  subject  which  have 
been  put  forth  by  the  sect,  rests  on  these  two 
principles, — that  men  follow  their  interest,  and 
that  the  interest  of  individuals  may  be,  and  in 
fact  perpetually  is,  opposed  to  the  interest  of 
society.  Unless  these  two  principles  be  grant 
ed,  Mr.  Mill's  Essay  does  not  contain  one  sound 
sentence.  All  his  arguments  against  monarchy 
and  aristocracy,  all  his  arguments  in"  favour 
of  democracy,  nay,  the  very  argument  by  which 
he  shows  that  there  is  any  necessity  for  having 
government  at  all,  must  be  rejected  as  utterly 
worthless. 

This  is  so  palpable,  that  even  the  Westmin 
ster  Reviewer,  though  not  the  most  clear-sight 
ed  of  men,  could  not  help  seeing  it.  Accord 
ingly,  he  attempts  to  guard  himself  against  the 
objection,  after  the  manner  of  such  reasoners, 
by  committing  two  blunders  instead  of  one. 
"All  this,"  says  he,  "  only  shows  that  the  mem 
bers  of  a  government  would  do  well  if  they 
were  all-wise  ;"  and  he  proceeds  to  tell  us,  that 
as  rulers  are  not  all-wise,  they  will  invariably 
act  against  this  principle  wherever  they  can,  so 
that  the  democratical  checks  will  still  be  neces 
sary  to  produce  good  government. 

No  form  which  human  folly  takes  is  so  richly 
and  exquisitely  laughable  as  the  spectacle  of  an 
Utilitarian  in  a  dilemma.  What  earthly  good 
can  there  be  in  a  principle  upon  which  no  man 
will  act  until  he  is  all-wise?  A  certain  most 
important  doctrine,  we  are  told,  has  been  de 
monstrated  so  clearly,  that  it  ought  to  be  the 
foundation  of  the  science  of  government.  And 
yet  the  whole  frame  of  government  is  to  be 
constituted  exactly  as  if  this  fundamental  doc 
trine  were  false,  and  on  the  supposition  that  no 
human  being  will  ever  act  as  if  he  believed  it 
to  be  true ! 

The  whole  argument  of  the  Utilitarians,  in 
favour  of  universal  suffrage,  proceeds  on  the 
supposition  that  even  the  rudest  and  most  un 
educated  men  cannot,  for  any  length  of  time, 
oe  deluded  into  acting  against  their  own  true 
.nterest.  Yet  now  they  tell  us  that,  in  all  aris- 


tocratical  communities,  the  higher  and  more 
educated  class  will,  not  occasionally,  but  inva 
riably,  act  against  its  own  interest.  Now,  the 
only  use  of  proving  any  thing,  as  far  as  we 
can  see,  is  that  people  may  believe  it.  To  say 
that  a  man  does  what  he  believes  to  be  against 
his  happiness,  is  a  contradiction  in  terms.  If, 
therefore,  government  and  laws  are  to  be  con 
stituted  on  the  supposition  on  which  Mr.  Mill's 
Essay  is  founded,  that  all  individuals  will, 
whenever  they  have  power  over  others  put  in 
to  their  hands,  act  in  opposition  to  the  general 
happiness,  then  government  and  laws  must  be 
constituted  on  the  supposition  that  no  individual 
believes,  or  ever  will  believe,  his  own  happi 
ness  to  be  identical  with  the  happiness  of  so 
ciety.  That  is  to  say,  government  and  laws 
are  to  be  constituted  on  the  supposition  that  no 
human  being  will  ever  be  satisfied  by  Mr.  Ben 
tham's  proof  of  his  "  greatest  happiness  prin 
ciple," — a  supposition  which  may  be  true 
enough,  but  which  says  little,  we  think,  for  the 
principle  in  question. 

But  where  has  this  principle  been  demon 
strated  1  We  are  curious,  we  confess,  to  see 
this  demonstration  which  is  to  change  the  face 
of  the  world,  and  yet  is  to  convince  nobody. 
The  most  amusing  circumstance  is,  that  the 
Westminster  Reviewer  himself  does  not  saem 
to  know  whether  the  principle  has  been  demon 
strated  or  not.  "  Mr.  Bentham,  he  says,  "  has 
demonstrated  it,  or  at  all  events  has  laid  such 
foundations  that  there  is  no  trouble  in  de 
monstrating  it."  Surely  it  is  rather  strange 
that  such  a  matter  should  be  left  in  doubt.  The 
Reviewer  proposed,  in  his  former  article,  a 
slight  verbal  emendation  in  the  statement  of 
the  principle;  he  then  announced  that  the 
principle  had  received  its  last  improvement; 
and  gloried  in  the  circumstance  that  the  West 
minster  Review  had  been  selected  as  the  organ 
of  that  improvement.  Did  it  never  occur  to 
him  that  one  slight  improvement  to  a  doctrine 
is  to  prove  ill 

Mr.  Bentham  has  not  demonstrated  the 
"greatest  happiness  principle,"  as  now  stated, 
He  is  far  too  wise  a  man  to  think  of  demon 
strating  any  such  thing.  In  those  sections  of 
his  Introduction  to  the  Principles  of  Morals  and 
Legislation,  to  which  the  Reviewer  refers  us  in 
his  note,  there  is  not  a  word  of  the  kind.  Mr. 
Bentham  says,  most  truly,  that  there  are  no  oc 
casions  in  which  a  man  has  not  some  motives 
for  consulting  the  happiness  of  other  men  ;  and 
he  proceeds  to  set  forth  what  those  motives 
are — sympathy  on  all  occasions,  and  the  love 
of  reputation  on  most  occasions.  This  is  the 
very  doctrine  which  we  have  been  maintaining 
against  Mr.  Mill  and  the  Westminster  Reviewer. 
The  principle  charge  which  we  brought  against 
Mr.  Mill  was,  that  those  motives  to  which  Mr. 
Bentham  ascribes  so  much  influence,  were 
quite  left  out  of  consideration  in  his  theory. 
The  Westminster  Reviewer,  in  the  very  arti 
cle  now  before  us,  abuses  us  for  saying,  in  the 
spirit  and  almost  in  the  words  of  Mr.  Bentham, 
that  "  there  is  a  certain  check  to  the  rapacity 
and  cruelty  of  men  in  their  desire  of  the  good 
opinion  of  others."  But  does  this  principle,  in 
which  we  fully  agree  with  Mr.  Bentham,  go  rhe 
length  of  the  new  "  greatest  happiness  princi- 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF  GOVERNMENT. 


705 


pie  ?"  The  question  is  not  whether  men  have 
some  motives  for  promoting  the  greatest  happi 
ness,  hut  whether  the  stronger  motives  be  those 
which  impel  them  to  promote  the  greatest  hap 
piness.  That  this  would  always  be  the  case, 
if  men  knew  their  own  worldly  interests,  is  the 
assertion  of  the  Reviewer.  As  he  expresses 
some  doubt  whether  Mr.  Benthani  has  demon 
strated  this  or  riot,  we  would  advise  him  to  set 
the  point  at  rest  by  giving  his  own  demonstra 
tion. 

The  Reviewer  has  not  attempted  to  give  a 
general  composition  of  the  "greatest  happiness 
principle;"  but  he  has  tried  to  prove  that  it 
holds  good  in  one  or  two  particular  cases. 
And  even  in  those  particular  cases  he  has 
utterly  failed.  A  man,  says  he,  who  calcu 
lated  the  chances  fairly,  would  perceive  that 
it  would  be  for  his  greatest  happiness  to  ab 
stain  from  stealing ;  for  a  thief  runs  a  greater 
risk  of  being  hanged  than  an  honest,  man. 

It  would  have  been  wise,  we  think,  in  the 
Westminster  Reviewer,  before  he  entered  on 
a  discussion  of  this  sort,  to  settle  in  what  hu 
man  happiness  consists.  Each  of  the  ancient 
sects  of  philosophy  held  some  tenet  on  this  sub 
ject  M'hich  served  for  a  distinguishing  badge. 
The  summvm  bonum  of  the  Utilitarians,  as  far 
as  we  can  judge  from  the  passage  which  we 
arc  now  considering,  is  the  not  being  hanged. 

That  it  is  an  unpleasant  thing  to  be  hanged, 
we  most  willingly  concede  to  our  brother.  But 
that  the  whole  question  of  happiness  or  misery 
resolves  itself  into  this  single  point,  we  cannot 
so  easily  admit.  We  must  look  at  the  thing 
purchased,  as  well  as  the  price  paid  for  it.  A 
thief,  assuredly,  runs  a  greater  risk  of  being 
hanged  than  a  labourer;  and  so  an  officer  in 
the  army  runs  a  greater  risk  of  being  shot  than 
a  banker's  clerk ;  and  a  governor  of  India  runs 
a  greater  risk  of  dying  of  cholera  than  a  lord 
of  the  bedchamber.  But  does  it  therefore  fol 
low  that  every  man,  whatever  his  habits  or 
feelings  may  be,  would,  if  he  knew  his  own 
happiness,  become  a  clerk  rather  than  a  cor 
net,  or  goldstick  in  waiting  rather  than  go 
vernor  of  India! 

Nothing  can  be  more  absurd  than  to  sup 
pose,  like  the  Westminster  Reviewer,  that 
thieves  steal  only  because  they  do  not  calcu 
late  the  chances  of  being  hanged  as  correctly 
as  honest  men.  It  never  seems  to  have  oc 
curred  to  him  as  possible,  that  a  man  may  so 
greatly  prefer  the  life  of  a  thief  to  the  life  of  a 
labourer,  that  he  may  determine  to  brave  the 
risk  of  detection  and  punishment,  though  he 
may  even  think  that  risk  greater  than  it  really 
is.  And  how,  on  Utilitarian  principles,  is  such 
a  man  to  be  convinced  that  he  is  in  the  wrong  1 
"You  will  be  found  out." — "Undoubtedly." — 
"You  will  be  hanged  within  two  years." — "I 
expect  to  be  hanged  within  one  year." — "Then 
why  do  you  pursue  this  lawless  mode  of  life]" 
— "Because  I  would  rather  Jive  for  one  year 
with  plenty  of  money,  dressed  like  a  gentleman, 
eating  and  drinking  of  the  best,  frequenting 
public  places,  and  visiting  a  dashing  mistress, 
than  break  stones  on  the  road,  or  sit  down  to 
the  loom,  with  the  certainty  of  attaining  a 
good  old  age.  It  is  my  humour.  Are  you 
answered?" 

VOL.  V.- 89 


A  king,  says  the  Reviewer  again,  would  go 
vern  well  if  he  were  wise,  for  fear  of  provok 
ing  his  subjects  to  insurrection.  Therefore,  the 
true  happiness  of  a  king  is  identical  with  the 
greatest  happiness  of  society.  Tell  Charles  II. 
that  if  he  will  be  constant  to  his  queen,  sober 
at  table,  regular  at  prayers,  frugal  in  his  ex 
penses,  active  in  the  transaction  of  business i 
if  he  will  drive  the  herd  of  slaves,  buffoons, 
and  procurers  from  Whitehall,  and  make  the 
happiness  of  his  people  the  rule  of  his  conduct, 
he  will  have  a  much  greater  chance  of  reign 
ing  in  comfort  to  an  advanced  age ;  that  his 
profusion  and  tyranny  have  exasperated  his 
subjects,  and  may,  perhaps,  bring  him  to  an 
end  as  terrible  as  his  father's.  He  might  an 
swer,  that  he  saw  the  danger,  but  that  life  was 
not  worth  having  without  ease  and  vicious 
pleasures.  And  what  has  our  philosopher  to 
say  1  Does  he  not  see  that  it  is  no  more  pos 
sible  to  reason  a  man  out  of  liking  a  short  life 
and  a  merry  one  more  than  a  long  life  and  a 
dull  one,  than  to  reason  a  Greenlander  out  of 
his  train  oil  ?  We  may  say  that  the  tastes  of 
the  thief  and  the  tyrant  differ  from  ours ;  but 
what  right  have  we  to  say,  looking  at  this 
world  alone,  that  they  do  not  pursue  their 
greatest  happiness  very  judiciously  1 

It  is  the  grossest  ignorance  of  human  nature 
to  suppose  that  another  man  calculates  the 
chances  differently  from  us,  merely  because 
he  does  what,  in  his  place,  we  should  not  do. 
Every  man  has  tastes  and  propensities,  which 
he  is  disposed  to  gratify  at  a  risk  and  expense, 
which  people  of  different  temperaments  and  ha 
bits  think  extravagant.  "  Why,"  says  Horace, 
"does  one  brother  like  to  lounge  in  the  forum, 
to  play  in  the  Campus,  and  to  anoint  himself 
in  the  baths,  so  well,  that  he  would  not  put 
himself  out  of  his  way  for  all  the  wealth  of  the 
richest  plantations  of  the  East ;  while  the  other 
toils  from  sunrise  to  sunset  for  the  purpose  of 
increasing  his  fortune  ?"  Horace  attributes  the 
diversity  to  the  influence  of  the  Genius  arid  the 
natal  star:  and  eighteen  hundred  years  have 
taught  us  only  to  disguise  our  ignorance  be 
neath  a  more  philosophical  language. 

We  think,  therefore,  that  the  Westminster 
Reviewer,  even  if  we  admit  his  calculation  of 
the  chances  to  be  right,  does  not  make  out  his 
case.  But  he  appears  to  us  to  miscalculate 
chances  more  grossly  than  any  person  who 
ever  acted  or  speculated  in  this  world.  "It  is 
for  the  happiness,"  says  he,  "of  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons  to  govern  well ;  for  he 
never  can  tell  that  he  is  not  close  on  the  mo 
ment  when  misgovernment  will  be  terribly 
punished:  if  he  was  sure  that  he  should  be  as 
lucky  as  his  predecessors,  it  might  be  for  his 
happiness  to  misgovern  ;  but  he  is  not  sure." 
Certainly  a  member  of  Parliament  is  not  sure 
that  he  shall  not  be  torn  in  pieces  by  a  mob,  or 
guillotined  by  a  revolutionary  tribunal,  for  his 
opposition  to  reform.  Nor  is  the  Westminster 
Reviewer  sure  that  he  shall  not  be  hanged  for 
writing  in  favour  of  universal  suffrage.  We 
may  have  democratical  massacres.  We  may 
also  have  aristocratical  proscriptions.  It  is 
not  very  likely,  thank  God,  that  we  should  see 
either.  But  the  radical,  we  think,  runs  as 
much  danger  as  the  aristocrat.  As  to  oui 


706 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


friend,  the  Westminster  Reviewer,  he,  it  must 
be  owned,  has  as  good  a  right  as  any  man  on 
his  side,  "Antoni  gladios  contemncre"  But  take 
the  man  whose  votes,  ever  since  he  has  sate 
in  Parliament,  have  been  the  most  uniformly 
bad,  and  oppose  him  to  the  man  whose  votes 
have  been  the  most  uniformly  good.  The 
Westminster  Reviewer  would  probably  select 
Mr.  Sadler  and  Mr.  Hume.  Now,  does  any 
rational  man  think, — will  the  Westminster  Re 
viewer  himself  say, — that  Mr.  Sadler  runs 
more  risk  of  coming  to  a  miserable  end,  on 
account  of  his  public  conduct,  than  Mr.  Hume  1 
Mr.  Sadler  does  not  know  that  he  is  not  close 
on  the  moment  when  he  will  be  made  an  ex 
ample  of;  for  Mr.  Sadler  knows,  if  possible, 
less  about  the  future  than  about  the  past.  But 
he  has  no  more  reason  to  expect  that  he  shall 
be  made  an  example  of,  than  to  expect  that 
London  will  be  swallowed  up  by  an  earthquake 
next  spring;  and  it  would  be  as  foolish  in  him 
to  act  on  the  former  supposition  as  on  the 
latter.  There  is  a  risk;  for  there  is  a  risk  of 
every  thing  which  does  not  involve  a  contra 
diction  ;  but  it  is  a  risk  from  which  no  man  in 
his  wits  would  give  a  shilling  to  be  insured. 
Yet  our  Westminster  Reviewer  tells  us,  that 
this  risk  alone,  apart  from  all  considerations 
of  religion,  honour,  or  benevolence,  would, 
as  a  matter  of  mere  calculation,  induce  a  wise 
member  of  the  House  of  Commons  to  refuse 
any  emoluments  which  might  be  offered  him 
as  the  price  of  his  support  to  pernicious  mea 
sures. 

We  have  hitherto  been  examining  cases 
proposed  by  our  opponent.  It  is  now  our  turn 
to  propose  one,  and  we  beg  that  he  will  spare 
no  wisdom  in  solving  it. 

A  thief  is  condemned  to  be  hanged.  On 
the  eve  of  the  day  fixed  for  the  execution,  a 
turnkey  enters  his  cell,  and  tells  him  that  all  is 
safe,  that  he  has  only  to  slip  out,  that  his  friends 
are  waiting  in  the  neighbourhood  with  disguises, 
and  that  a  passage  is  taken  for  him  in  an  Ame 
rican  packet.  Now,  it  is  clearly  for  the  great 
est  happiness  of  society  that  the  thief  should 
be  hanged,  and  the  corrupt  turnkey  exposed 
and  punished.  Will  the  Westminster  Reviewer 
tell  us,  that  it  is  for  the  greatest  happiness  of 
the  thief  to  summon  the  head  jailer,  and  tell 
the  whole  story?  Now,  either  it  is  for  the 
greatest  happiness  of  the  thief  to  be  hanged, 
or  it  is  not.  If  it  is,  then  the  argument,  by 
which  the  Westminster  Reviewer  attempts  to 
prove,  that  men  do  not  promote  their  own  hap 
piness  by  thieving,  falls  to  the  ground.  If  it  is 
not,  then  there  are  men  whose  greatest  happi 
ness  is  at  variance  with  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  community. 

To  sum  up  our  arguments  shortly,  we  say, 
that  the  "greatest  happiness  principle,"  as  now 
ktated,  is  diametrically  opposed  to  the  prin 
ciple  stated  in  the  Westminster  Review  three 
months  ago. 

We  say,  that  if  the  "greatest  happiness 
principle,"  as  now  stated,  be  sound,  Mr.  Mill's 
Essay,  and  all  other  works  concerning  govern 
ment,  which,  like  that  essay,  proceed  on  the 
eupposition,  that  individuals  may  have  an  in 
terest  opposed  to  the  greatest  happiness  of 
society,  are  fundamentally  erroneous. 


We  say,  that  those  who  hold  this  principle 
to  be  sound,  must  be  prepared  to  maintain, 
either  that  monarchs  and  aristocracies  may  bo 
trusted  to  govern  the  community,  or  else  that 
men  cannot  be  trusted  to  follow  their  own  inte 
rest,  when  that  interest  is  demonstrated  to 
them. 

We  say,  that  if  men  cannot  be  trusted  to 
follow  their  own  interest,  when  that  interest 
has  been  demonstrated  to  them,  then  the  Utili 
tarian  arguments,  in  favour  of  universal  suf 
frage,  are  good  for  nothing. 

We  say,  that  the  "greatest  happiness  prin 
ciple"  has  not  been  proved;  that  it  cannot  be 
generally  proved ;  that  even  in  the  particular 
cases  selected  by  the  Reviewer  it  is  not  ciear 
that  the  principle  is  true;  and  that  many  cases 
might  be  stated  in  which  the  common  sense 
of  mankind  would  at  once  pronounce  it  to  be 
false. 

We  now  leave  the  Westminster  Reviewer 
to  alter  and  amend  his  "  magnificent  principle" 
as  he  thinks  best.     Unlimited,  it  is  false.     Pro 
perly  limited,  it  will  be  barren.     The  "greatest 
happiness  principle"  of  the  1st  of  July,  as  far 
as   we  could  discern   its  meaning   through  a 
cloud   of    rodomontade,   was   an   idle    truism. 
The  "greatest  happiness  principle"  of  the  1st 
of  October  is,  in  the  phrase  of  the  American 
newspapers,  "important  if  true."     But  unhap 
pily  it  is  not  true.     It  is  not  our  business  to 
i  conjecture  what  new  maxim  is  to  make   the 
j  bones  of  sages  and  patriots  stir  on  the  1st  of 
December.     We  can  only  say,  that,  unless  it 
be  something  infinitely  more  ingenious    than 
!  its  two  predecessors,  we  shall  leave  it  untno- 
!  lested.     The  Westminster   Reviewer  may,  if 
|  he  pleases,  indulge  himself  like  Sultan  Schah- 
|  riar,   with   espousing   a   rapid  succession    of 
|  virgin  theories.     But  we  must  beg   to  be   ex- 
j  cused  from  playing  the  part  of  the  vizier,  who 
i  regularly  attended  on  the  day  after  the  wedding 
!  to  strangle  the  new  sultana. 

The  Westminster  Reviewer  charges  us  with 
|  urging  it  as  an  objection  to  the  "  greatest  hap- 
!  piness  principle,"  that,  "  it  is  included  in  the 
i  Christian  morality."     This  is  a  mere  fiction  of 
;  his  own.     We  never  attacked  the  morality  of 
|  the   gospel.     We    blamed    the   Utilitarian   for 
claiming  the  credit  of  a  discovery,  when  they 
!  had  merely  stolen  that  morality,  and  spoiled  it 
;  in  the  stealing.     They  have  taken  the  precept 
!  of  Christ,  and  left  the  motive ;   and  they  de- 
!  mand  the  praise  of  a  most  wonderful  and  bene- 
i  ficial  invention,  when  all  that  they  have  done 
has  been  to  make  a  most  useful  maxim  useless 
by  separating  it  from  its  sanction.     On   reli-  , 
;  gious  principles,  it  is  true  that  every  individual 
I  will  best  promote  his  own  happiness  by  pro- 
I  moting  the  happiness  of  others.     But   if  re- 
|  ligious  considerations  be  left  out  of  the  ques- 
1  tion,  it  is  not  true.     If  we  do  not  reason  on  the 
i  supposition  of  a  future  state,  where  is  the  mo 
tive  ?     If  we  do  reason  on  that  supposition, 
where  is  the  discovery'? 

The  Westminster  Reviewer  tells  us,  that 
"  we  wish  to  see  the  science  of  government 
unsettled,  because  we  see  no  prospect  of  a 
settlement  which  accords  with  our  interests." 
His  an<rry  eagerness  to  have  questions  settled 
resembles  that  of  a  judge  in  one  of  Dryden's 


UTILITARIAN  THEORY  OF   GOVERNMENT. 


707 


piays — the  Amphitryon,  we  think — who  wishes 
to  decide  a  cause  after  hearing  only  one  party, 
nnd  when  he  has  been  at  last  compelled  to 
listen  to  the  statement  of  the  defendant,  flies 
into  a  passion,  and  exclaims,  "There  now, 
sir !  see  what  you  have  done.  The  case  was 
quite  clear  a  minute  ago ;  and  you  must  come 
and  puzzle  it !"  He  is  the  zealot  of  a  sect. 
We  are  searchers  after  truth.  He  wishes  to 
have  the  question  settled.  We  wish  to  have  it 
sifted  first.  The  querulous  manner  in  which 
we  have  been  blamed  for  attacking  Mr.  Mill's 
system,  and  propounding  no  system  of  our 
own,  reminds  us  of  the  horror  with  which  that 
shallow  dogmatist,  Epicurus,  the  worst  parts 
of  whose  nonsense  the  Utilitarians  have  at 
tempted  to  revive,  shrank  from  the  keen  and 
searching  scepticism  of  the  second  Academy. 

It  is  not  our  fault  that  an  experimental 
science  of  vast  extent  does  not  admit  of  being 
settled  by  a  short  demonstration ; — that  the 
subtilty  of  nature,  in  the  moral  as  in  the  phy 
sical  world,  triumphs  over  the  subtilty  of  syllo 
gism.  The  quack  who  declares  on  affidavit 
that,  by  using  his  pills,  and  attending  to  his 
printed  directions,  hundreds  who  had  been 
dismissed  incurable  from  the  hospitals  have 
renewed  their  youth  like  the  eagles,  may,  per 
haps,  think  that  Sir  Henry  Halford,  when  he 
feels  the  pulses  of  patients,  inquires  about  their 
symptoms,  and  prescribes  a  different  remedy 
to  each,  is  unsettling  the  science  of  medicine 
for  the  sake  of  a  fee. 

If,  in  the  course  of  this  controversy,  we  have 
refrained  from  expressing  any  opinion  respect 
ing  the  political  institutions  of  England,  it  is 
not  because  we  have  not  an  opinion,  or  be 
cause  we  .shrink  from  avowing  it.  The  Utili 
tarians,  indeed,  conscious  that  their  boasted 
theory  of  government  would  not  bear  investi 
gation,  were  desirous  to  turn  the  dispute  about 
Mr.  Mill's  Essay  into  a  dispute  about  the  whig 
party,  rotten  boroughs,  unpaid  magistrates,  and 


ex  officio  informations.  When  we  blamed 
them  for  talking  nonsense,  t:iey  cried  out  that 
they  were  insulted  for  being  reformers, — just 
as  poor  Ancient  Pistol  swore  that  the  scars 
which  he  had  received  from  the  cudgel  of 
Fluellen  were  got  in  the  Gallia  wars.  We, 
however,  did  not  think  it  desirable  to  mix  up 
political  questions,  about  which  the  public 
mind  is  violently  agitated,  with  a  great  pro 
blem  in  moral  philosophy. 

Our  notions  about  government  are  not,  how 
ever,  altogether  unsettled.  We  have  an  opi 
nion  about  parliamentary  reform,  though  we 
have  not  arrived  at  that  opinion  by  the  royal 
road  which  Mr.  Mill  has  opened  for  the  ex 
plorers  of  political  science.  As  we  are  taking 
leave,  probably  for  the  last  time,  of  this  con 
troversy,  we  will  state  very  concisely  what  our 
doctrines  are.  On  some  future  occasion  we 
may,  perhaps,  explain  and  defend  them  at 
length. 

Our  fervent  wish,  and,  we  will  add,  our  san 
guine  hope,  is,  that  we  may  see  such  a  reform 
in  the  House  of  Commons  as  may  render  its 
votes  the  express  image  of  the  opinion  of  the 
middle  orders  of  Britain.  A  pecuniary  quali 
fication  we  think  absolutely  necessary;  arid  in 
settling  its  amount,  our  object  would  be  to 
draw  the  line  in  such  a  manner  that  every 
decent  farmer  and  shopkeeper  might  possess 
the  elective  franchise.  We  should  wish  to  see 
an  end  put  to  all  the  advantages  which  parti 
cular  forms  of  property  possess  over  other 
forms,  and  particular  portions  of  property  over 
other  equal  portions.  And  this  would  content 
us.  Such  a  reform  would,  according  to  Mr. 
Mill,  establish  an  aristocracy  of  wealth,  and 
leave  the  community  without  protection,  and 
exposed  to  all  the  evils  of  unbridled  power. 
Most  willingly  would  we  stake  the  whole  con 
troversy  between  us  on  the  success  of  the  ex 
periment  which  we  propose. 


EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


709 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM/ 

[EDINBURGH  REVIEW  FOR  OCTOBER,  1844.] 


MORI  than  ten  years  ago  we  commenced  a 
sketch  of  the  political  life  of  the  great  Lord 
Chaiham.f  We  then  stopped  at  the  death  of 
George  ihe  Second,  with  the  intention  of  speed 
ily  resuming  ouf  task.  Circumstances  which 
it  would  be  tedious  to  explain,  long  prevented 
us  from  carrying  this  intention  into  effect.  Nor 
can  we  regret  the  delay.  For  the  materials 
which  were  within  our  reach  in  1834  were 
scanty  and  unsatisfactory,  when  compared  with 
those  which  we  at  present  possess.  Even  now, 
Chough  we  have  had  access  to  some  valuable 
sources  of  information  which  have  not  yet  been 
opened  to  the  public,  we  cannot  but  feel  that 
the  history  of  the  first  ten  years  of  the  reign  of 
George  the  Third  is  but  imperfectly  known  to 
us.  Nevertheless,  we  are  inclined  to  think 
that  we  are  in  a  condition  to  lay  before  our 
readers  a  narrative  neither  uninstructive  nor 
uninteresting.  We  therefore  return  with  plea 
sure  to  our  long  interrupted  labour. 

We  left  Pitt  in  the  zenith  of  prosperity  and 
glory,  the  idol  of  England,  the  terror  of  France, 
the  admiration  of  the  whole  civilized  world. 
The  wind,  from  whatever  quarter  it  blew, 
carried,  to  England  tidings  of  battles  won,  for 
tresses  taken,  provinces  added  to  the  empire. 
At  home,  factions  had  sunk  into  a  lethargy, 
such  as  had  never  been  known  since  the  great 
religious  schism  of  the  sixteenth  century  had 
roused  the  public  mind  from  repose. 

In  order  that  the  events  which  we  have  to 
relate  may  be  clearly  understood,  it  may  be 
desirable  that  we  should  advert  to  the  causes 
which  had  for  a  time  suspended  the  animation 
of  both  the  great  English  parties. 

If,  rejecting  all  that  is  merely  accidental,  we 
look  at  the  essential  characteristics  of  the 
Whig  and  the  Tory,  we  may  consider  each  of 
them  as  the  representative  of  a  great  principle, 
essential  to  the  welfare  of  nations.  One  is, 
in  an  especial  manner,  the  guardian  of  liber 
ty,  and  the  other,  of  order.  One  is  the  moving 
power,  and  the  other  the  steadying  power  of 
the  state.  One  is  the  sail,  without  which 
society  would  make  no  progress;  the  other 
the  ballast,  without  which  there  would  be 
small  safety  in  a  tempest.  But,  during  the 
forty-six  years  which  followed  the  accession 
of  the  house  of  Hanover,  these  distinctive 
peculiarities  seemed  to  be  effaced.  The  Whig 
conceived  that  he  could  not  better  serve  the 
cause  of  civil  and  religious  freedom  than  by 
strenuously  supporting  the  Protestant  dynasty. 
The  Tory  conceived  that  he  could  not  better 
prove  his  hatred  of  revolutions  than  by  attack- 


*  Correspondence  of  William  Pitt,  Earl  of  Chatham. 
4  vols.  8vo.  London,  1840. 

Letters  of  Horace  JValpole,  Earl  of  Orford,  to  Sir  Horace 
Mann.  4  vols.  8vo.  London,  1843-4. 

f  See  page  226. 


ing  a  government  to  which  a  revolution  had 
given  being.  Both  came  by  degrees  to  attach 
more  importance  to  the  means  than  to  the 
end.  Both  were  thrown  into  unnatural  situa 
tions  ;  and  both,  like  animals  transported  to 
an  uncongenial  climate,  languished  and  de 
generated.  The  Tory,  removed  from  the  sun 
shine  of  the  court,  was  as  a  camel  in  the 
snows  of  Lapland.  The  Whig,  basking  in  the 
rays  of  royal  favour,  was  as  a  reindeer  in  the 
sands  of  Arabia. 

Dante  tells  us  that  he  saw,  in  Malebolge,  a 
strange  encounter  between  a  human  form  and 
a  serpent.  The  enemies,  after  cruel  wounds 
inflicted,  stood  for  a  time  glaring  on  each  other. 
A  great  cloud  surrounded  them,  and  then  a 
wonderful  metamorphosis  began.  Each  crea 
ture  was  transfigured  into  the  likeness  of  its 
antagonist.  The  serpent's  tail  divided  itself 
into  two  legs ;  the  man's  legs  intertwined  them 
selves  into  a  tail.  The  body  of  the  serpent 
put  forth  arms;  the  arms  of  the  man  shrank 
into  his  body.  At  length  the  serpent  stood  up 
a  man,  and  spake ;  the  man  sank  down  a 
serpent,  and  glided  hissing  away.  Something 
like  this  was  the  transformation  which,  during 
the  reign  of  George  the  First,  befell  the  two 
English  parties.  Each  gradually  took  the  shape 
and  colour  of  its  foe;  till  at  length  the  Tory 
rose  up  erect  the  zealot  of  freedom,  and  the 
Whig  crawled  and  licked  the  dust  at  the  feet 
of  power. 

It  is  true  that,  when  these  degenerate  politi 
cians  discussed  questions  merely  speculative, 
and,  above  all,  when  they  discussed  questions 
relating  to  the  conduct  of  their  own  grand 
fathers,  they  still  seemed  to  differ  as  their 
grandfathers  had  differed.  The  Whig,  who 
during  three  Parliaments  had  never  given  one 
vote  against  the  court,  and  who  was  ready  to 
sell  his  soul  for  the  Comptroller's  staff,  or  for 
the  Great  Wardrobe,  still  professed  to  draw 
his  political  doctrines  from  Locke  and  Milton, 
still  worshipped  the  memory  of  Pym  and 
Hampden,  and  would  still,  on  the  thirtieth  of 
January,  take  his  glass,  first  to  the  man  in  the 
mask,  and  then  to  the  man  who  would  do  it 
without  a  mask.  The  Tory,  on  the  other  hand, 
while  he  reviled  the  mild  and  temperate  Wai- 
pole  as  a  deadly  enemy  of  liberty,  could  sec 
nothing  to  reprobate  in  the  iron  tyranny  of 
Stafford  and  Laud.  But,  whatever  judgment 
the  Whig  or  the  Tory  of  that  age  might  pro 
nounce  on  transactions  long  past,  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that,  as  respected  the  practical 
questions  then  pending,  the  Tory  was  a  re 
former,  and  indeed  an  intemperate  and  in 
discreet  reformer,  while  the  Whig  was  con 
servative  even  to  bigotry.  We  have  ourselves 
seen  similar  effects  produced  in  a  neighbour 
ing  country  by  similar  causes.  Whc  woulil 
30 


710 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


have  TDelieved,  fifteen  years  ago,  that  M.  Guizot 
and  M.  Villeinain  would  have  to  defend  pro 
perty  and  social  order  against  the  Jacobinical 
attacks  of  such  enemies  as  M.  Genoude  and 
M.  de  La  Roche  Jaquelin  ? 

Thus  the  successors  of  the  old  Cavaliers 
had  turned  demagogues ;  the  successors  of 
the  old  Roundheads  had  turned  courtiers.  Yet 
was  it  long  before  their  mutual  animosity 
began  to  abate ;  for  it  is  the  nature  of  parties 
to  retain  their  original  enmities,  far  more  firm- 
<y  than  their  original  principles.  During  many 
years,  a  generation  of  Whigs  whom  Sidney 
•yould  have  spurned  as  slaves,  continued  to 
'vage  deadly  war  with  a  generation  of  Tories 
v^hom  Jefferies  would  have  hanged  for  re 
publicans. 

Through  the  whole  reign  of  George  the  First, 
and  through  nearly  half  of  the  reign  of  George 
the  Second,  a  Tory  was  regarded  as  an  enemy 
of  the  reigning  house,  and  was  excluded  from 
all  the  favours  of  the  crown.  Though  most 
of  the  country  gentlemen  were  Tories,  none 
but  Whigs  were  created  peers  and  baronets. 
Though  most  of  the  clergy  were  Tories,  none 
but  Whigs  were  created  deans  and  bishops.  In 
every  county  opulent  and  well-descended  Tory 
squires  complained  that  their  names  were  left 
out  of  the  commission  of  the  peace ;  while 
men  yf  small  estate  and  mean  birth,  who  were 
for  toleration  and  excise,  septennial  parlia 
ments  and  standing  armies,  presided  at  quarter 
sessions,  and  became  deputy  lieutenants. 

By  degrees  some  approaches  were  made 
owards  a  reconciliation.  While  Walpole  was 
at  the  head  of  affairs,  emnity  to  his  power 
induced  a  large  and  powerful  body  of  Whigs, 
headed  by  the  heir-apparent  of  the  throne,  to 
make  an  alliance  with  the  Tories,  and  a  truce 
even  with  the  Jacobites.  After  Sir  Robert's 
fall,  the  ban  which  lay  on  the  Tory  party  was 
taken  off.  The  chief  places  in  the  administra 
tion  continued  to  be  filled  by  Whigs,  and, 
indeed,  could  scarcely  have  been  filled  other 
wise  ;  for  the  Tory  nobility  and  gentry,  though 
strong  in  numbers  and  in  property,  had  among 
them  scarcely  a  single  man  distinguished  by 
talents,  either  for  business  or  for  debate.  A 
few  of  them,  however,  were  admitted  to  sub 
ordinate  offices  ;  and  this  indulgence  produced 
a  softening  effect  on  the  temper  of  the  whole 
body.  The  first  levee  of  George  the  Second 
after  Walpole's  resignation  was  a  remarka 
ble  spectacle.  Mingled  with  the  constant  sup 
porters  of  the  house  of  Brunswick,  with  the 
Russells,  the  Cavendishes,  and  the  Pelhams, 
appeared  a  crowd  of  faces  utterly  unknown  to 
the  pages  and  gentlemen-ushers,  lords  of  rural 
manors,  whose  ale  and  fox-hounds  were  re- 
nownec"  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  Mendip 
hills,  or  round  the  Wrekin,  but  who  had  never 
crossed  the  threshold  of  the  palace  since  the 
days  when  Oxford,  with  the  white  staff  in  his 
hand,  stood  behind  Queen  Anne. 

During  the  eighteen  years  which  followed 
this  day,  both  factions  were  gradually  sinking 
deeper  and  deeper  into  repose.  The  apathy  of 
:he  public  mind  is  partly  to  be  ascribed  to  the 
unjust  violence  with  which  the  administration 
of  Walpole  had  been  assailed.  In  the  body 
politic,  as  in  the  natural  body,  morbid  languor 


generally  succeeds  to  morbid  excitement.  The 
people  had  been  maddened  by  sophistry,  by 
calumny,  by  rhetoric,  by  stimulants  applied  to 
the  national  pride.  In  the  fulness  of  bread, 
they  had  raved  as  if  famine  had  been  in  the 
land.  While  enjoying  such  a  measure  of  civil 
and  religious  freedom  as,  till  then,  no  great 
society  had  ever  known,  they  had  cried  out  for 
a  Timoleon  or  a  Brutus  to  stab  their  oppres 
sors  to  the  heart.  They  were  in  this  frame  of 
mind  when  the  change  of  administration  took 
place ;  and  they  soon  found  that  there  was  to 
be  no  change  whatever  in  the  system  of  go 
vernment.  The  natural  consequences  follow 
ed.  To  frantic  zeal  succeeded  sullen  indiffer 
ence.  The  cant  of  patriotism  had  not  merely 
ceased  to  charm  the  public  ear,  but  had  become 
as  nauseous  as  the  cant  of  Puritanism  after 
the  downfall  of  the  Rump.  The  hot  fit  was 
over :  the  cold  fit  had  begun :  and  it  was  long 
before  seditious  arts,  or  even  real  grievances, 
could  bring  back  the  fiery  paroxysm  which 
had  run  its  course,  and  reached  its  termination. 

Two  attempts  were  made  to  disturb  this 
tranquillity.  The  banished  heir  of  the  house 
of  Stuart  headed  a  rebellion ;  the  discontented 
heir  of  the  house  of  Brunswick  headed  an  op 
position.  Both  the  rebellion  and  the  opposition 
came  to  nothing.  The.  battle  of  Culloden  an 
nihilated  the  Jacobite  party;  the  death  of 
Prince  Frederic  dissolved  the  faction  which, 
under  his  guidance,  had  feebly  striven  to  an 
noy  his  father's  government.  His  chief  fol 
lowers  hastened  to  make  their  peace  with  the 
ministry ;  and  the  political  torpor  became 
complete. 

Five  years  after  the  death  of  Prince  Fre 
deric,  the  public  mind  was  for  a  time  violently 
excited.  But  this  excitement  had  nothing  to 
do  with  the  old  disputes  between  Whigs  and 
Tories.  England  was  at  war  with  France. 
The  war  had  been  feebly  conducted.  Minorca 
had  been  torn  from  us.  Our  fleet  had  retired 
before  the  white  flag  of  the  House  of  Bourbon, 
A  bitter  sense  of  humiliation,  new  to  the 
proudest  and  bravest  of  nations,  superseded 
every  other  feeling.  The  cry  of  all  the  coun 
ties  and  great  towns  of  the  realm  was  for  a 
government  which  would  retrieve  the  honour 
of  the  English  arms.  The  two  most  powerful 
men  in  the  country  were  the  Duke  of  New 
castle  and  Pitt.  Alternate  victories  and  de 
feats  had  made  them  sensible  that  neither  of 
them  could  stand  alone.  The  interests  of  the 
state,  and  the  interests  of  their  own  ambition, 
impelled  them  to  coalesce.  By  their  coalition 
was  formed  the  ministry  which  was  in  power 
when  George  the  Third  ascended  the  throne. 

The  more  carefully  the  structure  of  this 
celebrated  ministry  is  examined,  the  more 
shall  we  see  reason  to  marvel  at  the  skill  or 
the  luck  which  had  combined  in  one  harmo 
nious  whole  such  various  and,  as  it  seemed, 
incompatible  elements  of  force.  The  influence 
which  is  derived  from  stainless  integrity,  the 
influence  which  is  derived  from  the  vilest  arts 
of  corruption,  the  strength  of  aristocratical 
connection,  the  strength  of  democratical  enthu 
siasm,  all  these  things  were  for  the  first  time 
found  together.  Newcastle  brought  to  the 
coalition  a  vast  mass  of  power,  which  had 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


711 


descended  to  him  from  Walpole  and  Pelham. 
The  public  offices,  the  church,  the  courts  of 
law,  the  army,  the  navy,  the  diplomatic  ser 
vice,  swarmed  with  his  creatures.  The  bo 
roughs,  which  long  afterwards  made  up  the 
memorable  schedules  A  and  B,  were  repre 
sented  by  his  nominees.  The  great  Whig 
families,  which  during  several  generations  had 
been  trained  in  the  discipline  of  party  warfare, 
and  were  accustomed  to  stand  together  in  a 
firm  phalanx,  acknowledged  him  as  their  cap 
tain.  Pitt,  on  the  other  hand,  had  what  New 
castle  wanted,  an  eloquence  which  stirred  the 
passions  and  charmed  the  imagination,  a  high 
reputation  for  purity,  and  the  confidence  and 
ardent  love  of  millions. 

The  partition  which  the  two  ministers  made 
of  the  powers  of  government  was  singularly 
happy.  Each  occupied  a  province  for  which  he 
was  well  qualified ;  and  neither  had  any  inclina 
tion  to  intrude  himself  into  the  province  of  the 
other.  Newcastle  took  the  treasury,  the  civil 
and  ecclesiastical  patronage,  and  the  disposal 
of  that  part  of  the  secret  service  money  which 
was  then  employed  in  bribing  members  of 
Parliament.  Pitt  was  secretary  of  state,  with 
the  direction  of  the  war  and  of  foreign  affairs. 
Thus  the  filth  of  all  the  noisome  and  pestilen 
tial  sewers  of  government  was  poured  into  one 
channel.  Through  the  other  passed  only  what 
was  bright  and  stainless.  Mean  and  selfish 
politicians,  pining  for  commissionerships,  gold 
sticks,  and  ribands,  flocked  to  the  great  house 
at  the  corner  of  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields.  There, 
at  every  levee,  appeared  eighteen  or  twenty 
pair  of  laAvn  sleeves  ?  for  there  was  not,  it  was 
said,  a  single  prelate  who  had  not  owed  either 
his  first  elevation  or  some  subsequent  transla 
tion  to  Newcastle.  There  appeared  those 
members  of  the  House  of  Commons  in  whose 
silent  votes  the  main  strength  of  the  govern 
ment  lay.  One  wanted  a  place  in  the  excise 
for  his  butler.  Another  came  about  a  prebend 
for  his  son.  A  third  whispered  that  he  had 
always  stood  by  his  Grace  and  the  Protestant 
succession;  that  his  last  election  had  been 
very  expensive  ;  that  pot-wallopers  had  now 
no  conscience ;  that  he  had  been  forced  to  take 
up  money  on  mortgage ;  and  that  he  hardly 
knew  where  to  turn  for  five  hundred  pounds. 
The  duke  pressed  all  their  hands,  passed  his 
arms  round  all  their  shoulders,  patted  all  their 
backs,  and  sent  away  some  with  wages,  and 
some  with  promises.  From  this  traffic  Pitt 
stood  haughtily  aloof.  Not  only  was  he  him 
self  incorruptible,  but  he  shrank  from  the 
loathsome  drudgery  of  corrupting  others.  He 
had  not,  however,  been  twenty  years  in  Par 
liament,  and  ten  in  office,  without  discovering 
how  the  government  was  carried  dn.  He  was 
perfectly  aware  that  bribery  was  practised  on 
a  large  scale  by  his  colleagues.  Hating  the 
practice,  yet  despairing  of  putting  it  down, 
and  doubting  whether,  in  those  times,  any 
ministry  could  stand  without  it,  he  determined 
to  be  blind  to  it.  He  would  see  nothing,  know 
nothing,  believe  nothing.  People  who  came 
to  talk  to  him  about  shares  in  lucrative  con 
tracts,  or  about  the  means  of  securing  a 
Cornish  corporation,  were  soon  put  out  of 
countenance  oy  nis  arrogant  humility.  They  | 


did  him  too  much  honour.  Such  matters  were 
beyond  his  capacity.  It  was  true  that  his  poor 
advice  about  expeditions  and  treaties  was 
listened  to  with  indulgence  by  a  gracious 
sovereign.  If  the  question  were,  who  should 
command  in  North  America,  or  who  should  be 
ambassador  at  Berlin,  his  colleagues  would 
probably  condescend  to  take  his  opinion.  But 
he  had  not  the  smallest  influence  with  the 
secretary  of  the  treasury,  and  could  not  ven 
ture  to  ask  even  for  a  tide-waiter's  place. 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  he  did  not  owe 
as  much  of  his  popularity  to  his  ostentatious 
purity,  as  to  his  eloquence,  or  to  his  talents  for 
the  administration  of  war.  It  was  everywhere 
said  with  delight  and  admiration  that  the  great 
Commoner,  without  any  advantages  of  birth 
or  fortune,  had,  in  spite  of  the  dislike  of  the 
court  and  of  the  aristocracy,  made  himself  the 
first  man  in  England,  and  made  England  the 
first  country  in  the  world ;  that  his  name  was 
mentioned  with  awe  in  every  palace  from 
Lisbon  to  Moscow ;  that  his  trophies  were  in 
all  the  four  quarters  of  the  globe ;  yet  that  he 
was  still  plain  William  Pitt,  without  title  or 
riband,  without  pension  or  sinecure  place. 
Whenever  he  should  retire,  after  saving  the 
state,  he  must  sell  his  coach-horses  and  his 
silver  candlesticks.  Widely  as  the  taint  of 
corruption  had  spread,  his  hands  were  clean. 
They  had  never  received,  they  had  never 
given,  the  price  of  infamy.  Thus  the  coalition, 
gathered  to  itself  support  from  all  the  high 
and  all  the  low  parts  of  human  nature,  and 
was  strong  with  the  whole  united  strength  of 
virtue  and  of  mammon. 

Pitt  and  Newcastle  were  co-ordinate  chief 
ministers.  The  subordinate  places  had  been 
filled  on  the  principle  of  including  in  the  go 
vernment  every  party  and  shade  of  party,  the 
avowed  Jacobites  alone  excepted ;  nay,  every 
public  man  who,  from  his  abilities  or  from  his 
situation,  seemed  likely  to  be  either  useful  in 
office  or  formidable  in  opposition 

The  Whigs,  according  to  what  was  then 
considered  as  their  prescriptive  right,  held  by 
far  the  largest  share  of  power.  The  main 
support  of  the  administration  was  what  may 
be  called  the  great  Whig  connection — a  con 
nection  which,  during  near  half  a  century,  had 
generally  had  the  chief  sway  in  the  country, 
and  which  derived  an  immense  authority  from 
rank,  wealth,  borough  interest,  and  firm  union. 
To  this  connection,  of  which  Newcastle  was 
the  head,  belonged  the  houses  of  Cavendish, 
Lennox,  Fitzroy,  Bentinck,  Manners,  Conway, 
Wentworth,  and  many  others  of  high  note. 

There  were  two  other  powerful  Whig  con 
nections,  either  of  which  might  have  been  a 
nucleus  for  a  formidable  opposition.  But 
room  had  been  found  in  the  government  for 
both.  They  were  known  as  the  Grenvilles 
and  the  Bedfords. 

The  head  of  the  Grenvilles  was  Richar* 
Earl  Temple.  His  talents  for  administration 
and  debate  were  of  no  high  order.  But  his 
great  possessions,  his  turbulent  and  unscru 
pulous  character,  his  restless  activity,  and  his 
skill  in  the  most  ignoble  tactics  of  faction, 
made  him  one  of  the  most  formidable  enemies 
that  a  ministry  could  have.  He  was  keepei 


7J2 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


of  the  privy  seal.  His  brother  George  was 
treasurer  of  the  navy.  They  were  supposed 
to  be  on  terms  of  close  friendship  with  Pitt, 
who  had  married  their  sister,  and  was  the 
most  uxorious  of  husbands. 

The  Bedfords,  or,  as  they  were  called  by 
their  enemies,  the  Bloomsbury  gang,  professed 
to  be  led  by  John  Duke  of  Bedford,  but  in  truth 
led  him  wherever  they  chose,  and  very  often 
led  him  where  he  never  would  have  gone  of 
his  own  accord.  He  had  many  good  qualities 
of  head  and  heart,  and  would  have  been  cer 
tainly  a  respectable,  and  possibly  a  distin 
guished  man,  if  he  had  been  less  under  the 
influence  of  his  friends,  or  more  fortunate  in 
choosing  them.  Some  of  them  were  indeed, 
to  do  them  justice,  men  of  parts.  But  here, 
we  are  afraid,  eulogy  must  end.  Sandwich  and 
Rigby  were  able  debaters,  pleasant  boon  com 
panions,  dexterous  intriguers,  masters  of  all 
the  arts  of  jobbing  and  electioneering,  and, 
both  in  public  and  private  life,  shamelessly 
immoral.  Weymouth  had  a  natural  eloquence, 
which  sometimes  astonished  those  who  knew 
how  little  he  owed  to  study.  But  he  was  in 
dolent  and  dissolute,  and  had  early  impaired  a 
fine  estate  with  the  dice-box,  and  a  fine  con 
stitution  Math  the  bottle.  The  wealth  and 
power  of  the  duke,  and  the  talents  and  auda 
city  of  some  of  his  retainers,  might  have  seri 
ously  annoyed  the  strongest  minis)  ry.  But  his 
assistance  had  been  secured.  He  was  Lord- 
lieutenant  of  Ireland;  Uigby  was  his  secretary; 
and  the  whole  party  dutifully  supported  the 
measures  of  the  government. 

Two  men  had,  a  short  time  before,  been 
thought  likely  to  contest  with  Pitt  the  lead  of 
the  House  of  Commons — William  Murray 
and  Henry  Fox.  But  Murray  had  been  re 
moved  to  the  Lords,  and  was  Chief-Justice  of 
the  King's  Bench ;  Fox  was  indeed  still  in  the 
Commons.  But  means  had  been  found  to  se 
cure,  if  not  his  strenuous  support,  at  least  his  si 
lent  acquiescence.  He  was  a  poor  man;  he 
was  a  doting  father.  The  office  of  Paymaster- 
General  during  an  expensive  war  was,  in  that 
age,  perhaps  the  most  lucrative  situation  in 
the  gift  of  the  government.  This  office  was 
bestowed  on  Fox.  The  prospect  of  making  a 
noble  fortune  in  a  few  years,  and  of  providing 
amply  for  his  darling  boy  Charles,  was  irre 
sistibly  tempting.  To  hold  a  subordinate  place, 
however  profitable,  after  having  led  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  having  been  intrusted  with 
the  business  of  forming  a  ministry,  was  in- 
ieed  a  great  descent.  But  a  punctilious  sense 
of  personal  dignity  was  no  part  of  the  charac 
ter  of  Henry  Fox. 

We  have  not  time  to  enumerate  all  the 
other  men  of  weight  and  talents  who  were,  by 
some  tie  or  other,  attached  to  the  government. 
We  may  mention  Hardwicke,  reputed  the  first 
lawyer  of  the  age ;  Legge,  reputed  the  first 
financer  of  the  acre  ;  the  acute  and  ready  Os 
wald;  the  bold  and  humrrous  Nugent;  Charles 
Townshend,  the  most  brilliant  and  versatile 
of  mankind ;  Elliot,  Barrington,  North,  Pratt. 
Indeed,  as  far  as  we  recollect,  there  were  in 
the  whole  House  of  Commons  only  two  men 
of  distinguished  abilities  who  were  not  con 
nected  with  the  government;  and  those  two 


men  stood  so  low  in  public  estimation,  that 
the  only  service  which  they  could  have  ren 
dered  to  any  government  would  have  been  to 
oppose  it.  We  speak  of  Lord  George  Sack- 
ville  and  Bubb  Dodington. 

Though  most  of  the  official  men,  and  all  the 
members  of  the  cabinet,  were  reputed  Whigs, 
the  Tories  were  by  no  means  excluded  from 
employment.  Pitt  had  gratified  many  of  them 
with  commands  in  the  militia,  which  increased 
both  their  income  and  their  importance  in 
their  own  counties ;  and  they  were  therefore 
in  better  humour  than  at  any  time  since  the 
death  of  Anne.  Some  of  the  party  still  con 
tinued  to  grumble  over  their  punch  at  the 
Cocoa-Tree ;  but  in  the  House  of  Commons 
not  a  single  one  of  the  malecontents  durst  lift 
his  eyes  above  the  buckle  of  Pitt's  shoe. 

Thus  there  was  absolutely  no  opposition. 
Nay,  there  was  no  sign  from  which  it  could 
be  guessed  in  what  quarter  opposition  was 
likely  to  arise.  Several  years  passed  during 
which  Parliament  seemed  to  have  abdicated 
its  chief  functions.  The  Journals  of  the  House 
of  Commons  during  four  sessions  contain  no 
trace  of  a  division  on  a  party  question.  The 
supplies,  though  beyond  precedent  great,  were 
voted  without  discussion.  The  most  animated 
debates  of  that  period  were  on  road  bills  and 
enclosure  bills. 

The  old  king  was  content ;  and  it  mattered 
little  whether  he  were  content  or  not.  It 
would  have  been  impossible  for  him  to  eman 
cipate  himself  from  a  ministry  so  powerful, 
even  if  he  had  been  inclined  to  do  so.  But  he 
had  no  such  inclination.  He  had  once,  in 
deed,  been  strongly  prejudiced  against  Pitt,  and 
had  repeatedly  been  ill-used  by  Newcastle ; 
but  the  vigour  and  success  with  which  the  war 
had  been  waged  in  Germany,  and  the  smooth 
ness  with  which  all  public  business  was  car 
ried  on,  had  produced  a  favourable  change  in 
the  royal  mind. 

Such  was  the  posture  of  affairs  when,  on 
the  25th  of  October,  1760,  George  the  Second 
suddenly  died,  and  George  the  Third,  then 
twenty-two  years  old,  became  king.  The 
situation  of  George  the  Third  differed  widely 
from  that  of  his  grandfather  and  that  of  his 
great-grandfather.  Many  years  had  now 
elapsed  since  a  sovereign  of  England  had  been 
an  object  of  affection  to  any  part  of  his  people. 
The  first  two  kings  of  the  house  of  Hanover 
had  neither  those  hereditary  rights  which  have 
often  supplied  the  defect  of  merit,  nor  those 
personal  qualities  which  have  often  supplied 
the  defect  of  title.  A  prince  may  be  popular 
with  little  virtue  or  capacity,  if  he  reigns  by 
birthright  derived  from  a  long  line  of  illus 
trious  prede'cessors.  An  usurper  may  be 
popular,  if  his  genius  has  saved  or  aggran 
dized  the  nation  which  he  governs.  Perhaps 
no  rulers  have  in  our  time  had  a  stronger  hold 
on  the  affection  of  subjects  than  the  Ernperor 
Francis,  and  his  son-in-law  the  Emperor 
Napoleon.  But  imagine  a  ruler  with  no  better 
title  than  Napoleon,  and  no  better  understand 
ing  than  Francis.  Richard  Cromwell  was 
such  a  ruler ;  and,  as  soon  as  an  arm  was 
lifted  up  against  him,  he  fell  without  a  struggle, 
amidst  universal  derision.  George  the  Firs* 


THE   EARL   OF   CHATHAM. 


713 


and  George  the  Second  were  in  a  situation 
which  bore  some  resemblance  to  that  of  Rich 
ard  Cromwell.  They  were  saved  from  the 
fate  of  Richard  Cromwell  by  the  strenuous 
and  able  exertions  of  the  Whig  party,  and  by 
the  general  conviction  that  the  nation  had  no 
choice  but  between  the  house  of  Brunswick 
and  Popery.  But  by  no  class  were  the  Guelphs 
regarded  with  that  devoted  affection,  of  which 
Cnarles  the  First,  Charles  the  Second,  and 
James  the  Second,  in  spite  of  the  greatest 
faults,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  greatest  misfor 
tunes,  received  innumerable  proofs.  Those 
Whigs  who  stood  by  the  dynasty  so  manfully 
with  purse  and  sword,  did  so  on  principles 
independent  of,  and  indeed  almost  incompati 
ble  with,  the  sentiment  of  devoted  loyalty. 
The  moderate  Tories  regarded  the  foreign 
dynasty  as  a  great  evil,  which  must  be  endured 
for  fear  of  a  greater  evil.  In  the  eyes  of  the 
high  Tories,  the  elector  was  the  most  hateful 
of  robbers  and  tyrants.  The  crown  of  another 
was  on  his  head ;  the  blood  of  the  brave  and 
loyal  was  on  his  hands.  Thus,  during  many 
3rears,  the  kings  of  England  were  objects  of 
strong  personal  aversion  to  many  of  their 
subjects,  and  of  strong  personal  attachment  to 
none.  They  found,  indeed,  firm  and  cordial 
support  against  the  pretender  to  their  throne ; 
but  this  support  was  given,  not  at  all  for  their 
sake,  but  for  the  sake  of  a  religious  and 
political  system,  which  would  have  been  en 
dangered  by  their  fall.  This  support,  too, 
they  were  compelled  to  purchase  by  perpetually 
sacrificing  their  private  inclinations  to  the 
party  which  had  set  them  on  the  throne,  and 
which  maintained  them  there. 

At  the  close  of  the  reign  of  George  the  Se 
cond,  the  feeling  of  aversion  with  which  the 
house  of  Brunswick  had  long  been  regarded  by 
half  the  nation  had  died  away  ;  but  no  feeling 
of  affection  to  that  house  had  yet  sprung  up. 
There  was  little,  indeed,  in  the  old  king's 
character  to  inspire  esteem  or  tenderness.  He 
was  not  our  countryman.  He  never  set  foot 
on  our  soil  till  he  was  more  than  thirty  years 
old.  His  speech  betrayed  his  foreign  origin 
and  breeding.  His  love  for  his  native  -land, 
though  the  most  amiable  part  of  his  character, 
was  not  likely  to  endear  him  to  his  British  sub 
jects.  That  he  was  never  so  happy  as  when 
he  could  exchange  St.  James's  for  Hernhausen  ; 
that,  year  after  year,  our  fleets  were  employed 
to  convoy  him  to  the  Continent;  that  the  in 
terests  of  his  kingdom  were  as  nothing  to  him 
when  compared  with  the  interests  of  his  elec 
torate,  could  scarcely  be  denied.  As  to  the  rest, 
he  had  neither  the  qualities  which  make  dul- 
ness  respectable,  nor  the  qualities  which  make 
libertinism  attractive.  He  had  been  a  bad  son 
and  a  worse  father;  an  unfaithful  husband  and 
an  ungraceful  lover.  Not  one  magnanimous 
or  humane  action  is  recorded  of  him  ;  but  many 
instances  of  meanness,  and  of  a  harshness 
which,  but  for  the  strong  constitutional  re 
straints  under  which  he  was  placed,  might  have 
made  the  misery  of  his  people. 

He  died;  and  at  once  a  n.ew  world  opened. 
The  young  king  was  a  born  Englishman.  All 
his  tastes  and  habits,  good  or  bad,  were  Eng 
lish.  No  portion  of  his  subjects  had  any  thing 

Vot,  V.— 90 


to  reproach  him  with.  Even  the  remaining 
adherents  of  the  house  of  Stuart  could  scarcely 
impute  to  him  the  guilt  of  usurpation.  He  was 
not  responsible  for  the  Revolution,  for  the  Act 
of  Settlement,  for  the  suppression  of  the  risings 
of  1715  and  of  1745.  He  was  innocent  of  the 
blood  of  Derwentwater  and  Kilmarnock,  of  Bal- 
merino  and  Cameron.  Born  more  than  fifty 
years  after  the  old  line  had  been  expelled, 
fourth  in  descent  and  third  in  succession  of  the 
Hanoverian  dynasty, he  might  plead  some  show 
of  hereditary  right.  His  age,  his  appearance, 
and  all  that  was  known  of  his  character,  con 
ciliated  public  favour.  He  was  in  the  bloom 
of  youth ;  his  person  and  address  were  pleasing. 
Scandal  imputed  to  him  no  vice ;  and  flattery 
might,  without  any  glaring  absurdity,  ascribe 
to  him  many  princely  virtues. 

It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  the  senti 
ment  of  loyalty,  a  sentiment  which  had  lately 
seemed  to  be  as  much  out  of  date  as  the  belief 
in  witches  or  'he  practice  of  pilgrimage,  should, 
from  the  day  of  his  accession,  have  begun  to 
revive.  The  Tories,  in  particular,  who  had 
always  been  inclined  to  king-worship,  and  who 
had  long  felt  with  pain  the  want  of  an  idol  be 
fore  whom  they  could  bow  themselves  down, 
were  as  joyful  as  the  priests  of  Apis,  when, 
after  a  long  interval,  they  had  found  a  new  calf 
to  adore.  It  was  soon  clear  that  George  the 
Third  was  regarded  by  a  portion  of  the  nation 
with  a  very  different  feeling  from  that  which 
his  two  predecessors  had  inspired.  They  had 
been  merely  first  Magistrates,  Doges,  Stadt- 
holders;  he  was  emphatically  a  King,  the 
anointed  of  Heaven,  the  breath  of  his  people's 
nostrils.  The  years  of  the  widowhood  and 
mourning  of  the  Tory  party  were  over.  Dido 
had  kept  faith  long  enough  to  the  cold  ashes 
of  a  former  lord;  she  had  at  last  found  a  com 
forter,  and  recognised  the  vestiges  of  the  old 
flame.  The  golden  days  of  Harley  would  re 
turn  ;  the  Somersets,  the  Lees,  and  the  Wynd- 
hams  would  again  surround  the  throne.  The 
latitudinarian  prelates,  who  had  not  been 
ashamed  to  correspond  with  Doddridge  and  to 
shake  hands  with  Whiston,  would  be  succeeded 
by  divines  of  the  temper  of  South  and  Atter- 
bury.  The  devotion  which  had  been  so  signally 
shown  to  the  house  of  Stuart — which  had  been 
proof  against  defeats,  confiscations,  and  pro 
scriptions;  which  perfidy,  oppression,  ingrati 
tude,  could  not  weary  out — was  now  transferred 
entire  to  the  house  of  Brunswick.  If  George 
the  Third  would  but  accept  the  homage  of  the 
Cavaliers  and  High-churchmen,  he  should  be  to 
them  all  that  Charles  the  First  and  Charles  the 
Second  had  been. 

The  prince  whose  accession  was  thus  hailed 
by  a  great  party  long  estranged  from  his  house, 
had  received  from  nature  a  strong  will,  a  firm 
ness  of  temper  to  which  a  harsher  name  might 
perhaps  be  given,  and  an  understanding  not, 
indeed,  acute  or  enlarged,  but  such  as  qualified 
him  to  be  a  good  man  of  business.  But  his 
character  had  not  yet  fully  developed  itself.  He 
had  been  brought  up  in  strict  seclusion.  The 
detractors  of  the  Princess  Dowager  of  Wales 
affirmed  that  she  had  kept  her  children  from 
commerce  with  societ}',  in  order  that  she  might 
hold  an  undivided  empire  over  their  minds.  Sh« 


714 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


gave  a  very  different  explanation  of  her  con 
duct.  She  would  gladly,  she  said,  see  her  sons 
and  daughters  mix  in  the  world,  if  they  could 
do  so  without  risk  to  their  morals.  But  the 
profligacy  of  the  people  of  quality  alarmed  her. 
The  young  men  were  all  rakes ;  the  young 
women  made  love,  instead  of  waiting  till  it  was 
made  to  them.  She  could  not  bear  to  expose 
those  whom  she  loved  best  to  the  contaminating 
influence  of  such  society.  The  moral  advan 
tages  of  the  system  of  education  which  formed 
the  Duke  of  York,  the  Duke  of  Cumberland, 
and  the  Queen  of  Denmark,  may  perhaps  be 
questioned.  George  the  Third  was  indeed  no 
libertine  ;  but  he  broughyo  the  throne  a  mind 
only  half  opened,  and  was  for  some  time  en 
tirely  under  the  influence  of  his  mother  and  of 
his  Groom  of  the  Stole,  John  Stuart  Earl  of 
Bute. 

The  Earl  of  Bute  was  scarcely  known,  even 
by  name,  to  the  country  which  he  was  soon  to 
govern.  He  had  indeed,  a  short  time  after  he 
came  of  age,  been  chosen  to  fill  a  vacancy 
which,  in  the  middle  of  a  parliament,  had  taken 

S'ace  among  the  Scotch  representative  peers, 
e  had  disobliged  the  Whig  ministers  by  giv 
ing  some  silent  votes  with  the  Tories,  had  con 
sequently  lost  his  seat  at  the  next  dissolution, 
and  had  never  been  re-elected.  Near  twenty 
years  had  elapsed  since  he  had  borne  any  part 
in  politics.  He  had  passed  some  of  those 
years  at  his  seat  in  one  of  the  Hebrides,  and 
from  that  retirement  he  had  emerged  as  one  of 
the  household  of  Prince  Frederic.  Lord  Bute, 
excluded  from  public  life,  had  found  out  many 
ways  of  amusing  his  leisure.  He  was  a  tolera 
ble  actor  in  private  theatricals,  and  was  par 
ticularly  successful  in  the  part  of  Lothario.  A 
handsome  leg,  to  which  both  painters  and  sa 
tirists  took  care  to  give  prominence,  was  among 
his  chief  qualifications  for  the  stage.  He  de 
vised  quaint  dresses  for  masquerades.  He 
dabbled  in  geometry,  mechanics,  and  botany. 
He  paid  some  attention  to  antiquities  and  works 
of  art,  and  was  considered  in  his  own  circle  as 
a  judge  of  painting,  architecture,  and  poetry. 
It  is  said  that  his  spelling  was  incorrect.  But 
though,  in  our  time,  incorrect  spelling  is  justly 
considered  as  a  proof  of  sordid  ignorance,  it 
would  be  most  unjust  to  apply  the  same  rule 
to  people  who  lived  a  century  ago.  The  novel 
of  Sir  Charles  Grandison  was  published  about 
the  time  at  which  Lord  Bute  made  his  appear 
ance  at  Leicester  House.  Our  readers  may 
perhaps  remember  the  account  which  Char 
lotte  Grandison  gives  of  her  two  lovers.  One 
of  them,  a  fashionable  baronet  who  talks  French 
and  Italian  fluently,  cannot  write  a  line  in  his 
own  language  without  some  sin  against  ortho 
graphy  ;  the  other,  who  is  represented  as  a 
most  respectable  specimen  of  the  young  aris 
tocracy,  and  something  of  a  virtuoso,  is  de 
scribed  as  spelling  pretty  well  for  a  lord.  On 
the  whole,  the  Earl  of  Bute  might  fairly  be 
called  a  man  of  cultivated  mind.  He  was  also 
a  man  of  undoubted  honour.  But  his  under 
standing  was  narrow,  and  his  manners  cold 
and  haughty.  His  qualifications  for  the  part 
of  a  statesman  were  best  described  by  Frederic, 
who  often  indulged  in  the  unprincely  luxury  of 
sneering  at  his  dependents.  "Bute,"  said  his 


royal  highness,  "you  are  the  very  man  to  be 
envoy  at  some  small  proud  German  court  where 
there  is  nothing  to  do." 

Scandal  represented  the  Groom  of  the  Stole 
as  the  favoured  lover  of  the  Princess-Dowager, 
He  was  undoubtedly  her  confidential  friend. 
The  influence  which  the  two  united  exercised 
over  the  mind  of  the  king,  was  for  a  time  un 
bounded.  The  princess,  a  woman  and  a  fo 
reigner,  was  not  likely  to  be  a  judicious  advi 
ser  about  affairs  of  state ;  the  earl  could  scarcely 
be  said  to  have  served  even  a  noviciate  in  poll 
tics.  His  notions  of  government  had  been  ac 
quired  in  the  society  which  had  been  in  the 
habit  of  assembling  round  Frederic  at  Kew  and 
Leicester  House.  That  society  consisted  prin 
cipally  of  Tories,  who  had  been  reconciled  to 
the  house  of  Hanover  by  the  civility  with 
which  the  prince  had  treated  them,  and  by  the 
hope  of  obtaining  high  preferment  when  he 
should  come  to  the  throne.  Their  political 
creed  was  a  peculiar  modification  of  Toryism. 
It  was  the  creed  neither  of  the  Tories  of  the 
seventeenth  nor  of  the  Tories  of  the  nineteenth 
century ;  it  was  the  creed,  not  of  Filmer  and 
Sacheverell,  not  of  Perceval  and  Eldon,  but  of 
the  sect  of  which  Bolingbroke  may  be  consi 
dered  as  the  chief  doctor.  This  sect  deserves 
commendation  for  having  pointed  out  and  justly 
reprobated  some  great  abuses  which  sprang 
up  during  the  long  domination  of  the  Whigs. 
But  it  is  far  easier  to  point  out  and  reprobate 
abuses  than  to  propose  reforms ;  and  the  reforms 
which  Bolingbroke  proposed  would  either  have 
been  utterly  inefficient,  or  would  have  produced 
much  more  mischief  than  they  would  have  re 
moved. 

The  revolution  had  saved  the  nation  from 
one  class  of  evils,  but  had  at  the  same  time- 
such  is  the  imperfection  of  all  things  human- 
engendered  or  aggravated  another  class  of 
evils  whieh  required  new  remedies.  Liberty 
and  property  were  secure  from  the  attacks  of 
prerogative.  Conscience  was  respected.  Nf 
government  ventured  to  infringe  any  of  thr 
rights  solemnly  recognised  by  the  instrumenl 
which  had  called  William  and  Mary  to  th« 
throne.  But  it  cannot  be  denied  that,  under 
the  new  system,  the  public  interests  and  the 
public  morals  were  seriously  endangered  by 
corruption  and  faction.  During  the  long  strug 
gle  against  the  Stuarts,  the  chief  object  of 
the  most  enlightened  statesmen  had  been  to 
strengthen  the  House  of  Commons.  The  strug 
gle  was  over,  the  victory  was  won,  the  House 
of  Commons  was  supreme  in  the  state;  and 
all  the  vices  which  had  till  then  been  latent  in, 
the  representative  system  were  rapidly  deve 
loped  by  prosperity  and  power.  Scarcely  had 
the  executive  government  become  really  re 
sponsible  to  the  House  of  Commons,  when  it 
began  to  appear  that  the  House  of  Commons 
was  not  really  responsible  to  the  nation.  Many 
of  the  constituent  bodies  were  under  the  abso 
lute  control  of  individuals;  many  were  notori 
ously  at  the  command  of  the  highest  bidder. 
The  debates  were  not  published ;  it  was  very 
seldom  known  out  of  doors  how  a  gentleman 
had  voted.  Thus,  while  the  ministry  was  ac 
countable  to  the  Parliament,  the  majority  of  the 
i  Parliament  was  accountable  to  nobody.  Under 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


715 


gttch  circumstances,  nothing  could  be  more  na 
tural  than  that  the  members  should  insist  on 
being  paid  for  their  votes,  should  form  them 
selves  into  combinations  for  the  purpose  of 
raising  the  price  of  their  votes,  and  should  at 
critical  conjunctures  extort  large  wages  by 
threatening  a  strike.  Thus  the  Whig  minis 
ters  of  George  the  First  and  George  the  Se 
cond  were  compelled  to  reduce  corruption  to  a 
system,  and  to  practise  it  on  a  gigantic  scale. 

If  we  are  right  as  to  the  cause  of  these 
abuses,  we  can  scarcely  be  wrong  as  to  the 
remedy.  The  remedy  was  surely  not  to  de 
prive  the  House  of  Commons  of  its  weight  in 
the  state.  Such  a  course  would  undoubtedly 
have  put  an  end  to  parliamentary  corruption 
and  to  parliamentary  factions  :  for,  when  votes 
cease  to  be  of  importance,  they  will  cease  to 
be  bought,  and  when  knaves  can  get  nothing 
by  combining,  they  will  cease  to  combine. 
But  to  destroy  corruption  and  faction  by  in 
troducing  despotism,  would  have  been  to  cure 
bad  by  worse.  The  proper  remedy  evidently 
•was,  to  make  the  House  of  Commons  respon 
sible  to  the  nation. ;  and  this  was  to  be  effected 
in  two  ways — first,  by  giving  publicity  to  par 
liamentary  proceedings,  and  thus  placing 
every  member  on  his  trial  before  the  tribunal 
of  public  opinion;  and  secondly,  by  so  reform 
ing  the  constitution  of  the  House,  that  no  man 
should  be  able  to  sit  in  it  who  had  not  been 
returned  by  a  respectable  and  independent 
body  of  constituents. 

Bolingbroke  and  Bolingbroke's  disciples 
recommended  a  very  different  mode  of  treating 
the  diseases  of  the  state.  Their  doctrine  was, 
that  a  vigorous  use  of  the  prerogative  by  a 
patriot  king  would  at  once  break  all  factious 
combinations,  and  supersede  the  pretended  ne 
cessity  of  bribing  members  of  Parliament.  The 
king  had  only  to  resolve  that  he  would  be 
master,  that  he  would  not  be  held  in  thraldom 
by  any  set  of  men,  that  he  would  take  for  min 
isters  any  persons  in  whom  he  had  confidence, 
without  distinction  of  party,  and  that  he  would 
restrain  his  servants  from  influencing,  by  im 
moral  means,  either  the  constituent  bodies  or 
the  representative  body.  This  childish  scheme 
proved  that  those  who  proposed  it  knew  no 
thing  of  the  nature  of  the  evil  with  which  they 
pretended  to  deal.  The  real  cause  of  the  pre 
valence  of  corruption  and  faction  was,  that  a 
House  of  Commons,  not  accountable  to  the 
people,  was  more  powerful  than  the  king. 
Bolingbroke's  remedy  could  be  applied  only  by 
a  king  more  powerful  than  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  How  was  the  patriot  prince  to  govern 
in  defiance  of  the  body  without  whose  consent 
he  could  not  equip  a  sloop,  keep  a  battalion 
under  arms,  send  an  embassy,  or  defray  even 
the  charges  of  his  own  household  ?  Was  he 
to  dissolve  the  Parliament  ?  And  what  Avas  he 
likely  to  gain  by  appealing  to  Sudbury  and 
Old  Sarum.  against  the  venality  of  their  repre 
sentatives?  Was  he  to  send  out  privy  seals  1 
Was  he  to  levy  ship-money1?  If  so,  this 
boasted  reform  must  commence  in  all  proba 
bility  by  civil  war,  and,  if  consummated,  must 
be  consummated  by  the  establishment  of  ab 
solute  monarchy.  Or  was  the  patriot  king  to 
carry  the  House  of  Commons  with  him.  in  his 


upright  designs?  By  what  means?  Inter- 
dieting  himself  from  the  use  of  corrup  influ 
ence,  what  motive  was  he  to  address  to  the  Dod- 
ingtons  and  Winningtons  ?  Was  cupidity, 
strengthened  by  habit,  to  be  laid  asleep  by  a 
few  fine  sentences  about  virtue  and  union? 

Absurd  as  this  theory  was,  it  had  many  ad 
mirers,  particularly  among  men  of  letters.  It 
was  now  to  be  reduced  to  practice;  and  the  re 
sult  was,  as  any  man  of  sagacity  must  have 
foreseen,  the  most  piteous  and  ridiculous  of 
failures. 

On  the  very  day  of  the  young  king's  acces 
sion,  appeared  some  signs  which  indicated  the 
approach  of  a  great  change.  The  speech 
which  he  made  to  his  council  was  not  submit 
ted  to  the  cabinet.  It  was  drawn  up  by  Bute, 
and  contained  some  expressions  which  might 
be  construed  into  reflections  on  the  conduct  of 
affairs  during  the  late  reign.  Pitt  romon 
strated,  and  begged  that  these  expressions  migW* 
be  softened  down  in  the  printed  copy ;  but  it 
was  not  till  after  some  hours  of  altercation 
that  Bute  yielded ;  and,  even  after  Bute  had 
yielded,  the  king  affected  to  hold  out  till  the 
following  afternoon.  On  the  same  day  on 
which  this  singular  contest  took  place,  Bute 
was  not  only  sworn  of  the  privy  council,  but 
introduced  into  the  cabinet. 

Soon  after  this,  Lord  Holdernesse,  one  of  the 
secretaries  of  state,  in  pursuance  of  a  plan 
concerted  with  the  court,  resigned  the  seals. 
Bute  was  instantly  appointed  to  the  vacant 
place.  A  general  election  speedily  followed, 
and  the  new  secretary  entered  parliament  in 
the  only  way  in  which  he  then  could  enter  it, 
as  one  of  the  sixteen  representative  peers  of 
Scotland.* 

Had  the  ministers  been  firmly  united,  it  can 
scarcely  be  doubted  that  they  would  have  been 
able  to  withstand  the  court.  The  parliament 
ary  influence  of  the  Whig  aristocracy,  com 
bined  with  the  genius,  the  virtue,  and  the 
fame  of  Pitt,  would  have  been  irresistible. 
But  there  had  been  in  the  cabinet  of  George 
the  Second  latent  jealousies  and  enmities, 
which  now  began  to  show  themselves.  Pitt 
had  been  estranged  from  his  old  ally  Legge, 
the  chancellor  of  the  exchequer.  Some  of  the 
ministers  were  envious  of  Pitt's  popularity; 
others  were,  not  altogether  without  cause, 
disgusted  by  his  imperious  and  haughty  de 
meanour;  others,  again,  were  honestly  op 
posed  to  some  parts  of  his  policy.  They 
admitted  that  he  had  found  the  country  in  the 
depths  of  humiliation,  and  had  raised  it  to  the 
height  of  glory;  they  admitted  that  he  had 
conducted  the  war  with  energy,  ability,  and 
splendid  success.  But  they  began  to  hint  that 
the  drain  on  the  resources  of  the  state  was 
unexampled,  and  that  the  public  debt  was  in 
creasing  with  a  speed  at  which  Montague  or 
Godolphin  would  have  stood  aghast.  Some 
of  the  acquisitions  made  by  our  fleets  and 
armies  were,  it  was  acknowledged,  profitable 
as  well  as  honourable;  but,  now  that  George 
the  Second  was  dead,  a  courtier  might  ven- 


*In  the  reign  of  Anne,  the  House  of  Lords  had  re 
solved  that,  under  the  23d  article  of  Union,  no  Scotch 
peer  could  he  created  a  peer  of  Great  Britain.  This  re 
solution  was  not  annulled  till  the  year  1782. 


Tie 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


ture  to  ask  why  England  was  to  become  a  par 
ty  in  a  dispute  between  two  German  powers. 
What  was  it  to  her  whether  the  house  of 
Hapsburg  or  the  house  of  Brandenburg  ruled 
in  Silesia?  Why  were  the  best  English  regi 
ments  fighting  on  the  Maine  1  Why  were  the 
Prussian  battalions  paid  with  English  gold  1 
The  great  minister  seemed  to  think  it  beneath 
him  to  calculate  the  price  of  victory.  As  long 
as  the  Tower  guns  were  fired,  as  the  streets 
were  illuminated,  as  French  banners  were 
carried  in  triumph  through  the  streets  of  Lon 
don,  it  was  to  him  matter  of  indifference  to 
what  extent  the  public  burdens  were  augment 
ed.  Nay,  he  seemed  to  glory  in  the  magnitude 
of  these  sacrifices,  which  the  people,  fascinated 
by  his  eloquence  and  success,  had  too  readily 
made,  and  would  long  and  bitterly  regret. 
There  was  no  check  on  waste  or  embezzle 
ment.  Our  commissaries  returned  from  the 
camp  of  Prince  Ferdinand  to  buy  boroughs, 
to  rear  palaces,  to  rival  the  magnificence  of 
the  old  aristocracy  of  the  realm.  Already  had 
we  borrowed,  in  four  years  of  war,  more  than 
.he  most  skilful  and  economical  government 
would  pay  in  forty  years  of  peace.  But  the 
prospect  of  peace  was  as  remote  as  ever.  It 
could  not  be  doubted  that  France,  smarting 
and  prostrate,  would  consent  to  fair  terms  of 
accommodation ;  but  this  was  not  what  Pitt 
wanted.  War  had  made  him  powerful  and 
popular :  with  war,  all  that  was  brightest  in 
his  life  was  associated :  for  war,  his  talents 
were  peculiarly  fitted.  He  had  at  length  be 
gun  to  love  war  for  its  own  sake,  and  was 
more  disposed  to  quarrel  with  neutrals  than 
to  make  peace  with  enemies. 

Such  were  the  views  of  the  Duke  of  Bedford 
and  of  the  Earl  of  Hardwicke ;  but  110  member 
of  the  government  held  these  opinions  so 
strongly  as  George  Grenville,  the  treasurer  of 
the  navy.  George  Grenville  was  brother-in- 
law  of  Pitt,  and  had  always  been  reckoned 
one  of  Pitt's  personal  and  political  friends. 
But  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  two  men  of 
talents  and  integrity  more  utterly  unlike  each 
other.  Pitt,  as  his  sister  often  said,  knew 
nothing  accurately  except  Spenser's  Fairy 
Queen.  He  had  never  applied  himself  stead 
ily  to  any  branch  of  knowledge.  He  was  a 
wretched  financier.  He  never  became  fami 
liar  even  with  the  rules  of  that  House  of 
which  he  was  the  brightest  ornament.  He 
had  never  studied  public  law  as  a  system; 
and  was,  indeed,  so  ignorant  of  the  whole 
subject,  that  George  the  Second,  on  one  occa 
sion,  complained  bitterly  that  a  man  who  had 
never  read  Vattel  should  presume  to  under 
take  the  direction  of  foreign  affairs.  But 
these  defects  were  more  than  redeemed  by 
high  and  rare  gifts;  by  a  strange  power  of 
inspiring  great  masses  of  men  with  confidence 
and  affection ;  by  an  eloquence  which  not 
only  delighted  the  ear,  but  stirred  the  blood 
and  brought  tears  into  the  eyes  ;  by  originality 
in  devising  plans ;  by  vigour  in  executing 
them.  Grenville,  on  the  other  hand,  was  by 
nature  and  habit  a  man  of  details.  He  had 
Deen  bred  a  lawyer;  and  he  had  brought  the 
industry  and  acuteness  of  the  Temple  into 
official  and  parliamentary  life.  He  was  sup 


posed  to  be  intimately  acquainted  with  the 
whole  fiscal  system  of  the  country.  He  had 
paid  especial  attention  to  the  law  of  Parlia 
ment,  and  was  so  learned  in  all  things  relating 
to  the  privileges  and  orders  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  that  those  who  loved  him  least 
pronounced  him  the  only  person  competent 
to  succeed  Onslow  in  the  Chair.  His  speeches 
were  generally  instructive,  and  sometimes, 
from  the  gravity  and  earnestness  with  which 
he  spoke,  even  impressive;  but  never  bril 
liant,  and  generally  tedious.  Indeed,  even 
when  he  was  at  the  head  of  affairs,  he  some 
times  found  it  difficult  to  obtain  the  ear  of  the 
House.  In  disposition  as  well  as  in  intellect, 
he  differed  widely  from  his  brother-in-law. 
Pitt  was  utterly  regardless  of  money.  He 
would  scarcely  stretch  out  his  hand  to  take 
it ;  and,  when  it  came,  he  threw  it  away  with 
childish  profusion.  Grenville,  though  strictly 
upright,  was  grasping  and  parsimonious.  Pitt 
was  a  man  of  excitable  nerves,  sanguine  in 
hope,  easily  elated  by  success  and  popularity, 
keenly  sensible  of  injury,  but  prompt  to  for 
give  ;  Grenville's  character  was  stern,  melan 
choly,  and  pertinacious.  Nothing  was  more 
remarkable  in  him  than  his  inclination  al 
ways  to  look  on  the  dark  side  of  things.  He 
Avas  the  raven  of  the  House  of  Commons, 
always  croaking  defeat  in  the  midst  of  tri 
umphs,  and  bankruptcy  with  an  overflowing 
exchequer.  Burke,  with  general  applause, 
compared  Grenville,  in  a  time  of  quiet  and 
plenty,  to  the  evil  spirit  whom  Ovid  described 
looking  down  on  the  stately  temples  and 
wealthy  haven  of  Athens,  and  scarce  able  to 
refrain  from  weeping  because  she  could  find 
nothing  at  which  to  weep.  Such  a  man  was 
not  likely  to  be  popular.  But  to  unpopularity 
Grenville  opposed  a  dogged  determination, 
which  sometimes  forced  even  those  who 
hated  him  to  respect  him. 

It  was  natural  that  Pitt  and  Grenville,  being 
such  as  they  were,  should  take  very  different 
views  of  the  situation  of  affairs.  Pitt  could  see 
nothing  but  the  trophies ;  Grenville  could  see 
nothing  but  the  bill.  Pitt  boasted  that  England 
was  victorious  at  once  in  America,  in  India, 
and  in  Germany — the  umpire  of  the  Continent 
the  mistress  of  the  sea.  Grenville  cast  up  the 
subsidies,  sighed  over  the  army  extraordina- 
ries,  and  groaned  in  spirit  to  think  that  the 
nation  had  borrowed  eight  millions  in  on* 
year. 

With  a  ministry  thus  divided,  it  was  not  dif 
ficult  for  Bute  to  deal.  Legge  was  the  first 
who  fell.  He  had  given  offence  to  the  young 
king  in  the  late  reign,  by  refusing  to  support  a 
creature  of  Bute  at  a  Hampshire  election.  He 
was  now  not  only  turned  out,  but  in  the  closet, 
when  he  delivered  up  his  seal  of  office,  was 
treated  with  gross  incivility. 

Pitt,  who  did  not  love  Legge,  saw  this  event 
with  indifference.  But  the  danger  was  now 
fast  approaching  himself.  Charles  the  Third 
of  Spain  had  early  conceived  a  deadly  hatred 
of  England.  Twenty  years  before,  when  he 
was  King  of  the  Two  Sicilies,  he  had  been 
eager  to  join  the  coalition  against  Maria  The 
resa.  But  an  English  fleet  had  suddenly  ap 
peared  in  the  Bay  of  Naples.  An  English 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


717 


captain  had  landed,  had  proceeded  to  the 
palace,  had  laid  a  watch  on  the  table,  and  hac 
told  his  majesty  that,  within  an  hour,  a  treaty 
of  neutrality  must  be  signed,  or  a  bombardmen 
would  commence.  The  treaty  was  signed 
the  squadron  sailed  out  of  the  bay  twenty-four 
hours  after  it  had  sailed  in  ;  and  from  that  day 
the  ruling  passion  of  the  humbled  prince  was 
aversion  to  the  English  name.  He  was  a 
length  in  a  situation  in  which  he  might  hope  to 
gratify  that  passion.  He  had  recently  become 
King  of  Spain  and  the  Indies.  He  .saw,  with 
envy  and  apprehension,  the  triumphs  of  our 
navy,  and  the  rapid  extension  of  our  colonial 
empire.  He  was  a  Bourbon,  and  sympathizec 
with  the  distress  of  the  house  from  which  he 
sprang.  He  was  a  Spaniard;  and  no  Spaniard 
could  bear  to  see  Gibraltar  and  Minorca  in  the 
possession  of  a  foreign  power.  Impelled  by 
such  feelings,  Charles  concluded  a  secre 
treaty  with  France.  By  this  treaty,  known  as 
the  Family  Compact,  the  two  powers  bound 
themselves,  not  in  express  words,  but  by  the 
clearest  implication,  to  make  war  on  England 
in  common.  Spain  postponed  the  declaration 
of  hostilities  only  till  her  fleet,  laden  with  the 
treasures  of  America,  should  have  arrived. 

The  existence  of  the  treaty  could  not  be  kep' 
a  secret  from  Pitt.  He  acted  as  a  man  of  his 
capacity  and  energy  might  be  expected  to  act 
He  at  once  proposed  to  declare  war  against 
Spain,  and  to  intercept  the  American  fleet.  He 
had  determined,  it  is  said,  to  attack  without 
delay  both  Havanna  and  the  Philippines. 

His  wise  and  resolute  counsel  was  rejected 
Bute  was  foremost  in  opposing  it,  and  was 
supported  by  almost  the  whole  cabinet.  Some 
of  the  ministers  doubted,  or  affected  to  doubt, 
the  correctness  of  Pitt's  intelligence ;  some 
shrank  from  the  responsibility  of  advising  a 
course  so  bold  and  decided  as  that  which  he 
proposed ;  some  were  weary  of  his  ascen 
dency,  and  were  glad  to  be  rid  of  him  on  any 
pretext.  One  only  of  his  colleagues  agreed 
with  him,  his  brother-in-law,  Earl  Temple. 

Pitt  and  Temple  resigned  their  offices.  To 
Pitt  the  young  king  behaved  at  parting  in  the 
most  gracious  manner.  Pitt,  who,  proud  and 
fiery  everywhere  else,  was  always  meek  and 
humble  in  the  closet,  was  moved  even  to  tears. 
The  king  and  the  favourite  urged  him  to  accept 
some  substantial  mark  of  royal  gratitude. 
Would  he  like  to  be  appointed  governor  of 
Canada  1  A  salary  of  £5000  a-year  should  be 
annexed  to  the  office.  Residence  would  not  be 
required.  It  was  true  that  the  governor  of 
Canada,  as  the  law  then  stood,  could  not  be  a 
member  of  the  House  of  Commons.  But  a  bill 
should  be  brought  in,  authorizing  Pitt  to  hold 
his  government  together  with  a  seat  in  Parlia 
ment,  and  in  the  preamble  should  be  set  forth 
his  claims  to  the  gratitude  of  his  country. 
Pitt  answered,  with  all  delicacy,  that  his  anxie 
ties  were  rather  for  his  wife  and  family  than 
for  himself,  and  that  nothing  would  be  so  ac 
ceptable  to  him  as  a  mark  of  royal  goodness, 
which  might  be  beneficial  to  those  who  were 
dearest  to  him.  The  hint  was  taken.  The 
same  gazette  which  announced  the  retirement 
of  the  secretary  of  state,  announced  also,  that, 
In  consideration  of  his  great  public  services,] 


his  wife  had  been  created  a  peeress  in  her  own 
right,  and  a  pension  of  three  thousand  pounds 
a-year,  for  three  lives,  had  been  bestowed  on 
himself.  It  was  doubtless  thought  that  the 
rewards  and  honours  conferred  on  the  great 
minister  would  have  a  conciliatory  effect  on 
the  public  mind.  Perhaps,  too,  it  was  thought 
that  his  popularity,  which  had  partly  arisen 
from  the  contempt  which  he  had  always  shown 
for  money,  would  be  damaged  by  a  pension; 
and,  indeed,  a  crowd  of  libels  instantly  ap 
peared,  in  which  he  was  accused  of  having 
sold  his  country.  Many  of  his  true  friends 
thought  that  he  would  have  best  consulted  the 
dignity  of  his  character  by  refusing  to  accept 
any  pecuniary  reward  from  the  court.  '  Never 
theless,  the  general  opinion  of  his  talents,  vir 
tues,  and  services  remained  unaltered.  Ad 
dresses  were  presented  to  him  from  several 
large  towns.  London  showed  its  admiration 
and  affection  in  a  still  more  marked  manner. 
Soon  after  his  resignation  came  the  Lord 
Mayor's  day.  The  king  and  the  royal  family- 
dined  at  Guildhall.  Pitt  was  one  of  the  guests. 
The  young  sovereign,  seated  by  his  bride  in 
his  state  coach,  received  a  remarkable  lesson. 
He  was  scarcely  noticed.  All  eyes  were  fixed 
on  the  fallen  minister;  all  acclamations  directed 
to  him.  The  streets,  the  balconies,  the  chim 
ney-tops,  burst  into  a  roar  of  delight  as  his 
chariot  passed  by.  The  ladies  waved  their 
handkerchiefs  from  the  windows.  The  com 
mon  people  clung  to  the  wheels,  shook  hands 
with  the  footmen,  and  even  kissed  the  horses. 
Cries  of  "No  Bute!"  "No  Newcastle  salmon!'* 
were  mingled  with  the  shouts  of  "  Pitt  for  ever !" 
When  Pitt  entered  Guildhall,  he  was  welcomed 
by  loud  huzzas  and  clapping  of  hands,  in  which 
the  very  magistrates  of  the  city  joined.  Lord 
Bute,  in  the  mean  time,  was  hooted  and  pelted 
through  Cheapside,  and  would,  it  was  thought, 
have  been  in  some  danger,  if  he  had  not  taken 
the  precaution  of  surrounding  his  carriage  with 
a  strong  body-guard  of  boxers.  Many  persons 
blamed  the  conduct  of  Pitt  on  this  occasion  as 
disrespectful  to  the  king.  Indeed,  Pitt  himself 
afterwards  owned  that  he  had  done  wrong. 
He  was  led  into  this  error,  as  he  was  after 
wards  led  into  more  serious  errors,  by  the  in 
fluence  of  his  turbulent  and  mischievous 
brother-in-law,  Temple. 

The  events  which  immediately  followed 
Pitt's  retirement  raised  his  fame  higher  than 
ever.  War  with  Spain  proved  to  be,  as  he 
had  predicted,  inevitable.  News  came  from 
the  West  Indies  that  Martinique  had  been 
taken  by  an  expedition  which  he  had  sent 
forth.  Havanna  fell ;  and  it  was  known  that 
he  had  planned  an  attack  on  Havanna.  Ma 
nilla  capitulated;  and  it  was  believed  that  he 
had  meditated  a  blow  against  Manilla.  The 
American  fleet,  which  he  had  proposed  to  in 
tercept,  had  unloaded  an  immense  cargo  of 
bullion  in  the  haven  of  Cadiz,  before  Bute 
could  be  convinced  that  the  court  of  Madrid 
really  entertained  hostile  intentions. 

The  session  of  Parliament  which  followed 
Pitt's  retirement  passed  over  without  any  vio 
lent  storm.  Lord  Bute  took  on  himself  the 
most  prominent  part  in  the  House  of  Lords. 
He  had  become  secretary  of  state,  and  indeed 


718 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


prime  minister,  without  having  once  opened 
his  lips  in  public  except  as  an  actor.  There 
was,  therefore,  no  small  curiosity  to  know  how 
he  would  acquit  himself.  Members  of  the 
House  of  Commons  crowded  the  bar  of  the 
Lords,  and  covered  the  steps  of  the  throne.  It 
was  generally  expected  that  the  orator  would 
break  down ;  but  his  most  malicious  hearers 
were  forced  to  own  that  he  had  made  a  better 
figure  than  they  expected.  They,  indeed,  ridi 
culed  his  action  as  theatrical,  and  his  style  as 
tumid.  They  were  especially  amused  by  the 
long  pauses  which,  not  from  hesitation  but 
from  affectation,  he  made  at  all  the  emphatic 
words,  and  Charles  Townshend  cried  out, 
"Minute  guns!"  The  general  opinion  how 
ever  was,  that  if  Bute  had  been  early  practised 
in  debate,  he  might  have  become  an  impres 
sive  speaker. 

In  the  Commons,  George  Grenville  had  been 
intrusted  with  the  lead.  The  task  was  not,  as 
yet,  a  very  difficult  one :  for  Pitt  did  not  think 
fit  to  raise  the  standard  of  opposition.  His 
speeches  at  this  time  were  distinguished,  not 
only  by  that  eloquence  in  which  he  excelled 
all  his  rivals,  but  also  by  a  temperance  and  a 
modesty  which  had  too  often  been  wanting  to 
his  character.  When  war  was  declared 
against  Spain,  he  justly  laid  claim  to  the  merit 
of  having  foreseen  what  had  at  length  become 
manifest  to  all,  but  he  carefully  abstained 
from  arrogant  and  acrimonious  expressions; 
and  this  abstinence  was  the  more  honourable 
to  him,  because  his  temper,  never  very  placid, 
was  now  severely  tried,  both  by  gout  and  by 
calumny.  The  courtiers  had  adopted  a  mode 
of  warfare,  which  was  soon  turned  with  far 
more  formidable  effect  against  themselves. 
Half  the  inhabitants  of  the  Grub  Street  garrets 
paid  their  milk-scores,  and  got  their  shirts  out 
of  pawn,  by  abusing  Pitt.  His  German  war, 
his  subsidies,  1m  pension,  his  wife's  peerage, 
•were  shin  of  beef  and  gin,  blankets  and  baskets 
of  small  coal,  to  the  starving  poetasters  of  the 
Fleet.  Even  in  the  House  of  Commons,  he 
was,  on  one  occasion  during  this  session,  as 
sailed  with  an  insolence  and  malice  which 
called  forth  the  indignation  of  men  of  all  par 
ties  ;  but  he  endured  the  outrage  with  majestic 
patience.  In  his  younger  days  he  had  been 
but  too  prompt  to  retaliate  on  those  who  at 
tacked  him;  but  now,  conscious  of  his  great 
services,  and  of  the  space  which  he  filled  in 
the  eyes  of  all  mankind,  he  would  not  stoop  to 
personal  squabbles.  "This  is  no  season,"  he 
said,  in  the  debate  on  the  Spanish  war,  "  for 
altercation  and  recrimination.  A  day  has  ar 
rived  when  every  Englishman  should  stand 
forth  for  his  country.  Arm  the  whole  ;  be  one 
Deople;  forget  everything  but  the  public.  I 
Set  you  the  example.  Harassed  by  slanderers, 
sinking  under  pain  and  disease,  for  the  public 
I  forget  both  my  wrongs  and  my  infirmities !" 
On  a  general  review  of  his  life,  we  are  inclined 
to  think  that  his  genius  and  virtue  never 
shone  with  so  pure  an  effulgence  as  during 
the  session  of  1762. 

The  session  drew  towards  the  close;  and 
Bute,  emboldened  by  the  acquiescence  of  the 
Hoti-  -d  to  strike  another  great  blow, 

and  to  become  first  minister  in  name  as  well 


as  in  reality.  That  coalition,  which  a  few 
months  before  had  seemed  all-powerful,  had 
been  dissolved.  The  retreat  of  Pitt  had  de 
prived  the  government  of  popularity.  New 
castle  had  exulted  in  the  fall  of  the  illustrious 
colleague  whom  he  envied  and  dreaded,  and 
had  not  foreseen  that  his  own  doom  was  at 
hand.  He  still  tried  to  flatter  himself  that  he 
was  at  the  head  of  the  government ;  but  insults 
heaped  on  insults  at  length  undeceived  him. 
Places  which  had  always  been  considered  as 
in  his  gift,  were  bestowed  without  any  refer 
ence  to  him.  His  expostulations  only  called 
forth  significant  hints  that  it  was  time  for  him 
to  retire.  One  day  he  pressed  on  Bute  the 
claims  of  a  Whig  prelate  to  the  archbishopric 
of  York.  "  If  your  grace  thinks  so  highly  of 
him,"  answered  Bute,  "I  wonder  that  you  did 
not  promote  him  when  you  had  the  power." 
Still  the  old  man  clung  with  a  desperate  grasp 
to  the  wreck.  Seldom,  indeed,  have  Christian 
meekness  and  Christian  humility  equalled  the 
meekness  and  humility  of  his  patient  and  ab 
ject  ambition.  At  length  he  was  forced  to  un 
derstand  that  all  was  over.  He  quitted  that 
court  where  he  had  held  high  office  during  forty- 
five  years,  and  hid  his  shame  and  regret  among 
the  cedars  of  Claremont.  Bute  became  first 
lord  of  the  treasury. 

The  favourite  had  undoubtedly  committed  a 
great  error.  It  is  impossible  to  imagine  a  tool 
better  suited  to  his  purposes  than  that  which 
he  thus  threw  away,  or  rather  put  into  the 
hands  of  his  enemies.  If  Newcastle  had  been 
suffered  to  play  at  being  first  minister,  Bute 
might  securely  and  quietly  have  enjoyed  the 
substance  of  power.  The  gradual  introduction 
of  Tories  into  all  the  departments  of  the  go 
vernment  might  have  been  effected  without 
any  violent  clamour,  if  the  chief  of  the  great 
Whig  connection  had  oeen  ostensibly  at  the 
head  of  affairs.  This  was  strongly  represented 
to  Bute  by  Lord  Mansfield,  a  man  who  may 
justly  be  called  the  father  of  modern  Toryism, 
of  Toryism  modified  to  suit  an  order  of  things 
under  which  the  House  of  Commons  is  the 
most  powerful  body  in  the  state.  The  theories 
which  had  dazzled  Bute  could  not  impose  on 
the  fine  intellect  of  Mansfield.  The  temerity 
with  which  Bute  provoked  the  hostility  of 
powerful  and  deeply-rooted  interests,  was  dis 
pleasing  to  Mansfield's  cold  and  timid  nature. 
Expostulation,  however,  was  vain.  Bute  was 
impatient  of  advice,  drunk  with  success,  eager 
to  be,  in  show  as  well  as  in  reality,  the  head 
of  the  government.  He  had  engaged  in  an 
undertaking,  in  which  a  screen  was  absolutely 
necessary  to  his  success,  and  even  to  his 
safety.  He  found  an  excellent  screen  ready  in 
the  very  place  where  it  was  most  needed;  and 
he  rudely  pushed  it  away. 

And  now  the  new  system  »f  government 
came  into  full  operation.  For  the  first  time 
since  the  accession  of  the  house  of  Hanover, 
the  Tory  party  was  in  the  ascendant.  The 
prime  minister  himself  was  a  Tory.  Lord 
Egremont,  who  had  succeeded  Pitt  as  secretary 
of  state,  was  a  Tory,  and  the  son  of  a  Tory. 
Sir  Francis  Dash  wood,  a  man  of  slender  parts, 
of  small  experience,  and  of  notoriously  im 
moral  character,  was  made  chancellor  of  the 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


71* 


exchequer,  /or  no  reason  that  could  be  ima 
gined,  except  that  he  was  a  Tory  and  had  been 
a  Jacobite.  The  royal  household  was  filled 
•with  men  whose  favourite  toast,  a  few  years 
before,  had  been  the  "  King  over  the  water." 
The  relative  position  of  the  two  great  national 
seats  of  learning  was  suddenly  changed.  The 
University  of  Oxford  had  long  been  the  chief 
seat  of  disaffection.  In  troubled  times,  the 
High  Street  had  been  lined  with  bayonets ;  the 
colleges  had  been  searched  by  the  king's  mes 
sengers.  Grave  doctors  were  in  the  habit  of 
talking  very  Ciceronian  treason  in  the  theatre ; 
and  the  under-graduates  drank  bumpers  to  Ja 
cobite  toasts,  and  chanted  Jacobite  airs.  Of 
four  successive  Chancellors  of  the  University, 
one  had  notoriously  been  in  the  Pretender's 
service;  the  other  three  were  fully  believed 
to  be  in  secret  correspondence  with  the  exiled 
family.  Cambridge  had  therefore  been  espe 
cially  favoured  by  the  Hanoverian  princes, 
and  had  shown  herself  grateful  for  their  pa 
tronage.  George  the  First  had  enriched  her 
library;  George  the  Second  had  contributed 
munificently  to  her  senate-house.  Bishoprics 
and  deaneries  were  showered  on  her  children. 
Her  Chancellor  was  Newcastle,  the  chief  of 
the  Whig  aristocracy ;  her  High-Steward  was 
Hardwicke.  the  Whig  head  of  the  law.  Both 
her  burgesses  had  held  office  under  the  Whig 
ministry.  Times  had  now  changed.  The  Uni 
versity  of  Cambridge  was  received  at  St. 
James's  with  comparative  coldness.  The  an 
swers  to  the  addresses  of  Oxford  were  all  gra- 
ciousness  and  warmth. 

The  watchwords  of  the  new  government 
were  prerogative  and  purity.  The  sovereign 
was  no  longer  to  be  a  puppet  in  the  hands  of 
any  subject,  or  of  any  combination  of  subjects. 
George  the  Third  would  not  be  forced  to  take 
ministers  whom  he  aisliked,  as  his  grandfa 
ther  had  been  forced  to  take  Pitt.  George  the 
Third  would  not  be  forced  to  part  with  any 
whom  he  delighted  to  honour,  as  his  grand 
father  had  been  forced  to  part  with  Carteret. 
At  the  same  time,  the  system  of  bribery  which 
had  grown  up  during  the  late  reigns  was  to 
cease.  It  was  ostentatiously  proclaimed  that, 
since  the  accession  of  the  young  king,  neither 
constituents  nor  representatives  had  been 
bought  wiii  the  secret  service  money.  To 
free  Britain  from  corruption  and  oligarchical 
cabals,  to  detach  her  from  continental  connec 
tions,  to  bring  the  bloody  and  expensive  war 
with  France  and  Spain  to  a  close,  such  were 
the  specious  objects  which  Bute  professed  to 
procure. 

Some  of  these  objects  he  attained.  England 
withdrew,  at  the  cost  of  a  deep  stain  on  her 
faith,  from  her  German  connections.  The  war 
with  France  and  Spain  was  terminated  by  a 
peace,  honourable  indeed  and  advantageous  to 
our  country,  yet  less  honourable  indeed  and  ad- 
Yantageous  than  might  have  been  expected  from 
a  long  and  almost  unbroken  series  of  victo 
ries,  by  land  and  sea,  in  every  part  of  the 
world.  But  the  only  effect  of  Bute's  domestic 
administration  was  to  make  faction  wilder  and 
corruption  fouler  than  ever. 

The  mutual  animosity  of  the  Whig  and  Tory 
parties  had  begun  to  languish  after  the  fall  of  ! 


Walpole,  and  had  seemed  to  be  almost  extinct 
at  the  close  of  the  reign  of  George  the  Second. 
It  now  revived  in  all  its  force.  Many  Whigs, 
it  is  true,  were  still  in  office.  The  Duke  of 
Bedford  had  signed  the  treaty  with  France.  The 
Duke  of  Devonshire,  though  much  out  of  hu 
mour,  still  continued  to  be  Lord-chamberlain. 
Grenville,  who  led  the  House  of  Commons,  and 
Fox,  who  still  enjoyed  in  silence  the  immense 
gains  of  the  Pay-Office,  had  always  been  re 
garded  as  strong  Whigs.  But  the  bulk  of  the 
party  throughout  the  country  regarded  the  new 
minister  with  abhorrence.  There  was,  indeed, 
no  want  of  popular  themes  for  invective  against 
his  character.  He  was  a  favourite  ;  and  favour 
ites  have  always  been  odious  in  this  country. 
No  mere  favourite  had  been  at  the  head  of  the 
government,  since  the  dagger  of  Felton  reached 
the  heart  of  the  Duke  of  Buckingham.  After 
that  event,  the  most  arbitrary  and  the  most 
frivolous  of  the  Stuarts  had  felt  the  necessity 
of  confiding  the  chief  direction  of  affairs  to 
men  who  had  given  some  proof  of  parliamen 
tary  or  official  talent.  Strafford,  Falkland, 
Clarendon,  Clifford,  Shaftesbury,  Lauderdale, 
Danby,  Temple,  Halifax,  Rochester,  Sunder- 
land,  whatever  their  faults  might  be,  were  all 
men  of  acknowledged  ability.  They  did  not 
owe  their  eminence  merely  to  the  favour  of  the 
sovereign.  On  the  contrary,  they  owed  the  fa 
vour  of  the  sovereign  to  their  eminence.  Most 
of  them,  indeed,  had  first  attracted  the  notice  of 
the  court  by  the  capacity  and  vigour  which 
they  had  shown  in  opposition.  The  Revolu 
tion  seemed  to  have  for  ever  secured  the  state 
against  the  domination  of  a  Carr  or  a  Villiers. 
Now,  however,  the  personal  regard  of  the  king 
had  at  once  raised  a  rAn  who  had  seen  no 
thing  of  public  businesdPeho  had  never  opened 
his  lips  in  Parliament,  over  the  heads  of  a 
crowd  of  eminent  orators,  financiers,  diploma 
tists.  From  a  private  gentleman,  this  fortunate 
minion  had  at  once  been  turned  into  a  secre 
tary  of  state.  He  had  made  his  maiden  speech 
when  at  the  head  of  the  administration.  The 
vulgar  resorted  to  a  simple  explanation  of  the 
phenomenon,  and  the  coarsest  ribaldry  against 
the  Princess  Mother  was  scrawled  on  every 
wall  and  in  every  alley. 

This  was  not  all.  The  spirit  of  party,  roused 
by  impolitic  provocation  from  its  long  sleep, 
roused  in  turn  a  still  fiercer  and  more  malig 
nant  fury,  the  spirit  of  national  animosity. 
The  grudge  of  Whig  against  Tory  was  mingled 
with  the  grudge  of  Englishman  against  Scot. 
The  two  sections  of  the  great  British  people 
had  not  yet  been  indissolubly  blended  together. 
The  events  of  1715  and  of  1744  had  left  pain- 
ful  and  enduring  traces.  The  tradesmen  of 
Cornhill  had  been  in  dread  of  seeing  their  tills 
and  warehouses  plundered  by  bare-legged 
mountaineers  from  the  Grampians.  They  still 
recollected  that  Black  Friday,  when  the  news 
came  that  the  rebels  were  at  Derby,  when  all 
the  shops  in  the  city  were  closed,  and  when  the 
Bank  of  England  began  to  pay  in  sixpences. 
The  Scots,  on  the  other  hand,  remembered, 
with  natural  resentment,  the  severity  with 
which  the  insurgents  had  been  chastised,  the 
military  outrages,  the  humiliating  laws,  the 
heads  fixed  on  Temple  Bar,  the  fires  and  quar- 


730 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tering-blocks  on  Kennington  Common.  The 
favourite  did  not  suffer  the  English  to  forget 
from  what  part  of  the  island  he  came.  The  cry 
of  all  the  south  was  that  the  public  offices,  the 
army,  the  navy,  were  filled  with  high-cheeked 
Drummonds,  and  Erskines,  Macdonalds  and 
Macgillivrays,  who  could  not  talk  a  Christian 
tongue,  and  some  of  whom  had  but  lately  be 
gun  to  wear  Christian  breeches.  All  the  old 
jokes  on  hills  without  trees,  girls  without 
stockings,  men  eating  the  food  of  horses,  pails 
emptied  from  the  fourteenth  story,  were  point 
ed  against  these  lucky  adventurers.  To  the 
honour  of  the  Scots  it  must  be  said,  that  their 
prudence  and  their  pride  restrained  them  from 
retaliation.  Like  the  princess  in  the  Arabian 
tale,  they  stopped  their  ears  tight,  and,  unmoved 
oy  the  shrillest  notes  of  abuse,  walked  on, 
without  once  looking  round,  straight  towards 
the  Golden  Fountain. 

Bute,  who  had  always  been  considered  as  a 
man  of  taste  and  reading,  affected,  from  the 
moment  of  his  elevation,  the  character  of  a 
Maecenas.  If  he  expected  to  conciliate  the 
public  by  encouraging  literature  and  art,  he 
was  grievously  mistaken.  Indeed,  none  of  the 
objects  of  his  munificence,  with  the  single  ex 
ception  of  Johnson,  can  be  said  to  have  been 
well  selected  ;  and  the  public,  not  unnaturally, 
ascribed  the  selection  of  Johnson  rather  to  the 
doctor's  political  prejudices  than  to  his  literary 
merits.  For  a  wretched  scribbler  named  Sheb- 
beare,  who  had  nothing  in  common  with  John 
son  except  violent  Jacobitism,  and  who  had 
stood  in  the  pillory  for  a  libel  on  the  Revolu 
tion,  was  honoured  with  a  mark  of  royal  ap 
probation,  similar  to  that  which  was  bestowed 
on  the  author  of  that  English  Dictionary,  and 
of  the  Vanity  of  Jflpaan  Wishes.  It  was  re 
marked  that  Adam,  a  Scotchman,  was  the  court 
architect,  and  that  Ramsay,  a  Scotchman,  was 
the  court  painter,  and  was  preferred  to  Rey 
nolds.  Mallet,  a  Scotchman  of  no  high  literary 
fame,  and  of  infamous  character,  partook 
largely  of  the  liberality  of  the  government. 
John  Home,  a  Scotchman,  was  rewarded  for  the 
tragedy  of  Douglas,  both  with  a  pension  and 
with  a  sinecure  place.  But,  when  the  author 
of  the  Bard,  and  of  the  Elegy  in  a  Country 
Churchyard,  ventured  to  ask  for  a  professor 
ship,  the  emoluments  of  which  he  much  need 
ed,  and  for  the  duties  of  which  he  was,  in  many 
respects,  better  qualified  than  any  man  living, 
he  was  refused;  and  the  post  was  bestowed  on 
the  pedagogue  under  whose  care  the  favourite's 
son-in-law,  Sir  James  Lowther,  had  made  such 
signal  proficiency  in  the  graces  and  in  the  hu 
mane  virtues. 

Thus,  the  first  lord  of  the  treasury  was  de 
tested  by  many  as  a  Tory,  by  many  as  a  favour 
ite,  and  by  many  as  a  Scot.  All  the  hatred 
which  flowed  from  these  various  sources  soon 
mingled,  and  was  directed  in  one  torrent  of 
obloquy  against  the  treaty  of  peace.  The 
Duke  of  Bedford,  who  negotiated  that  treaty, 
was  hooted  through  the  streets.  Bute  was  at 
tacked  in  his  chair,  and  was  with  difficulty 
rescued  by  a  troop  of  guards.  He  could  hardly 
•walk  the  streets  in  safety  without  disguising 
bimself.  A  gentleman  who  died  not  many 
years  ago  used  to  say,  that  he  once  recognised 


the  favourite  earl  in  the  piazza  of  Covent- 
Garden,  muffled  in  a  large  coat,  and  with  a  hat 
and  wig  drawn  down  over  his  brows.  His 
lordship's  established  type  with  the  mob  was 
a  jack-boot,  a  wretched  pun  on  his  Christian 
name  and  title.  A  jack-boot,  generally  ac 
companied  by  a  petticoat,  was  sometimes 
fastened  on  a  gallows,  and  sometimes  com 
mitted  to  the  flames.  Libels  on  the  court,  ex. 
ceeding  in  audacity  and  rancour  any  that  had 
been  published  for  many  years,  now  appeared 
daily  both  in  prose  and  verse.  Wilkes,  with 
lively  insolence,  compared  the  mother  of 
George  the  Third  to  the  mother  of  Edward  the 
Third,  and  the  Scotch  minister  to  the  gentle 
Mortimer.  Churchill,  with  all  the  energy  of 
hatred,  deplored  the  fate  of  his  country,  in 
vaded  by  a  new  race  of  savages,  more  cruel 
and  ravenous  than  the  Picts  or  the  Danes,  the 
poor,  proud  children  of  leprosy  and  hunger. 
It  is  a  slight  circumstance,  but  deserves  to  be 
recorded,  that  in  this  year  pamphleteers  first 
ventured  to  print  at  length  the  names  of  the 
great  men  whom  they  lampooned.  George  the 
Second  had  always  been  the  K .  His  mi 
nisters  had  been  Sir  R W ,  Mr.  P , 

and  the  Duke  of  N .  But  the  libellers  of 

George  the  Third,  of  the  Princess  Mother,  and 
of  Lord  Bute,  did  not  give  quarter  to  a  single 
vowel. 

It  was  supposed  that  Lord  Temple  secretly 
encouraged  the  most  scurrilous  assailants  of 
the  government.  In  truth,  those  who  knew 
his  habits  tracked  him  as  men  tracked  a  mole. 
It  was  his  nature  to  grub  underground.  When 
ever  a  heap  of  dirt  was  flung  up,  it  might  well 
be  suspected  that  he  was  at  work  in  some  foul 
crooked  labyrinth  below.  But  Pitt  turned 
away  from  the  filthy  work  of  opposition,  with 
the  same  scorn  with  which  he  had  turned 
away  from  the  filthy  work  of  government.  He 
had  the  magnanimity  to  proclaim  everywhere 
the  disgust  that  he  felt  at  the  insults  offered  by 
his  own  adherents  to  the  Scottish  nation,  and 
missed  no  opportunity  of  extolling  the  courage 
and  fidelity  which  the  Highland  regiments  had 
displayed  through  the  whole  war.  But,  though 
he  disdained  to  use  any  but  lawful  and  honour 
able  weapons,  it  was  well  known  that  his  fair 
blows  were  likely  to  be  far  more  formidable 
than  the  privy  thrusts  of  his  brother-in-law's 
stiletto. 

Bute's  heart  began  to  fail  him.  The  Houses 
were  about  to  meet.  The  treaty  would  instantly 
be  the  subject  of  discussion.  It  was  probable 
that  Pitt,  the  great  Whig  connection,  and  the 
multitude,  would  all  be  on  the  same  side.  The 
favourite  had  professed  to  hold  in  abhorrence 
those  means  by  which  preceding  ministers 
had  kept  the  House  of  Commons  in  good  hu 
mour.  He  now  began  to  think  that  he  had 
been  too  scrupulous.  His  Utopian  visions 
were  at  an  end.  It  was  necessary,  not  only  to 
bribe,  but  to  bribe  more  shamelessly  and  flagi 
tiously  than  his  predecessors,  in  order  to  make 
up  for  lost  time.  A  majority  must  be  secured, 
no  matter  by  what  means.  Could  Grenville 
do  this  1  Would  he  do  it  ?  His  firmness  and 
ability  had  not  yet  been  tried  in  any  perilous 
crisis.  He  had  been  generally  regarded«as  an 
humble  follower  of  his  brother  Temple,  and 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


72 


en'  his  brother-in-law,  Pitt,  and  was  supposed, 
though  with  little  reason,  to  be  still  favourably 
inclined  towards  them.  Other  aid  must  be 
called  in.  And  where  was  other  aid  ID  be 
found  ] 

There  was  one  man  whose  sharp  and  manly 
logic  had  often  in  debate  been  found  a  macch 
for  the  lofty  and  impassioned  rhetoric  of  Pitt, 
whose  talents  for  jobbing  were  not  inferior  to 
his  talents  for  debate,  whose  dauntless  spirit 
shrank  from  no  difficulty  or  danger,  and  who 
was  as  little  troubled  with  scruples  as  with 
fears.  Henry  Fox,  or  nobody,  could  weather 
the  storm  which  was  about  to  burst.  Yet  was 
he  a  person  to  whom  the  court,  even  in  that 
extremity,  was  unwilling  to  have  recourse. 
He  had  always  been  regarded  as  a  Whig  of  the 
Whips.  He  had  been  the  friend  and  disciple 
of  Walpole.  He  had  long  been  connected  by 
close  ties  with  William  Duke  of  Cumberland. 
By  the  Tories  he  was  more  hated  than  any 
man  living.  So  strong  was  their  aversion  to 
him,  that  when,  in  the  late  reign,  he  attempted 
to  form  a  party  against  the  Duke  of  Newcastle, 
they  had  thrown  all  their  weight  into  New 
castle's  scale.  By  the  Scots,  Fox  was  abhor 
red  as  the  confidential  friend  of  the  conqueror 
of  Culloden.  He  was,  on  personal  grounds, 
most  obnoxious  to  the  Princess  Mother.  For 
he  had,  immediately  after  her  husband's  death, 
advised  the  late  king  to  take  the  education  of 
her  son,  the  heir-apparent,  entirely  out  of  her 
hands.  He  had  recently  given,  if  possible, 
still  deeper  offence  ;  for  he  had  indulged,  not 
without  some  ground,  the  ambitious  hope  that 
his  beautiful  sister-in-law,  the  Lady  Sarah 
Lennox,  might  be  queen  of  England.  It  had 
been  observed  that  the  king  at  one  time  rode 
every  morning  by  the  grounds  of  Holland 
House,  and  that,  on  such  occasions,  Lady 
Sarah,  dressed  like  a  shepherdess  at  a  mas 
querade,  was  making  hay  close  to  the  road, 
which  was  then  separated  by  no  wall  from  the 
lawn.  On  account  of  the  part  which  Fox  had 
taken  in  this  singular  love  affair,  he  was  the 
only  member  of  the  privy  council  who  was  not 
summoned  to  the  meeting  at  which  his  majesty 
announced  his  intended  marriage  with  the 
Princess  of  Mecklenburg.  Of  all  the  states 
men  of  the  age,  therefore,  it  seemed  that  Fox 
was  the  last  with  whom  Bute,  the  Tory,  the 
Scot,  the  favourite  of  the  Princess  Mother, 
could,  under  any  circumstances,  act.  Yet  to 
Fox,  Bute  was  now  compelled  to  apply. 

Fox  had  many  noble  and  amiable  qualities, 
which  in  private  life  shone  forth  in  full  lustre, 
and  made  him  dear  to  his  children,  to  his  de 
pendents,  and  to  his  friends ;  but  as  a  public 
man  he  had  no  title  to  esteem.  In  him  the  vices 
which  were  common  to  the  whole  school  of 
Walpole  appeared,  not  perhaps  in  their  worst, 
but  certainly  in  their  most  prominent  form  ; 
for  his  parliamentary  and  official  talents  made 
all  his  faults  conspicuous.  His  courage,  his 
vehement  temper,  his  contempt  for  appear 
ances,  led  him  to  display  much  that  others, 
quite  as  unscrupulous  as  himself,  covered  with 
a  decent  veil.  He  was  the  most  unpopular  of 
the  statesmen  of  his  time,  not  because  he  sinned 
more  than  many  of  them,  but  because  he  canted 
less. 

VOL.  V.— 91 


He  felt  his  unpopularity;  but  he  felt  it  after 
the  fashion  of  strong  minds.  He  became,  not 
cautious,  but  reckless,  and  faced  the  rage  of 
the  whole  nation  with  a  scowl  of  inflexible  de 
fiance.  He  was  born  with  a  sweet  and  gene 
rous  temper ;  but  he  had  been  goaded  and 
baited  into  a  savageness  which  was  not  natural 
to  him,  and  which  amazed  and  shocked  those 
who  knew  him  best.  Such  w*.i  the  man  to 
whom  Bute,  in  extreme  need,  applied  for  suc 
cour. 

Such  succour  Fox  was  not  unwilling  to  af 
ford.  Though  by  no  means  of  an  envious 
temper,  he  had  undoubtedly  contemplated  th« 
success  and  popularity  of  Pitt  with  bitter  mor 
tification.  He  thought  himself  Pitt's  match  as 
a  debater,  and  Pitt's  superior  as  a  man  of  busi 
ness.  They  had  long  been  regarded  as  well 
paired  rivals.  They  had  started  fair  in  the  ca 
reer  of  ambition.  They  had  long  run  side  by 
side.  At  length  Fox  had  taken  the  lead,  and 
Pitt  had  fallen  behind.  Then  had  come  a  sud 
den  turn  of  fortune,  like  that  in  Virgil's  foot 
race.  Fox  had  stumbled  in  the  mire,  and  had 
not  only  been  defeated,  but  befouled.  Pitt  had 
reached  the  goal,  and  received  the  prize.  The 
emoluments  of  the  Pay-Office  might  induce  the 
defeated  statesman  to  submit  in  silence  to  the 
ascendency  of  his  competitor,  but  could  not 
satisfy  a  mind  conscious  of  great  powers,  and 
sore  from  great  vexations.  As  soon,  therefore, 
as  a  party  arose  adverse  to  the  war  and  to  the 
supremacy  of  the  great  war-minister,  the  hopes 
of  Fox  began  to  revive.  His  feuds  with  the 
Princess  Mother,  with  the  Scots,  with  the  To 
ries,  he  was  ready  to  forget,  if,  by  the  help  of 
his  old  enemies,  he  could  now  regain  the  im 
portance  which  he  had  lost,  and  confront  Pitt 
on  equal  terms. 

The  alliance  was,  therefore,  soon  concluded. 
Fox  was  assured  that,  if  he  would  pilot  the  go 
vernment  out  of  its  embarrassing  situation,  he 
should  be  rewarded  with  a  peerage,  of  which 
he  had  long  been  desirous.  He  undertook  on 
his  side  to  obtain,  by  fair  or  foul  means,  a  vote 
in  favour  of  the  peace.  In  consequence  of 
this  arrangement  he  became  leader  of  the 
House  of  Commons;  anAGrenville,  stifling  his 
vexation  as  well  as  he  could,  sullenly  acqui 
esced  in  the  change. 

Fox  had  expected  that  his  influence  would 
secure  to  the  court  the  cordial  support  of  some 
eminent  Whigs  who  were  his  personal  friends, 
particularly  of  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  and  of 
the  Duke  of  Devonshire.  He  was  disappointed, 
and  soon  found  that,  in  addition  to  all  his  other 
difficulties,  he  must  reckon  on  the  opposition 
of  the  ablest  prince  of  the  blood,  and  of  the 
great  house  of  Cavendish. 

But  he  had  pledged  himself  to  win  the  battle ; 
and  he  was  not  a  man  to  go  back.  It  was  no 
time  for  squeamishness.  Bute  was  made  to 
comprehend  that  the  ministry  could  be  saved 
only  by  practising  the  tactics  of  Walpole  to  an 
extent  at  which  Walpole  himself  would  have 
stared.  The  Pay-Office  was  turned  into  a  mart 
for  votes.  Hundreds  of  members  were  closeted 
there  with  Fox,  and,  as  there  is  too  much  rea 
son  to  believe,  departed  carrying  with  them  the 
wages  of  infamy.  It  was  affirmed  by  persons 
who  had  the  best  opportunities  of  obtaining  in 
3P 


T28 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


formation,  that  twenty-five  thousand  pounds 
were  thus  paid  away  in  a  single  morning.  The 
lowest  bribe  given,  it  was  said,  was  a  bank  note 
for  two  hundred  pounds. 

Intimidation  was  joined  with  corruption. 
All  ranks,  from  the  highest  to  the  lowest,  were 
to  be  taught  that  the  king  would  b«  obeyed. 
The  Lords-lieutenant  of  several  counties  were 
dismissed.  The  Duke  of  Devonshire  was  es 
pecially  singled  out  as  the  victim  by  whose 
fate  the  magnates  of  England  were  to  take 
warning.  His  wealth,  rank,  and  influence,  his 
stainless  private  character,  and  the  constant 
attachment  of  his  family  to  the  house  of  Han 
over,  did  not  secure  him  from  gross  personal 
indignity.  It  was  known  that  he  disapproved 
of  the  course  which  the  government  had  taken; 
and  it  was  accordingly  determined  to  humble 
the  Prince  of  the  Whigs,  as  he  had  been  nick 
named  by  the  Princess  Mother.  He  went  to 
the  palace  to  pay  his  duty.  "  Tell  him,"  said 
the  king  to  a  page,  "that  I  will  not  see  him." 
The  page  hesitated.  "  Go  to  him,"  said  the 
king,  "and  tell  him  those  very  words."  The 
message  was  delivered.  The  duke  tore  off 
his  gold  key,  and  went  away  boiling  with 
anger.  His  relations  who  were  in  office  in 
stantly  resigned.  A  few  days  later,  the  king 
called  for  the  list  of  privy-councillors,  and  with 
his  own  hand  struck  out  the  duke's  name. 

In  this  step  there  was  at  least  courage, 
thoush  little  wisdom  or  good-nature.  But  as 
nothing  was  too  high  for  the  revenge  of  the 
court,  so  also  was  nothing  too  low.  A  perse 
cution,  such  as  ha<7  never  been  known  before 
and  has  never  beon  known  since,  raged  in 
every  public  department.  Great  numbers  of 
humble  and  laborious  clerks  were  deprived  of 
iheir  bread,  not  because  they  had  neglected 
their  duties,  not  because  they  had  taken  an  ac 
tive  part  against  the  ministry,  but  merely  be 
cause  they  had  owed  their  situations  to  the 
recommendation  of  some  nobleman  or  gentle 
man  who  was  against  the  peace.  The  pro 
scription  extended  to  tide-waiters,  to  gaugers, 
to  doorkeepers.  One  poor  man  to  whom  a 
pension  had  been  given  for  his  gallantry  in  a 
light  with  smugglers,  was  deprived  of  it  be 
cause  he  had  been  befriended  by  the  Duke  of 
Grafton.  An  aged  widow,  who,  on  account  of 
her  husband's  services  in  the  navy,  had,  many 
years  before,  been  made  housekeeper  to  a 
public  office,  was  dismissed  from  her  situation, 
because  it  was  imagined  that  she  was  distantly 
connected  by  marriage  with  the  Cavendish 
family.  The  public  clamour,  as  may  well  be 
supposed,  grew  daily  louder  and  louder.  But 
the  louder  it  grew,  the  more  resolutely  did  Fox 
go  on  with  the  work  which  he  had  begun.  His 
old  friends  could  not  conceive  what  had  pos 
sessed  him.  "I  could  forgive,"  said  the  Duke 
of  Cumberland,  "Fox's  political  vagaries,  but 
I  am  quite  confounded  by  his  inhumanity. 
Surely  he  used  to  be  the  best-natured  of  men." 

Ai  last  Fox  went  so  far  as  to  take  a  legal 
opinion  on  the  question,  whether  the  patents 
granted  by  George  the  Second  were  binding  on 
George  the  Third.  It  is  said  that,  if  his  col 
leagues  had  not  flinched,  he  would  at  once 
have  turned  out  the  tellers  of  the  Exchequer 
and  justices  in  Eyre. 


Meanwhile  the  Parliament  met.  The  min 
isters,  more  hated  by  the  people  than  ever, 
were  secure  of  a  majority,  and  they  had  also 
reason  to  hope  that  they  would  have  the  ad 
vantage  in  the  debates  as  well  as  in  the  divi 
sions.  For  Pitt  was  confined  to  his  chamber 
by  a  severe  attack  of  gout.  His  friends  moved 
to  defer  the  consideration  of  the  treaty  till  he 
should  be  able  to  attend.  But  the  motion  was 
rejected.  The  great  day  arrived.  The  discus 
sion  had  lasted  some  time,  when  a  loud  huzza 
was  heard  in  Palace-yard.  The  noise  came 
nearer  and  nearer,  up  the  stairs,  through  the 
lobby.  The  door  opened,  and  from  the  midst 
of  a  shouting  multitude  came  forth  Pitt,  borne 
in  the  arms  of  his  attendants.  His  face  was 
thin  and  ghastly,  his  limbs  swathed  in  flannel, 
his  crutch  in  his  hand.  The  bearers  set  him 
down  within  the  bar.  His  friends  instantly 
surrounded  him,  and  with  their  help  he  crawled 
to  his  seat  near  the  table.  In  this  condition  he 
spoke  three  hours  and  a  half  against  the  peace. 
During  that  time  he  was  repeatedly  forced  to 
sit  down  and  to  use  cordials.  It  may  well  be 
supposed  that  his  voice  was  faint,  that  his  ac 
tion  was  languid,  and  that  his  speech,  though 
occasionally  brilliant  and  impressive,  was  fee 
ble  when  compared  with  his  best  oratorical 
performances.  But  those  who  remembered 
what  he  had  done,  and  who  saw  what  he  suf 
fered,  listened  to  him  with  emotion  stronger 
than  any  that  mere  eloquence  can  produce. 
He  was  unable  to  stay  for  the  division,  and 
was  carried  away  from  the  .House  amidst 
shouts  as  loud  as  those  which  had  announced 
his  arrival. 

A  large  majority  approved  the  peace.  The 
exultation  of  the  court  was  boundless.  "Now," 
exclaimed  the  Princess  Mother,  "my  son  is 
really  king."  The  young  sovereign  spoke  of 
himself  as  freed  from  the  bondage  in  which  his 
grandfather  had  been  held.  On  one  point,  it 
was  announced,  his  mind  was  unalterably 
made  up.  Under  no  circumstances  whatever 
should  those  Whig  grandees,  who  had  en 
slaved  his  predecessors  and  endeavoured  to 
enslave  himself,  be  restored  to  power. 

His  vaunting  was  premature.  The  real 
strength  of  the  favourite  was  by  no  means 
proportioned  to  the  number  of  votes  which  he 
had,  on  one  particular  division,  been  able  to 
command.  He  was  soon  again  in  difficulties. 
The  most  important  part  of  his  budget  was  a 
tax  on  cider.  This  measure  was  opposed,  no* 
oily  by  those  who  were  generally  hostiie  to 
his  administration,  but  also  by  many  of  his 
supporters.  The  name  of  excise  had  always 
been  hateful  to  the  Tories.  One  of  the  chief 
crimes  of  Walpole,  in  their  eyes,  had  been  his 
partiality  for  this  mode  of  raising  money. 
The  Tory  Johnson  had  in  his  Dictionary  given 
so  scurrilous  a  definition  of  the  word  "  excise," 
that  the  Commissioners  of  excise  had  serious 
ly  thought  of  prosecuting  him.  The  counties 
which  the  new  impost  particularly  atfected 
had  always  been  Tory  counties.  It  was  the 
boast  of  John  Philips,  the  poet  of  the  English 
vintage,  that  the  Cider-land  had  ever  been 
faithful  to  the  throne,  and  that  all  the  pruning- 
|  hooks  of  her  thousand  orchards  had  been 
beaten  into  swords  for  the  service  of  the  ill 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


723 


fw'&\  tftuarts.  The  effect  of  Bute's  fiscal 
&.  -U^Lx  was  to  produce  an  union  between  the 
gently  and  yeomanry  of  the  Cider-land  and 
the  Whigs  of  ths  capital.  Herefordshire  and 
Worcestershire  were  in  a  flame.  The  city  of 
London,  though  not  so  directly  interested,  was, 
if  possible,  still  more  excited.  The  debates 
en  this  question  irreparably  damaged  the  go 
vernment.  Dashwood's  financial  statement 
had  been  confused  and  absurd  beyond  belief, 
and  had  been  received  by  the  House  with 
roars  of  laughter.  He  had  sense  enough  to 
be  conscious  of  his  unfitness  for  the  high 
situation  which  he  held,  and  exclaimed,  in  a 
comical  fit  of  despair,  "What  shall  I  do? 
The  boys  will  point  at  me  in  the  street,  and 
or-y,  'There  goes  the  worst  chancellor  of  the 
exchequer  that  ever  was.'  "  George  Grenville 
came  to  the  rescue,  and  spoke  strongly  on  his 
favourite  theme,  the  profusion  with  which  the 
late  war  had  been  carried  on.  That  profu 
sion,  he  said,  had  made  taxes  necessary.  He 
called  on  the  gentlemen  opposite  to  him  to 
say  where  they  would  have  a  tax  laid,  and 
dwelt  on  this  topic  with  his  usual  prolixity. 
"  Let  them  tell  me  where,"  he  repeated,  in  a 
monotonous  and  somewhat  fretful  tone.  "I 
say,  sir,  let  them  tell  me  where.  I  repeat  it, 
sir;  I  am  entitled  to  say  to  them — tell  me 
•where."  Unluckily  for  him,  Pitt  had  come 
down  to  the  House  that  night,  and  had  been 
bitterly  provoked  by  the  reflections  thrown  on 
the  war.  He  revenged  himself  by  murmur 
ing,  in  a  whine  resembling  Grenville's,  a  line 
of  a  well-known  song,  "Gentle  shepherd,  tell 
*ms  where."  "If,"  cried  Grenville,  "gentlemen 

are  to  be  treated  in  this  way" Pitt,  as  was 

his  fashion  when  he  meant  to  mark  extreme 
contempt,  rose  deliberately,  made  his  bow, 
and  walked  out  of  the  Hous>e,  leaving  his 
brother-in-law  in  convulsions  of  rage,  and 
everybody  else  in  convulsions  of  laughter. 
It  was  long  before  Grenville  lost  the  nickname 
of  the  gentle  shepherd. 

But  the  ministry  had  vexations  still  more 
serious  to  endure.  The  hatred  which  the  To 
ries  and  Scots  bore  to  Fox  was  implacable. 
In  a  moment  of  extreme  peril,  they  consented 
to  put  themselves  under  his  guidance.  But 
the  aversion  with  which  they  regarded  him 
broke  forth  as  soon  as  the  crisis  seemed  to  be 
over.  Some  of  them  attacked  him  about  the 
accounts  of  the  Pay-Omce.  Some  of  them 
rudely  interrupted  him  when  speaking,  by 
laughter  and  ironical  cheers.  He  was  natu 
rally  desirous  to  escape  from  so  disagreeable 
a  situation,  and  demanded  the  peerage  which 
had  been  promised  as  the  reward  of  his  ser 
vices. 

It  was  clear  that  there  must  be  some  change 
in  the  composition  of  the  ministry.  But  scarce 
ly  any,  even  of  those  who,  from  their  situation, 
might  be  supposed  to  be  in  all  the  secrets  of 
the  government,  anticipated  what  really  took 
place.  To  the  amazement  of  the  Parliament 
and  the  nation,  it  was  suddenly  announced 
that  Bute  had  resigned. 

Twenty  different  explanations  of  this  strange 
step  were  suggested.  Some  attributed  it  to 
profound  design,  and  some  to  sudden  panic. 
Some  said  that  the  lampoons  of  the  opposition 


had  driven  the  earl  from  the  field  ;  some  that 
he  had  taken  office  only  in  order  to  bring  the 
war  to  a  close,  and  had  always  meant  to  retire 
when  that  object  had  been  accomplished.  He 
publicly  assigned  ill  health  as  his  reason  for 
quitting  business,  and  privately  complained 
that  he  was  not  cordially  seconded  by  his  col 
leagues  ;  and  that  Lord  Mansfield,  in  particu 
lar,  whom  he  had  himself  brought  into  the 
cabinet,  gave  him  no  support  in  the  House  of 
Peers.  Lord  Mansfield  was,  indeed,  far  too 
sagacious  not  to  perceive  that  Bute's  situation 
was  one  of  great  peril,  and  far  too  timorous  to 
thrust  himself  into  peril  for  the  sake  of  an 
other.  The  probability,  however,  is,  that 
Bute's  conduct  on  this  occasion,  like  the 
conduct  of  most  men  on  most  occasions,  was 
determined  by  mixed  motives.  We  suspect 
that  he  was  sick  of  office ;  for  this  is  a  feeling 
much  more  common  among  ministers  than 
persons  who  see  public  life  from  a  distance 
are  disposed  to  believe.  And  nothing  could 
be  more  natural  than  that  this  feeling  should 
take  possession  of  the  mind  of  Bute.  In  gene 
ral,  a  statesman  climbs  by  slow  degrees. 
Many  laborious  years  elapse  before  he  reaches 
the  topmost  pinnacle  of  preferment.  In  the 
earlier  part  of  his  career,  therefore,  he  is  con 
stantly  lured  on  by  seeing  something  above 
him.  During  his  ascent  he  gradually  becomes 
inured  to  the  annoyances  which  belong  to  a 
life  of  ambition.  By  the  time  that  he  has 
attained  the  highest  point,  he  has  become  pa 
tient  of  labour  and  callous  of  abuse.  He  is 
kept  constant  to  his  vocation,  in  spite  of  all 
its  discomforts,  at  first  by  hope,  and  at  last  by 
habit.  It  was  not  so  with  Bute.  His  whole 
public  life  lasted  little  more  than  two  years. 
On  the  day  on  which  he  became  a  politician 
he  became  a  cabinet  minister.  In  a  few 
months  he  was,  both  in  name  and  in  show, 
chief  of  the  administration.  Greater  than  he 
had  been  he  could  not  be.  If  what  he  already 
possessed  was  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit, 
no  delusion  remained  to  entice  him  onward. 
He  had  been  cloyed  with  the  pleasures  of  am 
bition  before  he  had  been  seasoned  to  its  pains. 
His  habits  had  not  been  such  as  were  likely 
to  fortify  his  mind  against  obloquy  and  public 
hatred.  He  had  reached  his  forty-eighth  year 
in  dignified  ease,  without  knowing,  by  per 
sonal  experience,  what  it  was  to  be  ridiculed 
and  slandered.  All  at  once,  without  any  pre 
vious  initiation,  he  had  found  himself  exposed 
to  such  a  storm  of  invective  and  satire  as  had 
never  burst  on  the  head  of  any  statesman. 
The  emoluments  of  office  were  now  nothing 
to  him  ;  for  he  had  just  succeeded  to  a  princely 
property  by  the  death  of  his  father-in-law. 
All  the  honours  which  could  be  bestowed  on 
him  he  had  already  secured.  He  had  obtained 
the  Garter  for  himself,  and  a  British  peerage 
for  his  son.  He  seems  also  to  have  imagined, 
that  by  quitting  the  treasury  he  should  escape 
from  danger  and  abuse  without  really  resign 
ing  power,  and  should  still  be  able  to  exercise 
in  private  supreme  influence  over  the  royal 
mind. 

Whatever  may  have  been  his  motives,  he 
retired.  Fox  at  the  same  time  took  refuge  in 
the  House  of  Lords ;  and  George  Grenville 


724 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


became  first  lord  of  the  treasury  and  chancellor 
of  the  exchequer. 

We  believe  that  those  who  made  this  ar 
rangement  fully  intended  thatGrenville  should 
be  a  mere  puppet  in  the  hands  of  Bute ;  for 
Grenville  was  as  yet  very  imperfectly  known 
even  to  those  who  had  observed  him  long. 
He  passed  for  a  mere  official  drudge;  and  he 
had  all  the  industry,  the  minute  accuracy,  the 
formality,  the  tediousness,  which  belong  to  the 
character.  But  he  had  other  qualities  which 
had  not  yet  shown  themselves — devouring 
ambition,  dauntless  courage,  self-confidence 
amounting  to  presumption,  and  a  temper 
which  could  not  endure  opposition.  He  was 
not  disposed  to  be  anybody's  tool ;  and  he  had 
no  attachment,  political  or  personal,  to  Bute. 
The  two  men  had,  indeed,  nothing  in  common, 
except  a  strong  propensity  towards  harsh  and 
unpopular  courses.  Their  principles  were 
fundamentally  different. 

Bute  was  a  Tory.  Grenville  would  have 
been  very  angry  with  any  person  who  should 
have  denied  his  claim  to  be  a  Whig.  He  was 
more  prone  to  tyrannical  measures  than  Bute; 
but  he  loved  tyranny  only  when  disguised 
under  the  forms  of  constitutional  liberty.  He 
mixed  up,  after  a  fashion  then  not  very  un 
usual,  the  theories  of  the  republicans  of  the 
seventeenth  century  with  the  technical  maxims 
of  English  law,and  thus  succeededin  combining 
anarchical  speculation  with  arbitrary  practice. 
The  voice  of  the  people  was  the  voice  of  God ; 
but  the  only  legitimate  organ  through  which 
the  voice  of  the  people  could  be  uttered  was 
the  Parliament.  All  power  was  from  the  peo 
ple  ;  but  to  the  Parliament  the  whole  power  of 
the  people  had  been  delegated.  No  Oxonian 
divine  had  ever,  even  in  the  years  which  im 
mediately  followed  the  restoration,  demanded 
for  the  king  so  abject,  so  unreasoning  a  ho 
mage,  as  Grenville,  on  what  he  considered  as 
the  purest  Whig  principles,  demanded  for  the 
Parliament.  As  he  wished  to  see  the  Parlia 
ment  despotic  over  the  nation,  so  he  wished  to 
see  it  also  despotic  over  the  court.  In  his 
view,  the  prime  minister,  possessed  of  the  con 
fidence  of  the  House  of  Commons,  ought  to  be 
mayor  of  the  palace.  The  king  was  a  mere 
Childeric  or  Chilperic,  who  might  well  think 
himself  lucky  in  being  permitted  to  enjoy  such 
handsome  apartments  at  St.  James's,  and  so 
fine  a  park  at  Windsor. 

Thus  the  opinions  of  Bute  and  those  of  Gren- 
Ville  were  diametrically  opposed.  Nor  was 
there  any  private  friendship  between  the  two 
statesmen.  Grenville's  nature  was  not  forgiv 
ing;  and  he  well  remembered  how,  a  few 
months  before,  he  had  been  compelled  to  yield 
the  lead  of  the  House  of  Commons  to  Fox. 

We  are  inclined  to  think,  on  the  whole,  that 
the  worst  administration  which  has  governed 
England  since  the  Revolution  was  that  of 
George  Grenville.  His  public  acts  may  be 
classed  under  two  heads — outrages  on  the 
liberty  of  the  people,  and  outrages  on  the  dig 
nity  of  the  crown. 

He  began  by  making  war  on  the  press. 
John  Wilkes,  member  of  parliament  for  Ayles- 
tmry,  was  singled  out  for  persecution.  Wilkes 
h.ad,  till  very  lately,  been  known  chiefly  as  one 


of  the  most  profane,  licentious,  ai.d  agreeable 
rakes  about  town.  He  was  a  man  of  taste, 
reading,  and  engaging  manners.  His  sprightly 
onversation  was  the  delight  of  green-rooms 
and  taverns,  and  pleased  even  grave  hearers, 
when  he  was  sufficiently  under  restraint  to 
abstain  from  detailing  the  particulars  of  his 
amours,  and  from  breaking  jests  on  the  New 
Testament.  His  expensive  debaucheries  forced 
him  to  have  recourse  to  the  Jews.  He  was 
soon  a  ruined  man,  and  determined  to  try  his 
chance  as  a  political  adventurer.  In  Parlia 
ment  he  did  not  succeed.  His  speaking, 
though  pert,  was  feeble,  and  by  no  means  in 
terested  his  hearers  so  much  as  to  make  them 
forget  his  face,  which  was  so  hideous  that  the 
aricaturists  were  forced,  in  their  own  despite, 
to  flatter  him.  As  a  writer,  he  made  a  better 
figure.  He  set  up  a  weekly  paper,  called  the 
North  Briton.  This  journal,  written  with  some 
pleasantry,  and  great  audacity  and  impudence, 
had  a  considerable  number  of  readers.  Forty- 
four  numbers  had  been  published  when  Bute 
resigned;  and,  though  almost  every  number 
had  contained  matter  grossly  libellous,  no  pro 
secution  had  been  instituted.  The  forty -fifth 
number  was  innocent  when  compared  with 
the  majority  of  those  which  had  preceded  it, 
and  indeed  contained  nothing  so  strong  as  may 
now  be  found  daily  in  the  leading  articles  of 
the  Times  and  Morning  Chronicle.  But  Gren 
ville  was  now  at  the  head  of  affairs.  A  new 
spirit  had  been  infused  into  the  administration. 
Authority  was  to  be  upheld.  The  government 
was  no  longer  to  be  braved  with  impunity. 
Wilkes  was  arrested  under  a  general  warrant, ' 
conveyed  to  the  Tower,  and  confined  there  with 
circumstances  of  unusual  severity.  His  papers 
were  seized,  and  carried  to  the  secretary  of  state. 
These  harsh  and  illegal  measures  produced  a 
violent  outbreak  of  popular  rage,  which  was 
soon  changed  to  delight  and  exultation.  The 
arrest  was  pronounced  unlawful  by  the  Court 
of  Common  Pleas,  in  which  Chief  Justice 
Pratt  presided,  and  the  prisoner  was  dis 
charged.  This  victory  over  the  government 
was  celebrated  with  enthusiasm  both  in  Lon 
don  and  in  the  Cider-counties. 

While  the  ministers  were  daily  becoming 
more  odious  to  the  nation,  they  were  doing 
their  best  to  make  themselves  also  odious  to 
the  court.  They  gave  the  king  plainly  to  un 
derstand  that  they  were  determined  not  to  be 
Lord  Bute's  creatures,  and  exacted  a  promise 
that  no  secret  adviser  should  have  access  to 
the  royal  ear.  They  soon  found  reason  to  sus 
pect  that  this  promise  had  not  been  observed. 
They  remonstrated  in  terms  less  respectful 
than  their  master  had  been  accustomed  to 
hear,  and  gave  him  a  fortnight  to  make  his 
choice  between  his  favourite  and  his  cabinet. 

George  the  Third  was  greatly  disturbed. 
He  had  but  a  few  weeks  before  exulted  in  his 
deliverance  from  the  yoke  of  the  great  Whig 
connection.  He  had  even  declared  that  his 
honour  would  not  permit  him  ever  again  to 
admit  the  members  of  that  connection  to  his 
service.  He  now  found  that  he  had  only  ex 
changed  one  set  of  masters  for  another  set  still 
harsher  and  more  imperious.  In  his  distress 
he  thought  on  Pitt.  From  Pitt  it  was  possible 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


725 


that  better  terms  might  be  obtained  than  either 
from  Grenville,  or  from  the  party  of  which 
Newcastle  was  the  head. 

Grenville,  on  his  return  from  an  excursion 
into  the  country,  repaired  to  Buckingham 
House.  He  was  astonished  to  find  at  the 
entrance  a  chair,  the  shape  of  which  was  well 
known  to  him,  and  indeed  to  all  London.  It 
was  distinguished  by  a  large  boot,  made  for 
the  purpose  of  accommodating  the  great  com 
moner's  gouty  leg.  Grenville  guessed  the 
whole.  His  brother-in-law  was  closeted  with 
the  king.  Bute,  provoked  by  what  he  con 
sidered  as  the  unfriendly  and  ungrateful 
conduct  of  his  successors,  had  himself  pro 
posed  that  Pitt  should  be  summoned  to  the 
palace. 

Pitt  had  two  audiences  on  two  successive 
days.  What  passed  at  the  first  interview  led 
him  to  expect  that  the  negotiation  would  be 
brought  to  a  satisfactory  close ;  but  on  the 
morrow  he  found  the  king  less  complying. 
The  best  account,  indeed  the  only  trustworthy 
account  of  the  conference,  is  that  which  was 
taken  from  Pitt's  own  mouth  by  Lord  Hard- 
wicke.  It  appears  that  Pitt  strongly  repre 
sented  the  importance  of  conciliating  those 
chiefs  of  the  Whig  party  who  had  been  so  un 
happy  as  to  incur  the  royal  displeasure.  They 
had,  he  said,  been  the  most  constant  friends  of 
the  house  of  Hanover.  Their  power  and  cre 
dit  were  great ;  they  had  been  long  versed  in 
public  business.  If  they  were  to  be  under 
sentence  of  exclusion,  a  solid  administration 
could  not  be  formed.  His  majesty  could  not 
bear  to  think  of  putting  himself  into  the  hands 
of  those  whom  he  had  recently  chased  from 
his  court  with  the  strongest  marks  of  anger. 
"I  am  sorry,  Mr.  Pitt,"  he  said,  "but  I  see  this 
will  not  do.  My  honour  is  concerned.  I  must 
rapport  my  honour."  How  his  majesty  suc 
ceeded  in  supporting  his  honour,  we  shall 
soon  see. 

Pitt  retired,  and  the  king  was  reduced  to 
request  the  ministers  whom  he  had  been  on 
the  point  of  discarding,  to  remain  in  office. 
During  the  two  years  which  followed,  Gren 
ville,  now  closely  leagued  with  the  Bedfords, 
was  the  master  of  the  court ;  and  a  hard  mas 
ter  he  proved.  He  knew  that  he  was  kept  in 
place  only  because  there  was  no  choice  except 
between  himself  and  the  Whigs.  That,  under 
any  circumstances,  the  Whigs  would  be  for 
given,  he  thought  impossible.  The  late  attempt 
to  get  rid  of  him  had  roused  his  resentment; 
the  failure  of  that  attempt  had  liberated  him 
from  all  fear.  He  had  never  been  very  courtly. 
He  now  began  to  hold  a  language,  to  which, 
since  the  days  of  Cornet  Joyce  and  President 
Bradshaw,  no  English  king  had  been  compel- 
.ed  to  listen. 

In  one  matter,  indeed,  Grenville,  at  the  ex 
pense  of  justice  and  liberty,  gratified  the  pas 
sions  of  the  court  while  gratifying  his  own. 
The  persecution  of  Wilkes  was  eagerly  press 
ed.  He  had  written  a  parody  on  Pope's  Essay 
on  Man,  entitled  the  Essay  on  Woman,  and  had 
appended  to  it  notes,  in  ridicule  of  Warbur- 
ton's  famous  Commentary. 

This  composition  was  exceedingly  profligate, 
but  not  more  so,  we  think,  than  some  of  Pope's 


own  works — the  imitation  of  the  second  satire 
of  the  first  book  of  Horace,  for  example ;  and, 
to  do  Wilkes  justice,  he  had  not,  like  Pope, 
given  his  ribaldry  to  the  world.  He  had 
merely  printed  at  a  private  press  a  very  small 
number  of  copies,  which  he  meant  to  present 
to  some  of  his  boon  companions,  whose  morals 
were  in  no  more  danger  of  being  corrupted  by 
a  loose  book,  than  a  negro  of  being  tanned  by 
a  warm  sun.  A  tool  of  the  government,  by 
giving  a  bribe  to  the  printer,  procured  a  copy 
of  this  trash,  and  placed  it  in  the  hands  of  th-5 
ministers.  The  ministers  resolved  to  visit 
Wilkes's  offence  against  decorum  with  the 
utmost  rigour  of  the  law.  What  share  piety 
and  respect  for  morals  had  in  dictating  this 
resolution,  our  readers  may  judge  from  the 
fact,  that  no  person  was  more  ea^ger  for  bring 
ing  the  libertine  poet  to  punishment  than  Lord 
March,  afterwards  Duke  of  Queensberry. 

On  the  first  day  of  the  session  of  Par 
liament,  the  book,  thus  disgracefully  ob 
tained,  was  laid  on  the  table  of  the  Lords  by 
the  Earl  of  Sandwich,  whom  the  Duke  of  Bed 
ford's  interest  had  made  Secretary  of  State. 
The  unfortunate  author  had  not  the  slightest 
suspicion  that  his  licentious  poem  had  ever 
been  seen,  except  by  his  printer  and  by  a  few 
of  his  dissipated  companions,  till  it  was  pro 
duced  in  full  Parliament.  Though  he  was  a 
man  of  easy  temper,  averse  from  danger,  and 
not  very  susceptible  of  shame,  the  surprise, 
the  disgrace,  the  prospect  ot  utter  ruin,  put  him 
beside  himself.  He  picked  a  quarrel  with  one 
of  Lord  Bute's  dependents,  fought  a  duel,  was 
seriously  wounded,  and,  when  half  recovered, 
fled  to  France.  His  enemies  had  now  their 
own  way  both  in  the  Parliament  and  in  the 
King's  Bench.  He  was  censured;  expelled 
from  the  House  of  Commons  ;  outlawed.  His 
works  were  ordered  to  be  burned  by  the  com 
mon  hangman.  Yet  was  the  multitude  still 
true  to  him.  In  the  minds  even  of  many  moral 
and  religious  men,  his  crime  seemed  light  when 
compared  with  the  crime  of  his  accusers.  The 
conduct  of  Sandwich,  in  particular,  excited 
universal  disgust.  His  own  vices  were  noto 
rious;  and,  only  a  fortnight  before  he  laid  the 
Essay  on  Woman  before  the  House  of  Lords, 
he  had  been  drinking  and  singing  loose  catches 
with  Wilkes  at  one  of  the  most  dissolute  clubs 
in  London.  Shortly  after  the  meeting  of  Par 
liament,  the  Beggar's  Opera  was  acted  at 
Covent-Garden  theatre.  When  Macheath  ut 
tered  the  words — "That  Jemmy  Twitcher 
should  peach  me  I  own  surprised  me," — pit, 
boxes,  and  galleries,  burst  into  a  roar  which 
seemed  likely  to  bring  the  roof  down.  From 
that  day  Sandwich  was  universally  known  by 
the  nickname  of  Jemmy  Twitcher.  The  cere 
mony  of  burning  the  North  Briton  was  inter 
rupted  by  a  riot.  The  constables  were  beaten  ; 
the  paper  was  rescued;  and,  instead  of  ir,  a 
jack-boot  and  a  petticoat  were  committed  to  the 
flames.  Wilkes  had  instituted  an  action  for 
the  seizure  of  his  papers,  against  the  under 
secretary  of  state.  The  jury  gave  a  thousand 
pounds  damages.  But  neither  these  nor  any 
other  indications  of  public  feeling  had  powef 
to  move  Grenville.  He  had  the  Parliament 
with  him  :  and,  according  to  his  political  creed, 
3*2 


726 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  sense  of  the  nation  was  to  be  collected  from 
the  Parliament  alone. 

Soon,  however,  he  found  reason  to  fear  that 
•ven  the  Parliament  might  fail  him.  On  the 
question  of  the  legality  of  general  warrants, 
the  opposition,  having  on  its  side  all  sound 
principles,  all  constitutional  authorities,  and 
the  voice  of  the  whole  nation,  mustered  in  great 
force,  and  was  joined  by  many  who  did  not 
ordinarily  vote  against  the  government.  On  one 
occasion  the  ministry,  in  a  very  full  House, 
had  a  majority  of  only  fourteen  votes.  The 
storm,  however,  blew  over.  The  spirit  of  the 
opposition,  from  whatever  cause,  began  to  flag 
at  the  moment  when  success  seemed  almost 
certain.  The  session  ended  without  any  change. 
Pitt,  whose  eloquence  had  shone  with  its  usual 
lustre  in  alKthe  principal  debates,  and  whose 
popularity  was  greater  than  ever,  was  still  a 
private  man.  Grenville,  detested  alike  by  the 
court  and  by  the  people,  was  still  minister. 

As  soon  as  the  Houses  had  risen,  Grenville 
took  a  step  which  proved,  even  more  signally 
than  any  of  his  past  acts,  how  despotic,  how 
acrimonious,  and  how  fearless  his  nature  was. 
Among  the  gentlemen  not  ordinarily  opposed 
to  the  government,  who,  on  the  great  constitu 
tional  question  of  general  warrants,  had  voted 
with  the  minority,  was  Henry  Conway,  brother 
of  the  Earl  of  Hertford,  a  brave  soldier,  a  tole 
rable  speaker,  and  a  well-meaning,  though  not 
a  wise  or  vigorous  politician.  He  was  now 
deprived  of  his  regiment,  the  merited  reward 
of  faithful  and  gallant  services  in  two  wars. 
It  was  confidently  asserted  that  in  this  violent 
measure  the  king  heartily  concurred. 

But  whatever  pleasure  the  persecution  of 
Wilkes,  or  the  dismissal  of  Conway,  may  have 
given  to  the  royal  mind,  it  is  certain  that  his 
majesty's  aversion  to  his  ministers  increased 
day  by  day.  Grenville  was  as  frugal  of  the 
public  money  as  of  his  own,  and  morosely  re 
fused  to  accede  to  the  king's  request,  that  a  few 
thousand  pounds  might  be  expended  in  buying 
some  open  fields  to  the  west  of  the  gardens  of 
Buckingham  House.  In  consequence  of  this 
refusal,  the  fields  were  soon  covered  with 
buildings,  and  the  king  and  queen  were  over 
looked  in  their  most  private  walks  by  the  upper 
windows  of  a  hundred  houses.  Nor  was  this 
the  worst.  Grenville  was  as  liberal  of  words  as 
he  was  sparing  of  guineas.  Instead  of  explain 
ing  himself  in  that  clear,  concise,  and  lively 
manner,  which  alone  could  win  the  attention 
of  a  young  mind  new  to  business,  he  spoke  in 
the  closet  just  as  he  spoke  in  the  House  of 
Commons.  When  he  had  harangued  two 
hou.s,  he  looked  at  his  watch,  as  he  had  been 
in  the  habit  of  looking  at  the  clock  opposite  the 
Speaker's  chair,  apologized  for  the  length  of 
his  discourse,  and  then  went  on  for  an  hour 
more.  The  members  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons  can  cough  an  orator  down,  or  can  walk 
away  to  dinner;  and  they  were  by  no  means 
sparing  in  the  use  of  these  privileges  when 
Grenville  was  on  his  legs.  But  the  poor  young 
king  had  to  endure  all  this  eloquence  with 
mournful  civility.  To  the  end  of  his  life  he 
continued  to  talk  with  horror  of  Grenville's 
orations. 


About  this  time  took  place  one  of  the  most 
singular  events  in  Pitt's  life.  There  was  a 
certain  Sir  William  Pynsent,  a  Somersetshire 

I  baronet  of  Whig  politics,  who  had  been  a 
member  of  the  House  of  Commons  in  the  days 
of  Queen  Anne,  and  had  retired  to  rural  pri 
vacy  when  the  Tory  party,  towards  the  end 
of  her  reign,  obtained  the  ascendency  in  her 

j  councils.  His  manners  were  eccentric.  His 
morals  lay  under  very  odious  imputations. 
But  his  fidelity  to  his  political  opinions  was 
unalterable.  During  fifty  years  of  seclusion 
he  continued  to  brood  over  the  events  which 
had  driven  him  from  public  life,  the  dismissal 
of  the  Whigs,  the  peace  of  Utrecht,  the  deser 
tion  of  our  allies.  He  now  thought  that  he 
perceived  a  close  analogy  betweer  .ne  well- 
remembered  events  of  his  youth  and  tne  events 
which  he  had  witnessed  in  extreme  old  age ; 
between  the  disgrace  of  Marlborough  and  the 
disgrace  of  Pitt;  between  the  elevation  of 
Harley  and  the  elevation  of  Bute;  between 
the  treaty  negotiated  by  St.  John  and  the  treaty 
negotiated  by  Bedford ;  between  the  wrongs 
of  the  house  of  Austria  in  1712  and  the  wrongs 
of  the  house  of  Brandenburgh  in  1762.  This 
fancy  took  such  possession  of  the  old  man's 
mind  that  he  determined  to  leave  his  whole 
property  to  Pitt.  In  this  way  Pitt  unex 
pectedly  came  into  possession  of  near  three 
thousand  pounds  a  year.  Nor  could  all  the 
malice  of  his  enemies  find  any  ground  for 
reproach  in  the  transaction.  Nobody  could 
call  him  a  legacy-hunter.  Nobody  could  ac 
cuse  him  of  seizing  that  to  which  others  had  a 
better  claim.  For  he  had  never  in  his  life 
seen  Sir  William ;  and  Sir  William  had  left 
no  relation  so  near  as  to  be  entitled  to  form 
any  expectations  respecting  the  estate. 

The  fortunes  of  Pitt  seemed  to  flourish  ;  bu1 
his  health  was  worse  than  ever.  We  cannot 
find  that,  during  the  session  which  began  in 
January,  1765,  he  once  appeared  in  Parliament. 
He  remained  some  months  in  profound  retire 
ment  at  Hayes,  his  favourite  villa,  scarcely 
moving  except  from  his  arm-chair  to  his  bed, 
and  from  his  bed  to  his  arm-chair,  and  often 
employing  his  wife  as  his  amanuensis  in  his 
most  confidential  correspondence.  Some  of 
his  detractors  whispered  that  his  invisibility 
was  to  be  ascribed  quite  as  much  to  affectation 
as  to  gout.  In  truth  his  character,  high  and 
splendid  as  it  was,  wanted  simplicity.  With 
genius  which  did  not  need  the  aid  of  stage- 
tricks,  and  with  a  spirit  which  should  have 
been  far  above  them,  he  had  yet  been,  through 
life,  in  the  habit  of  practising  them.  It  was, 
therefore,  now  surmised  that,  having  acquired 
all  the  consideration  which  could  be  derived 
from  eloquence  and  from  great  services  to  the 
state,  he  had  determined  not  to  make  himself 
cheap  by  often  appearing  in  public,  but,  under 
the  pretext  of  ill  health,  to  surround  himself 
with  mystery,  to  emerge  only  at  long  intervals 
and  on  momentous  occasions,  and  at  other 
times  to  deliver  his  oracles  only  to  a  few  fa 
voured  votaries,  who  were  suffered  to  make 
pilgrimages  to  his  shrine.  If  such  were  his 
object,  it  was  for  a  time  fully  attained.  Never 
was  the  magic  of  his  i,ame  so  powerful,  never 


THE  EARL  OF   CHATHAM. 


727 


was  he  regarded  by  his  country  with  such  su 
perstitious  veneration,  as  during  this  year  of 
silence  and  seclusion. 

While  Pitt  was  thus  absent  from  parliament, 
Grenville  proposed  a  measure  destined  to  pro 
duce  a  great  revolution,  the  effects  of  which 
will  long  be  felt  by  the  whole  human  race. 
We  speak  of  the  act  for  imposing  stamp-duties 
oil  the  North  American  colonies.  The  plan 
was  eminently  characteristic  of  its  author. 
Every  feature  of  the  parent  was  found  in  the 
child.  A  timid  statesman  would  have  shrunk 
from  a  step,  of  which  Walpole,  at  a  time  when 
the  colonies  were  far  less  powerful,  had  said — 
"He  who  shall  propose  it  will  be  a  much 
bolder  man  than  I."  But  the  nature  of  Gren 
ville  was  insensible  to  fear.  A  statesman  of 
large  views  would  have  felt,  that  to  lay  taxes 
at  Westminster  on  New  England  and  New 
York,  was  a  course  opposed,  not  indeed  to 
the  letter  of  the  statute-book,  or  to  any  decision 
contained  in  the  Term  Reports,  but  to  the 
principles  of  good  government,  and  to  the 
spirit  of  the  constitution^  A  statesman  of 
large  views  would  also  have  felt,  that  ten 
times  the  estimated  produce  of  the  American 
stamps  would  have  been  dearly  purchased  by 
even  a  transient  quarrel  between  the  mother 
country  and  the  colonies.  But  Grenville  knew 
of  no  spirit  of  the  constitution  distinct  from 
the  letter  of  the  law,  and  of  no  national  interests 
except  those  which  are  expressed  by  pounds, 
shillings,  and  pence.  That  this  policy  might 
give  birth  to  deep  discontents  in  all  the  pro 
vinces,  rom  the  shore  of  the  Great  Lakes  to 
the  Mexican  sea;  that  France  and  Spain 
might  seize  the  opportunity  of  revenge ;  that 
the  Empire  might  be  dismembered ;  that  the 
debt — that  debt  with  the  amount  of  which  he 
perpetually  reproached  Pitt — might,  in  con 
sequence  of  his  own  policy,  be  doubled  ;  these 
were  possibilities  which  never  occurred  to 
that  small,  sharp  mind. 

The  Stamp  Act  will  be  remembered  as  long 
as  the  globe  lasts.  But,  at  the  time,  it  attracted 
much  less  notice  in  this  country  than  another 
act  which  is  now  almost  utterly  forgotten. 
The  king  fell  ill,  and  was  thought  to  be  in  a 
dangerous  state.  His  complaint,  we  believe, 
was  the  same  which,  at  a  later  period,  repeat 
edly  incapacitated  him  for  the  performance  of 
his  regal  functions.  The  heir-apparent  was 
only  two  years  old.  It  was  clearly  proper  to 
make  provision  for  the  administration  of  the 
government,  in  case  of  a  minority.  The  dis 
cussions  on  this  point  brought  the  quarrel  be 
tween  the  court  and  the  ministry  to  a  crisis. 
The  king  wished  to  be  intrusted  with  the 
power  of  naming  a  regent  by  will.  The  minis 
ters  feared,  or  affected  to  fear,  that,  if  this 
power  were  conceded  to  him,  he  would  name 
the  Princess  Mother,  nay,  possibly,  the  Earl 
of  Bute.  They,  therefore,  insisted  on  intro 
ducing  into  the  bill  words  confining  the  king's 
choice  to  the  royal  family.  Having  thus  ex 
cluded  Bute,  they  urged  the  king  to  let  them, 
in  the  most  marked  manner,  exclude  the 
Princess  Dowager  also.  They  assured  him 
that  the  House  of  Commons  would  undoubt 
edly  strike  her  name  out,  and  by  this  threat 
they  wrung  from  him  a  reluctant  assent.  In  a 


few  days,  it  appeared  that  the  representation? 
by  which  they  had  induced  the  king  to  put 
this  gross  and  public  affront  on  his  mother 
were  unfounded.  The  friends  of  the  princess 
in  the  House  of  Commons  moved  that  her 
name  should  be  inserted.  The  ministers  could 
not  decently  attack  the  parent  of  their  master. 
They  hoped  that  the  opposition  would  come  to 
their  help,  and  put  on  them  a  force  to  which 
they  would  gladly  have  yielded.  But  the  ma 
jority  of  the  opposition,  though  hating  the 
princess,  hated  Grenville  more,  beheld  his  em» 
barrassment  with  delight,  and  would  do  nothing 
to  extricate  him  from  it.  The  process's  name 
was  accordingly  placed  in  the  list  of  persons 
qualified  to  hold  the  regency. 

The  king's  resentment  was  now  at  the 
height.  The  present  evil  seemed  to  him  more 
intolerable  than  any  other.  Even  the  junta  of 
Whig  grandees  could  not  treat  him  worse  than 
he  had  been  treated  by  his  present  ministers. 
In  his  distress  he  poured  out  his  whole  heart 
to  his  uncle,  the  Duke  of  Cumberland.  The 
duke  was  not  a  man  to  be  loved ;  but  he  was 
eminently  a  man  to  be  trusted.  He  had  an  in 
trepid  temper,  a  strong  understanding,  and  a 
high  sense  of  honour  and  duty.  As  a  general, 
he  belonged  to  a  remarkable  class  of  captains 
— captains,  we  mean,  whose  fate  it  has  been 
to  lose  almost  all  the  battles  which  they  have 
fought,  and  yet  to  be  reputed  stout  and  skilful 
soldiers.  Such  captains  were  Coligni  and 
William  the  Third.  We  might,  perhaps,  add 
Marshal  Soult  to  the  list.  The  bravery  of  the 
Duke  of  Cumberland  was  such  as  distinguish 
ed  him  even  among  the  princes  of  his  brave 
house.  The  indifference  with  which  he  rode 
about  amidst  musket-balls  and  cannon-balls 
was  not  the  highest  proof  of  his  fortitude. 
Hopeless  maladies,  horrible  surgical  opera 
tions,  far  from  unmanning  him,  did  not  even 
discompose  him.  With  courage,  he  had  the 
virtues  which  are  akin  to  courage.  He  spoke 
the  truth,  was  open  in  enmity  and  friendship, 
and  upright  in  all  his  dealings.  But  his  nature 
was  hard;  and  what  seemed  to  him  justice 
was  rarely  tempered  with  mercy.  He  was, 
therefore,  during  many  years  one  of  the  most 
unpopular  men  in  England.  The  severity 
with  which  he  had  treated  the  rebels  after  the 
battle  of  Culloden,  had  gained  for  him  the 
name  of  the  butcher.  His  attempts  to  intro 
duce  into  the  army  of  England,  then  in  a  mosi 
relaxed  state,  the  rigorous  discipline  of  Pots 
dam,  had  excited  still  stronger  disgust.  No 
thing  was  too  bad  to  be  believed  of  him.  Many 
honest  people  were  so  absurd  as  to  fancy  that, 
if  he  were  left  regent  during  the  minority  of 
his  nephews,  there  would  be  another  smother 
ing  in  the  tower.  These  feelings,  however, 
had  passed  away.  The  duke  had  been  living, 
during  some  years,  in  retirement.  The  Eng 
lish,  full  of  animosity  against  the  Scots,  now 
blamed  his  royal  highness  only  for  having  left 
so  many  Camerons  and  Macpheisons  to  be 
made  gangers  and  custom-house  ulficers.  He 
was,  therefore,  at  present  a  favourite  with  his 
countrymen,  and  especially  with  the  inhabit 
ants  of  London. 

He  had  little  reason  to  love  the  king,  and 
had  shown  clearly,  though  noi  obtrusively,  his 


728 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


dislike  of  the  system  which  had  lately  been 
pursued.  But  he  had  high  and  almost  roman 
tic  notions  of  the  duty  which,  as  a  prince  of 
the  blood,  he  owed  to  the  head  of  his  house. 
He  determined  to  extricate  his  nephew  from 
bondage,  and  to  effect  a  reconciliation  between 
the  Whig  party  and  the  throne,  on  terms 
honourable  to  both. 

In  this  mind  he  set  off  for  Hayes,  and  was 
admitted  to  Pitt's  sick-room.  For  Pitt  would 
not  leave  his  chamber,  and  would  not  commu 
nicate  with  any  messenger  of  inferior  dignity. 
And  now  began  a  long  series  of  errors  on  the 
part  of  the  illustrious  statesman,  errors  which 
involved  his  country  in  difficulties  and  dis 
tresses  more  serious  even  than  those  from 
which  his  genius  had  formerly  rescued  her. 
His  language  was  haughty,  unreasonable,  al 
most  unintelligible.  The  only  thing  which 
could  be  discerned  through  a  cloud  of  vague 
and  not  very  gracious  phrases  was,  that  he 
would  not  at  that  moment  take  office.  The 
truth,  we  believe,  was  this.  Lord  Temple, 
who  was  Pitt's  evil  genius,  had  just  formed  a 
new  scheme  of  politics.  Hatred  of  Bute  and 
of  the  princess  had,  it  should  seem,  taken  en 
tire  possession  of  Temple's  soul.  He  had 
quarrelled  with  his  brother  George,  because 
George  had  been  connected  with  Bute  and  the 
princess.  Now  that  George  appeared  to  be 
the  enemy  of  Bute  and  the  princess,  Temple 
was  eager  to  bring  about  a  general  family  re 
conciliation.  The  three  brothers,  as  Temple, 
Grenville,  and  Pitt  were  popularly  called, 
might  make  a  ministry,  without  leaning  for 
aid  either  on  Bute  or  on  the  Whig  connection. 
With  such  views,  Temple  used  all  his  influ 
ence  to  dissuade  Pitt  from  acceding  to  the 
propositions  of  the  Duke  of  Cumberland.  Pitt 
was  not  convinced.  But  Temple  had  an  in 
fluence  over  him  such  as  no  other  person  had 
ever  possessed.  They  were  very  old  friends, 
very  near  relations.  If  Pitt's  talents  and  fame 
had  been  useful  to  Temple,  Temple's  purse 
had  formerly,  in  times  of  great  need,  been  use 
ful  to  Pitt.  They  had  never  been  parted  in 
politics.  Twice  they  had  come  into  the  cabi 
net  together;  twice  they  had  left  it  together. 
Pitt  could  not  bear  to  think  of  taking  office 
without  his  chief  ally.  Yet  he  felt  that  he  was 
doing  wrong,  that  he  was  throwing  away  a 
great  opportunity  of  serving  his  country.  The 
obscure  and  unconciliatory  style  of  the  an 
swers  which  he  returned  to  the  overtures  of 
the  Duke  of  Cumberland,  may  be  ascribed  to 
the  embarrassment  and  vexation  of  a  mind 
not  at  peace  with  itself.  It  is  said  that  he 
mournfully  exclaimed  to  Temple, 

"Extinxi  te  meque,  soror,  populumque,  patresque 
Sidonios,  urbemque  tuam." 

The  prediction  was  but  too  just. 

Finding  Pitt  impracticable,  the  Duke  of 
Cumberland  advised  the  king  to  submit  to  ne 
cessity,  and  to  keep  Grenville  and  the  Bed- 
fords.  It  was,  indeed,  not  a  time  at  which  of 
fices  could  safely  be  left  vacant.  The  unset 
tled  state  of  the  government  had  produced  a 
general  relaxation  through  all  the  departments 
of  the  public  service.  Meetings,  which  at  an- 
othpr  time  would  have  been  harmless,  now 
turned  to  riots.,  and  rapidly  rose  almost  to  the 


dignity  of  rebellions.  The  houses  of  **arlia 
ment  were  blockaded  by  the  Spitalfields  weav 
ers.  Bedford  House  was  assailed  on  all 
sides  by  a  furious  rabble,  and  was  strongly 
garrisoned  with  horse  and  foot.  Some  people 
attributed  these  disturbances  to  the  friends  of 
Bute,  and  some  to  the  friends  of  Wilkes,  But, 
whatever  might  be  the  cause,  the  effect  was 
general  insecurity.  Under  such  circumstances 
the  king  had  no  choice.  With  bitter  feelings 
of  mortification,  he  informed  the  ministers 
that  he  meant  to  retain  them. 

They  answered  by  demanding  from  him  a  pro 
mise  on  his  royal  word  never  more  to  consult 
Lord  Bute.  The  promise  was  given.  They 
then  demanded  something  more.  Lord  Bute's 
brother,  Mr.  Mackenzie,  held  a  lucrative  office 
in  Scotland.  Mr.  Mackenzie  must  be  dis 
missed.  The  king  replied  that  the  office  had 
been  given  under  very  peculiar  circumstances, 
and  that  he  had  promised  never  to  take  it 
away  while  he  lived.  Grenville  was  obstinate, 
and  the  king,  with  a  very  bad  grace,  yielded. 

The  session  of  parliament  was  over.  The 
triumph  of  the  ministers  was  complete.  The 
king  was  almost  as  much  a  prisoner  as  Charles 
the  First  had  been,  when  in  the  Isle  of  Wight. 
Such  were  the  fruits  of  the  policy  which,  only 
a  few  months  before,  was  represented  as  hav 
ing  for  ever  secured  the  throne  against  the 
dictation  of  insolent  subjects. 

His  majesty's  natural  resentment  showed 
itself  in  every  look  and  word.  In  his  extremi 
ty,  he  looked  wistfully  towards  that  Whig  con 
nection,  once  the  object  of  his  dread  and 
hatred.  The  Duke  of  Devonshire,  who  had 
been  treated  with  such  unjustifiable  harshness, 
had  lately  died,  and  had  been  succeeded  by  his 
son,  who  was  still  a  boy.  The  king  conde 
scended  to  express  his  regret  for  what  had 
passed,  and  to  invite  the  young  duke  to  court. 
The  noble  youth  came,  attended  by  his  uncles, 
and  was  received  with  marked  graciousness. 

This  and  many  other  symptoms  of  the  same 
kind  irritated  the  ministers.  They  had  still  in 
store  for  their  sovereign  an  insult  which  would 
have  provoked  his  grandfather  to  kick  them 
out  of  the  room.  Grenville  and  Bedford  de 
manded  an  audience  of  him,  and  read  him  a 
remonstrance  of  many  pages,  which  they  had 
drawn  up  with  great  care.  His  majesty  was 
accused  of  breaking  his  word,  and  of  treating 
his  advisers  with  gross  unfairness.  The  prin 
cess  was  mentioned  in  language  by  no  means 
eulogistic.  Hints  were  thrown  out  that  Bute's 
head  was  in  danger.  The  king  was  plainly 
told  that  he  must  not  continue  to  show,  as  he 
had  done,  that  he  disliked  the  situation  in 
which  he  was  placed;  that  he  must  frown 
upon  the  opposition,  that  he  must  carry  it  fair 
towards  his  ministers  in  public.  He  several 
times  interrupted  the  reading,  by  declaring 
that  he  had  ceased  to  hold  any  communication 
with  Bute.  But  the  ministers,  disregarding 
his  denial,  went  on ;  and  the  king  listened  in 
silence,  almost  choked  by  rage.  When  they 
ceased  to  read,  he  merely  made  a  gesture  ex 
pressive  of  his  wish  to  be  left  alone.  He  after 
wards  owned  that  he  thought  he  should  have 
gone  into  a  fit. 

Driven  to  despair,  he  again  had  recourse  to 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


729 


the  Duke  of  Cumberland;  and  the  Duke  of 
Cumberland  again  had  recourse  to  Pitt.  Pitt 
was  really  desirous  to  undertake  the  direction 
of  affairs,  and  owned,  with  many  dutiful  ex 
pressions,  that  the  terms  offered  by  the  king 
were  all  that  any  subject  could  desire.  But 
Temple  was  impracticable ;  and  Pitt,  with 
great  regret,  declared  that  he  could  not,  with 
out  the  concurrence  of  his  brother-in-law,  un 
dertake  the  administration. 

The  duke  now  saw  only  one  way  of  deli 
vering  his  nepheAV.  An  administration  must 
be  formed  of  the  Whigs  in  opposition,  without 
Pitt's  help.  The  difficulties  seemed  almost 
insuperable.  Death  and  desertion  had  griev 
ously  thinned  the  ranks  of  the  party  lately 
supreme  in  the  state.  Those  among  whom 
the  duke's  choice  lay  might  be  divided  into 
two  classes,  men  too  old  for  important  offices, 
and  men  who  had  never  been  in  any  important 
office  before.  The  cabinet  must  be  composed 
of  broken  invalids  or  of  raw  recruits. 

This  was  an  evil,  yet  not  an  unmixed  evil. 
If  the  new  Whig  statesmen  had  little  experience 
in  business  and  debate,  they  were,  on  the  other 
hand,  pure  from  the  taint  of  that  political  im 
morality  which  had  deeply  infected  their  pre 
decessors.  Long  prosperity  had  corrupted 
that  great  party  which  had  expelled  the  Stuarts, 
limited  the  prerogatives  of  the  Crown,  and 
curbed  the  intolerance  of  the  Hierarchy.  Ad 
versity  had  already  produced  a  salutary  effect. 
On  the  day  of  the  accession  of  George  the 
Third,  the  ascendency  of  the  Whig  party  ter 
minated  ;  and  on  that  day  the  purification  of 
the  Whig  party  began.  The  rising  chiefs  of 
thai;  party  were  men  of  a  very  different  sort 
from  Sandys  and  Winnington,  from  Sir  Wil 
liam  Younge  and  Henry  Fox-  They  were 
men  worthy  to  have  charged  by  the  side  of 
Hampden  at  Chalgrove,  or  to  have  exchanged 
the  last  embrace  with  Russell  on  the  scaffold 
in  Lincoln's-Inn  Fields.  They  carried  into 
politics  the  same  high  principles  of  virtue 
which  regulated  their  private  dealings,  nor 
would  they  stoop  to  promote  even  the  noblest 
and  most  salutary  ends  by  means  which  ho 
nour  and  probity  condemn.  Such  men  were 
Lord  John  Cavendish,  Sir  George  Savile,  and 
others  whom  we  hold  in  honour  as  the  second 
founders  of  the  Whig  party,  as  the  restorers 
of  its  pristine  health  and  energy  after  half  a 
century  of  degeneracy. 

The  chief  of  this  respectable  band  was  the 
Marquis  of  Rockingham,  a  man  of  splendid 
fortune,  excellent  sense,  and  stainless  charac 
ter.  He  was  indeed  nervous  to  such  a  degree, 
that,  to  the  very  close  of  his  life,  he  never  rose 
without  great  reluctance  and  embarrassment 
to  address  the  House  of  Lords.  But,  though 
not  a  great  orator,  he  had  in  a  high  degree 
some  of  the  qualities  of  a  statesman.  He  chose 
his  friends  well;  and  he  had,  in  an  extra 
ordinary  degree,  the  art  of  attaching  them  to 
him  by  ties  of  the  most  honourable  kind.  The 
cheerful  fidelity  with  which  they  adhered  to 
him  through  many  years  of  almost  hopeless 
opposition,  was  less  admirable  than  the  dis 
interestedness  and  delicacy  which  they  showed 
when  he  rose  to  power. 

We  are  inclined  to  think  that  the  use  and 

VOL.  V.— 92 


the  abuse  of  party  cannot  be  better  illustrated 
than  by  a  parallel  between  two  powerful  con 
nections  of  that  time,  the  Rockinghams  and  the 
Bedfords.  The  Rockingham  party  was,  in  our 
view,  exactly  what  a  party  should  be.  It  con 
sisted  of  men  bound  together  by  common 
opinions,  by  common  public  objects,  by  mu 
tual  esteem.  That  they  desired  to  obtain,  by 
honest  and  constitutional  means,  the  direction 
of  affairs,  they  openly  avowed.  But,  though, 
often  invited  to  accept  the  honours  and  emo 
luments  of  office,  they  steadily  refused  to  do  so 
on  any  conditions  inconsistent  with  their  prin 
ciples.  The  Bedford  party,  as  a  party,  had,  as 
far  as  we  can  discover,  no  principle  whatever. 
Rigby  and  Sandwich  wanted  public  money, 
and  thought  that  they  should  fetch  a  higher 
price  jointly  than  singly.  They  therefore 
acted  in  concert,  and  prevailed  on  a  much 
more  important  and  a  much  better  man  than 
themselves  to  act  with  them. 

It  was  to  Rockingham  that  the  Duke  of 
Cumberland  now  had  recourse.  The  marquis 
consented  to  take  the  treasury.  Newcastle,  so 
long  the  recognised  chief  of  the  Whigs,  could 
not  well  be  excluded  from  the  ministry.  He 
was  appointed  keeper  of  the  privy  seal.  A 
very  honest  clear-headed  country  gentleman, 
of  the  name  of  Dowdeswell,  became  Chancel 
lor  of  the  Exchequer.  General  Conway,  who 
had  served  under  the  Duke  of  Cumberland, 
and  was  strongly  attached  to  his  royal  high 
ness,  was  made  Secretary  of  State,  with  the 
lead  in  the  House  of  Commons.  A  great 
Whig  nobleman,  in  the  prime  of  manhood, 
from  Avhom  much  was  at  that  time  expected, 
Augustus  Duke  of  Grafton,  was  the  other  se 
cretary. 

The  oldest  man  living  could  remember  no 
government  so  weak  in  oratorical  talents  and 
in  official  experience.  The  general  opinion 
was,  that  the  ministers  might  hold  office  during 
the  recess,  but  that  the  first  day  of  debate  in 
Parliament  would  be  the  last  day  of  their 
power.  Charles  Townshend  was  asked  what 
he  thought  of  the  new  administration.  "  It  is," 
said  he,  "  mere  lute-string :  pretty  summer 
wear.  It  will  never  do  for  the  winter." 

At  this  conjuncture  Lord  Rockingham  had 
the  wisdom  to  discern  the  value,  and  secure 
the  aid,  of  an  ally,  who,  to  eloquence  sur 
passing  the  eloquence  of  Pitt,  and  to  industry 
which  shamed  the  industry  of  Grenville,  united 
an  amplitude  of  comprehension  to  which 
neither  Pitt  nor  Grenville  could  lay  claim  A 
young  Irishman  had,  some  time  before,  come 
over  to  push  his  fortune  in  London.  He  had 
written  much  for  the  booksellers  ;  but  he  was 
best  known  by  a  little  treatise,  in  which  the 
style  and  reasoning  of  Bolingbroke  were  mi 
micked  with  exquisite  skill,  and  by  a  theory, 
of  more  ingenuity  than  soundness,  touching 
the  pleasures  which  we  receive  from  tho  ob 
jects  of  taste.  He  had  also  attained  a  high 
reputation  as  a  talker,  and  was  regarded  by 
the  men  of  letters  who  supped  together  at  the 
Turk's  Head  as  the  only  match  in  conversa 
tion  for  Dr.  Johnson.  He  now  became  private 
secretary  to  Lord  Rockingham,  and  was  brought 
into  Parliament  by  his  patron's  influence. 
These  arrangements,  indeed,  were  not  made 


730 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


without  some  difficulty.  The  Duke  of  New 
castle,  who  was  always  meddling  and  chatter 
ing,  adjured  the  first  lord  of  the  treasury  to  be 
on  his  guard  against  this  adventurer,  whose 
real  name  \vas  O'Bourke,  and  whom  his  Grace 
knew  to  be  a  wild  Irishman,  a  Jacobite,  a 
Papist,  a  concealed  Jesuit.  Lord  Rockingham 
treated  the  calumny  as  it  deserved ;  and  the 
Whig  party  was  strengthened  and  adorned  by 
the  accession  of  Edmund  Burke. 

The  party,  indeed,  stood  in  need  of  acces 
sions  ;  for  it  sustained  about  this  time  an  al 
most  irreparable  loss.  The  Duke  of  Cum 
berland  had  formed  the  government,  and  was 
its  main  support.  His  exalted  rank  and  great 
name  in  some  degree  balanced  the  fame  of 
Pitt.  As  mediator  between  the  Whigs  and  the 
court,  he  held  a  place  which  no  other  person 
could  fill.  The  strength  of  his  character  sup 
plied  that  which  was  the  chief  defect  of  the 
new  ministry.  Conway,  in  particular,  who, 
with  excellent  intentions  and  respectable  ta 
lents,  was  the  most  dependent  and  irresolute 
of  human  beings,  drew  from  the  counsels  of 
that  masculine  mind  a  determination  not  his 
own.  Before  the  meeting  of  Parliament  the 
duke  suddenly  died.  His  death  was  generally 
regarded  as  the  signal  of  great  troubles,  and  on 
this  account,  as  well  as  from  respect  for  his 
personal  qualities,  was  greatly  lamented.  It 
was  remarked  that  the  mourning  in  London 
was  the  most  general  ever  known,  and  was 
both  deeper  and  longer  than  the  Gazette  had 
prescribed. 

In  the  mean  time,  every  mail  from  America 
brought  alarming  tidings.  The  crop  which 
Grenville  had  sown,  his  successors  had  now  to 
reap.  The  colonies  were  in  a  state  bordering 
on  rebellion.  The  stamps  were  burned.  The 
revenue  officers  were  tarred  and  feathered. 
All  traffic  between  the  discontented  provinces 
and  the  mother  country  was  interrupted.  The 
Exchange  of  London  was  in  dismay.  Half  the 
firms  of  Bristol  and  Liverpool  were  threatened 
with  bankruptcy.  In  Leeds,  Manchester,  Not 
tingham,  it  was  said  that  three  artisans  out  of 
every  ten  had  been  turned  adrift.  Civil  war 
seemed  to  be  at  hand;  and  it  could  not  be 
doubted,  that,  if  once  the  British  nation  were 
divided  against  itself,  France  and  Spain  would 
soon  take  part  in  the  quarrel. 

Three  courses  were  open  to  the  ministers. 
The  first  was  to  enforce  the  Stamp  Act  by  the 
sword.  This  was  the  course  on  which  the 
king,  and  Grenville,  whom  the  king  hated  be 
yond  all  living  men,  were  alike  bent.  The  na 
tures  of  both  were  arbitrary  and  stubborn. 
They  resembled  each  other  so  much  that  they 
could  never  be  friends ;  but  they  resembled 
each  other  also  so  much,  that  they  saw  almost 
all  important  practical  questions  in  the  same 
point  of  view.  Neither  of  them  would  bear  to  be 
governed  by  the  other ;  but  they  perfectly  agreed 
as  to  the  best  way  o.f  governing  the  people. 

Another  course  was  that  which  Pitt  recom 
mended.  He  held  that  the  British  Parliament 
was  not  constitutionally  competent  to  pass  a 
law  for  taxing  the  colonies.  He  therefore  con 
sidered  the  Stamp  Act  as  a  nullity,  as  a  docu 
ment  of  no  more  validity  than  Charles's  writ  of 
ship-money,  or  James's  proclamation  dispens 


ing  with  the  penal  laws.  This  doctrine  seems 
to  us,  we  must  own,  to  be  altogether  untenable. 

Between  these  extreme  courses  lay  a  third 
way.  The  opinion  of  the  most  judicious  and 
temperate  statesmen  of  those  times  was,  that 
the  British  constitution  had  set  no  limit  what 
ever  to  the  legislative  power  of  the  British 
Kings,  Lords,  and  Commons,  over  the  whole 
British  Empire.  Parliament,  they  held,  was 
legally  competent  to  tax  America,  as  Parlia 
ment  was  legally  competent  to  commit  any 
other  act  of  folly  or  wickedness,  to  confiscate 
the  property  of  all  the  merchants  in  Lombard 
street,  or  to  attaint  any  man  in  the  kingdom 
of  high  treason,  without  examining  witnesses 
against  him,  or  hearing  him  in  his  own  defence 
The  most  atrocious  act  of  confiscation  or  of 
attainder  is  just  as  valid  an  act  as  the  Tolera 
tion  Act  or  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act.  But  from, 
acts  of  confiscation  and  acts  of  attainder,  law 
givers  are  bound,  by  every  obligation  of  mo 
rality,  systematically  to  refrain.  In  the  same 
manner  ought  the  British  legislature  to  re 
frain  from  taxing  the  American  colonies.  The 
Stamp  Act  was  indefensible,  not  because  it 
was  beyond  the  constitutional  competence  of 
Parliament,  but  because  it  wasunjus:  and  im 
politic,  sterile  of  revenue,  and  fertjie  of  dis 
contents.  These  sound  doctrines  were  adopted 
by  Lord  Rockingham  and  his  coll  -agues,  and 
were,  during  a  long  course  of  years ,  inculcated 
by  Burke,  in  orations,  some  of  wh.ch  will  last 
as  long  as  the  English  language. 

The  winter  came;  the  Parliament  met;  and 
the  state  of  the  colonies  instantly  became  the 
subject  of  fierce  contention.  Pitt,  whose  health 
had  been  somewhat  restored  by  the  waters  of 
Bath,  reappeared  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
and,  with  ardent  and  pathetic  eloquence,  not 
only  condemned  the  Stamp  Act,  but  applauded 
the  resistance  of  Massachusetts  and  Virginia; 
and  vehemently  maintained,  in  defiance,  we 
must  say,  of  all  reason  and  of  all  authority, 
that,  according  to  the  British  constitution,  the 
supreme  legislative  power  does  not  include  the 
power  to  tax.  The  language  of  Grenville,  on 
the  other  hand,  was  such  as  Strafford  might 
have  used  at  the  council-table  of  Charles  the 
First,  when  news  came  of  the  resistance  to  the 
liturgy  at  Edinburgh.  The  colonists  were 
traitors;  those  who  excused  them  were  little 
better.  Frigates,  mortars,  bayonets,  sabres, 
were  the  proper  remedies  for  such  distempers. 

The  ministers  occupied  an  intermediate  po 
sition;  they  proposed  to  declare  that  the  legis 
lative  authority  of  the  British  Parliament  over 
the  whole  empire  was  in  all  cases  supreme ; 
and  they  proposed,  at  the  same  time,  to  repeal 
the  Stamp  Act.  To  the  former  measure,  Pitt 
objected;  but  it  was  carried  with  scarcely  a 
dissentient  voice.  The  repeal  of  the  Stamp 
Act  Pitt  strongly  supported  ;  but  against  the 
government  was  arrayed  a  formidable  assem 
blage  of  opponents.  Grenville  and  the  Bed- 
fords  were  furious.  Temple,  who  had  now 
allied  himself  closely  with  his  brother,  and 
separated  himself  from  Pitt,  was  no  despicable 
enemy.  This,  however,  was  not  the  worst. 
The  ministry  was  without  its  natural  strength. 
It  had  to  struggle,  not  only  against  its  avowed 
enemies,  but  against  the  insidious  hostility  of 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


731 


the  king,  and  of  a  set  of  persons  who,  about 
this  time,  began  to  be  designated  as  the  king's 
friends. 

The  character  of  this  faction  has  been  drawn 
by  Burke  with  even  more  than  his  usual  force 
and  vivacity.  Those  who  know  how  strongly, 
through  his  whole  life,  his  judgment  was  bias 
sed  by  his  passions,  may  not  unnaturally  suspect 
that  he  has  left  us  rather  a  caricature  than  a 
likeness ;  and  yet  there  is  scarcely,  in  the 
whole  portrait,  a  single  touch  of  which  the 
fidelity  is  not  proved  by  facts  of  unquestionable 
authenticity. 

The  public  generally  regarded  the  king's 
friends  as  a  body  of  which  Bute  was  the  direct 
ing  soul.  It  was  to  no  purpose  that  the  earl 
professed  to  have  done  with  politics,  that  he 
absented  himself  year  after  year  from  the  levee 
and  the  drawing-room,  that  he  went  to  the 
north,  that  he  went  to  Rome.  The  notion,  that, 
in  some  inexplicable  manner,  he  dictated  all 
the  measures  of  the  court,  was  fixed  in  the 
minds,  not  only  of  the  multitude,  but  of  some 
who  had  good  opportunities  of  obtaining  infor 
mation,  and  who  ought  to  have  been  superior 
to  vulgar  prejudices.  Our  own  belief  is  that 
the~e  suspicions  were  unfounded,  and  that  he 
ceased  to  have  any  communication  with  the 
king  on  political  matters  some  time  before  the 
dismissal  of  George  Grenville.  The  supposi 
tion  of  Bute's  influence  is,  indeed,  by  no  means 
necessary  to  explain  the  phenomena.  The 
king,  in  1765,  was  no  longer  the  ignorant  and 
inexperienced  boy  who  had,  in  1760,  been 
managed  by  his  mother  and  his  groom  of  the 
stole.  He  had,  during  several  years,  observed 
the  struggles  of  parties,  and  conferred  daily  on 
high  questions  of  state  with  able  and  experi 
enced  politicians.  His  way  of  life  had  developed 
his  understanding  and  character.  He  was  now 
no  longer  a  puppet,  but  had  very  decided  opi 
nions  both  of  men  and  things.  Nothing  could 
be  more  natural  than  that  he  should  have  high 
notions  of  his  own  prerogatives,  should  be  im 
patient  of  opposition,  and  should  wish  all  pub 
lic  men  to  be  detached  from  each  other  and  de 
pendent  on  himself  alone;  nor  could  anything 
be  more  natural  than  that,  in  the  state  in  which 
the  political  world  then  was,  he  should  find  in 
struments  fit  for  his  purposes. 

Thus  sprang  into  existence  and  into  note  a 
reptile  species  of  politicians  never  before  and 
never  since  known  in  our  country.  These  men 
disclaimed  all  political  ties,  except  those  which 
bound  them  to  the  throne.  They  were  willing 
to  coalesce  with  any  party,  to  abandon  any 
party,  to  undermine  any  party,  to  assault  any 
party,  at  a  moment's  notice.  To  them,  all  ad 
ministrations  and  all  oppositions  were  the 
same.  They  regarded  Bute,  Grenville,  Rock- 
ingham,  Pitt,  without  one  sentiment  either  of 
predilection  or  of  aversion.  They  were  the 
king's  friends.  It  is  to  be  observed  that  this 
friendship  implied  no  personal  intimacy.  These 
people  had  never  lived  with  their  master,  as 
Dodtngton  at  one  time  lived  with  his  father,  or 
as  Sheridan  afterwards  lived  with  his  son. 
They  never  hunted  with  him  in  the  morning,  or 
played  cards  with  him  in  the  evening;  never 
shared  his  mutton,  or  walked  with  him  among 
bis  turnips.  Only  one  or  two  of  them  ever 


saw  his  face,  except  on  public  days.  The 
whole  band,  however,  always  had  early  and 
accurate  information  as  to  his  personal  inclina 
tions.  None  of  these  people  were  high  in  the 
administration.  They  were  generally  to  be 
found  in  places  of  much  emolument,  little 
labour,  and  no  responsibility ;  and  these  places 
they  continued  to  occupy  securely  while  the 
cabinet  was  six  or  seven  times  reconstructed. 
Their  peculiar  business  was  not  to  support  the 
ministry  against  the  opposition,  but  to  support 
the  king  against  the  ministry.  Whenever  his 
majesty  was  induced  to  give  a  reluctant  assent 
to  the  introduction  of  some  bill  which  his  con 
stitutional  advisers  regarded  as  necessary,  his 
friends  in  the  House  of  Commons  were  sure  to 
speak  against  it,  to  vote  against  it,  to  throw  in 
its  way  every  obstruction  compatible  with  the 
forms  of  Parliament.  If  his  majesty  found  it 
necessary  to  admit  into  his  closet  a  Secretary 
of  State  or  a  First  Lord  of  the  Treasury  whom 
he  disliked,  his  friends  were  sure  to  miss  no 
opportunity  of  thwarting  and  humbling  the  ob 
noxious  minister.  In  return  for  these  services, 
the  king  covered  them  with  his  protection.  It 
was  to  no  purpose  that  his  responsible  servants 
complained  to  him  that  they  were  daily  betray 
ed  and  impeded  by  men  who  were  eating  the 
bread  of  the  government.  He  sometimes  jus 
tified  the  offenders,  sometimes  excused  them, 
sometimes  owned  that  they  were  to  blame,  but 
said  that  he  must  take  time  to  consider  whether 
he  could  part  with  them.  He  never  would  turn 
them  out;  and,  while  everything  else  in  the 
state  was  constantly  changing,  these  syco 
phants  seemed  to  have  a  life-estate  in  their 
offices. 

It  was  well  known  to  the  king's  friends,  that 
though  his  majesty  had  consented  to  the  repeal 
of  the  Stamp  Act,  he  had  consented  with  a 
very  bad  grace;  and  that  though  he  had  eagerly 
welcomed  the  Whigs,  when,  in  his  extreme 
need  and  at  his  earnest  entreaty,  they  had  un 
dertaken  to  free  him  from  an  insupportable 
yoke,  he  had  by  no  means  got  over  his  early 
prejudices  against  his  deliverers.  The  minis 
ters  soon  found  that,  while  they  were  encoun 
tered  in  front  by  the  whole  force  of  a  strong 
opposition,  their  rear  was  assailed  by  a  large 
body  of  those  whom  they  had  regarded  as 
auxiliaries. 

Nevertheless,  Lord  Rockingham  and  his  ad 
herents  went  on  resolutely  with  the  bill  for 
repealing  the  Stamp  Act.  They  had  on  their 
side  all  the  manufacturing  and  commercial 
interests  of  the  realm.  In  the  debates  the 
government  was  powerfully  supported.  Two 
great  orators  and  statesmen,  belonging  to  two 
different  generations,  repeatedly  put  forth  all 
their  powers  in  defence  of  the  biii.  The  House 
of  Commons  heard  Pitt  for  the  last  time,  and 
Burke  for  the  first  time,  and  was  in  doubt  to 
which  of  them  the  palm  of  eloquence  should  be 
assigned.  It  was  indeed  a  splendid  sunset  and 
a  splendid  dawn. 

For  a  time  the  event  seemed  doubtful.  In 
several  divisions  the  ministers  were  hard 
pressed.  On  one  occasion,  not  less  than 
twelve  of  the  king's  friends,  all  men  in  office, 
voted  against  the  government.  It  was  to  no 
purpose  that  Lord  Rockingham  remonstrated 


732 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


vrith  the  king.  His  majesty  confessed  that 
there  was  ground  for  complaint,  but  hoped  that 
gentle  means  would  bring  the  mutineers  to  a 
better  mind.  If  they  persisted  in  their  mis 
conduct,  he  would  dismiss  them. 

At  length  the  decisive  day  arrived.  The  gal 
lery,  the  lobby,  the  Court  of  Requests,  the 
staircases,  were  crowded  with  merchants  from 
all  the  great  ports  of  the  island.  The  debate 
lasted  till  long  after  midnight.  On  the  divi 
sion,  the  ministers  had  a  great  majority.  The 
dread  of  civil  war,  and  the  outcry  of  all  the 
trading  towns  of  the  kingdom,  had  been  too 
strong  for  the  combined  strength  of  the  court 
and  the  opposition. 

It  was  in  the  first  dim  twilight  of  a  February 
morning  that  the  doors  were  thrown  open,  and 
that  the  chiefs  of  the  hostile  parties  showed 
themselves  to  the  multitude.  Conway  was  re 
ceived  with  loud  applause.  But  when  Pitt  ap 
peared,  all  eyes  were  fixed  on  him  alone.  All 
hats  were  in  the  air.  Loud  and  long  huzzas 
accompanied  him  to  his  chair,  and  a  train  of 
admirers  escorted  him  all  the  way  to  his  home. 
Then  came  forth  Grenville.  As  soon  as  he 
was  recognised,  a  storm  of  hisses  and  curses 
broke  forth.  He  turned  fiercely  on  the  crowd, 
and  caught  one  man  by  the  throat.  The  by 
standers  were  in  great  alarm.  If  a  scuffle 
began,  none  could  say  how  it  might  end.  For 
tunately  the  person  who  had  been  collared  only 
said,  "If  I  may  not  hiss,  sir,  I  hope  I  may 
laugh,"  and  laughed  in  Grenville's  face. 

The  majority  had  been  so  decisive,  that  all 
the  opponents  of  the  ministry,  save  one,  were 
disposed  to  let  the  bill  pass  without  any  further 
contention.  But  solicitation  and  expostulation 
were  thrown  away  on  Grenville.  His  indomi 
table  spirit  rose  up  stronger  and  stronger  un 
der  the  load  of  public  hatred.  He  fought  out 
the  battle  obstinately  to  the  end.  On  the  last 
reading  he  had  a  sharp  altercation  with  his 
brother-in-law,  the  last  of  their  many  sharp 
altercations.  Pitt  thundered  in  his  loftiest 
tones  against  the  man  who  had  wished  to  dip 
the  ermine  of  a  British  king  in  the  blood  of  the 
British  people.  Grenville  replied  with  his 
wonted  intrepidity  and  asperity.  "  If  the  tax," 
he  said,  "  were  still  to  be  laid  on,  I  would  lay 
it  on.  For  the  evils  which  it  may  produce  my 
accuser  is  answerable.  His  profusion  made  it 
necessary.  His  declarations  against  the  con 
stitutional  powers  of  king,  lords,  and  com 
mons,  have  made  it  doubly  necessary.  I  do 
not  envy  him  the  huzza.  I  glory  in  the  hiss. 
If  it  were  to  be  done  again,  I  would  do  it." 

The  repeal  of  the  Stamp  Act  was  the  chief 
measure  of  Lord  Rockingham's  government. 
But  that  government  is  entitled  to  the  praise 
of  having  put  a  stop  to  two  oppressive  prac 
tices,  which,  in  Wilkes's  case,  had  attracted 
the  notice  and  excited  the  just  indignation  of 
the  public.  The  House  of  Commons  was  in 
duced  by  the  ministers  to  pass  a  resolution, 
condemning  the  use  of  general  warrants,  and 
another  resolution,  condemning  the  seizure  of 
papers  in  cases  of  libel. 

It  must  be  added,  to  the  lasting  honour  of 
Lord  Rockingham,  that  his  administration  was 
the  first  which,  during  a  long  course  of  years, 
aad  '.he  courage  and  the  virtue  to  refrain  from 


bribing  members  of  Parliament.  His  enemies 
accused  him  and  his  friends  of  weakness,  of 
haughtiness,  of  party  spirit;  but  calumny  itself 
never  dared  to  couple  his  name  with  corrup« 
tion. 

Unhappily  his  government,  though  one  of 
the  best  that  has  ever  existed  in  our  country, 
was  also  one  of  the  weakest.  The  king's 
friends  assailed  and  obstructed  the  ministers 
at  every  turn.  To  appeal  to  the  king  was  only 
to  draw  forth  new  promises  and  new  evasions. 
His  majesty  was  sure  that  there  must  be  some 
misunderstanding.  Lord  Rockingham  had  bet 
ter  speak  to  the  gentlemen.  They  should  be 
dismissed  on  the  next  fault.  The  next  fault 
was  soon  committed,  and  his  majesty  still  con 
tinued  to  shuffle.  It  was  too  bad.  It  was  quite 
abominable;  but  it  mattered  less  as  the  proro 
gation  was  at  hand.  He  would  give  the  delin 
quents  one  more  chance.  If  they  did  not  alter 
their  conduct  next  session,  he  should  not  have 
one  word  to  say  for  them.  He  had  already 
resolved  that,  long  before  the  commencement 
of  the  next  session,  Lord  Rockingham  should 
cease  to  be  minister. 

We  have  now  come  to  a  part  of  our  story 
which,  admiring  as  we  do  the  genius  and  the 
many  noble  qualities  of  Pitt,  we  cannot  relate 
without  much  pain.  We  believe  that,  at  this 
conjuncture,  he  had  it  in  his  power  to  give  the 
victory  either  to  the  Whigs  or  to  the  king's 
friends.  If  he  had  allied  himself  closely  with 
Lord  Rockingham,  what  could  the  court  have 
done  1  There  would  have  been  only  one  alter 
native,  the  Whigs  or  Grenville ;  and  there  could 
be  no  doubt  what  the  king's  choice  would  be. 
He  still  remembered,  as  well  he  might,  wif.h 
the  utmost  bitterness,  the  thraldom  from  which 
his  uncle  had  freed  him,  and  said  about  this 
time,  with  great  vehemence,  that  he  would 
sooner  see  the  devil  come  into  his  closet  than 
Grenville. 

And  what  was  there  to  prevent  Pitt  from  al 
lying  himself  with  Lord  Rockingham  ]  On  all 
the  most  important  questions  their  views  were 
the  same.  They  had  agreed  in  condemning 
the  peace,  the  Stamp  Act,  the  general  warrants, 
the  seizure  of  papers.  The  points  in  which 
they  differed  were  few  and  unimportant.  In 
integrity,  in  disinterestedness,  in  hatred  of  cor 
ruption,  they  resembled  each  other.  Their 
personal  interests  could  not  clash.  They  sat 
in  different  houses,  and  Pitt  had  always  de 
clared  that  nothing  should  induce  him  to  be 
first  lord  of  the  treasury. 

If  the  opportunity  of  forming  a  coalition 
beneficial  to  the  state,  and  honourable  to  all 
concerned,  was  suffered  to  escape,  the  fault 
was  not  with  the  Whig  ministers.  They  be 
haved  towards  Pitt  with  an  obsequiousness 
which,  had  it  not  been  the  effect  of  sincere  ad 
miration  and  of  anxiety  for  the  public  interests, 
might  have  been  justly  called  servile.  They 
repeatedly  gave  him  to  understand  that,  if  he 
chose  to  join  their  ranks,  they  were  ready  to 
receive  him,  not  as  an  associate,  but  as  a 
leader.  They  had  proved  their  respect  for  him 
by  bestowing  a  peerage  on  the  person  who,  at 
that  time,  enjoyed  the  largest  share  of  his  con 
fidence,  Chief  Justice  Pratt.  What  then  was 
there  to  divide  Pitt  from  the  Whigs'?  What, 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


733 


on  the  other  hand,  was  there  in  common 
between  him  and  the  king's  friends,  that  he 
should  lend  himself  to  their  purposes — he  who 
had  never  owed  any  thing  to  flattery  or  intrigue, 
ne  whose  eloquence  and  independent  spirit  had 
overawed  two  generations  of  slaves  and  job 
bers,  he  who  had  twice  been  forced  by  the 
enthusiasm  c  f  an  admiring  nation  on  a  reluc 
tant  prince  1 

Unhappily  the  court  had  gained  Pitt,  not,  it 
is  true,  by  those  ignoble  means  which  were 
employed  when  such  men  as  Rigby  and  Wed- 
derburn  were  to  be  won,  but  by  allurements 
suited  to  a  nature  noble  even  in  its  aberra 
tions.  The  king  set  himself  to  seduce  the  one 
man  who  could  turn  the  Whigs  out  without 
letting  Grenville  in.  Praise,  caresses,  pro 
mises,  were  lavished  on  the  idol  of  the  nation. 
He,  and  he  alone,  could  put  an  end  to  faction, 
could  bid  defiance  to  all  the  powerful  connec 
tions  in  the  land  united,  Whigs  and  Tories, 
Rockinghams,  Bedfords,  and  Grenvilles.  These 
blandishments  produce  a  great  effect.  For 
though  Pitt's  spirit  was  high  and  manly,  though 
his  eloquence  was  often  exerted  with  formida 
ble  effect  against  the  court,  and  though  his 
theory  of  government  had  been  learned  in  the 
school  of  Locke  and  Sidney,  he  had  always 
regarded  the  person  of  the  sovereign  with  pro 
found  veneration.  As  soon  as  he  was  brought 
face  to  face  with  royalty,  his  imagination  and 
sensibility  became  too  strong  for  his  principles. 
His  Whigism  thawed  and  disappeared  ;  and  he 
became,  for  the  time,  a  Tory  of  the  old  Ormond 
pattern.  Nor  was  he  by  any  means  unwilling 
to  assist  in  the  work  of  dissolving  all  political 
connections.  His  own  weight  in  the  state  was 
wholly  independent  of  such  connections.  He 
was  therefore  inclined  to  look  on  them  with 
dislike,  and  made  far  too  little  distinction 
between  gangs  of  knaves  associated  for  the 
mere  purpose  of  robbing  the  public,  and  con 
federacies  of  honourable  men  for  the  promo 
tion  of  great  public  objects.  Nor  had  he  the 
sagacity  to  perceive  that  the  strenuous  efforts 
which  he  made  to  annihilate  all  parties  tended 
only  to  establish  the  ascendency  of  one  party, 
and  that  the  basest  and  most  hateful  of  all. 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  he  would  have 
been  thus  misled,  if  his  mind  had  been  in  full 
health  and  vigour.  But  the  truth  is,  that  he 
had  for  some  time  been  in  an  unnatural  state 
of  excitement.  No  suspicion  of  this  sort  had 
yet  got  abroad.  His  eloquence  had  never 
shone  with  more  splendour  than  during  the 
recent  debates.  But  people  afterwards  called 
to  mind  many  things  which  ought  to  have 
roused  their  apprehensions.  His  habits  were 
gradually  becoming  more  and  more  eccentric. 
A  horror  of  all  loud  sounds,  such  as  is  said  to 
have  been  one  of  the  many  oddities  of  Wallen- 
utein,  grew  upon  him.  Though  the  most  affec 
tionate  of  fathers,  he  could  not  at  this  time 
bear  to  hear  the  voices  of  his  own  children, 
and  laid  out  great  sums  at  Hayes  in  buying  up 
houses  contiguous  to  his  own,  merely  that  he 
might  have  no  neighbours  to  disturb  him  with 
their  noise.  He  then  sold  Hayes,  and  took 
possession  of  a  villa  at  Hampstead,  where  he 
again  began  to  purchase  houses  to  right  and 
left.  In  expense,  indeed,  he  vied,  during  this 


part  of  his  life,  with  the  wealthiest  of  the  con- 
querors  of  Bengal  and  Tanjore.  At  Burton. 
Pynsent,  he  ordered  a  great  extent  of  ground 
to  be  planted  with  cedars.  Cedars  enough  for 
the  purpose  were  not  to  be  found  in  Somerset 
shire.  They  were  therefore  collected  in  Lon 
don,  and  sent  down  by  land  carriage.  Relays 
of  labourers  were  hired ;  and  the  work  went 
on  all  night  by  torchlight.  No  man  could  be 
more  abstemious  than  Pitt;  yet  the  profusion 
of  his  kitchen  was  a  wonder  even  to  epicures. 
Several  dinners  were  always  dressing;  for  his 
appetite  was  capricious  and  fanciful ;  and  at 
whatever  moment  he  felt  inclined  to  eat,  he 
expected  a  meal  to  be  instantly  on  the  table. 
Other  circumstances  might  be  mentioned,  such 
as  separately  are  of  little  moment,  but  such  as, 
when  taken  together,  and  when  viewed  in  con 
nection  with  the  strange  events  which  followed, 
justify  us  in  believing  that  his  mind  was  already 
in  a  morbid  state. 

Soon  after  the  close  of  the  session  of  Parlia 
ment,  Lord  Rockingham  received  his  dismissal. 
He  retired,  accompanied  by  a  firm  body  of 
friends,  whose  consistency  and  uprightness 
enmity  itself  was  forced  to  admit.  None  of  them 
had  asked  or  obtained  any  pension  or  any  sine 
cure,  either  in  possession  or  in  reversion.  Such 
disinterestedness  was  then  rare  among  politi 
cians.  Their  chief,  though  not  a  man  of  bril 
liant  talents,  had  won  for  himself  an  honoura 
ble  fame,  which  he  kept  pure  to  the  last.  He 
had,  in  spite  of  difficulties  which  seemed  al 
most  insurmountable,  removed  great  abuses 
and  averted  a  civil  war.  Sixteen  years  later, 
in  a  dark  and  terrible  day,  he  was  again  called 
upon  to  save  the  state,  brought  to  the  very 
brink  of  ruin  by  the  same  perfidy  and  obsti 
nacy  which  had  embarrassed,  and  at  length 
overthrown,  his  first  administration. 

Pitt  was  planting  in  Somersetshire  when  he 
was  summoned  to  court  by  a  letter  written 
with  the  royal  hand.  He  instantly  hastened 
to  London.  The  irritability  of  his  mind  and 
body  were  increased  by  the  rapidity  with  which 
he  travelled;  and  when  he  reached  his  jour 
ney's  end  he  was  suffering  from  fever.  Ill  as 
he  was,  he  saw  the  king  at  Richmond,  and 
undertook  to  form  an  administration. 

Pitt  was  scarcely  in  the  state  in  which  a 
man  should  be  who  has  to  conduct  delicate  and 
arduous  negotiations.  In  his  letters  to  his  wife, 
he  complained  that  the  conferences  in  which 
it  was  necessary  for  him  to  bear  a  part  heateu 
his  blood  and  accelerated  his  pulse.  From 
other  sources  of  information  we  learn,  that  his 
language,  even  to  those  whose  co-operation  he 
wished  to  engage,  was  strangely  peremptory 
and  despotic.  Some  of  his  notes  written  at 
this  time  have  been  preserved,  and  are  in  a 
style  which  Louis  the  Fourteenth  would  have 
been  too  well  bred  to  employ  in  addressing 
any  French  gentleman. 

In  the  attempt  to  dissolve  all  parties,  Pitt 
met  with  some  difficulties.  Some  Whigs,  whom 
the  court  would  gladly  have  detached  front 
Lord  Rockingham,  rejected  all  offers.  Th« 
Bedfords  were  perfectly  willing  to  break  Math 
Grenville;  but  Pitt  would  not  come  up  to  theii 
erms.  Temple,  whom  Pitt  at  first  meant  to 
place  at  the  head  of  the  treasury,  proved  ii,- 
3Q 


734 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


tractable.  A  coldness  indeed  had,  during  some 
months,  been  fast  growing  between  the  brothers- 
in-law,  so  long  and  so  closely  allied  in  poli 
tics.  Pitt  was  angry  with  Temple  for  oppos 
ing  the  repeal  of  the  Stamp  Act.  Temple  was 
angry  with  Pitt  for  refusing  to  accede  to  that 
family  league  which  was  now  the  favourite 
plan  at  Stowe.  At  length  the  Earl  proposed 
an  equal  partition  of  power  and  patronage, 
and  offered,  on  this  condition,  to  give  up  his 
brother  George.  Pitt  thought  the  demand  ex 
orbitant,  and  positively  refused  compliance. 
A  bitter  quarrel  followed.  Each  of  the  kins 
men  was  true  to  his  character.  Temple's  soul 
festered  with  spite,  and  Pitt's  swelled  into 
contempt.  Temple  represented  Pitt  as  the 
most  odious  of  hypocrites  and  traitors.  Pitt 
held  a  different,  and  perhaps  a  more  provoking 
tone.  Temple  was  a  good  sort  of  man  enough, 
whose  single  title  to  distinction  was,  that  he 
had  a  large  garden,  with  a  large  piece  of  water, 
and  a  great  many  pavilions  and  summer- 
houses.  To  his  fortunate  connection  with  a 
great  orator  and  statesman  he  was  indebted 
for  an  importance  in  the  state  which  his  own 
talents  could  never  have  gained  for  him.  That 
importance  had  turned  his  head.  He  had 
begun  to  fancy  that  he  could  form  administra 
tions,  and  govern  empires.  It  was  piteous  to 
see  a  well-meaning  man  under  such  a  delusion. 

In  spite  of  all  these  difficulties,  a  ministry 
was  made  such  as  the  king  wished  to  see,  a 
ministry  in  which  all  his  majesty's  friends 
were  comfortably  accommodated,  and  which, 
with  the  exception  of  his  majesty's  friends, 
contained  no  four  persons  who  had  ever  in 
their  lives  been  in  the  habit  of  acting  together. 
Men  who  had  never  concurred  in  a  single  vote 
found  themselves  seated  at  the  same  board. 
The  office  of  paymaster  was  divided  between 
two  persons  who  had  never  exchanged  a  word. 
Most  of  the  chief  posts  were  filled  either  by 
personal  adherents  of  Pitt,  or  by  members  of 
the  late  ministry,  who  had  been  induced  to 
remain  in  place  after  the  dismissal  of  Lord 
Rockingham.  To  the  former  class  belonged 
Pratt,  now  Lord  Camden,  who  accepted  the 
great  seal,  and  Lord  Shelbnrne,  who  was  made 
one  of  the  secretaries  of  state.  To  the  latter 
class  belonged  the  Duke  of  Grafton,  who  be 
came  First  Lord  of  the  Treasury,  and  Conway 
who  kept  his  old  position  both  in  the  govern 
ment  and  in  the  House  of  Commons.  Charles 
Townshend,  who  had  belonged  to  every  party, 
and  cared  for  none,  was  Chancellor  of  the  Ex 
chequer.  Pitt  himself  was  declared  prime 
minister,  but  refused  to  take  any  laborious 
office.  He  was  created  Earl  of  Chatham,  and 
the  privy  seal  was  delivered  to  him. 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say,  that  the  fail 
ure,  the  complete  and  disgraceful  failure,  of 
this  arrangement,  is  not  to  be  ascribed  to  any 
want  of  talents  in  the  persons  whom  we  have 
named.  None  of  them  were  deficient  in  abili 
ties  ;  and  four  of  them,  Pitt  himself,  Shelburne, 
Camden,  and  Townshend,  were  men  of  high 
intellectual  eminence.  The  fault  was  not  in 
Ihe  materials,  but  in  the  principle  on  which 
the  materials  were  put  together.  Pitt  had 
mixed  up  these  conflicting  elements,  in  the 
full  confidence  that  he  should  be  abie  to  /reep 


them  all  in  perfect  subordination  to 

and  in  perfect  harmony  with  each  other.     We 

shall  soon  see  how  the  experiment  succeeded. 

On  the  very  day  on  which  the  new  prime 
minister  kissed  hands,  three-fourths  of  that 
popularity  which  he  had  long  enjoyed  without 
a  rival,  and  to  which  he  owed  the  greater  part 
of  his  authority,  departed  from  him.  A  violent 
outcry  was  raised,  not  against  that  part  of  his 
conduct  which  really  deserved  severe  condem 
nation,  but  against  a  step  in  which  we  can  see 
nothing  to  censure.  His  acceptance  of  a  peer 
age  produced  a  general  burst  of  indignation. 
Yet  surely  no  peerage  had  ever  been  better 
earned ;  nor  was  there  ever  a  statesman  who 
more  needed  the  repose  of  the  Upper  House. 
Pitt  was  now  growing  old.  He  was  much 
older  in  constitution  than  in  years.  It  was 
with  imminent  risk  to  his  life  that  he  had,  on 
some  important  occasions,  attended  his  duty 
in  Parliament.  During  the  session  of  1764, 
he  had  not  been  able  to  take  part  in  a  single 
debate.  It  was  impossible  that  he  should  go 
through  the  nightly  labour  of  conducting  the 
business  of  the  government  in  the  House  of 
Commons.  His  wish  to  be  transferred,  under 
such  circumstances,  to  a  less  busy  and  a  less 
turbulent  assembly,  was  natural  and  reason 
able.  The  nation,  however,  overlooked  all 
these  considerations.  Those  who  had  mpst 
loved  and  honoured  the  great  Commoner, 
were  loudest  in  invective  against  the  new 
made  Lord.  London  had  hitherto  been  true  to 
him  through  every  vicissitude.  When  the 
citizens  learned  that  he  had  been  sent  for  from 
Somersetshire,  that  he  had  been  closeted  with 
the  king  at  Richmond,  and  that  he  was  to  be 
first  minister,  they  had  been  in  transports  of 
joy.  Preparations  were  made  for  a  grand  en 
tertainment,  and  for  a  general  illumination. 
The  lamps  had  actually  been  placed  round  the 
Monument,  when  the  Gazette  announced  that 
the  object  of  all  their  enthusiasm  was  an  earl. 
Instantly  the  feast  was  countermanded.  The 
lamps  were  taken  down.  The  newspapers 
raised  the  roar  of  obloquy.  Pamphlets,  made 
up  of  calumny  and  scurrility,  filled  the  shops 
of  all  the  booksellers ;  and  of  those  pamphlets, 
the  most  galling  were  written  under  the  direc 
tion  of  the  malignant  Temple.  It  was  now 
the  fashion  to  compare  the  two  Williams, 
William  Pulteney  and  William  Pitt.  Both,  it 
was  said,  had,  by  eloquence  aud  simulated  pa 
triotism,  acquired  a  great  ascendency  in  the 
House  of  Commons  and  in  the  country.  Both 
had  been  intrusted  with  the  office  of  reforming 
the  government.  Both  had,  when  at  the  height 
of  power  and  popularity,  been  seduced  by  the 
splendour  of  the  coronet.  Both  had  been 
made  earls,  and  both  had  in  a  moment  become 
objects  of  aversion  and  scorn  to  the  nation, 
which  a  few  hours  before  had  regarded  them 
with  affection  and  veneration. 

The  clamour  against  Pitt  appears  to  have 
had  a  serious  effect  on  the  foreign  relations  ot 
the  country.  His  name  had  till  now  acted 
like  a  spell  at  Versailles  and  Saint  Ildefonso. 
English  travellers  on  the  Continent  had  re- 
marked,  that  nothing  more  was  necessary 
to  silence  a  whole  room-full  of  boasting 
Frenchmen,  than  to  drop  a  hint  of  the  r.roba- 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


735 


bility  that  Mr.  Pitt  would  return  to  power.  In  | 
an  instant  there  was  deep  silence :  all  shoulders 
rose,  and  all  faces  were  lengthened.  Now, 
unhappily,  every  foreign  court,  in  learning 
that  he  was  recalled  to  office,  learned  also  that 
he  no  longer  possessed  the  hearts  of  his  coun 
trymen.  Ceasing  to  be  loved  at  home,  he 
ceased  to  be  feared  abroad.  The  name  of  Pitt 
had  been  a  charmed  name.  Our  envoys  tried 
in  vain  to  conjure  with  the  name  of  Chatham. 

The  difficulties  which  beset  Chatham  were 
daily  increased  by  the  despotic  manner  in 
which  he  treated  all  around  him.  Lord  Rock- 
ingham  had,  at  the  time  of  the  change  of 
ministry,  acted  with  great  moderation,  had 
expressed  a  hope  that  the  new  government 
would  act  on  the  principles  of  the  late  govern 
ment,  and  had  even  interfered  to  prevent 
many  of  his  friends  from'quitting  office.  Thus 
Saunders  and  Keppel,  two  naval  commanders 
of  great  eminence,  had  been  induced  to  remain 
at  the  Admiralty,  where  their  services  were 
much  needed.  The  Duke  of  Portland  was  still 
lord-chamberlain,  and  Lord  Besborough  post 
master.  But  within  a  quarter  of  a  year,  Lord 
Chatham  had  so  effectually  disgusted  these 
men,  that  they  all  retired  in  deep  disgust.  In 
truth,  his  tone,  submissive  in  the  closet,  was 
at  this  time  insupportably  tyrannical  in  the 
cabinet.  His  colleagues  were  merely  his 
clerks  for  naval,  financial,  and  diplomatic 
business.  Con  way,  meek  as  he  was,  was  on 
one  occasion  provoked  into  declaring  that 
such  language  as  L<>rd  Chatham's  had  never 
been  heard  west  of  Constantinople,  and  was 
with  difficulty  prevented  by  Horace  Walpole 
from  resigning,  and  rejoining  the  standard  of 
Lord  Rockingham. 

The  breach  which  had  been  made  in  the 
government  by  the  defection  of  so  many  of  the 
Rockinghams,  Chatham  hoped  to  supply  by  the 
help  of  the  Bedfords.  But  with  the  Bedfords 
ne  could  not.  deal  as  he  had  dealt  with  other 
parties.  It  was  to  no  purpose  that  he  bade 
high  for  one  or  two  members  of  the  faction, 
in  the  hope  of  detaching  them  from  the  rest. 
They  were  to  be  had ;  but  they  were  to  be  had 
only  in  the  lot.  There  was  indeed  for  a 
moment  some  wavering  and  some  disputing 
among  them.  But  at  length  the  counsels  of  the 
shrewd  and  resolute  Rigby  prevailed.  They 
determined  to  stand  firmly  together,  and  plainly 
intimated  to  Chatham  that  he  must  take  them 
all,  or  that  he  should  get  none  of  them.  The 
event  proved  that  they  were  wiser  in  their 
generation  than  any  other  connection  in  the 
state.  In  a  few  months  they  were  able  to  dic 
tate  their  own  terms. 

The  most  important  public  measure  of  Lord 
Chatham's  administration  was  his  celebrated 
interference  with  the  corn-trade.  The  harvest 
had  been  bad  ;  the  price  of  food  was  high  ;  and 
he  thought  it  necessary  to  take  on  himself  the 
responsibility  of  laying  an  embargo  on  the  ex 
portation  of  grain.  When  Parliament  met, 
this  proceeding  was  attacked  by  the  opposition 
as  unconstitutional,  and  defended  by  the  minis 
ters  a;>  indispensably  necessary.  At  last,  an 
act  was  passed  to  indemnify  all  who  had  been 
Concerned  in  the  embargo. 

The  first  words  uttered  by  Chatham,  in  the 


House  of  Lords,  were  in  defence  of  his  conduct 
on  this  occasion.  He  spoke  with  calmness, 
sobriety,  and  dignity,  well  suited  to  the  audience 
which  he  was  addressing.  A  subsequent 
speech  which  he  made  on  the  same  subject 
was  less  successful.  He  bade  defiance  to 
aristo:ratical  connections,  with  a  supercilious 
ness  to  which  the  Peers  were  not  accustomed, 
and  with  tones  and  gestures  better  suited  to  a 
large  and  stormy  assembly  than  to  the  body  of 
which  he  was  now  a  member.  A  short  alter 
cation  followed,  and  he  was  told  very  plainly 
that  he  should  not  be  suffered  to  browbeat  the 
old  nobility  of  England. 

It  gradually  became  clearer  and  clearer  that 
he  was  in  a  distempered  state  of  mind.  His 
attention  had  been  drawn  to  the  territorial  ac 
quisitions  of  the  East  India  Company,  and  he 
determined  to  bring  the  whole  of  that  great 
subject  before  Parliament.  He  would  not, 
however,  confer  on  the  subject  with  any  of  his 
colleagues.  It  was  in  vain  that  Conway,  who 
was  charged  with  the  conduct  of  business  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  Charles  Town- 
shend.  who  was  responsible  for  the  direction  of 
the  finances,  begged  for  some  glimpse  of  light 
as  to  what  was  in  contemplation.  Chatham's 
answers  were  sullen  and  mysterious.  He  must 
decline  any  discussion  with  them  ;  he  did  not 
want  their  assistance ;  he  had  fixed  on  a  per 
son  to  take  charge  of  his  measure  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  This  person  was  a  member 
who  was  not  connected  with  the  government, 
and  who  neither  had,  nor  deserved  to  have,  the 
ear  of  the  House — a  noisy,  purseproud,  illiterate 
demagogue,  whose  Cockney  English  and  scraps 
of  mis-pronounced  Latin  were  the  jest  of  the 
newspapers,  Alderman  Beckford.  It  may  well 
be  supposed  that  these  strange  proceedings 
produced  a  ferment  through  the  whole  political 
world.  The  city  was  in  commotion.  The 
East  India  Company  invoked  the  faith  of  char 
ters.  Burke  thundered  against  the  ministers, 
The  ministers  looked  at  each  other,  and  knew 
not  what  to  say.  In  the  midst  of  the  confu 
sion,  Lord  Chatham  proclaimed  himself  gouty, 
and  retired  to  Bath.  It  was  announced,  after 
some  time,  that  he  was  better,  and  that  he 
would  shortly  return,  that  he  would  soon  put 
every  thing  in  order.  A  day  was  fixed  for 
his  arrival  in  London.  But  when  he  reached 
the  Castle  inn  at  Marlborough,  he  stopped, 
shut  himself  up  in  his  room,  and  remained 
there  some  weeks.  Everybody  who  travelled 
that  road  was  amazed  by  the  number  of  his 
attendants.  Footmen  and  grooms,  dressed  in 
his  family  livery,  filled  the  whole  inn,  though 
one  of  the  largest  in  England,  and  swarmed 
in  the  streets  of  the  little  town.  The  truth 
was,  that  the  invalid  had  insisted  that,  during 
his  stay,  all  the  waiters  and  stable-boys  of  the 
Castle  should  wear  his  livery. 

His  colleagues  were  in  despair.  The  Duke 
of  Grafton  proposed  to  go  down  to  Marlbo 
rough  in  order  to  consult  the  oracle.  But  he 
was  informed  that  Lord  Chatham  must  decline 
all  conversation  on  business.  In  the  mean 
time,  all  the  parties  which  were  out  of  office, 
Bedfords,  Grenvilles,  and  Rockinghams,  joined 
to  oppose  the  distracted  government  on  the 
vote  for  the  land-tax.  They  were  reinforcm' 


T38 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


by  almost  all  the  county  members,  and  had  a 
considerable  majority.  This  was  the  first 
time  that  a  ministry  had  been  beaten  on  an  im 
portant  division  in  the  House  of  Commons 
since  the  fall  of  Sir  Robert  Walpole.  The 
administration,  thus  furiously  assailed  from 
without,  was  torn  by  internal  dissensions.  It 
had  been  formed  on  no  principle  whatever. 
From  the  very  first,  nothing  but  Chatham's 
authority  had  prevented  the  hostile  contingents 
which  made  up  his  ranks  from  going  to  blows 
with  each  other.  That  authority  was  now 
withdrawn,  and  every  thing  was  in  commotion. 
Conway,  a  brave  soldier,  but  in  civil  affairs 
the  most  timid  and  irresolute  of  men,  afraid 
of  disobliging  the  king,  afraid  of  being  abused 
in  the  newspapers,  afraid  of  being  thought 
factious  if  he  went  out,  afraid  of  being  thought 
interested  if  he  stayed  in,  afraid  of  every  thing, 
and  afraid  of  being  known  to  be  afraid  of  any 
thing,  was  beaten  backwards  and  forwards 
like  a  shuttlecock  between  Horace  Walpole, 
who  wished  to  make  him  prime  minister,  and 
Lord  John  Cavendish,  who  wished  to  draw  him 
into  opposition.  Charles  Townshend,  a  man 
of  splendid  talents,  of  lax  principles,  and  of 
boundless  vanity  and  presumption,  would  sub 
mit  to  no  control.  The  full  extent  of  his  parts, 
of  his  ambition,  and  of  his  arrogance,  had  not 
ye*  been  made  manifest;  for  he  had  always 
quailed  before  the  genius  and  the  lofty  charac 
ter  of  Pitt.  But  now  that  Pitt  had  quitted  the 
House  of  Commons,  and  seemed  to  have  ab 
dicated  the  part  of  chief  minister,  Townshend 
broko'  loose  from  all  restraint. 

While  things  were  in  this  state,  Chatham  at 
kngih  returned  to  London.  He  might  as  well 
have  remained  at  Marl  borough.  He  would  see 
nobody.  He  would  give  no  opinion  on  any  public 
mailer.  The  Duke  of  Grafton  begged  piteously 
for  an  interview,  for  an  hour,  for  half  an  hour, 
for  five  minutes.  The  answer  was,  that  it  was 
impossible.  The  king  himself  repeatedly  con 
descended  to  expostulate  and  implore.  "  Your 
duty,"  he  wrote,  "your  own  honour,  require 
you  to  make  an  effort."  The  answers  to  these 
appeals  were  commonly  written  in  Lady  Chat 
ham's  hand,  from  her  lord's  dictation ;  for  he 
had  not  energy  even  to  use  a  pen.  He  flings 
himself  at  the  king's  feet.  He  is  penetrated 
by  the  royal  goodness,  so  signally  shown  to 
the  most  unhappy  of  men.  He  implores  a 
little  more  indulgence.  He  cannot  as  yet 
transact  business.  He  cannot  see  his  col 
leagues.  Least  of  all  can  he  bear  the  excite 
ment  of  an  interview  with  majesty. 

Some  were  half  inclined  to  suspect  that  he 
was,  to  use  a  military  phrase,  malingering. 
He  had  made,  they  said,  a  great  blunder,  and 
had  found  it  out.  His  immense  popularity, 
his  high  reputation  for  statesmanship,  were 
gone  for  ever.  Intoxicated  by  pride,  he  had 
undertaken  a  task  beyond  his  abilities.  He 
now  saw  nothing  before  him  but  distresses 
and  humiliations ,  and  he  had  therefore  simu 
lated  illness,  in  order  to  escape  from  vexations 
which  he  had  not  fortitude  to  meet.  This  sus 
picion,  though  it  derived  some  colour  from 
•hat  weakness  which  was  the  most  striking 
blemish  of  his  character,  was  certainly  un- 


minister,  had  been,  as  we  have  said,  in  an  un 
sound  state;  and  physical  and  moral  causes 
now  concurred  to  make  the  derangement  of  his 
faculties  complete.  The  gout,  which  had  been 
the  torment  of  his  whole  life,  had  been  sup 
pressed  by  strong  remedies.  For  the  first  time 
since  he  was  a  boy  at  Oxford,  he  passed  seve 
ral  months  without  a  twinge.  But  his  hand 
and  foot  had  been  relieved  at  the  expense  of 
his  nerves.  He  became  melancholy,  fanciful, 
irritable.  The  embarrassing  state  of  public 
affairs,  the  grave  responsibility  which  lay  on 
him,  the  consciousness  of  his  errors,  the  dis 
putes  of  his  colleagues,  the  savage  clamours 
raised  by  his  detractors,  bewildered  his  en 
feebled  mind.  One  thing  alone,  he  said,  could 
save  him.  He  must  repurchase  Hayes.  The 
unwilling  consent  of  the  new  occupant  was 
extorted  by  Lady  Chatham's  entreaties  and 
tears ;  and  her  lord  was  somewhat  easier. 
But  if  business  were  mentioned  to  him,  he, 
once  the  proudest  and  boldest  of  mankind, 
behaved  like  an  hysterical  girl,  trembled  frcm 
head  to  foot,  and  burst  into  a  flood  of  tears. 

His  colleagues  for  a  time  continued  to  en 
tertain  the  expectation  that  his  health  would 
soon  be  restored,  and  that  he  would  emerge 
from  his  retirement.  But  month  followed 
month,  and  still  he  remained  hidden  in  myste 
rious  seclusion,  and  sunk,  as  far  as  they  could 
learn,  in  the  deepest  dejection  of  spirits.  They 
at  length  ceased  to  hope  or  to  fear  any  thing 
from  him ;  and,  though  he  was  still  nominally 
prime  minister,  took,  without  scruple,  steps 
which  they  knew  to  be  diametrically  opposed 
to  all  his  opinions  and  feelings,  allied  them 
selves  with  those  whom  he  had  proscribed, 
disgraced  those  whom  he  most  esteemed,  and 
laid  taxes  on  the  colonies,  in  the  face  of  the 
strong  declarations  which  he  had  recently 
made. 

When  he  had  passed  about  a  year  and 
three-quarters  in  gloomy  privacy,  the  king 
received  a  few  lines  in  Lady  Chatham's  hand. 
They  contained  a  request,  dictated  by  her 
lord,  that  he  might  be  permitted  to  resign  the 
privy  seal.  After  some  civil  show  of  reluc 
tance,  the  resignation  was  accepted.  Indeed 
Chatham  was,  by  this  time,  almost  as  much 
forgotten  as  if  he  had  already  been  lying  in 
Westminster  Abbey. 

At  length  the  clouds  which  had  gathered 
over  his  mind  broke  and  passed  away.  His 
gout  returned,  and  freed  him  from  a  more 
cruel  malady.  His  nerves  were  newly  braced. 
His  spirits  became  buoyant.  He  woke  as  from 
a  sickly  dream.  It  was  a  strange  recovery. 
Men  had  been  in  the  habit  of  talking  of  him 
as  of  one  dead,  and,  when  he  first  showed 
himself  at  the  king's  levee,  started  as  if  they 
had  seen  a  ghost.  It  was  more  than  two 
years  and  a  half  since  he  had  appeared  in 
public. 

He,  too,  had  cause  for  wonder.  The  world 
which  he  now  entered  was  not  the  world 
which  he  had  quitted.  The  administration 
which  he  had  formed  had  never  been,  at  any 
one  moment,  entirely  changed.  But  there  had 
been  so  many  losses  and  so  many  accessions, 
that  he  could  scarcely  rec9gnise  his  own 


cunded.     His   mind,  before  he  became  first  [  work.     Charles  Townshend  yas  dead.     Lord 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


737 


Shelburne  had  been  dismissed.  Conway  had 
sunk  into  utter  insignificance.  The  Duke  of 
Grafton  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  Bed- 
fords.  Tfoe  Bedfords  had  deserted  Grenv;lle, 
had  made  their  peace  with  the  king  and  .'the 
king's  friends,  and  had  been  admitted  to  office. 
Lord  North  was  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer, 
and  was  rising  fast  in  importance.  Corsica 
had  been  given  up  to  France  without  a  strug 
gle.  The  disputes  with  the  American  colo 
nies  had  been  revived.  A  general  election 
had  taken  place.  Wilkes  had  returned  from 
exile,  and,  outlaw  as  he  was,  had  been  chosen 
knight  of  the  shire  for  Middlesex.  The  mul 
titude  was  on  his  side.  The  court  was  obsti 
nately  bent  on  ruining  him,  and  was  prepared 
lo  shake  the  very  foundations  of  the  constitu 
tion  for  the  sake  of  a  paltry  revenge.  The 
House  of  Commons,  assuming  to  itself  an  au- 
foority  which  of  right  belongs  only  to  the 
rhole  legislature,  had  declared  Wilkes  inca 
pable  of  sitting  in  Parliament.  Nor  had  it 
been  thought  sufficient  to  keep  him  out. 
Another  must  be  brought  in.  Since  the  free 
holders  of  Middlesex  had  obstinately  refused 
to  choose  a  member  acceptable  to  the  court, 
the  House  had  chosen  a  member  for  them. 

This  was  not  the  only  instance,  perhaps  not 
the  most  disgraceful  instance,  of  the  inveterate 
malignity  of  the  court.  Exasperated  by  the 
steady  opposition  of  the  Rockingham  party, 
the  king's  friends  had  tried  to  rob  a  distin 
guished  Whig  nobleman  of  his  private  estate, 
and  had  persisted  in  their  mean  wickedness 
till  their  own  servile  majority  had  revolted 
from  mere  disgust  and  shame.  Discontent 
had  spread  throughout  the  nation,  and  was 
kept  up  by  stimulants  such  as  had  rarely 
been  applied  to  the  public  mind.  Junius  had 
taken  the  field,  had  trampled  Sir  William 
Draper  in  the  dust,  had  wellnigh  broken  the 
heart  of  Blackstone,  and  had  so  mangled  the 
reputation  of  the  Duke  of  Grafton  that  his 
grace  had  become  sick  of  office,  and  was  be 
ginning  to  look  wistfully  towards  the  shades 
of  Euston.  Every  principle  of  foreign,  do 
mestic,  and  colonial  policy  which  was  dear  to 
the  heart  of  Chatham,  had,  during  the  eclipse 
of  his  genius,  been  violated  by  the  govern 
ment  which  he  had  formed. 

The  remaining  years  of  his  life  were  spent 
in  vainly  struggling  against  that  fatal  policy 
which,  at  the  moment  when  he  might  have 
given  it  a  death-blow,  he  had  been  induced  to 
take  under  his  protection.  His  exertions  re 
deemed  his  own  fame,  but  they  effected  little 
for  his  country. 

He  found  two  parties  arrayed  against  the 
government,  the  party  of  his  own  brothers-in- 
law,  the  Grenvilles,  and  the  party  of  Lord 
Rockingham.  On  the  question  of  the  Middle 
sex  election  these  parties  were  agreed.  But 
on  many  other  important  questions  they  dif 
fered  widely  ;  and  they  were,  in  truth,  not  less 
hostile  to  each  other  than  to  the  court.  The 
Grenvilles  had,  during  several  years,  annoyed 
the  Rockinghams  with  a  succession  of  acri 
monious  pamphlets.  It  was  long  before  the 
Rockinghams  could  be  induced  to  retaliate. 
But  an  ill-natured  tract,  written  under  Gren- 
ville's  direction,  and  entitled  a  State  of  the 

VOL.  V.— 93 


Nation,  was  too  much  for  their  patience. 
Burke  undertook  to  defend  and  avenge  his 
friends,  and  executed  the  task  with  admirable 
skill  and  vigour.  On  every  point  he  was  vic 
torious,  and  nowhere  more  completely  victo 
rious  than  when  he  joined  issue  on  those  dry 
and  minute  questions  of  statistical  and  finan 
cial  detail  in  which  the  main  strength  of  Gren- 
ville  lay.  The  official  drudge,  even  on  his 
own  chosen  ground,  was  utterly  unable  to 
maintain  the  fight  against  the  great  orator 
and  philosopher.  When  Chatham  reappeared, 
Grenville  was  still  writhing  with  the  recent 
shame  and  smart  of  this  well-merited  chas 
tisement.  Cordial  co-operation  between  the 
two  sections  of  the  opposition  was  impossible* 
Nor  could  Chatham  easily  connect  himself 
with  either.  His  feelings,  in  spite  of  many 
affronts  given  and  received,  drew  him  towards 
the  Grenvilles.  For  he  had  strong  domestic 
affections  ;  and  his  nature,  which,  though 
haughty,  was  by  no  means  obdurate,  had  been 
softened  by  affliction.  But  from  his  kinsmen 
he  was  separated  by  a  wide  difference  of  opi 
nion  on  the  question  of  colonial  taxation.  A 
reconciliation,  however,  took  place.  He  visited 
Stowe :  he  shook  hands  with  George  Grenville ; 
and  the  Whig  freeholders  of  Buckinghamshire, 
at  their  public  dinners,  drank  many  bumpers 
to  the  union  of  the  three  brothers. 

In  opinions,  Chatham  was  much  nearer  to 
the  Rockinghams  than  to  his  own  relatives. 
But  between  him  and  the  Rockinghams  there 
was  a  gulf  not  easily  to  be  passed.  He  had 
deeply  injured  them,  and,  in  injuring  them, 
had  deeply  injured  his  country.  When  the 
balance  was  trembling  between  them  and  the 
court,  he  had  thrown  the  whole  weight  of  his 
genius,  of  his  renown,  of  his  popularity,  into 
the  scale  of  misgovernment.  It  must  be  added, 
that  many  eminent  members  of  the  party  still 
retained  a  bitter  recollection  of  the  asperity 
and  disdain  with  which  they  had  been  treated 
by  him  at  the  time  when  he  assumed  the  direc 
tion  of  affairs.  It  is  clear  from  Burke's  pam 
phlets  and  speeches,  and  still  more  clear  from 
his  private  letters,  and  from  the  language 
which  he  held  in  conversation,  that  he  long 
regarded  Chatham  with  a  feeling  not  far  re 
moved  from  dislike.  Chatham  was  undoubt 
edly  conscious  of  his  error,  and  desirous  to 
atone  for  it.  But  his  overtures  of  friendship, 
though  made  with  earnestness,  and  even  with 
unwonted  humility,  were  at  first  received  by 
Lord  Rockingham  with  cold  and  austere  re 
serve.  Gradually  the  intercourse  of  the  two 
statesmen  became  courteous  and  even  ami 
cable.  But  the  past  was  never  wholly  for 
gotten. 

Chatham  did  not,  however,  stand  alone 
Round  him  gathered  a  party,  small  in  number, 
but  strong  in  great  and  various  talents.  Lord 
Camden,  Lord  Shelburne,  Colonel  Barre,  and 
Dunning,  afterwards  Lord  Ashburton,  were 
the  principal  members  of  this  connection. 

There  is  no  reason  to  believe  that,  from  thi& 
time  till  within  a  few  weeks  of  Chatham's 
death,  his  intellect  suffered  any  decay.  His 
eloquence  was  almost  to  the  laj-t  heard  with 
delight.  But  it  was  not  exactly  the  ek^uence 
of  the  House  of  Lords.  That  lofty  and  pas- 


738 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


dionate,  but  somewhat  desultory  declamation 
in  which  he  excelled  all  men,  and  which  was 
set  off  by  .ooks,  tones,  and  gestures,  worthy  of 
Garrick  or  Talma,  was  out  of  place  in  a  small 
apartment  where  the  audience  often  consisted 
of  three  or  four  drowsy  prelates,  three  or  four 
old  judges,  accustomed  during  many  years  to 
disregard  rhetoric,  and  to  look  only  at  facts 
and  arguments,  and  three  or  four  listless  and 
supercilious  men  of  fashion,  whom  any  thing 
like  enthusiasm  moved  to  a  sneer.  In  the 
House  of  Commons,  a  flash  of  his  eye,  a  wave 
of  his  arm,  had  sometimes  cowed  Murray.  But, 
in  the  House  of  Peers,  his  utmost  vehemence 
and  pathos  produced  less  effect  than  the  mo 
deration,  the  reasonableness,  the  luminous 
order,  and  the  serene  dignity,  which  character 
ized  the  speeches  of  Lord  Mansfield. 

On  the  question  of  the  Middlesex  election, 
all  the  three  divisions  of  the  opposition  acted 
in  concert.  No  orator  in  either  House  de 
fended  what  is  now  universally  admitted  to 
have  been  the  constitutional  cause  with  more 
ardour  or  eloquence  than  Chatham.  Before 
this  subject  had  ceased  to  occupy  the  public 
mind,  George  Grenville  died.  His  party  ra 
pidly  melted  away ;  and  in  a  short  time  most 
of  his  adherents  appeared  on  the  ministerial 
benches. 

Had  George  Grenville  lived  many  months 
longer,  the  friendly  ties  which,  after  years  of 
estrangement  and  hostility,  had  been  renewed 
between  him  and  his  brother-in-law,  would,  in 
all  probabilit}'-,  have  been  a  second  time  vio 
lently  dissolved.  For  now  the  quarrel  between 
England  and  the  North  American  colonies 
took  a  gloomy  and  terrible  aspect.  Oppres 
sion  provoked  resistance;  resistance  was 
made  the  pretext  for  fresh  oppression.  The 
warnings  of  all  the  greatest  statesmen  of  the 
age  were  lost  on  an  imperious  court  and  a  de 
luded  nation.  Soon  a  colonial  senate  con 
fronted  the  British  Parliament.  Then  the 
colonial  militia  crossed  bayonets  with  the  Bri 
tish  regiments.  At  length  the  commonwealth 
was  torn  asunder.  Two  millions  of  English 
men,  who,  fifteen  years  before,  had  been  as 
loyal  to  their  prince  and  as  proud  of  their 
country  as  the  people  of  Kent  or  Yorkshire, 
separated  themselves  by  a  solemn  act  from  the 
empire.  For  a  time  it  seemed  that  the  insur 
gents  would  struggle  to  small  purpose  against 
the  vast  financial  and  military  means  of  the 
mother  country.  But  disasters,  following  one 
another  in  xapid  succession,  rapidly  dispelled 
the  illusions  of  national  vanity.  At  length  a 
great  British  force,  exhausted,  famished, 
harassed  on  every  side  by  a  hostile  peasantry, 
was  compelled  to  deliver  up  its  arms.  Those 
governments  which  England  had,  in  the  late 
war,  so  signally  humbled,  and  which  had  dur 
ing  many  years  been  sullenly  brooding  over 
the  recollections  of  Quebec,  of  Minden,  and  of 
1he  Moro,  now  saw  with  exultation  that  the 
day  of  revenge  was  at  hand.  France  recog 
nised  the  independence  of  the  United  States ; 
and  there  could  be  little  doubt  tlml  the  example 
would  soon  be  followed  by  Spain. 

Chatham  and  Rockingham  had  cordially 
concurred  in  opposing  every  part  of  the  fatal 
rolicy  which  had  brought  the  state  into  this 


dangerous  situation.  But  their  paths  now  di 
verged.  Lord  Rockingham  thought,  and,  as 
the  event  proved,  thought  most  justly,  that  the 
revolted  colonies  were  separated  from  the  em 
pire  for  ever,  and  that  the  only  effect  of  pro 
longing  the  war  on  the  American  continent 
would  be  to  divide  resources  which  it  was  de 
sirable  to  concentrate.  If  the  hopeless  attempt 
to  subjugate  Pennsylvania  and  Virginia  were 
abandoned,  war  against  the  house  of  Bourbon 
might  possibly  be  avoided,  or,  if  inevitable, 
might  be  carried  on  with  success  and  glory. 
We  might  even  indemnify  ourselves  for  part 
of  what  we  had  lost,  at  the  expense  of  those 
foreign  enemies  who  had  hoped  to  profit  by 
our  domestic  dissensions.  Lord  Rockingham, 
therefore,  and  those  who  acted  with  him,  con 
ceived  that  the  wisest  course  now  open  to 
England,  was  to  acknowledge  the  independ 
ence  of  the  United  States,  and  to  turn  her 
whole  force  against  her  European  enemies. 

Chatham,  it  should  seem,  ought  to  have 
taken  the  same  side.  Before  France  had 
taken  any  part  in  our  quarrel  with  the  colo 
nies,  he  had  repeatedly,  and  with  great  energy 
of  language,  declared  that  it  was  impossible  to 
conquer  America;  and  he  could  not  without 
absurdity  maintain  that  it  was  easier  to  con 
quer  France  and  America  together  than 
America  alone.  But  his  passions  overpowered 
his  judgment,  and  made  him  blind  to  his  own 
inconsistency.  The  very  circumstances  which 
made  the  separation  of  the  colonies  inevitable, 
made  it  to  him  altogether  insupportable.  Tha 
dismemberment  of  the  empire  seemed  to  him 
less  ruinous  and  humiliating,  when  produced 
by  domestic  dissensions,  than  when  produced 
by  foreign  interference.  His  blood  boiled  at 
the  degradation  of  his  country.  Whatever 
lowered  her  among  the  nations  of  the  earth,  he 
felt  as  a  personal  outrage  to  himself.  And  the 
feeling  was  natural.  He  had  made  her  so 
great.  He  had  been  so  proud  of  her;  and  she 
had  been  so  proud  of  him.  He  remembered 
how,  more  than  twenty  years  before,  in  a  day 
of  gloom  and  dismay,  when  her  possessions 
were  torn  from  her,  when  her  flag  was  dis 
honoured,  she  had  called  on  him  to  save  her. 
He  remembered  the  sudden  and  glorious 
change  which  his  energy  had  wrought,  the 
long  series  of  triumphs,  the  days  of  thanks 
giving,  the  nights  of  illumination.  Fired  by 
such  recollections,  he  determined  to  separate 
himself  from  those  who  advised  that  the  inde 
pendence  of  the  colonies  should  be  acknow 
ledged.  That  he  was  in  error,  will  scarcely, 
we  think,  be  disputed  by  his  warmest  admirers. 
Indeed,  the  treaty  by  which,  a  few  years  later, 
the  republic  of  the  United  States  was  recog 
nised,  was  the  work  of  his  most  attached 
adherents  and  of  his  favourite  son. 

The  Duke  of  Richmond  had  given  notice  of 
an  address  to  the  throne,  against  the  further 
prosecution  of  hostilities  with  America.  Chat 
ham  had,  during  some  time,  absented  himself 
from  Parliament,  in  consequence  of  his  grow 
ing  infirmities.  He  determined  to  appear  in 
his  place  on  this  occasion,  and  to  declare  that 
his  opinions  were  decidedly  at  variance  with 
those  of  the  Rockingham  party.  He  was  in  a 
state  of  great  excitement.  His  medical  at- 


THE  EARL  OF  CHATHAM. 


739 


tendants  were  uneasy,  and  strongly  advised 
him  to  calm  himself,  and  to  remain  at  home. 
But  he  was  not  to  be  controlled.  His  son  Wil 
liam,  and  his  son-in-law  Lord  Mahon,  accom 
panied  him  to  Westminster.  He  rested  him 
self  in  the  chancellor's  room  till  the  debate 
commenced,  and  then,  leaning  on  his  two  young 
relations,  limped  to  his  seat.  The  slightest 
particulars  of  that  day  were  remembered,  and 
have  been  carefully  recorded.  He  bowed,  it 
was  remarked,  with  great  courtliness  to  those 
peers  who  rose  to  make  way  for  him  and  his 
supporters.  His  crutch  was  in  his  hand.  He 
wore,  as  was  his  fashion,  a  rich  velvet  coat. 
His  legs  were  swathed  in  flannel.  His  wig  was 
so  large,  and  his  face  so  emaciated,  that  none 
of  his  features  could  be  discerned  except  the 
high  curve  of  nose,  and  his  eyes,  which  still 
retained  a  gleam  of  the  old  fire. 

When  the  Duke  of  Richmond  had  spoken, 
Chatham  rose.  For  some  time  his  voice  was 
inaudible.  At  length  his  tones  became  distinct 
and  his  action  animated.  Here  and  there  his 
hearers  caught  a  thought  or  an  expression 
which  reminded  them  of  William  Pitt.  But  it 
was  clear  that  he  was  not  himself.  He  lost  the 
thread  of  his  discourse,  hesitated,  repeated  the 
same  words  several  times,  and  was  so  confused, 
that  in  speaking  of  the  Act  of  Settlement  he 
could  not  recall  the  name  of  the  Electress  So 
phia.  The  House  listened  in  solemn  silence, 
and  with  the  aspect  of  profound  respect  and 
compassion.  The  stillness  was  so  deep  that 
the  dropping  of  a  handkerchief  would  have 
been  heard.  The  Duke  of  Richmond  replied 
with  great  tenderness  and  courtesy  ;  but,  while 
he  spoke,  the  old  man  was  observed  to  be  rest 
less  arid  irritable.  The  duke  sat  down.  Chat 
ham  stood  up  again,  pressed  his  hand  on  his 
breast,  and  sank  down  in  an  apoplectic  fit. 
Three  or  four  lords  who  sat  near  him  caught 
him  in  his  fall.  The  House  broke  up  in  con 
fusion.  The  dying  rnan  was  carried  to  the  re 
sidence  of  one  of  the  officers  of  Parliament, 
and  was  so  far  restored  as  to  be  able  to  bear  a 
journey  to  Hayes.  At  Hayes,  after  lingering 
a  few  weeks,  he  expired  in  his  seventieth  year. 
His  bed  was  watched  to  the  last,  with  anxious 
tenderness,  by  his  wife  and  children  ;  and  he 
well  deserved  their  care.  Too  often  haughty 
and  wayward  to  others,  to  them  he  had  been 
almost  effeminately  kind.  He  had  through  life 
been  dreaded  by  his  political  opponents,  and 
regarded  with  more  awe  than  love  even  by  his 
political  associates.  But  no  fear  seems  to  have 
mingled  with  the  affection  which  his  fondness, 
constantly  overflowing  in  a  thousand  endearing 
forms,  had  inspired  in  the  little  circle  at  Hayes. 

Chatham,  at  the  time  of  his  decease,  had  not, 
in  both  Houses  of  Parliament,  ten  personal  ad 
herents.  Half  the  public  men  of  the  age  had 
been  estranged  from  him  by  his  errors,  and  the 
other  half  by  the  exertions  which  he  had  made 
to  repair  his  errors.  His  last  speech  had  been 
an  attack  at  once  on  the  policy  pursued  by 
the  government,  and  on  the  policy  recommended 


by  the  opposition.  But  death  at  once  restored 
him  to  his  old  place  in  the  affection  of  his 
country.  Who  could  hear  unmoved  of  the 
fall  of  that  which  had  been  so  great,  and  which 
had  stood  so  long?  The  circumstances,  too, 
seemed  rather  to  belong  to  the  tragic  stage  than 
to  real  life.  A  great  statesman,  full  of  years 
and  honours,  led  forth  to  the  senate-house  by  a 
son  of  rare  hopes,  and  stricken  down  in  full 
council  while  straining  his  feeble  voice  to 
rouse  the  drooping  spirit  of  his  country,  could 
not  but  be  remembered  with  peculiar  venera 
tion  and  tenderness.  Detraction  was  overawed. 
The  voice  even  of  just  and  temperate  censure 
was  mute.  Nothing  was  remembered  but  the 
lofty  genius,  the  unsullied  probity,  the  undis 
puted  services,  of  him  who  was  no  more.  For 
once,  all  parties  were  agreed.  A  public  fu 
neral,  a  public  monument,  were  eagerly  voted. 
The  debts  of  the  deceased  were  paid.  A  pro 
vision  was  made  for  his  family.  The  city  of 
London  requested  that  the  remains  of  the  great 
man  whom  she  had  so  long  loved  and  honoured 
might  rest  under  the  dome  of  her  magnificent 
cathedral.  But  the  petition  came  too  late. 
Every  thing  was  already  prepared  for  the  in 
terment  in  Westminster  Abbey. 

Though  men  of  all  parties  had  concurred  in 
decreeing  posthumous  honours  to  Chatham, 
his  corpse  was  attended  to  the  grave  almost 
exclusively  by  opponents  of  the  government 
The  banner  of  the  lordship  of  Chatham  waa 
borne  by  Colonel  Barre,  attended  by  the  Duke 
of  Richmond  and  Lord  Rockingham.  Burke,  Sa- 
vile,  and  Dunning  upheld  the  pall.  LordCamden 
was  conspicuous  in  the  procession.  The  chief 
mourner  was  young  William  Pitt.  After  the 
lapse  of  more  than  twenty-seven  years,  in  a 
season  as  dark  and  perilous,  his  own  shattered 
frame  and  broken  heart  were  laid,  with  the 
same  pomp,  in  the  same  consecrated  mould. 

Chatham  sleeps  near  the  northern  door  of 
the  church,  in  a  spot  which  has  ever  since 
been  appropriated  to  statesmen,  as  the  other 
end  of  the  same  transept  has  long  been  to 
poets.  Mansfield  rests  there,  and  the  second 
William  Pitt,  and  Fox,  and  Grattan,  and  Can 
ning,  and  Wilberforce.  In  no  other  Cemetery 
do  so  many  great  citizens  lie  within  so  nar 
row  a  space.  High  over  those  venerable  graves 
towers  the  stately  monument  of  Chatham,  and 
from  above,  his  own  effigy,  graven  by  a  cun 
ning  hand,  seems  still,  with  eagle  face  and 
outstretched  arm,  to  bid  England  be  of  good 
cheer,  and  to  hurl  defiance  at  her  foes.  The 
generation  which  reared  that  memorial  of  him 
has  disappeared.  The  time  has  come  when 
the  rash  and  indiscriminate  judgments  which 
his  contemporaries  passed  on  his  character 
maybe  calmly  revised  by  history.  And  history 
while,  for  the  warning  of  vehement,  high,  and 
daring  natures,  she  notes  his  many  errors,  will 
yet  deliberately  pronounce,  that,  among  the 
eminent  men  whose  bones  lie  near  his,  scarcely 
one  has  left  a  more  stainless,  and  none  a  mof* 
splendid  name. 


740 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


SPEECH 

ON  HIS  INSTALLATION  AS  LORD  RECTOR  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  GLASGOW. 

[MARCH  21,  1849.] 


MY  first  duty,  gentlemen,  is  to  return  you 
my  thanks  for  the  high  honour  you  have  con 
ferred  on  me.  That  honour,  as  you  well  know, 
was  wholly  unsolicited,  and  I  can  assure  you 
it  was  wholly  unexpected.  I  may  add,  that 
if  I  had  been  invited  to  become  a  candidate  for 
your  suffrages,  I  should  have  respectfully  de 
clined  the  invitation.  My  predecessor,  whom 
I  am  so  happy  as  to  be  able  to  call  my  friend — 
declared  from  this  place  last  year,  in  language 
which  well  became  him,  that  he  would  not  have 
come  forward  to  displace  so  eminent  a  states 
man  as  Lord  John  Russel.  I  can  with  equal 
truth  declare  that  I  would  not  have  come  for 
ward  to  displace  so  estimable  a  gentleman  and 
so  accomplished  a  man  as  Colonel  Mure.  But 
he  felt  last  year  that  it  was  not  for  him,  and  I 
feel  this  year  that  it  is  not  for  me,  to  question 
the  propriety  of  your  decision,  in  a  point  on 
which,  by  the  constitution  of  your  body,  you 
are  the  sole  judges.  I  therefore  accept  with 
thankfulness  the  office  to  which  I  am  called, 
fully  purposing  to  use  whatever  powers  belong 
to  it  with  the  single  view  of  the  promotion  of 
the  credit  and  the  welfare  of  this  university. 

I  am  not  using  a  mere  phrase,  of  course, 
when  I  say  that  the  feelings  with  which  I  bear 
a  part  in  the  ceremony  of  this  day,  are  such 
as  I  find  it  difficult  to  utter  in  words.  I  do  not 
think  it  strange,  that  when  that  great  master 
of  eloquence,  Edmund  Burke,  stood  where  I 
now  stand,  he  faltered  and  remained  mute. 
Doubtless  the  multitude  of  thoughts  which 
rushed  into  his  mind  were  such  as  even  he 
could  not  easily  arrange  or  express.  In  truth, 
there  are  few  spectacles  more  striking  or  affect 
ing,  than  that  which  a  great  historical  place 
of  education  presents  on  a  solemn  public  day. 

There  is  something  strangely  interesting  in 
the  contrast  between  the  venerable  antiquity 
of  the  body  and  the  fresh  and  ardent  youth  of 
the  great  majority  of  the  members.  Recollec 
tions  and  hopes  crowd  upon  us  together.  The 
past  and  the  future  are  at  once  brought  close 
to  us.  Our  thoughts  wander  back  to  the  time 
when  the  foundations  of  this  ancient  building 
were  laid,  and  forward  to  the  time  when  those 
whom  it  is  our  office  to  guide  and  to  teach  will 
be  the  guides  and  teachers  of  our  posterity. 
On  the  present  occasion  we  may,  with  peculiar 
propriety,  give  such  thoughts  their  course. 
For  it  has  chanced  that  my  magistracy  has 
fallen  in  a  great  secular  epoch.  This  is  the 
four  hundredth  year  of  the  existence  of  your 
university.  At  such  jubilees  as  these — jubilees 
of  which  no  individual  sees  more  than  one — it 
w  natural,  it  is  good,  that  a  society  like  this — 
a  society  which  survives  all  the  transitory  parts 
vf  which  it  ia  composed — a  society  which  has 


a  corporate  existence  and  a  perpetual  succes 
sion,  should  review  its  annals,  should  retracf 
the  stages  of  its  growth,  from  infancy  to  ma 
turity,  and  should  try  to  find  in  the  experience 
of  generations  which  have  passed  away,  lessonj 
which  may  be  profitable  to  generations  yet  un 
born.  The  retrospect  is  full  of  interest  and 
instruction. 

Perhaps  it  may  be  doubted  whether,  sine* 
the  Christian  era,  there  has  been  any  point  of 
time  more  important  to  the  highest  interests 
of  mankind,  than  that  at  which  the  existence 
of  your  university  commenced.  It  was  tho 
moment  of  a  great  destruction  and  of  a  great 
creation.  Your  society  was  instituted  just 
before  the  empire  of  the  east  perished — that 
strange  empire,  which,  dragging  on  a  languid 
life  through  the  great  age  of  darkness,  con 
nected  together  the  two  great  ages  of  light — • 
that  empire  which,  adding  nothing  to  our  stores 
of  knowledge,  and  producing  not  one  man  great 
in  letters,  in  science,  or  in  art,  yet  preserved, 
in  the  midst  of  barbarism,  those  master-pieces 
of  Attic  genius  which  the  highest  minds  still 
contemplate,  and  long  will  contemplate,  with 
admiring  despair;  and,  at  that  very  time, 
while  the  fanatical  Moslem  were  plundering  the 
churches  and  palaces  of  Constantinople,  break 
ing  in  pieces  Grecian  sculpture,  and  giving  to 
the  flames  piles  of  Grecian  eloquence,  a  few 
humble  German  artisans,  who  little  knew  that 
they  were  calling  into  existence  a  power  far 
mightier  than  that  of  the  victorious  sultan, 
were  busied  in  cutting  and  setting  the  first 
types.  The  University  came  into  existence  just 
in  time  to  see  the  last  trace  of  the  Roman 
empire  disappear,  and  to  see  the  earliest  printed 
book. 

At  this  conjuncture — a  conjuncture  of  un 
rivalled  interest  in  the  history  of  letters — a 
man  never  to  be  mentioned  without  reverence 
by  every  lover  of  letters,  held  the  highest 
place  in  Europe.  Our  just  attachment  to  that 
Protestant  faith  to  which  our  country  owes  so 
much,  must  not  prevent  us  from  paying  the 
tribute  which,  on  this  occasion  arid  in  this 
place,  justice  and  gratitude  demand  to  the 
founder  of  the  University  of  Glasgow,  the 
greatest  of  the  revivers  of  learning,  Pope 
Nicholas  the  Fifth.  He  had  sprung  from  the 
common  people ;  but  his  abilities  and  his  eru 
dition  had  early  attracted  the  notice  of  the 
great.  He  had  studied  much  and  travelled  far. 
He  had  visited  Great  Britain,  which,  in  wealth 
and  refinement,  was  to  his  native  Tuscany  what 
the  back  settlements  of  American  now  are  to 
Britain.  He  had  lived  with  the  merchant 
princes  of  Florence,  those  men  who  first  en 
nobled  trade  by  making  trade  the  ally  of  phi" 


INSTALLATION  SPEECH. 


741 


losophy,  of  eloquence,  and  of  taste.  It  was 
he  who,  under  the  protection  of  the  munificent 
and  discerning  Cosmo,  arrayed  the  first  public 
library  that  modern  Europe  possessed.  From 
privacy  your  founder  rose  to  a  throne ;  but  on 
the  throne  he  never  forgot  the  studies  which 
had  been  his  delight  in  privacy.  He  was  the 
centre  of  an  illustrious  group,  composed  partly 
of  the  last  great  scholars  of  Greece,  and  partly 
of  the  first  great  scholars  of  Italy,  Theodore 
Gaza  and  George  of  Trebizond,  Bessarin  and 
Tilelfo,  Marsilio  Ficino  and  Poggio  Bracciolini. 
By  him  was  founded  the  Vatican  library,  then 
and  long  after  the  most  precious  and  the  most 
extensive  collection  of  books  in  the  world.  By 
him  were  carefully  preserved  the  most  valuable 
intellectual  treasures  which  had  been  snatched 
from  the  wreck  of  the  Byzantine  empire.  His 
agents  were  to  be  found  everywhere — in  the 
bazaars  of  the  farthest  East,  in  the  monasteries 
of  the  farthest  West — purchasing  or  copying 
worm-eaten  parchments,  on  which  were  traced 
words  worthy  of  immortality.  Under  his  pa 
tronage  were  prepared  accurate  Latin  versions 
of  many  precious  remains  of  Greek  poets  and 
philosophers.  But  no  department  of  literature 
owes  so  much  to  him  as  history.  By  him  were 
introduced  to  the  knowledge  of  Western  Europe, 
two  great  and  unrivalled  models  of  historical 
composition,  the  work  of  Herodotus  and  the 
work  of  Thucydides.  By  him,  too,  our  ances 
tors  were  first  made  acquainted  with  the  grace 
ful  and  lucid  simplicity  of  Xenophon,  and  with 
the  manly  good  sense  of  Polybius. 

It  was  while  he  was  occupied  with  cares  like 
these  that  his  attention  was  called  to  the  intel 
lectual  wants  of  this  region — a  region  new 
gwarming  with  population,  rich  with  culture, 
and  resounding  with  the  clang  of  machinery — 
a  region  which  now  sends  forth  fleets  laden 
with  its  admirable  fabrics  to  lands  of  which, 
in  his  days,  no  geographer  had  ever  heard — 
then  a  wild,  a  poor,  a  half-barbarous  tract, 
lying  in  the  utmost  verge  of  the  known  world. 
He  gave  his  sanction  to  the  plan  of  establishing 
a  University  at  Glasgow,  and  bestowed  on  the 
new  seat  of  learning  all  the  privileges  which 
belonged  to  the  University  of  Bologna.  I  can 
conceive  that  a  pitying  smile  passed  over  his 
face  as  he  named  Bologna  and  Glasgow  together. 
At  Bologna  he  had  long  studied.  No  spot  in  the 
world  has  been  more  favoured  by  nature  or  by 
art.  The  surrounding  country  was  a  fruitful 
and  sunny  country,  a  country  of  corn-fields  and 
vineyards.  In  the  city  the  house  of  Beritivoglio 
bore  rule — a  house  which  vied  with  the  Medici 
in  taste  and  magnificence — which  has  left  to 
posterity  noble  palaces  and  temples,  and  which 
gave  a  splendid  patronage  to  arts  and  sciences. 

Glasgow  he  knew  to  be  a  poor,  a  small,  a 
rude  town,  and,  as  he  would  have  thought,  not 
likely  ever  to  be  otherwise  ;  for  the  soil,  com 
pared  with  the  rich  country  at  the  foot  of  the 
Apennines,  was  barren,  and  the  climate  was 
such  that  an  Italian  shuddered  at  the  thought 
of  it.  But  it  is  not  on  the  fertility  of  the  soil — 
it  is  not  on  the  mildness  of  the  atmosphere  that 
the  prosperity  of  nations  chiefly  depends. 
Slavery  and  superstition  can  make  Campania  a 
land  of  beggars,  and  can  change  the  plain  of 
Enna  into  a  desert.  Nor  is  it  beyond  the  power 
of  human  intelligence  and  energy,  developed 


by  civil  and  spiritual  freedom,  to  turn  sterile 
rocks  and  pestilental  marshes  into  cities  and 
gardens.  Enlightened  as  your  founder  was, 
he  little  knew  that  he  was  himself  a  chief  agent 
in  a  great  revolution — physical  and  moral,  po 
litical  and  religious — in  a  revolution  destined 
to  make  the  last  first,  and  the  first  last — in  a 
revolution  destined  to  invert  the  relative  posi 
tions  of  Glasgow  and  Bologna.  We  cannot,  I 
think,  better  employ  a  few  minutes  than  in  re 
viewing  the  stages  of  this  great  change  in 
human  affairs.  The  review  shall  be  short. 
Indeed,  I  cannot  do  better  than  pass  rapidly 
from  century  to  century.  Look  at  the  world, 
then,  a  hundred  years  after  the  seal  of  Nicholas 
had  been  affixed  to  the  instrument  which  called 
your  college  into  existence.  We  find  Europe — 
we  find  Scotland  especially,  in  the  agonies  of 
that  great  revolution  which  we  emphatically 
call  the  Reformation. 

The  liberal  patronage  which  Nicholas,  and 
men  like  Nicholas,  had  given  to  learning,  and 
of  which  the  establishment  of  this  seat  of 
learning  is  not  the  least  remarkable  instance, 
had  produced  an  effect  which  they  had  never 
contemplated.  Ignorance  was  the  talisman  on 
which  their  power  depended,  and  that  talisman 
they  had  themselves  broken.  They  had  called 
in  knowledge  as  a  handmaid  to  decorate  su 
perstition,  and  their  error  produced  its  natural 
effect.  I  need  not  tell  you  what  a  part  the 
votaries  of  classical  learning,  and  especially 
of  Greek  learning,  the  Humanists,  as  they  were 
then  called,  bore  in  the  great  movement  against 
spiritual  tyranny.  In  the  Scotch  University, 
I  need  hardly  mention  the  names  of  Knox,  of 
Buchanan,  of  Melville,  of  Maitland,  of  Lething- 
ton.  They  formed,  in  fact,  the  vau°*ard  of 
that  movement.  Every  one  of  the  chief  re 
formers — I  do  not  at  this  moment  remember  a 
single  exception — was  a  Humanist.  Every 
eminent  Humanist  in  the  north  of  Europe  was, 
according  to  the  measure  of  his  uprightness 
and  courage,  a  reformer.  In  truth,  mind^ 
daily  nourished  with  the  best  literature  of 
Greece  and  Rome,  necessarily  grew  too  strong 
to  be  trammelled  by  the  cobwebs  of  the  scho 
lastic  divinity ;  and  the  influence  of  such  minds 
was  now  rapidly  felt  by  the  whole  community; 
for  the  invention  of  printing  had  brought 
books  within  the  reach  even  of  yeomen  and 
of  artisans. 

From  the  Mediterranean  to  the  Frozen  Sea, 
therefore,  the  public  mind  was  everywhere  in 
a  ferment,  and  nowhere  was  the  ferment  greater 
than  in  Scotland.  It  was  in  the  midst  of  mar 
tyrdoms  and  proscriptions,  in  the  midst  of  a 
war  between  power  and  truth,  that  the  first 
century  of  the  existence  of  your  University 
closed.  Pass  another  hundred  years,  and  we 
are  in  the  midst  of  another  revolution.  The 
war  between  Popery  and  Protestantism  had,  in 
this  island,  been  terminated  by  the  victory  of 
Protestantism.  But  from  that  war  another 
war  had  sprung — the  war  between  Prelacy  and 
Puritanism.  The  hostile  religious  sects  were 
allied,  intermingled,  confounded  with  hostile 
political  parties.  The  monarchical  element  of 
the  constitution  was  an  object  of  almost  ex 
clusive  devotion  to  the  prelatist.  The  popular 
element  of  the  constitution  was  especially  dear 
to  the  Puritan.  At  length  an  appeal  was  made 


7-12 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


the  sword.  Puritanism  triumphed;  but 
I  uritanism  was  already  divided  against  itself. 
Independency  and  republicanism  were  on  one 
side,  presbyterianism  and  limited  monarchy  on 
the  other.  It  was  in  the  very  darkest  part  of 
that  dark  time — it  was  in  the  midst  of  battles, 
sieges,  and  executions — it  was  when  the  whole 
world  was  still  aghast  at  the  awful  spectacle 
of  a  British  king  standing  before  a  judgment 
seat,  and  laying  his  neck  on  a  block — it  was 
when  the  mangled  remains  of  the  Duke  of 
Hamilton  had  just  been  laid  in  the  tomb  of  his 
house — it  was  when  the  head  of  the  Marquis 
of  Montrose  had  just  been  fixed  on  the  Tolbooth 
of  Edinburgh,  that  your  University  completed 
her  second  century! 

A  hundred  years  more,  and  we  have  at 
length  reached  the  beginning  of  a  happier  pe 
riod.  Our  civil  and  religious  liberties  had, 
indeed,  been  bought  with  a  fearful  price.  But 
they  had  been  bought.  The  price  had  been 
paid.  The  last  battle  had  been  fought  on 
British  ground.  The  last  black  scaffold  had 
been  set  up  on  Tower  Hill.  The  evil  days  were 
over.  A  bright  and  tranquil  century — a  cen 
tury  of  religious  toleration,  of  domestic  peace, 
of  temperate  freedom,  of  equal  justice — was 
beginning.  That  century  is  now  closing.  When 
we  compare  it  with  any  equally  long  period  in 
the  history  of  any  other  great  society,  we  shall 
find  abundant  cause  for  thankfulness  to  the 
Giver  of  all  Good ;  nor  is  there  any  place  in 
the  whole  kingdom  better  fitted  to  excite  this 
feeling  than  the  place  where  we  are  now  as 
sembled.  For  in  the  whole  kingdom  we  shall 
find  no  district  in  which  the  progress  of  trade, 
of  manufactures,  of  wealth,  and  of  the  arts 
of  life,  has  been  more  rapid  than  in  Clydesdale. 
Your  university  has  partaken  largely  of  the 
prosperity  of  this  city  and  of  the  surroiinding 
region. 

The  security,  the  tranquillity,  the  liberty, 
which  have  been  propitious  to  the  industry  of 
the  merchant  and  of  the  manufacturer,  have 
been  also  propitious  to  the  industry  of  the 
scholar.  To  the  last  century  belong  most  of 
the  names  of  which  you  justly  boast.  The  time 
would  fail  me  if  I  attempted  to  do  justice  to 
the  memory  of  all  the  illustrious  men,  who, 
during  that  period,  taught  or  learned  wisdom, 
within  these  ancient  walls — geometricians,  ana 
tomists,  jurists,  philologists,  metaphysicians, 
poets — Simpson  and  Hunter,  Miller  and  Young, 
Reid  and  Stewart ;  Campbell — whose  coffin  was 
lately  borne  to  a  grave  in  that  renowned  transept 
which  contains  the  dust  of  Chaucer,  of  Spencer, 
and  of  Dryden ;  Black,  whose  discoveries  form 
an  era  in  the  history  of  chemical  science  ; 
Adam  Smith,  the  greatest  of  all  the  masters  of 
political  science ;  James  Watt,  who  perhaps 
did  more  than  any  single  man  has  done  since 
the  new  Atlantis  of  Bacon  was  written,  to  ac 
complish  the  glorious  prophecy. 

We  now  speak  the  language  of  humility  when 
we  say  that  the  University  of  Glasgow  need  not 
fear  a  comparison  with  the  University  of  Bo 
logna.  Another  secular  period  is  now  about 
to  commence.  There  is  no  lack  of  alarmists, 
vho  will  tell  you  that  it  is  about  to  commence 


under  evil  auspices.  But  from  me  yoTi  must 
expect  no  such  gloomy  prognostications.  I  am 
too  much  used  to  them  to  be  scared  by  them. 
Ever  since  I  began  to  make  observations  on  the 
state  of  my  country,  I  have  been  seeing  nothing 
but  growth,  and  I  have  been  hearing  of  nothing 
but  decay.  The  more  I  contemplate  our  noble 
institutions,  the  more  convinced  I  am  that  they 
are  sound  at  heart,  that  they  have  nothing  of 
age  but  its  dignity,  and  that  their  strength  is 
still  the  strength  of  youth.  The  hurricane 
which  has  recently  overthrown  so  much  that 
was  great  and  that  seemed  durable,  has  only 
proved  their  solidity.  They  still  stand,  august 
and  immovable,  while  dynasties  and  churches 
are  lying  in  heaps  of  ruin  all  around  us.  I  see 
no  reason  to  doubt  that,  by  the  blessing  of  God 
on  a  wise  and  temperate  policy,  on  a  policy  in 
which  the  principle  is  to  preserve  what  is  good 
by  reforming  in  time  what  is  evil,  our  civil 
institutions  may  be  preserved  unimpaired  to  a 
late  posterity,  and  that,  under  the  shade  of  our 
civil  institutions,  our  academical  institutions 
may  long  continue  to  flourish. 

I  trust,  therefore,  that  when  a  hundred  years 
more  have  run  out,  this  ancient  college  will  still 
continue  to  deserve  well  of  our  country  and  of 
mankind.  I  trust  that  the  installation  of  1949 
will  be  attended  by  a  still  greater  assembly  of 
students  than  I  have  the  happiness  now  to  see 
before  me.  The  assemblage  indeed  may  not 
meet  in  the  place  where  we  have  met.  These 
venerable  halls  may  have  disappeared.  My 
successor  may  speak  to  your  successors  in  a 
more  stately  edifice,  in  an  edifice  which,  even 
among  the  magnificent  buildings  of  the  future 
Glasgow,  will  still  be  admired  as  a  fine  specimen, 
of  architecture  which  flourished  in  the  days 
of  the  good  Queen  Victoria.  But  though  the 
site  and  the  walls  may  be  new,  the  spirit  of  the 
institution  will,  I  hope,  be  still  the  same.  My 
successor  will,  I  hope,  be  able  to  boast  that  the 
fifth  century  of  the  University  has  been  even 
more  glorious  than  the  fourth.  He  will  be  able 
to  vindicate  that  boast,  by  citing  a  long  list  of 
eminent  men,  great  masters  of  experimental 
science,  of  ancient  learning,  of  our  native  elo 
quence,  ornaments  of  the  senate,  the  pulpit,  and 
the  bar. 

He  will,  I  hope,  mention  with  high  honour 
some  of  my  young  friends  who  now  hear  me  ; 
and  he  will,  I  also  hope,  be  able  to  add  that 
their  talents  and  learning  were  not  wasted  on 
selfish  or  ignoble  objects,  but  were  employed  to 
promote  the  physical  and  moral  good  of  their 
species,  to  extend  the  empire  of  man  over  the 
material  world,  to  defend  the  cause  of  civil  and 
religious  liberty  against  tyrants  and  bigots,  and 
to  defend  the  cause  of  virtue  and  order  against 
the  enemies  of  all  divine  and  human  laws.  I 
have  now  given  utterance  to  a  part,  and  a  part 
only  of  the  recollections  and  anticipations  of 
which  on  this  solemn  occasion  my  mind  is  full. 
I  again  thank  you  for  the  honour  which  you 
have  bestowed  on  me ;  and  I  assure  you  that 
while  I  live  I  shall  never  cease  to  take  a  deep 
interest  in  the  welfare  and  fame  of  the  body 
with  which,  by  your  kindness,  I  have  this  day 
become  connected. 


SPEECH  ON  RETIRING  FROM  POLITICAL  LIFE. 


743 


SPEECH 


ON  RETIRING  FROM  POLITICAL  LIFE. 

[MARCH  22,  1849.] 


I  THANK  you,  my  Lord  Provost — gentlemen,  I 
thank  you  from  my  heart  for  this  great  honour.* 
I  may,  I  hope,  extend  my  thanks  further — ex 
tend  them  to  that  constituent  body,  of  which 
I  believe  you  are,  upon  this  occasion,  the  ex 
positors — and  which  has  received  me  here  in  a 
manner  which  has  made  an  impression  never  to 
be  effaced  from  my  mind.  [Alluding  to  the  box 
containing  the  document,  verifying  his  admis 
sion  as  a  freeman,  he  continued:]  That  box, 
my  lord,  I  shall  prize  as  long  as  I  live,  and 
when  I  am  gone,  it  will  be  appreciated  by  those 
who  are  dearest  to  me,  as  a  proof  that,  in  the 
course  of  an  active  and  chequered  life,  both 
political  and  literary,  I  succeeded  in  gaining 
the  esteem  and  good  will  of  the  people  of  one 
of  the  greatest  and  most  enlightened  cities  in 
the  British  empire.  My  political  life,  my  lord, 
has  closed.  The  feelings  which  contention  and 
rivalry  naturally  called  forth,  and  from  which 
I  do  not  pretend  to  have  been  exempted,  have 
had  time  to  cool  down.  I  can  look  now  ivpon 
the  events  in  which  I  bore  a  part,  as  calmly,  I 
think,  as  on  the  events  of  the  past  century.  I 
can  do  that  justice  now  to  honourable  opponents 
which  perhaps  in  moments  of  conflict  I  might 
have  refused  to  them. 

I  believe  I  can  judge  as  impartially  of  my 
own  career,  as  I  can  judge  of  the  career  of  an 
other  man.  I  acknowledge  great  errors  and 
deficiencies,  but  I  have  nothing  to  acknowledge 
inconsistent  with  rectitude  of  intention  and  in 
dependence  of  spirit.  My  conscience  bears  me 
this  testimony,  that  I  have  honestly  desired  the 
happiness,  the  prosperity,  and  the  greatness 
of  my  country ;  that  my  course,  right  or  wrong, 
was  never  determined  by  any  selfish  or  sordid 
motive,  and  that,  in  troubled  times  and  through 
many  vicissitudes  of  fortune,  in  power  and  out 
of  power,  through  popularity  and  unpopularity, 
1  have  been  faithful  to  one  set  of  opinions,  and 
to  one  set  of  friends.  I  see  no  reason  to  doubt 
that  these  friends  were  well  chosen,  or  that 
these  opinions  were  in  the  main  correct. 

The  path  of  duty  appeared  to  me  to  be 
between  two  dangerous  extremes — extremes 
which  I  shall  call  equally  dangerous,  seeing 
that  each  of  them  inevitably  conducts  society 
to  the  other.  I  cannot  accuse  myself  of  having 
ever  deviated  far  towards  either.  I  cannot 
accuse  myself  of  having  ever  been  untrue, 
either  to  the  catise  of  civil  or  religious  liberty, 
or  to  the  caiise  of  property  and  law.  I  reflect 
with  pleasure  that  I  bore  a  part  in  some  of  those 
reforms  which  corrected  great  abuses,  and  re 
moved  just  discontents.  I  reflect  with  equal 
pleasure,  that  I  never  stooped  to  the  part  of  a 


*  Tlie  tender  of  the  freedom  of  the  city  of  Glasgow. 


demagogue,  and  never  feared  to  confront  what 
seemed  to  me  to  be  an  unreasonable  clamour. 
I  never  in  time  of  distress  incited  my  country 
men  to  demand  of  any  government,  to  which  I 
was  opposed,  miracles — that  which  I  well  knew 
no  government  could  perform ;  nor  did  I  seek 
even  the  redress  of  grievances,  which  it  was 
the  duty  of  a  government  to  redress,  by  any 
other  than  strictly  peaceful  and  legal  means. 

Such  were  the  principles  upon  which  I  acted, 
and  such  would  have  been  my  principles  still. 
The  events  which  have  lately  changed  the  face 
of  Europe,  have  only  confirmed  my  views  of 
what  public  duty  requires.  These  events  are 
full  of  important  lessons,  both  to  the  governors 
and  the  governed  ;  and  he  learns  only  half  the 
lesson  they  ought  to  teach,  who  sees  in  them 
only  a  warning  against  tyranny  on  the  one 
hand,  and  anarchy  on  the  other.  The  great 
lesson  which  these  events  teach  us  is  that  ty 
ranny  and  anarchy  are  inseparably  connected ; 
that  each  is  the  parent,  and  each  is  the  offspring 
of  the  other.  The  lesson  which  they  teach  is 
this — that  old  institutions  have  no  more  deadly 
enemy  than  the  bigot  who  refuses  to  adjust 
them  to  a  new  state  of  society ;  nor  do  they 
teach  us  less  clearly  this  lesson,  that  the  sove 
reignty  of  the  mob  leads  by  no  long  or  circuit 
ous  path  to  the  sovereignty  of  the  sword.  I 
bless  God  that  my  country  has  escaped  both 
these  errors. 

Those  statemen  who,  eighteen  years  before, 
proposed  to  transfer  to  this  great  city  and  to 
cities  like  this,  a  political  power  which  but 
belonged  to  hamlets  which  contained  only  a 
few  scores  of  inhabitants,  or  to  old  walls  with 
no  inhabitants  at  all — these  statesmen,  and  I 
may  include  myself  among  them,  were  then 
called  anarchists  and  revolutionists ,  but  let 
those  who  so  called  us,  now  say  whether  we  are 
not  the  true  and  the  far-sighted  friends  of 
order?  Let  those  who  so  called  us,  now  say 
how  would  they  have  wished  to  encounter  the 
tempest  of  the  last  spring  with  the  abuses  of 
Old  Sarum  and  Gatton  to  defend — with  Glasgow 
only  represented  in  name,  and  Manchester  and 
Leeds  not  even  in  name.  We  then  were  not 
only  the  true  friends  of  liberty,  but  the  true 
friends  of  order;  and  in  the  same  manner  aided 
by  all  the  vigorous  exertions  by  which  the  go 
vernment  (aided  by  patriotic  magistrates  and 
honest  men)  put  down,  a  year  ago,  those  ma 
rauders  who  wished  to  subvert  all  society — 
these  exertions,  I  say,  were  of  inestimable  ser 
vice,  not  only  to  the  cause  of  order,  but  also 
to  the  cause  of  true  liberty. 

But  I  am  now  speaking  the  sentiments  of  » 
private  man.  I  have  quitted  politics — I  quitted 
them  without  one  feeling  of  resentment,  with 


744 


MACAULAY'S  MISCELLANEOUS  WRITINGS. 


out  one  feeling  of  regret,  and  betook  myself  to 
pursuits  for  which  my  temper  and  my  tastes,  I 
believe,  fitted  me  better.  I  would  not  willingly 
believe  that  in  ceasing  to  be  a  politician  I  re 
linquish  altogether  the  power  of  rendering  any 
service  to  my  country.  I  hope  it  may  still  be 
in  my  power  to  teach  lessons  which  may  be 
profitable  to  those  who  still  remain  on  the  busy 
stage  which  I  have  left.  I  hope  that  it  may 
still  be  in  my  power  so  faithfully,  without  fear 
or  malignity,  to  represent  the  merits  and  faults 
of  hostile  sects  and  factions,  as  to  teach  a  com 
mon  lesson  of  charity  to  all.  I  hope  it  will  be 
in  my  power  to  inspire,  at  least,  some  of  my 
countrymen  with  love  and  reverence  for  those 
free  and  noble  institutions  to  which  Britain 


owes  her  greatness,   and  from  which,  I  trust, 
she  is  not  destined  soon  to  descend. 

I  shall  now,  encouraged  by  your  approbation, 
resume,  with  alacrity,  a  task,  under  the  mag 
nitude  and  importance  of  which  I  have  some 
times  felt  my  mind  ready  to  sink.  I  thank  you 
again,  most  cordially,  for  your  kindness,  I 
value,  as  it  deserves,  the  honour  of  being  en 
rolled  in  your  number.  I  have  seen  with  de 
light  and  with  pride,  the  extent,  the  grandeur, 
the  beauty,  and  the  opulence  of  this  noble 
city — a  city  which  I  may  now  call  mine.  With 
every  wish  for  the  prosperity,  the  peace,  and 
the  honour  of  our  fair  and  majestic  Glasgow,  I 
now  bid  you,  my  kind  friends  and  fellow-citi 
zens,  a  most  respectful  farewell. 


THE  END. 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN  INITIAL  FINE  OF  25  CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
WILL  INCREASE  TO  SO  CENTS  ON  THE  FOURTH 
DAY  AND  TO  $1.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


SF 


• 


0 


OCT26J966     9 


ECEIVEP 


'•"• 


REC'D  UD 


.: 


NOV      v< 


CT  2  9  1962 


LD  21-100m-12,'43  (8796s) 


^278045^52. 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  UBRARY 


Wm 
,^-j 


isiMi 

wiij  I! 


-. 


ujHvIiK  <i\mw\ 


:lliilli:::;  Ill!;iil3 1  ilil 


I  iifc^^'^ffi^ii  i 

Ki 

plpilil 

I  milfKin'&'i  i-i   M-ill!  )>t     II  Iliil! 


till 


iilil 


li 


